*** DOLPHINS NEWS ***
Jan 14, 1998: -- News Update --
** JJ Makes No Decision Yet About Coaching Staff
JJ and his staff are visiting the Senior Bowl in Mobile
Alabama this week as rumors continue to fly about the future of the
Dolphins assistant coaching staff. As of right now, there have been
no changes in the coaching staff, but it looks as if JJ is waiting for
certain people to become available before he fires anyone.
JJ has said that no decisions will be made this week about the
future of the coaching staff, but changes are expected in the near
future.
Last week, offensive coordinator Gary Stevens came out and
said to the press that he had done a good job coaching this year, but
that he didn't have the personnel to get the job done. This directly
contradicts JJ's comments after the last game against New England that
the Dolphins should be doing better on offense with the personnel that
they have.
There was a rumor earlier in the week that the Bills might be
interested in hiring Gary Stevens as their offensive coordinator
should Miami dump him, but both new Bills head coach Wade Phillips and
Gary Stevens have denied this rumor this week.
Stevens, of course, is the assistant who is most likely to get
fired if JJ decides to clean house. JJ has already said that he wants
to completely change the offensive philosophy of the team and that
would seem to indicate that Stevens is on his way out. The current
speculation is that JJ wants Dallas offensive coordinator Ernie
Zampese, but Zampese is not available because he's still under
contract with Dallas.
For JJ to get Zampese, either Dallas must fire Zampese or JJ
must be able to offer him a supervisor title as a promotion to hire
him away from Dallas. However, Dallas doesn't look like it's going
to fire Zampese at least until they hire a new head coach. Right now,
Denver quarterbacks' coach Gary Kubiak is rumored to be the favorite,
but he won't be available until after the Super Bowl is over. That
means that Zampese will probably remain in Dallas until at least the
beginning of February.
It also appears that Miami will not be able to offer Zampese a
supervisor title to get him away from Dallas. It was originally
thought that if Miami fired offensive line coach Larry Beightol, they
would regain the rights to the supervisor titles that they gave him
when they hired him away from the Oilers. However, the NFL has
publicly stated that even if Miami fires Beightol, they don't regain
the use of the supervisor designation until next year when his
contract runs out, so Miami will probably not be able to sign Zampese
unless Dallas fires him.
The other rumors about Joe Bugel coming in to head the
Dolphins' offensive line appear to be premature. As of right now, the
Dolphins have not talked to Bugel about that position and it looks
like the Dolphins may retain Larry Beightol as their offensive line
coach.
Right now, however, we have only rumors to go on as far as the
coaching situation is concerned. There have been no decisions made
yet about the future of the coaching staff.
** Salary Cap to Go Up $10 million on TV Deals
As a result of the new television deals signed by the NFL, the
team salary cap is expected to go up about $10 million for the 1998
season over the current level of $42 million. This raise in the
salary cap will give the Dolphins about $13 million in available
salary to spend on free agents and draft picks this spring.
CBS will broadcast the AFC Sunday games this fall, having
stolen the rights away from NBC with their deal. ABC and Fox will
keep their current rights to Monday night football and the NFC
respectively and ESPN will gain exclusive rights to all Sunday night
games.
** Dolphins Target Free Agents
The Dolphins are targeting free agents this spring like they
target players for the draft, according to a story in today's Herald.
They have already put up a board in the training facility that lists
all the free agents available and are making background checks on each
of those players like they would for available players in the draft.
In fact, director of football operations Bob Ackles has said
that the Dolphins may sign some free agents on the first day of the
free agency signing period, which is February 13th.
Ackles acknowledges that the biggest need that the Dolphins
have is on the offensive line, which had no success providing the
Dolphins with a running game this year.
My Comments:
I think that JJ should just fire Stevens and get it over with.
That way, he can get on with the business of finding a new offensive
coordinator and be done with all the controversy. I just don't see
keeping Stevens in Miami, especially after he essentially referred to
his players as "chicken sh*t".
This is no place left for Gary Stevens in Miami any more.
The speculation on the salary cap is that the major increase
in available money actually hurts Miami because it allows teams that
were going to have problems to have more money available. I'm not so
sure, however, because Miami will be able to out-bid almost anyone for
a player that they really want. We'll see what happens fairly soon.
As far as the free agents are concerned, I think that it's a
good sign that the Dolphins are treating this more seriously than they
have in the past. Since JJ came to Miami, the free agents that
they've acquired have not always performed up to expectations and many
have been disappointments. Perhaps they'll do a better job this time
in picking up some impact players.
Related Info:
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Curt Fennell,
curt@phins.com, DOLFAN in New Rochelle (almost)
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