Was The Vic Fangio Move Too Late?
Photo Credit: Jeff Romance via USA TODAY Sports
It was impossible to question or criticize the Miami Dolphins when they hired defensive coordinator Vic Fangio. After all, they were getting a coach with a highly successful track record, which included building a system that has taken over the NFL over the last four seasons.
“Vic has been absolutely phenomenal for the players, coaches, and organization,” head coach Mike McDaniel said before the regular season. “It kind of fits exactly with what I saw from the beginning. I saw a lot of synergy [with] him and I, ironically. I think a lot of people are like, ‘Huh,’ when I say that, but the way we approach football, the way that our fundamental philosophies of how to teach accountability towards the player and then in the requisite, accountability necessary from players to do what we’re asking them to do, the commitment to absolutely the best fundamentals and technique that you yourself can really come up with over a lifetime of football. He’s delivered on that tenfold.”
But did the Dolphins get to the Fangio scheme too late?
The NFL is a game of adjustment. Coaches are too dedicated and too smart, and with the time they always find answers to the most difficult tasks. Vic Fangio’s two-high system came in vogue as an answer to the Sean McVay offense killing cover-3 looks, but after four years, teams apparently are figuring it out.
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Offenses in the current version of the NFL are extremely efficient, the bend-don’t-break philosophy doesn’t work as well as it did in the past. When coaches realized they had to dink and dunk, they found out it was a realistic solution for shell coverages. Sometimes, turnovers or drive-killing penalties will happen. But if not for that, this style of defense has not been able to force stops.
And, to be fair, it’s not just the Dolphins. Every defense with the same general defensive ideas have struggled through the first six weeks of the season.
Fangio-style defenses by DVOA:
Philadelphia Eagles (Sean Desai): 14th
Los Angeles Rams (Raheem Morris): 19th
Green Bay Packers (Joe Barry): 21st
Los Angeles Chargers (Brandon Staley): 25th
Miami Dolphins (Vic Fangio): 27th
Carolina Panthers (Ejiro Evero): 30th
For the Dolphins, there’s also a personnel problem. It can be solved over time, but it’s not great news for the 2023 season. The defensive roster was adapted and built to a totally different scheme, a man-heavy, blitz-heavy system run by Brian Flores and Josh Boyer.
Under Boyer as the defensive coordinator, between 2020 and 2022, the Dolphins defense was 11th in EPA/play, 12th in success rate, eighth in dropback EPA, and 17th in rush EPA. Those are not world-beaters, but are solid numbers — and would be more than enough considering how explosive the offense has been. Through six weeks this season under Fangio, the Dolphins are 23rd in EPA/play, 28th in success rate, 15th in dropback EPA, and 25th in rush EPA.
The Dolphins are still 5-1, so there’s not much to complain about. But they started losing 14-0 to the Carolina Panthers, and while they were still able to win, it’s hard to project the same success against stronger teams. Miami is a real contender, so they have to look at the big picture, not just the current standings. Against the Buffalo Bills, a fellow AFC contender, the offense was being forced to score on every drive to keep up the pace. But it wasn’t realistic against a stronger defense, and that’s why they lost.
The expectation is that things will get better when Jalen Ramsey is back. For a coverage-based style of defense, an elite cornerback might make a real difference — the team is tied for last in interceptions, for example, and the lack of aggressiveness has had a cost. That would allow Kader Kohou to be in the slot all the time, and Eli Apple would go back to the bench.
However, the style of defense is a broader issue. If Fangio can’t adjust to what the new NFL trend is, a soft style of defensive football may become costly and put in danger a season that has the potential to be special with such a great offensive production scheme-wise, with Mike McDaniel, and on the field with Tua Tagovailoa and Tyreek Hill.
Vic Fangio created a football revolution over the past half decade. But when it was time for the Dolphins to take advantage of the new era, it might be too late. It’s time to adapt again.
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