There will be a familiar — and for many Miami Dolphins fans, haunting — face back at Hard Rock Stadium Sunday: Former Dolphins head coach Joe Philbin returns to Miami Gardens for the first time since Stephen Ross fired him nine years ago last month.
Look for Philbin in silver and black on the visiting sidelines in the Dolphins’ Week 11 showdown with the Las Vegas Raiders, who last week put him in charge of their porous offensive line.
Miami Dolphins Welcome Back Joe Philbin
Philbin was part of Antonio Pierce’s midseason shakeup of the Raiders’ 29th-ranked offense. Pierce fired offensive coordinator Luke Getsy and offensive line coach James Cregg last week.
He replaced them with Scott Turner and Philbin, respectively. The Raiders also added Turner’s dad, Norv Turner, to their coaching staff as a senior advisor. The elder Turner briefly was the Raiders’ head coach two decades ago.
“Joe Philbin has been around this game a long time, coached some really good offensive lines, and been around some good offenses as well,” Pierce said. “And obviously, you got a gentleman who’s been a head coach, we talked about that prior. He’s been an offensive coordinator, and his forte is O-line play.”
That last point is debatable. During his three full seasons as Dolphins coach, Miami ranked in the top half of the league in yards per carry just once and was in the bottom half in sack rate all three years.
In 2013, the Dolphins allowed a sack roughly once every 10 pass attempts.
What’s more, the only thing most people really remember about the Dolphins’ offensive line during Philbin’s time in Miami was an historic embarrassment.
Dolphins’ Bullygate Scandal
The evidence that Philbin was overmatched as Dolphins head coach piled up not long after Stephen Ross picked him over Todd Bowles and Mike McCoy to replace Tony Sparano in 2012.
Hard Knocks featured the Dolphins his first year in Miami, and Philbin looked uncomfortable and out of touch under the microscope.
He wasn’t a natural and relatable leader, and that manifested itself in horrible ways in his second season.
The Dolphins in 2013 became a national storyline for all the wrong reasons.
The @Raiders bring on former Dolphins HC Joe Philbin as senior offensive assistant.
“We’re five as one. We act as one. You mess with one, you mess with all of us.”
Back in (2012-2015) Miami had a tough OL with @68INCOGNITO, Jake Long, and Mike Pouncey. pic.twitter.com/iTWqzOPVRa
— Mike Dixon (@MikeDixon_VST) February 20, 2024
Second-year tackle Jonathan Martin abandoned the team a month into the season, accusing teammates Richie Incognito, Mike Pouncey, and John Jerry of abusing him, both mentally and at times physically, during his short time with the Dolphins.
Incognito was the ringleader — and not long after Martin’s accusations became public — was suspended indefinitely. He wouldn’t play for the Dolphins again.
But the full story about what went on under Philbin’s watch wasn’t clear until the results of an independent investigation were made public.
A 144-page report by NFL investigator Ted Wells concluded that Martin was subjected on a near-daily basis to “a pattern of harassment” that included but was not limited to racial slurs, inappropriate touching, and sexual comments about family members.
Even Philbin’s own coaching staff was involved. There was a running “joke” that Martin was gay, and then-offensive line coach Jim Turner got into the act by giving Martin a male blowup doll for Christmas in 2012.
Joe Philbin’s Miami Dolphins Record
Turner was gone from Miami after the Wells Report, but remarkably, Philbin survived because investigators determined that he was not aware of the abuse.
“After interviewing Coach Philbin at length, we were impressed with his commitment to promoting integrity and accountability throughout the Dolphins organization — a point echoed by many players,” the report stated. “We are convinced that had Coach Philbin learned of the underlying misconduct, he would have intervened promptly to ensure that Martin and others were treated with dignity.”
Still, the impression throughout the league that Philbin wasn’t up for the job at that point became established fact.
So it surprised no one when things completely unraveled in early 2015. Philbin had lost the respect of his players, starting with Ndamukong Suh, who freelanced in games and at one point wore sneakers to a padded practice to protest Kevin Coyle’s scheme.
The breaking point was the team’s disastrous trip to London in Week 4.
In the leadup to the game, Philbin reportedly instructed backup defensive players to take it easy in practice on quarterback Ryan Tannehill, who at one point had grown so frustrated with his inability to complete passes on them that he made a comment about enjoying their “practice squad trophies.”
The bottom fell out that Sunday in a 27-14 loss to the New York Jets at Wembley Stadium.
The Dolphins have fired Joe Philbin. He was 24-28 since taking over as head coach in 2012.
(ESPN/Media Reports) pic.twitter.com/LCOeSuTxif— NFL on ESPN (@ESPNNFL) October 5, 2015
Ross fired Philbin the next day after three years without a playoff appearance and a 24-28 record.
“This was a tough decision for me to make knowing how tirelessly Joe worked in his four years here to make this a winning team,” Ross said at the time. “He is a man of the highest character and integrity that I developed a close personal relationship with.
“I am extremely disappointed with how we have started the season, but I feel confident that we can improve quickly with the talent we have on our roster.”
In the years since, Philbin has had stints with the Indianapolis Colts, Green Bay Packers, Dallas Cowboys, and Ohio State before agreeing to help Pierce with a Raiders team that has lost seven of its first nine games.