Fangio Has Some New Ideas for Dolphins Defense
Vic Fangio was out of the NFL in 2022 before his official two-week consultant job with the NFC champion Philadelphia Eagles, except the new Miami Dolphins defensive coordinator wasn't really away from football.
In his first public comments since the Dolphins officially hired him, Fangio told the team website he found a way to keep himself in the game even though he wasn't working with a team in any capacity.
"It was good time, I spent it well," Fangio told Dolphins.com. "I treated it like a college professor on a sabbatical. I had a full video setup of everything in the league, just as if I was a coach in somebody's office and studied a lot of different situations and facets of the game and it was very, very good for me and I've already come up with a new coverage or two that like I'm anxious to try out."
Fangio already had a great reputation for his coaching acumen based on his work with the San Francisco 49ers and Chicago Bears as defensive coordinator, earning NFL Assistant Coach of the Year with the latter in 2018.
But Fangio clearly has been long around enough to know that no matter how successful his defense has been — and the proof is that it has been imitated throughout the league — new wrinkles always are needed to stay ahead of the ever-evolving offenses.
"I guess imitation is the best form of flattery that or something like that, but I'd prefer it not being that way because offenses get used to attacking it," Fangio said. "And so we always have to adjust and come up with new things. But, yeah, I think it's good that teams have tried to copy (his defense) to some degree because they've seen it be successful,"
FANGIO'S THOUGHTS ON CURRENT DOLPHINS DEFENSIVE PLAYERS
One other key point from his interview was keeping an open mind on the players he will inherit on the Miami defense.
"I really like to have to wipe the slate clean," Fangio said. "I don't really like to watch too much of what they've done in the past. I like to get out there, work with them and form my own opinions without being influenced by what may have happened in the past.
"Obviously if we have a free agent that we're thinking about, signing that one of our current players whose contract is up and (GM Chris Grier) and management want my opinion, I'll look at him, but I like to give everybody a clean slate and form my own opinion."
Now a little less than a month away from the start of free agency, the Dolphins have 12 defensive players scheduled to become unrestricted free agents: DT John Jenkins, DT Justin Zimmer, edge defender Melvin Ingram, edge defender Trey Flowers, LB Andrew Van Ginkel, LB Duke Riley, LB Elandon Roberts, LB Sam Eguavoen, CB Nik Needham, CB Justin Bethel, S Eric Rowe and S Clayton Fejedelem.
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