Brian Daboll: Another Perspective

I wanted to offer a different perspective on Brian Daboll that I've been pondering since I heard about the hire.

I have to admit, when I heard his name pop up in the beginning, I was just as skeptical as most. Afterall, Miami had a horrible offense statistically. How could this possibly be considered a "good hire"?

I think this hire makes sense from a variety of standpoints. He seems to run a hybrid / adaptable offense that doesn't limit itself by terminology, and forms it's identity around it's personelle. Is it west coast? Is it the EP system that we've been talking about for the last three years? I don't know. And if I had to guess that will change over the course of his coordination depending on what pieces we have to offer, and what our opponent is doing defensively (afterall, we are a game-plan team).

The Kansas City Chiefs have chosen the course of building their team almost exclusively through the draft. Free agent hires are almost strictly considered supplemental, and can rarely be "counted on." This approach is used by the team that our owner has chosen to model the organization after, the Pittsburgh Steelers. The Steelers have possibly been the best drafting team of the last decade and have become the face of this approach in my opinion (not to take away from some of the better drafting teams like BAL & PHI)

Part of the reason this approach works for them is because of their stout coaching staff. Their staff is notorious for being able to find a balance between their draft picks, and their scheme. This is incredibly important for them because of another reason that Clark Hunt has chosen them as our standard: They are very efficient monetarily. They receive value from their players in the form of production, that production supplies wins, and ultimately renders fan excitement. The fans drop the money back into the organization and kick start the entire process all over again. Thee model.

The Chiefs are a smaller market team and have a considerably different way of operating than for instance the Raiders, Jets, or Redskins. They may not always have the luxury of going out and targeting a player, or competing in a bidding war for a free agent that "fits their system". Occasionally they will have to simply make due with what they have.

This brings me back to Brian Daboll. I believe that he may be just the type of coordinator that Scott Pioli is looking for to complete his 'type' of staff (I do realize he may not work out, and that Romeo does the hiring), and very possibly what he was looking for when he first began this process three years ago.

In order to successfully operate the way that we have chosen to operate and achieve the goals that we have set out to achieve (competing for entry to the Big Game every year), we have to strike that balance I was referring to earlier. We must find a coordinator that has the capability of achieving that balance, and making the proverbial "Chicken Salad Out Of Chicken Shit."

That balance was part of the reason why Daboll recorded high marks on the Phinsider poll regarding whether he should be kept. If he can offer us that kind of creativity, he may be able to offer the offense what Romeo did for the D. I believe we will, from an organizational standpoint, continue to acquire a team full of relative role players, like we're starting to see on D (and really, O if you think about it. We just don't have the QB to bring everything together). This helps to keep team morale high by getting everyone involved, helps keep contracts low due to the spread around workload, and maintains that team-first attitude that the Chiefs have installed.

Another reason I believe this is what Scott Pioli wants, organizationally, is what I recall about the reports that came out during Haley's first year. Supposedly Scott wanted to retain Chan Gailey, who is known for the same type of innovation and player-makes-the-system sort of coordination.

I think (personally) that aside from Haley's abrasive manner, his system may have cause more of his downfall than anything. The EP system we have been running is much more dependent on a quarterback that can quickly read the field and diagnose (like Brady or his previous QB Warner), than other systems like the West Coast O, which is much more about timing and chemistry between QB and receiver. I do think that Matt Cassel (Matt Moore?) possesses traits that may be able to transform him into an average / above average QB in the right system. I do not believe that system to be the one that Haley was so staunch about not changing for some reason. He seemed hellbent and sort of nostalgic about recreating the EP system that they used during his time with Parcells in NY, and I believe this is what Dick Haley meant when he allegedly told Todd that he "cant win with him."

Clearly, given the right circumstances, Matt Cassel is capable of a 11 win season, as he did in his first year starting QB for anyone since high school. But he needs to have a system tailor made to fit him, as well as obviously an OC who is capable of delivering that (Matt worked with the similarly offensively quirky Josh McDaniels in that eleven win season in NE). That type of attitude seems to be what adored Brian Daboll to Miami fans this past year.

Really, Matt Cassel can take the place of any player who is being underutilized in this example. I use him because he is probably the biggest example of it on the team.

I understand the hesitation about the hire. I still have some as well. But I am in the camp of people who believes that this offense has a hell of a lot of talent that is just waiting for someone to come in and do with it what we all think it's capable of. If Brian Daboll is able to achieve that, I think we will be very close to operating as an organization as Scott Pioli intended when he took the job. If we ever want to be the type of team that Clark Hunt wants, that matters.