In a long overdue move, the Miami Dolphins have fired Special Teams Coordinator Danny Crossman and Wide Receivers Coach Wes Welker.

The Miami Dolphins special teams were an unmitigated disaster in 2024 and have been for years under Crossman. This past season alone, the unit made countless mistakes, had a bunch of penalties called on them, he never fully adapted to the new kickoff rules, and his unit was totally unprepared most weeks.

The numbers speak for themselves; in 2022, the Dolphins’ special teams ranked 28th by the analytics gurus at Football Outsiders. They were tied for the worst punt return average and second worst kickoff return average. Somehow, some way, Mike McDaniel didn’t have a problem with this and brought Crossman back in 2023.

Want to go back even further? Before coming to Miami, Crossman was the special teams coordinator for the Buffalo Bills, and his units underperformed there as well. In 2018, their punt return unit ranked 21st, kickoff return unit ranked 24th, and they didn’t have a punt return longer than 31 yards. In regards to their punt coverage unit, they ranked 20th.

Sean McDermott found that unacceptable and fired Crossman at that time.

In 2023, Miami’s punt return coverage unit was ranked 28th, and their kickoff coverage unit was even worse, ranked dead last, 32nd, in all of the NFL.

Remember that 96-yard Buffalo punt return in the 4th quarter of the Week 18 2023  game that cost Miami the AFC East? Yeah that was Miami’s special teams.

Remember the brutal loss to the Titans at home on Monday Night Football in 2023? You also will remember in that game, our long snapper had a personal foul penalty in the 2nd half (like how does that even happen), and we had an illegal formation on a kickoff (with the modern rules is almost impossible to do), and we had one of our field goals blocked in this game.

Let’s not forget that earlier in the 2023 season, Mike McDaniel, who loses every challenge flag he seems to throw, actually won a challenge. Why do you ask? Miami was called for having too many men on the field for a punt, and a player was racing off the field before the snap but didn’t get off in time. The ref throws the flag and calls a penalty on Miami for having 12 men on the field.

BUT WAIT….in fact, Miami’s special teams did have 11 guys on the field, and the guy running off was running off for no reason, and Miami was going to play the down short-handed with only 10 men.

Crossman didn’t have the correct players on the field, and it took a Mike McDaniel challenge (I think the only one he won in the regular season this year) to fix the mistake his special teams coordinator made.

Let’s dive deeper into the stats, Jake Bailey was ranked 29th in yards per punt in 2023 and he was ranked 26th for having punts inside the 20. Both at the bottom of the league.

Miami also gave up a 99 yard kickoff return for a touchdown vs the Denver Broncos in 2023.

Remember the game vs the Ravens in 2023? Coming out of halftime any chance Miami had to mount a comeback was ended on the opening kickoff of the 2nd half when Baltimore ran it back 78 yards to the Miami 18 yard line.

The examples are endless and I haven’t even brought up any from this past year. Where we had Duke Riley get called for penalties on back to back weeks in September on big special teams plays. Or Malik Washington dropping a punt vs the Packers to start the game and a mistake Miami never recovered from. Or the fake punt vs Houston in which gave Houston a touchdown.

Needless to say, this move was deserved and long overdue.

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