While the Miami Dolphins continue to spew their "We can still turn the 2024 season around" rhetoric, 2025 is the critical year for the organization, or it should be.
Miami can't afford to dump the roster after the 2024 season. There is currently too much invested in the roster to simply implode it and start again. Stephen Ross knows this, and he doesn't have many options when it comes to fixing problems.
Ross will have to make a decision on his football team's future, but his hands are tied with most of it and here is why 2025 is the season that will decide the fate of Dolphins general manager Chris Grier and head coach Mike McDaniel.
Why the 2025 season will be critical for the Miami Dolphins
1. Stephen Ross won't fire McDaniel after this season and he shouldn't
If Ross fires McDaniel, he can write off the 2025 season as well. A new head coach will bring in a new system the the Dolphins are not built for. Ross doesn't want to go through another change, and firing McDaniel would bring change when the roster is built for him.
Another coach won't be able to emulate that, and while they are adjusting to each other in 2025, it's another wasted season for Ross.
McDaniel needs to stay at least through the midway point of next season. If the Dolphins' struggles next year are similar to this year's, there is no reason to keep him around, and 2025 will be his last with the Dolphins.
McDaniel signed an extension this offseason, but that means nothing to Ross, who has done that previously with two other coaches and then fired them a year later.
The Dolphins need McDaniel to succeed, and with the player contracts the way they are, McDaniel is married to those contracts as much as the players are, that changes after the 2025 season when Miami can get out of many of them.
2. Chris Grier is the only change that should be made this offseason if Ross feels he has to make a move
Grier is expendable for Ross, but he doesn't know it. If Ross wants to make a change this year for the sake of saying he made one, firing Grier would be the only option he has.
Hiring a replacement with the caveat that 2025 would be an evaluation year would give the new general manager a better vision of the team's roster and McDaniel.
If McDaniel succeeds in 2025, the replacement GM would have more reason to keep him on board, but this is also a reason why Ross is likely to stick with Grier through 2025 as well.
Success in 2025 could be attributed to Grier, and Ross isn't the type of owner who likes to second-guess himself. For that reason, Grier is likely to stay through the 2025 season, and if changes need to be made, they will all be done at the end of that season with a new GM taking over and hiring his own people.
Grier could be this year's scapegoat, but in reality, he is tied to the 2025 season as much as anyone else, and while many of us would love to see that change after the season, it's hard to imagine that Ross would make that move.
3. The dynamics of the Dolphins roster will change after the 2025 season
Tyreek Hill has a $15 million out for the Dolphins in 2026. Miami would save $36 million in cap space by releasing him. Bradley Chubb may not make it to 2025, and Terron Armstead will also be gone. Even Tua Tagovailoa's contract is absorbable if it needs to be.
According to OvertheCap.com, the top 12 paid players entering the 2026 season have a combined guaranteed salary of $00.00 dollars. That doesn't mean there aren't cap liabilities if they are released, but there are no guaranteed contract dollars left entering that season.
Miami's window of opportunity is closing. 2024 was supposed to see a jump. Miami was expected to challenge or outright win the AFC East. They were expected to move into the playoffs and finally get out of the first weekend. In 2025, a run for the Super Bowl has been expected.
That doesn't change because Miami is having a bad season in 2024. The roster is built with a timetable for success, and that clock is counting down. 2026 is the absolute final season for this regime.
If Ross runs it back in 2025 and the Dolphins make the playoffs or even advance in the playoffs, they still have most of the pieces in place for another run in 2026.
That being said, if they fail in 2025, the window will be closed for Grier and McDaniel, and it would be shocking if Ross didn't make a move after the 2025 season.