DAVIE, Fla. — Among the many things former Dolphins wide receiver Oronde Gadsden remembers about Jimmy Johnson was his relentless drive to find talent.
Johnson had a well-established reputation by the time he was named the Dolphins’ head coach in 1996. He’d won titles at the University of Miami and with the Dallas Cowboys by finding big-time talent and developing small-time talent.
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And, yes, players knew you could never be comfortable with your job in the NFL because, well, that’s the nature of the league. But the message was always different with Johnson, a little more meaningful, a little more poignant.
“Nobody was solid in what they were doing and where they were because he always was looking,” said Gadsden, who spent the first two years of his six-year Dolphins career under Johnson.
“You knew people were coming in on that Tuesday to work out. You’d just come by to get you a lift or a workout, and you’d see three receivers working out and you’d be like, ‘Damn, I thought we were good. I thought we were good with the six people we’ve got.’ He’s still trying to look for the next one.”
It was announced recently that Johnson will be inducted into the Pro Football Hall of Fame. Although he’ll be remembered by most for winning two Super Bowls with the Dallas Cowboys, Johnson’s years in Miami were memorable because he laid the foundation for the Dolphins teams his buddy Dave Wannstedt would eventually coach (2000-04) with relative success.
Johnson, who served as an NFL analyst for FOX-TV between parting ways with the Cowboys and being hired by the Dolphins, was expected to return Miami to its glory days of the 1970s. It never happened.
Johnson amassed a good deal of talent but never won a Super Bowl here. In fact, Johnson never came close to a Super Bowl in his years with the Dolphins (1996-99). Miami earned three playoff berths in Johnson’s four seasons but never won their division and never advanced to the AFC Championship Game.
Johnson initially retired after the 1998 season, but he changed his mind when then-owner Wayne Huizenga allowed Johnson to bring in Wannstedt as his top assistant. He would groom him to eventually take over the head coaching job.
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Johnson retired for good after the 1999 season, a few weeks after telling Huizenga and team president Eddie Jones he didn’t think he could do the job any longer. Johnson met with his team at 9 a.m. the day after a playoff loss to the Jaguars and broke the news that he wouldn’t return.
“I guess you might say it’s my time,” Johnson said in his press conference while announcing his retirement. “I’ve had my time in the sun. I’ve had my time in the spotlight, and now it’s time to spend time with my family.”
With Miami, Johnson set the stage for winning by successfully identifying talent, talent others often passed on like defensive end Jason Taylor, the Hall of Famer who was a third-round pick in 1997, and linebacker Zach Thomas, the Hall of Fame finalist who was a fifth-round pick in 1996.
Johnson was coming off a high-profile breakup with Dallas owner Jerry Jones when he joined the Dolphins.
The Dolphins were coming off a high-profile breakup with legendary coach Don Shula.
It was the second time Johnson would take an NFL job under such conditions. He took over the Cowboys after their high-profile breakup with legendary coach Tom Landry.
But while Johnson was able to build the Cowboys from the ground up, his magic didn’t work as well in Miami despite taking over a team that had Hall of Fame quarterback Dan Marino.
Johnson ended up going 36-28 (.563) in the regular season. He made the playoffs in each of his last three seasons, but the results at that point — he went 2-3 in the postseason with the Dolphins — were sometimes disastrous. Miami lost to New England 17-3 in a wild-card game in 1997. It lost to Denver 38-3 in a divisional playoff game in 1999 (after defeating Buffalo in a wild-card game). And Miami was infamously blasted by Jacksonville 62-7 in 2000 (after beating Seattle in a wild-card game).
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Regardless, Johnson left a mark on the organization.
Jimmy Johnson, now a broadcaster with Fox Sports, speaks with the media at the Miami Beach convention center on Tuesday. (Jasen Vinlove / USA Today)In one of his best-known gambles, Johnson named Thomas a starting linebacker as a rookie ahead of veteran Jack Del Rio, whom Johnson had coached in Dallas.
“I love that guy,” Thomas said of Johnson recently on “The Joe Rose Show” on 560-AM (WQAM) in Miami. “He gave me everything.”
Defensive tackle Tim Bowens was a first-round pick of the Dolphins in 1994 under Shula, an old-school coach known for being tough. But Bowens, a mainstay on the defensive line for years, said his first training camp under Johnson was something different.
“It was just something I never went through,” Bowens said. “I was two years with Coach Shula, and that was pretty rough. And then you get Jimmy, man, that was like, brutal. I’m talkin’ brutal.”
Johnson was in your face, constantly challenging, constantly pushing, constantly testing his guys. It wore on them more mentally than physically.
“That’s what I’m talking about, that ‘mental,’” Bowens said. “Not physical but mental. Everybody is strong (physically). It’s the mental part.”
Johnson used those mind games to try to revive a team that was dealing with playoff disappointment and a ticking clock on Marino.
Johnson drafted players such as Taylor and Thomas, defensive tackle Daryl Gardener, cornerbacks Sam Madison and Patrick Surtain, safety Shawn Wooden, linebacker Derrick Rodgers, defensive ends Kenny Mixon and Lorenzo Bromell, tight end Ed Perry and fullback Rob Konrad. All were mainstays through the early- and mid-2000s.
But there were also draft failures, guys such as running back John Avery, a first-round pick in 1998, wide receiver Yatil Green, the first-rounder in 1997, running back J.J. Johnson, a 1999 second-round pick, and running back Cecil Collins, a 1999 fifth-round pick. Avery and Johnson weren’t good enough, Green was injured and Collins, who represented a high-upside, low-round gamble by Johnson, had off-field issues that held him back.
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The coach’s relationship with Marino suffered in his later days with the team. A match that should have been made in heaven, one that could have mirrored the success Johnson had in Dallas with Hall of Fame quarterback Troy Aikman, never materialized.
Johnson retired one day after that ugly playoff loss to Jacksonville.
Despite a lack of big-time success in Miami, Johnson remained relentless and undeterred in his search for talent during his years with the Dolphins. That’s because Johnson’s coaching gifts went beyond finding personnel. He knew how to manage people, as well.
“I think his strength was his relationship with the players and his feel for the game,” Gadsden said. “You always have X’s and O’s, but he knew what buttons to push and when to press down, when to let up some.
“And I think he was a true head coach, which is hard to come by right now. Regardless of his background, he didn’t coach the offense, he didn’t coach the defense. He was just the head coach. You know what I mean?”
The Dolphins weren’t a finished product when Johnson took over as head coach. It was his job to make them a finished product, get them over the hump. But despite having a Hall of Fame quarterback and a developing defense, his Dolphins teams never quite got the job done. They accumulated lots of talent, but they never advanced to a conference championship, let alone a Super Bowl.
It’s something that still puzzles players to this day.
“It doesn’t matter how much talent we had, we didn’t get it done,” Bowens said. “I just hate we couldn’t win one for him and Dan.”
(Top photo: Sporting News via Getty Images)
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