Fatherhood Changed Mike McDaniel. Will The NFL Follow His Lead?

Summary

Podcast Summary: "Fatherhood Changed Mike McDaniel. Will The NFL Follow His Lead?"

The Lead – December 8, 2023
Host: Matt Stroup | Guest: Kent Babb, Washington Post Reporter

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Overview of the Episode

This episode of The Lead explores the personal and professional evolution of Miami Dolphins head coach Mike McDaniel, focusing on how his approach to fatherhood is challenging—and possibly changing—one of the most traditional, high-pressure workplaces in the world: the NFL. Through Kent Babb’s in-depth reporting and interviews, the episode looks at how McDaniel’s personal struggles, family background, and philosophy of honesty and presence have shaped his leadership style, and questions whether his example could inspire a broader cultural shift in the league and beyond.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Mike McDaniel’s Unique Coaching Persona

• Portrayed as an intellectual “oddball” among NFL coaches: “He speaks different, he looks different. He certainly behaves different than kind of the domineering, alpha, traditional NFL coach archetype.” (Kent Babb, 03:23)
• Known for prioritizing rest and family time, leaving work at odd hours to spend time with his family—highly unusual in the NFL’s “grit at all costs” culture.
• Uses humor and candidness in his public persona, exemplified by press conference moments:

  “Where’s the ping pong table? That’s what I want to know. Who stole the ping pong table? Was it a thievery?”
  (Mike McDaniel, 02:01)

2. Background: Fatherless Upbringing and Gentle Parenting

• McDaniel’s father was largely absent; raised by a single mother who focused on constant positive reinforcement.
• His mother’s encouragement led to high achievement—straight A’s, Yale admission, an NFL coaching career.
• McDaniel internalized the need to be an engaged and emotionally present father, determined to “right life’s wrongs” (05:56).
• Kent Babb draws parallels between McDaniel’s gentle, psychological approach to coaching and modern “gentle parenting.”

  “In the NFL culture, these guys are taught to be tough. First, ignore pain… And that’s exactly what Mike McDaniel doesn’t do.”
  (Kent Babb, 04:37)

3. Early Career and Struggles With Work/Life Balance

• Began as a ball boy, then an offensive assistant—often working until 5 a.m., mimicking the NFL’s “badge of honor” around overwork (09:26).
• Developed unhealthy coping mechanisms, notably alcohol abuse, leading to unreliability and being eventually fired by mentor Gary Kubiak.

  “You can’t just not show up for work.”
  (Kent Babb recalling Kubiak’s words, 10:09)

4. Personal Turning Point: Meeting His Wife, Struggles With Infertility

• Met future wife Katie Hempstock by chance at a nightclub; their whirlwind romance quickly turned serious (11:01).
• The couple faced years of painful infertility, silent struggles and emotional toll, culminating in a breakthrough after treatment for endometriosis (16:42–18:15).
• McDaniel’s emotional reaction to the long-awaited pregnancy news underscored his deep desire to become a father.

  “The only word he could make out was positive.”
  (Kent Babb, 18:15)

5. Authenticity and Player Relationships

• McDaniel’s openness with players about his struggles—including alcoholism and infertility—is unusual in NFL culture (20:00).
• He formed deep, personal relationships with players like Raheem Mostert and Deebo Samuel, focusing on their well-being beyond football.

  “He was vulnerable, he was open, he was honest. And as weird as it is, that’s just not a thing in the NFL.”
  (Kent Babb, 20:55)

6. Coaching Tua Tagovailoa: From Tough Love to Empowerment

• Tua’s upbringing was dominated by a demanding father, old-school coaches, and a culture of fear and criticism.
• McDaniel’s first act as Dolphins head coach was to reach out, offering belief and support:

  “One thing I know about you is you have the ambition to be great. My job is to coach you to get all that greatness out of you.”
  (Mike McDaniel, 25:33)

• Compiled a 700-play highlight reel to help Tua rebuild his self-belief; direct echo of McDaniel’s mother’s encouragement.
• During Tua’s concussion saga, McDaniel put player safety and Tua’s well-being above football outcomes, even prompting the league to rethink concussion protocols.

  “When you see these people as people, you don’t just see them as somebody who can go on injured reserve… you see them as a human being whose future is suddenly in jeopardy.”
  (Kent Babb, 27:15)

7. Fatherhood Now: Setting Boundaries and Modeling Change

• Since the birth of his daughter Ayla June in 2020, McDaniel prioritizes being present at home, even leaving the office when he feels exhausted.
• Describes his personal life as “chaotic” but fulfilling, fully immersing himself in family time:

  “True unconditional love is the most powerful thing. It’s so simple.”
  (Mike McDaniel, 30:48)

• Remarkable not because he’s a father, but because “an NFL head coach, maybe for the first time in this sport’s history, is creating boundaries and saying, you know what? I’m going home, I’m going to be a dad.” (Kent Babb, 31:01)

8. Will the League Follow His Lead?

• McDaniel’s approach is still unusual—its sustainability as a model depends on continued team success.
• If he can win while maintaining personal boundaries and supporting players as people, others might follow.
• Implications extend beyond the NFL, offering a “proof of concept” that high achievement and happiness can coexist:

  “You don’t have to berate your employees. You don’t have to live in fear or anxiety. You can have a peaceful life and a successful one all at the same time.”
  (Kent Babb, 32:14)

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• Mike McDaniel on fatherhood:

  “Everything that people say about fatherhood and being a parent, yeah, I get it. And it doesn’t even do it justice. It is everything. Everything to me.”
  (Mike McDaniel, 30:19)

• On challenging NFL norms:

  “When somebody cares about you that much, when somebody believes in you as much as Mike believes in his players, how do you not give him your absolute best?”
  (Kent Babb, 22:04)

• On success and happiness:

  “It is possible to succeed beyond your wildest dreams and also be happy… you can have a peaceful life and a successful one all at the same time.”
  (Kent Babb, 32:14)

• Key story moment:
  When Tua suffered a serious concussion, he didn’t call out for his father or wife—he asked repeatedly, “Where’s Mike?” highlighting the depth of their bond (27:44).

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Timestamps for Important Segments

• McDaniel’s unique style: 00:40–04:57
• Upbringing and influence of gentle parenting: 05:09–07:20
• Early career grind and alcohol struggles: 08:47–10:50
• Chance meeting and infertility journey: 11:01–18:15
• Openness with players, changing relationships: 19:39–22:18
• Tua Tagovailoa, coaching approach and concussion crisis: 22:39–29:29
• Fatherhood now, personal boundaries: 29:48–31:28
• Big picture: Could he change the NFL?: 31:28–32:41

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Conclusion

Mike McDaniel’s journey—from a fatherless childhood and early NFL burnout, through personal vulnerability and the challenges of fatherhood—has profoundly shaped his approach to coaching. He’s defying the traditional, often toxic culture of the NFL by being open, compassionate, and prioritizing both his family and the humanity of his players. Whether this approach can succeed long-term and inspire wider change remains to be seen, but McDaniel’s story offers a hopeful model for balancing professional ambition and personal fulfillment—not just in sports, but in any demanding workplace.

Transcript

[Kent Babb]

I'm Jason Concepcion and welcome to Six Trophies, a podcast hosted by myself and four time New York Times bestselling author Shea Serrano. Each week Shay and I are finding the best of the NBA storylines and then handing out six pop culture themed trophies for six basketball related activities. Listen to six Trophies with Jason Concepcion and Chase Serrano on the Wondery app or wherever you get your podcasts.

[Matt Stroup]

Kent Babb, you recently wrote about a scene that plays out apparently pretty often with Dolphins head coach Mike McDaniel at work. A scene that ends with him doing something unusual for an NFL coach. Can you explain?

[Kent Babb]

Well, this is an NFL coach who among the jokes about his offense, which is prolific and possibly even record breaking, is that it's like the 250 IQ offense. He's a little skinny nerd. But I write that the gears don't turn as much as they grind. And for as much as we talk about the NFL being a highly physical game, it's as much or more grueling mentally, particularly as a head coach. And Mike McDaniel has figured out that surprise. He's way less productive. When he's exhausted, his speech halts, his thoughts grind to a stop. An employee says that he's buffering and he's now learned to recognize these signs when he needs a reboot, when he needs what he calls the greatest energy reset known to man. And that's when he gets up and stops what he's doing, turns off the film and goes home to see his family.

[Matt Stroup]

Leaving his high pressure job out of the blue to go home and see his family is just one example of how Mike McDaniel does things a bit differently. He's the coach in aviator shades who says slightly offbeat things during a press conference.

[Mike McDaniel]

Where's the ping pong table? That's what I want to know. Who stole the ping pong table? Was it a thievery?

[Matt Stroup]

And he's the mad scientist behind the high flying offense that has the Dolphins at the top of the AFC East. TUA Lawson, Tyreek Hill on cue. You're not going to catch him, are you? No touchdown today Kent Babb of the Washington Post explains how Mike McDaniel became someone who was willing to challenge the conventional wisdom of the NFL and whether his approach will backfire or potentially change the league from Wondery. I'm Matt stroup. It's Friday, December 8th, and this is the lead, So can't you recently wrote a really incredible profile of Mike McDaniel for the Washington Post and it explains how he became this NFL head Coach who was doing things very differently from his peers. Before we jump into McDaniel's backstory, I was wondering if you could explain what you were trying to learn when you set out to write this story.

[Kent Babb]

Well, Mike McDaniel, I think, is seen as sort of this widespread oddball.

[Mike McDaniel]

Should I have an announcement? Oh, oh, I should announce that my wife went to the grocery store, which was exciting because I'm a big snack time guy.

[Kent Babb]

He speaks different, he looks different. He certainly behaves different than kind of the domineering, alpha, traditional NFL coach archetype.

[Mike McDaniel]

For me, I have so many people that I would feel very guilty if I wasn't completely and utterly present for them. And it snowballs into my personal life.

[Kent Babb]

And as much as anything, I wanted to figure out, what is it about him that is so different. I'm a dad. I've got two young daughters. I grew up playing sports in the South. I am the stereotypical sort of jock guy who got tough love, who had to rub some dirt in it, who had to just suck it up and deal. And through that, I've tried to study fatherhood. And I don't want to pass those bad habits on to my daughters. I think there's a different way. And what I read about a lot is called gentle parenting. And it's about just a more thoughtful approach, a more psychological approach. At the time, I didn't even know if McDaniel had a kid or kids. But the way he coaches his players is not unlike the way I try to parent my daughters in particular. In the NFL culture, these guys are taught to be tough. First, ignore pain, don't listen to your body's alarms. And that's exactly what Mike McDaniel doesn't do. So it just made me curious in general to find out what he's doing on the football field. That may also be translating to the workplace and also maybe even family.

[Matt Stroup]

All right, well, let's get into the story of how Mike McDaniel became the person he is today. You wrote about how his earliest days had a huge impact on the kind of person he wanted to be. Tell us a little bit about that.

[Kent Babb]

So not unlike a lot of Americans, Mike McDaniel grew up without knowing his father. He's biracial. He grew up outside of Denver in a lower income household where it was just him and his mom. And for whatever reason, he didn't know his father. He met him a handful of times, but the dad just never kind of came around. And McDaniel as a child and even as A teenager was trying to figure out, how do I change that? How do I get my dad to like me? Why did I scare him away? And that was the most important thing for him. Just, dad, come home. And as McDaniel told me, he was set from a young age on righting his life's wrongs. And among those was not just to be a father, but was to be a good father.

[Matt Stroup]

And can you tell us a little bit about his relationship with his mom? What was her role as he was growing up without his dad around.

[Kent Babb]

So it's interesting even listening to him, because I'm the son of a single mother myself. And his mother raised him with constant positive reinforcement, with reminders of her affection. It was that he was special. He was capable of doing anything.

[Mike McDaniel]

My mom really built me up as a child to basically made sure that I didn't have any limitations on my expectations of myself. And in that process, I got very goal ambitious.

[Kent Babb]

And sure enough, the world wound up proving this woman right. I mean, he got into Yale. He got straight A's all the time. He got a job in the NFL.

[Mike McDaniel]

It was the environment. It was the vision of trying to do something better with my life than my circumstances around me really provided.

[Kent Babb]

The way he put it to me was, anytime any of us are faced with a difficult obstacle or decision, how do you face that? So are you going to charge into it, or are you going to cower? Well, his belief is that because he was reinforced so strongly, that in each of these situations, he charged in with confidence, not anxiety. And he believed his mom convinced him that he could indeed accomplish anything.

[Matt Stroup]

And, Kent, based on your story, it seems like Mike McDaniel not having a dad in the picture actually had a direct connection to him falling in love with football. So can you connect those two ideas for us?

[Kent Babb]

Well, in his many transformations, one of the things he tried to do was find out what his dad would have liked and maybe what would have brought him home. He knew his dad liked football, so he started hanging around the Denver Broncos. In a crazy twist of fate, he wound up getting an internship by dropping his hat.

[Matt Stroup]

McDaniel lost his hat at Broncos training camp as a child, and when Broncos video coordinator Gary McCune found him crying, he brought Mike a brand new cap and invited him and his family to watch practice with him the following day.

[Kent Babb]

And somehow that's changed NFL history just by a kid dropping his hat. With the internship, he was able to be a ball boy, along with Gary Kubiak, the longtime Denver Broncos quarterback who became a coach in his second act. And he became really close with McDaniel, who obviously is very smart, he's very intellectual, and he was super driven. And Kubiak, Mike Shanahan, the legendary head coach, they just wanted to know more about this kid. So suddenly he's hustling to bring the ball back with Kubiak's kids. He's hanging out with Kyle Shanahan, who's now an NFL head coach himself, who's Mike Shanahan's son. But again, this whole time he's banking. Okay, what are they doing? What's the relationship that these guys have with their dads that I didn't.

[Matt Stroup]

I'm still thinking about the butterfly effect of a kid dropping his hat and so many steps later, us getting one of the most explosive offenses in NFL history. That's wild. So you wrote about how, especially early in his career, Mike McDaniel had a tendency to work himself to the bone, just as many NFL coaches do. Can you talk a little bit about how he developed that habit and how his lifestyle eventually caught up to him?

[Kent Babb]

Well, not surprisingly, the NFL, which is a now a $20 billion a year industry, is an absolute pressure cooker, especially if you're not at the top, top of the heap. It is absolutely grueling and borderline abusive if you're a lower rung employee.

[Mike McDaniel]

Yeah.

[Kent Babb]

So when Mike McDaniel was first starting out as a 23 year old offensive assistant, which is essentially another way of saying he was the head coach's personal assistant, is grunt work. And a lot of times it took him until five in the morning, and there's just not a whole lot of work life balance there. Now, that can be true in any line of work, but in particular, it's not just true in the NFL, but it's a badge of honor. The later you stay, the longer you deprive yourself of sleep or food or liquids, the stronger you are.

[Mike McDaniel]

Gary Kubiak was very regimented. And at like six on the dot, he would call my office phone and there was two occasions where that just kept ringing. And then, where's Mike? And I'd show up in a panic.

[Kent Babb]

He was not able to emotionally recover from the intellectual strain he was putting on his mind every day. And so he used alcohol as a way to cope and often would show up drunk or hungover from the night before. And it got to a point where Gary Kubiak, who was now his boss as the Houston Texans head coach, had to bring him in and say, look, you can't just not show up for work.

[Mike McDaniel]

What he was telling me was your priorities are a little mixed up and you're going out too much. And I think you need to get that figured out.

[Kent Babb]

This happened a couple of times, and eventually Kubak had to fire him. And at 23, 24, it looked like the Mike McDaniel story in the NFL was over.

[Matt Stroup]

Well, that brings us to a big turning point in this story. A turning point that takes place at a nightclub, Kentucky. Tell us what took place on a fateful night in 2010.

[Kent Babb]

Well, in Sacramento, of all places, which of the NFL fans among us we know is not exactly the nexus point of the NFL universe? There's no NFL team there. There was a semi pro team there, which is where Mike McDaniel was able to hook on as a coach, as a running backs coach. And just one night, hanging out at the nightclub, he ran into a young woman named Katie Hempstock. And she was there, almost didn't go hang out. But it was a friend's birthday. We were at a nightclub, and I see this guy across the way and he saw me. We met.

[Mike McDaniel]

And just like that, I mean, it's just classic story of when you know

[Kent Babb]

things, you know, and they talked and hit it off and wound up spending the weekend together. By the end of the weekend, they had connected so much that McDaniel gave her his Yale football ring and kind of a promise that someday I'm going to marry you. And as ridiculous as that sounds, Katie believed him. And there's just something about Mike McDaniel that he can say these ludicrous over the top things and you kind of believe him. That may or may not be his X man power as a, as a coach and a motivator and a leader, but he can kind of make you think the impossible as possible. And that was one of the first instances of Mike McDaniel vowing something absurd and somebody else saying, you know what, maybe that's true.

[Matt Stroup]

Focusing for a second more on the night that they met, we recently learned some additional details about that night on a Thursday Night Football broadcast from Al

[Kent Babb]

Michaels at the United Football League 2010. He's the running backs coach. One of the running backs that he coaches is dancing with a girl. And Mike says, listen, you're not dancing with her anymore or you're not playing with his team next year.

[Matt Stroup]

Does it track for you based on what you know, that McDaniel would boot one of his own players off the dance floor to dance with the woman who would eventually become his wife?

[Kent Babb]

Yeah, I mean, this is somebody who's going to go after what, what he wants. Now, he didn't tell me this story himself, but I'm obviously very entertained by all things Mike McDaniel. And sure, the fact that he would say, look, I'm going to cut you when he had no power to cut this running back in the USFL or whatever the devil it was, is pretty funny.

[Mike McDaniel]

The perceived threat that I made to a player was over the top. A joke considering both he and I knew that as a running back coach, I had no ability to say if he was there or not.

[Kent Babb]

So, yeah, like, it sounds like this little 140 pound guy checked this pro football running back out of the way so he could go dance and hang out with his future wife.

[Matt Stroup]

Well, I guess it all worked out because Mike and Katie eventually got married in 2014. By then, Mike McDaniel was back in the NFL. And Kent, you wrote about how while McDaniel's professional life was progressing, he and Katie were running into some challenges in their personal life. Tell us a little about the struggles they faced when it came to growing their family.

[Kent Babb]

You know, when, when they got married, it was one of those things where they at the time weren't putting pressure on themselves to start a family. They sort of just thought, you know, we'll go on our honeymoon and then in a few months Katie will get pregnant. And that just sort of kept not happening. And look, I mean, my wife and I, like a lot of people, had some issues conceiving our second child. And the social pressure that sort of gets inadvertently put on people eventually kind of becomes debilitating. But he had this work that kept him intellectually stimulated almost around the clock, whereas Katie, like a lot of NFL girlfriends and eventually wives, she didn't have that. Like, she was just at home to try to take care of the bills and manage the household and keep the train on the tracks. And so she kind of went deep inside her head. And anytime anybody would ask about whether they're having kids or not having kids, she overthought and became anxious. And what wound up happening is Katie knowing that Mike wanted to have a child so bad amplified the pressure on herself to give him, give them that child. She wanted to help him right his life's wrongs and be the dad that he always wanted to be. And it just wasn't happening. Katie had a test done that found that she had low embryonic reserve, meaning she had a condition where her body produced a lower amount of a hormone that creates and sustains the eggs within her body. She was having severe menstrual cramps. She was just in a lot of discomfort that she didn't share a whole lot of with Mike. She internalized it. She scream, cried into a pillow the moment Mike McDaniel left and pretended like it was all good. I mean, she would go to the bar, happy hour with her friends, and try to be the fun person who wasn't experiencing anything stressful, and then just drink and drink and drink until she blacked out. And that was her way, like her husband, of coping with this terrible burden she was carrying. And it was just kind of getting out of control. It was becoming a corrosive problem with her relationship. And she decided that, you know what? My husband is better off without me. And in her own mind, wow. She challenged her husband to leave her and go find somebody who could give him the family that he'd always wanted. She didn't tell him that. It's just one more thing that she kept to herself. And it just ate at her and ate at her and ate at her.

[Matt Stroup]

And Kent, how and when did things start to turn in the right direction for Mike and Katie as they tried to have a kid?

[Kent Babb]

So, interestingly, right around the time that the 49ers were plowing through the 2019 NFL season, she got really sick.

[Mike McDaniel]

Kyle Shanahan's wife, Mandy Shanahan, was with my wife one day where I was at work, and she, like, keeled over and threw up from, like, menstruation pain. Mandy was like, what is wrong with you? And she's like, oh, no. This just happens once in a while. Mandy was like, that is not right.

[Kent Babb]

And she had a test done that showed that she had severe endometriosis, which is a rare and very difficult gynecological condition that essentially is when scar tissue develops in the reproductive system. She had surgery to remove it. And literally the day before the 49ers left for the Super Bowl, Katie took a pregnancy test. And sure enough, for the first time, she had a positive result. McDaniel is famous for being difficult to reach. A lot of people say he's impossible to reach. This is part of him being super present in everything he does. So Katie was calling, and she couldn't get through to him, and eventually just started calling and FaceTiming other co workers of his. And there was a person in the office that she finally got through to. The person kind of burst into McDaniel's office, was like, hey, Katie's on the phone. You've got to take this. And confused as he was, he looked at the FaceTime screen and there's his wife with tears streaming down her face holding two pregnancy test sticks. And the only word he could make out was positive.

[Mike McDaniel]

And it was a big deal to me because, you know, I wanted to be a dad. I had a lot of bone to pick in my life, about to rectify that, and it wasn't in the cards. And all of a sudden, randomly, oh, she's pregnant.

[Kent Babb]

What he said that it was such an emotional moment. He doesn't remember the sound he made, but whatever it was. Kyle Shanahan and Mike LaFleur, two friends and fellow coaches with the 49ers, came rushing in and when they found out why he had made whatever sound he'd made, they got glassy eyed too. So I think everybody knew and appreciated just how difficult this journey was. And finally they had a positive result. What does it take to go racing in the fastest cars in the world? Oscar Piastri. Your head's trying to get ripped one way, your body's trying to go another. Lance Stroll. It's very extreme in the sense somehow closer racing wheel to wheel. We've been given unprecedented access to two of the most famous names in Formula One, McLaren and Aston Martin. I'm Landon Arts. They build a beautiful bit of machinery that I get to then go no fun in. They open the doors to their factories. As the 2024 season reached its peak. I'm Josh Hartnett. This is F1 back at base. Listen wherever you get your podcasts.

[Matt Stroup]

So, Kent, we talked a minute ago about Mike McDaniel's strong desire to become a father, which he finally did in 2020. And along the way, it seems like he also started to open up to his players about some of his struggles in trying to become a dad. Can you explain what you learned about that and how it impacted his relationship with some of his players?

[Kent Babb]

Well, one of the sort of inarguable truths supposedly of succeeding in the NFL is that you don't treat players, if you're a coach, like peers. You treat them like the inferiors that they are. It's just like this terrible, like, militaristic thing that we tended to glamorize. Well, like a lot of things like that. Mike did question that and he decided to try to get to know players as people. And in doing that, he didn't conceal himself. He was wide open about his drinking, about having gotten fired in Houston, about almost having gotten fired for drinking in Atlanta.

[Mike McDaniel]

I was drinking, you know, every night. I just thought it was just to have fun. And then you start questioning, okay, well, why am I drinking alcohol in the office on a Wednesday night? Which is what. What was happening in Atlanta in 2015

[Kent Babb]

about his and Katie's difficulties to conceive a child. I mean, he was vulnerable, he was open, he was honest. And as weird as it is, that's just not a thing in the NFL. I've covered the NFL, been around the league for a long time, almost to a person. Coaches are going to talk about all the things they're great at, all the things they've accomplished. They don't have fears, they don't have doubts. They definitely don't care about what's going on at home or you as a person. You know, we're here to do a job. And that's just sort of part of the culture, this accepted culture that I think just now is being challenged for the first time. And it's taking somebody like Mike to challenge that. And you know, what he did is in particular in San Francisco, Francisco. He got to know Raheem Mostert on a personal level and Deebo Samuel on a personal level.

[Mike McDaniel]

It's a very cool thing to watch because Deebo's a player that if you take the time and you're able to show him exactly what you want, he is willing to do whatever it takes to improve upon it. I know he wants to be great. And the best thing about him is, is he is not satisfied.

[Kent Babb]

When somebody cares about you that much, when somebody believes in you as much as Mike believes in his players, how do you not give him your absolute best? As obvious as that may sound, that's kind of a revolutionary concept in pro football.

[Matt Stroup]

Well, we've also seen some similar openness and vulnerability between Mike McDaniel and his fourth year quarterback, Tua Tango Vailoa. And it also seems like he's assumed kind of a father figure role with Tua. So first, what can you tell us about Tua's relationship with his own dad and his NFL coach before McDaniel arrived?

[Kent Babb]

So Tua and Galu, his father, are close. Tua loves his dad, but Galu is sort of an old school father. Like, he believes in tough love, as it's called. I know you've played a huge role in Tua's life, especially on the field. What has your message been to him throughout this week going into the national championship? I really wanted to thank you for just being obedient. You know, I think that's the. The key word to, you know, any child for a parent to their kids, it's just, just thanking them for being very obedient. And if Tua had a great game but threw an interception, Gallo would thrash him with the belt. And this is just my belief, but I think that Tua succeeded almost as a result of an acute fear of failure and letting his father down. I'm used to somebody really getting down on me because that's kind of the way my, my dad coached me was what he would call tough love. You know, I had that with coach Saban. You know, we had that with Flo last year. And his college coach, Nick Saban at Alabama is also an old school intimidating coach. And to his first NFL coach, Brian Flores, who would become famous later for suing the the NFL for racial discrimination, is also a product of this Bill Belichick no nonsense coaching tree where players are not looked at as individuals or human beings, but as fungible assets that must be replaced before they deteriorate. If you can't get it right, you know, take a seat. You gotta get better. You get yelled at, you get scolded, you get embarrassed in front of the rest of your team. And I think because of the way Tua was brought up, this didn't motivate him to be great. So me having to go through sitting myself down, looking in the mirror and really thinking like, dang, am I really like this bad? Do I really like, not know how to play this position? The pressure finally caved in on him. I mean, people joked about Tua in the Dolphins quarterback situation just being untenable.

[Matt Stroup]

And again, it hurts me to say it because I love Tua the person, but Tua the quarterback has a long way to go to catch Justin Herbert, as you said, and to be who they expected him to be. When all the tank for Tua talk was happening in 2019, they drafted this

[Kent Babb]

super talented college player who just couldn't cut it in the NFL.

[Matt Stroup]

So with all of that as the backdrop, what approach did Mike McDaniel take with Tua when he first arrived as Dolphins head coach last year?

[Kent Babb]

So one of the first things that McDaniel did, in fact, he called Tua from the Dolphins jet taking him from San Francisco to Miami. The first person he called was Tua.

[Mike McDaniel]

There he is, man. I just had to get on with you real quick.

[Kent Babb]

And he said he Tua was the reason that Mike McDaniel got into coaching.

[Mike McDaniel]

One thing I know about you is you have the ambition to be great. My job is to coach you to get all that greatness out of you.

[Kent Babb]

He was special. He could accomplish anything.

[Mike McDaniel]

I know you're not afraid of that. So this is an awesome day for me, and I'm damn sure gonna make sure that when you look back on this day, you're gonna be like, damn, that was one of the best days of my career, too.

[Kent Babb]

And the echoes of what McDaniel's mother told him are too obvious to ignore. It was an attempt to build this young man up. He compiled a 700 play video of all of Tua's best plays as college and professional player and kind of said, look, you got to watch this. Look how good you are. Look how amazing you are. And in the course of this, he discovered that the one thing Tua does that not even Patrick Mahomes or Aaron Rodgers can do is he can't anticipate a player, a wide receiver, getting open before he's even open. And by the time he is open, the ball's already there. And somehow McDaniel noticed that. And the hardest person he had to convince that Tua Tonga Wailoa was a great NFL quarterback was Tua himself. And he set out to convince this young man that he had this greatness in him, if only he could believe.

[Matt Stroup]

Well, it's also been well documented that Tua went through a really scary saga with concussions last year. What was Mike McDaniel's role in all of that? In the aftermath of that, and as

[Kent Babb]

Tua was recovering, the first thing is one of those concussions was really scary to watch. Comes down on the back of his head with serious force. He goes down, and right as he

[Matt Stroup]

goes down, you can see both his hands. You just get.

[Kent Babb]

Right away, you get concerned.

[Matt Stroup]

They're bringing a stretcher out right now.

[Kent Babb]

It scared McDaniel the most, because for better or worse, when you see these people as people, you don't just see them as somebody who can go on injured reserve or to the bench. You see them as a human being whose future is suddenly in jeopardy.

[Mike McDaniel]

That was an emotional moment. That is not part of the deal that anyone signs up for. Even though, you know it's a possibility in football to have something that you have to get taken off on a stretcher.

[Kent Babb]

So after one of those concussions that was particularly grisly, medical personnel, team personnel, all kind of surrounded Tua on the field, and everybody kind of noticed that he was muttering the same thing. And he wasn't calling for his father, he wasn't calling for his wife. He kept saying the same thing, and that was, where's Mike? And he wanted Mike McDaniel to be there with him. That's how close they had become at that time. When Tua was out for a number of weeks, it allowed these guys to get super close because Tua spent a lot of his free time in Mike's office. And they talked a lot of football, of course, but they also talked about their backgrounds, their upbringings, what their moms did, what their dads did. It was sort of like a best friend relationship. I say that because it didn't feel like a coach to player or a head coach to a quarterback kind of vibe. In. In December of the 2022 season, McDaniel, who's famous for pouring over game film, that's one of his superpowers as a coach and noticing these small things. While he noticed something that wasn't related to play, it was that Tua, after another hit, was walking erratically. He was behaving as if something was wrong. And so he called Tua in and made him see a doctor. And sure enough, that was possibly the third. It was not officially confirmed, but possibly the third concussion the TUA had in one year. And it roiled the league and forced the NFL and the NFLPA to update its concussion protocol to finally say that if somebody is behaving erratically or. Or can't walk straight or is stumbling around, that's enough to pull them out for their own safety, because prior to that, that wasn't part of the protocol.

[Matt Stroup]

Well, clearly, Mike McDaniel's personal journey has had a big impact on how he coaches. And so going back to his personal life, he and his wife Katie, had a daughter, Ayla June McDaniel, in October of 2020. What did he tell you about what life is like for him as a dad?

[Kent Babb]

I mean, chaotic. Like I think a lot of dads know. It's. It's a life. We all kind of know, especially if you've got young kids. Among the things that Mike and I bonded over was just the stress and the joy and the, you know, sort of noise of having young kids. I've got a six and a one year old, and it's exhilarating. It's exhausting. And if you're doing it right, you're not doing anything else. And that's what he does. I mean, he leaves work, which, again, is rare in that business. And when he's at home, he's at home, and that's all he's doing.

[Mike McDaniel]

Everything that people say about fatherhood and being a parent, yeah, I get it. And it doesn't even do it Justice. It is everything. Everything to me.

[Kent Babb]

He's not coach, he's not Mike. He's dad. And there's one person in the world who can call him that, and that's Ayla June, and she's three. And you know, they do the dad and little girl thing. I mean, he gets home and they watch a movie, they dance around, they sing, play on the floor.

[Mike McDaniel]

True unconditional love is the most powerful thing. It's so simple. I'm gonna go to the hotel room, she's probably gonna make me watch sing 2 for the 900th time, and then

[Kent Babb]

he tucks her in. I mean, there's nothing remarkable about the fact that he has a child or the fact that Ayla has a dad. What's remarkable is the fact that an NFL head coach, maybe for the first time in this sports history, is creating boundaries and saying, you know what? I'm going home, I'm going to be a dad. And when I'm at home being a dad, I'm not going to be a coach. It's just not heard of in the sport. But you know what? It's pretty refreshing.

[Matt Stroup]

Well, finally, Kent, you talked about how Mike McDaniel is doing things differently and actually being a present father while also being an NFL coach. How do you think that has impacted his ability to be an effective coach?

[Kent Babb]

I mean, the short answer is it's too early to tell, but he's succeeding. And just like anything in any kind of industry, and particularly, you know, something like the NFL, it has to work. You know, if he cuts off his workday and the Dolphins lose, then he's going to be criticized to shortchanging his job. And if he's too good of a father, hardcore Dolphins fans are not going to let him off the hook if they got blown out by the 49ers. He has to succeed. And I'm hopeful that this is going to be sort of a proof of concept, not just in football, but in society and the workplace of the future, that it is possible to succeed beyond your wildest dreams and also be happy. Like, you don't have to berate your employees. You don't have to live in fear or anxiety. You can have a peaceful life and a successful one all at the same time. And I think Mike McDaniel and the dolphins are trying to prove that to a world that doesn't often like to be changed.

[Matt Stroup]

Well, Kent, thanks for all your great reporting and this excellent story, and thanks for joining us to talk about it.

[Kent Babb]

Thanks so much for having me.

[Matt Stroup]

You can Find a link to Kent Babb's full story about Mike McDaniel in our show notes and follow his [e-mail] okay, that's it for today. This episode was produced by me, Matt Stroup and edited by Anders Kelto. Audio editing by Adrian Tapia Sound design and mixing by Aaron May. Fact checking by Ian Hurley. Production assistants from Matt Beagle. The rest of our team includes Tiffany Oshinsky, Joe Richardson and Daniel Gonzalez. Our executive producer is Anders Kelto. The lead is executive produced by Dave Easton, Marshall, Louie and Aaron o'. Flaherty. For Wondery from Wondery, I'm Matt Stroup. We'll talk to you next.