What might allow new Dolphins coach Jeff Hafley to be the best head coach he can be are his coordinator hires.

Hafley has his college head coaching experience at Boston College, but this is his first go at it in the NFL. He comes in majoring in defense, as Green Bay Packers defensive coordinator the past two seasons.

As Hafley gives the keys to the offense to Bobby Slowik, whom he retained and promoted to offensive coordinator, he brought his former Packers linebackers coach with him to Miami to be his defensive coordinator.

Sean Duggan, who also was his linebackers coach at BC and co-defensive coordinator their final season there in 2023, is progressing quickly in his first few months on the job. Duggan’s familiarity with how Hafley wants his defense run has him running defensive meetings during the offseason program so Hafley can sit in with the offense to familiarize himself with what Slowik will do, Hafley revealed to the Richard Sherman Podcast in an interview released Tuesday morning.

“What he’s done now is he’s organized it all for me,” Hafley told Sherman, who had Hafley as his position coach on the 2018 San Francisco 49ers. “He’s presenting in front of the defense, so I can go in with the offense, be the head coach right now. We’ll sit down and we’ll talk, we’ll meet, and once training camp hits, I’ll take it back over. But that allows me to be the head coach right now. I think that’s huge.”

Hafley, who has said he’ll call plays defensively while Slowik calls the offense, described his involvement with Slowik’s groups.

“I’m sitting in on the quarterback meetings. I’m sitting in on the offensive installs,” Hafley said. “Because what I learned this go-around is, I got to know everything that’s going on. I just can’t be the defensive coach. I don’t want the players just to see me as the defensive coordinator. I want them to see me and feel me as the head coach, and I want to know all of the scheme.”

To that, Hafley gives Duggan the credit in allowing him to expand early on.

“He’s really allowed me to do that,” he said. “I think he’s a star, and I’m really grateful that he’s with me.”

Another obstacle for Hafley in 2026 will be adjusting to coaching from the field again after being in the booth with the Packers the past two seasons. Hafley and Sherman reminisced over how Robert Saleh, now Tennessee Titans coach but then 49ers defensive coordinator when the two were together in San Francisco, wanted Hafley upstairs but Sherman said he wanted him on the sideline to keep defensive backs in check.

“It’ll be fun to be back on the field,” Hafley said. “Honestly, the last few years, I felt it was best for who we had on defense, for me to be up there, take my notes, tell them about it. There were times I wanted to be down on the field. There were moments, especially when adversity hits, that you want to get your hands on them and be with them.”

Hafley revealed how he’ll balance analytics between feel of the game when making critical decisions, like whether to go for a fourth down or not.

“I’m going to want to know what the analytics says, but I’m going to go by what I feel is best for our team in the moment, in the game,” he said. “For some guys, just going off the paper and off the numbers is fine. I just, nah, I want to get a feel for the game.

“That’s kind of how it ended up my last couple of years of BC,” Hafley continued. “Tell me what the analytics say, and let me make a decision based off the flow of the game and how I feel, what the team needs from me in the moment. There’s some moments when you decide not to go for it and your team kind of looks at you sideways, too, and when those guys are telling you to go for it at times, you know they’re going to go for it. And there’s others where they’re going to say go for it, and you say, ‘No, you guys chill out. We’re going to punt the ball right here.’”

The Dolphins are holding their rookie minicamp starting Friday and then voluntary organized team activities begin May 18.