The Green Bay Packers will need a new defensive coordinator in 2026. On Monday, ESPN’s Adam Schefter reported that the Miami Dolphins will be hiring Packers defensive coordinator Jeff Hafley to be the team’s next head coach, following the firing of Mike McDaniel earlier this offseason. The Dolphins also made a change at general manager, hiring former Packers vice president of player personnel Jon-Eric Sullivan to run their front office.
This isn’t the first move that the Dolphins have made to poach
from the Packers since Sullivan’s hiring, either, as the team has signed preseason star Omar Brown, who was placed on injured reserve for a collapsed lung and later waived with an injury settlement, and brought in a pro scout from Green Bay, too.
Hafley joined Green Bay in 2024, following a head coaching stint at Boston College, where he had three different athletic directors in four seasons. In 2024, Hafley’s disguise-heavy defense improved throughout the season. After the team’s Week 10 bye that year, the Packers only allowed 18.4 points per game.
His defense’s performance in the second half of the 2024 season was the catalyst for his name getting hot at the head coaching level in the NFL. Packers head coach Matt LaFleur said several times this year that he believed that Hafley was going to get a job in 2025, that it was surprising to LaFleur that Hafley didn’t get a job last cycle and that he expected Hafley to receive one in 2026. In total, Hafley interviewed with six teams for their head coaching vacancies this year.
Hafley said in December that his expectation for “Micah [Parsons] and myself” is for the All-Pro pass-rusher to return from injury and lead the league in sacks in 2026. Obviously, Parsons and Hafley will no longer be paired up for the upcoming season.
Now, it’s time for the defensive coordinator search. Green Bay has two potential internal candidates, defensive line coach and run game coordinator Demarcus Covington and passing game coordinator Derrick Ansley, on staff. Both have previously been defensive coordinators at the NFL level. Sources in the coaching representation world have told me throughout the year that both Covington and Ansley make some sense as either Hafley’s replacement in Green Bay or Hafley’s defensive coordinator, should he take a head coaching gig. At this point, it’s not clear whether Hafley, who coached in the booth for the Packers, will be an on-field play-caller in Miami.
Covington has already interviewed for the Dallas Cowboys and New York Jets defensive coordinator openings this offseason, the two most developed searches thus far in 2026.
