So now that the Minnesota Vikings have officially put Fred Pagac out of his misery and taken the defensive coordinator job away from him, the question of who they'll actually place in that spot is still out there. As pointed out by NMVike in the FanPosts earlier today (during the execution at Lambeau), a new name has emerged, and it appears that the Vikings might have some competition for him.
NFL.com's Jason LaCanfora is reporting that the Vikings are interested in Miami Dolphins' defensive coordinator (and interim head coach) Todd Bowles for the the position of defensive coordinator. The Oakland Raiders have interviewed Bowles for their head coaching position, and the Dolphins are also interested in retaining him as their defensive coordinator, if not removing the "interim" tag from his title. The Dolphins were spurned by former Tennessee Titans' head coach Jeff Fisher, who decided to take the job with the St. Louis Rams.
The Dolphins had a bit of a rough season in 2011, losing their first seven games of the year before recovering to end up with a record of 6-10. Defensively, however, the Dolphins actually appeared to be pretty good on paper, finishing 6th in the National Football League in scoring defense, allowing just 19.6 points/game. (I say "on paper" because I didn't see a whole lot of Dolphins games this season.)
Miami allowed 23.7 points/game during their 0-7 start, but just 16.3 points/game over their final nine (when they went 6-3). Former coach Tony Sparano was fired after the team's 13th game of the year, and Bowles took over the reins, leading Miami to a 2-1 mark in their final three games, with the one blemish being a 27-24 loss to the high-flying New England Patriots.
Bowles sounds like he would be a good get, but it also sounds like we have some competition for him. Hopefully things will sort themselves out on this front relatively soon.