MIAMI Dolphins head coach Mike McDaniel cleared the air on how he met his wife after longtime NFL broadcaster Al Michaels shared a tale about the two.
Michaels told a story during Amazon Prime’s broadcast of the Dolphins‘ win over the New York Jets on Black Friday and insisted McDaniel met his wife, Katie, by threatening the job security of one of his former players.
The 78-year-old longtime NFL voice was alongside football analyst Kirk Herbstreit for the game when Michaels suggested while McDaniel was with the Sacramento Mountain Lions team, he allegedly stole Katie from one of his players.
Michaels describes it as McDaniel saw one of the running backs he coached dancing with Katie after a win and not having any of it.
“They blow out Omaha, and they go to a nightclub to celebrate. One of the running backs that he coaches is dancing with a girl.
“Mike says, ‘Listen, you’re not dancing with her anymore, or you’re not playing with this team next year.’
“So the guy says, ‘What can I do?’ So then McDaniel starts dancing with her — that’s the beginning of the story.
“Four years later, they’re married. Katie, that’s how he met her. ‘Hey you, get off. I’m dancing with her,'” Michaels said on air.
However, on Monday during his press conference, McDaniel refuted the story and said Michaels made him out to look like “kind of a D-bag.”
‘I would say the skeleton of the story is correct. But there’s a couple of important caveats. First of all, the perceived threat I made to a player was over the top a joke.
“Considering both he and I knew that as the running backs coach, I had no ability to say if he was there or not. It was more in jest.
“And then, second of all, my wife was telling me people were talking about me stealing people’s girls. The dude had met her for 45 seconds.
The Dolphins head coach continued to downplay the story and referred to the moment as a “light-hearted, very unique scenario” that Michaels took wrong.
“It was a special place in our memories… I feel like I was painted out to kind of be a d-bag, and it wasn’t like that at all. It was all nice,” McDaniel said.
McDaniel and Katie have been married since 2014 and have a 3-year-old daughter together.
The Dolphins knocked off the Jets in a blowout 34-13 win over the weekend.
Tua Tagovailoa threw for 243 yards and one touchdown, while star receiver Tyreek Hill caught nine passes for 102 yards.
Miami is currently in 8-3, entering their Week 13 match against the Atlanta Falcons.
