ORCHARD PARK, N.Y. -- Jeff Ireland left the locker room about the same time several players on the victorious Dolphins came out, but the differences between the general manager and players as they streamed toward team buses could not have been more obvious if one was measuring their physical size.

Ireland is an average-sized man who has put together a team of giants.

And he is a man currently stuck in a no-win situation while his players are able to celebrate victory whenever they author it, including Sunday when the Dolphins beat the Bills 30-23.

I chased Ireland out of the locker room Sunday, leaving behind interviews with some players because, frankly, what they have to say about this game will soon fade into oblivion.

What Ireland says and does the next three months will determine the direction of the franchise for years.

Ireland, as we speak, is putting together a list of coaching candidates the Dolphins will interview once the season ends in two weeks. He is including everyone of worthy repute on that list.

That means the coaches on the Mount Rushmore of candidates — Bill Cowher, Jon Gruden, Jeff Fisher — will be on the list he will turn over to owner Stephen Ross. But Ireland’s list will also include the other guys that should be on Miami’s radar.

The worthy college coaches.

The hot coordinators around the NFL.

The best available retreads.

No one has been interviewed yet, and no one can be hired until after the season. But everybody Ireland deems worthy of Ross’ attention will be on that list.

Ireland will then turn over that list, and then the search for Miami’s ninth head coach will begin.

Ireland will not lead that search. Carl Peterson, if or when he gets hired by the Dolphins, will not lead that search.

Stephen Ross will lead that search. Period.

This will be the owner’s hire. Let’s establish that now before confusion sets in because the Dolphins the past four years have been a mystery regarding which person is responsible for which thing — sometimes the blame or credit going to Tony Sparano, sometimes to Bill Parcells, sometimes to assistant coaches, sometimes to Ireland — without anyone really knowing or volunteering the truth.

If this coach hire doesn’t work out, it’ll be completely on Ross, not on Ireland.

By the way, there are plenty of other things fans already blame Ireland for that weren’t really his doing, but that’s not the point here. Ireland refuses to get into that conversation anyway, as surely as he declined to talk to me after I caught up to him by a humming team bus Sunday.

He said he sees no point in the conversation. He understands many fans don’t like him, some for legitimate reasons and some for doing things he never really did.

And he realizes that calls he did make that have worked — such as the signings of quarterback Matt Moore and running back Reggie Bush — are quickly dismissed in people’s minds because he picked those players, they’re playing well, and that simply doesn’t fit the current hate-everything-Ireland narrative.

So Ireland declined to comment just as he has all year long.

Other folks in the organization, meanwhile, tell me everyone better get used to Ireland because it is practically guaranteed he will be around in 2012.

That last sentence, strong as it was, didn’t rise to the level of confidence Ross used only seven days ago when he said Ireland would be his general manager in 2012 and would lead the coach search.