There may be several reasons why Jeff Fisher spurned Miami to become head coach of the Rams, but the prospect of working with Dolphins general manager Jeff Ireland wasn't one of them.

"I met Jeff Ireland when he was 11 years old," Fisher said. "Jeff Ireland was the ball boy for the 'DBs' when I was playing for the Bears. His grandpa was a scout. I've known Jeff Ireland for a long time. Now obviously, I didn't know him as he worked his way through Baylor (as a place-kicker) and doing this and that.

"But Jeff Ireland is a very, very talented GM. And he's going to be successful. Never was there an issue between Jeff Ireland and I. Under no circumstances. Whoever comes in as a head coach (in Miami) is lucky to have Jeff Ireland as their GM."

Reports from south Florida indicated Dolphins owner Stephen Ross didn't want to give Fisher more power than Ireland in player personnel decisions, which may have caused Fisher to pick St. Louis.

From a Rams perspective, team sources say Fisher never asked for full control of personnel in St. Louis. But neither Fisher nor Rams executive vice president of football operations Kevin Demoff gave a definitive answer Tuesday on the "final say" question.

"I'm not going to go into who's got final say," Fisher said. "Our philosophy, and mine has been for years, that you have to make decisions together. And if you can't arrive on a decision then move on to the next one."

After the formal press conference, Fisher elaborated on the topic to a small group of reporters.

"There's too much that needs to be done in this building for one person to do it all," he said. "It's like anything else, you've got to surround yourself with good people and trust the people to get their jobs done.

"It's no different than when you're putting together a coaching staff. The head coach is not calling offense, defense, and making special teams decisions in the game. You let your coordinators do those things.

"It's all about surrounding yourself with the best people you can."

Even with Fisher's statements in support of Ireland, the fact that he can be part of the GM hiring process in St. Louis may have helped Fisher decide on the Rams. And Fisher is getting in on the process very early.

Demoff had interviewed only three general manager candidates prior to the Fisher hiring: Ryan Grigson of Philadelphia, Lake Dawson of Tennessee, and Les Snead of Atlanta. Grigson has since taken the GM job in Indianapolis.

Dawson was promoted Wednesday to vice president of player personnel by the Titans, which seemingly takes him out of play with the Rams. Dawson doesn't have the GM title in Tennessee, but why would the Titans give him a promotion if they thought he was leaving for St. Louis?

So the Rams' original list of nine general manager candidates — all of which the team had received permission to interview — continues to get whittled down. Eric DeCosta of Baltimore decided to stay with the Ravens almost as soon as his name appeared on the Rams' permission list.

As part of the front office shuffling announced Wednesday in Tennessee, another candidate — Ruston Webster — was promoted to general manager, thus taking himself out of consideration in St. Louis.

So assuming Dawson's out, that leaves Snead and four candidates the Rams received permission to interview but have yet to interview. Arizona director of player personnel Steve Keim; New York Jets vice president of college scouting Joey Clinkscales; Miami director of player personnel Brian Gaine; and Indianapolis director of player personnel Tom Telesco.

Demoff has indicated that three or four new candidates would be added to the list.

"This is the most important relationship in the building _ that between a head coach and a general manager," Demoff said. "We'll make sure we get it right."

Demoff said the fact that Grigson, Dawson and Snead were interviewed first didn't necessarily mean they were frontrunners for the GM job.

"It just happened that that was the timing that worked for them and that worked for us," Demoff said. "It might have been who answered our phone calls first on that day we slotted (for GM interviews)."

With Fisher knee-deep in assembling a coaching staff, Demoff said no general manager interviews would take place until next week.