21 carries, 73 yards, 3.5 avg... that average sounds awfully familiar... where have I seen that before?
I think they don't want him to get hurt.. it's the only logical explanation A returner is a dangerous profession. Especially in preseason.
Keller was in there too right? If Clay and Keller are both in the lineup they can run two TE or a single TE with a FB. Edit. Guess he wasn't since we opened with 3 WRs and Clay. Gibson started the game rather than Keller, FWIW.
Did you notice the blocking by the Jags on that play? And people think our offensive line is bad. The T/G combo on the left side appeared to completely ignore Robertson. But they sure got off the line fast I'd love to see a GIF of that play.
Honestly Tannehill needs to let it loose. I understand the offensive line play affecting him but he looks like a stiff out there. Still just the second game but eh, I don't see much difference yet from last year.
I think it's good that Philbin opted for the Hall of Fame game, as it's clear the team needs the work. The first team offense looks like an 8 cylinder engine running on 5 cylinders. The offensive line just looks anything but coherent right now, and that's with Martin appearing to have had a decent night. I don't know what type of effect the line's issues appear to be having on Tannehill, but if he has indeed stepped his game up I haven't seen any real tangible evidence of it yet. Defensively the first team looked outstanding, with Wake and Ellerbe looking like beasts. Will Davis made a nice interception, but more importantly, didn't allow himself to get beat deep on the play. I'd like to see Jamar Taylor get back to practice and soon. He's getting closer to the point where any more time missed might really set him back for this season. Caleb Sturgis might have basically sewn up the job with that 58 yard FG. That was a thing of beauty. On to Houston to face the Texans. Looking forward to this match-up as I think it could provide a bit better barometer of where we currently stand as a team. So far I'm seeing a defense that definitely looks as if it can be a much improved unit and an offense that, despite the new weapons, still looks like the mass exodus of a clown car. But that being said, there's 3 more weeks to get the kinks out. Let's hope they do.
and you can do that with Egnew, too. He's emerging as a better move TE than Clay if he keeps up his current pace.
Hard to take much from the defense since JAX didn't have MJD and two starting WR's (and their QB situation is not the best). OL again looked poor and is most likely going to be the weak link this year, but hopefully it improves. Offense definitely looked more comfortable, aside from when Tannehill had to run for his life because of the OL, needs a better test though.
Not from Daniel Thomas lol. He's never had a 2 TD game in his career... And Gray's numbers are with the 2's and 3's.
I thought besides the Keller adjustment, the best flash was Dion sims on that sideline play, his coordination on it was excellent, surprising, and he got downfield pretty quickly.
man our oline play..once upon a time [video=youtube_share;fmvSBk6HMx0]http://youtu.be/fmvSBk6HMx0[/video]
Good point except it seems to me we need to show the teams we will be playing this year that they must account for that possibility, we should target Wallace a few times to scare some DC's and also get some game time chemistry going between the two. It could have been, which seems more likely to me, that Tanny wasn't getting enough time in the pocket to allow Wallace-deep plays develop, plus they don't want to risk Tanny gtetting sacked any more than necessary in preseason.
I'm assuming those are Gray's stats. Wouldn't the short yardage he covered for those TD's bring down his YPG?
This was a weird incident... Blackmon starts jawing at Carroll, then his HC tells him to knock it off, then he gets into it with his own teammate in Babin, then he gets kicked off the sideline. Glad we didn't this draft this punk...
That too ya. It seems everything's pretty vanilla at this point. I'd like to see a few deep ones myself, maybe by game 4 they'll have that worked in better.
Either alcohol or he got hit more than we know and could be seeing the long term effects of too many concussions, which is what I'm inclined to believe. He's not stupid, so only way he shows up to comment on the air under the influence is if he's way gone alcoholic and we'd hear about that. I'm going with the concussion long term effects mostly out of respect for a HOFer who took us to the promised land and won it the only time we have and for that he earned my respect. I wish they would replace him though, sadly.
TE has been the pleasant surprise from camp and it seems that the depth has enabled Charles Clay to move to FB/HBack. Now, he'll be on the field with 4 other threats as opposed to past seasons where defenses did not worry that Fasano or Bess would break one. Let's hope LB depth starts a similar uptick.
I don't see any of draftees getting cut other than maybe Jones. I see maybe one or two undrafted guys making it.
The problem with that and I agree that Lane's value has decreased since he was laying crushing blocks when he first arrived in Miami, is that if Clay gets hurt, we don't have a fullback. I guess they could slide Gray into the spot in a pinch.. My guess is Gilli but I don't discount your guess as a real possibility.
On top of that, take out Gray's three 1 yard dives for TD's and a Firstdown in short yardage situations and he's really averaging 4.0 with the 2nd unit line. (Which are miracle numbers really)
Griese is a Dolphins fan - This is for fun. Why not. http://sports.espn.go.com/ncf/news/story?id=6087452
Lol... how weird is it that our 2 biggest receiving threats and guys we're rooting for the most are a former jet and former Steeler? It's also weird that one of my daughter's has a Macbook with the model # 1181... coincidence? lol...
The Good: Defensive backfield looks great. The Bad: We still don't have a pro quarterback. Gray is the best running back on the team. Dustin Keller is the best receiver on the team.
Really like the way Davis comes off the blitz, times the jump for the deflection...shows instincts for the playmaking gene.
Your short selling Lamar Miller bud - He is by far the best back on the team. Keller might be a great reciever but best on the team....I doubt it.
The Good: Dolphin games are available on television now. The Bad: Some people still prefer radio broadcasts.
If he could just tackle. I'm impressed so far in coverage, but in 2 games, I've got him for 3 missed tackles.
My observations. 1. Ryan Tannehill was clearly uncomfortable with the lack of pass protection. It showed up several times. Sometimes he handled it really well, buying time by stepping up into the pocket or out of it a little and throwing strikes (mostly over the middle of the field) but then there were times he tried to back foot the ball because of the discomfort, or made poor decisions when he rolled out to the sideline. But he really made up for some of the poor throws earlier with that touchdown pass which was superb. Was a great catch by Dustin Keller but the read and decision to throw the ball, as well as the placement of it, were all great. A lot of his poor throws I would swear he had the right idea just a misplaced ball in large part due to pressure. 2. Speaking of the poor decisions, it's flat out uncanny how poor Ryan Tannehill's decision making can be when he's rolling out to the sideline and about to go out of bounds. He's predictable, chancy and doesn't seem to have a sense for when a guy is covered. This goes all the way back to last year when he had several bad plays on plays like this. He had two more last night. I can't explain it. The quality of the decision making is far worse than it usually is on this type of play. 3. The offensive coaches started to give the line a lot of help once they realized Tannehill was getting rattled. You started seeing max protects out there, plus a lot of chip blocking. Most (actually I believe damn near all) of the chip blocks were directed at whoever Jonathan Martin was blocking. The max protections also allowed for easier, tighter zone protection by the offensive line, 4. The zone protection on the left side was very tight as Jonathan Martin and Richie Incognito had good chemistry. Richie was often there to protect Martin's inside shoulder. However the zone protection on the right side was shaky at best. There was very little chemistry between Josh Samuda and Tyson Clabo in their zone protection hand-offs. This is probably in part because of the lack of experience playing next to one another, as the interior of the line has been shuffled around a lot in camp. 5. Josh Samuda really struggled as he got straight up beat by Sen'Derrick Marks in pass pro twice and also had about two other sub-par blocks on the night while with the first unit. I think that's been discussed a lot. But Tyson Clabo struggled nearly as much. I'm talking about individually, not just with chemistry. One nagging thing I worry about with Clabo is that his superior pass protection is sourced in his power and his savvy, but you could tell toward the end in Atlanta that his age was sapping his athletic ability. This got tested against the Jaguars and it's a little disturbing when someone like Tyson Alualu is beating you with quickness and speed. I wonder about Clabo's ability to pick up stunts in the zone protection as he lacks the later burst to do this reliably, and that really came through at times in the game. I had at least 5 blocks from him that were terrible in the 1st quarter. The Dolphins might have to get Lance Louis to play right guard even if they lose a little bit in run blocking, because he has the lateral agility (even with a torn ACL) to help cover up Clabo's lack of agility. 6. Daniel Thomas had four runs on the night and he personally botched two of them. You can't blame the offensive line or point out the quality of competition, as they were unforced errors. On 2nd & Short the Dolphins rushed to the line and executed a dive play, and instead of bucking it up inside right behind Incognito and Pouncey, he hesitated, danced, and was caught for no gain. That's bad short yardage work. On his next carry he actually had the blocking to take the play for a good gain, but he tripped on his own feet as he took the ball and cut up the field, so the play only gained 2 yards. On the other hand, his next two carries were good. He had really good blocking on his third carry, especially by Richie Incognito who would not allow the defensive tackle to fill the gap. The next play he did not have great blocking as Samuda's man slanted inside and Samuda couldn't stop him from flashing into the play side running lane. Daniel Thomas cut it back to the back side and gained a decent amount of yards. Was a good play. 7. Jonas Gray didn't gain a lot of yards on the night. A lot of it was due to poor blocking from the 2nd string offensive line, but some of it was just due to his being unable to find the hole or break tackles. The thing that he did that interested me most was his work in short yardage. He had two carries on the goal line and produced touchdowns on both of them, just like he produced touchdowns at Notre Dame at a very, very high percentage from similar goal line carries. He was instinctive, decisive, quick and powerful. What I also liked was his 6 yard run from the 7 yard line that set up his own goal line punch in. In a compressed space like the tight red area from the 7 yard line, gaining 5 or 6 yards there is a highly successful run play and he did most of it just by showing an unusual will, with broken tackles and after-contact yardage. He displayed this at Notre Dame. I noted it fairly often. Given that last week he showed the ability to work the passing game including as a blocker, and now this week he showed unusual aptitude for short yardage work, I would say that Daniel Thomas does have a few things to be nervous about...because those are both his roles. Bottom line to me is, even if Daniel Thomas doesn't get bumped by Jonas Gray, I don't think the Dolphins are cutting Jonas this year. 8. Dion Sims was not quite the same blocker in this game that he was in the Hall of Fame game. The inconsistency we saw in college popped up in this game. What was flat out stunning was the success, attitude and competence displayed by Michael Egnew in his blocking effort. He spent much of the evening blocking and he did it willingly and successfully. His best blocks tend to be his cut blocks, where he gets to use that tremendous lower body explosion to explode into a defender's legs. That was also true in the Hall of Fame game. But really all of his blocks tended to be successful. What you need to see more of is him being successful making plays in the passing game. You see flashes of it but you want to see a breakout. Dion Sims on the other hand I still feel like has tight hips that prevent him from changing directions well. That came into play on that catch he had that should have been a touchdown. I'm sure Jonas Gray was thankful it wasn't, but the fact of the matter is if Dion was more agile and changed directions more quickly and fluidly, that would have been a touchdown. 9. I like Derrick Shelby a lot but he might consider looking in the rear view mirror once or twice to make sure that Tristan Okpalaugo isn't catching up on him. Tristan has a highly compelling body and good athleticism. He made plays last week and he made another play this week. When the Dolphins go to a 3-man front in pass rush situations with a 4th rusher standing up and choosing where to rush from, earlier in the game they had Olivier Vernon playing the part of that stand-up guy (that you imagine will eventually be Dion Jordan). However, later in the game it was Tristan Okpalaugo who was executing that role, and that's how he got his sack. I'd keep an eye out for him. They might try and keep him on the practice squad, but NFL teams are good at poaching defensive end talent when they have great frame/athleticism. 10. Speaking of Olivier Vernon, I was disappointed in him. We've heard a LOT about him in camp. He's successfully pass rushed Jon Martin quite a bit and the coaches have been talking him up constantly. Mike Sherman even recently referred to him as one of the very best pass rushers in the NFL. Well, Eugene Monroe disagrees, because he handled Olivier very easily. He knocked him on the ground quite a bit. When Olivier went to the look I talked about earlier, standing up and choosing where to rush from, he went over to Luke Joeckel's side and tried to pass rush him. Joeckel easily handled him as well. I don't understand why Cameron Wake wouldn't be in that role, if you wanted to use it. Vernon should be the guy that slants in and rushes the guard while Wake challenges the tackle on his outside. When Cam Wake had to rush a guard, with his size, he looked...average. And you never say that about Cameron Wake. He's a stellar football player. I think the coaches need to re-think some of their strategies. 11. If the 5th wide receiver spot is up for grabs between Marvin McNutt, Chad Bumphis and Brian Tyms, I don't think there's any question who wins. That would be Chad Bumphis. The coaches put him back on punt returns which was strange to me because I don't recall hearing once all week that he was working there in practice. In fact I remember reading who they had working there and continuing to wonder to myself, why don't they ever get Bumphis involved in that mix? Then we get to the game and suddenly he's back there. He bobbled the one punt return but luckily was able to recover it himself. Aside from that he had good decisions on fair catches, one good return, and one so-so return where there wasn't a lot of room to run. But he's still more interesting as a wide receiver than a return man. That 23 yard catch he had was eerie in how similar it was to several catches that Davone Bess made over the middle exactly like that. He made a heck of a play. Rookies make mistakes (as he did on his bobbled punt return) but it's a great sign when they respond to those mistakes. He also made another good play converting a 3rd and short where the ball was too high and he had to jump for it which allowed the tackler to get on him quickly enough after the catch to prevent the 1st down, but Bumphis kept his feet, swiveled and lunged for the extra yard. Very nice work. Marvin McNutt had some good running on that end-around and also caught a low ball during the game, and made a play that way. However, it might not be enough to erase the drops he's had in practice. Brian Tyms continues to be mostly potential but not performance. He had several mistakes during the game, though he did make a nice play hitting the punt returner after he bobbled the punt. 12. I've changed my mind about Jordan Kovacs. He was the other UDFA I highlighted this year along with Chad Bumphis. But I thought Kovacs would be more likely for the practice squad because his athleticism and size are not really compelling enough that you'd be sure he is claimed off waivers. Well, I still don't know how coveted he would be on the waiver wire, but I think he makes the 53 man squad regardless. He looks for all the world like the Miami Dolphins' THIRD best safety on the team. The coaches may still like Kelcie McCray more but it's hard for me to imagine Kovacs not being in the top four amongst the safeties. He hustles to the ball and is always near it. His tackling is good. He runs all out at all times because he sees the field and runs with certainty. He is very disciplined in coverage and actually his athleticism is underrated. He can keep up with guys. He was out there directing the other guys in the secondary multiple times. And what else, of course? He's going to be a darling special teams guy because of his mentality. I really think he makes the roster. 13. Some clean-up. I watched Sam Brenner because of the indications that the coaches may like him a lot, and also the fact that there are scouts that like him. I saw the same thing I saw at Shrine practices, which is an unimpressive player. Kheeston Randall continues to perform well. Vaughn Martin is interesting in that he excels in certain situations such as double-teams and short yardage when he gets to display his core strength. But in other situations he's uninteresting. I'd consider him for a role as a run stopping specialist in short yardage. Lee Robinson was once again somewhere between "ok" and "impressive". Not a lot of work for Dion Jordan, which was curious. The Dolphins made no effort to get Mike Wallace involved in the game even though he played most of the 1st quarter, and you have to imagine they're just not showing all their cards. The Jags played a lot of shell and Tannehill dealt with a lot of pressure, and these things made Wallace fairly invisible. They showed ways they can get Brian Hartline involved even under those circumstances, but do they have ways they can do that with Mike Wallace? I guess it goes back to the whole "one trick pony" question. There's really not much to say about Will Davis' performance other than just giving the kid a thumbs up for a heck of an interception, and also for knocking down that pass on a blitz. Otherwise, not much to say. He did allow one catch I saw. I got the feeling that despite his interception, Nolan Carroll had a rough night in coverage. Jimmy Wilson had a bad game and didn't have a good Hall of Fame game either. At this point it's tough to imagine him making the team.
I was wondering the same, then Tanny said in the post-game interview that they'd called a few plays for Wallace, but he didn't have the time to get it to him, so it sounds like more of the latter than the former. Nice write-up, thanks!
The entire NFL world knows what they have planned for Wallace. Every single Dolphin fan on the planet knows what they have planned for Wallace. What secret formula do you possibly believe they are hiding. Is Wallace going to be invisible or something come the opening regular season game?? Hell, he is invisible already thru two preseason games. This statement is rediculous. Wallace will stretch defenses, there is no big secret. If Wallace hasn't caught a ball yet it isn't because they are hiding something spectacular. Wallace will run deep routes, they won't be special routes no other team knows about and a totally uncoverable suprise once we unveil it upon teams. Sssshhhh...We have the secret weapon Wallace play. The fact that Wallace hasn't caught a ball thru two preseason games shouldn't be an unrecoverable concern, but it should be a concern.
