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Gase taking new approach with rookie mini camp

Discussion in 'Miami Dolphins Forum' started by Phins_Fan_87, May 2, 2016.

  1. Phins_Fan_87

    Phins_Fan_87 Phins and Heat fan Club Member

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    [video=twitter;727135001041620993]https://twitter.com/ProFootballTalk/status/727135001041620993[/video]

    I like it.
     
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  2. Fame

    Fame Well-Known Member

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    The article says the "camp" will be focused on things like nutrition, sports science, personal finance, and dealing with the media in addition to diving into the playbook.

    Seems like a pretty good idea to me. Let the rookies know that this is a job, not a vacation. Get them in the meeting room and get them learning.
     
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  3. dolfan7171

    dolfan7171 Well-Known Member

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    I like that too. It makes a lot sense. I hope they take advantage of this and apply it to their lives.
     
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  4. Finster

    Finster Finsterious Finologist

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    Thinking outside the box, but making a ton of common sense, I like it.
     
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  5. Agua

    Agua Reality: Try It!

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    Sure, why not.
     
  6. djphinfan

    djphinfan Season Ticket Holder Club Member

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    The point about these kids not doing drill work after doing three months of drill training makes some sense..
     
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  7. dolfan7171

    dolfan7171 Well-Known Member

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    These guys will most likely be the ones they want to focus on in training camp. They'll be healthier and they'll learn some life skills at the same time. Good move.
     
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  8. Finster

    Finster Finsterious Finologist

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    It's a nice little buffer, I liken it to the Army, where you go to reception first for a couple days, getting your gear and hearing about what's to come, gives you a little breathing time before you get thrown into the meat grinder, to mentally prepare as well as you can.
     
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  9. dolphin25

    dolphin25 Well-Known Member

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    not to mention learning the playbook too. I like this.
     
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  10. brandon27

    brandon27 Season Ticket Holder Club Member

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    Wouldn't it be nice if we've landed a coach that has such a positive impact on this team that other coaches in the league start following suit? Man, that would really mean we made a really good decision for once in the recent past involving head coach.

    Interesting idea and concept. The only downside is the one pointed out in the article, this is a quick first chance to really see how these kids are going to look right in front of your very own eyes. I guess though, you could also say, the lack of these few practices, is really going to make this kids want to put the mental effort in now, so when training camp starts, they can go all out to impress, and at least have a clue.

    Sounds like this could be a positive.
     
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  11. Finster

    Finster Finsterious Finologist

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    I don't think you miss much at all skipping these couple practices, because these guys are who they are whether you put them out there or not, and getting in the building, talking with the coaches, understanding what it is they expect of you, will give them a bit of an acclimation period, and will likely produce better practices when the time comes, because that first rookie camp is usually sloppy, and in large part is probably due to a lot going through the heads of draftees, and not just football.

    It does make a ton of sense, and I could see it becoming the norm in the NFL, something that once realized makes people thump their head and say "now why hadn't I thought of that?".
     
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  12. Fin D

    Fin D Sigh

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    I'm in favor of trying this new concept, I disagree with the author of the article though in his description of the one minor downside. Its not real it doesn't matter. What may be a downside however, is that some of these rookies may be the type to learn better by applying it on the field right away. We'll see though.
     
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  13. Brasfin

    Brasfin Well-Known Member

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    Sounds good. It'd be nice if the rookies got tested at the end of the minicamp to see how much they were able to learn and what areas they are weakest at so that they could study a bit prior to training camp.
     
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  14. jdang307

    jdang307 Season Ticket Holder Club Member

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    Every new regime brings with it new techniques, in the end, it all comes down to the talent they've acquired. Remember Philbin with the two practice fields, Parcells with his lifting program, etc.
     
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  15. Finatik

    Finatik Season Ticket Holder Staff Member Club Member

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    And one of the biggest parts, that they don't get to hear about some of this stuff since the rookie symposium has been done away with. Financial planning, sports science, and dealing with the media are all "skills" that they should be hearing about. And not beating your wives, girl friends and driving drunk. Yeah. That too.
     
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  16. MikeHoncho

    MikeHoncho -=| Censored |=-

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    Gase looks like a Chad Pennington / Vladimir Putin lovechild.
     
  17. Fin D

    Fin D Sigh

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    Joke stealer
     
  18. MikeHoncho

    MikeHoncho -=| Censored |=-

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    So, a priest, a rabbi and Bill Murray walk into a bar...
     
  19. Conuficus

    Conuficus Premium Member Luxury Box

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    Well away from here
    One would also get a chance to see which players are actually learning from a mental aspect to that of physical aspect. Your body only does what your mind wants; not the other way around. Jimmy Johnson once said "shoot me in the head if I ever take a dumb player."

    I agree, you can't do **** with them.
     
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  20. Conuficus

    Conuficus Premium Member Luxury Box

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    The symposium was important. Who's ****ing was that?
     
  21. dolfan7171

    dolfan7171 Well-Known Member

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    You make a good point right here. I like players who are mentally tough. If they are strong mentally, I think it will naturally carry over into the physical and technical stuff they will learn in camp.
     
  22. The_Dark_Knight

    The_Dark_Knight Defender of the Truth

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    I was watching a documentary once on the '72 Dolphins once and in this piece, Don Shula stated that following the loss in the Super Bowl to the Dallas Cowboys, he worked his team essentially like dogs in the blazing heat of Miami to get them into the best shape of their lives; not wanting a repeat of the previous season. Shula recognized the Dolphins had the fortune of playing in a city with high heat and high humidity, two factors that take a toll on athletic performance (after all, "Gatorade" was developed by the University of Florida!) and wanted to exploit that for every Miami home game.

    I understand what Gase is doing with his rookies and I actually think it's a pretty good idea, provided these rookies understand that being drafted isn't the pinnacal of their careers but merely the beginning. I just hope that Gase himself will take a page out of Shula's playbook; dump that stupid air conditioned dome, WHIP these players into the best shape of their lives and run opponents into the ground during home games in Miami. Even in November/December, when it's blustering cold north of the Mason/Dixon line, it's still hot and humid in Miami, an element that the Dolphins need to take advantage of, much like the frigid conditions the Packers have always taken advantage of at Lambeau Field.

    Like I said, I think Gase's approach with these rookies is pretty good in this day and age of "me, me, me". I just hope that he also takes full advantage of what he has down in Miami like Shula did and return glory back to Miami.
     
  23. Finatik

    Finatik Season Ticket Holder Staff Member Club Member

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    Each team is supposed to do a "local" program now.
     
  24. Galant

    Galant Love - Unity - Sacrifice - Eternity

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    Just found this article on Gase in the UK's The Guardian newspaper - How One Young Coach is Modernizing the NFL's Most Meaningless Weekend by Les Carpenter

    "The idea was such a good one, you’d have thought someone in an NFL team office would have come up with it before. New Miami Dolphins coach Adam Gase is re-inventing one of the most meaningless weekends in professional football: the rookie minicamp. It’s about time.Football coaches have long tried to exact complete control over their players, filling the off-seasons with purposeless spring practices that exist solely to manipulate workout schedules and keep players in close sight. Athletes in other sports get vacations when their seasons end, NFL players get loaded up with empty drills invented to keep them occupied. These offseason workouts have official football-sounding names like Organized Team Activities and Minicamp, but the actual football involves players in shorts standing around while the coaches blow whistles.

    None has less function than the rookie minicamp, a week-end affair that comes right after the draft and presumably exists to acclimate draft picks and undrafted free agents to the team’s offensive and defensive schemes. But teams do little with these days. They fear getting their new draft picks will get hurt and are loath to teach any of their plays to players they will soon cut. The few plays they do run come with fictitious names and are discarded at the end of the camp. For example, the Jets once named a rookie minicamp play after a sportswriter.
    Gase, in his first spring with the Dolphins, is re-thinking the rookie minicamp. The Miami Herald’s Armando Salguero reports that Gase will not have the Dolphins rookies touch the field this weekend. Instead, Miami’s rookie minicamp will be a series of meetings that not only discuss scheme but also how to act like a professional athlete. Salguero reports here will be sessions on nutrition, financial planning, dealing with the media and sports science. Given that the Dolphins’ first-round pick in last week’s draft was Laremy Tunsil, who looked overmatched by the real world on draft night, such tutorials are more than appropriate.

    The Dolphins’ minicamp will only have 18 players, which means there’s actually a possibility they will learn something. There is also an excellent chance the Dolphins life skills clinic won’t be anything like the NFL’s own rookie symposium best known for Hall of Famer Cris Carter’s advice that players designate a member of their “crew” to be “a fall guy” when trouble hits.
    In an NFL where teams focus more on analysis and diet and are looking to other sports for inspiration, Gase is a good fit as a head coach. Most know him as the Broncos offensive coordinator during Peyton Manning’s first years with the team or as Chicago’s coordinator last season. I remember him more as the coach who might have gotten more out of Tim Tebow than anyone else.
    This was in those heady last few weeks of the 2011 regular season when Tebow led Denver to an inexplicable AFC West title and an overtime playoff win over Pittsburgh. The mania surrounding Tebow churned at outrageous heights. Much of the credit for nursing eight wins out of him went to coach John Fox who changed the offense to maximize Tebow’s running. The rest went to offensive coordinator Mike McCoy who implanted Fox’s changes. But the coach who molded Tebow in those weeks, who spent hours with him in film rooms and on the field, was Gase.
    Gase was the one who drilled Tebow on his footwork and talked for hours with the quarterback about his throwing mechanics. They dissected film together and chatted on the phone late at night. Gase handed Tebow the films of plays and formations that Tebow would take home and devour each evening. The modest improvement Tebow showed in his throwing that season came from the endless hours they spent keeping Tebow balanced when he threw.

    It was Gase who told me then that Tebow could “flip a switch,” converting from a jovial, almost hyper presence in the locker room to calm on the field. For two and a half months Gase channeled that focus and gave Tebow the most useful weeks of his career.

    As a worldwide frenzy swirled around Tebow and the Broncos, Gase and Tebow worked mostly undisturbed. Their post-practice workouts took place in the far corners of the team’s facility. Their conversations were away from the noise. Sometimes they joked about the all-out blitz of attention Tebow got and laughed about the perception that Tebow was only obsessed with religion when the reality was that he was a football nerd consumed with learning offenses. When Tebow left Denver he was never the same as a player.
    Now after runs with Manning and Jay Cutler, Gase has a team of his own. To some this was a surprise given he was never one of these coaches who promoted himself, drumming his name to the top of hiring lists. But in his first big move as Dolphins coach he has done something smart by getting rid of the dumbest practices and forcing his rookies to understand the fishbowl into which they have been dropped.

    Watching poor Laremy Tunsil the other night bewildered by the Twitter and Instagram accounts that ruined his draft, it is clear they need all the life skills training they can get. Save the football for a practice that really matters."
     
  25. VanDolPhan

    VanDolPhan Club member Club Member

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    Teams are also encouraged to switch after the Fowler injury last year.
     
  26. finfansince72

    finfansince72 Season Ticket Holder Club Member

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    I think the feeling is that injuries early on and off the field stuff derail rookies just as much so as lack of talent, coaching, etc. How many careers are ruined because of off the field stuff? If we can get everyone into camp healthy with their heads focused on football then its not such a bad idea. Hopefully this works out, I think it makes a lot of sense.
     
  27. Clark Kent

    Clark Kent Fighter of the Nightman

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    1972 was a long time ago and the era's are not comparable. In this day in age, the majority of NFL athletes in are in top shape (And more than likely, using various PED's to do so), to get a piece of the pie, which unlike other major sports, isn't guaranteed. You can't squeeze blood from a stone. Working them like dogs has no real advantages in this day in age. In fact, it's more than likely detrimental.

    As for rookies, they've been spending 8-10 hours a day preparing for combines, pro days, private workouts, etc... In addition to just having played a college football season. these rookies are undoubtedly in the best shape of their lives (to date). They need physical rest to prepare for an even longer, more grueling football season too.

    I do like the idea of getting rid of the bubble, making every practice outdoors, rain or shine, to acclimate to Miami's weather.
     

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