Eight observations on the Miami Dolphins at the halfway point of 2008 Start running or it's over. During training camp, Sparano expressed complete confidence that Ricky Williams and Ronnie Brown would gear up the ground game as the heart of Miami's offense. That hasn't happened. The Dolphins have averaged just 73.5 yards rushing the past four weeks to fall to 11th in the AFC. Williams has just 283 yards, 40th in the NFL. He hasn't shown the power or explosiveness of the past. Brown gained more than 100 yards in consecutive games against the Patriots and Chargers, but in four games since he hasn't reached 60 yards. The Dolphins can't survive on the Wildcat and, besides, yardage out of that formation has drastically declined in each game since its debut at New England. This is the one if we don't get fixed very soon is going to kill us.
Couldn't agree more, i think put the wildcat on the shelf, concentrate on running behind that Long Character more and then in the last few games when its close, after not using the wildcat for sevearl weeks, use it near the endzone to catch a team off guard for 6. We need ronnie and ricky to get back on track to dominate the clock.
The running game has tapered off lately but we have to keep in mind that Ronnie and Ricky are being swapped out often to keep legs fresh and keep the opponent guessing. I don't believe the Dolphins need to have a 12-1500 yard rusher in this offense or even one guy who gets 20 carries for a buck 25 per game. If the balance is there and the consistency improves a bit combined with the accurate passing game this offense is in fine shape. This is not an explosive beat you with one play offense. This thing has been built to chip away at you in small chunks. That is why I don't mind seeing the three or four yard plays on first down as long as those chains are continuing to move. I don't see panic mode. When it comes to The Wildcat. Be done with it mates. Save it for a rainy day.
Our running game has gotten stale, and the Wildcat is longer fresh. When KC uses the Wildcat and Tyler Thigpen catches a touchdown pass, and we haven't even gotten there yet. We need to keep putting wrinkles in the Wildcat. Ronnie and Ricky need to have better games if they do not you are putting a lot of pressure on Chad.
Yep, agreed 100% brother. I see two things. Our "Conventional" running game is not good right now. We couldnt run against arguably the worst run Defense in the league last weekend. That is sad. If they are going to continue to use the WIldcat, they better figure out a couple new things other than Ronnie draw...Ronnie Fake-handoff then Draw etc....
NFL Stats: by Team Category We are 22nd in the league in rushing. That stinks for all the talent we have in our backfield. The only team in the AFC East that is worst then us is the Bills at 26.
I agree, but I would also add that we need for Pennington to get more touchdown passes. I wonder if he is concerned about turnovers in the red zone. We all know that those are game killers, and maybe he is thinking that 3 is better than nothing. I agree with all the 8 observations and side with the running game being the number one thing that needs to improve.
I also think teams before this week were saying to themselves stop the run, make chad beat us, which has loaded up the box against R&R. From here on out i don't htink that will be the case, its going to be drop back into zone schemes' which should open up the holes for ronnie and ricky. I think chad's consistent play has caught the attention of opposing d coordinators. I also think that while our running game has gone stale, it won't last long. And the key point to that which i believe CK has pointed out in other threads, is that our balance on offense, the running or chad's passing has been very good when it counted. They move the chain and score / kill clock when it matters. Thats been a huge difference and is prob. more important than our backs having 100 yard stat lines.
we have shown that if you put 8 in the box to stop our running game, we can and will beat you with the short passing game. we even used the short pass to run 8 minutes off the clock and beat Denver. How many times have you seen that done in this league? Certanly not on this team, not in the last 10+ years for sure. As we keep beating teams with the passing game, opponents will have to stop stacking the box and the running game should improve, it has to. And our OL is still only together 7 games, they have more learning and gelling to do. But no doubt we must improve our running game, as Sparano said "you won't win in the playoffs without a running game".
Theres one thing that every cinderells story has in common....THE 12TH MAN.. Our team is aware of winning us over, lets get there to find out if we can trust them or not......
Bingo, teams are also seeing that Camarillo can make them pay just as much as Ted Ginn can, soon they will have to respect the pass and that will open up teh run.
the thing about our running game is teams are loading up to stop it... and Chad, Teddy and Greggy are making them pay... eventually they wont be able to keep those extra guys in the box all game and the running game will open up
To be honest I think both the passing and the run game need to step up, or our season can go down hill fast.