Jason La Canfora: The Miami Dolphins are overhyped

Is there that much hype around this team?

He says we'll probably be 8-8 or fighting for the last Wild Card spot. That seems to be where more or less everyone has projected the Phins.

Kinda seems like a strawman. He's acting like us making flashy moves means everyone is picking us to win it all, which isn't true. If we hadn't made any moves I'm sure it would've been, "a mediocre team from a year ago failed to improve their team in significant ways."

 

Have we been hyped..at all?

Not really, more like "..they will take LT Lane Johnson..uhm..yeah.."

 

I actually thought that's exactly what he was implying. The premise of his piece about the Phins was built around an idea that they are hyped to be a great team.

 

I didn't think he said anything earth shattering. Those are question marks and could hold us back. I don't think our ceiling or "at best" is 8-8 though. I disagree with that. If our FA's work out, Dion Jordan rushes the passer, and Martin handles himself I see us having a ceiling of 10-6. I'm not suggesting those things will happen, but if things fall into place it absolutely could.

 

I love how some assume a team is suddenly overhyped because they were very active in free agency and the draft.

 

Stuff Canfora......If he can have an exotic (La?..really?) name then i can have the same thoughts. I hope we go the whole way and prove his educated, logical, knowledge minded brain wrong! Maybe im being too optimistic but ya never know!

 

I stopped caring about national media said about this football team a long time ago. That said, even if La Canfora had been glowing I would have recommended binning the article. The guy is a TOTAL hack.

 

Pretty much every prediction he had about the draft was wrong. Pretty much everything he said about teams in FA was wrong. So what he's saying is we can expect a Super Bowl appearance since everything he says the opposite seems to occur. This is why I only read certain writers. Sure its a matter of opinion but he picked the Cowboys who have one of the all time choke players at qb as a surprise team.

 

No matter how he worded it, he was fairly spot on as to where this team is... Are there not questions about the running game?? LT ?? Are we not all here saying that we'll go as far as Tanny takes us ?? I might disagree with the last section about enough help for Wake, I think that was addressed with Jordan, but really if there was/is hype about this team, it's not coming from the fanbase...

 

Don't forget 2 field goals and the Fins are 9-7 with a rookie QB that played 19 games in college and no weapons.
In my work you open your mouth and you are wrong you loose it all but all of these guys say whatever and there are no consequences.
Case in point Jamie Dukes, that fat **** actually is offensive and with little depth and he still has a job.
Last year this team had less talent than in the last 3 and they did better.

 

Well, once one understands NFL media types are a step below National Enquirer standards, one begins to grasp why no one should pay attention to them.

"Dolphins Sign Bat Boy, Dolphins open secret training facility on Moon"

To engage his points:

-Tannehill was not all that good last season anyway
-Dansby was to "leader" as Anhydrous is to Wet
-Running Backs still matter? He should talk to his colleagues, they seem to differ in opinions on that matter

 

I don't think anyone disagrees with his assessment of the team, they disagree with what would constitute a 'disappointment.' He seems to imply that 8-8 or fighting for the Wild Card would be a disappointment, I'm guessing that's where most of us see this team this year.

I'm sure as hell not predicting 12-4 and a Super Bowl win.

 

I've seen that facility...it's great...hehehehe

 

all he basically said was he doesn't see us as a legit threat to the Pats (which is probably true) and there's better and more proven teams in the AFC that we won't be able to beat out for one of the 2 wildcard spots.

 

I really do expect 10-6 or better tbh, Philbin runs a tighter ship then Sparano imo

My one real worry, and no one is talking about it...really, really, do not like PK Sturgis, that can cost us wins, in a way I'm hoping DCash rounds back into form as we need someone who is money and neither strike me as that type of performer.

 

Would you have thought the stealers missed the playoffs last yr?

 

i dont know, i've seen quite a few fans on here proclaim this season as playoffs or bust

 

Yes a few guys on the NFLN are jocking the Dolphins pretty hard.

 

I thought that with the emergence of Cincinnati, yes, either Baltimore or Pittsburgh could be on the outside looking in.

Ravens
Steelers
Bengals

Texans
Colts
Titans

Pats
Fins

Broncos
Chiefs

if i had to guess, 6 of these 10 teams will be competing for 2 wildcard spots, including Miami, because we aren't winning the division. all La Canfora said was if people are expecting us to be a playoff team, he doesn't see it.

 

Does it matter what people "here" proclaim?

Nope, nor does it matter what Confora has to say, at the end of it all you have to play the games.

Will say, much of what the NFL commentariat thinks is very much conventional wisdom, which normally is proven wrong, if one recalls Joe Flacco was barely Chad Henne prior to last season, he sucked, game manager, blah blah.

How did that turn out? Was there a montage of the talking heads slamming him in prior years?

Nope.

 

He's giving us his opinion based on the theory of going all in to buy a championship...That's not our philosophy for this staff at this time..I've never heard of the youngest team in the league going all in..

It was a poor projection of our team, not mentioning anything about the coach going into his 2nd year and how one would want his own players, how much money we had to work with, and how young the players we did sign were..

We didnt ask to be hyped, but because of the aggressive approach by the GM and the room he had to play with, then the ill informed put us into a theory that they can understand without doing any real work.

 

Yeah, seems like a mixed blessing to me...

 

What does this pudgy prick know? He's paid to stare at his blackberry.

 

I know right. It's such a bad thing we drastically improved the worst receiving corps in the NFL; improved offensive speed at WR/TE, seemingly methodically refaced the linebacking corps with greater speed, blitz/pass rush capability, and overall playmaking ability; upgraded the secondary with better ball skills and improved depth; then topped it off by adding the draft's top defender. Last time I checked Super Bowl teams don't win SBs by having inferior ability, so any notion that our FA moves are inconsequential is kinda silly to me.

 

The thing most people forget is that every off season, almost every team has an argument that they "got better". especially since teams have matured in their handling of the salary cap and now typically avoid those "cap hell" off season purges.

But this is a competitive league. All 32 teams can't have gotten better.

 

.... which is why I could easily see a team like San Diego finishing 4-12 this year, the transitional Steelers going 6-10, and the Bears have a couple things go wrong and finish trying to break .500.

 

How can you be "overhyped" before you have taken a snap in a season game? Nobody has a cystal ball let alone a media guy looking for readers.

 

That is why the offseason is so much fun.

 

I get where he is coming from, historically, teams who spend big in FA fail to see an equivalent return on their investments and typically have cap trouble within a short time. The difference with Miami is that Ireland was able to add talent without mortgaging the future the way the Cowboys, Redskins, Jets etc have done recently.

And the talk about question marks is meh, all teams have weaknesses. It'd be foolish to predict a record at this point b/c of how much turnover the roster has undergone but I'm not the least bit worried about the Colts or Bengals.

 

Since I have been stating for weeks that I feel the Dolphins will be an 8-8 team in 2013, I really didn't have a problem with what La Canfora wrote regarding the Dolphins. He is 100% correct that the Dolphins still have not fixed their problem at the LT position. The secondary is still a huge question mark and we have no idea if any of the RB's on the roster will be as effective as Bush was.

I do agree with those who stated that the Dolphins really haven't been that hyped in the media. Some individuals in the media have spoken positively about the off season moves the Dolphins have made, while others haven't been that impressed. So I'm not sure why La Canfora seems to think the Dolphins have been over hyped at this time.

The biggest question for the Dolphins still remains, will Tannehill become the long term answer for the Dolphins at the QB position? Until we know the answer to this question, we have no way of knowing if the off season moves will benefit this team or not. If Tannehill becomes a quality starter this season, the Dolphins could possibly get to nine wins and while this will probably not get them into the playoffs, it will show that Tannehill and the team are headed in the right direction.

If Tannehill does not continue to develop and he proves to be just another mediocre starter in the NFL. The Dolphins will probably end up with their fifth losing season in a row. If this happens, Ross will spend next season looking for more than just taxpayer funding to renovate the stadium. Another losing season would mean Ireland would be out of a job, Philbin would definitely be on the hot seat with the new GM and with Ross. The new GM would also be looking at the QB's in the 2014 draft to see if he can find the QB of the future for the Dolphins.

So the 2013 season is all about finding out if Tannehill is the future or not. If he is, the playoffs will be something the Dolphins will be a part of soon enough. If he isn't the answer, the playoffs won't be something the Dolphins will be playing in for several more years.

 

In order for you to be overhyped I think you gotta at least have a baseline prediction as to how the team will perform. From all of the NFLN and ESPN coverage I've seen no one has put a W/L to it or said we are going to the Superbowl. I haven't even, with the exception of 1 or 2 folks, that we are even going to the playoffs. So aside from saying we made a big splash in FA and in the draft....what exactly is the "Hype" saying we are going to do?

 

The only hype Miami has gotten is the fact their offseason has been exciting. The signing of Wallace and the drafting of Jordan. Other than that, people pretty much have said they are the 2nd best team in the AFC East and have a chance at fighting for a wild card spot.

I don't see how that is overhyped. Mostly beause last season Miami was fighting for a wild card spot and wasn't eliminated until the last week of the season.

 

I don't disagree completely with the article. I do think we've improved the team in all areas with the exception of left tackle. that remains to be seen. im not sure why he doesn't put us on par with cincinnati and Indianapolis. we beat cincinnati pretty soundly. we lost to Indianapolis but it wasn't a devastating defeat. I think we can beat both teams.

And if Dion Jordan explodes, we can compete with NE. Who doesn't have Gronk for god knows how long or Welker.