Yes.

 

We haven't gotten worse at any position other than FS & LG. Yet, we've improved TE x 2, LT, LB, DE and safety depth. Plus, there's more FA time left and the draft.

And of course, Thill and Jones are back from injuries.

 

In my opinion we're the same team. We lost a few players but replaced them with players who were injured before and hoping they regain their mojo. We may be a little better on defense but we did nothing to stop the run which was horrible up the middle.

In other words we're counting on injured players from last year to vastly improve this team.

 

Last year I wouldn't have pegged Ajayi to do what he did, when Foster went down it wasn't looking good.
Last year I would have expected that OL to actually hold up as well as they did.
Last year I didn't expect the team to make the playoffs.

Clearly, I don't know squat.
I'm okay with that.

So right now, on the question of if we're better now, my answer is - I have no idea. This is a new outfit, new approach, and thus, I have no opinion. Instead, I'm waiting to see how things play out.

I can say I like the fact the Dolphins haven't splurged again. I've not seen anything this FA that scares me. I'm hopeful for how things turn out, but I've no idea what that might prove to be. So really none of this matters.*




*See above - I don't know beans.

 

IMO we're better at DE, LB and possibly TE. We're worse in the secondary (That IAQ injury hurts us at a critical position) and on the OL (although adding the best run blocking TE in the league helps mitigate that). And we're worse at DT b/c we haven't signed a third DT. I felt we needed to upgrade from Mitchell anyways so I can't criticize that move. But I also don't see the wisdom in forgetting the draft and the rest of FA b/c a wise FO should consider where to stock new players from rather than try and fix everything in one phase.

 

Getting our best player in Reshad back is huge. THill, Maxwell missed the last 4 games obviously.

We lost IAQ but Nate Allen is a better FS than Michael Thomas/Walt Aikens.

Timmons is a clear upgrade over Paysinger.

Julius Thomas and Fasano are def upgrade over Sims/Jones.

Tunsil will upgrade over Albert at LT, and Larsen will hopefully upgrade at G simply because he actually is a Guard.

 

I think people forget just how devastating injuries have been for us last year and in the past. I mean, we went 10-6 with essentially an entire second string defense on the field...Suh was the only projected starter on the field for all 17 games. The way Moore, Ajayi and the O line closed out the year was the real difference maker and a huge building block for 2017.

So are we better for this season? Absolutely.

 

Agree on a lot of your points and the defensive struggles last year were directly related to not being able to stop the run and having inexperienced / less talents corners and safeties exposed way to much. Outside of Suh the interior line and linebacker play wasn't good enough. This year they get back some key players but like any year more will get hurt. They will also face what I consider tougher opponents this year so they better not think they can coach without talent. How much of this is on Gase I dunno but I feel front office is controlling off-season acquisitions with Gase having little say.

 

You didn't really explain why you think we aren't better right now.

I guess I'd like to see an explanation as to how you think with all the recoveries and new players, how you think we either broke even or got worse.

 

How can you say we haven't improved our run defense with Timmons, Hayes and Reshad back from injury?

 

WADR, this isn't making sense. You asked if we're better than the team that lost to Pitt in the playoffs.

The defense of your stance is more about why we aren't GREAT against the run. But how can you say Reshad, Hayes and Timmons aren't better against the run than what we had in the playoffs?

 

I'd rather evaluate this team vs the totality of the one that played 17 games last year. Injuries will happen every year and the roster/ depth that grinded through the season is more relevant than the one that played game 17, imo.

I'd say we're a wash on D. Lose Mitchell and IAQ. Lost our D.C. More mileage on Wake. Add Timmons, Hayes for depth and hopefully get back a healthy Jones. Still have lots of question marks.

Slightly worse on O. Added competition on OL, but lost Albert and Stills got paid. Added Thomas, but imo skill position was never a weakness. Only so may balls to go around. My concern is that the team established its winning identity with the spark from a strong Oline and running game. Thus far we're moderately worse off in that regard. At least on paper.

Draft and adding cheap vets that are released could definitely push it the other way into the better camp. They did what they needed to do though, sign your own key pieces and build through the draft rather than breaking the bank on FAs.

 

I'm not trying to be difficult.

I'm going by the premise you set up. And those three are significantly better vs. the run than what we had at the end of our season.

 

Again, I'm confused.

In one post you ask if we'll be top 15 on run and then say we were bottom 4. You asked about improvement. Are we improved? Yes. maybe the moves we've made make us #16 from 28. That's a huge improvement.

And yes I think it's possible with these changes we could be a Top 15 unit.

 

I am confused. Are you asking if the Dolphins will have a top offense and/or defense? Or are you asking if the Dolphins who played the last game against the Steelers are better than the current roster?

IMO, the current roster is better.
IMO, hopefully there will be more improvements at Guard and defense.

 

I think what he's saying and I am to a degree is unless this defense steps up significantly or we obtain some more do your job players ala New England were destined for a defense in the teens - 20's which isn't good enough this year to make the playoffs

 

True. While the dolphins were over 20s in yards, they were under 20s when it came to scoring.

 

Pass catching TE was a weakness...esp one that we could flex. JTs strength is forcing the Defense to adjust it's lineup. He has to be covered with a DB...hes been successful beating that coverage, but it also gives us favorable numbers to run the ball. We did not have that last year.

 

Absolutely! God it feels good to not be the team making all the same mistakes over and over again.

For the first time in decades, you feel like there's a good plan in place and the right people are there to lead and execute.

 

It's pretty much impossible to tell at the moment, and we don't even have enough players on the DL to play a game at the moment, but what is more relevant is the fact that to attain the same success next year, we will have to be significantly better.

The only reason we made the playoffs last year is because of the parade of losers we played, being as good as we were last year will send us back down to 500 or worse, similar to '08.

What we really need, and this hasn't changed for a while now, is to start hitting home runs on some draft picks, guys like X, Parker and Phillips need to be better, dropping 1sts and 2nds on OK players ain't gonna get it done, you've got to knock it out of the park sometimes.

We'll see how these guys progress, but we need to stop giving away draft picks and start drafting better.

 

The biggest problem with last years defense wasn't giving up points. When the defense was relatively healthy they were around 12th-15th in scoring allowed. They finished the year at 18th. Should we want better? Of course.

However, the biggest problem was they bent too much. They didn't allow the offense to get on the field and score points. And IMO, that was due to their inability to stop the run. Timmons is an upgrade. Jones is a huge cog in stopping the run. If Timmons can play as well as he did last season this defense, as it stands right now, is better overall. And hopefully they can bring in a hole clogging DT to rotate with Suh and Phillips and grab another S in FA and/or the draft. Losing IAQ hurt.

Lippett and Howard are now one year older and more experienced.

People seem to ignore the fact that when our O-line was healthy they did extremely well. That included Bushrod.

Tunsil (back at his natural position), Pouncy (who I hope can stay healthy) Steen (who I believe is good enough to be a starter at G), Larsen, and the G's they get in FA/Draft should be at least as good as last years unit.

I see the offense being as good or better than last year. Mostly because of experience with Gase and the system.

 

The defense was what held us back, needed improvements...

Nate Allen is better than either of our Safeties that started in Pittsburgh last year. No one expected much from IAQ but he proved to be solid...and Allen can play as well. Either way he's a better option than what we had in the playoffs.
And then you factor in Jones instead of Rambo. ++++++++

Maxwell is in a contract year +
X.Howard should be healthy and improved ++
Lippett with another year of progression +

Alonso with more freedom outside ++
Timmons an upgrade at MLB++
Koa Misi is a still a thumper, hopefully he restructures, if so +
Hull,Hewitt, etc with another year of progression, same system +

Who's the 3rd DT? very important - -
B.Phillips prove it year though +
Hayes over Mario Williams, Jones +++

This team should be much improved on the defensive side already, and we are about to draft heavy on that side. With the D talent in this draft, we could nab two first round quality players with our first 2 picks.

 

one thing that irks me in this thread is people not realizing IAQ is never playing football again, unfortunately. So people saying Allen is worse than what we had are saying he's worse than Thomas which simply isn't true.

 

Well, this is a thread comparing the team to last year when we did have IAQ.

 

I agree with you...but you're no longer asking if we are just "better". Instead, you're asking if we're dominant on defense and we all know the answer there is no. This is not a dominant squad on either side of the ball.

However, could we be dominant on offense with our starting 11? I think we can. Another year of chemistry and confidence should go a long way for our line, our RB's and our QB/receiver chemistry, so I'm really not worried about adding any pieces there. If we grab another guard that's a potential starter then that's great, but I don't think it's necessary to have a repeat 10-6 performance.

We had a two-game stretch early on where we couldn't block a single person and lost to vastly inferior teams....we should have been 12-4 instead of 10-6. Then you look at the Seattle game where Stills dropped the easiest TD of his career, we missed multiple field goals, etc. That should have been a win as well, which makes us 13-3. Then look at the comeback against NE where Parker missed the game-tying catch on the final play- that was probably Tannehill's (and our offense's) best performance ever. One catch away from being 14-2.

Then we got blown out twice.

But here's the thing though- those four losses, those four games that kept us from being the #1 seed in the AFC and getting a 1st round bye...the offense was what technically lost 3 of 4, but ultimately cost us all 4 games. Sure, the D could have stepped up against NE and in our two other blowout losses, and you can't blame the 1st NE game on the offense since they came back like wildfire. So on the year, you really have 3 losses on the D and 3 (or 4, if you count NE) on the O.

So when I'm looking at "are we better" than last season, I look at those four key losses to see if we have pieces in place to prevent them from happening again. In Seattle, I don't think Stills drops that pass ever again. In weeks 3 and 4, I don't think our line becomes that lethargic and allows our QB to be leveled on every pass attempt. Against NE, I think Parker still mis-times that throw and misses but that's because he's been on injured reserve way too much to know if he's a stud or a dud.

If we match last season stride for stride (meaning we are as good but not better), that puts us at a 13-3 team. Mathematically, that's better because of the adjustments we made last season. Of course, our schedule is a lot tougher this year so that's not what our record will be....but I think we have a good shot at repeating a 10-6 performance against better teams. That's better too.

 

There is always an inherent problem with looking at games we should/could have won, because there is a flip side to that coin, games we won that we should/could have lost, like say Cle, SD and LA, and what if Ben didn't get injured in the 1st Steelers game.

We were involved in a lot of games where 1 play could make the difference between winning and losing, and it was vs a lot of bad teams, so imo last year is a bad year to gauge where we are as a team.

 

I wouldn't put much stock into the "tougher" SoS argument. Predicted (from pre-season) SoS usually overestimates tougher SoS and underestimates weaker SoS when compared to true SoS after the season. Here's a graph that compares pre-season vs. post-season SoS in 2014:
https://i.imgsafe.org/ece7ccd2a1.png

We're ranked #6 in SoS for 2017 right now with 0.547 opponent win rate:
http://www.thephinsider.com/2017/1/...nver-broncos-kansas-city-chiefs-buffalo-bills

Based on the graph from the first link, #6 pre-season SoS is being overestimated by ~0.04, meaning we're more likely to see an actual SoS around... 0.507 = average.

Note also that for 2016 we were predicted to have a moderately tough SoS of 0.516 and we ended up with a very weak SoS of 0.449. Point is, SoS isn't well predicted before the season.

 

I agree, we did squeak out a lot of games mid-season with a last minute victory. My example is still valid though because we're talking about potential here in the 2017 team...not what actually happened in 2016. My only point was that we could have been better than we actually were if not for the collapsing offensive line- although the D was generally bad, that's not what cost us four of the six games. That fell on the offense.

 

I agree about the Oline, but the D can't be ignored, we gave up 30 or more points in 4 of our 6 losses, so it's hard to put the blame all on the O when the D is giving up 30 points.

 

Farce.

We excelled running to the left side of the line - not Bushrod's side. That side was Albert/Tunsil - which is no longer the case.

Now we have two quasi-starters/backups in at LG and RG. Not to mention a center who can't be relied upon to stay healthy anymore. I don't like it because Ajayi IS the centerpiece of the offense.

Timmons isn't going to launch this team into a division champion. We needed to continue upgrade in the area we do best and then fill in the blanks.