Howdy all. I had the pleasure of spending the weekend with my fellow fansite operators as guests of the Miami Dolphins. The following was a portion of our Q&A on Saturday night. You may recognize some of the names. This is all off memory from about 60 hours ago, so I must apologize. My camera died, so I couldn’t record anything. So I’m sure there is plenty of stuff I just can’t recall. The Brian Wiedmeier (President, COO) session I can’t recall much right now either. Anyway… Jimmy Cefalo Admittedly I don’t remember a lot from this conversation. It was the furthest back. But I’ll rattle some off and perhaps you can job my memory. - Said that nobody in the world knows more about running routes than his former position coach with the Dolphins: Dan Henning - Pointed out what some of us here did. That the thing lost in the Carl Paymah/Greg Camarillo dust up was that after Ginn’s big game against Buffalo, Denver felt they had to bring the corner up and roll a safety to that side and take away the threat of Ginn. Ted’s gotten a lot better as a route runner. - Talked about Parcells being a big believer in those free-weight exercises rather than machines. When you’re walking into the press room at team headquarters, you’re constantly startled by heavy weights hitting the floor. Power lifting. And that plays into the physicality that Sparano and Parcells are instilling into this team. You look at the Denver game. It was close, but they lost two receivers for the season and another guy for 4-6 weeks. Like Cefalo said, it might not always be a perfect performance or even a win, but you know when you’ve played the Miami Dolphins. They beat people up. - Talked about some ‘behind the mic’ things with the radio calls (if you’re interested). Basically, he, Mandich and Rose work in some crummy circumstances at some opposing stadiums. Makes the job a lot tougher, and makes the radio call not so good at times. It’s a lot better calling games when you’re actually enthusiastic about what you’re covering. You don’t like to manufacture excitement. And the fans aren’t stupid. - Talked to him privately about the college recruiting process. Said his first letter came from UCLA. He was a 14-year old sophomore. The process was pretty bad back then. There weren’t nearly the amount of rules as today. Coaches would show up at his home out of the blue. They called constantly to the point that his parents took the phone off the hook in the afternoons. He was constantly being called out of class to the athletic department to talk with visiting college coaches. His take on the whole thing was, he missed out on what high school should have been like for a kid. As you know, he ended up at Penn State playing for Joe Pa. He basically had his pick of schools, but chose Penn State so his parents could watch him play. That was pretty much it for him. They were Italian immigrants who didn’t know a football from a soccer ball, but he wanted his parents to be able to be there. Yup, it was Joe Pa then Shula in Miami. Two extraordinary coaches. “At least I got to choose Paterno. Shula chose me.” Jeff Ireland Arrived to a standing ovation. We’re a bit more enjoyable than the standard media folk. We’re homers. Anyway… Jeff said that he fully expected to be here (4-4, now 5-4). A lot of people didn’t, but he absolutely did. Not so much the 4-4 record, but the way the team is playing. Said that when they were going thru the hiring process, someone asked him what he wanted in a head coach. “I want a captain.” They asked if he wanted a canoe captain or a battleship commander. Ireland says they have a battleship commander. OT: Go checkout the postgame locker room video on miamidolphins.com to see the general in action. BTW – the first part of the video is us welcoming the players back to the locker room. Jeff said that, while it might ruffle some Dolfans, he really enjoys watching Alabama play. That they are extremely well coached. That you feel good when you draft a guy who’s been through a program like that. Said that he was there recently as well as LSU. So while he couldn’t tell us ‘who’ he was scouting, he admitted it wasn’t difficult to figure out what players they were looking at. I asked him about our draft philosophy. If we’re a team that goes strictly ‘best player available’ early, maybe stray from that late for need, etc. Jeff said that our draft board is stacked horizontally rather than vertically. The positions are spread across the top row. Each position (column) is stocked with players and a grade next to them. For example: Code: [B]Quarterback Running Back Wide Receiver Tight End[/B] M.Ryan (95) D. McFadden (92) D. Jackson (88) M. Bennett (79) J. Flacco (93) R. Mendenhall (83) D. Thomas (84) D. Keller (77) C. Henne (90) F. Jones (81) M. Kelly (83) M. Rucker (75) That’s how they look at the board on draft day, except with every position listed. My interpretation: they aren’t a strict BPA team. They value some positions more than others (we knew that) and draft accordingly. He also confirmed that the Phins board is much smaller than most. He wouldn’t say exactly, but it was typically between 130-160 players (something like that, I can’t recall the exact words tonight). - Said it’s not a mystery, what they look for in players. ‘The Makeup’. Size, smarts, toughness, intensity, work ethic. - Said they’d been talking to Jerry and Stephen Jones for about 1-2 weeks about Fasano before the trade on Draft Eve. - The two most consistent players since ‘Day 1': Patrick Cobbs and Greg Camarillo. Cobbs is a helluva player as far as Ireland and the Dolphins are concerned. He does so many things well. - Channing Crowder drew a lot of praise from Ireland. He’s the quarterback of the defense. Talked about his intensity, passion and intelligence. Cefalo mentioned Crowder’s 1400 SAT score. OT: I just learned that there’s a new scoring system on the SAT’s. This is the old system. You get the feeling he’ll be back. Personally, I think they’d like to replace Ayodele with someone better than Crowder. Vernon Carey was part of the same question, and didn’t draw as much praise. Remains to be seen what will happen, but the endorsement wasn’t nearly what it was for Crowder, whom they really like. Ireland talked earlier about Sparano being big on how many plays a guy can play. Wilford doesn’t play special teams like Brandon London does. That they can’t suit up everybody and, on this team, they don’t have the luxury of having a lot of ‘specialists’ [my term, paraphrasing]. Tony Sparano For whatever reason, I’m having the hardest time with Sparano. I’m just not recalling as much as I should. I’m really sorry about that, because he was the best! Maybe I was just caught up in the moment. Anyway… Tony Sparano is as advertised. That is one intense individual when it comes to football. After arriving to a standing ovation, he got in there and was a bit mellow. Gave a short introduction. When he opened up the floor for questions, immediately you saw the volume of his voice rise. That intensity and passion came out. It was awesome. I’ve been in this room with four head coaches now (Wannstedt, Saban (twice), Cameron and Sparano). This was easily the best session. He’s confident. He’s passionate. He looks you right in the eye. And yes, he’s intense. He’s also funny. One guy said, “Coach, you’ve been here 10 minutes, and I’m already afraid of you.” “Well, you got the message.” My buddy Steve from PZ asked him about the ‘special moment’ he had on the sideline with Chad Pennington in Chad’s first preseason appearance. “There were a lot of moments in that (preseason) game.” Sparano continued on, that the day he got there, he sat every player down in his office and told them how he was going ‘touch’ them. Some days it was going to be a pat on the back. Some days it would be an arm around the shoulder. Other days he was gonna be in their face all day long. But you’re going to get what you need. And that surprised some people. That he is so intuitive with the players. He knows that you have to deal with different guys, different ways. And he knows how to do it. I'm not doing this point justice with the small pieces I'm giving you. But it abundantly clear that the guy knows what he's doing in this regard. He practices them hard so the games aren't, not to say 'easy', but they're prepared for as much as they can be prepared for, physically and mentally. Talking about Joey Porter, “I said, ‘Joe, you have to let your coaches coach you’ “. Porter has done that. The 11-year vet has learned new pass rush moves and is having an outstanding season. He was asked about Porter and all the talking that’s been done lately. Sparano said that with his tunnel vision, he’s only focused on the next game. But if something arises that needs to be addressed, he’ll address it. What I got out of that was, he’s not worried about it too much. If something arises, his lieutenants will bring it to him. He said they’ve still got a lot of tricks in the Wildcat bag. Teams have held it down lately, but they’ll show some new things. On Sunday, they sure did. Sparano emphatically defended Ernest Wilford. "You don't have to worry about motivation with Ernest Wilford." Hard worker, shows up every day trying to get better. Both he and Ireland (and Cefalo) talked about Donald Thomas unsolicited. They were really pleased with what that guy did and look forward to when he gets back. I asked him about Jason Allen. He said that it was Parcells that actually suggested they move Jason back to corner. Talked about his size, speed, explosion, ball skills. The mental side, making the transition took some time. Started to come around. Got better and better. They lost Lehan and were about to face a run of big receivers. They met and decided to go ahead and put him out there. Sparano said to “make no mistake”, when Allen stepped on that field, he was completely prepared and ready to play. They’ve preached from Day 1 about not giving up negative plays. The penalties, sacks, turnovers, etc. He’s proud of this group. I guess if there's one thing you should come away with from that session, it's that this team is in great hands. If that guy does not inspire confidence, I don't know what does. I really wish I could give you more, because it was top notch. Keith Sims Keith was really great. John Offerdahl’s energy was awesome last year and Keith was not a letdown from that. Keith is a huge fan of what this group is doing right now. Sees a lot of the same things in Sparano that he saw in Shula. The future is bright. Says that no matter how bad it hurt for us fans, the alumni felt it even more. They are a proud bunch. And what we’ve seen the last few years was not Dolphin football. Keith not only does postgames for WQAM, but he’s also president of the alumni association. Says that what Wayne Huizenga has done for the alumni and the charitable works he does and enables the organization to do……incredible. Former players from other teams marvel at it. There’s a suite at the stadium just for alumni. Whoever does the most charitable work gets a better chance of being in the box for games. Keith says if you get into the box, it costs you $40…..all of which Huizenga donates back to charity. Speaking of alumni, he says the ’72 guys stand just a little bit taller because of that accomplishment. I asked Keith what it’s like to play hurt, how they get their minds into that mentality (where we as regular folks generally can’t relate to it). Keith talked about his last year in Washington, how he tore his Achilles early on and never practiced again, yet played the rest of the season. He said his backup just couldn’t hack it and he knew he had to play. As a player, you just know you have to be out there. It’s unspoken between teammates. Coaches also wanted him to play if he could. He said they don’t talk to you a whole lot when you’re hurt. They have no use for you. He also felt that he owed it to Dan Snyder and those folks for taking him in when Jimmy cast him aside. And there’s also every player’s #1 fear: that your backup will excel and therefore take your job. So with all that, he shot up, etc. did whatever he had to do to get out there. It’s what they all do. He said that everybody makes medical mistakes. That what he did with that Achilles probably cost him 3 seasons. But you do what you have to do to play. I asked him if he could recall a current or recent LT/LG duo that came in like he and Richmond Webb did as rookies, locking the left side down and going to Pro Bowls for about a decade (because I sure couldn’t). Nope! He attributed that early ability (for him) to playing in a pass oriented offense at Iowa State. So he was used to doing the things Miami did. Said the day he and Richmond got there, Dan told them, “Rule #1 is, protect me.” Nobody wanted to be the guy responsible for 13 getting hit. So there was that sense of urgency among them. He also said that Dan never yelled at the linemen. Interesting tidbit: Keith and Richmond lined up together for 8 seasons in Miami. To this day, whenever they’re together, big 78 always stands to Keith’s left! Doesn’t matter what they’re doing, where they go, who they’re talking to, Richmond is always to his left. LOL Keith sang the praises of Chad Pennington. That we know he’s got some limitations, but how presence and leadership of that caliber…..especially on this young team…cannot be understated. Again, he has the ultimate reference point: “I played with 13.” He talked about how loves how Chad wanted stay in the AFC East. About what a change of scenery can do for a player cast aside by another organization. He took us back to when Jimmy got here and made the decision to block out the past (i.e. alumni) and started picking off Shula’s players (he loves Don Shula). Keith knew his time was coming. So when Washington brought him in, he had quite a chip on his shoulder to prove Jimmy wrong. Keith talked about our unshakable commitment to the run game during the Marino era. Every week, they talked about how they were gonna run the ball. They installed a game plan to run the ball. And each week, Shula would give it about one series. If they didn’t gain tear up the opponent in that time, it was, “All right Dan, we're gonna go out there throw the ball....”. But we never had a star running back. And they all understood how hard it was, with the weapon they had at QB and those two WR’s, to take the ball out of Marino’s hands. OT: Keith is a Dolphin at heart. But he’s got love for the Redskins. Said that experience, playing for that fan base in that stadium, was fantastic. Said he talked to JT about it after the trade. Toughest DT he ever had to block: Jerome Brown. Whenever he played hard, Brown was unblockable. Talked about how he dominated Brown early in a preseason game as a rookie and really got confident. Then on a 3rd down, Brown fired off the ball, literally picked him up and threw him into the backfield. First time he’d ever been lifted up off his feet! Said Russ Grimm, his position coach at Washington and a member of The Hogs, gave the same answer when Keith asked him the same question. “Two generations, same player!” Defensive end? Howie Long, who also slid inside a bunch. Gave him fits. He hates prima donna wide receivers. “You know full well you can’t make that catch if I don’t do my job.” He thinks today’s players aren’t like they were even in the ‘90’s. They just aren’t as hungry for a myriad of social reasons (another conversation, I don’t want to misquote the guy). BTW – Keith has lost 45 pounds this year and says he’s only 10 pounds away from his playing weight. That’s especially impressive considering he owns virtually all of the Dunkin’ Doughnuts franchises in South Florida! That’s all I got for now. There’s more but I just can’t recall it or can’t recall enough of it right now. And my words don't do it justice. I apologize for that. I did get my camera going again and took about 200 pictures and videos on Sunday at the game. I’ll try and shrink some down and post them in another thread for your viewing pleasure. So be on the lookout for Part II. Hope this was of some use.
Thanks. I especially enjoyed the sparano/ireland bits. I loved how you pointed out how they work the draft and they still line up like they're in the OLine formation. It's good to see ireland high on crowder. just because he doesn't make ints all the time or jumps out at the screen as sparano himself says it's the attention to detail and little things. the press conference celebration mentioned in the post above is an awesome sight to behold so if you haven't seen it go watch. as per the draft what does BPA mean?
The way I feel about the Crowder and Carey situation is Carey will likely be let go and Crowder will stay unless he tries to get greedy and ask for too much money and Ayodele will be or demoted to a backup role.
Best Player Available. Thanks. Yup, they seem to be big fans of Crowder. I expect him to get a contract. With Carey, it's not quite the John Beck line as far as endorsement. But it wasn't nearly the praise he (Ireland) was giving to Crowder. And Sparano was all about details that night. I just can't remember them all! Clearly I would not make this team.
Muck, did you happen to find out how tall Tony is??? LOL Me and some other people here have looked all over "online" and can't find anything.
Sounds like you had a blast Was that your chart on the draft or the actual Dolphin draft board ratings
Thanks Muck! I'm glad you chose to absorb the experience, rather than note the insignificant details. Your explanation of Sparano's presence, the powerful impression, and impact he projects was absolutely extraordinary reading, and conveyed a clear and very insightful perspective of the speakers, and personalities you met. ..and yeah, I wondered who those VIP fans were, on the teamsite postgame clip greeting the team after the game.
Great read Muck. Thanks for taking the time to fill us all in on that. Any Dolphin fan should feel extremely excited after reading this. Well done!
Thanks heaps for sharing Muck. btw, is that actually part of their board or just a made up example of the board? On another note, it's looking more like they want Crowder back. The only question is price and Crowder may want to test his market value. Carey on the other hand may not be offered as much as what he would get out there in the market. It still looks like it's pretty much touch and go with them.
This is so incredibly Parcells, isn't it? I've been thinking a little about why Parcell chose Sparano, and the more of this kind of information, the more clear it is that he's picking a guy that's just like him. In terms of motivation, and getting inside peoples head, Parcells was absolutely the number one coach, and it seems like it is a trait he shares with Sparano. It's also showing, a lot of "underperformers", or "busts", are turning up every Sunday, making plays.
That was brilliant man! Thanks for sharing with us poor suckers who don't have access like you all do!
I see there are some questions about the draft chart thing I put up. Let me assure you, the little table I put up was random in the truest sense of the word. It was simply to illustrate how the Phins lay theirs out. Obviously if I'd shot for accuracy, all the Phins picks would have been #1 at their position with a 99 rating.
The entire weekend was dedicated to him. They renamed the Best Overall Site award the Tom Eddie Award going forward. His wife and daughter were there with us. Oh, and there was this.
Now thats AWESOME!!!!! I had herd thru the grapevine that there might be something for him but never imagined that!!! Tom was truely a good person and deserved nothing less. Thanks for sharing!
Preview of Part II Here's a sneak preview of Part II to wet your whistle. This is a full shot of what the 'traditional' Wildcat looks like. Blow it up to 100% resolution for full effect. Wildcat (traditional)
The Dolphins are a class organization all the way. It was their doing. When that was on the screen, they talked for about 30 seconds on the PA about him.
I loved him over at phinfever, he made the place nice. I really miss him, he was so kind and generous to every one.
The most amazing thing is that I never realized the Fins or any other organization payed this much attention to fan sites. That's nice to hear.
x2. I had no idea they valued the fans this much...makes it all the more sad we, as a whole, haven't stuck by them the past couple years. Then again, we do pay a lot of the bills. Awesome post Muck. Thanks for sharing the experience w/ us.
Great post. I have often thought about those closed-doors sessions for media and fans etc. and how badly I wished I could hear what was said in them. This is more greatly appreciated than I can express. Thank you. A few interesting notes: - love you point about Sparano's intuitiveness. One of his best traits. Bill Walsh also had it, as did Lombardi. Mixing an understanding of men as individuals is necessary to get them to commit their hearts, blood, sweat and tears to a team effort. - So Parcells suggested moving Allen, hm? Interesting. Seems to be working, since they refused to play him at Safety, at least he sees the field more this way. - Ireland scouting at 'Bama, LSU, huh? Nice. Terence Cody....? - Good insight from Webb. Especially interested to hear things about Jimmy's tenure seeping out. Hadn't realized the bitterness and rancor towards him from some older players who were let go. Makes sense though. Surprised that he loves the 'Skins as much as he does, but that says something about what those fans must be like. Which ALSO tells us that compared to OUR fans the Skins fans are much more supportive of their team, in Webb's mind, I'll bet. And I think he'd be right if he said that. Our half-empty stadium is an embarrassing thing to see. Of course, Richmond couldn't very well stand in front of a group of Dolphins fan-site operators and say Skins fans were more supportive than Phins fans, but I'll bet he'd have said that to a room of 'Skins fans. - So Parcells didn't come speak, huh? Wonder why not.
