As the season approaches, and this motley crew of new faces and old 1-15ers band together to tackle everyone who is expecting nothing better than the second worst team in football, this miami dolphins team is surely a darkhorse in every definition of the word. when i type that i realize the word, though often thrown around, has an ambiguous meaning. if the dolphins are a darkhorse team, which i think they are, what does that actually mean. so that is my question to you, how do you define the word 'darkhorse'? My answer? A darkhorse must fly under the radar, seemingly coming from nowhere to reach and surpass whatever expections assigned to them, seemingly riding the coattails of some hunch of the astute observer. one must temper expectations with performance. for example, jayson foster is a darkhorse to make the 53 man roster, whereas joey porter is a darkhorse to make the probowl. so to have fun with it, heres a list of my top ten darkhorse dolphins. you will notice zero rookies on this list, because they are all darkhorse by nature of being a rookie: 10. Quentin Moses Lost in the shuffle of all our new defensive faces was one of the few bright spots of last season. now he will be given all the opportunity in the world to become an important member of our pass rush. people are expecting anderson and porter and merling to pick up JT's slack, but if Moses can be a season better than he was last year, he's a pivotal keeper... and one of the few bouts of good luck we've had in years. 9. Keith Davis he probably won't play too much except for special teams, but there he should shine. He's a darkhorse to become a fan favorite merely upon his ST abilities. but that's exactly what he did in Dallas. he was a game changer and there is no reason he won't do the same here. 8. David Kircus popular fanfare is busy toasting davone bess and jayson foster, and everyone still has a boner for camarillo, but i think Kircus gets a roster sport before all of them based on size and what we saw a glimpse of last night, and thats what we need on this team in our 4th or 5th WR. 7. Earnest Wilford he's been flying under the radar not for lack of publicity, but because he has been sucking it up lately. but give me game tape, not practices. when we signed him i went all over jaguar boards and came away hearing that we was one of the team's top fan favorites. everybody loved him, despite some drops now and then, he had a knack for clutch catches and 'howd he catch that?!' moments. with his size, thats what we need, and orande gadsden type WR. When the games start, I think he will be a player for us. 6. Reggie Torbor Again i went message board hunting about reggie when we signed him, and the most telling response came from a pats board post, who openly lamented us signing him based on two excellent performances in games against them last year. he's a superbowl winner who is ready for his chance and i wouldnt be surprised to see him starting by the end of the year, especially if last night is any indication of his nose for the ball. 5. Anthony Fasano Although he's been getting pretty good reviews, we haven't really heard anyone expecting much from him, esp since he hasn't done anything yet in this league. but i think we're all a little hesitant to put our hopes in the TE position. McMike was kind of the anti-darkhorse, all hype and no product, and david martin was no hype no product. i think anthony is a darkhorse to make us all realize that a TE is a relevant position again. 4. Chad Pennington Wow, who is actually excited? It seems like more of the same bandaid solution at QB, but Chad is a darkhorse to make us all stop throwing up a little in our mouth when we realize he is our new QB. if u think about it, he'll probably be the best QB we have had since Dan. he does have the pieces in place around him to take this from a bottom 5 to a middle of the pack offense. i think when we look back at what he does for this team, it will be one of the few times we dont regret what we did at QB. 3. Jason Allen he's a darkhorse to make everyone glad we drafted him. really, how much jason allen bashing has there been on this board over the past few years. and now the light seems to be coming on. if he can play up to his potential we are talking team captain, maybe even probowl down the road. the one thing hes always done is improve, and there's no reason to think he will stop now. 2. Ricky Williams i think we all know ricky is back, but he is a darkhorse to be great, or better than great - to return to normal. around the league, to the country, heck - no one is really talking about ricky - he's barely getting drafted in fantasy football, but he's going to turn heads, esp with ronnie taking it slow the first few games. ricky is a huge darkhorse to be one of the best backs in football again, but i dont think any of us would really be that surprised. 1. Yeremiah Bell Yeremiah, just stay healthy all season, please o please. he's a darkhorse to be the best player on our defense, the gamechanger we need in the secondary. no one outside of miami gives a dang about bell, let alone knows who he is. if he can play the whole season, i think he's gonna sell a lot of jerseys. No one knows hows good he can be cuz we've never seen him start a whole season, but i think we all have a hunch. okay there's my quick take on the 2008 darkhorse dolphins, im curious to hear what you all think. who do you think is the number one darkhorse dolphin? and how exactly do you even define the term darkhorse?
I voted Ricky Williams. While I have alot of hope and confidence in him, I don't think many people, out side of SOME (not all) PHINS FANS, think he will do very much. I really hope he has a monster year. (I hear he looked great last night)
I have to say Chad Pennington, with Ricky Williams a close second. I have always been concerned about Chad's arm, but he is very accurate....I have seen him smirk after beating the Phins, and I wanted to punch him in the face, but he is now a Phin, so hopefully he can ruin the Jet's and Favre's opener against us. Ricky looked good yesterday....hopefully Ronnie will also get back to his old self.
I picked other, that other is a guy who was injured last year and was a good player prior to it. He seems to not get recognition by some as a good player. My choice is Andre' Goodman.
Yeh....my picks (3) are.... Boomer Grigsby...(I really like this guy...looked good catching balls out of the backfield!!!) Anthony Fasano...(Sleeper Fantasy TE) (MY DARK HORSE PICK OF 2008) Matt Roth...(I think he puts it together this year)
obviously ricky williams! nobody but miami fans are really expecting him to be any good...but he is out for blood...and teams are gonna start noticing REAL quick.
Gotta go with Bell. He is a gamechanger on defense and absolutly no one knows who he is outside of Mia. He will play all the snaps on Defense while Ricky will be sub in and out with Ronnie Brown.
I was hesitant to pick ricky because he is such the obvious choice throughout dolphins fans. But to be honest, no one in the NFL is expecting much from him at all so he's my pick.
I liked what I saw out of Charlie Anderson during the first preseason game (at least until he got hurt). I think he's got a good chance of starting at OLB over Torbor. I think he could develop into a decent pass rusher for us.
i think ricky cannot be labeled as a dark horse merely because his past accomplishments preclude him from being a "dark horse." I voted for Kircus from that list, as he has gotten the least amount of press or publicity anywhere and seemed to do better than most of the WRs out there. i realize it was against 2nd string D, but he DID out-perform the WRs, regardless of circumstances. i had never seen him play before, but he seemed to give more effort than anyone.
I had to go with Fasano. He was behind the best (arguably) TE in the league and didn't get much opportunity. He has shown he has skills to play the position both blocking and catching. All of a sudden his ideal situation is aligning. Running game with a short passing game and he's starting. He will be seen as an outlet for any or all of our qb's, so he will be given the chance. He can catch, run well. Yet not a lot of attention his way. Whatever qb ends up playing for us, Fansano is skilled enough and will gain trust from the qb's the quickest, even faster if our WR keep dropping everyhting thrown their way and he will jump into the spotlight before the season is over. No one has reported on it much, but its a perfect situation (even moreso with the lack of WR options) and he has matured on the sidelines just enough to be entering his playing prime. My expecatations are huge for him this year, and i don't think he'll dissapoint.
Agreed. Little hard for a guy who was the best running back in the league to be considered a "dark horse". I voted for Jason Allen. He's been labeled a bust by MANY people despite barely getting the chance to play until last season when he performed well.
another name to throw out there is randy starks. i mean, how much money is he making? i havent heard much of anything about him
