My thoughts on year 2 of rebuild!

Offensive line looks good. Defense can't make stops when we need them to. If we kick 10 field goals a game maybe we will be good. I think we have gone as far as we can with Fitz. One big difference from last year is we aren't getting hammered keeping the games relatively close.

My biggest concern is whether we have the right HC, and I just don't know. I see both positives and negatives. Aside from that I'm waiting to see if Tua was the right pick. So in conclusion: don't know yet, but we HAVE to know by year 3.

"cbrad wrote:

My biggest concern is whether we have the right HC, and I just don't know. I see both positives and negatives. Aside from that I'm waiting to see if Tua was the right pick. So in conclusion: don't know yet, but we HAVE to know by year 3.

Flores blew a non challenge and played scared by kicking FGS against the highest scoring team in the league!Anybody with half a brain knew how that was going to turn out.And yes we need to see Tua!

I’m a believer in Flores. Does he make head scratching decisions every now and then? Sure, but he’s only in his 2nd year as a Head Coach, so that’s going to happen. The team plays hard for him and we’ve kept games against 2 Top Five teams and another playoff contender all close.
Do I want Miami to win every? Of course, but I’m not going to ***** and moan with every loss and claim this rebuild isn’t working, especially since this team is competitive. Anyone remember the first few weeks of the season last year?
Also, it was always going to be a tough season with such a young team and a bunch of newcomers with a very abbreviated offseason. I’m just as optimistic today as I was when the Dolphins won at New England in Week 17 last year.

The team to me looks like a scrappy bunch of youngsters who come to play every week and give it their all, which is a testament to the coaching, but who are easily outplayed when opposing teams simply want to turn on the juice. And that indicates a significant talent deficit.

"The Guy wrote:

The team to me looks like a scrappy bunch of youngsters who come to play every week and give it their all, which is a testament to the coaching, but who are easily outplayed when opposing teams simply want to turn on the juice. And that indicates a significant talent deficit.

Agreed. Let’s not forget that we took the least talented roster heading into last season and jettisoned our only remaining talent for draft picks.

I think it’s clear we need to draft for WR, RB, S and defensive front 7.

I’m seeing some progress with our OL, Gesicki and we have a lot of youth playing on both sides of the ball.

it’s also easy to forget that we’re going through our 2nd toughest 4 game stretch of the season. We faced 3 playoff teams and a lousy team. It’s really hard to gauge where this team is. This next 4 game stretch will be very telling. Catching SF with major injuries means we should be winning 2-3 games if we’re around a .500 team.

But honestly I had 0 expectations in year 2 besides progress and seeing our drafts start paying off.

It's a slow and painful process that seems to have gone on for twenty years.Still need to find an identity and consistency.

"mlb1399 wrote:

Agreed. Let’s not forget that we took the least talented roster heading into last season and jettisoned our only remaining talent for draft picks.

I think it’s clear we need to draft for WR, RB, S and defensive front 7.

I’m seeing some progress with our OL, Gesicki and we have a lot of youth playing on both sides of the ball.

it’s also easy to forget that we’re going through our 2nd toughest 4 game stretch of the season. We faced 3 playoff teams and a lousy team. It’s really hard to gauge where this team is. This next 4 game stretch will be very telling. Catching SF with major injuries means we should be winning 2-3 games if we’re around a .500 team.

But honestly I had 0 expectations in year 2 besides progress and seeing our drafts start paying off.

I agree but I thought the defence would be our strength considering the money we spent but hey the NFL has 9 teams giving up 400 ypg and the 10th is 399
The NFL has no defence.

"pumpdogs wrote:

Flores blew a non challenge and played scared by kicking FGS against the highest scoring team in the league!Anybody with half a brain knew how that was going to turn out.And yes we need to see Tua!

That "pass across the line of scrimmage" call killed an early drive that could have changed the entire game for us. Huge big-effort play by Fitz that got negated and it was head-scratching why we didn't challenge. Who knows- if that drive leads to a TD, maybe the rest of the day goes different and we score a few more TD's later on those field goal drives. At worst, that was another 3 points that we completely gave away.

I'm not sold on Flores either. He has the team playing tough and I do realize everyone is super young. There hasn't been enough to say either way whether he's the one or not. Blown calls like the one above don't play into his favor though, and we've had at least one in every loss.

"KeyFin wrote:

That "pass across the line of scrimmage" call killed an early drive that could have changed the entire game for us. Huge big-effort play by Fitz that got negated and it was head-scratching why we didn't challenge. Who knows- if that drive leads to a TD, maybe the rest of the day goes different and we score a few more TD's later on those field goal drives. At worst, that was another 3 points that we completely gave away.

I'm not sold on Flores either. He has the team playing tough and I do realize everyone is super young. There hasn't been enough to say either way whether he's the one or not. Blown calls like the one above don't play into his favor though, and we've had at least one in every loss.

I've gone on record as saying I'm unimpressed with Flores even after our hot finish.

I dont give us extra points for being so bad early on. The falls partly on coaching despite our talent issues.

I think Flores is a decent "get the guys to play hard" coach, but I've been underwhelmed with our game plans and strategy in his tenure.

"AGuyNamedAlex wrote:

I dont give us extra points for being so bad early on. The falls partly on coaching despite our talent issues.

I mean, I UNDERSTAND that he had very little talent to work with last season, but I also realize that he was a part of the front office's plans and agreed to take that role. So I don't count the mini win-streak at the end as a pro or a con...you can't factor in one side of the argument without also factoring in that we started the first few games as the worst team in modern football history.

In other words, it wasn't specifically Flores fault for those early failures (especially with last minute trades), but I can't fully credit him for finally becoming competitive either. A lot of that was simply Fitzpatrick and the team coming together despite the talent gap....we saw the same thing the other night with the Miami Heat. It wasn't the strategy as much as it was a few guys really stepping up and playing on an entirely different level.

I also realize that we're early in season two and there was a huge roster churn...so I'm not handing out big-time pros and cons this season yet either. But going into week 5, I really need to start seeing some consistency in receivers getting open, rookie CB's not getting completely torched, etc....that stuff is 100% coaching. The line is a massive plus on the season and I have to give credit there, but it's hard to say it's been positive overall since Flores is supposed to be a defensive mastermind and we brought in several NE veterans to build the D around.

So I don't know- I'm still neutral on Flores but paying bigger attention to the little stuff I handed out automatic passes on last season. For me, the goal here is playoff team in year 3. I really don't have an expectation for this season other than guys playing hard & not quitting, which I'm already seeing. But I also expect to see some pass rush pressure this season, some 3 & outs by the D, establishing a running game and some clear separation by our receivers...stuff like that is what I'm judging by since they're all clear problems.

I see both positives and negatives in those areas, but I think I'm still critical of Flores overall because I haven't see enough upside YET.

"The Guy wrote:

The team to me looks like a scrappy bunch of youngsters who come to play every week and give it their all, which is a testament to the coaching, but who are easily outplayed when opposing teams simply want to turn on the juice. And that indicates a significant talent deficit.

Do teams really take their foot off the pedal then decide to turn on the juice?

I'm not sure I buy that.. I think their defense is statistically average defensively when looking at points per game.... We still have a long way to go - Your statement may be true but I believe you are making an assumption that isn't true.

"Bumrush wrote:

Do teams really take their foot off the pedal then decide to turn on the juice?

I'm not sure I buy that.. I think their defense is statistically average defensively when looking at points per game.... We still have a long way to go - Your statement may be true but I believe you are making an assumption that isn't true.

It was pretty clear whenever we put Seattle into any sort of situation where they needed to do something, they did it with ease.

I dont know what you personally want to attribute that to but it is what happened at the end of the day.

"AGuyNamedAlex wrote:

It was pretty clear whenever we put Seattle into any sort of situation where they needed to do something, they did it with ease.

I dont know what you personally want to attribute that to but it is what happened at the end of the day.

I can't assume that Seattle didn't try to score on their previous drives.

That's all I am saying.

"Bumrush wrote:

I can't assume that Seattle didn't try to score on their previous drives.

That's all I am saying.

I dont necessarily think they werent trying, I just think every time they actually needed to do something they did.

It also helped that their WR were dropping barely contested passes l, especially early on.

"AGuyNamedAlex wrote:

I dont necessarily think they werent trying, I just think every time they actually needed to do something they did.

It also helped that their WR were dropping barely contested passes l, especially early on.

Agreed.
However, after being adamant about how poor the defense has performed early on (Adam Gase level), I think we need to give them credit. NFL defenses this year look like arena-league level defenses, so you have to take that in to account.

You also have to look at the poor play of Noah, he alone has been a major liability and impediment to Miami beating Buffalo, Seattle or both.

"AGuyNamedAlex wrote:

It was pretty clear whenever we put Seattle into any sort of situation where they needed to do something, they did it with ease.

I dont know what you personally want to attribute that to but it is what happened at the end of the day.

Like on that 4th down when they got sacked?

"Dol-Fan Dupree wrote:

Like on that 4th down when they got sacked?

They didnt NEED to make a play at that point. They actually chose to go for it because they had confidence in their ability to put up points as the game progressed if they failed.

If youre asking me if they made any plays defensively sure, but just about every time Seattle actually felt threatened in any way they basically had their way with us.

"AGuyNamedAlex wrote:

They didnt NEED to make a play at that point. They actually chose to go for it because they had confidence in their ability to put up points as the game progressed if they failed.

If youre asking me if they made any plays defensively sure, but just about every time Seattle actually felt threatened in any way they basically had their way with us.

ummm, O.K.

"KeyFin wrote:

That "pass across the line of scrimmage" call killed an early drive that could have changed the entire game for us. Huge big-effort play by Fitz that got negated and it was head-scratching why we didn't challenge. Who knows- if that drive leads to a TD, maybe the rest of the day goes different and we score a few more TD's later on those field goal drives. At worst, that was another 3 points that we completely gave away.

I'm not sold on Flores either. He has the team playing tough and I do realize everyone is super young. There hasn't been enough to say either way whether he's the one or not. Blown calls like the one above don't play into his favor though, and we've had at least one in every loss.

What is in the back of my mind also is I can't name one coach that has succeded after leaving new england.The pats win on scheme but the for whatever reason the scheme never works anywhere else.

My thoughts right now is that Flores is not a good NFL head coach.

"Dol-Fan Dupree wrote:

ummm, O.K.

We can disagree, but it was very basic strategy IMO

They had an opportunity to put a dagger in us without actually losing anything of value in the long run because they trust their offense against a defense like ours.

If they were anticipating a low scoring affair where they would struggle with our defense they would have taken the three.

That play, in my opinion, had very little to no potentialnegative impact on their overall strategy.

Of course that is just my opinion which is why I prefaced it with the fact that we can disagree.

"Bumrush wrote:

Do teams really take their foot off the pedal then decide to turn on the juice?

I'm not sure I buy that.. I think their defense is statistically average defensively when looking at points per game.... We still have a long way to go - Your statement may be true but I believe you are making an assumption that isn't true.

I think good teams come into games against the Dolphins with their normal level of effort rather than some special level of effort, and they turn on the juice only when the game takes an unexpected shape -- for example the 17-15 score in the fourth quarter the other day. At those times they crank the juice and dominate easily, and the Dolphins aren't able to overcome that due to a talent deficit.

In other words the Dolphins' scrappiness keeps them in games against good teams who are playing without any special effort. When those teams crank the juice and increase their effort, however, the Dolphins' scrappiness is easily overcome by the other team's increased emotional energy, due to the talent differential involved.

The one game that went differently this year was against Jacksonville -- another team with a talent deficit, and which played in an emotionally depleted state after having played a barn burner down the wire just four days prior. In that game the Dolphins' scrappiness was the difference.

"pumpdogs wrote:

I agree but I thought the defence would be our strength considering the money we spent but hey the NFL has 9 teams giving up 400 ypg and the 10th is 399
The NFL has no defence.

The reason for this is two fold...

Once upon a time during training camp, defenses trained hard...lots of hits and as a results, points scored we’re pretty low. Enter the union.

Now defense during training camp is literally a joke. Can’t start in pads until x, can’t use this tackle, can’t use that tackle. Now points are higher than they used to be.

Now enter this Covid season...with no preseason, defenses are way behind the power curve.

That’s why some of these offensive stats that some here post, need to have an asterisk by them