• The Dolphins were awarded four players from their seven waiver claims. Those four making the team represent a higher number than the amount of unrestricted veteran free agents who made the team the first week.

The veterans included David Garrard, Chad Johnson, Gary Guyton, Eric Steinbach, Artis Hicks, Tyrell Johnson, Richard Marshall, Jamaal Westerman and Legedu Naanee. Only Naanee and Marshall are on the team now.

Garrard, Chad Johnson, Guyton, Tyrell Johnson and Westerman were cut. Hicks was placed on injured reserve and Steinbach retired.

So, basically, the Dolphins got more production from one day of trolling the other teams’ waiver discards than they got from the weeks of unrestricted free agency in the spring and summer.

And, although receiver Anthony Armstrong leads the list of recent additions who promise some help, it must be said none of the four players was good enough to make their previous teams.

Building for future?

And then there is this:

The Dolphins three weeks ago traded cornerback Vontae Davis in return for a second-round pick and a conditional sixth-round pick next year. Ireland suggested to reporters he could use that second-rounder as “ammunition” to improve the Dolphins this year by adding a veteran receiver.

Ireland obviously decided that immediate upgrade wasn’t the one to make so he kept the pick in his stockpile and is going with a less expensive option instead.

None of this suggests the Dolphins are all in for 2012. It all suggests this is another foundation-laying year, perhaps a long year, ahead.

What will that translate to when it’s all done? As receiver Davone Bess points out, “We don’t have the hardest schedule in the league, so if we get on a roll and just keep rolling, I think we’ll be in good shape.”

For Miami, good shape would be 8-8.

But reality will more likely be 6-10. Again.