Nuptials and negotiations: Dolphins’ Mike Gesicki reflects on an offseason to remember
The news was starting to filter out in the early morning — that the Dolphins were placing the franchise tag on tight end Mike Gesicki — and yet, Gesicki could only muster a one-word message in response to his agent: OK.
It wasn’t because of apathy, though. Dawn hadn’t even arrived in Bora Bora, a south Pacific island northwest of Tahiti in French Polynesia, where Gesicki was enjoying his honeymoon with his newlywed wife, Halle.
“It was 3 a.m., my agent texted me. He’s like, ‘Hey, they’re tagging you,’” Gesicki recalled Wednesday. “I rolled over in the middle of the night, checked my phone, I got a text from my agent and I was like, ‘OK.’ I also had like 100 other texts because I slept through it. It was like 4 a.m., 3 a.m. Bora Bora time and [I] rolled over, checked my phone and knew it happened. Woke up Halle, she was all excited and went back to sleep.”
It was an offseason of milestones for the 26-year-old Gesicki. In early March, he married his longtime girlfriend. “[I] signed a lifetime contract with happiness, kindness, beauty, and a future of love fully guaranteed at signing to my number one since the day I met her,” he wrote in an Instagram post.
Days later, he posted a photo from Bora Bora of him signing another contract, the one-year franchise tag that will pay him $10.9 million in 2022. It’s a sizable increase in pay for Gesicki, who made less than $7 million in his first four seasons, but less than he likely would have been offered had he reached unrestricted free agency.
“I mean, I don’t think anybody across the league would be mad about a situation where you get to come back, you’re obviously getting an increase in financial purposes and all that kind of stuff,” Gesicki said. “It’s obviously not the goal, the end-all, be-all goal. It’s definitely more team-friendly than it is player-friendly. But [it’s] just giving me more reasons to come back here, continue to work hard and continue to be motivated and get back to work and help this team win football games and hopefully eventually get what I deserve moving forward.”
Gesicki said he remains open to a long-term deal, with a July 15 deadline for players who received the franchise tag.
“I am absolutely open to negotiation, but not really up to me, as a lot of this is not,” he said. “I just kind of go with the flow. If they reach out, my agent will be listening.
“That’s up to them honestly,” he answered when asked if not receiving a long-term deal bothered him. “I have a good relationship with [general manager] Chris [Grier] and [senior vice president of football and business administration] Brandon [Shore], and this new coaching staff — maybe that has something to do with it. I’m not sure. I don’t really have all the answers, but I do know the kind of person that I am and the worker that I am. I’m just going to go back out there and continue to do what I do, continue to improve and make plays and help this team win football games and eventually get compensated for it.”
Gesicki, who set career highs for catches (73) and receiving yards (780) in 2021, wouldn’t commit either way when asked whether he planned to dispute his designation as a tight end over a wide receiver given his high-volume usage as a pass-catcher. Instead, he pointed to his attendance at voluntary workouts as his commitment to the team.
“I mean, I’m definitely playing. I’m here in OTAs,” he said. “This is obviously optional, so here I am. I want to do whatever I can to help this team win football games. I’ve been here for four years. The last two years we’ve been the last team out at the end of the regular season in terms of playoffs. Whatever it takes to go out there and win some games, win a playoff game, get back out there and kind of get this city going in the right direction. It’s been a long time. But obviously it’s a long process and a lot of work goes into it. We’re far away from that right now, but there’s obviously the excitement.
“I’m not really a big controversy guy,” he continued. “I’m not trying to be the guy that’s the bad locker room guy, or the guy that’s bringing the organization down or the guy that’s in the headlines for the wrong reasons. Just trying to, like I said, help this team any way I can going on my fifth year.”
Gesicki met with new coach Mike McDaniel last week as they begin to implement an offensive scheme Gesicki said will be different from what he’s accustomed to.
“At the end of the day, football’s football,” he said. “These coaches are elite in what they do, and I think that they’re going to put people in position to be successful. To be honest, we haven’t even really going over installs or things like that. It’s just very, very basic knowledge of the offense. So, that’s pretty much where we’re at right now. I’m ready to do whatever I can to go out there and make plays.”
Gesicki joked that, following the trade of wide receiver DeVante Parker, he’s just barely the longest-tenured offensive player on the team over fellow tight end and draftmate Durham Smythe, who was selected two rounds after Gesicki and received a two-year extension in March. With that new distinction, Gesicki is looking forward to being a leader on a new-look offense that’s set to face big expectations in 2022.
“We’ll have some big-time opportunities coming up this fall. But it’s April right now,” he said. “Everybody is optimistic. Everybody is happy. Everybody is in a good mood. But we’ll see how it goes when things start flying around and adversity hits. But I think this locker room and the guys that are still here have been through a lot. So I’m excited to use our past to get better in the future.”
In an offseason full of changes for Gesicki — from nuptials to a new staff — he’s not only trying to stay on top of a new system but avoid a massive marriage faux-pas. As he spoke to reporters with his hands behind his back, he couldn’t help but smile when it was mentioned that his ring was missing from his finger.
“Yeah, I’m in trouble right now,” he said. “So Halle was on a bachelorette party this weekend in Miami. So I went back home to see my parents. Went home. Forgot my ring back home. I’m driving to the airport on Sunday I’m like, ‘Oh boy.’ Text Hallie. I’m like, ‘Hey I forgot my ring. Yeah, OK. No, I didn’t do it on purpose. I forgot it.’ I got out of the shower. I put it down. And then when I got out, forgot to put it back on. So I’ll be sure to replace that on my finger here. I’m pretty sure everybody that at least I care about knows I’m married.”
This story was originally published April 13, 2022 at 3:59 PM.
