Dolphins lost out on Burrow, but Miami’s five wins had tangible benefit in this area
A six-pack of Miami Dolphins notes on a Friday:
▪ It would be easy, in the days before the draft, to bemoan the Dolphins winning enough games last season to cost them the chance to draft LSU quarterback Joe Burrow. It was frustrating for some Dolphins fans at the time, and it’s frustrating for some now — and understandably so.
Heck, I was frustrated — as someone who would find this team infinitely more interesting to cover with an elite quarterback behind center — while at the same time admiring what head coach Brian Flores and his staff were able to extract from this roster.
But lost amid this emotion is the likelihood that what the Dolphins achieved last season in defying the odds and winning five games likely helped them in free agency.
Ted Karras - who turned down more total money from the Patriots in a two-year deal - recently spoke of how Miami’s Week 17 win in New England “earned a lot of respect from me.” Shaq Lawson was impressed how “down the last final stretch of the season, those guys were playing great ball and it was exciting to watch.”
You think Kyle Van Noy and Lawson (who admitted he had a tough decision leaving Buffalo) and Byron Jones would have joined a 1-15 team?
Think again.
Two sources intimately familiar with Jones’ decision said the Raiders and Philadelphia made offers comparable to the Dolphins in free agency — the Raiders made the highest per-year offer, one source insisted — but Jones chose the Dolphins because he liked Flores, thought this was a young-up-and-coming team and he liked the idea of playing in the AFC and in South Florida.
According to one of the sources, he was also highly impressed by Raiders general manager Mike Mayock. But what Flores accomplished with this team, and the feedback he got about Flores and the Dolphins from at least one player who played here last season influenced his decision.
He saw a team with a promising future and “felt good” about the situation here, according to one of the sources.
The Dolphins raised their offer during the course of negotiations on March 16, and the Jones camp acquiesced to Miami’s request for a fifth year, in exchange for a roster bonus.
If Flores had made decisions that fed into the tanking narrative — he never did — or if the Dolphins had remained a total embarrassment (as they were in the first two games but not again), you can be sure Miami wouldn’t have been as appealing to the high-end free agents who signed here, especially when there was comparable and better money elsewhere.
So we can all bemoan the five wins in the context of losing out on Burrow. (I, personally, would rather have Burrow than the five wins.) But Dolphins fans can take solace in what the five wins did not only for morale, but the tangible result of luring high-quality free agents.
▪ Why would the Dolphins spend time interviewing a receiver with three career catches for 66 yards? Because there are extenuating circumstances with Dan Chisena, who skipped three years of football at Penn State to focus on track and field, where he finished in the top 13 in NCAA competition in two relay races.
He’s really fast (nfldraftscout.com lists his 40 time as 4.32), considered an exceptional leader and very good special teams player in coverage (especially as a punt-return gunner, an underrated skill), and was voted MVP of the Tropical Bowl all-star game, where he caught five passes (two more than he did in all of 2019) for 155 yards and two touchdowns. Teams like the Dolphins are intrigued enough to give him a look as a likely undrafted free agent.
▪ The Dolphins have reached out to several more front-seven defenders in recent days, including Mississippi’s Qaadir Sheppard, Charlotte’s Alex Highsmith, Temple’s Shaun Braldey and Syracuse’s Ken Coleman.
Zierlein said Sheppard “has the body type, play strength and toughness of an NFL talent, but 2019 was a forgettable year and 2018 was more average than good by draft standards. Teams might gamble on the 2018 tape and make Sheppard a late-round pick as a 3-4 SAM linebacker.”
Bradley, who had 87 tackles (including eight for loss) and three pass breakups last season, is 6-2, 235 and Zierlein said he’s “an undersized inside linebacker better-suited at the WILL spot in a 3-4. The intangibles and special teams production could give him a shot.”
ESPN’s Mel Kiper Jr. this week raved about Highsmith, who was named a third-team All-American by the Associated Press as a senior, finishing among the top five nationally with 21.5 tackles for loss and 14 sacks (among his 75 total stops) in 13 starts.
Zierlein’s take: “Stand-up edge rusher with splashy production to get him noticed by 3-4 fronts. He currently projects as an NFL backup, but his ascending play and production could push him into a bigger role if he can get bigger and stronger.”
Coleman had 10 tackles for loss and two sacks last season. Zierlein calls him “a marginal athlete with average physical traits who has put in the work to become stronger, more durable and more skilled as a rusher.”
Incidentally, Alabama defensive tackle Raekwon Davis told NBC’s Mike Florio that he has had considerable contact with the Dolphins in recent weeks. The potential second-day pick had 47 tackles, three for loss and 0.5 sack in 12 starts.
▪ Former Dolphins general manager Randy Mueller said every time he sees Alabama coach Nick Saban, they reference (gallows humor) the Dolphins’ decision to pass on Drew Brees to sign Daunte Culpepper.
“Every time we see each other, we laugh about it in jest because it was serious business at the time,” Mueller told WQAM’s Joe Rose and Zach Krantz. “We wanted Drew Brees. Our medical staff had a lot to say and they should have. [If we had picked Brees], we’re going against the grain on the medical side.
“I’m no doctor [but] I stayed at a few Holiday Inns. We wanted Drew Brees and Drew Brees wanted Miami. We were all really distraught about the whole thing. We could put Wayne Huizenga’s money on the line and we made the decision for Culpepper. History shows the risk would have been worth it, but we couldn’t have done it against our doctors. Percentages, you wouldn’t take that bet, and not with $10 million. It was a dire thing, the picture was painted, that it was going to be a struggle [with Brees’ shoulder]. And we didn’t think we could do that. We wanted to.”
The Dolphins find themselves in a similar position, reliant on advice from Dolphins doctors who haven’t put their hands on Alabama quarterback Tua Tagovailoa since the NFL Combine. What they advised general manager Chris Grier — and that information remains unknown — will carry weight in Miami’s decision.
As the Miami Herald reported a month ago and ESPN reported Friday, the Dolphins wanted to rush Tagovailoa to Miami on March 13, the final day that prospect visits were permitted before the NFL banned them because of coronavirus. But that visit could not be arranged, and Dolphins doctors consequently have not been able to examine Tagovailoa since doing so at the NFL Combine in late February.
▪ Count CBS’ Jason LaCanfora among those who believe talk of Tagovailoa falling below Miami at No. 5 is a smokescreen.
“It seems a little contrived to me,” LaCanfora writes. “If there is a consensus among major execs... that now Herbert is a better QB prospect with less risk that Tua, I’d love to hear them make that argument. There’s no way that can be backed by the tape. One guy faced the best competition on the planet every week and slayed virtually every dragon he faced. The other simply did not. It’s not even really close, and I would be far more worried about why Herbert didn’t dominate the Pac-12 and what that portends in the future than I would about Tagovailoa’s health.
“And I suspect, that when all is said and done, Tua is still gone by the fifth pick and is indeed one of the top two quarterbacks selected. I suspect that many doth protest too much, amid the jostling to get in position to land a top QB next week.”
▪ Quick stuff: While the Dolphins have done video conferencing with top center prospects Matt Hennessey (Temple) and Nik Harris (Washington), they had not with Michigan’s Cesar Ruiz (the draft’s top interior lineman) as of midweek, for whatever that’s worth...
An Iowa football official mentioned how Flores is really good at college player evaluation — better than many coaches — from his scouting background in New England, and how that works to Miami’s advantage...
The Dolphins have reached out to several players who could be priority free agents, including Iowa running back Toren Young (81 carries, 432 yards, 5.3 average last season) and South Carolina tight end Kyle Markway (31 catches, 349 yards, 2 touchdowns last season).
Here’s my Friday Dolphins-flavored piece on the draft’s inside linebacker options.
Here’s my Thursday night piece with lots of Dolphins nuggets, including continued contact with Jordan Love.
Here’s my Thursday Dolphins-flavored piece on edge rushers in the NFL Draft.
Here’s my Dolphins-flavored look at interior linemen in the draft.
Here’s my Tuesday night Dolphins nuggets with information on players they’ve contacted and a lot more.
Here’s my Wednesday night Dolphins nuggets with information what the Dolphins have been doing with Justin Herbert and a lot more.
Here’s my Dolphins-flavored piece on the top cornerbacks in the draft.
Here’s my Dolphins-flavored piece on the top defensive tackles in the draft.
Here’s my Dolphins-flavored piece on the top offensive tackles in the draft.
Here’s my Dolphins-flavored piece on the top safeties available in the draft.
Here’s my Dolphins-flavored piece on some of the second-tier quarterbacks in the draft.
This story was originally published April 17, 2020 at 4:36 PM.
