How the Dolphins went from seemingly solving wide receiver to another roster mess
Third of a series examining the Dolphins at different positions on offense just past the season’s midway point.
If there were a position that the Dolphins believed had been sufficiently addressed heading into 2021, it was wide receiver.
Miami drafted Jaylen Waddle sixth overall; allocated $11 million to Will Fuller, who was headed toward Pro Bowl consideration last season in Houston before an NFL suspension; and brought to camp at least 10 receivers who seemed worthy of NFL roster spots.
But like everything with this 2021 season, the grand plan unraveled.
A look at where the Dolphins receivers stand and their metrics just past the halfway point:
▪ DeVante Parker, who missed only two games the previous two seasons and had seemed to move past the soft-tissue issues that hampered him early in his career, has been sidelined three separate times with hamstring problems since late July and will end up missing at least six of Miami’s first 11 games.
Parker has been effective when he has played - 25 catches for 327 yards and a 13.1 average that ranks 40th in the league.
But the health issue raises serious questions about whether the Dolphins will part with Parker after the season, with two years left on his contract.
If the Dolphins want to move on from Parker after 2021, they can save $6.2 million in cap space (and his entire $5.7 million salary) by releasing him after June 2022. But they would need to find a new No. 1 receiver, and acquiring a genuine No. 1 would cost significantly more in salary and cap allocation.
So for even those exasperated with Parker’s health, a strong case could still be made to keep him.
Parker is on injured reserve and will miss at least two more games.
▪ The Dolphins knew signing Fuller was something of a gamble because he missed 22 regular-season games in his first four NFL seasons and has never made it through an entire season healthy before last season, when he missed five games due to the suspension. He missed two, six, nine and five games in his first four years heading into 2020.
But the Dolphins believed the risk was justified because he was healthy all of last season and because of his impressive body of work; he’s the only NFL receiver with at least 20 touchdowns while being targeted less than 250 times during the past four seasons. Fuller has 22 TDs on 241 targets, which is exceptional. Texans quarterback Deshaun Watson deserves some of the credit for that, obviously.
Fuller, who missed the first game due to league suspension and the second due to personal reasons, played a combined 65 snaps in Games 3 and 4 before going on injured reserve with a finger injury that Dolphins coach Brian Flores revealed was significant. He will miss a sixth consecutive game on Thursday, but Flores sounded hopeful that he will return very soon.
Barring a healthy and impressive final seven games, it’s doubtful he would be retained, meaning the Dolphins will need to start from scratch in their search for a new boundary receiver (and more than one if Parker is jettisoned).
Fuller, who had 879 yards in receptions in 11 games last season before his NFL suspension, has just 26 yards receiving on four catches in his two games for Miami.
▪ Waddle’s rookie season hasn’t been a disappointment, but the Dolphins’ inability to maximize his downfield speed has prevented Waddle from measuring up statistically to the receiver selected two spots before him, LSU’s Ja’Marr Chase.
Waddle’s numbers: 56 catches for 496 yards and three touchdowns.
Chase’s numbers: 44 catches for 835 yards and seven touchdowns.
On the plus side, Waddle is sixth in the NFL in receptions with 56. That’s behind only Cooper Kupp, Tyreek Hill, Davante Adams, Keenan Allen and Brandin Cooks. PFF ranks him 37th of 127 qualifying receivers.
And he has 275 of his 496 receiving yards in the slot, which is 11th in the league. He’s a skilled slot receiver, as the Dolphins expected.
The bad news: His 8.9 yards per reception is 155th among 198 NFL receivers this year.
Most disappointing has been the modest yards after catch.
No Power 5 wide receiver with 100-plus receptions since 2014 averaged more yards after the catch per reception than Waddle did at Alabama (9.8). He averaged 10.1 in YAC in his final year in college.
But as an NFL rookie, he’s just 87th among all receivers in YAC at 4.3 per reception.
Now here’s the big caveat: Some of Waddle’s YAC at Alabama came from runs after long receptions on bombs.
The Dolphins have thrown him only six passes that have traveled at least 20 yards in the air, and he has caught only one for 36 yards. So the YAC was invariably going to be lower in moving to an offense that’s far more conservative than the one he played in at Alabama.
(The Dolphins actually have thrown more deep passes to Parker — seven — and completed four of them even though Parker has played far fewer snaps than Waddle — 274 to 503.)
Waddle has four drops; only 12 NFL receivers have more, including Chase (six).
Waddle has lined up in the slot for 247 snaps and lined up on the boundary for 121 snaps.
▪ Albert Wilson went from producing the most electrifying first two weeks of training camp in recent Dolphins history to having virtually no impact once the season started.
He has eight catches for 56 yards — with two drops — and played just 28 percent of Miami’s offensive snaps. PFF ranks him 124th of 127 receivers.
Meanwhile, Preston Williams has taken a step back. He has played in only three games, been suspended for one, was a healthy scratch for three and has five catches for 67 yards. His future here is tenuous.
▪ Mack Hollins, one of the most underappreciated players on the roster last season, is no longer underappreciated.
Though PFF rates him 114th among receivers, he has been Miami’s second- or third-most reliable receiver factoring in durability. Of his 10 receptions for 106 yards, two have been touchdowns and seven have gone for first downs.
PFF rates him 72nd as a run blocker.
He has played 39 percent of the Dolphins’ offensive snaps, up from 27 percent last season largely because of Parker’s and Fuller’s injuries. He also has played 60 percent of Miami’s special teams snaps.
There’s not enough data to evaluate Isaiah Ford and Kirk Merritt (who caught one pass and dropped one and couldn’t corral what would have been a difficult catch in 11 snaps against Houston).
▪ Conclusions? Though Parker is one of the Dolphins’ two best players on offense when healthy, the recurrence of the hamstring injuries raise questions about his future. Fuller and Wilson — impending unrestricted free agents — almost assuredly won’t return.
If Parker is retained, then the Dolphins will know they have Parker, Waddle and Hollins (who’s likely to be re-signed unless there’s a regime change), with Allen Hurns and Williams (both under contract next season), Kirk Merritt, and Lynn Bowden Jr. (under contract next season) and any rookies competing for a roster spot. Even in that scenario, at least one accomplished veteran receiver must be added.
If the Dolphins move on from Parker, then the team must add two veteran, accomplished receivers. That would be challenging — even with Miami’s $80 million-plus in cap space — because of all the other needs (offensive line, inside linebacker, running back).
Bad luck — rather than bad decisions — can be blamed for the Dolphins’ predicament at receiver. Incredibly, Parker, Fuller and Waddle haven’t been on the field together for a full game this season.
The view here: It’s understandable that the Dolphins stuck with Parker this season and committed to Fuller because Parker had missed only two games the past two seasons and Fuller didn’t miss a game due to health reasons last year.
But the team made a mistake by not waiting until Sept. 1 to move Lynn Bowden Jr. to injured reserve, which would have allowed him to return for the final 14 games.
Here’s Part 1 of the series on how the Dolphins botched their offensive line construction.
Here’s Part 2 of the series on where the Dolphins stand at running back and tight end.
This story was originally published November 10, 2021 at 12:14 PM.
