Kelly: Dolphins’ 2025 season hinges on transformation of O-line | Opinion
While fantasy football and sports gambling have poured gasoline on the flame that is the NFL, amplifying the number of eyeballs paying attention to professional football, there’s an old adage about this physical sport that hasn’t changed in five decades.
It’s the understanding that football games are won and lost in the trenches.
Talk to any defender in any era and he will consistently testify that the most important thing to do every game is stopping the run, making an opponent one-dimensional.
Easiest way to make a quarterback uncomfortable is to pressure the passer.
There’s one unit responsible for both.
A football team can have the most feared passer in the game, and possess one of the biggest playmaking weapons in the league, but a team that gets pushed around in the trenches will struggle to stack up wins.
That was the Miami Dolphins’ problem last season.
Outside of playing six and a half games without Tua Tagovailoa last season, the challenges Miami had on the offensive line in 2024 weighed that team down like an anchor.
The O-line issues were so bad, coach Mike McDaniel was forced to call short passing plays as run game substitutions because those check downs and screens were more consistent than Miami’s limp run game.
The Dolphins struggled to protect their quarterbacks last season, allowing 43 sacks (an increase of 12 sacks from 2023), and possessed one of the worst run games — ranked 28th in yards per carry — in the NFL in 2024.
Those struggles are the reason the franchise reinforced the trenches on both sides of the ball this past offseason, and I’m boldly predicting that the team’s effectiveness at rebuilding the offensive line will dictate how much success the 2025 Dolphins have.
We know what Tagovailoa can do when healthy. We know the level of efficiency the 2023 Pro Bowler plays with. But an offensive line is needed to keep him healthy.
We know the type of weapons Tyreek Hill and Jaylen Waddle are, and how they can score a touchdown on any given play. But pass protection needs to give them time to get open and create a window for the quarterback to make that bold throw.
We know that De’Von Achane’s a walking house call, especially after setting an NFL record of 7.8 yards per carry as a rookie in 2023. But Miami’s starting tailback, who averaged 4.5 yards on his 203 carries last season, needs an offensive line to create running lanes.
Last season the NFL average was 4.44 yards per carry. The Dolphins produced 4.01 yards per carry.
The NFL average for rushing yards a game was 119.8. Miami checked in at 105.6.
Miami was also below the league average in third-down conversions, fourth-down conversions, red-zone and goal-to-go efficiency. While all of those issues can’t be blamed on the shortcomings of the run game, having a rushing attack that meets the league average would have been beneficial.
But that’s old news according to this year’s Dolphins offensive linemen.
“We got the parts. We got the pieces. We got everything we need,” said center Aaron Brewer, who was named one of six team captains on Monday. “Why not? Why not us?”
Brewer is referring to the offseason elevation of Patrick Paul, a towering but athletic 6-foot-7 left tackle, who served as Terron Armstead’s understudy for most of last season, and Jonah Savaiinaea, a former Arizona standout the Dolphins traded a treasure trove of draft picks to move up in the second round of the 2025 draft to acquire, and James Daniels, an 84-game starter Miami added as the big-ticket free agent signing this past offseason.
Pair them with Brewer, who is in his second season in this offense, and Austin Jackson, who missed half of last season with a knee injury, and all but one week of training camp with a foot injury, and the belief is that Miami should have a solid starting five.
Where things get a little troublesome are the backups, especially if Liam Eichenberg is sidelined for months with the knee injury that got him placed on the physically unable to perform list. Last week’s re-signing of offensive tackle Kendall Lamm should boost the unit a bit, but Miami needs a healthy season from all of its starting linemen to give this team its best chance.
“I have a lot of confidence in what I’m supposed to do,” Jackson said. “I know as long as I take care of my body, I’ll be OK.”
And hopefully the unit will too because as they go, so will the Dolphins season.
This unit intends for their actions, their play to do the talking for them.
“It’s not much [to] talk [about]. We just do it,” said Paul, who played 337 snaps as a rookie as season. “Each day we set the standard for the team, so [we have to] just go out there attacking it every single day.”
