Two fires touch stop Waddle knocked into the end zone of Miami type broke window. They had to get that touchdown on that play, they give it. What is up? Dolphans And welcome to the Drive Time Podcast, part of the Miami Dolphins podcast network, covering your team, your Miami Dolphins. How's it going? Everybody? I am your host Travis Wingfield. And on today's show we heard from Dolphins assistant coaches.
This week, we'll play the audio from that and get the details of my key and day with a handful of the Dolphins assistant coaching staff plus another signing will break down quarterback Chris Traveler's game from somewhere in South Florida. This is the Drive Time Podcast. Dolphins want to kick off this Friday edition of the Drivetime Podcast by looking
into new Dolphins quarterback Chris Streveler. And this is a pretty interesting player here joining the squad and from just gathering some of the reaction from the media around the league, there's some belief in s Traveler's upside here among draft knicks and beat writers and national coverage guys. And we talked in the podcast on Monday about having to find a solution at quarterback to whether that's finding one on the free agent market, in the draft or retaining Jacoby Brissette.
But if you could get a player like Straveler in here and develop his game and a little bit of you know, identifying him as such for the season, and that's not to cap his potential there by any means, but if you can get him into that role for the season and feel good about that, what a boon that would be. So another tire in the fire, so to speaker and iron in the fire, I should say,
with Chris Traveler. And he served as the Cardinals backup under Colt McCoy for that stretch of games last year when Kyler Murray was down, so technically QB three, but he has seen some NFL action the last couple of years. Not of his passes came last year the rest He
had seven total rushing attempts for twenty one yards. More on that in just one moment in his career seventeen twenty five for a buck forty one, a touchdown and a pick, and a total of fifty four snaps played thirty and twenty four last year, and though he was not deployed in this role with the Cardinals in the regular season. He's the type of quarterback that can function is part of your game plan with specific packages because
of his very unique running skill set. And we talked about fullback John Lovett on the Wednesday podcast and his awesome, fun to watch Princeton tape where he's taken direct snaps and bowling over defensive backs. That's Streveler at South Dakota, and that's Straveler in the Canadian Football League. Like, go watch those clips. It's kind of hilarious. I think Josh Howtz posts a clip of him just bulldozing some unassuming defensive back up there in the Great White North six
fifteen pound guy, and he packs a real punch. And his pro day numbers back in were a four five one forty yard dash with a one inch broad jump and a thirty eight point five inch vertical with a seven point three five three cone time. Those are really good, like middle linebacker numbers and for the layman, very very very explosive metrics at the quarterback position. We're gonna have
Kent Lee Platt on the podcast after the combine. He's the creator of the Relative Athletics scorecard, which cumulatively measures a player's workout numbers and categorizes the best scores by position and overall, going back to like you know, N seven or something crazy like that. And Cam Newton is his number one quarterback ever on that chart who scored
a perfect ten. And while pro days have traditionally produced better numbers in the combine and Traveler did not work out the combine that year, but Cam was in the green, which is the elite category for every measure with a four sixty six three cone for a quarterback at that size. Nonetheless, it is completely absurd vertical and a one inch broad jump lower body explosion. That's the name of the game, for every position, for every sport. It all starts in
the lower half. As Chubbs once said, it's all in the hips. That's the play style for Traveler, the power running ability. So that alone fascinates me for the possibility of incorporating him as an offensive weapon in addition to his duties as a full time reserve quarterback. If that were how it shook out watching some of his preseason work with the Cardinals, you better freaking maintain your rush Land integrity because he can hit the top of that drop and then get the hell out of there in
a flash. There's a great moment from this past August against the Cowboys where he just hits the top of the drop on a third down in three sees a lane open up in the middle against you know, man coverage, so there's no underneath hook linebacker hanging out, and he takes off for like twenty five yards and five of those yards were after contact as he just lowers his shoulder and like he did in college, like he did
in the CFL, runs over a defensive back. And you go back to his CFL tape, they're throwing passes to him like Philly specials, letting him take those quarterback lead slash quarterback power snaps, as well as playing a true drop back game. And we should mention that the running game and the CFL. You know, after thoughts are strong word, but they don't use it very often because well, you
only get three downs. So to call those quarterback runs that shows you how much confidence they had in his ability to get positive yards and ultimately led to them winning a great cup up there under Straveler. That's their super Bowl. Something else I think speaks to his athletic ability. He spent time with the Ravens and look at the quarterbacks the Ravens have developed or attempted to develop under Lamar Jackson. Tyler Huntley this past season successfully in my opinion.
We know what he can do with his legs in the running game. That's what he was a Utah, That's what he was as a pro. In relief of Lamar Jackson, Trace mcsolier was drafted there. He was a scramble and create type of quarterback at Penn State and in his brief cameo there in the National Football League and even r G three who came back out of retirement, what's the theme there? They wanted athletic quarterbacks who could help maintain some semblance of that offense that Lamar Jackson ran.
And nobody in the National Football League can run the same style as Lamar Jackson, but you want to have at least comparable analogs. And they always had that. And that's where s Traveler wound up at one point his career. And just watching more of the Cardinals preseason tape, I see a triple option reverse on tape. He's a trigger man. I see him dropping a dime over the top of
a fade route. From about twenty five yards out where his receiver stacked his defensive back and he just drops that thing right into the elevator shaft and down it goes into the bucket. His loan career touchdown pass was a jet sweet pop pass where he takes off on miss directions. So you get the idea of the skill set here, right. You have to go to the CFL to get a better grasp of his passing game skill set, but even there you see a ton of touchdown runs
on goal to go situations. Quarterback lead quarterback pilot you talked about, but with the arm, there's a lot of dropback, see it's not there, and then go off script and ad lib. And he was fantastic at that up in the Great White North. He can really drive the ball
to the perimeter. So a big, strong arm, which to me is always a nice pairing as far as getting a quarterback into your system and working with him and developing him to pair that with a good plus running skill set, you'll always take a chance on guys like that. To me, he's an intriguing player for two reasons here for a couple of reasons, with the main two to develop him under McDaniel, Smith and Bevil and staff curious
about that. And then also number two, what he did in zone read design quarterback runs from the pistol with the motion and misdirection game, there could be a possibility of something there with an eye towards some packages you can utilize that skill set within. So good stuff there, Chris Traveler, another signing here in the month of I'm worried for the Miami Dolphins. Let's take a quick break here and go back to quite literally my favorite content
we do here on the Drivetime Podcast. It's almost exclusively an in season segment, but today we get to treat you to assistant coaches media availability. They met with us earlier this week that next Drivetime Podcast with Travis Wingfield presented by a donation back here on the Friday edition of the Drive Time Podcast. And I am very excited about this as I was bi weekly on the in season editions of Drive Time to bring you guys assistant coaches media and we have a lot to get to here.
I spoke to almost every single coach. I couldn't quite get to everybody. Pat and Sam had a lot of the scrum around them throughout the course of the day, so I didn't get any audio from Pat and I only spoke to Sam or was around Sam for a couple of minutes. So we'll go ahead and play the entirety of what I have for you guys here, starting with Mike McDaniel, who came out and addressed us before the assistant coaches came out and met with us. And he starts off with a great joke, So American went
out here, so I couldn't resist, you know. UM, So excited UM today for you guys to meet the the entire coaching staff. Feel extremely proud, UM and UH and
blessed to have these men working with me. UM. The The biggest thing with with coaches in general, UM that shouldn't be lost in all of it, is it's about their ability to communicate to players, because it's all about the players, really, And that's why I'm so excited about the group of guys you guys are about to meet, UM, not only for their aptitude in coaching, but really who they are as human beings and their ability to connect
to players. I think will prove the the Miami Dolphins organization. UM very proud. Moving forward, UM, Starting with an on offense Frank Smith. UM. I couldn't be happier to work with us this guy. He's very diligent, very good at his job, and a great leader of men that I think all the players will really respond to and that people will enjoy working for UM. And also very excited UM to be working with Josh Boyer. UH. Not only is his you know, I hated going against the scheme
really UM. Not only does he do a great job with that, but his ownership of that scheme UM is really gonna be awesome moving forward for the Miami Miami Dolphins and all the players involved. And he's surrounded by by outstanding individuals UM that command the respective players. But also no UH are are true to the whole vision of what coaching should truly be and that's a dedication to getting each and every player better, UM, one day
at a time. So without further ado, I want to induce them as fast as possible so you guys can get through it, so then we can, I don't know, continue our planned Wes Welker versus Pat certain and Sam Madison one of the ones that barring old man injury, UH hopefully it's a fixture for Miami practices moving forward. I believe most of us would pay to see that. So he's just joking around there, maybe about the one
on ones, the old man injury. But let's go ahead and kick this off here with let's go to Frank Smith, who you heard Coach talk about first. There he did us talk about Josh Boyer and hating going against that scheme. I asked Boyer about that. We'll come back to that. Let's go ahead and get to Frank Smith here first.
And first, when I approached Coach Smith, he was answering a question from another reporter who had asked about outside zone wide zone schemes, and he basically talked about how in his coaching career, in his stops they were able to adapt to the players they had in their systems, and he referenced his time with the Oakland Raiders before the move to Las Vegas with Rodney Hudson and Collecchio Assemmibly,
who are two massive, massive human beings. And you might recall, you might not, the Raiders were one of the primary gap slash power scheme teams in the NFL those years. So it's not just about zone outside zone, the type of thing it's about adapting to your scheme. So that was a big part of really all these coaches messages here on this Wednesday, we spoke to them. Let's go ahead and get back to Frank Smith, her Dolphins offensive coordinator.
I asked him about what is the one common theme across all these players for yourself and all these other coaches who have managed to get career years out of players so many stops along the way in your guys career, what's the key to that? I think that the biggest thing that UM collectively us as coaches, I think we're uh. Communication skills are really strong, uh. And that starts as listening.
So I would think that UM listening to your players here, hearing what they have to say about what they're doing, and also when you're explaining to them, you're listening at the same time. So I think that it's a game of people, and when you want to win with people, it's a two way communication. In the one way, I think that's where a lot of art the staff you would tell they're really really good communicators and makes our process so far been really from that point so UM.
And that's also holding players to a standard that you're gonna hold yourself too. So I think a lot of people sometimes it's easy to you know, say one thing and not be about it. And I think that's one thing here is gonna be. We're gonna try to excel in communication and hold ourselves and basically running the program
to a standard of excellent. Up Next, I wanted to ask coach about the idea of the collaboration across the staff with his offensive coordinator and run game title, Darryl Bevil's passing game title, Coach McDaniel as the play caller, and how all of that and the entirety of the staff comes together for one ultimate plan. Here's Coach Smith.
I think the big thing of regardless of whatever title you have, because we have a tremendous amount of experience on his staff, I think whatever it is is ultimately um game playing process, building the offense processes U collaborative together as you're looking at UH what they did in San Francisco versus UH experiences that I've had different things we've done U. Matt Common has a little bit of the college perspective John and West for with UH, Mike
and San Francisco. Bevan his wealth of experience, Eric and everywhere he's been. I mean, you look at the staff, there's a ton of experiencing different facets, a lot of NFL experience, and then um perspective, And I think when you have perspective and experience with good guys, guys who communicate well, we're gonna build something that is obviously tailored to our players. That's gonna hopefully bring out what they
do well. And I think all those like you could do circle back around titles and all that just give you know, the wealth of like you know what ever whatever for the hiring process. But ultimately it's gonna be all of us coming together, putter has together, and make sure we get if that's right for the players. Next night, I asked coach about playing and sell Florida and recognizing the early season temperature as you get in September and
October and the like. Here's Coach talking about what that weather has been like on the other side of the sidelines. I've been on the other part of it where the team melted when we came here. So in Oakland and the fourth quarder we do guys were passing out on the sideline. I mean, it was unbelievable and now, that was the first thing I thought about when I was in the building staring at the stadium, going, this is gonna be awesome because now we get to be a
part of watching them melt uh. So literally that was one of the first things that I remember talking to Mike about. But I mean, I think it starts with you know, ultimately circle back around to what we're trying to build here and as a as a program is UH standard performance. And the standard performance takes parts every day,
whether it's inside or outside. And if you have that UH measuring stick, the practice field will be so competitive that it would be just basically you'll take that from out here and to put it on the field so as I'm not trying to knock over the table, but basically like that is where you want to go. You create that practice habits that go onto the field on Sundays and Mondays that just make it all worthwhile. And the training is really as hard or if not harder
than the games. You've been watching this here about twenty years. I'd say every two years, there's a guy on TD that throws up on the opposition self. I know, okay, I had I had one guy almost passed out and then another one have full body cramps. Goodness, So it was it was like, and we're from northern California, so we're like, you know, there's nothing you can do because you can't simulate this environment. There's so that you have coach Frank Smith talking about his experiences here in some
early season games in South Florida. Let's go ahead and spend this over to the defensive coordinator, Josh Boyer, who was asked about the philosophy of building the defense. Is it back to front and the way you build a defense? Here's coach Boyer, so, I I think basically what you
do is you try to accumulate good players. That again, and there's there's certain guys that are fits for different schemes, and you know, you always try to get at guys that you feel like you can fit in your scheme or have a skill set that will fit in your scheme. And I think you take from that pool, you take the best players available, and then you kind of retool
what you're doing from there. And next back to the question I asked coach Boyer about what Mike McDaniel said about hating going up against this defensive scheme that Bowyer has overseen the last couple of years. Here's Josh Boyer on how he and McDaniel can kind of help give each other eyes on the opposite side of the football.
It's awesome, you know, because especially when you you get firsthand knowledge of a certain scheme or a certain how certain type of offense, of why they're installing, what their adjustments are. Um, you know, and I I've been in such a you know, call it one system type thing that the offense has kind of been this and this is from afar. You're like, you think this, you think that, And sometimes it's like yeah, okay, you were right on that. Okay,
this is how they do it. And then there's other little, um say, little tweaks to how they do it or how they teach it to kind of give you a knowledge of you know, when you're going up against guys that you know for common systems, you're like, okay, when you see it on film, you're like, all right, okay, that makes sense. Or you know, and again you like week the week you go you go in and you study guys and like, you know, okay, or and just
because somebody comes from someplace like Zach Taylor. He's he's a great example of like you know, everybody's like, oh, it's McVeigh, it's McVeigh. It's like, no, it's not really McVeigh. I mean, you know, Mike Sherman, you know that that's his big influence, and like you know, and again they're all intertwined and they all have their own little thing
about him and they all do a great job at it. Yeah, it's been awesome to sit there and talk to Mike about his experiences and how he builds an offense and the things that he does. There. Did you ever get back in the paper for a big hit later on after the fresh Now, Josh Biner, that was it? So that's that, that's what happened. You can't you can't get it because I can't. I can't ever come back in the varsity again, like three more years. You have to
have had something. Oh yeah, yes, yes, yes, so yeah, I mean I was but like that was the but I stopped But to be honest, I stopped looking. I want ahead and included that last little note there because Coach talked about how when he was a freshman in high school he got called upon for a big spot in a varsity baseball game and got the game winning knock, and he was so pumped to go check the paper the next day, and when he did, they put Josh Biner in the newspaper. So he never looked at the
paper again after that. And I know exactly what you're talking about, coach, because in our paper it was if you get two hits in the game, your name automatically goes in the paper. So I was always pumped up to check it after that. Luckily it was never Winfield, even though I head coach always called me Travis Winfield.
Let's go ahead and go back to the offensive side of the football now and quarterbacks coach Darryl Bevil, And I asked coach, as you heard Frank Smith say earlier, about his wealth of experience and knowledge in this game as an offensive coordinator going back to two thousand six, that's been the role he's been in and now as the quarterbacks coach here, he talked a little bit about
how the offense goes with the quarterback. Thought it was very good insight here from coach about how that experience helps him in this position at quarterbacks coach and passing game coordinator with the Miami Dolphins. Oh, I mean I've I've been around UM. I'm very fortunate in my career to be around some great quarterbacks you know, also some
great quarterback coaches. UM as an offensive coordinator never got far away from that that spot, you know, I mean that's really where the you know, the game has played on offense. UM. So I spent a lot of time in that room, so a lot of confidence to be over the term's quarterback friendly offenses all the time. Where does that How would you describe with a quarterback friendly? I think it's you know, things that that the one
of the things that the quarterback does best. And then to UM is when you have we were just talking about when you have the ability to run the ball. You know that that is very quarterback friendly. You know, there's UM instead of having you know, seventy five plays where pressures on the quarterback every play, you know, now you're taking it down to you know, forty five plays where you know he has an opportunity to kind of
take a broad trucking along. Here on the offensive staff with assistant head coach and tight ends coach John Embry, who I asked the same question, I was to Frank Smith about and I listed the names for him and he knew each one as I went along the list of of Tony Gonzalez, of Chris Cooley, of Cameron Brad of Cameron Jordan's or I'm sorry Jordan, Cameron, and as well with um more recently George Kittle with the forty niners. How do you get that peak performance out of those players?
What's the common trade across those players? Here's coach embree. Uh, the one trade that does go through all of those guys because they're all different type players as they love football and they're willing, you know, they're willing to let me coach them. And you know that's that's a big thing. Not everyone wants to be coached because you know, I tell those guys, my job is to never be satisfied.
And so you can come off a big game or certain things and then you come in and I'm like, yeah, but yeah, but hey, this isn't you can't keep doing this. And and so if you're a person that wants to just revel in what just happened, it's not gonna work. But if you have that short memory and understand, like, hey,
you got that twenty four hours to enjoy it. Let anyone tell you how great you were, because when you come in money, I'm gonna tell you all the things you didn't do right and how we got to work at it to get better. So if you love football and you're a true competitor, that's where and that's what all those guys have in common. They're true competitors. They
don't listen to the outside noise. Like cam Brake. You know, I had Cam on the practice squard basically for two years, you know, just trying to develop him and teach him in. Remember the first time he hit the sled, it hit him, you know, but he didn't flinch and he and he kept working in grinding the same with Jordan. When I got Jordan and Cleveland. It's it's uh when it's it's
fun for me as a coach. It's probably more fun for me as a coach when you get that clay, so to speak, and you get to mold it and and it's not going to fight you back, and you get to help try to create it, helped create something that that you know has an opportunity to be special. And then all those guys absolutely have a lot of talent. You know that that goes without saying. Yeah. So you you mentioned love with the game, this is not your
position group. Have you met Christian Wilkins jet No, I haven't. Yeah, you're gonna love him and he loves he loves football. It's a little bit up there. Yeah, he's a he's he's a character. But um, I'm sure you got this already earlier. But you know, obviously you have some experience on coach McDaniel. I've heard all these stories about you know, the way he watches tape and the way he puts himself in it, just buries himself in the film room
and kind of comes up with things. Obviously you've watched tape with him in your career too. What's what of those film sessions? Good? Like, like, what's can you describe them for us at all? Um? I'm actually not in there while he's doing all of it, but I might be in there and while he's doing some of it. And you know, Mike is is unbelievably detailed. Uh. I think one of the another great trade of his is he has great patience and he's not afraid to fail.
You know, he will tinker and and tries different things. I remember the first time we uh did we call it spirit motion. It's where a guy basically motions full speed and then we do different running place off of it, and I think the guys are kind of looking around like we're really gonna do this, like he's what's wrong with them? And then all of a sudden we're practicing and it was working and now they love it, and
then they nicknamed themselves to spirit bros. So it's like only certain guys were getting to do it and the other guys wanted to do it. And then you go fast forward a year later you got Trent Williams doing it. You know, Trent being a spirit bro. So, uh, he is very creative and he has great patience, and I think you know, when you're creative like that, there's gonna be times things don't work. And you know the great thing about him is that does and prevent him from
trying or tweaking or fixing or and doing it. And and the thing about what we do when we fail and when it doesn't work, it's it's on the biggest stage that you can be on, you know, And so you have to be able to block out the crowd noise, which I think he does a k a Twitter, Instagram, all those different things and all that and media and and focus and really trust and believe in your plan. And I think that Mike has has proven that over his career. He trusts and believes in his plan and
it's landed him in this position. We have two more coaches here on the offensive side to cover. We'll go ahead and pick it up with Matt apple Bomb, Dolphins offensive line coach, and I posed the question that you heard Frank Smith talked about earlier with regards to the vast experience and different experiences of guys at the college level,
National Football League level. Here's Matt Applebaum talking about the college experience, NFL experience and what it can ultimately do for him at this level and this role with the Miami Dolphins. I mean, I think, uh, we're all product of our experiences, and I try to pull from all
my experiences in a positive way. So I don't know if there's like a you know, a direct correlation that I was just in a college program and you know, we've got some young guys and maybe we'll play out that way, you know, um, maybe from a scheme perspective. I mean there's, um, there's some carryover. We ran a very pro style attack at BC, but other college jobs I had we didn't. And maybe you know, some of that stuff can get dabbled in or something like that.
But uh, you know, I'm one to just try to pull from all my experiences and use the moving forward. So when you kind of self scout and look at what you're inheriting here on the Dolphins offensive line, what have you seen so far? From you know, we're it's brand new man, you know what I mean. We're all just been here for a short order. Uh. Like I said, we're trying to do a lot of things. Get to know each other, put the scheme together, put the playbook together,
figure out what we have. Your finger out free, you can figure out the draft. So you know, I can't give via the type of thorough answer that you deserve for that. Um, but I'm excited to work with those guys. Um. You know, I have watched some and I feel like there's some guys in the room that have ability and
I'm just looking forward to get my hands on. All Right, there's coach Apple Bam, let's go ahead and finish up on the offensive side before we take a break and then get to the defensive coaches on the other side. Here with Wes Welker, who I asked about the process of the Deebo Samuel position change last year, not position change, but maybe rule change to get more handoffs, and how that kind of coincided with the Niners offense taking off and the winning streak they went on after that as
a result. How did that kind of plan come to fruition with you and the receiver's room, with Deebo Samuel, Mike McDaniel as the run game coordinator, and the entire staff they're working on that, how did it all come together? Well, you know there's a few times even last year, especially like at New England, um, where we put him in the backfield. Uh, a few times. Um, you know it's you know, it's a matchup night nightmare, and um, you know,
I always knew how Bill was about matchups and everything. So, UM, you know, when you're on the third down and you get her first down and then you go fast and you put Devo in the backfield and you're eleven personnel. Next thing you know, you're in one personnel and you know, and he's pretty much one of the best running backs in the league as well. So it's um, it's it's really tough on defenses and and matching you up and whether they need to go base, whether you go nickel,
all these different things. It's, um, you know, it really messes with defenses as far as that goes. And and then uh, we we just kind of built on it.
And you know, and I think we we had some running backs go down and and um, you know, we had some uh rookies and stuff like that playing running back that you know, maybe weren't ready for those carries a game where you know, um, you know Debo's you know, it's a big kid, and and uh you know he he's a help of player and and um, you know, being able to maybe take you know, five to ten of those runs um off those young guys plays. How much of that can you translate over to here? I
don't think you brought depot with you. We did. Jeez man, what are we gonna do? Uh now, Um, I think you you build it around your personnel and you kind of build from there. Um. It's not like we drafted Debo right off the bat and said, all right, we're gonna make him running back. Um, you know, we wanted to make him a receiver and build him up as a receiver and put him up as a receiver, and and then it just kind of happened to um, you know, start to move him into running back a little bit.
So UM, you know, I think it's all about the skill sets of your guys and and um, how in trouble they are, uh with all those positions. And you know Debos, you know, extremely smart kid and UM, but you have to build that. You can't sit there and start right off the bat. Okay, you're gonna play receiver and running back your rookie year or anything like that. It's something that happens over time, and you continue to work with guys and and prepare them and get them ready.
And um, some guys can handle that. Some guys can Um. You know, Debos was one of those special players that I could handle it. What do you see when you watch Juliet want Um, I see speed, I see you know, the acceleration. I see a passion for the game. I see um you know a guy that's that's not scared. Um, you know, and and just a heck of a football player.
And UM, you know anytime, you know, no matter the skill set and all those different things, you you've got to have a mind for the game, and he definitely has that, and you know, I'm looking forward to working with them on that. So there you go. Wide receivers coach Wes Welker talk about Jalen Waddle and just the experience of adapting your scheme for a player and having a plan for the player to develop them in certain areas.
Great stuff there. We're gonna take our last break here on this Friday edition of the Drivetime Podcast and come back on the other side and get to the rest of the defensive assistance. I spoke to Drivetime Podcast, brought to you by Auto Nation. Drivetime Podcast a Friday edition here as we get ready to close up the month of February and head into March for the scouting Combine, ultimately free agency, and then finally the draft in April.
After that, we go back now to assistant coaches media, and I spoke to Dolphins defensive line coach Austin Clark and asked him a little bit about Jalen Phillips and his rookie season and year number two and what he's looking forward to for the second year player in that second season, Yeah, I think for him and he would tell you, this is becoming a three down player, you know, playing a run at a high level, continually to develop his past us at multiple spots, um, you know, and
just becoming more reliable. I think it's it's a hard thing to do as a rookie like he did and come in and you know see that he had that streak of production where he kind of figured it out, you know, and I think he was you know, he was a little thinged up in preseasons that kind of hurt him a little bit. But to have a full off season of O T A S you know, build on the things he was he was good at and then take some of those areas of growth, um and and just keep going with him, just focus on him
throughout O T AS. That's why I think it's nice about that stuff and then carry that into training camp and uh, you know, play playing every game healthy. You know. It was really proud of what he did and how hard he plays. You know, this guy plays freaking hard
and and we're fired up about it. Finished up here with coach Clark about the retention of himself and some other defensive assistance and just assistance across the entire staff and what that says about McDaniel's plan and approach and the importance of those relationships and the maintaining of them. Here's Coach Clark talking about went back to the Miami
Dolphins under a new head coach. Yeah, I would say, you know, I was fired up Coach mcgein to give me the opportunity personally, because you know, I love this organization, love these players, and love the direction that's going. And then to to meet him and hear his vision and uh, you know the other coaches like them guys over there with all those people over there to bring to know
that there's like phenomenal coaches, players people. I think, you know, he's built the hell of his staff and you know, not not just like the position coaches, you know, like Derek LeBlanc and some of these other guys that keeps bringing in here to help out the front and the defense, you know, And uh, just fired up about that man and really like the vision at at a program and lucky as hed to be a part of it. So the guys he was talking about, and I apologized some
of the audio here was Wendy. There was some trains and construction, just a lot going on out there. But the guys he was talking about where pats are Tan and Sam Madison, who again had scrums around them the entire time. Let's go ahead and pick it up here with Sam Madison, who was asked about, well, what else the special opportunity to come back not just by himself but with his former counterpart in Lockdown Corner on the
other side of the field and Pastor Tan. Here's Sam Madison talking about that experience and the opportunity they have here in South Florida back with the Miami Dolphins. Yeah. Man, the only thing we you know, we talked about, like I I thought he would h eventually got a college head job or college job somewhere, and I was like, hey, just to make sure you come back and get me to come a coach for you. But uh didn't see
this coming out of the blue. Um lying on my couch and getting ready to go back because we were on vacation now and I was I was home and my phone just rung at an awkward hour and it was coach read So uh, just happy and thankful, you know, to be back here in South Florida. But you can still be able to come back to an organization that I know, that I care about, that I love and hopefully being able to help me. Youm in um eventually get the best out of their career playing in Nation
Football games. And Sam Madison will of course were speed coaching a pair of very accomplished cornerbacks like himself and pass or Tan and xaviing Howard and Byron Jones. What does he seeing those two players they have they have it. You know, x is definitely one of the tops in the league right now. You look at Byron, He's going
out there heat challenging. You know, our our job that's coming here and get those guys better and the guys that's behind them and show them a little small things that you know, because they've been in the league long enough, they understand and know exactly, you know, how to get through this season knowing that it's going to be grueling and it's totally different. Joe like, uh, you know, this
is the first year for seventeen games. It was rough, you know, and now being able to talk to these guys through it, how to get through it, but just knowing that every game is going to be that important. You can't have a day off, you can't have a game all. You know, it's just gonna be fun to be able to give them the things that they need to be able to go out there and and and and help us win football games. But I'm not gonna be easy. I'm gonna beat tough. I'm gonna be demanding.
And that's what they I think they did with expect That's what we expected. Mail demanded the best out of us each and every day. We demanded the best out of each other, each other when we're in practice doing games. And that's the same thing that that we've been preaching and talking since our kids been a little and seven o seven and all those other different things. And that's what we're gonna do. No great stuff there from the legend.
Let's keep it going with another former player here and Stephen Gregory, who I asked, what is the benefit for you to have both played and coached in a similar system, because he played with the Patriots when Josh Boyer coached there, and he also coached with the Lions under Matt Patricia in a similar scheme. Here's safety's coach Stephen Gregory on how that helps him prepare for this job with the
Miami Dolphins. It definitely helps. No. Obviously, being a player back in New England when I was there within this system helped me, uh, you know, really develop a good knowledge had not only coach the system, to play in the system. Uh, kind of feeling really to the players, you know what it's like to be in those positions. Uh,
the communication of terminology, everything that goes with it. And then obviously, you know, my time in Detroit was kind of running the same system with Matt Patricia there and um, you know, getting an opportunity to coach in it and then learn all the nuances of different levels of the defense, you know, just prepares me to kind of help these
guys as much as I can. And you know, obviously some of the different wrinkles and different things that they've adapted and developed over the years, which I learned, you know, some more things last year being here. I think it all, it all encompasses a good foundation of of trying to teach and and develop. Last question here for coach Gregory, what do you think you've got in those two impressive
young safeties and Javon holland Brandon Jones Yeah. Obviously, you know, the natural u natural instincts in the the athleticism that they bring, the speed at which they played the game is uh, are things that you love. Obviously they're still young. Uh, they're still young players in their career, and there's still so much that they can learn from a formation identification, route recognition and the offensive concepts. You know, just being able to see things a little bit faster to help them,
you know, for themselves in a position to make more plays. Uh. You know, it's exciting. I'm extremely grateful for the opportunity to work with those guys, work with this staff or with the people that are around this building. Um, I think it's gonna be something special. And we'll go ahead
and finish up here with the last coach. I've got audio on with Tyrone mackenzie, Dolphins outside linebackers coach, and I asked him about his experience with Mike Vrabel, who of course was a long time Patriot and played there at the same time that Josh Boyer was a coach there and had that connection come across as anything that he noted for experience within this system to get this
job here under Josh Boyer. Here's coach Mackenzie, I think every everywhere you go is going to be a different system. You know, everybody has their own style of it, um.
So I mean like being with deem Piece, you know, and Mike and Tennessee is different from being with uh, you know, Appatricia or Matt Eager flu or Wade Phillips or here with Josh Boyd because everybody has around down man, and so the biggest thing for me, um, it's just to get there, understand the standard, understand the schemes that you want to run, and kind of take it from there. So there you go. Assistant coach Media, a little bit
of sound bites from most of the guys. Next time, I'll go ahead and hit the guys we didn't get this time around, and we'll hear from every coach on this Dolphins staff until next time. That's gonna be my time. We have plenty of content coming your way next week from the combine in Indianapolis. You'll want to keep it locked right here on the Drive Time podcast. You all please be sure to subscribe to the podcast on Apple Podcast, Leave us a rating, leave us a review. Plenty of
those still coming in. We appreciate those tenfold. Also, please give me a follow on Twitter at Wingfield NFL. Follow the team at Miami Dolphins across all social platforms. Check out Dolphins Today on the YouTube channel as well as the Fish Tank podcast with Seth and o J, and last but not least, Miami Dolphins dot Com. Until next time finds up ca line Daddy's coming Home. M