Dolphins Win Fourth Straight, Recapping 34-31 over the Cardinals

you your daily dose of Miami Dolphins football. And on today's show, it may be a tropical storm out there outside here in South Florida, but nothing is going to rain on our parade. Today. It is a victory Monday edition of Drive Time as the Dolphins win, Win, Win, Win. The Dolphins win in Arizona thirty four to thirty one, fourth quarter medal from the offense and from that rookie quarterback, the defense making enough big place to win, and the

special teams once again on top of it. We're gonna do the five Takeaways, some stats, some game notes, some individual performances, and we're gonna hear from John, Kim, Jemmy all of that and more on this Monday, November the ninth edition of the Drivetime podcasts. That is another Miami Dolphins win four in a row. And support for drive time comes from Auto Nation. And there are so many reasons to drive pink, but for Auto Nation, there's only

one to finish the fight against cancer. In fact, Auto Nation has helped raise over twenty five million dollars to Drive out Cancer. To join the fight, visit the Auto Nation store near you or drive pink dot com. Win win, win, win win is because that's four wins in a row for your Miami Dolphins. One over the Arizona Cardinals, a back and forth, a fair offensive, fireworks throughout, big plays

on defense, takeaways, special teams. I can't think of another better team win than this one for your Miami Dolphins. They continue to do it on all three phases. Last week, maybe the defense and special teams carried the water a little bit more. Today, you get more out of the offense. Special teams are still there for you in the defense makes big plays time and time again in this game

throughout the course of the season. Let's go ahead and just jump right into this first with the stats as the story up on Miami Dolphins dot com will tell you, and if you're not familiar by now we have two stories every Sunday night, the Player Spotlight this week taking a look at two a tongue Byloa and that ninety three yard drive in the fourth quarter to put the Dolphins back to even the first time that he had ever trailed any team in his NFL career through two games,

and the first time the Dolphins had trailed since going back to Week four against the Seattle Seahawks. Check out that Spotlight article and also check out the Dolphins finish in Arizona beat Cardinals thirty thirty one, and in this piece you'll find the stats from this game. The Dolphins post three hundred and twelve offensive yards. The Cardinals had four forty two in the game, Miami ninety one rushing, Arizona one hundred and seventy eight. A lot of that

from that darn quarterback Kyler Murray. My goodness, he's good. We'll get to him here in just one second, passing yards to one from Miami to sixty four from the Cardinals. The Dolphins were four out of eight on third downs. The Cardinals were five out of twelve and two for three on fourth downs. That third one a big one, wasn't it. The Dolphins got themselves a takeaway and did not turn the ball over themselves. They also had one sack, the Cardinals had three. In the game, both teams committed

seven penalties. Miami got flagged for seventy five yards, the Cardinals for seventy one and time of possession much closer this week. Arizona had it for thirty one minutes three seconds, the Dolphins had it for twenty eight minutes and fifty seven seconds. How about some key notes from this game that come out of a post game before we jump into the five takeaways. It's now the fourth win in row.

That's the first time Miami has four consecutive wins since seen the last time this team played in the postseason. They won six games in a row that season, and the five and three record is the best start through the first eight games of a season for the franchise since.

The Dolphins have now won five of its past six, ten of its last seventeen, and they have scored twenty one plus points in seven consecutive games, the longest such streak since the Dolphins did it eight times in a row and the final two games of two thousand one, combined with the first six games of two thousand two. It's the longest single season streaks since a seven game streak in nineteen eight seven, which includes three games played

with replacement players that year. So Kiana reeves, Gene Hackman, and Jon Favreau out there for the replacement players. The Dolphins four game win streak is tied for the second longest active mark as I record this podcast with Kansas

City and New Orleans. Now, the Saints are currently up on Sunday Night Football as I record this podcast, so we'll see how long that stands by the Dolphins and the upper echelon there for winning streaks, but the Dolphins, Chiefs, and Saints have the winning streaks behind Pittsburgh, who has an eight game winning streak, So at worst, the Dolphins tied for the third longest winning streak right now in the NFL with Kansas City if the Saints score holds.

The Dolphins took a seventeen halftime lead in this game. It was the fourth consecutive game this year the Dolphins had at least twenty one points at halftime, and the team had the lead in each of those games. It marks just the second time the Dolphins have scored twenty one plus points in the first half of four consecutive games. Miami also did this in the third through sixth games of the nineteen seventy seven season. All kinds of marks being set here for this Dolphins offense. So a big

wint thirty one. Let's go ahead and break right into the takeaways from this game. I start off with takeaway number one, that rookie quarterback to a tongue baloa. He was feeling it. We're gonna go ahead and hear from him. Coach Flora's and Ted Harris, and we'll start with the head coach of your Miami Dolphins, Brian Flores, on his rookie quarterback to a tonga by Lowa's performance in this game. He made a lot of plays for us, a lot of big place for us, especially down the stretch. We

needed it. You know. It was kind of a back and forth game. They made play as we made plays on the stage wasn't too big from tonight. Um he played well, but we had a lot of guys played well. Offensive line, you know, backs, uh, you know, tight ends, everyone could tribute. A lot of guys contribute. It was a team victory who made plays really, you know, all three sides of the ball. And that's how that's what you need to to win a game like that against

an opponent like that. And we'll go ahead and seamlessly transition into a Tongue Baloa talking about his performance and the performance of the offense. I do apologize the first part of this audio a little bit loud, trying to adjust levels on that. Here's Tongue Valoa. I. I think it was it was a good, you know win first off. But I think the biggest thing throughout the game was you know, taking what the defense gave us, um, you know, and and just taking into a play at a time

and snap at a time. UM. I was very fortunate, um you know before that play ran, you know and got out of that, you know, the the pressure situation on third down, um, you know. But I think it's just taking it a play at a time and you know the place that we've been given by our offensive coordinator, by chan um he he helped us, you know, get

into situations where we could be successful offensively. And last week you probably recall to having a kind of candid moment on the sideline with captain and center Ted Carriss, who approached to h who maybe didn't feel his best individually after that performance, although always stoked to get the

Dolphins win. And they captured a moment during the NFL Turning Points series on on NBC Sports, showing the moment when Carris approached to H and kind of picked him up there a little bit, and they talked about throughout the course of this week to us said that Ted came over and just picked him up being a good teammate.

Here's Ted on the I asked him about that moment and kind of how this team was able to apply that same mentality to getting themselves in the frame of mind to go out there and beat a good Cardinals team on the Sunday. Here's Ted Carris on the rock quarterback. Yeah, I don't think anyone on offense felt like they played their best last week. And you know that's what when you know, there was a candid moment that got captured

and up being being pretty cool. But um, you know he came in and work and worked, you know, as hard. It's just like everyone did to improve and and to not you know, put up a repeat performance like that, and it's very important to him and we all know that, and it's important to us, and uh, you know, we have a we have a great group of guys. It's a lot of fun to come to work every day with them. And how about that game, man, Not just the statistics we've heard about from to eight passing yards,

two passing touchdowns. He also rushed for thirty five yards, and if you take away a couple of kneel downs there at the end of the game, he had four carries or rather five carries for thirty six rushing yards. So taking a little bit off the stats, they're off the top of the kneel downs, But I think any quarterback any day will take that. His passer rating was one two point three on the day. And I'm gonna kind of roll down this thing right here with you guys.

The first opening shot where he rolls out to Mike a SICKI love the way he gets those hips cleared and kind of flips that thing through with a good amount of velocity and touch on that path as we saw that time and time again coming out of college and now with the Miami Dolphins. A designed run in this game, a couple of them, and he takes a slide. It takes a good left footed slide in there, going feet first into second base as it were, keeping himself healthy,

keeping himself protected. That's always great to see. They come back with a deep shot to Preston Williams and he's taking that inside release on those cornerbacks. That's one of the things that Preston does so well. We'll talk about him here in just one second. Gets that inside release and then kind of puts that big body in front of heat and the defensive back and is able to kind of box out as they work down the field. And I thought that was a really good adjustment from Ta.

They tried it deep on the first time, the first possession of the game, they tried going deep to Preston, couldn't connect. The ball kind of went over Preston's had a little bit. He had to make an adjustment, and the second time he had the same inside release and the football this time was right on the money, right and stride for him to keep that defensive back on his back and catch the football and run right through it.

We sell the football coming out early, and not just on those deep shot plays, but in general throughout the course of the game. The touchdown to Preston Williams, the broadcast crew talked about this, and I thought they did a good job breaking this down, seeing how the coverage kind of fell off and chased at sicky to the corner of the end zone because it was third and seven and there was I think three or four yards

between the first down marker and the end zone. So the Cardinals defense, you know, take away the end zone first, then play up afterwards, they followed asiki to the corner. Preston sets that thing down a couple of yards short of the first down marker, but because two is so quick and on time, and the rhythm of the passing game is so quick and on time, Preston can catch that thing tucket, get up field and not just get the first down, but launch across the end zone line

there for the touchdown. He did a great job, I thought, when there was pressure on him throughout the course of the game, where he attacks the line of scrimmage after getting pressure off either tackle, gets forward through the pocket, attacks the line and doesn't look to run, keeps his eyes down field and flips that thing out to the right for Davante Parker for sixteen yards. That's that's a

really good looking shot there. Of how he can manage pressure, get out of pressure, and throw that football all over the field because he keeps his eyes upfield and keeps targets available at all times. Then the play backed up on their own goal line, third down and nine to rip that thing to DeVante Parker under pressure, a tight window coverage kind of hovering around Parker on that play. If that ball is late at all, you've got a chance for an interception there, You've got a chance for

six points. The other direction. Your best case if you're late is a pass breakup, and then Matt Hawk has to punch out of his own end zone, which he can do, but I'm saying that's not an ideal spot to be. That's the best case scenario. If that ball is late, it's not, it's on time. It converts. Then a couple of plays later they get another third down conversion because to of scrambles and makes a play with

his legs. And it reminds me of a play back against Old Miss last year for Alabama where a free rusher comes off the outside to what does this thing? And he's so twitchy as a player back there where he separates his hands from the football and takes the left hand and kind of ball fakes. It's a very Russell Wilson type thing we've seen him do over the course of his ten year his brilliant tenure career there

in Seattle. You kind of get the ball defender chasing the football and it kind of breaks them down and then two goes off from the other direction. He did exactly that on this third down and fourth conversion, breaking pressure, breaking the pocket, getting down filled with the run and converting with his legs, the quick twitch, the ball fake, steps around the free rusher. Man, that's fun, fun, fun,

fun stuff to watch. And then the fourth quarter drive. Man, what a freaking drive on the Drive Time podcast here five for five fifty three yards and the touchdown pass twenty three yards rushing on that drive, including that third and four conversion and the throw to DeVante Parker, the dime in the back of the end zone to mac Hollins who makes a great catch, the first reception of his Dolphins career, and of course, his first touchdown with

the Miami Dolphins. So to a big time performance in game number two on the road to steal a win there late in the fourth quarter with some big time moments, big time play when it mattered the most takeaway number two, Well, the zero blitz creates another defensive score for your Miami Dolphins. And speaking of that zero look and the defensive score once again, Emmanuel ogbas seventh sack of the season, another force fumble, this time winds up in the hands of

Shack Lawson for a big Dolphins touchdown. A big block from Brandon Jones as he helps free up Lawson for that touchdown run. Let's go ahead, and here from Emmanuel Ogball right now, who was asked postgame, are you just gonna turn in one of these sack fumbles every single week here for the Miami Dolphins. I thought his response was fantastic. I mean, that's what it takes to win games, and I'm down to do it. In other words, hell yeah, I'll do it. As long as we're winning football games,

I don't care. And that's what the Dolphins did tonight. And I thought they were so good mixing coverage. You look at the very first play of the game, Kyler had a bunch of time back there because not because there wasn't a good pass rush or anything, because Miami only rushed three players and went with eight guys in coverage. Then they come back to plenty of zero looks end up burned him a couple of times. The long touchdown past there to Christian Kirk Byron Jones spoke about that

how he just said, that guy's fast. That's that's all there was too on that play. But he did talk about the interception as well that turned into a touchdown. He had his hands on the football and the ball wind up on the hands the receiver. He talked about that, and that's kind of some of the fire you play with on that zero look if you have a quarterback like Kyler Murray who can get the football of that quickly.

But it also caused plenty of problems to like the sack fumble, the touchdown, the missed opportunity to Andy Isabella in the back of the end zone because he was open back there, but the rush got back so fast he had to throw that football over the top of the end line and he couldn't bring it down. So there's so many elements of this game defensively, different guys

coming into the lineup. Bobby McCaine goes down for a little bit, returns to the lineup, and they just find ways to put these guys in position to make plays, regardless of who it is, regardless of which level of the defense it comes from. There's so much defensive creativity, so many good calls, and to do this, to have a performance where you're down so many coaches in the game because of a few players that are a few

coaches rather that did not coach in this game. To come up with the plan, to get the calls, to get the guys in the right spot, to not really have any pre snap formational penalties on the defense. Really good work by this Miami defense once again, and I thought the way they altered their plan a little bit. We saw Xavian Howard on new Copkins. DeAndre Hopkins in the first half didn't have a target for the first time in the first half of a game in his

entire career. And then he came back and there was some moments between both x and DeAndre Hopkins. The Dolphins wind up switching he and Byron Jones to kind of have Jones go over and shadow Hopkins in that game. So just an adaptive mindset, good mix of coverage and calls on the defensive side. You love to see you here from Brian Flores and this defense is playing really good football. Lighten things up and four straight wins as a result. Takeaway number three kind of the same story.

On offense, we saw plenty of different looks from the offense. They can open up in that twelve personnel, two tight ends both Kisiki and smythe to one side of the formation. That's gonna give you an unbalanced look. They run the football out of that, they go pistol. They come back with spread or empty looks. They can motion a guy into the backfield and go to the pistol, go to

the fly sweep look. They can go to the run pass option and to a kept a run on a run pass option and slid down for a first down and a nice slide into second base. You'd love to see that, But you just have to love the mix that inside screen to the tight end to dirm Smith early in the game on the Dolphins first offensive touchdown possession,

opening things up and taking shots. The big play to Preston Williams I thought, really seemed to loosen things up for the Dolphins offense to get them going on top of the quarterback runs. I mean, you're gonna hear too a talk about this a little bit right here, will play some sound from him. This team was a little

bit undermanned. Lost Preston Williams in the game, lost Dirham Smith in the game, was without Matt Brita, where without Miles Gaskin, Lyndon Boden wasn't available on the reserve slash COVID nineteen list. So the Dolphins find ways to get guys involved, to find out what makes them tick, what makes them most productive in the game, both offensively and defensively.

We're talking about the offensive side here. Although Emmanuel Ogba did say the trust that he has in the coaching staff and the trust they have in him, and the insistence on putting guys in positions where they're going to be successful and give them a chance to make plays. I know it sounds so simple in theory, but it

doesn't always happen. And we actually had Emmanuel Ogba in his pre conference say that he's been repeating this thing over and over again, coaches putting him in a great position to make plays and to go out there and play winning football. But I wanted to ask to Uh about this team's resolve and the ability to overcome some of the adversity they faced from personnel standpoint, not having

those guys I listed available to them on offense. Here's to talking about his teammates ability and resolve to overcome the shortcomings. Will play my question. First, hey to congrats on the win. Earlier coach Flora spoke about the resolve of you guys with the coaching staff having so many guys down, I wanted to ask you to speak about the resolve of your teammates being down so many running backs and receivers. Davante Parker caught all six of his

passes after Preston Williams left the game injured. If you could just speak about the resolve of your teammates in this game, My goodness. Yeah. I think we persevered offensively. I think defensively as well. We had some guys banged up UM, you know, in the first half a little. Then they were able to come back. But you know,

we we persevered as an offense. We we knew we didn't have a lot of the guys you know out there at you know, we kind of called certain plays for UM, but we made it work and I think that was that was the beauty of everyone UM coming together, you know, with Matt catching the touchdown, um, you know, and then just just the completions that we were able to get to our tight ends, um, you know, Davonte Jachim and then even you know, some some plays dumping

it down to the running back. So, like I said, it was one of those things where that's what the defense gave us and that's what we're going to take. And so the ability to adapt and adjust to your offense and really mixed things up on offense is our takeaway number three. And that kind of segway is perfectly the takeaway number four. Just the resilient bunch of this group,

and coach Flores talks about it. Let's go ahead and hear from coach first on what he thinks about his team's ability to overcome adversity throughout the course of the week and mental toughness a hallmark he is starting to believe of this football team. Um. I think our guys, Um, there were a lot of adversity this week. Um, these last couple of days especially, But I talked about our mental toughness last week. I think, uh, that showed up

again today hard for victory. You know, our players, you know, our players stepped up. We had coaches stepping up. You know, we had assistant uh strength coaches coming in and Kayleb. Barnhill came in there and was helping us. From a coaching standpoint, I think we we had we had a lot of people step up and and and uh and

help and it was definitely a team victory. And coach would follow up on that on a later question talking about the camaraderie and the entire team, not just the players, the entire team relationships, that kind of camaraderie, and you know, I think that that that that that shows up on the field, and I'm proud of this group. I'm proud of, uh, you know, our team. When I say team, I'm not just talking about the fifty three players and the sixteen

practice squad players in the coaches. I'm talking about everyone. And so the resiliency of this bunch. I mean, we saw again Preston Williams has carded off in this game, took his shoes off, left the field on a cart, did not return with a foot injury, and the passing game found the way to adjust right, got the deep

ball going to Davante Parker. After that gets a big defensive past interference call, which does not go on his sixty plus yard performance in this game, but it does count as far as Dolphins putting the ball down the field, and we saw those deep shots early on going to Preston Williams. So he leaves the game, you come back to number eleven, who has shown time and time again he can make place down the football field. You get the football out of jakeem Grant hot, you get the

ball to Davante Parker Hall on a curl route. You find Patrick Laird on that dump off in behind the blitz on that fantastic sequence of plays right before the field goal at the end of the first half. We'll talk about that and our fifth takeaway. The ball just kept coming out quick, regardless of depth of target. And it's not that the offense changed. It's more of a tip of the cat from Miami's ability to find the

next next man up. Roll fill it out, find out who you need to get the football to, what makes them click the best, and get them the ball. Preston Williams down, Matt Breeda down, Miles Gascon, Lindbow and all down. And you still find a way to make plays with the guys you do have available to you. Jachem Grant showing the strength and his game with the wiggle in the open field. And again back to the Atrick Laired comment, we'll talk about the sequence of plays right before the

field goal. Here in just one second, Jordan Howard finds his fourth touchdown of the season, has a huge eight yard game on the first down run at the end of the first half. That play was massive. You find a way to get the guys you have out there playing their best football, and I think that this group really responds to that, and they've shown how resilient they are both with having players down personnel wise, and of course the Dolphin's coaching staff situation factoring into this game

as well. So that's takeaway number four. Takeaway number five before we get to the individual performances and John con Jemmy here on the Sunday Night Slash Monday Recap podcast, Takeaway number five the end of the first half sequence and setting up big plays with big plays and the team stacking up the big plays. We've talked about that on the podcast so many times. I've referenced it, I think every Sunday here on the podcast Cam Wake before

the Miami miracle. A couple of tackles on defense forces the Patriots field goal and gives the offense a chance so New England cannot kneel the clock out and they make that play that happened in this game again as well Byron Jones, A big stick on Kyler Murray on the third down play right short of the sticks that led to a fourth down that led to a turnover on downs. Big time play right there. And let's go ahead and hear about that play from the man himself

Byron Jones. Yeah. I mean, that's that's something that we talk about in the in the locker room, is bring your own juices. You know, they had a good crowd here today, but that's only about four thousand, ten thousand people. I'm not sure what the number is, but it's not it's not a full stadium. So the challenge for us on defense and really the entire team is to bring

your own juice. Man, when we made good plays, obviously we're gonna celebrate and in high five and slapheads, but um, that's the Bedia football and the Bedia football is really bring your own juice and having an energy like your seven ten years old back back in the day, but in the backyards, um, yeah, we just keep it rolling, keep having some fun. Byron was also asked about how he feels this team is performing and if you see something special developing in season, did you see it back

in training camp? He said that you don't ever want to feel that way in training camp because you have to go out there and prove it. But he also said that it's only halfway through the season right now, and we have to go out there and keep playing. And the way we do that is to go out and keep preparing the way we have so far the season. Keep working hard the hallmark of this football team. Hard work. The game is important to them and they definitely show

that on Sundays. But back to the general takeaway here, stacking up those big plays we talked about, Byron Jones big hit on Kyler Murray on one of the field goals of Dolphins forced the Cardinals into Eric Rowe has a massive tackle for loss, much in the way e Land and Roberts had a tackle for loss last week. Before the big Emmanuel aug Bas strip sack and the

Van Gigle touchdown run. Rog gets a big TfL. The defense makes a good coverage play on third down, good play stack on top of each other, and it saves the Dolphins four points down there in the red zone. Brandon Jones makes a tackle on Chase Edmonds and the third quarter short of the sticks, and an aug Ball with the pass rush on the ensuing play puts the right tackle right in the lap of Kyler Murray to

force a field goal. So these big plays before the big plays, kind of bottling up multiple plays in a row. That's what this coaching staff and this team and this league really talks about, right Stacking up good days, well, stacking up good plays leads to good results as well, and we're seeing that from the Miami Dolphins. But back to the end of the first half sequence, you get a three and out on defense. Cliff Kingsbury calls that time out because Andy Isabella did have the first down.

He retreats and gets tackled by who else besides Shack Lawson with Emmanuel og Ball in the neighborhood because both those guys bailed out into the hook. As we've seen out of the zero pressure defense, the cover zero looks or even just showing multiple linebackers and defensive lineman up on the line of scrimmage, kind of condensing the first level and second level of the defense into one, causing

confusion for the quarterback. Because of that, you get lost in og ball pulling out this time, and they make a tackle right there short of the sticks. So the defense contributes with a big three and out that gets the offense back onto the field. And the very first play after that to gets it out quickly to Jachim Grant who makes a man miss and not only makes the man miss for more yardage, finds a way to get out of bounds and preserves the clock by getting

out of bounds. Then you come right back after the sack. You get the football out quick in the face of the blitz. We talked about on the podcast Pasket All Week last week on the All Review too, of throwing in behind the blitz is his bread and butter, that flick of the wrist, the quick foot, the quick footwork. He doesn't have to get perfectly aligned because he can just fling that thing out there with a quick flick of the wrist and doesn't have to have his feet

perfect because of it either. And the mental processing to go ahead and work in behind the blitz and know where the hot route is. We saw exactly that on the Patrick Lair catch and run where he does a great job staying and bounce up the sideline and getting seventeen yards out of that play. And then we come back and get the field goal there from Jason Sanders. So a big sequence of plays there at the end of the half, putting up multiple good plays in a

row to get the desired results. This Dolphins team talked about stringing some wins together back after the Jags game. It didn't happen after that, but talked about it again after the Niners game, and boy have they four in a row. They're stringing those wins together because they're stringing

good plays together throughout the course of the game. Let's get a few more notes here on this game, just kind of some miscellaneous notes before we turn this thing over to John kN Jemmie for his three takeaways from the contest. The option play where Miami tosses the ball to Malcolm Perry who then pitches it outside to savan Akhmed out on the edge. That play didn't work, but

some cool creative design there. We talked about the inside screen to durham smythe you get your chem grant on the fly, sweet motion, you fake it out to him, you fake it the other direction to Savan Akhmed, and you throw that thing down the barrel for Durham Smith for a nice catch and run. I thought there was

plenty of good creativity in the game that way. We saw Jason Strowbridge on the field active for his first NFL action, a good chance to have some fresh legs after the defense played in ninety five snaps a week ago. And speaking of Akhmed back in the backfield, he led the way for Dolphins ball carriers with thirty seven rushing

yards in this game. Saw some explosion out of that guy right, a good burst, a good one cut, and this guy took some carries from Miles Gaskin at Washington now and it wasn't a ton because Gaskin played plenty there at you Dub and produced big time for the Huskies. But Achmed was part of the equation there as well. And I thought you saw why today, some good work off the edge, a good explosive run up the middle. He can catch the football as well, So I thought

a very nice day view for Akhmed at receiver. We talked about Preston Williams that inside release where he stacks the defensive backs, got that big thirty five yard reception off of that. Jachim had another big punt return in this game. Thought that was fantastic. And then of course the play we talked about where he made the guy miss and got out of bounds. Mac Hollard's first career touchdown with the Miami Dolphins, first catch with the Miami

Dolphins as well. Nice job getting that thing stuck in the chess plate, getting the feet down and controlling the football all the way to the ground and finishing that thing off on the defensive line. I thought ray Kwon Davis had good penetration throughout the course of the game. A couple of times he broke through there and forced the back to bubble or forced Kyler Murray to kind of flee or change directions. And then aug ball again.

So many times getting his hands up on football's and not just batting passes down, which he did again in this game, but getting the ball out of the quarterback's hand. Those big heavy paws, those big heavy mids. We heard Shack Lawson talking about it back in training camp. Those things are heavy. They can get the football out when he arrives and makes that impact. He did it again today with a huge play. I thought Christian Wilkins had a couple of big wins in side, stacking things up,

coming off blocks, and making tackles at the line. Ray Kwon Davis was with him, so was Zach Seeler, so was Shack Lawson on a few instances. And Zack Seeler the play of the day for the Dolphins defense. He stacked that thing up on that fourth down run to Chase Edmunds, saw it discarded the block, got in the gap, made the play, and then he landed. Roberts and and Exaviing Howard both joined in there to finish that thing

off and get that stop. So the Dolphins defensive line made several plays in this game, despite the Cardinals offense having some success with the yards department. It's all about the players you win, right, not just the total yardage. At the end of the day, how many plays can you win? I thought this Dolphins defense made enough plays to win this game. At linebacker, Kyle van Noy has such excellent gap control and does such a good job

setting the edge off the outside. There's a play where he ran down Chase Edmunds in the red zone on the outside to an outside run. I thought that was very impressive for him to stay in control and stay on top of that play. And speaking of speed to the edge, Jerome Baker was great to get him back out there after he left the game early but returned with an injury. He was back on the field making those chase plays the sideline once again. And a defensive

backfield Brandon Jones. We talked about the key block on the scoop and score. He also had a huge stop in the middle of the third quarter on a tackle on Chase edmund short of the sticks that forced a fourth and one. The Cardinals would go from it from their own forty six and convert, but it was still a big play at the time. Eric wrote the big TfL on the red zone from second and four to second and ten, which helped Miami's defense get off the field.

And I just like the way this Dolphins defensive backfield played aggressive in general. We saw them getting gravy at times and really kind of trying to assert their will and playing to that cover zero look and trying to force Kyler Murray into tight windows. Because this guy can extend plays and it makes it very tough on defensive backfield when he extends so much. Special teams wise, jakeem

Grant had a big return. Jason Sanders two consecutive field goals made in this game gives him twenty for his career now going back to last season, seventeen for seventeen on the year and a career long fifty six yard field goal. So the special teams playing well once again, and the punt game with Matta Hawk a couple of punts inside this one of yardbine once more, or before I turn this thing over to John kN jemmy, how about the Washington State Cougars on Saturday night getting their

first victory of the season taking down Oregon State. Pretty cool? Are our true freshman quarterback, first ever true freshman in the history of Washington State to start the opener. He went to St. Louis High School in Honolulu, the same school as two A tongue of byloa. And lastly, here before we hear from John kN jemmy, the Dolphins are

now five and three. There are four teams tied at five and three in that fifth, sixth, seventh, and eighth spot in the a f C, your Dolphins one of them, the Raiders, the Colts, and the Browns among that group of five and three teams as well. All right, let's go ahead and turn this thing over now to John Conjemmy for his three takeaways and joining me for our fourth consecutive victory three Takeaways on the Drivetime podcast. Is the co host of the audible podcast here on the

Miami Dolphins podcast Network. He is John con Jemmy. John, how are you doing tonight, sir? I am absolutely fantastic after that football game and a and a greed come from behind win in terms of being able to, you know, come back from a deficit, you know, for the first time in a long time, and be on the right side of winning a football game. Yeah. And before we get to your three takeaways here, you know, I talked about it in my personal takeaways, the resiliency of this

football team. So many moments where it seemed like this thing might have starred to slip away, Like even even the fumble kickoff that the Dolphins couldn't recover was like such a gut punch, but they kept coming back, They kept bouncing back and making the plays they had to make. To win. And with that, John, I want to hear

your first takeaway from Dolphins thirty four Cardinals thirty one. Well, I think the first takeaway that really jumped out at me was TA was to h um, this is the same player that you know if I would have watched him play high school football, and obviously we all watched him play college football. But now, as in his second start as a pro, he's doing and displaying traits that

he's had all along. You know, he's a competitive person that doesn't really beat himself too many times in terms of making mistakes and and doing things that prevent you from winning. And I just thought that he gave the Dolphins a chance because of his timing in the past offense, his decision making in the past offense, his athletic ability. He's never gonna run like Kyler Murray, but he's gonna be able to escape and provide a positive play when

potentially a negative play could come up. And I just think I think he did all the things and all the attributes that made him the fifth overall draft choice, you know, in the last year's draft. So I just thought tour was to he came out, he played really well he pushed the ball down the field. He was decisive when he threw it, he was elusive when he needed to be, and he was able to put this team, you know, in a position at the end of the game to come back and and win a game on

a road against a really good football team. So his numbers were much better, the play calling form was much better. They still moved him out of the pocket, but they were allowing him to push the ball down the field when the opportunities came about. And I just thought he played a solid game. Yeah, he you mentioned the rushing ability. He joked post game that he felt like he was in quicksand on that play, a couple of those runs, I should say. And then somebody asked him if he

was as fast as Kyler Murray. He goes, oh, not not even close, not even closch, John, I think I think we all would agree with that. But to have made the plays when they counted, And you talked about the skill set that he showed in college, it takes me back to our our preview, our draft preview shows, John, the clips we did for YouTube, and you're right, I mean the quick release, the quick twitch, the ability to get out of pressure and he raised that free rusher man.

That was fun to watch. I mean, we could talk all night about this, but I want to get to your takeaway number two here, John Well, the second takeaways. The defense does it again. Um, I mean, they're able

to find a way to score points. And in a game where two of and the offense came back from a deficit in the fourth quarter when you had to rely on you know, the leg again of Jason Sanders for two not one, but two uh long field goals to go through the uprights, it was still the defense providing six points and and maybe bridging the gap where the Dolphins offense and special teams might have fell short. And again it was Emmanuel Office, you know, seven sacks

on the year. He gets another sacked Forest Bumble and then you get the scoop and score by his partner Shack Lawson. So it seems like the Miami Dolphins, for as bad as they were last year, and being able to pressure the quarterback and being able to sack the quarterback, being able to affect the quarterback, that's how good they've been this year and doing all those things, and and in doing those things, they've taken it to the next level.

They're they're taking the football away and actually scoring points. So that's what you love to see, you know, you love to see in consecutive weeks. You know, you get the scoop and score. I Van Ginkel last week for seventy eight yard you get the one this week by by Shack Lawson. I think he won thirty some yards

for the touchdown, maybe thirty six, I can't remember. But it was one of those games where the defense found a way to do it again and even though they weren't you know, there was some some questionable calls in the secondary when with Xavian Howard and past interference and you know, the couple of him he probably just should have ran with the receiver and not really uh made

contact because the balls weren't catch anyway. But I just thought the aggressiveness of that front seven the fourth and one stop and they found ways to just do their job and do it at a high level, and it contributed also, you know, very much to the victory. I think we talked about this at the Rams game. It's it's not about, you know, the total yardage at the end of the day, it's about how many plays did you win had a big net impact on the game, and I think we saw it in this one as well.

And you know, John, you going over that list of players there that are making these big plays, they're all guys that are new either this year or last year. And you're gonna hear Brian Flores his name on a list of Coach of the Year candidates, and rightfully so, he's in a hell of a job. But I think there's also another award there for people to put teams together,

the Executive of the Year. And if things continue to go this way with Shack Laws and Emmanuel Ogba, if to a tongue of Bloo continues to progress and play well, you might have a Dolphins GM on that list, on the shortlist for Executive of the Year as well. Your third takeaway, John, My third takeaway is Jason Sanders comes through again. Uh, this is the guy that is just how how can you be so perfect in a game that's so hard and you get one opportunity? You know,

your job is one opportunity. It's not like Jason can come back after two or throws one. He's trying to throw one away and it's almost picked off, but it's not and you get to come back the next play

and try it all over again. You know, Sanders and kickers like him around the league, you know, they get one opportunity, and like we saw today, he was able to stay up up from fifty yards, you know, to get those points when he did at the end of the half, and then and then be able to think, you know, just to get hit from fifty six yards just incredible. So I just thought that it gives the

Dolphins offense and the entire team confidence. When you cross the fifty yard line, you're you're starting to get into Jason Sanders territory. And and it's not like it's you know, these are automatic kicks. Over the last couple of weeks, I know, when you know, the the offense was struggling in the red zone and they were settling for chip shot field goals. That's one thing, and you expect to

make them. But when you get over forty five yards, those those can be dicey, and and those can be a little bit inconsistent depending on where you're playing in the time of year. But Jason Sanders has been terrific. And I also think you know, the entire special teams group, they had a chance to get on a loose football and you know, to start the third quarter, they had an opportunity on a pump return where Jachim makes the first three guys missed and he gains like another twelve

or fifteen yards. That gives the Dolphins pretty good field position. I thought the coverage teams have been pretty good, you know, the entire year, and but but Jason Sanders, he's been the difference in terms of finding those points for the Dolphins. And uh, you know, we have defense scoring, you have Jason being perfect, you have the offense coming back from a fourth quarter deficit. Couldn't have been a better road win to keep this momentum going for the Miami Dolphins. No,

not at all. And back home next week for the Chargers at hard Rock Stadium with Justin Herbert, a battle of rookie quarterbacks here at the at the hard Rock Stadium. Man that that's gonna be another high level, primetime level football game that people are gonna want to into. And that's kind of who this Miami Dolphins team have become in recent weeks. It kind of a must watch ticket at this point, blowing teams away and now finding a

way to finish out a close game in Arizona. John can Gemmy, the co host of the audible podcast here on the Miami Dolphins podcast Network. You guys can find their episodes usually Thursday, right John, Yeah, usually on Thursday. So uh that's when the older, older guys warm up during the beginning of the week. We finally spit it out by Thursday. Well, I'm just I'm a ball of energy tonight. This whole podcast was was done up here quickly because I can't I can't stop talking about this

Dolphins football team. In the meantime, go ahead and check out John's three key or three takeaways rather, that's posted on Miami Dolphins dot com. Right now, John, appreciate your time is always my friend. We'll see you next Sunday at hard Rock. Sounds great for I was looking forward to it, and away he goes John kN Jemmy always a fun addition here to the Sunday night recap edition of Drive Time. As for my time, that's gonna be

my time you will all. Please be sure to subscribe to the podcast on Apple Podcast, leave us a rating, leave us a review, give me a follow on Twitter. It's at Wingfield, NFL follow the team at Miami Dolphins. Check out the Audible podcast and also the fish Tank podcast. Both Seth and Juice joined me every Friday for Flashback, and of course, last but not least, the two pieces up on Miami dolphins dot com right now, the player Spotlight and the Sunday night game recap. Check it out

Miami Offense dot com. Until next time, fins Up.