Drive Time: 2024 Miami Dolphins Initial 53 Man Roster

good camp in preseason. He always runs hard. He had a critical late game conversion in that Dallas game that clinched the playoffs. The coaching staff loves him. He knows the offense. I don't think it's that big of a surprise, although I did think it was closer than maybe the team thought.

twenty one heavy personnel team. John hus Smith and Julian Hill's emergence in addition to the roster should say with Smith's case and Hill's emergence would only empower the concept they want to run more twenty one and twelve personnel. Two tight ends or two backs or twenty two personnel, which I think you can do a lot of that with a Chan as a running back and Raheem Moster

as a running back. That gives you two backs and then the two tight ends, and then a Chan becomes a receiver, and all of a sudden you're in quasi eleven personnel and a Chan is one of the receivers. Like that is a dynamic weapon, a dynamic threat you have as the option there. And of course the sobering news on the day is that Odell Beckham Junior goes to the physically unable to perform list, or rather stays there, and he will then miss the first four games as

he Chubb Good and Isaiah Win almost forgot that last one. There, so a pretty good crop of players there on PUP. Of course, with OBJ going to the PUP, we kind of were hoping otherwise. I got to take the l on that one. Thought he'd be back for opening day.

But now I assume as he starts to ramp up and he looked like he was getting closer to me, I would assume that he would be getting some reps and spend this next month getting himself ready for the stretch run where you can kind of start to maybe roll out more of a traditional eleven personnel package with Beckham and kind of get it at its peak at the right time of year, if that makes sense. But I think the Dolphins are a embarrassment of riches offensively,

even with the four receivers in the room. Obviously you're going to see a lot of hill and waddle in that package there when it comes to those those twenty those twelve and twenty one personnel sets. So that's kind of the big shock of the day with a pup and the short receiver list of Obviously Eric Azukama a guy that I thought would would make it through and make it on because of the way he performed in games, but he was a wave today, so we'll see what

happens with him going forward. Obviously, this roster is, you know, gonna change and shift a lot over the next couple of days and weeks. At tight end, I mentioned Johnny and Julian and then Durham, Smyth and Tanner. Connor sticks On is the fourth further evidence of what I just talked about with two tight ends, and obviously Connor gives you some special teams relief as well. In terms of how he can go cover kicks and be a big critical part of your third phase on the offensive line.

five guys. Aaron Brewer, you're hopefully opening day starting center. I think he's training that direction. Robert Jones and leam Meikenberger the guards, and then Lester Cotton and Jack Driscoll round out that unit.

Neville Gallimore I thought would too. I think both those guys could be in contention for post week one re signings or reacquisitions here, as your salary becomes only twenty five percent of the guarantee that you were guaranteed when you were guaranteed it at that point, so that could be an option there By the Dolphins, you go with a couple of bigger guys in Benito and Brandon Peely. I thought that it'd be kind of one of the other with those two guys. They both stick around and

will both play plenty of snaps on the nose. I imagine with Campbell and Steeler kind of working hand in hand as the primary guys otherwise, and then of course Deshan hand being kind of the primary backup across all those spots at linebacker. And this is with the edge group also added in here, You've got no real surprises.

I don't think you got Emmanuel Ogba and Jalen Phillips off the edge, along with Quinton Bell and the two rookies Chop Robinson and Mohammed Kamara, and then your off ball linebackers David Long, Jordan Brooks, Anthony Walker, Junior, Duke Riley and Channing tendall round out that group. I thought Curtis Bolton was a guy that maybe had a shot to stick around, got caught in the numbers game though, because this room was, I mean, the linebacker group was

always maybe even too deep for changing Tendall. But I think he sneaks himself on there because of special team's value, and what I talked about previously was just go find ball, hit ball in sub package. Looks if we get to that position at cornerback, you've got six Storm Duck the

UDFA sticks. Isaiah Johnson was a guy I thought had a chance as well, but Duck was really good all camp long, punctuated with us two picks in the practice up in Tampa Bay, Ethan Bonner cater Co who kind of round out the group with Siran Neil who has extreme special teams value there, and obviously the top two dogs there Jalen Ramsey and Kendall Fuller, and then five safeties Javon Holland, Marcus May and Jordan Poyer with Elijah Campbell and Patrick mc morris. After a really good preseason,

gets on the opening day roster. And that's great news because I thought maybe he would be injured for longer than that. He is not in fact injured. He is on the fifty three man roster as of this taping, Specialist Blake Ferguson was released from the team. I don't know any information about that, but that was kind of

a shock as well. We have some other just factoids here to add on before we get out of here or move to the next segment, which, by the way, you're gonna hear a microphone change, so if you hear a different scenartio, I do apologize for that. One was taped in one location, one at the other location and didn't have time to uh or didn't have the same microphone to you, So I talked about OBJ on pup. We also get Cam Smith and River Craycraft to the

injured reserve to return doesignation to return. Those guys will have to miss at least three games and they can return after those injuries. So that is the initial roster. Let's close up this first segment here with some sound from head coach Mike McDaniel, who was asked point blank, what are you looking for in a quarterback?

able to do it? There there's a specific ability to be able to throw, you know, with a with a base and be able to throw in a phone booth. That is a skill that not everybody has and you have to be adapt to that in the National Football League because of the pass rush as well as you know, really really hone in on quarterbacks that there's a skill you know to throw a ball to someone there's and then how accurate can you be? And then another level is can you look at defenders and see defenders and

still throw to moving targets? So can you see do you have to see only your offensive player to make a throw or can you see the defense for reasons of throwing into windows? Anticipation and then as well as zone manipulation. So boom, I was fired out.

most talented arm in the league. I don't think even his biggest supporter would sell you on that. But the ability to get the ball up and down, not in golf but in football is a unique skill that I think people tend to sleep on where from whatever type of footwork, whatever type of position your body, your hips, your shoulders, your feet are in, you can quickly get to your motion and get through that motion and release

the ball on target accurately. Right, And to that end about the quick release, and my goodness, I did not realize that the comment that to A made was going to go over the way it did. Maybe that's that's on me for not understanding the social landscape for this fan base right now, But I mean that comment was clearly very very clearly directed towards the concept of like this is why we don't, you know, prioritize certain positions and oh man, I'm getting so tired of this argument.

But anyway, let's let's go to this because I wanted to talk about this. Did you guys see the comment from Mike Golick Junior, What a what a weirdo right, trying to infer that Tua was like talking negatively about his teammates.

You are outmatched every single time. And that's not just me saying that's all the coaches that have operated in the system, going back to Alex Gibbs and freaking Mike Shanahan in the early two thousands and nineties. More on that later on, But the Mike Goullet comment talking about to being slanderous to his own offensive line just out

of left field. And I wanted to tell this story because there was a tweet that Mina Kimes had sent back in twenty twenty one about I think it was I think it was the possession in Chicago that resulted in a touchdown in the preseason, and she was, you know, nagging Austin Jackson's performance, and I was like, yeah, but what was the result of that drive? Because she was again talking about this offensive line. This is before the

system was what it was. This was when Tua's quickness and the quick release, I should say, was the only thing that was protecting the offensive line. Now you have a system that builds around it intentionally, which again, if you want to know more about that, I'm happy to tell you guys. But I had said, what was the result of that drive? Because you're sitting here negging the offensive line, but what happened?

out on target from those precarious positions. Not the sliding, diving Patrick Mahomes throws that you see that make the Madden Engine, but the ability to get the ball off and on target from those awkward platforms. And that's the biggest part of building around this quarterback and the system of what it does right. It reduces this number of true dropbacks, and with all the motion and wide zone running with absolute screaming speed to the perimeter, you get

lateral displacement just through your scheme alone. I mean again, I've gone over this so many times, and if social media is any indication it's not sticking for me. But I still digress. I have more thoughts on this, and I'm sure it'll come up again here very very soon. But the part about seeing the field, I thought he

really articulated that very very well. I always go back to the Josh McCown story on the Underdog podcast he was doing when he was breaking down to a film and he was talking about being in the quarterback room with Kurt Warner and Kurt was like, just make that throw and he's like, Kurt, you got to understand, I don't see it the way you see it. You have a special skill set, a Hall of Fame skill set, where you can see things before they happen, and that

is the talent to play quarterback position. I have no follow ups on that. That is describing the nuance, the intangible of the position that I think gets totally lost in this current landscape of big arm, throw ball, far run around fast, which time and time again we have seen that if you can do that without the other stuff, you go the way of JaMarcus Russell. Now some guys have both and it's fantastic. Josh Allen is that way

in some sense. He's not great at reading out the field, but he's pretty freaking good at it, and he has the rarest of physical traits to go along with it, and that's why he's gonna be in the Hall of Fame one day as well.

to you by Auto Nation. On Monday, head coach Mike mcdanie connel was asked about the edge position and what you saw from the two rookies to give you confidence going forward that you're going to have enough with both Bradley Chubb and Cam Good opening the season on the physically unable to perform list.

And they've got to learn a lot of things that come with, you know, playing defense in in the NFL and all the different layers that that that comes with that, how how to learn the playbook. And I think the biggest thing is that you want to see continued progression without halt because there's so much ground. Again, and I've seen a ton of that. There's been days that all of our young guys have, you know, as they would say, it not a good day, and those are irrelevant to

me if and only if things are approved upon. And I've seen that that consistent progression with the whole group, And that's super important because that's what you end up having to do during the season. During the season, you're gonna do stuff well week one and you're gonna do stuff poorly week one and guess what week two, you'll in this case, you'll be will happen in just a couple of days, and then you'll have to do that.

And the idea is that in the National Football League, if you don't do something well, teams will take advantage of it, and then especially if you put it on tape. So you have to get stuff fixed. Which is what's been so monumental for watching these guys get these reps. Is I'm not just saying I need to see progression. I need to because the second we are able to adjust something in your game or or identify that something

is lacking and needs improvement, you better you better fix it. Otherwise, you know, the whole defense will will feel Listen, if you don't, if you're not on the backside run chasing appropriately, you'll h you'll turn the page and you'll get three bootlegs on you, and then you play the next week. You got to show that you'll stop the boot with that same guy or they're going to keep running it and they'll test you early. That's just the nature of football.

So all those guys, I'm happy with them because that's what I'm evaluating. I already know what's coming, good and bad plays regardless. How are you able to adjust your game as the scheme necessitates each day? And that's what I'm really pumped about. That group.

to the next level. But back to the larger point here, just looking at the numbers and the production, you get the sense they're going to have to count on these two rookies early on from day one, and you probably expected that with Chob Robinson, even if that means a reduction in his role to more of a complimentary rusher, which I think was kind of the long term thought

as his rookie season. As it pertains to his rookie season, long term, you hope that he is a you know, eighty five percent snap taker who is a beast against the running pass right and if he's not that this year, hopefully there's some growth that developed over the course of the last month plus for him to be serviceable in that regard and then to kind of be that third down rusher and then hopefully when Bradley Chubb gets back in JP's full strength, he can go into that complimentary

role where he's you know, nosebacker rushes or you know, NASCAR package off the edge when when Phillips condenses inside and picks off his man and he just runs with full speech rate of the quarterback. And that's a great problem to have. But I think the ability to get that first drive against the Bucks on tape was so valuable for Chopp because he got washed out a lot

of those plays. His pass rushes didn't go anywhere. Now you have some tape to look at to say, where can I be better in an actual game setting against a top right tackle in Luke Goodeki, because we also saw how impactful that he is as a rusher in that game like today, like he's ready, He's already there with a clear variety of moves that compliment one another like his speed to power move is a wicked change up to that pure burst he has off the edge and will suit him well for a long time in

this league. Now, if you asked me who had the best preseason of anybody on the Miami Dolphins roster, I think it was Mo Kamara. He understands angles and how to rush half a man like a lot like frequently, and I thought that he was fantastic versus the run. He consistently played under his man with that good pad level. And I talked him about this on the podcast this summer, like what does being six ' one due to benefit you? He's like, I'm always I'm always a low man. He

kept containing. He showed that long arm move that keeps the outside run the running back contained inside. He flashed the pass rush like never go all in on preseason tape.

from Okamara for four. So it's a good place to be at that group. Maybe not week one in terms of your depth, but going forward, gosh, that edge group looks pretty daunting for opposing teams when we get everybody back and loaded up ready to go. Let's go ahead, and speaking of depth, talk to coach McDaniel about the importance of depth on the roster heading into the season.

not fifty three. The sixty nine man roster has has been absolutely crucial, and you don't necessarily know at what positions, but you know, it's kind of changed the way that I look at that that that number and what that squad is, and you know, going into year three, I thought it's you know, Chris and I have made sure that regardless of the decisions that are made between one player to the next, that sixty nine man roster would be one group moving in one direction and understood the

finer details of what we're trying to do because the you know, the the one thing that I do know, there's a there's a stat out there in football there's one hundred percent injury rate. You know, just really think about that. Every player at one point in time gets hurt, every single player. So you know, much of much of the entire league is, you know, doing your best to minimize what those what those injury rates are, but then also having plans of action in case, in case, whomever

goes down. So you try to tuel yourself so that the ship can keep moving in one direction and minimize the effect of every lost player, fully understanding that there's a reason why players are starters, so they're how do you minimize that? How do you have a stronger group that you know, when those inevitable things occur, there's there's less turbulence, you know, And and I think that's been steady on our mind the entire process.

If something were to happen beyond them. I think this year you have maybe no not maybe well. On the defensive line, I do think Campbell is at this stage of his career, is not as good as what Christian Wilkins was, but you still have Seiler. And on the offensive line, you definitely sacrificed your top level talent and lieu of more depth, right, But I think that you're better conditioned to survive injuries in those positions this year

because of better depth at those spots. And if you go back and look at NFL trends, no positions get injured more than the three interior offensive line spots. They are most frequently the ones that get rolled up, they're most often in trash. They can get their fingers caught and face mask on every single play. Those positions miss

games than anybody else on a football field. So being deep there in an offense that can negate your importance or relegate your importance in terms of the system, and playing in the system will take care of what we need you to do from a matchup standpoint. That makes a lot more sense to me. I think this year they're just better equipped to sustain losses in not just either of those spots, but really across the roster and I started listing these and it's every spot.

be different. But if if we had to go to Ethan Bonner for a game, or you know, if Cam Smith gets back and gets rolling, like there's good depth in that position group, especially if you have all these you know, young players either on the back end of the roster or on the practice squad that I think

can play this level. Like literally every spot is deeper, especially with those practice squad spots as we talked about, and you know, I've felt for a long time you're going to have to cut a handful of guys off this roster who are worthy of being on NFL rosters and hopefully they all can sneak back through to the practice squad, but from there they just become more depth. Right, Like McDaniel said, it's a sixty nine nice man roster

and you should view it that way, all right. Next, Tua was asked, what do you look for how do you approach your backup quarterback with regards to the job they have to assist you getting ready for Sundays.

We'll see no that like that doesn't make sense to me because this that so then we'll find another way to do it. And you know that's sort of the like some of the ways that they can help me prepare for a game week.

I'm hopeful that Skyler is able to take this time from from today to week one, or hopefully it's not ever, but if it's week ten, and just really bury himself in the playbook and get a lot of practice reps in a situation where he can begin to feel it out faster. Because if scholar can play faster, then I'm much more open to the idea of that as your long term solution to the backup quarterback. Let's go back to twoa here, who also weighed in on the depth of the roster.

the personnel group beings as well for guys that are injured. Okay, we're gonna you know, probably go twenty one a little more than we would twelve if our tight ends are down, or you know, we can't go eleven because of our receivers, all right, we'll go twelve, you know, more than anything else. So I think they do a really good job in you know, grouping it with personnels and whatnot, and how we want to maneuver the game that way.

Riek and Waddle in both the Chiefs games. Do you remember the second player of the Chiefs game when Wattle had his ankle twisted up and played like thirty percent of the snaps the rest of the way and when he was playing he was hobbling around there, or in the Chiefs game when he was back off a Highland ankle spraying from two weeks prior where he wasn't right and negative twenty five degree temperature keeping that thing tight. Like gosh, man, there's so much more contacts than that,

or winning games where you're down. You know, Javon Holland and Deshaun Elliott's going in out of the lineup and you're down. You know, Tyreek Hill you're down, Robert Hunt, you're down. Connor Williams, you're down. Isaiah Win Kendall Lambs in the game for toront Armstead, like happened all year long, and they still find a way to win games. And that's what he was saying right there. Let's go here next from Tua, who was asked about pushing the limits

of the offense. Marcel Louis. Jock's gonna have a great story for us here coming up soon. I just know because he's asked this question to a lot of guys and I love his writing. Let's go ahead and hear from Tua on what that means from his perspective.

Or like Jalen Waddle for instance, who just had a hell of a season last year with injury luck, or having Jalen Ramsey from Game one forward and just the offensive continuity with guys, And they showed you their priority

in terms of bringing these guys back. And I keep laughing because like a lot of my podcast content goes through this vein of knowing firsthand from the coaches what this offensive system is like, because I'm here and I listen and I'm I talk to people, and you can see like the priority of what they approached this offseason with Rob Jones coming back, Isaiah Whinn coming back, Lester Cotton coming back, Jack Driskell getting his contract, and prioritizing

tackle with Liam or not Liam, sorry with with Austin Jackson, with Toront Armstead, with Kendall Lamb, with Patrick Paul and then just throwing bodies at the guard position, you know, Kendall or Liam Miikenberg in his fourth year here. I think that the continuity of all those guys being in their third year, Rob Jones, Liam Austin, t Ron Lester Cotton, I think that goes a long way for the system. Let's go ahead and run this SoundBite because it kind of broke the internet on Monday.

round pick out of the supplemental draft. Their left guard was Mark Schlera who was a tenth round draft pick. Tom Nalan was the center. He was a seventh round draft pick. Brian Habib was a tenth round draft pick at right guard, and Tony Jones, the right tackle, was undrafted.

The ninety eight Broncos had the same left tackle, left guard, and center, a supplemental first rounder, a tenth rounder, and a seventh rounder, and then they replaced the right guard with a third round draft pick in Dan Neil and the right tackle with a seventh round draft pick in

Harry Swain. And you can pretty much track this system going all the way back to Mike Shanahan or Alex Gibbs, who the highest offensive lineman interior offensive linean I should say that they drafted in and their history was the third round in Will Shields. He wanted to be an all pro, But I digress. It was a player they didn't a position they didn't prioritize drafting early on. And you can follow this all the way through every single

coaching tree. You can look at the stop in Houston for Shanahan and McDaniel when they had Andre Johnson and DeAndre Hopkins did they prioritize the interior offensive linelan and there was two udfas in that group. They sure didn't. Or the Atlanta Falcons who broke offensive records. Was that because of the seventh round draft pick playing right guard? Or you think it was because of Julio Jones and

Tony Gonzalez. I think it was the latter who to the Niners draft from the first round and they had Deebo Samuel and George Kittle on their roster and a

bunch of question marks on the interior offensive line. Was Brandon Ayuk not an offensive lineman, pretty weird, Matt Lafleur and Green Bay, I mean all Sean McVay, all these guys have shown you the system works with how they build the offensive line around the simple fact of if every single piece on the offense is responsible for your production, and the quarterback would be like, you know, seventy percent of that, Tyreek Hill will be ten percent of that,

Joan Wall would be like eight percent of that. Like you start to whittle it down, where would you put your resources in the guys that make the biggest impact the Tyreek, the wattle, the tua or the two percent needle mover at guard, which is a position that they feel that they can scheme around and operate a system that reduces true dropbacks, that takes care of basically any one on one matchup that you're going to see because of how they run things. It's just all there for you.

And if you understand the system. I think you'll understand that, and we'll check back. I keep going over this whole thing again, but we'll check back and see where the offense when they're you know, when they're third and rushing and first and total offense. In November, we'll come back and talk about some more. But I digress once more. Let's take our last break and finish up with some

soundbites here from Raheem Moster and Zach Seeler. That's all next Draft Time podcast, your host Travis Wingfilm, brought to you by Autoation. I heard from running back Raheem Moster and defensive tackle Zach Seeler on Monday. Let's go ahead and run this audio the same question we heard spoken for two of there about the expansion of the offense testing the limits. Here is the perspective from RB one Raheem Moster.

most defenses. Like I was just talking to the Bucks defense and Levonte David right last week when we had joint practices and we were able to conversate a little bit in between breaks, and one of the things that

he brought up was our motions. You know, that was that kind of just it left a visual that it was it was hard for him to paint that picture where everybody's gonna be at because you got, you know, guys going left and right and up and down, and you just then you never know, you know what what what it looks like from a defensive standpoint, and and that's our thing is like we want to make the defense. You know, we want them getting out of their shell

being confused, you know, not understanding this offense. Because if you if that happens, that that means You're you're doing it at a fast rate, and that's something that's never been done. So, you know, just trying to be unconventional, trying to do something you know that's unique and different, and just trying to hold that title is being number one offense in the in the league.

I mean, there's there's really not any quarterback that's in the league that's doing what he's doing and and it's exciting to see and I'm just excited for him this year. You know we're gonna we're gonna be hit the ground, hitting the ground, running and high flying and you know, keep that mentality.

fits this system. Center is different than that. It's the guard position that you can tell how this thing is built with Jones, Win, Driscoll, Liam it's cheap, right, and that not spending twenty million dollars on Robert Hunt or spending thirteen million dollars on Damian Lewis allows you to go get Kalais Campbell, Jordan Poyer, Jordan Brooks, Kendall Fuller,

Anthony Walker. Sorry, got a text, whoever it might be like you were able to be aggressive in the offseason, Jonas Smith because you didn't have to pay that twenty million bucks for a guard who maybe would have given you, you know, a twenty percent boost on your production from that position. Back to Zach for one more question here, what's it been like to work with Kalais Campbell? Again? Kalais' impact, I think it's going to be much bigger than even his stature or his production on the field.

I mean, that's awesome, and so it's it's been awesome to play off him and help me learn as a player on and off the field. He's taught me a lot. We sit down and talk a lot about leadership and how to affect the young guys off the field. I mean, he knows where he's at, and he knows where I'm at and he's like, looks, it's your time to work, and I'm trying to make sure I do that, make sure to be more vocal and help the guys make the adjustments and learn on the field, whether it's here

or not here. I mean this next twenty four to forty hours, a lot can happen and a lot things can shake up, So it's exciting to work with him.

in this league, They've been around the block. They bring a certain level of ish to them, if you will, And I just thought that snippet on Campbell kind of speaks to that concept.

So it comes down to this, and I'm not exactly sure when this happened, maybe twenty years ago or so, but it is one hundred percent tied to practice time. The specialist work together all practice long. But if you have to pull a quarterback off of you know, his reps, then you can't run your usual practice script like out here. For instance, in training camp, you'll get two of for four or five snaps, and then Skyler gets four or five, and then Mike White gets a few and you repeat

the cycle. You'd have to have the entire team shut down that period to just practice their kicks or to you know, practice the holding of said snaps and kicks, and they do. You have special teams periods where they do that, and for a lot of the main guys like Tua and Rik, it's a water break. But those guys are out there for two hours and if you can just leave them on their own island and they

can practice. Isn't that better for everybody else? And the you know holding is something you can just learn to do, so you learned to do it. And then number two, he also asked about the ability to run a trap play on the kickoff, and yes you can. That's the beauty of it. You can almost treat it like an offensive play. And you'll also see teams run games like stunts that you would on a defensive line when they're

covering kicks as well. And we're actually gonna cover this on the debut episode of Dolphins HQ, which premieres on the Thursday opening day Thursday on the Dolphins YouTube channel and will air on television on CBS Local Miami here wfor on Saturday. So that show is coming out your way and we're gonna talk about the new kickoff ru'll and kind of break it down for you guys.