Drive Time: Dolphins Bills Week 2 All 22 Review

Draft Time podcast. Heyda going off script to kick things off here, because you know, we're good people like we support this team through thick and thin. I made it a life goal to work my way into a position where I could be around this team every single day. And I accomplished that mission and I'm very proud of it. But today I find myself asking myself, what's the point? Why do you even do this? Yeah, it's a fun job.

I've always said that this job is only work when we lose and brother, is it work after a game like that? And I was prepared to come on the show last night, which, by the way, I know it was a terrible podcast. I appreciate those that stuck with me listen to it as I tried my best to get through that episode at two o'clock in the morning. And I was prepared to come in here and kind

of thrash the team. And you know, I even told some friends before the game started, if they can't move the ball on this iteration of the Bills defense, I'm gonna he'll turn a little bit and say that the only thing they have left to redeem me is to go execute better, improve it, or get the guys back

that I've been harping on to make it better. But quite frankly, with what we've seen, I don't think you can point to OBJ or to Malik Washington or he create Crafts and say that's the easy fix right there, because you're not moving the ball. And two games in with your starting quarterback before he got injured, and that's a whole separate case. We'll talk about that, really. I mean, if we were just talking about thirty one to ten and two was okay. You know, we'd bounce back, we'd

be okay after the weekend of football games. But now you're looking at this process like what the hell's next? Because if he misses extended time, what do you have in this season? Is it going to be any better than it was last year?

my preferred player. So are you going three and fourteen, because that's how you have to get it, That's how what you have to do to get him.

I got people in the video staff here talking about their preference to do mindless work, to go do equipment or field crew or one guy even joked about, you know, being on the custodial staff. Like, trust me, brother, you don't want to do that. But that's where we're at today, because how can you be anywhere else? You know? My takeaway, the fifth takeaway in the podcast was we are not ready to compete in the AFC heavyweights. And that's abundantly

clear with or without the quarterback, certainly without him. Another primetime showing and absolute shellacking. And as we pivot here into the tape, you know, this is again all off script. I didn't plan any of this. I just kind of wanted to talk about it.

my concern right now. So I don't You're not gonna see me on social for the weekend because I just can't deal with that. But I think it's totally fair to wonder where the hell we go from here? As a Dolphins fan, which I twenty four hours ago, the question was the twenty four year playoff drought and beating and snapping that streak, not are we rebuilding? Are we going in a different direction? Is our quarterback going to play again? I just man, oh god, what did we

do to deserve this? I also root for the Seattle Mariners. Do you guys know much about them? They're the laughing stock of baseball. My college football team got its conference revoked. The basketball team I used to root for moved, Like why do I even watch sports?

I am, I am you guys. Now, I do think some of the points about like, oh, the offensive line, they asked for this, like we're gonna get into that, not that that wasn't the reason too.

twenty two the Charger game. They re route underneath they press you and they funnel you into safety help and you have deep hookbackers and you have to find ways to expose that. And the perimeter is the area that you do that with. And we saw it in the Chiefs playoff game last year. But we also saw Miami overcome that in the open against the Chargers last year. But Jacksonville went to that game plan, held you to twenty points. Buffalo went to that game plan and it

looked terrible all night long to just ten points. That's all they did. That's how they limit Tyrek and Waddle. On the eight Chan touchdown, there are three defenders that clamp on Waddle to the boundary, and then they pass a bracket on Tyreek coming from the field over to the boundary from that same side, and he gets passed into another cluster of Bills defenders. So there's like five or six Bills defenders around Reak and Waddle, and that's

why you get the walk in. That's why I was so gung ho about Devon a Chan's expansion in the passing game, about Jalen Wright's addition to the offense, about Odell Beckham and how he could expose the vertical element the deep out element with all the spaces created from Reagan Waddle, John new Smith being that spot guy, the hook guy over the middle of the football league, Washington in that same role, and you saw it here with a Chan But the rest of those guys haven't been

here or done that. I think it's pretty clear the book on the current makeup of the passing game. You know, teams are doing what they did downe the stretch last year. Make Waddle and Hill beat double teams for this Dolphins offense to beat you. Because if that's what you need to do consistently, you know, those are two of the five or six best receivers in the National Football League

for my money. But if you go back over time, like Antonio Brown in his prime is a guy that could beat brackets consistently, Calvin Johnson, you better be one of the best all time. And as much as I love Reek, I don't think that's his game. I mean, he can run through brackets, we see him doing that plenty of times, but he's not going to consistently overwhelm you with physicality and his release and make you pay

for doing that for playing press man like that. And through two games, we just haven't done it at all. You know, had that scramble at the end of the half against that two man look, and that's what you have to do. I think that's the thing that takes them out of that overplay because you have safeties twenty five yards off the football and cornerbacks who have their back to the quarterback. What's the one thing you can do to beat that. It's the quarterback run game, and

that's not his strength. I think the scramble ability you saw in the game shows improvement in that area, but it's not the strength of his game. It leaves these massive areas of the field open for him to get to,

and on that one he did. They did hit a throw against that two man on the drive after the pick six, but Tua has to throw those things with so much anticipation that if you're off by a beat, it's it doesn't work or it gets deflected and gets picked off like we saw against Grant Debos, and you you know, you kind of feel like maybe those early picks that you could possibly attribute to receivers not being

in the right place. I think we'll talk about the chows and want to hear in a minute the Debo's played like, put your hands up, dude, and you're a receiver in the route, put your hands up. I could see, you know, the quarterback looking at that and being like, now I'm going to hesitate because I don't have trust in those players in the timing offense. And that's all

it takes to break up a where them offense. The fourth down failure before the James Cook touchdown, it's the same look on the earlier third down miss where they run these double end breakers. It's a stack and Reeked takes the first access and Waddle has a little pivot jerk to the outside where he takes one step to

widen the corner and cross back across the face. And because he slips on the second one, they have a three man bracket in there where it's like two guys in man coverage and then the kind of hybrid zone player playing the high low. Because Waddle slips, he can cover both the high low and then from there two has got nowhere to go with the football and the pass protection can't hold up long enough for him to get to the backside of the red. It's just that

type of night. One small mistake compounded by a larger one,

over and over and over again. I did like the creativity of the game plan early, more of that good action where you're selling one direction going the other way, like when you bring Julian Hill across the formation to act as a lead block on a toss to eight chand of the strength, only to have Tyreek Hill come back across the formation and he catches the flip instead and goes backside to go against all that overplay looked great, But then off of that, you know, and Juice made

this point on the postgame show, it is a absolute principle in this offense. I've seen coaching clinics from the coaches here in the building, where you catch the football and you separate defenders upfield, you get upfield and run to space. That's why they love Jalen Wright's where they

love Devon eh Chan. But from what we've seen from Wreaking Wattle on some of these plays is the lateral movement that they choose not to hit it up in there, and it creates these better angles and you'll lose valuable yardage for an offense that's struggling. You know, second and three is a lot better than second and six. So we do a lot of that. That's like a main

coaching point. Catch the ball, get upfield, Like there was a wattle end around where he had a cm inside and just nope, went ahead and esdued that and took it outside wide and it cost him a couple of yards. I did love the flip to John new Smith on that same screen. Look where they fake the pump now throw and then flip it inside off the chip block. That's a cool sequence, you know, kind of to show that screen through five quarters and have that wrinkle off

of it. And they had great connectivity in the run game really all throughout the first half over one hundred yards. That big rip to eh Chan was a wrinkle with power where Austin continuously just keep washing guys down off that right side. Liam had some good climbs up there. Aaron Brewer I thought was fantastic in this game. Again, but where it stopped, like it was a full stop on that third and one stuff on alec Ingold. They

sold out to stop that play. They get one stalemate right at the point of attack, and it happened to be a Brewer against a bigger defensive tackle and then it was linebackers flowing into that gap and they just never had a shot from there. It seemed like from that point forward, the Bills I discipline got much improved, or maybe they just knew, you know, we weren't threatening them in the intermediate areas. They stopped reacting so much

to all the shifts and motions. And I thought a nice rinkle off of that was the Hill, the Julian Hill seam shot right before Tua got hurt, where they threw a little fake perimeter screen or pumped the perimeter screen, and you see a static second level not moving much, and then Julian Hill runs to see them behind that. We saw that with Mike Asiki over the years. You

have to connect there. I thought it was a good enough throw and Julian Hill could have either taken one more step to get it in a better spot or just catch the ball because it hit both of his hands. So we have to hit those, you know, and I fast change here. I saw the complaints about the end of half clock management. I get it, because you know you're down by two touchdowns, and I get the concept of,

you know, protecting the football and playing last shot. With Josh Allen, I would do the same thing most instances. But when they got to second and six from the plus side, fifty seven seconds to go in the half and we lose three on that toss flip play running into the strength of the Bills defense, I just can't get behind that one. It looked like Liam was confused in the play because he reached the guard or the three technique I should say, and got outside of him

and sealed him. But it just gave him a downhill run on Hien who couldn't bubble around it. So like I just felt like they played scared from that point, like after the early picks, after that third and one shut down, like they just kind of compounded from there, and it was more of the same what we've heard from the past, like what Jordan Poyer said, if you get down, if you get the Dolphins down, they can beat themselves more from there. That's what happened again, exact

same thing happened again and then again compounding. Once the game got out of hand, they were able to pin their ears back and that's when most teams pad their sack totals, and that's what happened. It's very tough to pass, protect over and over and over again on the defense knows the pass is coming and so you get some stat padding on the pass rush element. That way the quarterback on his best game. Obviously this will go down in one of his worst games. I think the throat

to Grant d Bos, though, was really really good. More of that elite processing anticipation we've come to love. But the timing issues with the new receiver burns you in the biggest way possible. Because Buffalo has this two man look with the two high safeties. Becomes cover three where they have three deep third defenders and they have these two deep hook droppers. That's what teams are going to

do against us all year long. Well who knows now you know on the quarterback position, but he lets this thing go with elite anticipation to Debos, who's three yards shy of the sticks and it hits him eight yards beyond the stick, so eleven yards of extra out with the ball in the air and it hits him right off the chest and Granted out of the break, you want a few yards of separation, but that deep third corner is driving in tight and he never gets his hands up and a get a turnover like put your

damn hands up, bruh. It's like you're on a roller coaster. The touchdown drive that two had after that was clinical work from two, which you've come to expect from this quarterback. Right the throw to Waddle down the middle, that one was a quick release, quick choppy feet to get himself in position to go from runner to quick snap off down the middle. Really impressive throw. And then the progression on the Hn touchdown, go full field scan see the

heavy coverage tilt towards Wattle and Tyreek. You know you've got the one on one outside with Ingled hitting the key block. Just really good detail on that play. Impressive touchdown throw. But the more I watch the second pick, you know, I think the common ideology to across Dolphins fans on Thursday night was that it was Robbie Chosen's fault. I think two Wad just sailed that one because now the leverage of the defender is inside leverage, so he's

driving inside and it makes the throw. You know, you want to throw against that. You want to throw to that blind spot because he can't get back there. Chosen didn't go that way, but the throw doesn't really go that wide. It was like on the outside shoulder of a hook route, but it just kind of looks like it was a high throw.

to seeing static routes on the offense. Five yards over the ball and stop. That's not how this offense operates. But you see to a retreat because there's multiple signs of pressure there. Just eat the sack, though, dude, I don't see the benefit of throwing that ball away to save ten or twelve yards when it's already third down.

Like things happen quick in this league. Things can change very quickly and all of a sudden future looks kind of bleak. Let's go ahead and take our first break right there, come back and do some more offensive notes, including Devon A Chan's a big night. We'll do the defense as well. I have some snap count gripes, as I'm sure you do all of that. Next Draft Time podcast, your host Travis Wingfield, brought to you by Auto Nation.

Seems like Devon A Chan's gonna get his own segment on the show every single week because this guy looks like a bona fide star at the running back kind of and the receiver position, right, So I just watch his game and think what a perfect fit he is for this offense. Because the idea is you create these advantageous angles with misdirection and hesitation and eye candy for the defense and against a player like him. If you hesitate by a single beat, by half of a beat,

even it is over. And the way this guy can attack angles, the way he sets up defenders, this is a very very special talent we are watching unfold right in front of our eyes. I have not seen many backs that can set things up while rolling at the speed that he does. The way he does, it's like one jab step at a defender in pursuit to cause just a little bit of a breakdown. I better drop

my shoulder and make contact right here. But then his next step off of that once he breaks you down, is this elongated stride that has pure acceleration behind it, so that when he makes that one cut, they wind up diving at like the side of his leg and they just bounce off. And he has great contact balance that we saw in the game all night long, even some power runs where he's dropping the shoulder and bouncing off guys and staying on his feet, putting that hand

in the ground and just keeping on rolling. He is an absolute superstar, and I think the offense is gonna have to go through him and Jalen Wright. Maybe the rest of the season, I don't know, we'll see a couple more individual standouts. I like John who Smith him on those chip releases is great addition to what this offense does with the lateral movement in fakes that keeps those rushers at bay. You get these edge taking false

steps chasing all that eye candy. Then they have a chip from him, which is an easy block because they're stationary. They don't really know where they want to go at this point, and it's an easier assignment for a guy that's not known for his blocking. Then when they start to engage him, they lean into him and then he releases and all of a sudden they are off balanced and he can then kind of, you know, get rolling from there. I love that look for him in this

Dolphins offense. I think Aaron Brewer, Aaron Brewer, sorry, has been brilliant through two games. Pancake on that waddle end around on the long touchdown driver, he reaches a backer out beyond the numbers and puts him on the ground. That is rare athletic ability at that position. He did it all night long. I thought he played with great angles and has enough power to hold guys. He does lose some of those matchups, but the plus plus athletic ability.

It's like a quarterback that has just electric traits but kind of misses some layups here and there. He'll miss a lay up here and there, but he makes up for it in spades with a bunch of really good blocks out in space. I thought Austin Jackson had a similar game to like last week two really good stuff in the running game. He washed down that front side or the backside should say, on cutback runs all night long,

had plenty of good pass pro reps. I didn't really dive into the tape when Skyler got in the game late. I watched it kind of just one time, one rep at a time. So if he got beat there my apologies. But he had one rep like last week where he got beat very quickly a swipe on von Miller in the game when sky was in the game for a sack. So I thought, by a large good game by Austin, but to get up one more sack in the game.

I love the way Jaalen Waddle understands spacing as a route runner and how to throttle down in certain spots that near touchdown pass on the long touchdown drive, he flattened his route like he was running right towards the safety and he kind of peered into the space and flattened his route back to the quarterback and two have felt that and put it right on his chest behind

the linebacker. A nice play there, and then Jalen Wright man, I thought the run on the armstet hole was what I saw all camp along where there's this crease the size of a piece of notebook paper and he hits it with ultimate conviction and comes out the other side. I'm so excited about the future. Well, I'm not ex about anything right now, but conceptually A chan and Jalen Wright to me is going to be the best one

two punch in the backfield the National Football League. And also the defender on that play had no protest on Armstead's hold because he swam himself into the hold, so I thought it was a pretty bogus call. My last note here is that at Oliver just kind of whipped anybody that he faced.

The reason the offensive line is an issue is because of those compounded mistakes. I never contended the opposite. I never said this as a team that can get in third and eleven consistently and come out and beat you. I just thought three years in we'd have a clean operation. But that hasn't been the case. So it compounds and it becomes an absolute disaster. Quite frankly, Dubos chosen terrible terrible Nights to a terrible Knight. Don't have to go

any further than that. Played poorly. A couple of bad decisions or a couple of bad plays early I thought impacted Toua's decision making in Psyche and ultimately was his undoing at the end of the game. Julian Hill should have caught two touchdown passes. I thought the first one for sure, either take one more step or just make the catch because it hit both hands, and you know, if he can make those plays, it kind of changes how this offense can take advantage of the over play

we talked about all the time. He did have plenty of good blocks, but also had a share of misses. I think the catches push him back into the red category here for me. Cotton and Lamb not good in relief. Tyreek I thought was slow all night. I thought they jammed and rerouted him all night and never really shook free. So just a bad night and the snap counts. Here's my biggest gripe before we take our last break and go to the defense. Austin, Liam and Brewer all go

the distance. Armstead played sixty one, so Lamb played thirty nine percent. Rob Jones and Lester Cotton had a fifty three forty seven split, and then of course two win scholars seventy two and twenty eight split. There At quarterback, Wattle seventy two percent of the snaps, Tyreek sixty eight percent of the snaps. I love this. I love keeping them fresh. It's worked in the past when you have OBJ or cray Craft or Malik, because we saw it

what Trent Shirfield we shot. We saw it with River Craycraft. They had options that could let those guys take a couple of snaps off, but we just don't have that. So if you are going to have twenty one snaps where Wattle's not on the field, you're gonna have twenty four snaps where Riek is not on the field. Can we just stay in the groupings that don't require eighty four or eighty eight on the field. You know, twenty six snaps for Debos is thirty four percent, seventeen snaps

for Chosen as twenty two percent. That's a third and a fifth of the game on two guys that quite frankly, don't know where they're supposed to be in the offense and aren't great players either. I like Dabosa's skill set, but I've long made a issue with Chosen on this podcast, but Dabosa doesn't know where he's going. And another forty five percent for Barrios, who by the way, had one target and no catches, so zero catches in two games running you know, thirty five pass pounds.

Running back split goes sixty two percent, twenty four percent right, and fourteen percent. Hefe who, of course got hurt. So I imagine we get plenty more right in the future and plenty more chan because that guy, what a stud he is? Last break right there? Come back on the other side, do the defense get the hell out of here? Draft Time Podcast, your host Travis Wingfield, brought to you by Auto Nation. Not a good night for the offense, little

bit better of a night for the defense. Let's go ahead and get it started here on their first touchdown. I don't know, Maybe someone smarter than me can help me.

ball right into that spot. They have a natural rub behind that that gives a linebacker no hope of getting over there. It's a walk in touchdown caught with your hand in the cookie jar, which I'm okay. I'm okay

going down swinging against a guy like that. Because we saw some plays where they did get them off the rhythm and gave the ball back to the offense, especially in that first half, all those short fields, I think they kind of kept you in the game until they didn't and then obviously the pick six late like there was the offense kind of didn't do the defense in

your favors. They did have a conversion where Khalil Shaker checked up in the hook zone on third and six where he ran and David Long off of a vertical and that was between too high, which tells you it's a Tampa two backer. And I'm wondering why David Long is the one running that because that was like Jordan Brooks' specialty in Seattle, and I thought these two guys, actually, if anybody on defense, had probably the best games. But I don't want David Long running the Tampa two pipe

because that's just not his game. On the very next play, we see why Jordan Brooks gets a wheel from Curtis Samuel from the backfield and could not have covered it better. It's interesting usage and range there for those two backers. I just think that Jordan brook should be the one taking the deeper hook drops in those situations. Now, you can't always commit to that because you're gonna have different

looks and you want to keep it disguised. But it just was interesting to me that David Long was in that role of not Jordan Brooks. I felt we were at a real numbers disadvantage, and this is where you kind of get beat on the look. On the forty nine yard James Cook touchdown, they have, let's break this down. They have double whys, which is two tight ends to that side of the formation, unbalanced personnel right twelve personnel, two tight ends both in the S side of the field.

We line up with a zero technique which is a nose tackle head up over the center, a two I technique which is another player right next to that player inside shoulder of the guard, and a nine technique which is way outside the formation in general. And we have Fuller and Long as the only other players in the box, and Poyer is in the post as the single high safety,

but also he is also a left of center. They seal the nine technique, which is Quentin Bell with one of those tight ends one on one took him out of the play. They seal the zero technique, which is Brandon Peeley with the center took him out of the play. They then get a triple team on the two Y technique which is Deshan Hand and then both Long and

Fuller come in to scrape off of that play. But Cook is such a damn good runner like a chan is, and he knows where the where he can set guys up to hit their fit wrong, and he presses that gap which gets Fuller and Long to both drive that fit and it leaves the a gap unmanned at the second level. And if then Peelee can just get off a single block and slow him down, it's gonna be like a two yard play. But he can't because well

he's undrafted rookie. Who is your fourth defensive tackle, not a rookie second year player, But you get what I'm saying. And then Ployer's angle from depth is awful. He runs the weirdest route, runs right past him. They got a good look. They executed the backman a special play. The anatomy of an overall bad play from the Dolphins defense on that long touchdown, which really took the wind out of the sales at that point after the offense continuously

puts you in bad spots all night. So that's the general. The individual standouts. David Long plays so fast and fluid and decisive. He shot a gap on that third down stuff to start the game where he sort of bluffed like he was gonna go get with and coverage and then crashes downhill right at the snap. Just smart and instinctive player.

these tackles that have eighty ninety pounds on him. The way he crashes in there and still has his bearings to find things and locate ball carriers, to me, is so much fun to watch. And then the very next play he hits Khalil Shakur on that crossing route and sends Shakur three yards backwards. Huge collision, huge hitter. Tonestter love watching him play. I thought Jordan Brooks had some really good working coverage that Curtis Salley Pla talked about.

The next play, he passes off a slant inside, then closes on the flat and forces Josh Allen to kind of clutch and throw an awkward short hop that he does sometimes when he gets a little bit jittery back there. I do think he runs himself into some bad fits for the first couple of weeks, but on a day full of bad tape. I thought he was one of the better ones out there. Chop Robinson also was a

guy that I thought was worth mentioning. That speed on the Ray Davis screen where he was out flanked and ran that thing down is a glimpse of what he can offer.

spacing on that long play to Ty Johnson. He feels Ramsey there and peels back and closes down the other option, which I thought was really heady of him. But Ramsey winds up losing eyes on Johnson, so it doesn't pay off. But I feel like his understanding of what he's doing back there just kind of looks the best of anybody in the defensive backfield. Individual misses were a plenty. Jordan Poyer two games in this one probably worse than the first.

Late to react, late, to move, bad angles, just textbook bad safety play. On his late hit, both routes to his side and half field safety look break off quickly, and so he does. Then you see his head locate the front side crosser, but he doesn't go. He doesn't feel it and go. And then by the time he gets the he's late and he throws his head into Shakure's head for a late hit. So I don't know, I think Marcus may might be interesting at this point

in that position. Jalen Ramsey, Dude, you know, I don't know why you would come down on a cat blitz and just go one hundred miles an hour and jump through the air, Because since when does Josh Allen throw right into a blitz?

what we're doing there. I mean, he collisions the back fifteen yards down the field with Josh moving to his right, and it looks like he has eyes in the quarterback, but there's like three defenders that are there closer to the quarterback if he takes off and he can't reverse field because they're the pursuits coming that way as well. He just kind of like stops collisions of the running back and lets him run right past him, gets knocked off balance and gets shredded. Like that's not the guy

that I'm to watching play football out there. Quinton Bell and Emmanuel Ogbaugh had like no juice all night long. Quinton Bell's been that way really for all the games. I think, you know, hit the great start to training camp, but this is probably a special teams and you know, fourth or fifth rusher at best. I think Jalen Phillips couldn't keep his his foot his feet in the ground most of the night. I thought his pass rush plan

didn't really work out for him. But Nito Jones, you know, same as Emn and Q like not a lot of juice there. Deshaun Han couldn't couldn't shed single blocks quickly enough. They kind of boyed us in that way, and when he would cross face, they would just ride him right out of the play. Snap counts on defense, the general takeaways, we have way too many replacement level players or worse, playing a lot of snaps. And I mentioned it with

the offense, you know, Pee Lee, Quinton Poyer. At this point, these are where a lot of the big plays occurred going after those guys. On top of beating stars like Ramsey or JP not keeping his footing all night and

losing outside contained on an Alan rush. Everything I talked about all off season, it's not working because I thought these guys would be like ten percent snap takers, But here they are the first two games playing you know, twenty five thirty snaps or thirty five forty percent of the snaps, and those are the reps you're getting destroyed on tracks. Brooks along with the distance Fuller, halland Poyer, Ramsey all played all but four snaps. That's ninety one percent.

Sealer gave you seventy eight percent. Again, he's that's that's what he does. Kala has played half the snaps to Sean Han played half the snaps and Peeley played at twenty percent off the edge, Ogbas sixty two, Chop fifty three percent, JP half the snaps, and Quentin Bell thirty six. That's a lot of players that I didn't think were going to contribute this year playing twenty thirty five forty percent.

opened some things up inside. The Dolphins ran for one hundred yards in that first half. Jordan Brooks I thought had really good reps and coverage, had some good run fits and had some misses, but you know, on a tape full of bad tapes, he's in there. And then I put Chob Robinson number five. Just those two plays alone, showing some of the explosion and quickness and had you know, two impactful plays that cut down bills drive. So yipee man, all twenty two in the can. Let's go ahead and

call it a podcast right there. With the next podcast we do. I'm not sure what it'll be exactly. It'll be on Tuesday. I'm gonna probably get away from it for a weekend here.