Drive Time: Dolphins Chargers Week 1 Preview

I can't wait to see you know, onno back on the field and it's gonna be fun.

two hubs for it all. The MetLife takeover, obviously, and you're gonna see droves of Finns fans come Sunday before we get into all the matchups. And since you've been hearing about our team for the last nine months, let's go ahead and get to know the Some are picking this Chargers team to break through and get to the dance, most notably Greg Rosenthal of NFL Media, who picked a Eagles Chargers Super Bowl. And I think the talent matches

out there in Los Angeles. It all starts with their selection of their quarterback from what I think will go down as the best class ever in twenty twenty, Justin Herbert and he spearheads a remade offense under new offensive coordinator Kellen Moore. After that group finished thirteenth in the NFL a year ago in both total offense and scoring.

Their offensive line is anchored by a draft grand slam left tackle Rashaun Slater and a free agent hit in Corey Linsley at center, Austin Eckler, one of the greatest franchise fines in terms of the UDFA market. He has produced thirty eight touchdowns over the last two seasons outside or I guess inside For the receivers, Keenan Allen's one of the best pure route runners in the game, while Mike Williams plays above the rim. We saw that last

year in the matchup. On defense, they return a ton of players from injury this year, including Anthony Johnson and Sebastian Joseph Day, to a defense that really struggled inside against the run. Adding reinforcements inside for Brandon Staley's defense Eric Kendricks Day on Henley Go Koog's they offer speed coverage and Bliss's ability to Kenneth Murray's thump inside Khalil Mack and Joey Bosa one of the best edge rushing tandems in the entire game. While the defensive backfield is

led by do it all safety Derwin James. You probably recall the name Michael Davis. He made a name for himself last year as a plus corner, really starting with this Dolphins game, and they're hoping to get a bounce back from last year's big free agent splash J C. Jackson, who was playing terrible for an injury, so I'm curious to see him back on the field for the Chargers in Week one. I think it's the most intriguing matchup

on the entire Week one docket. I think both teams are double digit win outfits this year, and whoever gets out with a victory is going to be riding as high as any other team in the league going into the Week two matchup, maybe the winner of Jets Bills or some crazy upset that we don't foresee coming. But I think if Miami gets this game, I think you're looking at a trip to Orchard Park on October first

at three to zero. That's kind of how I see this game tilting the skills from Miami over the next couple of weeks. As for the Chargers road to get here under Staley and even longer back Tom Telesco, this roster has never been short on talent, yet things just seem to pop up, whether it's injuries, missed field goals, or the craziest way to lose games late, all while the chargering it slogan they've been tabbed with. They were a playoff team last year but went one and done.

That was their first playoff appearance after I devastating loss in twenty twenty one in Houston in December that folks don't seem to bring up in the quarterback conversation very often, but Herbert threw two backbrecking picks in that game which crippled their pluss and chances that year. That was a nine win season, preceded by seven and five win campaigns ahead of a twelve and four to twenty eighteen season that saw them get to the Divisional round before being

trounced by the Brady led Patriots. For twenty twenty three, CBS Sports has their win projection at nine and a half. There are six teams with overall better win totals k C, Cincinnati, Philly, San Francis, Go, Buffalo and Jacksonville, and they are tied with eight teams. One of those teams is US with nine and a half over under. So all the excitement Dolphins fans. The Chargers fans feel the same way, all twelve of them. Additionally, only seven teams are projected with

a better shot at the Super Bowl. Same goes for us. So that's the history. Let's go ahead and look at some of the key storylines heading into this game. They are a plenty. This is a team coming off their last game, a twenty seven to nothing lead in the first half of a playoff game that ultimately turned into one of the biggest collapses we've seen in a postseason game or game anywhere. So they've had that to chew

on for the last nine months. But for the Dolphins, they've had since last December chew on the contest against this same team. And that's where it really all starts with me. Are the narratives that were born from that game, despite the previous weeks of dominance. And that's how it goes in this world, right, So we can't complain about

it too much, I guess. Let's go ahead and hear from Tyreek Hill when I asked him how playing against a Fangio defense every day in practice would prepare you not just for the Charge and a coach that learned under Fangio, but all the coaches across the NFL as this is the most replicated off not duplicated defense ran in the NFL. How does seeing that defense every single day benefit you guys heading into the twenty twenty three campaign.

foot out the gas. We're gonna continue doing what we've been doing, you know, practicing fast, practicing deliberate, and you know, getting too our spots for our quarterback, you know, and as far as the offensive line, you know, those guys are going are going to take pride in, you know, protecting our quarterback because he's clearly he's our key to success and everybody knows that. So that's that's the plan. Baby.

getting hands on footballs. And the one I always talk about, the one where Tyreek got free at the start of the second quarter down the middle of the football field. The ball was there, but it just looked like he didn't see it or missed it in the lights. I'm not really sure still to this day, but I tend to think that we were just off that night, and that's going to happen over the course of a seventeen

game season. Remember last year the Chiefs were stifled by a Colts team who was dreadful in Week three, stifled to the tune of three hundred and fifteen yards of offense and just thirteen points on that day, when they averaged four hundred and forty yards over the other sixteen games. Like it happens, and that was a night where the Chargers were super thin on the defensive line because of injuries.

That's also a defense that plays by the theory that we welcome you to run the football any snap you want, because for yards a pop opposed to throwing the ball every down where most quarterbacks average between seven and eight yards per pass, or if you're too, nine and a half yards per pass, and it checks out. I think it's sound reasoning. But if a team can commit to it, they can obviously shorten the game, which I think is

an overrated trope. But you can shorten the game and make your offense really have to be perfect, because if you only have seven or eight drives, you better score, you know, on half of those in order to be able to keep up with an offense that is moving the ball consistently down the field and keeping your offense off the field. I'm really curious to see how they

use last year's recipe to attack. If you guys saw the great story from Jory Epstein on Yahoo's Sports where she detailed how McDaniel sees offense as an ever evolving unit, and we know that's kind of how it works under that Shanahan tree from all those offensive geniuses. You know. Jordan Rodrieg mentioned that on the podcast as well. I just really, really really trust Mike McDaniel to have had a full offseason to craft what this year's offense will

look like, and ultimately this week one game plan. Le's go ahead and hear from coach real quick when he was asked about playing into the Chargers planned a season ago.

It just tells a lot about that team, how they didn't blink and they came out to challenge this and they did so I think that goes to you know that that's a lesson that can never fall to the wayside for any coach or team that uh that you know, it's it's all about the group of people coming together and you know, they they were prideful, they they came out with a chip on their shoulder, I would say.

And it was cool from a coaching perspective to see, uh, see a team attack it that way and that will happen nine times out of ten if if people have that competitive edge on you and that that's something that the second you forget in this league. You know, that's a great thing about the National Football League is the

parody is so real. The the you know, the fact that you know eighty plus percent of games come down to turnover differential, like it just speaks to how it's a communal effort by a bunch of individuals and if you don't bring it, it will get brought on you.

two or three moves beyond that as well. That's the genesis of coach McDaniel's offense, right, that's the genesis of all the great offenses out there, thinking multiple steps ahead, and the Chargers will have to play guestwork as to what our thoughts are in that regard for a week one game.

he's always an available resource. And I just have to imagine the conversation of hey, Vic, you know when you were in this look and I do this, how would you counter that? That has to have happened a few times, right, so now you get a chance to counter the counter of the counter. And in fact, you know, coach Fangio discussed this back in August when he was asked if Mike ever comes to him for ideas and thoughts, well, I'm.

the table that maybe not everyone else does. And back to that Jory Epstein piece, McDaniel laid out what he was looking for in a quarterbacks coach and it included one having worked with multiple previous high profile quarterbacks Russell Wilson, Brett Favre, on and on and on for coach Bev, and two a former offensive coordinator Slash having play calling experience,

which Bev checks both those boxes. And I think ultimately it boils down to a complete trust and McDaniel to maximize his resources, and in this game he has two very very smart resources who were either in that building next year or literally taught the man who's calling this defense really what to do. So it's a hell of

a storyline as we have throughout this game. Before we move on to the next one, some defensive metrics here for the Chargers from twenty twenty two, sixty one percent of the time in nickel, twenty five percent in their base three four, and then eight percent in dime and then other variations of sub packages there, which is pretty commonplace. And this goes back to what I mentioned with Staley welcoming the run and the need for your middle linebacker

to be able to have insane range a lah. While I think David Long is a great fit here in Miami. You know, they try to get that from Kenneth Murray. It hasn't worked out really great there. They've added Eric Kendricks, they drafted day On Henley, so clearly a point of contention finding that speedy, rangy middle linebacker. And you know, Kendricks a little bit long in the tooth, and we'll

talk about him here a lot in this podcast. And Henley, as much as I love him, he's still kind of a position convert, so I don't think you're going to see much of him on defense in this opener. But to tie it back to the you know, personnel in general, you're going to get personnel matching. That's like, you know, thirty of the three two teams, we'll do that. So it's not uncommon, but you can sort of dictate against that. Right, So let's go ahead and revisit this.

one tight end, three receivers. That's eleven personnel. The two numbers account for the running backs on the field and the tight ends, and then you're left over for eligibles. The total numbers five is how many receivers you have, So eleven, one back, one tight end, what's one plus one two? So there's three remaining three wide receivers, And

again customary for all teams across the league. Before we get into some of the numbers and the personnel groupings, I want to look back at game ones for the Cowboys under Kellen Moore, and we're on the wrong side of a trend here, but I think you'll still appreciate this point anyway. Last year they scored three points in the openers had two hundred and forty four yards of offense.

Both of those were season lows, and they don't play their stars in the prese neither, So something's interesting to chew on there for Kellen Moore and Cowboys and Chargers. Twenty twenty one was very good. Same Bucks team. They lost both games, though, but twenty nine points and four hundred and fifty one yards are obviously really good totals. In twenty twenty, just seventeen points in three hundred and eighty yards. Those were both bottom five outputs for that

Cowboys team. Also a loss to the Rams back in twenty nineteen, they went off thirty five points four hundred and ninety four yards in this time a win against a pretty good offensive production.

But from twenty twenty two. Here's the twelve teams point outputs last year that had new OC's Bears nineteen, Broncos, sixteen Texans, twenty Colts, twenty Raiders, nineteen, your Miami Dolphins, twenty Vikings, twenty three Patriots, seven Giants, twenty one Steelers had twenty. They scored twenty three and overtime so three

in the extra period. Seahawks seventeen, Buccaneers nineteen. I found this interesting that only one team scored more than twenty one points, and it was just twenty three, and the average was eighteen point four points per game. If you get eighteen points out of the Chargers on Sunday, you're gonna win the game.

But being able to capitalize on the Chargers potentially being slow out the gates, I think it's very important in this game, getting a couple of early scores against them and then holding them on defense. I think if you get out to a ten point lead or something in the first quarter, I think you're going to cruise to victory. So really capitalizing on the potential of that rust if it exists, and all of that takes us into our

next storyline here. But real quick, just some offensive splits for Kellen Moore a year ago in Dallas sixty one percent of the time and eleven personnel, so you're going to see us match that likely with lots of five dB personnel. But also they ran twelve personnel one back two tight ends twenty two percent of the time, which allows us to get into our depth in the front

seven play more. You know, Chubb Agba, Phillips, Baker and long type of guys Seeler and Wilkins and Raq one like, keep those guys out there because you can stay with that base against that personnel package and then just go X and Cater and all of a sudden, you're not getting into our depth in the cornerback room. So please run twenty two personnel. You've got the possibility of matching some big nickel with the safeties that we use to come down and love to hit in the running game.

De Shan Elliot's that guy, Brandon Jones is that guy. There's options. That's pretty much it, though nothing else more than seven percent run from Dallas a year ago. We'll do more on this next week, because I just don't want to get into the weeds when it's predictive. We don't have actual data to go off of the two more storylines. Actually, we're at the break time right now. Let's go ahead and do that. Let's take our first break and come back and finish up two storylines and

then get into the matchups for the game. That's all next Draft Time Podcast your host Travis Wingfield, brought to you by Auto Nation. Tis the season for football Dolphins. Join your Miami Dolphins for our season kickoff party at Oasis on Saturday, September ninth. Fans can enjoy giveaways and a guest performance from Grammy nominated DJ Audien. For more information,

visit Miami dolphins dot com Slash Kickoff. I meant to get to all the storylines in that first segment, but this is a beefy show, so we're gonna go ahead and punt two of them here to this segment, and the first one here is no preseason workload for the Charger starters.

is always always always going to be debated. What should teams do. I think you're crazy if you don't think there will be some rust. But could it prevent some health issues? I guess that's your trade off you have to accept either way. It's fascinating as hell to me. And then finally, we're not gonna not talk about this Tua versus Herbert, and of course this is always going to be a topic when these two teams meet from here forward and hopefully for the next fifteen to twenty years.

red zone body of work. Well, Tua last year was the number one passer in terms of rating in the red zone at one twelve point two, and he was also the number two rated passer on third down at one thirty point one. Scorching in the situation where there's no system to help you out right, Third down and long is all about how do you compete within your own playmaking ability and to a ball out all year long. In that regard, It's why I don't get these knocks that are on him. But I guess if you don't,

you know what, never mind? Then I also think the discussion really shows you the flaws and evaluation based on I guess the velocity of the throw. I don't know, Maybe I'm just too innodated on social media, but it's literally the only argument I ever see does to a throw of some of the most miles per hour in the league.

his laborman ucl. If that was all it took, then that's all it would take, right, But that's not all it takes.

some of the best numbers you'll ever see. He topped out at ninety three in his career, averaged just around ninety miles an hour, and by like seven or eight years into his career, he was averaging eighty six miles per hour. So either way, I think it's the best comparison I can make. But either way, I just hope fans enjoyed this fun matchup for years to come with guys that were picked back to back and will be

compared for years because it's fun. We're gonna keep getting into the weeds here, and I wanted to change how

we do this a little bit this season. Those storylines will probably be less in future matchups as we get more data and there's just less you know, Dolphins and Giants don't have the same lore as this one does, obviously, for you know, coaching changeover quarterback comparison, all that fun stuff, plus we'll get more data to give you more number driven matchup stuff, but we just don't have that for the first game of the year. So Dolphins offense versus

a Charger defense. I want to go ahead and read the projected lineups for Sunday. Tongue of I Looa up against a secondary of Derwin James A Loohi Gilman and Jaseer Taylor are wide receivers versus their corners. Look for the main matchups of Hill and Waddle versus J. C. Jackson and Michael Davis. Then when you get that slot interior position, you know Hill and wattall will play both, but Barryos and Smyth is your slot and tight end versus a guy like Asante Samuel who is all gamble

all the time. And then on the interior defensive line or I should say offensive line, Isaiah Win, Connor Williams, Robert Hunt up against Sebastian, Joseph Day, Austin Johnson, and Chris Hinton. And then off the edge, is it gonna be Tea Stead. I tend to think it's going to be Lamb.

converted safety. So if we can test that conditioning in the first game out and get those guys with hands on hips, the options are to bring up essentially practice squad level guys and have tired dudes out there running with Tyreek and Jalen.

So there's an interesting choice there for Dolphin, the Dolphin's coaching staff. But what I really like, I want to see Eric Hendricks in coverage. I think that's your rabbit hat there. He and I Lohi Gilman. There was a game against the Rams a few years ago where they just kept going after Kendricks matchup on the three receivers with the strength, and he couldn't hang. And you dictate that by your personnel and your packaging, whether it's Azukama,

whether it's Burrios, maybe even a running back. I think that's a matchup you exploit here. We'll come back to that more in a moment. Some key matchups and achievements for the offensive line pass pro versus Mac and Bosa. Look, both those guys are premier rushers who can ret games in one on one situations, especially Bosa. Twenty twenty two was an injury plagued one for both guys. They did have the lowest Mac had the lowest pressure rate of

his career, just eleven point eight percent. But don't get it twisted. He is still really, really good. Bosa plays with strength and craftiness and a more that does not quit. He typically lines up off the offense is right, and I think it's pretty clear that you have to slide your protection that way to give Austin some help, and especially if Tearan can go, but even not Kendall lamb against Mac. I like that a lot more than Bosa

on Jackson. I think the next two keys play into that key, and they are isolating the linebackers in the middle of the field passing game and run the football successfully on early downs. Didn't do that enough last year. The whole offense operates through running off the football and

selling that run action. Right, So if we can get that second level thinking about the run and having to anticipate in order to catch up to a run game that's clipping off five or six yards of pop, then you can really control those players in that area, and

from there you can get into isolating those matchups. I'll never forget the twenty eighteen That twenty eighteen game, and it was eight on eight, eight of eight passing against linebackers and mostly Eric Hendricks for two hundred and three yards. Thanks to Pro Football Focus for that. So stretching that way, creating space with their personnel successfully running the football, operate in the screen game to solve those pass rushers down and get your big guys out in space against a

very ferocious front. You do those things, you're gonna be very hard to stop. And then finally another counter there getting vertical shots to take them out of that two man press inside leverage defense. We know about it last year, right, we talked about it at length. They had a bunch of guys who played really well at jamming, re routing and competing at the catch point.

DJ Audion. For more information, visit Miami Dolphins dot com. Slash kickoff the Dolphins defense versus the Chargers offense. Going down the list here, Javon Holland, Brandon Jones and Deshaun Elliott up against Justin Herbert and that quarterback Xavier and Howard cater coohu, and then we'll see who it is between Eli Apple and Cam Smith going up against Mike Williams, Josh Palmer and Quinton Johnston. And then of course inside

cater Coohu, Keenan, Allen, Gerald, Everett, Donald Parham. That's a fun matchup there, co who On Keenan, Allen, Wilkins, Steeler and Ray Kwan versus Zion Johnson, Corey Linsley and Jamari Sailor, Chubb Phillips and Ogba off the edge against Ray Shawn Slater and Trey Pipkins. And then David Long and Jerome

Baker up against Austin Eckler and Joshua Kelly. And as far as personnel usage, we discussed this in the storylines, but wanted to declare the format going forward when we have an actual twenty twenty three data set on these teams. We're not going to talk about it here, but some key matchups and achievements for our defense to look forward to. Can we change the picture to force Herbert into some

mistakes that's where he's got in trouble before. Maybe there's some rusts there, some of those quick throws of the outside where he's thinking, man that you have a zone coverage, so and corner, peel off and make a play and go back for six. The best plans are always the same against all good quarterbacks, a good mix of both

man and zone. And we saw xaviing Howard get a pick on Herbert when he thought it was a man coverage play and he fell back into his zone back in twenty twenty to basically put that game on ice. Herbert will put the ball in your guys's hands if you give enough chances. But we also saw him torch our man coverage last year, notably going up top to Mike Williams against xaviing Howard on two bad groins on the year, though he was fifth against man coverage and

twenty six against zone. So I kind of think that tells you where this system benefits going up against the quarterback like him. Another big matchup I think is Rayquan Davis on Corey Linsley. If we can hold Lensley and not let him climb and get to second levels and get to additional blocks, that's going to free up Christian and Zach to have one on one matchups against Zion Johnson who was a disaster last year and Jamari Sailor who was a good rookie, but he's no matchup for

those two guys. Raque against Lensley, can you just hold him at the point and not let him climb as a big heath me in this game. And I mentioned Coohu on Keenan Allen like you know X. I like X healthy against Mike Williams because his physicality usually matches up well with those guys. It's the speedsters and the change of direction guys that he does not do so well against. But I think Cater's feet are exactly what you need to be able to hang with a technician

like Keenan Allen. It's a fun matchup to watch. And then Phillips on Pipkins. Pipkins loves to not overset, and then we'll lunge and do his blocks when you go at that speed rush off the edge. So I'm curious to see if JP can use his in game adjustment knowledge to get him lunging there before crossing face and winning back inside. I think JP has a big sack

in this game that changes it. That's kind of one of my predictions here, and I'm super super intrigued to see what the Chargers conditioning is, Like I mentioned that earlier, but people are gonna tell you about depth is our issue, but then they have no idea what other teams are working with because every team has depth issues because that's

how fuck sports works. If you get any cramping at receiver or dB for LA, They're gonna have to turn to what's essentially a practice squad guy like Ignogny or crossing it for us a year ago. Think about that, Like, last time that happened for our offense was Baltimore in Week two and how did that turn out for them? So very interesting to have to watch there. My keys to victory create indecision for Herbert and the Chargers offense. Every coach says this every week, ever, but what I

mean is causing a sense of indecision. I think this is going to be a key for us all year because what I think we have in the past rush chamber, but against this quarterback. He beat us last year with some extending of plays and us just not having an bullets on third down keeping them behind the chains. Hitting the quarterback and changing the picture on him could lead to holding the football or sacks or quick decisions where

he puts the ball in harm's way. So just giving Herbert a second indecision to a second of indecision could go a long way here. Number two efficiently run the football. And again that sounds generic, but specifically to this defense and how they want to play it and look like Tua and the weapons. They're going to have their days, but I think this day is more about the running game. I just I think that's kind of how you want to build your offense to be able to win in

multiple ways. And this one, to me goes to the running game. If they want to they want you to get bored taking a profit, but the best play callers don't get bored taking a profit. They want you to throw in completions and get to their dime personnel and then let their pass rush go to work against tight windows and create chaos that way. But running the football keeps their quarterback off the field, keeps us ahead of the chains, It keeps everything open what we want to

do in terms of the passing game. And in fact, I found this really cool information here for you guys. I wanted to plug in the podcast. I bookmarked it on Twitter. I don't know how to pounce this guy's name, Argen Menon. He posted a clip of how the Chargers were the worst team at defending runs off either tackle and the Dolphins were the best team running off tackle

a season to go. And I think that bodes very well for the Dolphins in this game, especially with how they can set the screen game up that way, how they can set up those deep play action roles and get Tyreek and Jalen on crossers the running game. Man, if they run the ball successfully in this game, it's going to be a long.

leads to more chances for a breakdown. So stay aggressive, attack and let's go lie at that scoreboard.

teeth of their defense. In addition to the outside stretch stuff, you should get doubles catching climb opportunities to soften up the middle of that defense. After you stretch them vertically, and if they never react, just do it for sixty minutes. If they sneak a safety down or go you know, pull someone else into the box, go up top and

hit your vertical shots. The premiere are perimeter passing game against zone you know, backs, tight ends, flats, sticks, hitches to the wide receivers and then go vertical when they play man. My areas of concern protecting the edges, especially if we don't have to Ron, Armstead, Bosa and Mac could wreck this game if we get behind the chains, stay in third and long, and have to do a more true drop back passing. I want to say the coverage, but I just don't. I don't believe that Tyreek and

Jalen are going to get beat by that personnel. Again, I don't believe it's going to happen, So I'm not concerned about it, even though I put it in there. And then justin Herbert as a runner, you know, I think our defense is going to be very good, So I'm not worried about most quarterbacks most of the time. I mean, they're great quarterbacks get theirs. But Herbert as a runner was what killed us last year to create

some of those third down opportunities. Until we stop a quarterback on the move, I just don't predict it's going to happen, even though it's all new defense. But his ability to extend could throw out all the goodwill of Vic Fangio's system and how they communicate and pass off and create confusion for quarterbacks if Herbert runs all that's out the window and then finally special teams until they're not.

that fun stuff. Check out both my and the team social media at Winklin NFL at Miami Dolphins.