Drive Time: Dolphins Offseason Could Improve Three Critical Areas

I'll just ki. Drive Time with Travis Wingfield begins. Now check your pulse if you're not for what is up? Dolphins? And welcome to the Drive Time podcast, part of the Miami Dolphins podcast network, covering your team, your Miami Dolphins. How's it going everybody? I am your host, Travis Wheatfield. And on today's show, we are recapping well a lot the twenty twenty three NFL Draft as a whole. We'll look at the areas the Dolphins on paper improved this offseason.

We'll see what the masses are saying about are four new Miami Dolphins. I'll stop by the film room once again to give you the omissions from the original film study on these guys, now that I had the entire weekend and take a look under the hood, plus my top draft notes and top rosters heading into the summer. All of that and more from the Baptist Health Studios inside the Baptist Health Training Complex. This is the Draft

Time Podcast, Maggie. So if you haven't listened to the draft episode, which I'm not sure there's a single person here who would have skipped those and come straight to this one, but just in case, I just want to go ahead and detail a few extra notes from watching not just two or three games from these guys, but getting into six plus games and seeing what they really offer with a real mind of just watching that player and watching their potential fit here with the Miami Dolphins.

So real quick, just a brief omission period on each of the four draft picks, and we start in the second round with cornerback camp Smith and watching more and more of his tape. I think maybe the best trait of all that I like for him is that he keeps your defensive playbook wide open. What I mean by that there are reps of him doing a little bit of everything on that South Carolina tape the pick he

had against Clemson last year. He's ten yards off in the slot and they try to get a takeoff from that position, which is a very common route in twenty twenty three. He squats on it in a way that limits the break off the top of the route by playing underneath and kind of being ready to trigger downhill. But it allows him to also flip his hips and

run vertically. And on this rep, when you watch just the broadcast version, you see the ball go up and then Smith is tracking it like a wide receiver, and then the other actual wide receiver appears in frame trying to get back in phase, but he can't do it, and so Smith winds up rundown this deep shot for an easyt I think that rep tells you all you need to know about his game, his confidence, the trust he has, and what he sees that allows him to

play this way where he can funnel down and challenge the short game without having to sacrifice the deep portion of the field Because he can flip his hips and take off in an instant that tense split speed right, he has plenty adequate long speed, and then of course the length helps him disrupt the catch point if he is behind a little bit or falls out of phase

a little bit, then in the running game. You know, when I first watched his tape, I thought, this is a guy that doesn't really love to go make hits. But the more you watch, the same thing I love about his general approach to the game is what makes him effective. Here understanding of angles, where he is on

the field, and spatial awareness. You can just see the football IQ with this player, and the trait that almost always comes with that and does here is the effort throw the ball to the other side of the field and you'll see him take off and get his angle to where he has to be just in case the play breaks out and goes for a big gain. He wants to be there to prevent the long touchdown, and that awareness of where he is and the way he plays the football. In fact, there's a three play sequence

in the Vanderbilt game. One, he strings out an outside run and makes the play by set in the edge and coming back inside to make the tackle. Number two. The next play is an option play where he just disrupts the mesh point and kind of stays in a perfect position to defend both the quarterback and running back and it forces the quarterback to tuck it and turn up right into his help. Just delay that pitch for

as long as you possibly can. And this third one here, it goes back to the previous trade I mentioned where he can really play back the football. Is there's a one one pass play to the field where he's on the wide side of the field right a takeoff route to the perimeter, and you see him mere really good mirror technique wait for the receiver to engage the contact, which he then reciprocates, which means it's not a defensive

pass interference. And here's the best part, and this is what we didn't get the last time around we took a cornerback very high in the draft. Is he locates the football before making his leap or before going into the man, and that's going to prevent so many defensive pass interference calls that were flagged on the previous high

draft pic at cornerback here for the Miami Dolphins. I can't tell you how much I love that quality because all year last year, all those zero looks the man coverage, so much urgency put on these cornerbacks in coverage, they got flagged so frequently because they panicked and just played through the man, and you have almost no chance of making a play in that regard. But cam Smith typically finds the ball and plays the ball opposed to playing

through his man. This tape is fantastic. And by the way, I've got Brett Coleman's schedule for the podcast on Friday this week, and he just texts me cam Smith with about eight greater than signs. That's all he said. He loves cam Smith's tape. We'll talk about that more on Friday. Devon a Chain. This is something I think we probably could just cover about this team with a blanket statement

and call it good. But man, there is a certain type of player they've clearly prioritized down here in South Florida, and it revolves around the play will and determination. You see that on a Chain's tape with regularity. Yeah, he's one hundred and eighty pounds. He's probably not pushing the pile ten yards down the field on any given play.

But anyone who just sees the weight and tells you this guy's not gonna drop his pads and run tough and run through tackles is simply not watching the tape, which I've seen that take from you know, a couple of couple of guys that cover the team that clearly don't watch the tape. This dude finishes runs. He plays on one hundred at all times, and this is another part of the makeup that the Dolphins have clearly demonstrated

that they love. He's smart. Gosh, if there are three wrong decisions to make or gaps to hit and just one correct one, you typically find a chain finding the ladder. And he's fast. He does it quickly, just incredibly adept at hitting small creases at full speed. And we know what happens when you've got nearly four to two speed and you do that. You know what else? Those two

things play into pass protection. There are all kinds of examples of him getting his block executed, even when giving up sixty seventy pounds to some of these top edge rushers in the SEC. It ain't always pretty, but it's usually effective, and a lot of that has to do with his effort and will to do that. Elijah Higgins. I might be having the most fun watching Higgins so far from his class. I referenced it in the post selection breakdown podcast. But everything this guy does operates through

his strength core upper body, lower body. He's just a brick house in terms of the way he uses that size to his advantage. You pair really with really really good route running, and man, I can see this ceiling for him being, you know, fulfilling multiple roles from both

wide receiver and tight end perspectives. And I wrap that phrase, you know, wide receiver and tight end in air quotes because I think gone are the days of just painting a player with some broad brush, and in is the idea of filling out specific roles on your team, like whether it's blocking from an inline position or cracking from a plus split, or running from the slot, you know, vertically down the field to open up that too high show.

He's got a lot of tools on his proverbial belt, but man, the way he controls DB's in the physicality aspect of his matchups. I mentioned this in the ways that he fights off re routes and positions himself for contested balls. You see it in the running game too, And you know, I think about what he could potentially add as a run blocker, you know, off the edge of some of this stuff that we saw receivers doing

on this offense a year ago. I see a lot of that in Higgins games, as it projects towards a potential role here on the offense down the line. Then Ryan Hayes, you go back and find the Senior Bowl reps for all the guys that played in that game. I think that's where you can really see where Hayes

projects at the next level. The one on ones were a bit of a learning experience for Hayes, and day one like it wasn't good, but they always talk about guys that improved throughout the week, and that's what you

saw from Hayes. Some of those bigger, heavy handed rushers were just bull rushing him and dropping their weight on a guy that was, you know, coming into that game about three hundred pounds, and he would give up some ground, he would get knocked back a little bit, but then he started to make an adjustment, whether it was getting a deeper drop or widening his base, or striking earlier, or just finding different, you know, contact points to put his weight on, you know, more so than somewhere else.

And all of a sudden, these bull rushers are getting stonewalled right at the point. Now. As for the run blocking aspect, of his game. Didn't take longer than Monday or was it Tuesday, the first day of practice for him to get that picked up. It was the same as his Michigan tape. Man. It was dominant. He is

out standing at the point of attack. In surprise, surprise, he fires off the ball and shortens the runway of his man significantly, something you see plenty in this offense down here, and I'm everybody's on the roster is going to compete, right so you know, hopefully we get Tron Armstead at left tackle for seventeen games and Austin Jackson shows you the growth we all saw last camp but then didn't get a chance to see because of the early injury and then a re injury when he came back.

And in this case, maybe you can see, you know, Hayes coming off the bench in some heavy packages, some six offensive line packages. You know, if he shows you that growth and makes his way through camp and earns a spot on the roster, I can see him potentially having a role in that regard because of the way he plays the run and widens that edge in the instance that you do go with a heavy six offensive lineman package. Just kind of thinking about the future what

that might look like. Obviously, lots of competition in that room, so we'll see who winds up filling out that role. But watching his Senior Bowl reps and the way he attacks those guys one on one, I really like the way he blocks off the edge in the ground game. Man, lots of like from this entire class. How about what the pundits are saying, you know, nationwide? I went around the web and dug up some draft takes from some of the big names in the industry. Here's what Kuiper

had to say. You know, mel Kiper, cornerback Cam Smith excelled and zone coverage in college, and he locks down SEC wideouts. Running Back de von a Chain could be one of the steals of the draft. He should be on preseason Rookie of the Year watch list. A Chain is super fast and has the ability to in the past game. What's not to like? Ryan Hayes is my fifteenth ranked offensive tackle. I was surprised he lasted that late.

His twenty twenty two tape is very solid. Warren Sharp of Sharp Football grated the Dolphins with the eighth best draft in the draft eighth best value. I should say, that's a weird way to put that. This is a metric that he devised based on draft capital over expectation.

Now does that mean anything, No, because you're working off of a consensus big board from all the major players and that doesn't really reflect how NFL teams think and who cares if you're doing better than the consensus media boards. But then where the players went based on their pre draft ranking, the Dolphins got value that way. So it's

not bad when you consider that. I mean, it's just one way of looking at this thing, especially when you consider that teams one through seven on his list all had seven or more picks in Miami hedge of course, just the four so real quick. Another Brett Coleman note. I got a different text from him earlier over the weekend that said, of course the Dolphins took a chane. He texted me that right when they'd had that draft pick come through. What a cheat code, he wrote me. Again,

he'll be doing the podcast later on this week. And speaking of future podcasts, you guys know my boy Emery Hunt from CBS Sports HKE was going to come on for his annual spot to taking a look at all the udfas that he thinks have the best chance to make an impact on this year's roster. Remember last year I asked for a name. He goes co Who. I was like, yeah, yeah, cater co who. He told me,

so that was all I needed to know. He then broke it down for us, but he was very indignant on the selection of cater Coho, who I think was the dolphins best rookie in general last year. Pretty I mean, obviously he was speaking of. We have reports, not official signings, but reports of Udfa's who will be joining the Miami Dolphins.

They are quarterback James Blackman from Arkansas State. May recall him from his days at Florida State, running back Chris Brooks from BYU, couple of wide receivers day Would Davis from Western Kentucky and Chris Coleman from cal Poly. I'll be honest with you, guys, I have not fired up the Hilltoppers nor the cal Paly tape. I also have not watched tight end Julian Hill out of Campbell. Offensive tackle Jared Horse from Michigan State. He's just a mean

dude on the offensive line. Alex Jensen from South Dakota State, another offensive tackle a guard DJ Scaife I think is how you say it from Miami, a center Aluma a Lave from where is he from? I didn't get his college on here. Defensive tackle Brandon Peeley from USC who I think has a chance to really make not just an impact on making the football team, potentially eating up from snaps on the nose. Tackle defensive tackle Anthony Montevalo

from UCF. Defensive lineman Randy Charlton from Mississippi State. Almost Norm Charlton and Randy Johnson put together an edge Garrett Nelson from Nebraska. We talked about him on the Visits podcast a couple weeks ago. And edge from Miami, Mitchell Agade. Another edge, Ezekiel Vanderberg from Illinois State. He is highly intriguing. I'm looking forward to diving into his tape. Linebacker Aubrey Miller from Jackson State, cornerback Kedrin Smith from Kentucky, free

safety Ethan Bonner from from Stanford. He is electric safety Bennett Williams from Oregon and Matt Turk's son, Michael Turk, the punter from Oklahoma. That's how you know you're getting old man, a player that you know that you remember watching very distinctly, his son is now on the football team. Before our first break, new Jersey numbers. Braxton Barrios gets the zero that's going to look cool on him. Chosen has the former number three of Will Fuller, almost with

Will Anderson, Will Fuller and Josh Rosen. Hopefully Chosen can make that more of a chosen number here In twenty twenty three, cater Cohu goes to four, which was my high school basketball and baseball number, so that makes me love him even more. Jalen Ramsey gets number five, Avi, Mike White fourteen, Jake Billy the Punter sixteen, Deshaan Elliott takes Eric Rose position really and his number twenty one. Miles Gaskin goes back to thirty seven. Malik Reid's gonna

wear number forty seven. Does that mean that Andrew Van Geegle has a new number? David Long fifty one, Dane gets number sixty seven. Keon Smith bumps up one number to seventy seven. Eric Sabert's gonna wear eighty two, and Freddy Swain takes Mike Gasicki's number eighty eight. There you go. Let's go ahead and take our first break. Right there

and come back on the other side. I'm gonna tell you three areas where the Dolphins improve this offseason that could take them from nine wins to eleven twell, maybe thirteen, maybe fourteen. That's next Draft Time Podcast, your host, I was Wingfield, brought to you by Auto Nation. Oh yeah, it's a Tuesday here, the first episode of the week. Like I mentioned earlier, we had three episodes drop over

the weekend. So if you went into Aaron Rodgers's Darkness Retreat and didn't know what happened over the weekend, go ahead and get back on the playlist. There ya, silly goose and check out those previous episodes of the Draft Time Podcast. I wanted to look at the Dolphins off season as a whole, and eventually when we get some

downtime here there ain't no downtime right now. We'll go ahead and take a look at a roster reset as we do at every pivotal point of the off season, and kind of gauge where the Dolphins are post draft, post free agency, post post Malone. But I wanted to look at some areas where I think the Dolphins the reason they were nine to eight last year despite the fact that I thought they were a much better football team.

I wanted to take a look at three areas that they were not good in that I think they got better at this offseason by nature of their moves. Number one is the short yardage game. And I've been talking about this a lot. This is an issue to me of sample size more than anything else, because even though Miami was twenty two for fifty five, which was forty five point five percent, and the only team in the

National Football League under fifty percent in short yardage? Is there anybody out there that here's how I view quarterbacks. If it's third and seven and you're on defense and you're like, oh man, I don't like our chances, that means that quarterback is good. If you don't like the offense's chances in third and seven, that means the quarterback needs to be replaced. That's kind of how I view that.

But if I told you it was third and three or shorter, and you can choose to be on the defense, or you can choose to have this Dolphins offense with Tua, Tyreek and Jalen which one are you taking? Anybody choosing the defense, would you take the defense? If I told you it was third and eight, you probably wouldn't do that then, which means your quarterback's pretty good. It's very hypothetical, you know, is evident by the fact that when Tua was in the game, Miami's third and long conversion rate

was thirty seven point eight percent. Tops were the Chiefs at forty five percent, and second place was thirty two point three percent the Bengals. So the Dolphins were comfortably in second place with the Chiefs, who ran away a number one. And again, everyone loves Patrick Mahomes. I think most people think he's the best quarterback in the NFL. Everybody loves Joe Burrow. I think most people think he's the second best quarterback in the NFL. Some people think

he's theirstst quarterback in the NFL. Two was right between those guys. Well, you think that's it then for posterity. Regardless of the quarterback, the Dolphins were number two and third and medium, which is four to six yards at sixty percent, only behind the Buffalo Bills. And one of the people think Josh Allen is the number three or four best quarterback in the NFL. But man, I just look at the offseason. I think about how the moves jive with improving the few areas that Miami could have

performed better in last year. Short yardage, I think perhaps foremost among them. So last year to an average nine point six average depth of target among starting quarterbacks that was the most in the NFL. When I only throws the ball five yards down the field, No he does. He led the NFL an average depth of target. Josh Allen. Mister Howitzer himself was second at nine point four yards. And what was the complaint from Buffalo fans when the Bills offense would hit some of the slumps they had

last year like all quarterbacks have. By the way, this thing turns into a rant every time I talk about Tua that Allen was pushing the ball too much and not taking what was there for the defense to give him. And frankly, I think that when he does that, he's unstoppable. We saw that Week three game. Miami did their damnedest to keep Josh Allen from pushing the ball on the field, and he was doing very good job of taking the short stuff, but eventually the mistakes piled up and the

Dolphins win that game. But we saw the Week fifteen game where he did a little bit of both the playmaking to take the short stuff, and that offense rolled that game right. But then the playoff game playoffs he was pushing the ball had an average depth of the target is fifteen yards in that game, nearly double the previous output, and the offense stunk in that game. So people want Josh Allen to take more short stuff and take what's there rather than try to push the ball

vertically all game. And to bring this back to the Dolphins in Tua, giving more options in that short passing game, I think between Sobert and Higgins and a Chin and Barrios, I think you've made big strides in that department. So it's not like, yeah, of course, throw the ball three hundred times to Tyreek and Jalen I would do the exact same thing. But I don't think that the average depth of target was a reflection of the Dolphins desire to push the ball vertically as much as they did,

although I think they loved it. I think it was more about the fact that the underneath options just weren't giving them as much as the intermediate and downfield options were. We got almost nothing last year from the tight end position in terms of the passing game, right, Kaziki's numbers plummeted. Smith didn't catch many balls. Beyond that, there wasn't a

lot to go around either. And they also averaged among all tight end groups in the NFL the lowest separation in the NFL, which is what we got away from at the receiver position the last couple of years. You know what else we'll do that twelve drops by running backs a year ago. That was more than any running back room in all of football. And that's a position that traditionally catches a very high volume of passes, you know, seventy five eighty eighty five percent of passes because they're quick,

checkdown throws. So I think the Dolphins in short yard is because of Barrios his ability to win the one on one matchups inside like we talked about Kyle Krabs a week ago, or devon a Chain's ability to separate and play both a pass protector and pass catcher role, or if a player like Elijah Higgins could have to speed quickly the way he can separate both physically and with his route running in short areas and Eric Sober in that same way, I think there's a big big

strike to be made there with just those four guys the expected climb in the running game from year two, but adding four good short area weapons I think makes a big difference there. My second area of improvement is the takeaways. Vic Fangio's defenses traditionally get takeaways like nobody's business. His last eleven years as a DC or head coach, his defense has averaged twenty three point six takeaways per year.

The Dolphins had just fourteen last year. That was tied for fortieth And of course, a lot of that production was lost to having so many guys not available for the entire season. Byron Jones out all damn year, Nick need him out for most of the year, Trell Williams out for the whole damn year, Brandon Jones out for a little more than half of the year, and you know, guys first stretches a play, notably Xavier and Howard playing

without two groins. Not really, but he was injured and clearly wasn't right, and you know, he's talked about how excited he is to have gotten the rest this offseason and you know, playing healthy again, hopefully after battling through those things all year last year and tip of the cap to him for doing that. The short yardage and lack of takeaways led directly to the worst average starting field position in all of football. Like, think about that.

The Dolphins were eleventh and scoring last year with the worst starting field position in the National Football League. Not to mention with all those injuries and what they do to your special teams units. As key guys you know got an elevation playing on offense or defense. So hopefully special teams is much better. It has to be this year. It was really bad last year. And of course better coverage and more ballhawks will help that too. Better pass

rush also tends lead to better third down defense. Right, it gives the ball back to the offense more too, right and with better field position. For an offense that ranked sixth in total offense and eleventh in scoring just by nature of a better field position, but also be playing more offensive snaps, you can see that eleventh ranked scoring offense climb a lot closer to the number six and hopefully even higher. And when I look at the Dolphins draft class and the positions they took, like think

about this. Twenty twenty two third down defense twenty fourth in the NFL. Passing offense was third, Passing defense is twenty seventh, Rushing offense was twenty sixth, Rushing defense was eighth. It looks to me like they went directly after those weaknesses. Passing defense with your first over your first pick in the draft. Third down defense, you know, twenty seventh ranked

passing defense and twenty fourth ranked third down defense. Let's go get a cornerback then, your rushing offense ranked twenty seventh. Let's go get a running back then. From a sustainability standpoint, the second year in the offense, I think is enough to expect a jump from guys like Tua Tyreek, Jalen Tarron, Liam Connor, Rob Austin rahem el Hefe and on and on. Finally,

more and more Fangio creativity. When I had the privilege of speaking with the coach, he mentioned spending time last year drawing up some new cover just a try out, and said he was excited to do that, and he got a big smile on his face. I got a big smile on my face, thinking like this is pretty freaking cool, and I just keep thinking about the versatility of the secondary as it's currently constructed. At safety, we

know Javon Hollin can play everywhere. We know Brandon Jones is a box slot combo in college and has done a little bit of everything here in the pros. Same story with his former college teammate to Sean Elliott. But then look at the corners. Cater played inside and out last year. Cam Smith has the ability to do both. Jalen Ramsey has essentially played that star role from the Saban defense where he just dictates matchups and plays where

he's needed. That includes inside, outside, tight end, speed receivers, big receivers. It just doesn't matter. Eatam plays inside and out. He can play safety in a pinch. I just think you have so many options at your disposal if you're Vic Fangio, and I refuse to believe it was designed that way by accident. And I'm thinking about all the pieces they have on this defense. And I mentioned how

before you could have three safeties in your nickel package. Right, If you don't want to go to the cornerback position, maybe it's ex and Cater before the Jaalen Tree before the camp Smith draft, and maybe you go more heavy at safety. Maybe you're bringing Jordan Poyer and it's Javon Holland, Brandon Jones, and Jordan Poyer. Well they did that in

a different way through the quarnerback position. So now I'm thinking about maybe it's a four corner nickel package with X and Cam Smith on the outside and Cater and Jalen on the inside and Javon Holland kind of patrolling the whole thing. And those guys, you know what they all do really well. They key the quarterback and they're super instinctive and smart. So if you make a mistake, these guys are jumping these routes and they're making big

plays on them. I'm thinking about having guys seven to ten yards off the ball with eyes in the quarterback named Javon Holland, named Jalen Ramsey, named Xavian Howard, named Cam Smith, like those guys all are known for making plays from that position. Watch out, man, Watch the hell out. I just think you've got so many options here. I just keep looking at where this team struggled last year

with the pass defense. You think about all those additions there, and not to mention David Long in the second level and what he does to your coverage in blitz packages, but also up front with Chubb being fully healthy, odbas back Malik reads here. I think Jalen Phillips gets even better this year first two picks were dB and running backs.

So in addition to getting best player available at least everywhere I've seen says that Smith fell a lot further than expected and Ah was projected to go about ten to fifteen spots higher, perhaps hence the McDaniel fistpump. They also fit knees. That's the ideal word, right, ideal world the living. You want to be having picks that make the big impact on your roster from a need standpoint, and also happen to be some of the best players available.

Sounds good to me. Let's go ahead and take a break right here and talk some NFL next on the Draft Time podcast, your host Travis Wingfield. We're brought to you by Auto Nation. I know I'm a couple of days late, but how about Vamos Gatto's and let's go Heat. Let's go Heat. We've got Heat Game two tonight and Panthers Game one in New York and Toronto, respectively. But what a day Sunday was. That was for me one of those rare, rare sports days where everything goes your way.

I talk about like Coog's and Dolphins winning on the same weekend in the NFL and college football. That's fun. But those two wins. I'm not really a hockey guy, but anytime South Florida can take down a Boston team, yeah, I'll take that. Please. Additionally, my Seattle Mariners who suck erased a four run deficit to win an extras and my favorite golfer won the Mexican Open. So again, Vonmo Scotto's let's go heat, Goms, go ms, and Tony fen Now for the win, baby e. All right, back to

the NFL Draft takeaways. Record number of Draft day trades forty one I think was the number. And how about the value gained by the Bears and Cardinals. Bravo to both of those staffs and what they were able to pull off on Draft weekend. I thought it was cool that the Cardinals did the exact same thing the Dolphins did back in twenty twenty one, going from three to

twelve to six. There's a great chart out there from Pro Football Focus where it measures who gained the most value in trades over the weekend, and it's the Cardinals and Bears neck and neck, and they are both three times more than the third place team, which was the Jacksonville Jaguars. Conversely, the Panthers and Texans, the two teams who made those big trades up the board, had the opposite effect in terms of surplus value. They had the least value, I should say, the most valued lost in

those trades, going up with both Chicago and Arizona. But that's the cost of getting highly valued prospects, right. The Texans paid a stee price. I wouldn't have paid the much, even though I love Will Anderson. I think it was the best player in the entire draft, besides maybe CJ. Stroud, But giving up a future one that might be a top five to ten pick, I just don't know about that. So that was generally what I found interesting. I thought

the Cardinals killed it. They got great capital next year, including a future one from a team, like I said, hasn't won a lot of games lately. Maybe that changes this year with CJ. Stroud and the changes they've made tomko Ryans. I think it's going to be a better

football team, but can they win right away? If not, the Cardinals might have a couple of top ten, maybe top five picks, but Paris Johnson, bj Ojelargie Ojelargie, o Jaalari, Garrett Williams and Michael Wilson that was their first four players. Those are all four really dang good football players. I thought Buffalo, I hate to say it got great value with Dalton king Kid and Osiris Torrance and then Dorian Williams, linebacker from Tulane, could also fill some of the snaps

left behind by Trey Tremaine Edmonds's departure. I thought the Lions left the draft a much better football team than when they entered it. Gibbs, Campbell, Laporta, Branch is a hell of a first two rounds. And then Hendon Hooker, even if he's only your backup quarterback as well worth a third round draft pick. The Packers I thought killed it.

Van Ness is a great player for them. Musgrave and Craft like that is a that kind of is almost like Gronk and Aaron Hernandez, you know, sans the extra curricular stuff at the tight end position in terms of getting two very talented young players that spot. And then Carl Brooks later on. We've talked about him a lot in the podcast. I absolutely loved what the Colts did in their draft, getting Anthony Richardson at number four. Finally the Colts have a quarterback. It seems like Julius Branch

with a thirty was it the thirty third pick. I don't know what that happened, but they got Julius Branch from Kansas State. He is excellent. I thought Josh Downs is a great pick, a nice little, you know, security blanket for Richardson. Early on there Blake Friedelan's a high upside tackle who needs some work, but a good spot's take a flyer on him. And then at a Barway, the defensive lineman from Northwestern. Really good value there. Some thought he might go in the first round. He was

a fourth round pick for them. They just took good players who most thought would go higher. Darius Rush, Will Mallory to boot on Day three and then of course the Eagles. Yeah, they just keep scooping up great players, and usually from Georgia. Thought the Swift trade was perfect for them one day after getting Carter and Smith, and they could wind up like if DeAndre Swift goes one and done and signs a big contract somewhere, they could

get a comp pick. That's like a fifth or sixth round pick for him, and just basically, you know, a two year down the road trade up for DeAndre Swift in the production he might give them, which I expect will be good. Atha Giants got three impact players with Deontay Banks, John Michael Schmidz and Jalen Hyatt off the top. I think all three of those guys are going to start for them next year. Steelers got Broderick Jones, my ot one, Joey Porter Junior in my cornerback maybe one,

maybe two, and be three I thought him. Christian Gonzalez and Devon Witherspoon were all real good players. And then Keanu Benton that might be the best one to two three picks of anybody in the entire draft. And then they got Darnell Washington, who I wanted, but I'm happy with what we got. Also really really like the Seahawks and Titans and Bucks classes. What a fun weekend, man, always a fun time of year. So that's the draft,

and I want to end the episode this way. Later on, at some point I want to go through and rank every position group of every team and tell you where I've got the fins on those rankings. But I want to sort of tease that with this. My top ten rosters in the NFL post twenty twenty three draft, and they are this get ready to weep Jets fans. Number ten Lions get a big time quarterback and they shoot way up this list. But they are great in the trenches.

I love the skills spots. This is this low because I think dB and quarterback are still a little bit dubious. But Chauncey Gardner Johnson getting there helps that dB group a lot. I just think he's gonna ask a lot of issues. That's why they crack the top ten over my number eleven team, which I'll tell you about here in just a second. The Dallas Cowboys are nine loaded defense at all three levels. Offensive line has taken some

hits in recent years. They have a proven quarterback, not as good as the rest on this list, most likely at the skills spots, but they're pretty good there too. I think Ceede Lam's a great player. The Bengals number eight, losing the two safeties and Von Bell and Jesse Bates for me, knocked them a few spots. Those guys kind of drove that defense from the back with Lou Anarumu. We'll see what Daxxon Hill can do for them in the replacement of those guys. The second year player from Michigan.

I'm still concerned about some spots on the offensive line and the second level of defense, but Joe Burrow in that passing game puts him up here pretty easily. The Ravens number seven they are annually here, would have been in this position a year ago had Lamar not gotten hurt by similar to the playoffs. But they're a great team every year, especially when their quarterback is right and he's finally paid. So now we can put that to rest.

The forty nine Ers coming at sixth this despite me having no confidence at the quarterback position they have this year. I'm not a crazy fan of brock Parties game. He played really well last year, but I think that was more system driven. We'll see what happens with Trey Lance. I mean, who the heck knows? And then Sam Darnold just tells you how good they are everywhere else though. Getting Javon hard Grape on that defensive line is stupid, man,

So stupid. Number five is the Chargers tons of injuries last year coming back, But will they ever stay healthy. If they do, they are loaded. I have the Bills at number four. Offensive line was addressed and frequency in the draft in a very strong way. I think they need more at the skills spots. We'll see if they wind up getting DeAndre Hopkins or not. Thought dB depth was challenged a year ago, but make no mistake, they did not fall off a cliff. And having that quarterback

helps big time too. He's still really good man. Number three is the Chiefs. A good quarterback and offensive line can carry them to the spot, and that's what they did. The skills are fine. Defense is fine too, but they are stout at the important positions like rush pass rushing. A pretty good cornerback, play, offensive line and quarterback all very very good. Number two Miami has the Dolphins the

number two rushs in the NFL. For me, go talk to a wall if you disagree, I'm biased, whatever, you can say, whatever you want, but find me a team with fewer weaknesses and better key position groups. Like Yeah, there are some questions on the offensive line. We'll see by the tight end position. But other than that, what do you got for me? What do you got from me? Guys?

That's it. There's only one team to media has a better roster with loaded receivers, loaded pass rushers, a very good quarterback, and all of a sudden, the loaded secondary. To me, it's the Philadelphia Eagles. Just outside this list are the New York Jets. And look, if we base our opinions on twenty twenty two, they're not good at quarterback. Wasn't good last year, but that's not always how it works.

I expect Rogers to be better this year. We will see, but certainly you can see the power dynamic here between the AFC and NFC. If Rogers is old Rogers, then I'll put the Jets in on the top ten. But I'm not buying until I see it. In the meantime. That's gonna be my time. You all, please be sure to subscribe to the podcast on Apple Podcasts. Leave us a rating, leave us a review. You can follow me on Twitter at Winkfold NFL. Follow the team at Miami Dolphins.

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