You are listening to the Miami Dolphins Podcast Network.
This is Drive Time with Travis Wingfield.
Back to throw to a looking clips about.
A wide Dolphins touchdown, Tyriquel uncrelievable, just blue.
By it for a second time.
Don knew where he was going right away.
I want to hit that man. I'm gonna help you.
Someone will step on his man.
Away Wattle, Wadle to a shotgun.
Back to throw, looking at them.
Up Myers touchdown.
It's Waddle his sixth touchdown, paradoun.
How's the King?
Drive Time with Travis Wingfield begins.
Now let me 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 Wingfield. And on today's show, the Dolphins are victorious again. We're not a play win. We're gonna save that for the regular season. And yeah it is the preseason. But I think there was a ton to take away from this game in Houston as the Dolphins win twenty eight to three.
Going away, we'll unpack it all the game story, five takeaways, player evals, sound from coach and Tua. All of that and more from the Baptist Hill Studios inside the Baptist Health Training Complex. This is the Drive Time podcast.
Heye Gaffe first, So how about.
That football game? Huh? I have my thoughts and takeaways. Let's go ahead and do some numbers here and tell you the story of the game as the Dolphins win twenty eight to three and just dominate in every sense of the word. You go down the entire stat page, it is Dolphins across the board, twenty three first downs to ten, three hundred and ninety eight total yards to one eighty six one ninety three to one to fifty four through the air, but twoh five to thirty two
on the ground. Miami ran sixty nine plays nice to forty eight of the Houston Texans. They had one turnover to not get a takeaway in the game. That kind of surprised me. Also didn't get a sack. Houston got two on us. And the penalties were way down except for late in the game, six for thirty four and I think four of those were in the second half. So that was great to see. And top thirty eight minutes and forty two seconds in this twenty eight to
three shmackdown of the Houston Texans. How about the efficiency. You're not gonna lose a lot of games, or ever lose a game when you go nine for fifteen on third down, two for two on fourth down, you go four for four in the red zone, and you go one for one when your goal to go, which means Dolphins scored three touchdowns from the mid to high red zone,
which is cool to hear. Texans on the other side of the football two for twelve, one third down, one for three and fourth inefficiency and they were zero for one inside the red zone. And also not gonna lose many games. When you rush the ball for two hundred and five yards one hundred and forty of those in the first half, you won't lose many games when you allowed just three points as a defense and the yards we mentioned with the rushing and total yard is now
didn't start very well. First play of the night is a pick. They run a little r glance wheel flat. What does that mean? The glance is the quick seam up the middle that they threw. The flat obviously is the ball out to the short flat area and the wheel is up the sideline, so you basically have three stressors, two verticals, one horizontal, and it's an RPO look, which means there's an option to hand the football off there, and you can tell that by the offensive lineman firing off the football.
So they kind of.
Ran this little like spam look on that where they tried to kind of catch the Texans off guard. I think, and Tua, I think if he hands that ball off you're gonna have a pretty good run on the ground there. Because the linebacker that two was working on that play, which there's always a conflict defender you work on RPO looks, he just never respected the run. He continued to get depth and Tua just kind of threw it right to him.
And that's probably a play that if you hand off because he's playing that far off, I believe you get a big run out of that play, potentially one on one in open space for aheem moster. It's a mistake, you learn from it, you move on, and Tua broke it down for us after the game.
It's really all it was just bad quarterback play there. It's not how you want to start out a drive anyway you look at it. So it's bad play, But like I said, I'm glad with the way we responded because the next series, you know, things were still jarred up when with the first two plays, and then we got into third down and things started to settle and we found out rhythm in the game.
But how about the way to responded. Coach McDaniel liked it quite a lot.
You know, I told him before the game, you know, I didn't expect him to play that long, but if if adversity comes our way, to seize it. And he he he took it extremely literal, So you know, to me, it's like, all right, perfect, what are you gonna do? You know, I think it was so valuable because it was the first play, and you know, he came back as I would expect, but the rep he had already
put himself there before what happens when that happens. It was on a play that he's had a lot of success with and he threw a pick, So we got behind the sticks and I think we had like a fourteen or fifteen play drive that was critical on three or four third downs on it. So that's that is exactly what preseason's for. That's why you want somebody to play. I'm glad he got it out of the way, but
more importantly, the team didn't blink. The team had a pretty short field to defend, right, And what a momentum swing that is when when your defense can come up and not bat and I hold a team for to not have points and then progressed from there. So I was happy with the way the team responded to that.
And really from there it was a super clean operation twenty one first half points that began with a ninety three yard four team play scoring march, and you really got everything you could have wanted. Dominant trench play, efficient passing, a beautiful ball from Tua to Barrios, thread the needle for a big completion down in the red zone when things get tight. And speaking of Braxton, is he a guy who's just going to come up with big grab
after big grab or what? You know? Seth and OJ loved the signing and I was like, I don't know, I think he's a pump returner, but I was wrong. Man, He's a good receiver, very very good receiver. I love the way he came back to the football when Skyler had that touchdown pass. He just kind of worked back on a broken play and got himself back in shape for a good play, and it turned out to be a six point play for Miami pretty easily with the
cornerback falling off. But back to Tua. I loved this comment from Coach at the end of his presser on Tua, who continues here at age twenty five now to just look so much more comfortable in everything he's doing that we've ever seen him before.
I think he's finding himself as a man, and he's doing it alongside teammates. And I think that that this You know, when when you're been doing something for that long, you're just enjoying the process day and day out. You know, he's he is so comfortable in his skin, and so his as for life is so strong now as a father and a husband and a quarterback, and he is enjoying.
You know, he's worried about the right stuff, like you throw a pick first play that's not ideal, but you focus on okay, Well, most people, you know might let that linger and have an effect on how you approach everything else. As a competitor, I'm going to try to not have that be the case. And I think all that fits within him and his development and where he's at. And I'm excited to see him every day. And he's got a really cool new tattoo, so that's cool too.
And this was to us first game since Christmas. I thought his comments here about how it felt to get back out there and before the game even was pretty cool to hear. Here's QB one.
It's awesome, man.
You get all the feelings that you normally feel of getting back out there again, butterflies, you know, anxious to get out there, all these thoughts going through your head. But I thought it felt really good being able to go out there, call plays with the guys, the camaraderie in the huddle. You know, things didn't go our way. Adversity hit and it was cool to see the guys respond.
We also got some injury updates from coach McDaniel said that Toront Armstead's doing well. They feel optimistic that he avoided anything substantial in terms of a timeline. They will find that out, but it sounds like he is trending towards coming back sooner rather than later. Devon a Chain left with a shoulder injury. They're going to find out more tomorrow and same with Rob Jones, who you saw limp off into the tunnel with a lower extremity injury
per Mike McDaniel. And they'll find out more on that tomorrow. Actually, before we get to the break here, I was gonna take a break after that. I thought this says a lot about coach when he was asked about Lester Cotton not playing in the game. I want to go ahead and play this sound for you because I think this is pretty rare across a landscape and a profession where maybe there's not so much personable relationships out there.
Yeah, he he had something minor. He probably.
Like if if we were like I mean, he wanted to go, but I didn't think it was fair to him to gut through something and put some some.
The potential of having a tape put out there that's not a reflection of how he's been playing. So he held him out. But he he.
He wants to get on the field in the worst way, and we'll be excited for that.
That's of course about offensive lineman Lester Cotton, who how cool is that? I mean oj I mentioned this to oj in the post game, and he was just kind of marveling over how much Mike gets it. Coach McDaniel understands it and understands the players and has his finger on the pulse of his locker room. And you know, I was talking to OJ about and I said like, yeah, he's got you know, the practice tape is there for the Dolphins, but nobody else in the league has tape
on cotton besides the one game last week. And you put him out there tonight and he goes out there and doesn't play well because he's too banged up. All of a sudden, they've got one bad tape and one good tape in preseason football and that's all they get of him. So very cool, I think of coach to do that for a player. I think that just speaks to the commitment he has to the guys and the type of person that he is beyond just being a football coach, a good human being. I believe that's what
Mike McDaniel is. All Right, go ahead and take a break right there, and we're gonna come back to the nitty gritty, the meat of the episode, the five takeaways from the game from Your Boy That's Next Drivetime podcast your host Travis Wingfield, Brought to you by Auto Nation. Five takeaways from a Dolphins twenty eight to three victory in the preseason over the Houston Texans, And we start here with number one. After a bad start, the offense gets rolling and the entire unit shows a bad full
of many clubs. What do I mean by that, We'll talk about it here in just a second. And that was really true for both quarterbacks, you know, bad starting drives to open the game, then coming back and really just taking the game by the horns from there at the quarterback play, and really the offense having you know, more clubs in its bag. That's been kind of a point I've been harping on all off season, and I think we've seen it in both weeks so far of
the preseason. Yes, last week we did not have the results at the end of drives zero for three in the red zone, but we saw the run game go for that one to twenty nine in the first half in defense really clamping down until a big punt return and a turnover with your back against the red zone that basically produced fourteen street points for the Falcons. We know this offense has explosives, right, we know what Tyreek
Hill and Jaln Waddle can do. Just got a very brief glimpse at one of those guys tonight in the game No Waddle. We know this offense can destroy teams in the middle of the field, especially in that intermediate portion, and attack, you know, really vertically don the scene. And we've seen these two weeks, they've shown the running game
that coach McDaniel, Frank Smith, Butch Barry erics Studisville. They have all crafted together the run game that we've all desired as fans since hiring one of the game's pre eminent run game coordinators and Mike McDaniel. And it's not like last year the efficiency was bad, they just didn't have the volume. In fact, Lewis Riddick of ESPN tweeted this, and this is a guy that I really take what
he says. I really I take it to the bank. Essentially, he says this, if the Dolphins will run the ball with this kind of effectiveness in the regular season, lookout and then and then that seems kind of innocuous, right and obvious. Yeah, But the follow up was to a fan who wrote back to him like, there's just the
pre serison and always gives me a kick. When someone said that to a person like Lewis who like he doesn't understand the value of preseason football, or you know what comes along with it, the stipulations that come along with it, he said to that fan. Nobody over here is overreacting to anything. I've been involved with the league for a long time. Now I know what it is
and what it isn't. I know how this offense looked last year when they had the run game going and when they committed to it, versus when they did not. I have made this comment so many times in the past, and I'm certain that my top takeaway after the Browns win last year was the exact same, but the ability to win games in different ways. You're not going to have your fastball, curveball and slider and every single game, every single Sunday, it's not gonna happen. But can you
get batters out with that slider? Can you get guys out with your curveball? We know we can destroy teams again in the middle of the field, but tonight we
saw the speedouts work to convert third downs twice. How many times have I talked about in the podcast how the offense and training camp has put themselves in position to expand upon the things that defenses have took away from them a year ago, when the offense struggled the quick game, the outside game, the screen game, the wheels to running backs up the sidelines, finding comebacks to your star receivers after they press cornerbacks off with their speed.
They had the one speed out to Tyreek, that two way go and that slot position for Tyreek like they were playing single high coverage on that and it looked like I'm thinking they might take the shot up top, but no, don't risk it on a third down conversion where you can possibly give the ball back to the opposing offense and put your defense back in a bad spot. Get the first downsion, get a fresh out of downs, and go back to work. Also, how good was Tyreek
on limited work? He is just he's the best am receiver in the game. That's not even close to me. And then the one to Burrios very similar throwing. I think that was from Skyler on a speed out. They had a couple of quick shots as well as the Cedric Wilson. If I'm not mistaken on an out route, I could be wrong there, but we saw swings to the backs on the perimeter against you know, manufactured one
on one chances. I love Savon Achmed, but if you have Wattle Hill, you know, chosen running vertical routes, who's the guy that's gonna get single covered by a linebacker or a safety, It's gonna be Savon Akman. He's gonna have that to the either the boundary, probably not the passing strength to the field, but he had one to the boundary. Here you throw out twohim in space. He slips a tackle on a one on one situation and
he goes into the end zone. On the other one, he breaks a tackle on third down and goes for like fifteen yards in a first down. We saw Chris Brooks weave his way through blockers and minimal traffic because again, you threw away from the passing strength on a screen that put him in position to hit a couple of blocks and weave his way through for a touchdown. I see an offense that has solutions to what teams might do to take away the perceived strengths of the offense.
That's what the entire off season was about to meet. Braxon Burrios fits that mold the running backs in the passing game, with most are getting better with a chain coming into the fold, with Braxon Barrios coming here. Chosen all these guys, I think give you a particular fit in a role to things you didn't do well last year because you know what you have into a tyrek and waddle. I see an offense that we know from
a year ago can strike fast. I saw an offense to night that could piece together a fourteen play touchdown drive that covers ninety three yards. I saw an offense that executed the red zone third down and always knew the plan had a largely clean operation from a pre snap and getting out of the uddle with like fifteen seconds to go, manufactured clean pockets when they weren't just kicking people's butts one on ones at the point of attack,
like those rolling pockets or the slide protection. That's the kind of stuff that I keep telling you guys about you're not gonna get in training camp. Like, yes, when Jalen Phillips beats James Tunstall in a training camp practice, it might look bad. That's very well, what's gonna look like. But you're not gonna get those one on one top chances in games. That's just not how this game works, and this coach last year really did a good job of creating clean pockets for Tua over and over again,
regardless of the personnel. That's my main driving point here is they just games are not like practice in that sense, man. And with that, with the ability to do all that, a defense that looks the part, and suddenly now you've got multiple routes to victory. If you can sustain that, if that's who you are, you're going to be tough to beat weekend and week out and hopefully into January
and into February. Because I keep thinking about this team, as you know, the best team that I ever saw at that was like the twenty seventeen Saints, and I know they didn't go all the way to the super Bowl, but the way that they relied upon Drew Brees when they needed him, and he wasn't necessarily still the same Drew Brees from two thousand and six, but when they needed him late in games, they would go to him because they had the running game, because they had the defense,
they could lean on and win games that way and kind of play a conservative and then go back to Brees when they needed him. Now Miami has much more high, high powered offense that can takeover games that way too. But that sounds even better to me if you can run the ball and play defense. Takeaway number two is the running backs and the offensive line producing individuals and up performances. And they were across the board. Man, everyone had a good game. It seemed like Raheem and Savan
had big plays on that second drive. Devon Achan had that big twenty yard run on third and fourteen where he just hit it. There was no messing around. I'm just gonna go get this first down. Savonn had a couple of big runs after that, like a twelve and an eight yard run. You were getting constant push seals, climbs, guys out in space hitting key blocks. Thought Austin Jackson had a great block out in space where he did
go to the ground, but he wiped somebody out. I thought I saw the same thing with Connor Williams, with Rob Jones, Rob Hunt. So many guys had key, key blocks on big runs. I think butch Berry might be onto something here. Man. The offensive line has talked about how he explained he knows what he wants, and he explains it isn't that kind of an indictment of previous teaching techniques and tells you how just giving these guys a similar look, a similar teaching technique, and we see
it in practice all the time. They're taught differently this year, and I think it's clicking better on the offensive line. So coaching improved depth and talent across the offensive line. I know y'all are worried about it. I'm frankly I'm not. I'm just not because Chris career is not Mike McDaniel's not. If you keep two and this offense and second and
third and short, good luck, good freaking luck. You can take even more shots, you can sustain even more drives, you can rest your defense more and just win more games. That's the bottom line of it all. Savon Auchman had that third down catch in the red zone. Then he goes off for sixty five yards where again hits. It just goes explosive play. Chris Brooks had a great night, decisive, powerful, good moves in space on that screenplay. How about the
blocking on that too. I thought River Craycraft was exceptional in the downfield blocking game. Guys like that, blocks like that turned fifteen yard runs into sixty five yard runs. Julian Hill was exceptional in the blocking game tonight. They ran for the most yards and a half for the Dolphins in a preseason game last week at one twenty nine since at least two thousand and top it in this game with one forty one in the first half. They finished with two hundred and five yards at five
point four yards a clip. It was over six yards per carry it before a couple of negative and runs for no gain at the very end of the game. But the individual stats here twelve for ninety nine for Savon Akhmed, and coach said after the game that sa is a consummate pro who focuses on the right things. You had Chris Brooks go eleven for forty seven. You had Raheem Mostert, how good did he look? Six for
thirty and tavan A chained six for twenty seven. Four point three was your lowest among individual averages in this game. You also had Akhmed four for thirty two in the receiving game and a touchdown, and Brooks won for eighteen and a touchdown in the receiving game. Let's go ahead and hear from coach on the running game performance on Saturday.
You know, I think there's a lot of individual effort. There's a you know, inches in the game of football, and especially with a penetrating front like Houston has, you have to be on your p's and q's. A lot of people have to execute things and then people have
to make plays when the opportunity is there. So I think the starting with the offensive line, that tight end group and the receivers all blocks and we had some ball carriers make some plays in tight windows, and you know that's it's cool for guys to get rewarded for all the work that goes on unseen, and.
Can we give some more love to the offensive line and just talk about how we had like twelve guys that had standout performances. On that Raheem touchdown run, You've got a perfectly executed play where Isaiah Winn holds up his man and that allows Kendall Lamb to crash down
and erase him. You get a seal from Connor Williams, Tyler Croft pins his man inside and then Durham spythe in twelve personnel package, has a tough ask where he comes across in motion and peels back to seal that backside edge, or I should say front side edge, easy touchdown for Raheem to just waltz into the end zone. And he looked fast and shifty as hell, like I've been saying. I thought that combination of Lynn Win Lamb,
Lynn Lamb Win, Williams Hunt Jackson was all fantastic. I'll watch the game again and give you more notes on the next podcast, But I harken back to coach saying the comment about how he'd be worried if we didn't feel we had NFL linemen at those backup spots. And again, go on Twitter right now and you're gonna see thirty two fan bases, thirty two reporters worried about the depth of their offensive line. There's just not that much of it out there. But tonight, once you got past that
front line, it was more of the same. I thought Cedric a boy, he was good. I thought Dan Feeney was good. I thought the whole damn team was good. Man Number three defensive structure and performance. I love the way this defense is designed. But you already probably knew that because Vic Fangio does this for his entire life. He's done this, He's done a great job of playing good zone defense with light boxes where you kind of sometimes occasionally blitz, but you get eyes in the quarterback
and you drive downhill. You put the quarterback in peril, and you take away the top option, make them get to their backside read. And then by that time you have pressure and all of a sudden you get hands on footballs. You get takeaway opportunities, so many takeaway opportunities in this game. But the Dolphins did not execute or I should say, finish on the catches or take advantage of those balls that pop up into the air. X's pass breakup was like vintage X. Just squat, drive and
make a play on the football. He was moving towards the ball before the receiver even has head back to the ball. Eli Apple had a fantastic game. He was right there on one. I don't know how the ball was caught when he was tackled quickly for like a two yard gain. Had another pass break up later on. I saw Elijah Campbell ditch his man and peel back to a different route, and damn near I get himself
a pick. Now he was flagged for legal contact with the process of how this defense is being executed was all there. Bryce Thompson was there flowing all over the end of the defense with a handful of plays. The rushers are coming from everywhere, whether it was Bake or
Duke or Channing. I just feel like they have a way of beating you with physicality up front of the defensive line and then utilizing all the speed you have at linebacker to fill lanes and again to expite the quarterbacks read process and thought process to really confuse them and force them into poor choices where they fill lanes with these fast linebackers and just clog things up, which again all of a sudd and making the quarterback hot.
With DB's having eyes on quarterbacks, if you make a mistake, you're going down and they're driving on the football to either take it away, you know, break it up, or at a minimum, just cut down the receiver after minimal or no yak at all. Coach McDaniel discussed the defense after the game, and I thought there was a great tidbit in there that has been a theme in talking to players all camp long, the attention to detail and the way it's communicated. We got a full glimpse of that on Saturday.
I think it's held true to what they with their collectively, the coaching staff headed by Vic and you know, the defense in general as a group of people. They want to continue to progress and get better. Uh, there's a you know, big part of playing defense that as a team. We talked about a ton That is, you know, the yards are cool, but they have to get in the
end zone. And being that mindset is kind of, you know, very similar to to to that of the team's mindset with adversity, like sometimes you'll give stuff up, don't worry about it. You finish, they don't. That's what you're trying to get done. And yeah, it's it's always fun when you know defensive units are getting better in a real way, not because of anything but their details, their technique and their fundamentals.
And again back to this depth idea. This is not on the defense or on the offensive line, but rather the defensive side obviously. But I keep seeing these tweets or takes about how thin this unit is and I'm just not seeing that at all, like at all. David Long, how good was he? That's what we've been seeing from
him in camp. By the way, Seth and OJ kind of dap me up a little bit for how much I praised his game this offseason and to see it kind of come to fruition already in preseason game number one and then see him play like that and his first action was just an absolute thing of beauty. Duke and Channing, I think those are two damn good football players.
We saw Van Ginkle we'll start the game off the edge, then kicked back to off ball and played well there all those plays by long that's without Christian Wilkins in front of him doing Christian Wilkins things. I think the teeth of that defense is gonna be one of the best in the league. I really really do. And we've already seen the depth at dB tested right yet Eli apples out there making all kinds of plays. How good
was forty nine Perry Nickerson? By the way, Kyle Krabs locked on Dolphins was fired about him, and I can see why he's got some good tape for us already. I thought Ignoghny was in good shape on that completion he allowed, and so was Cater on another like little levels concept running on a boot leg from CJ. Stroud, who showed you on those throws why he was the number two pick in the draft, very accurate, good placement.
I thought Noah was a tick late out of his back pedal and got depth when he should have drove, and that was all it took for Stroud's placement to put the ball away from him so he couldn't make a play. But I come away thinking he's a stock up guy in this game too. We'll do some more of these in the final second. But man, at one point it was seven drives, seven first downs, just three points, and they had drive start at the plus nine yard
line in the minus forty two yard line. It ended with three points allowed, the lowest in a preseason game for the Dolphins since twenty thirteen. One hundred and eighty six yards was the lowest allowed in a preseason game since twenty eighteen. Same year for the ten first downs, lowest amount allowed in a preseason game since that game against the Falcons, and then thirty two rush yards in a preseason game, the lowest allowed since twenty seventeen. What
a showing for Vic Fangio's side. Let's go ahead and take our last break right there and come back on the other side and talk about takeaways four and five and do some more player evals all of that's next Draft Time podcast, your host Travis Wingfield, brought to you
by automation. Takeaway number four from dolphins twenty eight to three preseason victory over the Houston Texans that Skyler had himself a pretty big surge in the competition for the backup quarterback position with a fifteen for twenty two, one hundred and fifty seven yard, three touchdown performance. He was sacked just once and had a one to twenty eight
point two passer rating. I thought his best ball was the incompletion of Hedrick Wilson, A tough play for him with good coverage, but I thought that ball was right where it needed to be. I like the way he played off script. I think this is the best part the operation. Let's go ahead and hear from coach McDaniel on just that Scalar's operation under center.
I thought Skyler uh did a did a great job handling everything. He you know, that's what you want to see, is you want to see from him. There was the how fast he was getting in and out of the huddle, you can tell was an emphasis from him as well as it was for me and and he he he didn't get bogged down with the play. There's some plays that he went back, but then he continued to press forward and uh and and try to make some plays.
And I think he did a great job of that, some on schedule, some off schedule, and the key will be to go watch the tape and get better from that moving forward.
I still think it's it's Mike White at QB two just based upon the body of work, but I think Scaler has shown improvement in some key air takeaway Number five are the youngsters who continue to make you excited about rounding out this roster to pair with what I continue to see called a top heavy roster. Again, I just don't see that, but that's because I believe that a lot of these guys give you opportunity to keep
you flexible in the future. Interesting irons in the fire with regards to guys who could a produce for the club this year, B provide valuable depth and special teams contributions while they continue to develop for future roles, kind of like a Chaining Tindal a year ago or Eric azou coom up. Potentially they're in allowing for more roster flexibility. You find a future hit in year two or three all of a sudden, you've got that thirty one year
old VET who had a down year. Maybe you can say goodbye to that player and promote a young player who's much cheaper and give you more future resources. That's how this thing works. You have to have constant thought of foresight to plan for what could happen in the future, and then of course option to see develop on the practice squad. You know, Devon a Chain looks like a hit right the way he's physical, the way he drops his shoulders and pushes the pile. Can't believe he's one
eighty eight. He is very, very physical in the way he runs. Shang Tindall I thought had a fantastic game. Rob Jones. Unfortunately he got hurt, but he's had a really good camp so far. You know, Skyler's big game. Chris Brooks, Ryan Hayes. I thought I had a good game. Mitchell Lagode, Cameron good I think looks really good off the edge. I think there are more than fifty three
players NFL players on this roster right now. Might we lose some of those guys to someone else, Yeah, probably, but that also could give us a nice little additional depth on the practice squad when that cutdown day comes, if you can survive some of those guys. So some of the guys I want to talk about. I mentioned the youngsters there, but again thought two after the pick was super sharp, super accurate, just really in command of
the operation at quarterback Skyler's same situation. A couple of throws that were off, but for the most part, really put the ball in good position and made a lot of plays off script. The entire running back room. You know, moster are a chain Acmeden Brooks. Just what else can you say? Those guys are fantastic. I mentioned Tyreek a little bit, just seeing him get out there and have a chance to run around and make a couple of plays and just the stress puts on defense. This is so obvious.
River Craycraft big catch for a first down and a third down, the blocking downfield never goes unnoticed. He has a spot in this roster. As far as I'm concerned, I think Braxon Barrows is a damn good football player who just is going to eat in those one on one opportunities. Saw some of that tonight. Durham Smith had a really good showing in this game, blocking, creating lanes in the running game. If he continues to get better, that could be a huge help to that room. I
mentioned Julian Hill. I thought he was fantastic in this game, catching the football and blocking. I listened pretty much the entire offensive line. I loved Austin's game, lamb Win Connor, the two Robs, Feenie Away, he like, just good stuff across the board. Seiler was physical upfront. They've they did some creative stuff up front with that down lineman, kind
of moving those guys across the board. Thought Raque had some some good reps as well, crashing down and you know, going with the flow of the run blocking game to get some stops. Thought Emmanuel Ogbass set hard edges and played really strong off the edge. I mentioned Long. I thought Jerome Baker showed you his speed on a couple of plays. I think those two guys are gonna fit together very well. Mentioned the pass breakup and just the
overall play by X. Thought Eli Apple was fantastic. Mentioned Bryce Thompson, a guy that I've been pretty high on so far through camp. Elijah had that really good play, but I think got the penalty on the play, so is it a good play? I guess not, but you can see kind of the awareness and where he's kind of earned himself some playing time so far. I want to put a bookend on the show with this because
I've been talking about it all camp long. I want to hear coach talk about how he calls preseason games, as it tracks with the theme we've been carrying here on draft time for a minute about how I mentioned it already. It's not the same as a game, Like listen to the way he talks about preseason how you're not scheming, you're not really having a plan for that team. Here's coach McDaniel.
Well, I just think you have to balance opportunities, and there's so many compounding variables with opportunities. So you know, you get playing time, but who who are the eligibles?
Who's the offensive line?
You want it to be settled on the field, and it doesn't just go into game performance. It's game performance on things that you know, there's a lot of times I'm calling place for them less like concerned about the defense and like, hey we wrapped this play.
We talked about it at length.
I want to see what he does, you know, those type of things, so you just try to balance that stuff out across the board with every position.
All right, that's gonna be my time. The next podcast will be out Monday at five o'clock. I'm going to rewatch the game on Sunday. Right now, I'm going to bed kind of rewatch the game and get you some more takeaways. We'll provide some numbers in there, get some more audio from coach McDaniel and his Monday press conference as well. In the meantime, you all please be sure to subscribe to the podcast on Apple Podcasts, leave us a rating and leave us a review. You can follow
me on Twitter at winkfold NFL. Follow the team at Miami Dolphins. Check out the fish Tank podcast with Seth and Jue, check us out on the postgame show iHeartRadio one oh five nine, and I believe wiod is where you can find that postgame show. All so the YouTube channel for media Availabilities, Dolphins are a drive time and fish Tank content, so much more and last but not least, MiamiDolphins dot Com. Until next time. Finn's up, Carolina and Cameron Daddy in first Cup and Gold