Drive Time: Dolphins Texans Week 15 All 22 Review

But for now, we'll break down the All twenty two tape here from the Dolphins loss in Houston. That's what's coming up today on the Draft Time podcast from the Baptist Hell Studios inside the Baptist Hell's training complex. This is the aforementioned Draft Time podcast maybe ugly Ugly tape Offensively and we'll start there. And I thought the Texans plan defensively was actually really good and took away a lot of what we were trying to do off the top.

The primary look they would show this man free coverage, which is, you know, they're one of the bigger cover one teams in the NFL. Single high safety, middle of the field and coverage on the outside. It's their most run defense, and they run it almost as much as anybody else in the NFL. But when we would have Rob Jones tap Aaron Brewer before the snap your road game indicator to get the snap off, those pressed up cornerbacks would see that, they would bail out and invert.

And what that means is they would play basically a Cover two look, but because of their ability to play kind of zone turn off of the perimeter, they could then work vertically down the stem or up the up the stem, I should say, and prevent deep shots from happening behind them, but also turn back downhill and come play the short underneath game. And it basically gave them like thirteen defenders with how we were unable to adjust

to what they were doing. And then they could also spam the middle of the field because that middle of the field safety wouldn't gain depth. And I suppose that is maybe part of the Tua tungueo ii looa evolution we have to see, and you can probably say, like limitation in terms of his ability to drive the ball down the sea might kind of cause some of this consternation.

But they just weren't that concerned about us attacking the deep middle portion of the field with those perimeter cloud cornerbacks being so fluid to play both deep and short, and they would squat on the crossers over the middle with that middle of the field safety and prevent those checkdowns and swing routes to getting big yards. Most of the time we did hit a few of those, but for the most part they held that stuff in check.

I thought the mix of that look playing with you know, man free where they would come down and play that pressed up coverage look and have that safety get depth and play this the deep field part of the field. They would then use that to bring an extra pass rusher, so they would spam the middle of the field and get basically two way perimeter players with their four man rushes on the outside, and then play that single high look with their pressure looks and bring five or six players.

And they did a good enough job with their four man rushes to affect Tuoa before those could open up. And then on their blitzes they got in enough to make him have to move off the spot away from where the opening was in the coverage. Does that all attrack to you, Guys like for instance, third and long second drive of the game, Wattle gets outside leverage against a press cornerback, so he is inviting Waddle to run an inbreaking route into the middle of the field to

the backside of the formation. And there's a middle of the field safety who had been, you know, clamping down on these crossing routes all game long to this point. But he gets vertical and gets that depth. So the incut is there. But what do they do but send the overload pressure from that same side where Wattle is open, because if they can cause confusion, which off of Leam Mikenberg and Jackson Carmen was pretty much whenever they wanted to do it, it would force Tua to have to

move to his left. And there isn't a quarterback on the planet that can move off the spot to his left, Not even Josh Allen can do this and throw that eighteen yard incut to the backside without it getting picked off. It was a great plan. It was great executed, really well executed. I can't even say freaking words. It completely

stifled our offense and has been the case. There was minimal ability to adjust or simplify and find man beaters and part of that is the structure of it, but part of that is also the personnel you had up front on the offensive line, which just off that right side was not good enough to compete in an NFL game. One nice adjustment that was there because they had a few adjustments that tracked and worked, was throwing the hookups and sticks to tight ends like we found John Ewis

Smith a couple of times. I think Durham got one in the game. There was one to a running back as well, where you split those second level defenders and you know this one area of space where they play that style where the mic linebacker gets more depth and helps that safety when he gets vertical or just gives a second player in the middle of the field.

yards down the field. Just basically saying, you're not gonna throw the ball to this direction, and we have the best cornerback in the NFL and Derek Stingley that we can play no safety help because he's gonna beat Tyreek Hill all game long. And he did that. So that's what happened, and we had guys play like crap. We adjusted a little bit. Those stick routes kind of worked and they would find some space in those hook zones, but the Texas would eventually adjust and we could not

Readjust to the readjustment. I thought there was another really good adjustment though, where John Wu, and this was kind of like the evolution that had to happen more. I think in the game where John Wu ran what looked like a crosser from an inline why position, and they would bring a receiver who was in the slot, you know, further to the left of John U, to the left side of the formation, and he would run that same

crosser path. But then Johnny would just stop his route and sit down between the two linebackers covering and zone, and that one receiver would kind of widen that middle of the field coverage and create space for Johnny. We've got the fourth down conversion on a play just like that, and there was another stick throw that we had on that same look. That was a nice game for the offense.

But even then, the Texan zones were so well connected, like they could have that you know one that cover one Tyreek to the outside, but he also has inside eyes that could peel off and go downhill and make that tackle on the leak Washington when he runs that

little pivot route that breaks to the outside. So you're covering the one vertical, but you also have eyes on the two because that vertical is designed to get the cornerback running with him to create that out route throw for Tua that we hit against the Jets all day long.

But because they're so good at zone turning and having you know, really four to three vertical speed, which if you go back to like the Brian Flores defense and the Bill Belichick defense, really one of their core principles at cornerback was you have to run four to three because that allows you to be able to get vertical and take away deep passes but also come downhill and cut down backs and tight ends or slot receivers on outs.

It just expands the field defensively and gives you extra defenders really against the count because you're not having to play these three high safety looks where we're going to basically just give you all the underneath work. We're going to cover that and have the skill set to be able to come back down the stem and make those plays so you can hit those against this coverage, against

these looks. But it's like five and six yard gains, and that's a really tough way to make a living in this league, especially when you commit you know, ten penalties in the game, and you have drop passes, you have a misthrow from a quarterback. Every single miss will ruin one of those drives if you try to make it that way, and that's never going to lead to more than points in the team.

But if you want to defeat this, you're going to have to lift that middle of the field camping safety and you need to throw corner routes, which I think we've proven would be a better option for a catch, you know, a catch point pass catcher, someone that can go out rebound the defenders, and Travis has to take an l ry here because for years I thought it doesn't matter how big your receivers are, just get open.

of the entire game tape is the effort. This is an offense that and you heard coach say this right has to play very well connected for it to work. And that's a whole other can of worms I don't

feel like getting into right now. I feel like Ck Parrott on Twitter kind of spelled that out for you if you want to go check out how troubling that might be and how much you know you put on the quarterback's plate to get to the line scrimmage and you know, get the snap off by the time he goes through his you know rolodex of checks he has to make. And while that might have been over emphasized in this scheme, you know the idea to play so connected.

It's true for everybody. But like a poker player, you know, you install your false keys, your play, you're ball handling, you run your decoy route. These are the pre the pre flop rays that you make. You carry out your action. After the flop comes out, you make a bet on the turn that kind of indicates you're still playing that same hand. You have to convince the defense that what you're doing has merit, that your bets have merit, that

you have the hand that you're saying you have. On this bluff on the first drive of the game, to what tries a glance to waddle but throws it high as the middle linebacker gets depth on the pass play on play action, I should say you're trying to get him to fall step downhill one or two steps to create that throwing window over the middle for your quarterback against an outside leverage cornerback. It's how you spring big plays.

The false steps on play action. Throw the endbreaker. Hopefully Wattle can make a safety miss and we're off to the races right, but on this particular play we fake the give and the running back, which in this instance was devon a. Chan jogs through the lane and you can see number forty three. He takes like a half

step forward. He very clearly sees the balls not going to eight Chan, who's not selling the fake run at all, and he backs off and puts his hand right in the passing lane and to his throw goes right over the top of his hand, which is too high for waddle. He was able to impact the play because we did not sell the run action hard enough. And that's why I say, like, it's not this tear down rebuild to

make things work. It's just these fine little details. And when you say that, ultimately that comes back to the top. So if you want to think it's intangible, I think it kind of is in some regards. I think that McDaniel's certainly within his ability to make those changes, or he's gonna have to be, because you can't keep doing

this right. And I think that you can go to him and say, you know, or to anybody that wants to get this thing corrected, and say like, this is what has to be corrected, and we're gonna have to make some changes to make it happen. And I think that that's very well within you know, again his skill set. But that's what has to happen, regardless of who it is.

That is what has to happen. You have to find adjustment, and you have to find better effort and just more strain in those particular moments because you are not doing enough to execute those fine details.

And then Tyreek changes where he's going because I think he realizes he probably ran the wrong route, which happened three or four times in this game. Then he starts blocking thirty yards down the field with the flat defender in front of Tua, and Tua's not gonna make anybody miss. We know that, so why we block him? Like all he had to do was come back downhill and run towards the sideline and Tua would have had a target and you could have found him for a first down.

But instead it goes for a short run or a negative run for like one yard and we're punting.

I don't think there's anybody in the league that does it like him. And the way they run to the football and hit they pack a punch. That's a damn good defense that has taken on the personality of their head coach. Go watch Demiko Ryans play a middle linebacker for the Houston Texans and go watch the Houston Texans play that game yesterday. It's the exact same thing. You are a reflection of your head coach. That has been true since day one, back in freaking nineteen ten football,

and it is today in twenty twenty four. And look, I think there are a lot of issues that tie back to that, you know, the top. And this is not my platform to, like, you know, say make this change and hire this guy, like I'm not doing that. But I think it's fair to say that we were soundly out coached. And that is a freaking theme my friends in these games. If you want to see a great example, And look, I praised some of the adjustments, right, but pull up third quarter, eight thirty seven. We run

all stick. It's five end of the route, empty formation. They all run five yards down the field and turn back to the quarterback. And it looks like when you're playing pick up basketball with your mates and nobody wants to like do anything to get open. Everyone just stands around and looks at each other and nothing happens. So I don't know, man, it just wasn't a good plan. It wasn't well executed, it wasn't well adjusted and that's

why you got beat. And I think it's you know, a theme that has developed for this team in the last three years. And again not to I saw someone that doesn't like my work but listens to all the podcasts, first of all, said.

career made by working for the team. But you know, like I was talking to Crabs about this on Sunday night, and like, dude, this perpetual cycle, especially when we go from Brady to Josh Allen, right, you know, not even a season's break there, we got like the you know, you couldn't get like one division title layup for yourself

in the one off year. You go right from one great to the probably like Josh Hallin's is the best quarterback of all time right now, My goodness, but it was nice to have that two year reprieve right where it wasn't like eight to nine, nine and eight in the hunt column, which was the worst place to be those I've talked about on the podcast, those you know, twenty really nine to like twenty eighteen Dolphins. That's the worst place to be in the entire National Football League.

And grant that we're we're kind of back there right now with some you know, mitigating circumstances that have caused that, and luckily, you know, better quarterback play will typically get you out of that. And we have that even though he missed four games, and you can argue that those are the four games that.

for anything in particular. I'm, you know, here to go with the motions and basically go with the flow of what they decide. But I think that we can all agree that there has to be something that changes. You can't just roll back the same program, same philosophy, same concept in year number four. You just can't do that right. It hasn't worked. You have to make an adjustment. That's my plea. Let's come back here and do the quarterback and the rest of the offense, and the next segment,

third second, we'll do the defense. It will be a quicker show today than the Tuesday show usually is Draft Time Podcast, your host, Travis Wingfield, brought to you by Auto Nation. All right, let's get to the quarterback talk here. Segment two, Film review podcast. Dolphins lose twenty twelve to the Houston Texans. Gosh, should have won that football game. Man, offense gotta be better than that, and the quarterback has

to be better than that too. He had some accuracy issues early on that I thought kind of brought back some of those same feelings about big game moments for Tua Tounguaailoa, and I do think that those are a little bit overstated because there's a lot of the things I just talked about, But he certainly has his hand in this issue as well. Twenty six year old quarterback. Is this who's going to be forever in terms of

some of the misthrows in these spots. I don't think that's how it works, but I can certainly understand your concern if you do feel that way. And he had accuracy issues early on, and the Texans clearly wanted to flood the interior with pressure, and I thought he did a good job early of getting off the spot and moving to his left. The first instant had no route

peeled back with him. But then the second one, the one that Tyreek Hill kicked, which hey, if you can get a foot on it, you can probably get a hand on.

athletic ability they have at the position. As much as I love and praise the Dolphins cornerbacks, we don't have that change of direction skill set to get back downhill.

But the cornerback was able to get some depth and take away up to like ten yards on the outbreaking stuff, and Tua shoots one for Tyreek with Wattle running an out from the slot, and Tua pumps the ball to Wattle, who's the two, right, the second receiver from Again, if you listen to the show, you know this, but for your first time listening, the one receiver is the closest to the sideline, the two is the next closest inside,

three is the next. It just keeps going inside until you get to you know, three or four, maybe even five, but nobody runs five zero formations is three by one, sometimes four by one, sometimes sometimes two by two. But anyway, so Reek is the one and he takes this uh. He runs this corner route with an inside release back to the corner, and Wattle's job as the two is to run a speed out and to pull that cloud corner back up to create space in the to the

corner throw for ty. But if he gets depth, you throw the out route, and in this particular instance, to a pumps to waddle and that does bring that cornerback up a little bit, not as much as I would like to, but he did bring him up. But then

he sails the throw. And the reason he sails the throw to me is because he has to reset his feet after the pump, and you see his base get too wide, and that can change your arm slot, and the ball winds up high when the arm slot dips lower than you're used to when you cut that thing loose. So a miss, miss mechanic, mechanical myss there, I should say. On the sack fumble, I thought that's where you started to see the way their effective game plan made to uncomfortable.

They did such a good job of challenging us at the line of scrimmage and mixing it up that you actually say, to a normally one of the best processors and decision makers, double clutch make him think, and you don't want your quarterback having to do that too often.

handle that, but you want to make it easy. I think the entire job of the play caller is to reduce that from the quarterback. And on this particular play, he has Kraycraft on an out to the field from the one. But the way they would show man and flip back to the zone, I don't think Tua knew if the slot cornerback would carry his man or peel out into the curl flat, so he double clutches. The protection breaks down against the four man rush, and the

play just totally falls apart. Their defensive tackle bull rushes Liam right into his lap, which Liam not in this game, buddy, But he's able to get out of that. But the problem is when he bubbles back. So usually two of

steps up and through pressure. On this one, he retreats a couple of yards and because of that, Daniel Hunter, who Jackson Carmen had a pretty good rep on this particular play, when he bubbles back, that gives Hunter the ability to shed that block and go get the sack fumble on Tua didn't have good ball security either, so that's really it. They just made him uncomfortable, made him double clutch, and that pass rush against what we had in terms of a available bodies. It's a really, really

tough way to make your offense go. I think on the first pick you saw more of what we talked about with how the Texans were able to expand their hook drops that hook linebacker in the middle of the field and actually this is maybe, you know, probably it probably should have been in legal contact in the play he hip checks Tyreek Hill before the ball gets out and it's eight yards down the fields. That's a flag to me, and I think that's what causes the route

to round off the way it did. Now you do have to flatten that route out and you have to work for the defender. In fact, I texted to OJ and he was like, you have to cross his face. You cannot go around him that way because that's what's going to happen on that throw because that will draw the flag if you go through him, run through the guy because he's standing there, it's going to be I

legal contact. And this is another reason to say the Dolphins probably need more size at the position and Travis takes a big, fat l guys that can get to spots with their physicality, because this has been a theme for three years now and Tua and I mean he has to be able to see that and not throw it as well. I get that you got the look you wanted, but man, Tyreek was never even close to get into that spot, so he let the reroute work. And maybe I'm wrong for saying two I should see that.

I don't know, man, but it's just bad football all around. They got him off his game pretty early, and that's where I thought the mistakes happened. You know, he worked Raheem on a little flat route on I think it was the touchdown drive, maybe the field goal drive. I forget where Tyreek ran stick nod and it would have

been it was before the Johnny touchdown pass. Tyreek runs stick nod and we should have run that play all game long because that's how you open up the middle of the field when they're doing what they're doing, and John here runs a slant off the backside of that was also open. He didn't see any of it, went to the other side for Raheem Moster. Now, the touchdown throw to Johndrey Smith was picktime. Quarterback play extends a

play that was dead, which has happened a lot. And you know two is not a creator, right, he does has a little bit of his game, but there's too many play calls that die out for him where he has to find a way to create. And this time he does it and puts the ball in the perfect location for that particular play.

an agenda right, because that's a good football. It's not a perfect ball, but it's a good ball. Catch the ball, man, there's a moment where it's in only Tyreek's hands and not in Stingley's at all strong hands. Pull it away. Keep that football for yourself. But we've dropped balls in every single big game we've played the last three years. So yeah, that was two's worst game of the year.

He's played to me two bad games this year. But I don't even sweat it because you know that he'll put in three hundred hours of work this offseason to fix that part of his game, to attack the type of coverage to make the throws he has to make to get over that hump, and he'll make it our strength.

Will Anderson where he locked that exact move down. Now, he did get beat inside on a glance throw to Waddle where to had him and it forced an incomplete pass. He had a holding call they picked up for some reason where he got beat on that same look. Not sure why, but to me, another good showing from Patrick Paul. I think left tackle, center, and quarterback have been the most consistent positions on the offense this year, and Patrick

Paul has contributed to quality starts to that list. I thought Malik Washington did some good stuff in the run blocking game. He ran hard with the football. I thought Wattle was sharp before he got hurt, and thought Rob Jones had one of his better games. He had some nice blocks at the point of attack. Really really tough day for the offense, though, like even these tiny little details, we throw a little chip release screen to John hus

Smith and Brewer has a block lined up. The cornerback ducks the block and is able to trip John new Smith like he's run through way horror tackles and Brewer's made way tougher blocks.

the spot by bull rushing. Liam protection slide was bad, but geez man, you know I've said I think that Liam's a good three position backup on the interior next year. Hopefully he's super durable, tough as hell. You know, he played through a tough injury last year. He can play five positions in a pinch. I don't want to see him at center, but I think that if you make him your sixth man on the interior, that's not a bad place to be. But this game made me think

like that looked like last year at center. Not a good look, but it wasn't It wasn't good in this one. I still hold out hope for that long term, you know, backup role, maybe the seventh offensive lineman. But you get what I'm saying, Jackson Carmen. There's not a need to do a deep dive here. It's just not an NFL player. Let's just leave it at that. I thought Aaron Brewer missed a lot of blocks were used to him hitting at the second level. He looked human in that regard.

Julian Hill lost the point of attack more than usual. I thought Alec kind of got bounced around a little bit tyreek. The effort was just in freelancing. Can't do it. And then a Chan that one effort play just drove me crazy. Snap counts for the offense, the quarterback and O line go the distant sixty eight snaps. Tyreek played all the snaps but two. Malik Washington played fifty nine percent, Wattle thirty eight percent after the injury, of course, Craig

Craft thirty one and Do both sixteen percent. John new Smith played two thirds of the snaps, Julian Hill played forty percent, m twenty four percent. A Chan again your lead back at two thirds of the snaps, Most played one third, and Jalen Wright had three snaps and alec Ingold had sixteen snaps in this football game. Last break right there, come back into the defense Draft Time podcast, your host Travis Wingfield, brought to you by Autoundation. All right,

defensive review. I think this was just a lot of out execution on our part. I mean, not a ton of mixture in disguise or anything like that. We play a lot of that Cover three, our primary coverage. We roll out by running it at the second highest rate in a game we have in this season. The Rams game was number one, but we just beat them up

up front time and time again. And as I say that on the first play of the other side of the two minute warning in the first half, they run that exact same inverted two middle of the field buzz safety look I talked about with the Texans defense, which fits because they run a Bobby Slowik offense off the Shanahan tree. Right, we didn't have anybody travel and I thought that there was you know, more so mixing roles in different matchups and playing zones and man and blitzing

your slot cornerback here and there. And I thought that produced way better connectivity than we did last week with several coverage busts when we had Ramsey, Cater and Kendall all healthy and practicing all week together. I think the secondary plays really good football despite some kind of shaky safety play the whole year. I thought our rushes were coordinated. I thought our backers were reading the way our defensive line was engaging and shedding blocks and scraping off of

those blocks. Accordingly, just a really sound, well executed game plan that mixed it up more as the game went on. But they just kind of outplayed the Texans in that way.

I mean, if not for the fake punt, we're probably talking about a thirteen point day for the defense and shoot the touchdown we scored after that fake punt drive that led to a touchdown, and you know, who knows if the game plays out this way, but that would have been to make it thirteen to twelve, pending a pat that we would miss.

taking it back for six. So he knocks that football free on a screen. He blows up a block on a screen two drives later and gets a TfL. Then on the drive right before the half, he knows where his help is, plays outside leverage, anticipates the outbreaking route and drives on to challenge Tank Dell and break up the pass. One of the best games I've seen Ko Kohou play probably since his rookie year Chop Robinson. You can see his impact before they even get to the production.

Watch how the other team plans for him, how he influences the way they call games. They are sliding, they are chipping, they are flat out dedicating multiple bodies on straight up double teams to take care of your rookie edge rusher, and he still wins.

Stroud to throw the ball away. So when a man like this, with his size, power, length and motor, when he beats you with speed on the second staf of the game, that's got to be a pretty hopeless feeling. Because he can basically go five or six pitches deep into his bag and he can get you out with all of them.

a great game for Zach Seiler. He would get plenty more pressure in the backfield, including a critical holding call on him, and another half of the sack to help keep the Dolphins alive.

But Stroud's ball is fine, but the way Jay the way that Jordan Brooks pinned him to the sideline, it made the throw go out of bounds. On the next drive, when I Seeler sack, you see a mug up in the A gap and slant his rush right into the left guard and the running back steps up to pick him up and pass pro but he gets past him with speed and that creates this natural pick that allows Seiler to scrape off and close on Stroud for that sack.

The very next play makes a TfL in the next drive where he goes from a stack off ball linebacker position all the way to the sideline where he splits a block, defeats a crackback from a receiver, and finishes by getting mixed into the ground. These last two games have been as good as you can play off ball linebacker. I still can't believe he scooped that ball off the turf from the phone recovery. He scoops it up while doing a jumping one ad to avoid all the bodies

at his feet. Unreal athletic ability. I think Quentin Bell's to development arc is pretty interesting. Big combine testing guy didn't find his way onto a defense to play a serious role in the first couple of years in Atlanta, gets here makes a great impression as a practice squad guy, a good scout team guy, has a great camp and makes the team, doesn't play much, gets more and more ops, and starts to play better and better as the year goes along. He sets such a hard edge in the

running game. He's a guy that I love to have in the rotation down the road so you can have your big guns, like you know, Chop and Phillips. Give him a breather on first and second downs here and there between a couple of series, because you know, you can get fifteen snaps from Quentin Bell playing the run game, and you can get you know, equal run production and get your guys a couple of plays off to get

them a breath there in the game. He really resets that thing and gives himself the opportunity to get off the block both in the B and C gap, and that's how you have to play the edge. And then a good game from Javon Holland. I like it when they sneak him down to the box and let him fit the run, fly up field against screens and jet sweeps and just let him play the hook coverage role. He has some big sticks and they're tight end of this game, even out Dalton Schultz for a couple of

plays individual misses. I just thought Walker looked really slow on that tank Dell jet sweep. I mean he also got lost in coverage in the first touchdown. Maybe he's banged up, and you know, him and Ployer had a kind of weird communication or coverage in that play. And I'm not going to get into Poyer talk because we've done it so much this year, but I thought it

was rough for him as well. And then Emmanuel ogbad just the juice on four man rushes just as not there opposite Chop it would be, you know, and that's gonna happen when you lose your top two guys to injury and the third guy never makes it to camp. So the Dolphin's edge and tackle groups are so banged up that I don't know what more you can ask for.

DeShawn Hand forty percent of the snaps. And that's the workload you get when this team feels they're kind of, you know, thin at the edge position without Tyas Bowser.

Duke all had one snap on defense. My top five tapes were Jordan Brooks, Zach Seeler, cater Coohu, Chop, Robinson and Javon Holland fin Let's Get out of Here podcast on Wednesday, probably gonna be a bigger picture, maybe off season preview of sorts even though we're still alive. People will talk about the scenarios just for the hell of it. I said I wouldn't do it on the show yesterday, but hey, we're comprehensive here. We have to cover both.

You know, if you want a podcast talking about the season's over, we'll do that for you, and we'll talk about how you can keep the season alive.