December 23, 2025 • 32 mins
We’re back in the film room assessing the offense and defense. What worked, what went wrong, and everything in between.
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
This is Drivetime with Travis Wingfield.
Speaker 2 (00:10):
What is up Dolphins and welcome to the Draft Time Podcast.
I am your host, Travis Wingfield. And on today's show,
well it's film review day. We'll tell you what started well,
how it turned around in the third quarter, and everything
in between for the Dolphins and Bengals on Sunday from
the Baptist Health Studios inside the Baptist Health Training Complex.
This is the Draft Time Podcast. We kick it off
(00:33):
as we always do with the offense and the general
points from the structure and scheme of things, and there
was some good but a lot that wasn't very good.
And I think on balance, whether it comes to execution
across the board, scheme issues, complexity within the scheme and
the calls and things, and that changed the landmarks and
launch points for the offense. I think there was a
(00:54):
lot of that involved. Defensively, I found myself coming away
from it saying good structure, good design, execution and ultimately
some effort in that third quart Let's go ahead and
kick it off as we always do with the offense
and some of the finer points here and we'll cover
it all here, so not really in any specific order,
but the Devan eight chant touchdown run is where I start,
and the nuance of the offensive line, which just a
(01:15):
spoiler alert throughout this podcast, The one unit I really
appreciated in this game was the offensive line, as well
as some of the defensive design and what they did
in coverage in the back end. Aside from that, not
a lot to write home from. We'll talk about Waddell
and a Chan as well, But on the offensive line,
Man Brewer the nuance to his game. He climbs up
like he's going to attach the mic linebacker and it
(01:36):
changes the angle of attack the entire linebacker group has
to take. The second level of their defense has to
take as he just then peels off and goes and
gets the wheel linebacker, which creates a real, really advantageous
leverage an angle of attack for Patrick Paul to find
the mic linebacker with a better angle, and both those
guys get wiped out. Really because of the way Aaron
(01:56):
Brewer kind of slow played his release into the line.
Speaker 1 (02:00):
Jalen Waddle gets.
Speaker 2 (02:01):
Just enough on that crackback thanks to some help from
Devon ah Chan, who makes a defender miss again as
he always does. Then Ingold hammers the kickout. Jonas avite
Naya has an overtake reach technique. Block on the three
tech basically means he's wider than you when you're trying
to get that direction, he's able to overtake him, get
on the outside shoulder, steal it back inside. Then a
Chan makes another safety miss in open field space, which
(02:24):
repeat me, or stop me if you've heard that again
a thousand times right, while Abram Brewer carries a different
block fifteen yards downfield, and that is the anatomy of
a Miami Dolphins touchdown. We were hitting the toss game
a lot early in finding creases, but I thought did
a good job early of showing change ups with a
couple of inside runs. And that's that's kind of the
delicate dance of this run game is you show all
(02:46):
that stuff, you show the inside stuff to get to
your outside zone game. But when push comes to shove,
we become mortally dependent on the outside game. And you
saw on a third and one play they got stuffed.
You cannot like consistently go to it and it can't
be your go to in every single spot because different
spots call for different looks. But there was good variety early.
(03:08):
I feel like there's really good variety in the scheme,
especially from a run game standpoint, in the opening script
in the first half, and then once we get away
from that, it's just spamming outside zone.
Speaker 1 (03:17):
It's spamming toss play.
Speaker 2 (03:18):
And to me, that's a big part of the anatomy
of why the discrepancy exists between first half and second
half football. I mean, we deployed CT counter on the
first play of the game. I saw lead ISO and
a reverse to Jalen Wright ahead of his two second
consecutive toss play and it pops. You got a little
bit of pin and poll in there, which Miami hasn't
executed that particularly well this year. But it's showing it right,
(03:40):
like a pitcher has his fourth or fifth best pitch
in his bag that he only throws a few times,
and it's really a show me pitch.
Speaker 1 (03:47):
You're trying to show it for something else.
Speaker 2 (03:49):
We got a nice wrinkle off of that look with
a bootleg from Quinn Ewers to Cedric Wilson for a
completion on drive number three. You fake the toss, you
run layers, a deep layer, an intermediate layer, and underneath
layer to kind of create conflict on that one side
of his own coverage and you get a receiver on
a linebacker. And that was a pregame key I discussed
create absolute chaos for Barrett Carter and Demetrius Knight, And
(04:11):
in the first half it happened. But once you get
time to like adjust and kind of make the calls
within the game, you get less and less of that.
And something else that was just popped up is in
it every week, really the formations like and look, nobody
really knows football, right, Like, besides the people that are
doing this in those meeting rooms every single day, no
one really truly knows what goes on. So we're all
(04:32):
trying to extrapolate what we you know, take from our knowledge,
what we think we see on the tape, and try
to give you the best analysis possible here. But I
think it's funny when you, like, you see one of
these crazy formations and you'll see like a journalist that
knows ball and like, there are you know, plenty of
journalists that know journalist level of football, and it's like
this formation is awesome, but it's so different. Then you
(04:53):
hear someone like Jto Sullivan who told you like that
there's no use for this. All it does is create
like better leverage for the defense, yet it takes you
two more steps.
Speaker 1 (05:02):
Like there's a second play of the game.
Speaker 2 (05:03):
You've got Wattle and Cedric Wilson in these condensed splits
up on the line of scrimmage, and then there's two
players directly behind them five yards stacked, and another player
who's inside of that at the running back position. You've
got three eligibles that are five yards off the football.
All that does is add time to get back to
the line of scrimmage into the route progression. And it's
another variant of footwork timing that the quarterback has to
(05:25):
be like on Q with in terms of making it
time up with the being in sync with the route concept.
You're putting more on your quarterback's plate by using these.
A lot of this offense is a one route design
where all the routes are designed to just clear space
and there's no actual pass option for the quarterback. And
that's where you saw too a get into law of
trouble here, and those routes are often swings behind the
(05:46):
line of scrimmage, so when it's not there, it gets
awfully dicey really quick. There was one to Wattle where
the ball had to get there, and it put him
and Julian Hill in space against four Bengals defenders and
you're at a starting point five yards behind the linesmage
like if you have to break a tackle to make
a game on that play, that's that's not putting him
in a good spot. In general, our screen game just
(06:07):
does not hit. It's it's often almost a throwaway down
or sometimes even on negative play. And I mean, when
was the less time a screen popped Like the Jets
game of John new Smith last year. It's just been
a regular occurrence there. And there's there's this has been
something we've talked about for years now. There is just
so much in the run game that depends upon like
elite I like.
Speaker 1 (06:30):
How do I say this, like.
Speaker 2 (06:32):
Side adjustments that have been made on the fly, and
if you're not very precise on it, the run game
gets blown up. Like there's so much faith in the
eye candy holding guys. Like there's a like leaving a
backside edge unblocked assuming Devon a Chan's jet motion will
take him and if it doesn't, all of a sudden
we get inside zone with a backside fold concept for
Jalen Wright, and that cutback lane is now occupied by
(06:53):
a two hundred and seventy pound unblocked player because we
thought he was going to run with devon a Chan
and maybe he does sometimes, but it's almost like a
sense of arrogance to like say, it's go, We're gonna
hold him with this and just leave him unblocked. You know,
it worked for a long time, but right now it's
kind of a coin flip if it does or not.
So in general, we just have so many unblocked guys
that make plays while we are finding assignments ten to
(07:15):
fifteen yards down the field. The best play design of
the day, in my opinion, was the League Washington touchdown.
You get gy counter that's guard and tight end counter
pulling play side with Greg Dolsitch getting a head start
with motion at the snap. You get two linebackers crash
on that fake action to the backside of the play
inside to eight Chan. Then you get awesome blocks on
the perimeter from Brewer, Austin Jackson, Julian Hill, and then
(07:37):
Elite goes in almost untouched. So there are plays where
it's like, yeah, that's great, that looks awesome, but there
are so many plays where we get drive killers because
Julian Hill can't make a side adjustment on a changing
landmark when he's trying to run at full speed to
cut off a safety coming down because his assignment changed
based upon how the defensive ends slanted inside. You feel
me there the third and one tackle for loss on
the two minute drive. We tossed it into the most
(08:00):
crowded area of the field. It's a spread formation three
by one to the field and now it's not spread out,
but all the splits are condensed. But it is a
spread formation because you only have one guy in the
backfield and there's no attached players.
Speaker 1 (08:12):
There's no whys.
Speaker 2 (08:13):
It's all spread formations, not spread, but they're not attached
to the formation. But you create this light front inside
because of that personnel. Like they're out there with only
three defenders inside the tackles, and one of those players
is an unstacked inside linebacker. That means there's no defensive
tackle in front of him to eat up a block.
It gives you free access to go block that guy
(08:33):
down the field. But there are five bangalist defenders over
to that trip side of the formation, and it's three
on five and we can't block them, and because we're
trying to get with and run the ball wide eight
chance speed doesn't outrace them. They they're ready for it,
and we can't attach those blocks because it's a three
moving targets.
Speaker 1 (08:50):
Those are tough to hit.
Speaker 2 (08:50):
Like Aaron Brewer, we talk about how special he is
because he hits them so regularly.
Speaker 1 (08:55):
That's not a regular thing.
Speaker 2 (08:56):
Like that makes him a pro bowler, right, And that's
what I mean by like the the confidence within the scheme.
Like sometimes if we just line up and play football,
we have our best plays, then we kind of get
these tricky plays where it seems to bog things down.
Sometimes they pop, I will give them that credit, but
a lot of the negative plays come from almost out
smarting ourselves. The force defender can set the edge uncontested
(09:16):
on this play and then e Chan turns it back
into the flow and he gets hammered by the three
pursuit defenders. Like the math just does not math on
that play. You can't have a soft edge in your
blocking scheme when the play design invites this heavy backside
pursuit because eventually you're gonna run into that edge and
then it's time to get backfield or back you know,
to cut that thing back, and by the time you do,
(09:36):
there's pursuit defenders that are gonna knock your face mask
off of you.
Speaker 1 (09:39):
And that happened on this play.
Speaker 2 (09:41):
And just again, by the way, the Theoese offensive pass interference,
he was trying to get out of the way the
linebacker and the linebacker runs over him. That's all I'm
gonna say about that. After the Greg dulswitch fumble, you
get three straight tipped passes. Someone did something wrong, because
I refuse to believe on the first one it was
designed this way where you fake an escort scream, which
we run all the time, right, and then two slants
him behind that and Dulcich is literally bringing his man
(10:04):
into the window to waddle and he gets a hand
in the football. It actually would have worked because we
flooded the area. But I think someone was in the
wrong spot because I think maybe he's supposed to kind
of hang back and be more of a blocker because
he takes his man right into the passing window. So
some good, a lot of convoluted as far as the
quarterback goes on tape. You know that Waller throw on
(10:24):
the first drive was not a good decision. We got
very lucky there. Three by one trips to the field.
You get the one and the three, which is the
furthest out and the furthest in right. They both run
square ins and it creates a deep out for Darren Waller,
who is the two. It's essentially trying to lift that
that underneath cloud corner and hold that safety a half
field safety's eyes so you can get outside access on
(10:45):
that honey hole throw.
Speaker 1 (10:47):
Right.
Speaker 2 (10:47):
It's a classic two beater, the old John Gruden honey
hole shot the soft area behind the zone corner underneath
the half field safety and yours does a good job
seeing that corner fall off into coverage there and doesn't
rip it because the underneath concept didn't hold the defender
the way it's supposed to, so Quinn has to improvise
and he moves.
Speaker 1 (11:06):
But then he just throws it up in the air.
Speaker 2 (11:07):
I mean, it's not open at all, and I bet
Waller was kind of surprised by it too, but he
trusts his guy, and I guess when you have Darren Waller,
it's not a terrible idea because it worked out for
twenty four yards. Just thought it was kind of funny
to watch on tape because I don't know how I
didn't see the reaction on Twitter to the play if
fans were loving it. But it was definitely a kind
of ballsy play on the first drive of the game.
Speaker 1 (11:28):
I thought we saw the air of the throw.
Speaker 2 (11:32):
Of that throw rather show up on the second play
of the drive after a chance touchdown run. I know
that's a lot to keep up with here, as you
probably haven't gone back and watched the game the way
I did, But it's a similar throw where he gets
waddle on a deep comeback against what becomes Cover three
for the defense, and a deep comeback against Cover three
with a curl flat defender who's not getting depth is like,
(11:52):
that's Valhalla for an offense. You take that for twenty
yards every time you get it. You threaten the vertical
on a deep threat, because if you're in cover three,
there's three deep defenders each responsible for a deep third
of the field, and you threaten that vertical throttle it
back down and there's not many cornerbacks who can handle
that when the curl flat defender is all the way
out of the equation. And that's what happens here. Quinn
(12:15):
throws it with anticipation, which is great, but his feet
weren't set. He's fading away.
Speaker 1 (12:19):
The balls off the mark. Waddle's wide open.
Speaker 2 (12:21):
The ball is nowhere near him, but you can see
that he's he's rushed and he's not set or into
the throw at all, which kind of speaks to a
possible conflict within the timing of the place, like the
timing of the play maybe didn't match up quinn Ewers's
footwork on that play. His next throw to Waller was
off target but caught for a first down. I'll say this,
he was playing within the rhythm of the offense. McDaniel
(12:43):
talked about it in his press commerce on Monday it
didn't look too big for him, and I agree with that.
There was a lot to want back, but I thought
it was a good debut for quinn Ewers. He's playing
within the rhythm and taking the ball where it needs
to go, and quite frankly, that was the most important
thing I thought you could see from quinn Ewers in
this game. I really liked his threat on the bootleg
to Cedric Wilson coming across the formation because he knows
(13:04):
he has a receiver against a linebacker and typically almost
every Damn time this happens.
Speaker 1 (13:09):
You want to throw that thing early.
Speaker 2 (13:11):
You want to give it to him with a chance
to push that thing, you know, to get space to
operate after he makes the catch. Sorry, Ws, you just
threw an interception in our bowl game. I was tracking that,
but he lets it play out because the more time
I have to let Cedric run away from this linebacker,
We're gonna get more space. Dot That's exactly what happens.
(13:31):
Throws it right on the upfield shoulder for a nice
game of twelve. He missed Waddle on a corner and
McDaniel and has Monday press conference talked about this, and
I'm sitting there nod in my head, like, yeah, that's
what I'm gonna talk about in the podcast tonight. It
was a you know, a watching it back on tape,
Waddle has this cornerback totally cooked. He re routes Wattle
eight yards down the field and it throws off the timing, which,
(13:52):
by the way, that's illegal contact.
Speaker 1 (13:54):
Brother can't do that.
Speaker 2 (13:55):
But you see Quinn double clutch, and I think that
was why he couldn't get there on time. It just
missed for a possible twenty five yard catch and then
yards after the catch as well. On that particular play
man the pick was forty three yards. We're like dominating
Utah State, but we keep turning it over. It's a
third pick for the quarterback, and Utah State still hasn't scored,
although they are first and goal right now, so they
probably will score here. Some of the process on the
(14:17):
middle of the field throws was really nice. We ran
this little high low drag over combination where Greg Dolsitch
takes the drag and Darren Waller runs the overroute behind that,
and it creates this big second window throw to Waller
and Quinn's patient and reads it out and then throws
that backside over out once he gets that second window
space to Waller for a first down. Really nice process
(14:37):
on that play. Before the Theo Wiese pick, he jams
won into double coverage to Waller. I think that was
just a misread because they crashed on it the whole
way and he didn't have a good feel for how
that play was unfolding. I thought the waist throw the
pick was actually pretty good, right on target, good timing
on it, and the defender did arrive early, so it
could have been DPI, but I do think wee could
also help his quarterback out by coming back to the
(14:58):
football a little bit more.
Speaker 1 (14:59):
The quarterbacks nenak unfortunate.
Speaker 2 (15:00):
You got a wet field because the rain had just
begun begun, and it's on the midfield logo paint, so
like you see Quinn's left foot that he tries to
stick in the ground and drive from totally slip out
from underneath him, and he can't getting leverage and push
and so it's an automatic like turnover on downs because
of that. Then I thought the one real poor choice
was the picky through to waddle that was trying to
(15:22):
catch a spark down thirty eight to fourteen. It was
a kin to the wall or throw. But when you
give a five foot ten guy chance, it's a lot
different than giving a six foot five guy chance, and
the dB took advantage of that. So I thought, pretty
solid start, plenty to grow from. Placement could be better,
just to hair off on a few timing plays, but
all in all, a couple of rookie decisions that he made,
it didn't look too fast for him, a pretty good start.
(15:42):
I'm excited to watch him in Tampa should he get
that nod, which I believe he will.
Speaker 1 (15:46):
That's I think so right, We don't know for sure.
Speaker 2 (15:48):
Let's go ahead and take our first break rate there,
come back and talk about the stands on offense, because
the defensive side as well. Drivetime Podcast brought to you
by AutoNation. Offensive standouts for the Miami Dolphins and a
forty five twenty one loss of the Cincinnati Bengals. Darren Waller,
that first third down is instructive to a point that
we the Royal Wii once again have been harping on
(16:11):
on this podcast.
Speaker 1 (16:12):
How the game has changed.
Speaker 2 (16:13):
Right. Everything is more contested, everything is more condensed. Deep
shots are scarce. The run game is in vogue, and
it's the era of the return of bully football, and
guys that can make catches like this are probably going
to be more valuable than speedsters. Eat your heart out, Travis,
My favorite kind of player is going to be extinct
here in a couple of years. His next third down
catch was even better. He wins in an out against
(16:35):
outside leverage, which that's tough to do, and the balls
way back inside plucks it, holds it away from the
defender so he can't knock it away. Although I will
say the point of attack stuff was pretty much a
wash for Darren Waller, but his receiving prowess is on
tape every single week.
Speaker 1 (16:48):
Aaron Brewer, I want to.
Speaker 2 (16:50):
See say there's been like one or two games where
he hasn't been in here in the standouts portion the
Waller player on the first drive, they double mug, both
linebackers bail and he becomes a four man rush with
three overloads to the left side. He takes his set
to the right, sees the backside looper, feels it coming
on a stunt, winding back inside it and goes and
parks him, puts him on his.
Speaker 1 (17:11):
Butt.
Speaker 2 (17:12):
Backside. Man, it was awesome to watch all the blocks
out in space. This guy is a man. He better
go to the Pro Bowl. Devon h Chan, the way
he polished up his game this offseason was outstanding. His
pass pro assignments are better. He's even more patient when
he lets blocks develop and can burrow and drive on
an inside dive play. He was already special, and he
got better this year. He makes the crack defender driving
(17:33):
on him, missing the backfield, which turns a possibly three
or four yard loss into a forty eight yard touchdown.
Jukes the safety that turns it from a ten yard
game to a forty eight yard touch Like just crazy,
crazy talent for this guy. Patrick Paul steady as she
goes man key blocks at the point of attack on
big runs, completely unbothered in pass pro. I have noticed
a small trend in his game, and this happened on
the all the Gordon stuff. I believe it was where
(17:57):
he can kind of lose the inside, like the slant
on a five technique, crossing his face on some of
those inside runs. That's I mean, it's trying to hit
a ninety eight mile hour fastball because it happens so
quick and you have to make a snap decision. If
your first step is not to the right to cut
it off, then it's tough to get there. But it's
led to a tackle for loss each of the last
two weeks. But buying large, Patrick Paul, he is the
man we hit YACHTSI on that draft pick Jalen Waddle.
(18:20):
I covered his game in the offensive section. He had
seventy two yards, easily could have had two more plays
of twenty five plus, could have had a couple of
more explosives or catches. I should say as well in there,
like he could have had one hundred and thirty hundred
and forty yards in this game. He just gets open
and sure enough, after the second one of those plays
I'm talking about, he spin cycles a cornerback for another
explosive play on a corner route, which, by the way,
alec Ingold that fumble is a turnover if ingle's not
(18:43):
a picture of consistency and effort. Man the way he
ran after that thing and had some big blocks at
the point of attacking this game as well, including devon
ah Chan's touchdown run. I like Jalen Wright, and this
is like a case of never being wrong, just early.
He popped so much in rookie camp, and we've seen
these flashes for two years with the screen past that
he caught, the tackle, he evades while he's like spinning
(19:03):
from an off target throw that he's trying to gather
his balance from, someone hits him in the thigh pad
and just bounces off of him like that'll play, man,
that'll play. I'm not putting Jonah in the standouts. I
just want to talk about his game for a second.
I think the growth in his game has been measurable.
It's not there yet, but there's things that have shown
me real like demonstrable growth that has me excited about
(19:24):
twenty six for him, his pass pro anchor has gotten
so much better. I think if there's one thing he
you know, that could be next for him. He's attaching
much better in the running game too, but if he
could sink his hips a little bit more into these
drive blocks and play from a lower pad level with
better leverage, he could finish these the way you've seen
Aaron Brewer do apposed to kind of falling off some
of the blocks at the point of attack when the
(19:46):
running back gets to the point of attack that you
see him get disengaged and his man can make the
play sometimes, but man, you see him on some of
those like run him off blocks and the ability to
reposition his hands and strain through the rep until he
does have the leverage advantage. That's come a long way.
If you're a tape head, just watch his hands. They've
gotten so much better from week one to now. Very
very valuable rookie campaign for Jonah. I'm glad that he's
(20:08):
gotten every single snap and didn't miss any time with
an injury because this is all going to add up
to make him a better football player next year. And
again there's times where he falls off, but the trajectory
of his improvement tells me that come twenty twenty six,
we're going to have left tackle, left guard, and center
as like walk down study positions for us going forward.
The misses offensively Cole Strange, I think he's earned like
(20:29):
the right to at least compete for the swing interior
job and maybe even a spot starter at parts on
the offensive line, although that's a wild assumption given where
we are right who knows what the hell of team
looks like next year. But there's consistent footwork shortcomings that
show up that get him off balance or overextended where
he has like immediate bad losses right sometimes on the
offensive line, it's not about how many losses you have,
(20:50):
but how bad the losses are, and his losses tend
to be pretty bad. He's been the most consistent leak
in passpro. I'd say Austin Jackson was up and down,
just kind of late to detach on some of the
first level blocks he made and unable to get to
the second level defender, but he also had some really
good play, So up and down for him, thought Julian
Hill struggled to get movement on why blocks and just
wasn't as sharp with his assignments as we've seen from
(21:11):
him this year. And then Malik Washington, like there's not
a lot of juice there as a receiver obviously, but
I don't think it's his fault. But he gets he
gets asked to, like, you know, win against these outside
linebackers at the point of attack, and he's He's a
five foot eight guy, one hundred and eighty five pounds, right,
Like not gonna happen that often on a call you
typically make for like a Juwan Jennings. So I just
thought that was interesting, theois that the interception we got
(21:32):
to be stronger, gotta be more detailed in that route.
Speaker 1 (21:34):
He stands out there as well.
Speaker 2 (21:35):
Snapcounts quarterback and offensive line with the distance fifty nine snaps.
Daniel Brunskill played ten as the extra offensive lineman running
backs eight Chan forty two, Right eighteen, Gordon three, alec
Ingold eighteen, Wattle played forty two, Malik thirty one, Cedric
Also thirty one, Theowiese twenty one, and d Scrig five,
and then at tight end twenty nine to twenty eight
(21:55):
for Waller and Hill and Dulswitch played seventeen. Let's keep
going here with the defense. General points a lot of
interesting stuff in this one from a scheme perspective, and
you could tell it kind of rattled the Bengals early
on in this game. We got to this inverted Tampa two. Look,
that's Cover two with the cornerbacks playing the deep half
(22:15):
and the safety stepping down playing the underneath cloud in
the curl flat area. And they got to this from
a single high presentation. And by the way, Tampa two,
you also have a pipe runner, someone that runs the
middle of the field and splits those split field safeties
to account for a possible you know, seam shot down
the middle of the field. But we present single high
where Jason Marshall's lineup in the slot, he inverts back
(22:38):
into the deep half. Ashton Davis is your other slot
where it looks like he could possibly be the invert guy.
But he does an invert, he winds the pipe and
one of the half field safeties stays home. That's a
lot to decipher for a quarterback after showing man coverage
from the slot. So that's typically a mink of Fitzpatrick
duty that you know it, but it seemed pretty clear
they were not going to deviate from their typical like
(22:59):
structure and game plan without the guy that kind.
Speaker 1 (23:01):
Of makes all that go.
Speaker 2 (23:02):
And I think it kind of bit them a couple
times because Davis was out of position a lot in
this game. But it makes all the variety possible, and
that's the calling card of the scheme. Man presentation, one thing,
post snap something else. They also got a sack on
Joe Burrow on that same inverted two look before the
McPherson field goal off the upright and in Burrow has
a good pocket, but the coverage is solid across the board.
(23:23):
He tries to move. Kenneth Grant gets off the block
and meets the quarterback with Chop Robinson for a sack.
And I will say the part that made it easier
on Burrow was just the lack of pressure. I mean,
we'll get to that here in one second, but their
first third down a conversion, both edges ran around the
quarterback and fell down behind him, easy pocket to operate from.
That happened too frequently in this game, whether it was choppin' Chubb,
(23:45):
whether it was your heavy looks with Zach Seeler out
there and Quentin Bell just no pressure off the edge
of the Dolphins all day long. The Sealer sack was
another great disguise and execution. Combination combination, split field presentation
that turns into brackets on both Chase and Higgins. Pretty
good concept. Right man coverage across the board. We're gonna
have to win against Kasiki and Josevash and Chase Brown
(24:05):
one on one. Essentially it became a zero look. There
was no safety help from what was a too high
pre snap look and they get pressure with the two
games both stunts. That's the outside guy looping in, inside
guy crashing out, and Sealer just explodes through the pickstunt
as he usually does for the sack. They had another
play well sniffed out on the first touchdown drive where
it was man to the boundary quarters to the field
(24:28):
fields the wide side. That's two quarter defenders, so I'll
take a one quarter, you take the other quarter, and
they were man to the backside of the formation. It's
a hybrid coverage and Burrow was perplexed by it. But
again he steps up off the spot and hits Jamar
Chase off script and guess who's covering that hook zone,
completely blind to what's going on Tyrel Dotson in that spot.
Speaker 1 (24:47):
More on that in a moment.
Speaker 2 (24:48):
The way t Higgins high points that first catch was
honestly amazing, like what a football player, full extension top
of his jump. I'd estimate he caught that ball around
like nine or ten feet off the ground.
Speaker 1 (24:59):
How the hell's Jack Joe's supposed to content with that?
He can't.
Speaker 2 (25:02):
Same thing with Darren Waller on our first possession, and
I think you can see the gravity of the constant
turnovers begin to take hold on the Dolphins defense in
that third quarter. The Bengals stayed on blocks longer, we
tackled worse, they broke more tackles. There was just a
kind of a deflated effect from those turnovers, and the
Levy eventually broke. What you want to take from that,
I guess is up to you. I kind of just think, like,
(25:23):
I guess I get it. But at the same time,
I'm like, no, excuse, I don't know. It's a tough
back and forth, not great, but I can kind of
also understand it. Last break right there, come back and
talk about the standouts, the stand downs. Top five tapes.
That's next Drive Time Podcast brought to you by AutoNation.
All right, as far as the individuals go on defense,
I've got three standouts.
Speaker 1 (25:45):
Rasul Douglas.
Speaker 2 (25:45):
You guys know how much of an affinity I have
for players that play with anticipation off of film study
and FBI football intelligence.
Speaker 1 (25:54):
That's suel Man.
Speaker 2 (25:55):
He makes that stick for a short gain on the
opening jet sweep. Then he reads a hook lat combo
knowing there's no routes behind him, so I can drive
downfield on that hook throw before the ball even gets there.
His ability to lock in on his job but also
fall off of his opportunity, off of his responsibilities to
free lance off of that and into different roles than
the defense. That's like that helps a play caller so
(26:17):
much because you know that job's taken care of and
I'm gonna get some help from other areas. It was
one of the things I talked about on Javon Hollins
college tape in Oregon. That kind of wasn't on his
Dolphins tape very often, but it's so valuable when you
have a defender who can do that, and then some
it's it really takes your defense to a different level
when you have that Kenneth Grant each more, each week
I see it more and more with this guy. There's
(26:38):
a double team on a run right at him on
the opening drive, and he pops the initial block and
stands him straight up rock'm sockem Robot style. Then the
combination block that comes at his side just looks like
he ran to a brick wall, no movement on ninety
He's the one enforcing the action. He's getting the power
you'd think he would from that body composition. And that's
a testament to Austin Clark, Anthony Wee and all the
(27:00):
coaches that work with him and himself to put the
work in to get the technique up to standard. Because
his his traits, his skills, they are there, the technique
keeps coming along. He'll be a nice player for your
Miami Dolphins. Jordan Brooks. The tangibles are obvious, obviously, but
if you're not tape dogging and you don't see the
way he impacts multiple gaps on every single play against
the run, then the football IQ, you know, in physical
(27:23):
traits to impact coverage and expand the hooks on twenty
yards down the field. I mean that rep where he
damn near picks it off to carry it twenty yards,
To have the eyes, like the right zone eyes to
know where the combination is going to take you, to
realize the ball's coming away and get more vertical depth,
make a play on the ball.
Speaker 1 (27:39):
That is rare, rare, rare talent.
Speaker 2 (27:41):
And I wouldn't say standouts, but I liked a couple
things about Jack Jones and Jason Marshall junior. With Marshall
the competitiveness up and press. I'm excited to watch him
next spring in summer and see how he develops his game.
I think there's a lot to work with there. He
had a pressed up two way go rep on Jamar
Chase where he presses and re routes him and he
kind of gets him off balance and burrows throw doesn't
(28:02):
time up because he's not, you know, on the right
path of his route and it forces an incompletion. And
then Jack Jones. Jack's gonna be in the negative category
today as well. But I want to say this about him,
his ability to mix his looks and the constant competitive
fire it plays for me. Man Like he had a
rep on Mike Gaziki in the slot where he's in
man coverage on Gasiki, and he's like playing with this
(28:23):
fake blitz because he knows I have the tight end.
I'm not worried about recovery speed. I can get back
over the top. Fakes the blitz, wheels back out and
it kind of confused Burrow. So he does some fun
stuff to mess with quarterbacks. We'll talk about him more
here in just one second. In fact, right now, because
the individual misses the catch point plays, I'm kind of like,
you know whatever, I guess it's it's not ideal, but
(28:43):
he's he's in a bad spot right there, right like
t Higgins has you know what, seven inches of height
on him. He just got caught up in some conflict
as well. Bad job all around to allow that. There
was a play where he turned a wheel route with
no help over the top to go cover the curl flat,
like you can't do that, man. Luckily A Burrow missed
that throw. Tyrrel Dotson is the big one here today.
(29:04):
I sometimes wonder if you guys think I just put
the same guys in here every single week, because I
kind of do. But I promise it's not copy and paste.
Like every week in coverage, there's these gaping holes in
the hook zone and Jordan Brooks is usually covering somebody,
and I don't know the exact responsibilities. So I can't
like definitively pound the table here, but I feel pretty
good about it. I have enough of an idea to
know there's often a culprit wearing number twenty five. They
(29:27):
throw a dig to Chase when we're in Tampa two
and he carries the route twenty five yards downfield. The
number three, you're supposed to carry that thing and pass
it off right to the safety. Like the safety is
not further than twenty yards down the field, So what
are we doing? That's why we call to So Burrow
just throws the end cuts Jamar Chase, who runs to
vacated space in the middle of the field, literally completely
vacated the hook's own ten yards down the field over
(29:47):
the ball. There are like seven or eight plays in
this game where I can point to that, and maybe
that's just me, but there's one where Yoseavash runs over
on Jason Marshall and we're covering caterpillars.
Speaker 1 (29:58):
Man, I just don't get it.
Speaker 2 (30:00):
Dante Trader had some bad eyes in this game, got
off an easy slide, got caught on an easy slide
off of play action, which is the route underneath the
formation into the flat where there's nothing there to hold him.
He just takes the cheese and the fake on the
play side. That's a bit disappointing given what his game
is like trades and study wise, He's supposed to be
sharp in that area of his game. He's a rookie,
so hopefully he gets better. But it wasn't great in
(30:20):
this game. I had Zeke Biggers getting washed with bad
gap discipline, freelancing, not a good game for him, but
Hedo Jones more of the same.
Speaker 1 (30:27):
Ifi Mela fan Wou as well.
Speaker 2 (30:28):
Just thought we'd see more of what Rasul Douglas does
from him in terms of like the FBI at this
stage of his career, Quentin Bell stuck in the mud
on rush games any rushes for that matter. Chop and
Chubb needs so much more from those guys and Zach
Steedler after his sack got caught on a lot of blocks.
Snap counts sixty one the distance for Ifi Mela fan Woom,
Jack Jones, and Rasul Douglas. Other safeties. Davis played forty seven.
(30:49):
Trader at corner played thirty three rather at safety. I
should say Marshall at corner played thirty one on the
inside Seiler forty kg, twenty eight Biggers and Phillips twenty
five and twenty four apiece, but he played sixteen snaps
at linebacker. Brooks and Dotson both played fifty eight. Both
Gay and Britt played three Chubb forty three, Chop forty two,
Bell twenty and Good seventeen. My top five tapes Rasul
(31:12):
Douglas number one this week, Aaron Brew at number two,
Jalen Waddle number three, Devon h At number four, and
Patrick Paul number five. And I realize this final note
here kind of flies in the face of something I
said ahead of the Pittsburgh game. But with new information
we adapt, right, And at six and eleven, you could
be getting the eighth pick in the draft. That's right
in the range of finding a blue chip player like
(31:34):
you pick eighth, you're probably gonna get one of r
vl Rees, David Bailey, Ruben Bain, Caleb Downs, maybe a
quarterback falls, who knows. But given the situation, it's all circumstantial, right.
I think the best thing now is to get up
there and try to get a blue chip at that
edge position, long way to go. I'm not gonna paint
myself into a corner positionwise, but watching this tape, this
(31:55):
team badly needs pass rush help and that's gonna be
the best spot to get it this offseason, all right.
Subscribe to the podcast, leave us a rating, Lewis a review,
Follow me on social at Winkle NFL, the team at
Miami Dolphins. Check out the YouTube channel for Dolphins HQ,
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Miami Dolphins dot Com Until next time finds up Caroline,
Cameron and Willow Daddy's Coming Home.
This is Drivetime with Travis Wingfield.
Speaker 2 (00:10):
What is up Dolphins and welcome to the Draft Time Podcast.
I am your host, Travis Wingfield. And on today's show,
well it's film review day. We'll tell you what started well,
how it turned around in the third quarter, and everything
in between for the Dolphins and Bengals on Sunday from
the Baptist Health Studios inside the Baptist Health Training Complex.
This is the Draft Time Podcast. We kick it off
(00:33):
as we always do with the offense and the general
points from the structure and scheme of things, and there
was some good but a lot that wasn't very good.
And I think on balance, whether it comes to execution
across the board, scheme issues, complexity within the scheme and
the calls and things, and that changed the landmarks and
launch points for the offense. I think there was a
(00:54):
lot of that involved. Defensively, I found myself coming away
from it saying good structure, good design, execution and ultimately
some effort in that third quart Let's go ahead and
kick it off as we always do with the offense
and some of the finer points here and we'll cover
it all here, so not really in any specific order,
but the Devan eight chant touchdown run is where I start,
and the nuance of the offensive line, which just a
(01:15):
spoiler alert throughout this podcast, The one unit I really
appreciated in this game was the offensive line, as well
as some of the defensive design and what they did
in coverage in the back end. Aside from that, not
a lot to write home from. We'll talk about Waddell
and a Chan as well, But on the offensive line,
Man Brewer the nuance to his game. He climbs up
like he's going to attach the mic linebacker and it
(01:36):
changes the angle of attack the entire linebacker group has
to take. The second level of their defense has to
take as he just then peels off and goes and
gets the wheel linebacker, which creates a real, really advantageous
leverage an angle of attack for Patrick Paul to find
the mic linebacker with a better angle, and both those
guys get wiped out. Really because of the way Aaron
(01:56):
Brewer kind of slow played his release into the line.
Speaker 1 (02:00):
Jalen Waddle gets.
Speaker 2 (02:01):
Just enough on that crackback thanks to some help from
Devon ah Chan, who makes a defender miss again as
he always does. Then Ingold hammers the kickout. Jonas avite
Naya has an overtake reach technique. Block on the three
tech basically means he's wider than you when you're trying
to get that direction, he's able to overtake him, get
on the outside shoulder, steal it back inside. Then a
Chan makes another safety miss in open field space, which
(02:24):
repeat me, or stop me if you've heard that again
a thousand times right, while Abram Brewer carries a different
block fifteen yards downfield, and that is the anatomy of
a Miami Dolphins touchdown. We were hitting the toss game
a lot early in finding creases, but I thought did
a good job early of showing change ups with a
couple of inside runs. And that's that's kind of the
delicate dance of this run game is you show all
(02:46):
that stuff, you show the inside stuff to get to
your outside zone game. But when push comes to shove,
we become mortally dependent on the outside game. And you
saw on a third and one play they got stuffed.
You cannot like consistently go to it and it can't
be your go to in every single spot because different
spots call for different looks. But there was good variety early.
(03:08):
I feel like there's really good variety in the scheme,
especially from a run game standpoint, in the opening script
in the first half, and then once we get away
from that, it's just spamming outside zone.
Speaker 1 (03:17):
It's spamming toss play.
Speaker 2 (03:18):
And to me, that's a big part of the anatomy
of why the discrepancy exists between first half and second
half football. I mean, we deployed CT counter on the
first play of the game. I saw lead ISO and
a reverse to Jalen Wright ahead of his two second
consecutive toss play and it pops. You got a little
bit of pin and poll in there, which Miami hasn't
executed that particularly well this year. But it's showing it right,
(03:40):
like a pitcher has his fourth or fifth best pitch
in his bag that he only throws a few times,
and it's really a show me pitch.
Speaker 1 (03:47):
You're trying to show it for something else.
Speaker 2 (03:49):
We got a nice wrinkle off of that look with
a bootleg from Quinn Ewers to Cedric Wilson for a
completion on drive number three. You fake the toss, you
run layers, a deep layer, an intermediate layer, and underneath
layer to kind of create conflict on that one side
of his own coverage and you get a receiver on
a linebacker. And that was a pregame key I discussed
create absolute chaos for Barrett Carter and Demetrius Knight, And
(04:11):
in the first half it happened. But once you get
time to like adjust and kind of make the calls
within the game, you get less and less of that.
And something else that was just popped up is in
it every week, really the formations like and look, nobody
really knows football, right, Like, besides the people that are
doing this in those meeting rooms every single day, no
one really truly knows what goes on. So we're all
(04:32):
trying to extrapolate what we you know, take from our knowledge,
what we think we see on the tape, and try
to give you the best analysis possible here. But I
think it's funny when you, like, you see one of
these crazy formations and you'll see like a journalist that
knows ball and like, there are you know, plenty of
journalists that know journalist level of football, and it's like
this formation is awesome, but it's so different. Then you
(04:53):
hear someone like Jto Sullivan who told you like that
there's no use for this. All it does is create
like better leverage for the defense, yet it takes you
two more steps.
Speaker 1 (05:02):
Like there's a second play of the game.
Speaker 2 (05:03):
You've got Wattle and Cedric Wilson in these condensed splits
up on the line of scrimmage, and then there's two
players directly behind them five yards stacked, and another player
who's inside of that at the running back position. You've
got three eligibles that are five yards off the football.
All that does is add time to get back to
the line of scrimmage into the route progression. And it's
another variant of footwork timing that the quarterback has to
(05:25):
be like on Q with in terms of making it
time up with the being in sync with the route concept.
You're putting more on your quarterback's plate by using these.
A lot of this offense is a one route design
where all the routes are designed to just clear space
and there's no actual pass option for the quarterback. And
that's where you saw too a get into law of
trouble here, and those routes are often swings behind the
(05:46):
line of scrimmage, so when it's not there, it gets
awfully dicey really quick. There was one to Wattle where
the ball had to get there, and it put him
and Julian Hill in space against four Bengals defenders and
you're at a starting point five yards behind the linesmage
like if you have to break a tackle to make
a game on that play, that's that's not putting him
in a good spot. In general, our screen game just
(06:07):
does not hit. It's it's often almost a throwaway down
or sometimes even on negative play. And I mean, when
was the less time a screen popped Like the Jets
game of John new Smith last year. It's just been
a regular occurrence there. And there's there's this has been
something we've talked about for years now. There is just
so much in the run game that depends upon like
elite I like.
Speaker 1 (06:30):
How do I say this, like.
Speaker 2 (06:32):
Side adjustments that have been made on the fly, and
if you're not very precise on it, the run game
gets blown up. Like there's so much faith in the
eye candy holding guys. Like there's a like leaving a
backside edge unblocked assuming Devon a Chan's jet motion will
take him and if it doesn't, all of a sudden
we get inside zone with a backside fold concept for
Jalen Wright, and that cutback lane is now occupied by
(06:53):
a two hundred and seventy pound unblocked player because we
thought he was going to run with devon a Chan
and maybe he does sometimes, but it's almost like a
sense of arrogance to like say, it's go, We're gonna
hold him with this and just leave him unblocked. You know,
it worked for a long time, but right now it's
kind of a coin flip if it does or not.
So in general, we just have so many unblocked guys
that make plays while we are finding assignments ten to
(07:15):
fifteen yards down the field. The best play design of
the day, in my opinion, was the League Washington touchdown.
You get gy counter that's guard and tight end counter
pulling play side with Greg Dolsitch getting a head start
with motion at the snap. You get two linebackers crash
on that fake action to the backside of the play
inside to eight Chan. Then you get awesome blocks on
the perimeter from Brewer, Austin Jackson, Julian Hill, and then
(07:37):
Elite goes in almost untouched. So there are plays where
it's like, yeah, that's great, that looks awesome, but there
are so many plays where we get drive killers because
Julian Hill can't make a side adjustment on a changing
landmark when he's trying to run at full speed to
cut off a safety coming down because his assignment changed
based upon how the defensive ends slanted inside. You feel
me there the third and one tackle for loss on
the two minute drive. We tossed it into the most
(08:00):
crowded area of the field. It's a spread formation three
by one to the field and now it's not spread out,
but all the splits are condensed. But it is a
spread formation because you only have one guy in the
backfield and there's no attached players.
Speaker 1 (08:12):
There's no whys.
Speaker 2 (08:13):
It's all spread formations, not spread, but they're not attached
to the formation. But you create this light front inside
because of that personnel. Like they're out there with only
three defenders inside the tackles, and one of those players
is an unstacked inside linebacker. That means there's no defensive
tackle in front of him to eat up a block.
It gives you free access to go block that guy
(08:33):
down the field. But there are five bangalist defenders over
to that trip side of the formation, and it's three
on five and we can't block them, and because we're
trying to get with and run the ball wide eight
chance speed doesn't outrace them. They they're ready for it,
and we can't attach those blocks because it's a three
moving targets.
Speaker 1 (08:50):
Those are tough to hit.
Speaker 2 (08:50):
Like Aaron Brewer, we talk about how special he is
because he hits them so regularly.
Speaker 1 (08:55):
That's not a regular thing.
Speaker 2 (08:56):
Like that makes him a pro bowler, right, And that's
what I mean by like the the confidence within the scheme.
Like sometimes if we just line up and play football,
we have our best plays, then we kind of get
these tricky plays where it seems to bog things down.
Sometimes they pop, I will give them that credit, but
a lot of the negative plays come from almost out
smarting ourselves. The force defender can set the edge uncontested
(09:16):
on this play and then e Chan turns it back
into the flow and he gets hammered by the three
pursuit defenders. Like the math just does not math on
that play. You can't have a soft edge in your
blocking scheme when the play design invites this heavy backside
pursuit because eventually you're gonna run into that edge and
then it's time to get backfield or back you know,
to cut that thing back, and by the time you do,
(09:36):
there's pursuit defenders that are gonna knock your face mask
off of you.
Speaker 1 (09:39):
And that happened on this play.
Speaker 2 (09:41):
And just again, by the way, the Theoese offensive pass interference,
he was trying to get out of the way the
linebacker and the linebacker runs over him. That's all I'm
gonna say about that. After the Greg dulswitch fumble, you
get three straight tipped passes. Someone did something wrong, because
I refuse to believe on the first one it was
designed this way where you fake an escort scream, which
we run all the time, right, and then two slants
him behind that and Dulcich is literally bringing his man
(10:04):
into the window to waddle and he gets a hand
in the football. It actually would have worked because we
flooded the area. But I think someone was in the
wrong spot because I think maybe he's supposed to kind
of hang back and be more of a blocker because
he takes his man right into the passing window. So
some good, a lot of convoluted as far as the
quarterback goes on tape. You know that Waller throw on
(10:24):
the first drive was not a good decision. We got
very lucky there. Three by one trips to the field.
You get the one and the three, which is the
furthest out and the furthest in right. They both run
square ins and it creates a deep out for Darren Waller,
who is the two. It's essentially trying to lift that
that underneath cloud corner and hold that safety a half
field safety's eyes so you can get outside access on
(10:45):
that honey hole throw.
Speaker 1 (10:47):
Right.
Speaker 2 (10:47):
It's a classic two beater, the old John Gruden honey
hole shot the soft area behind the zone corner underneath
the half field safety and yours does a good job
seeing that corner fall off into coverage there and doesn't
rip it because the underneath concept didn't hold the defender
the way it's supposed to, so Quinn has to improvise
and he moves.
Speaker 1 (11:06):
But then he just throws it up in the air.
Speaker 2 (11:07):
I mean, it's not open at all, and I bet
Waller was kind of surprised by it too, but he
trusts his guy, and I guess when you have Darren Waller,
it's not a terrible idea because it worked out for
twenty four yards. Just thought it was kind of funny
to watch on tape because I don't know how I
didn't see the reaction on Twitter to the play if
fans were loving it. But it was definitely a kind
of ballsy play on the first drive of the game.
Speaker 1 (11:28):
I thought we saw the air of the throw.
Speaker 2 (11:32):
Of that throw rather show up on the second play
of the drive after a chance touchdown run. I know
that's a lot to keep up with here, as you
probably haven't gone back and watched the game the way
I did, But it's a similar throw where he gets
waddle on a deep comeback against what becomes Cover three
for the defense, and a deep comeback against Cover three
with a curl flat defender who's not getting depth is like,
(11:52):
that's Valhalla for an offense. You take that for twenty
yards every time you get it. You threaten the vertical
on a deep threat, because if you're in cover three,
there's three deep defenders each responsible for a deep third
of the field, and you threaten that vertical throttle it
back down and there's not many cornerbacks who can handle
that when the curl flat defender is all the way
out of the equation. And that's what happens here. Quinn
(12:15):
throws it with anticipation, which is great, but his feet
weren't set. He's fading away.
Speaker 1 (12:19):
The balls off the mark. Waddle's wide open.
Speaker 2 (12:21):
The ball is nowhere near him, but you can see
that he's he's rushed and he's not set or into
the throw at all, which kind of speaks to a
possible conflict within the timing of the place, like the
timing of the play maybe didn't match up quinn Ewers's
footwork on that play. His next throw to Waller was
off target but caught for a first down. I'll say this,
he was playing within the rhythm of the offense. McDaniel
(12:43):
talked about it in his press commerce on Monday it
didn't look too big for him, and I agree with that.
There was a lot to want back, but I thought
it was a good debut for quinn Ewers. He's playing
within the rhythm and taking the ball where it needs
to go, and quite frankly, that was the most important
thing I thought you could see from quinn Ewers in
this game. I really liked his threat on the bootleg
to Cedric Wilson coming across the formation because he knows
(13:04):
he has a receiver against a linebacker and typically almost
every Damn time this happens.
Speaker 1 (13:09):
You want to throw that thing early.
Speaker 2 (13:11):
You want to give it to him with a chance
to push that thing, you know, to get space to
operate after he makes the catch. Sorry, Ws, you just
threw an interception in our bowl game. I was tracking that,
but he lets it play out because the more time
I have to let Cedric run away from this linebacker,
We're gonna get more space. Dot That's exactly what happens.
(13:31):
Throws it right on the upfield shoulder for a nice
game of twelve. He missed Waddle on a corner and
McDaniel and has Monday press conference talked about this, and
I'm sitting there nod in my head, like, yeah, that's
what I'm gonna talk about in the podcast tonight. It
was a you know, a watching it back on tape,
Waddle has this cornerback totally cooked. He re routes Wattle
eight yards down the field and it throws off the timing, which,
(13:52):
by the way, that's illegal contact.
Speaker 1 (13:54):
Brother can't do that.
Speaker 2 (13:55):
But you see Quinn double clutch, and I think that
was why he couldn't get there on time. It just
missed for a possible twenty five yard catch and then
yards after the catch as well. On that particular play
man the pick was forty three yards. We're like dominating
Utah State, but we keep turning it over. It's a
third pick for the quarterback, and Utah State still hasn't scored,
although they are first and goal right now, so they
probably will score here. Some of the process on the
(14:17):
middle of the field throws was really nice. We ran
this little high low drag over combination where Greg Dolsitch
takes the drag and Darren Waller runs the overroute behind that,
and it creates this big second window throw to Waller
and Quinn's patient and reads it out and then throws
that backside over out once he gets that second window
space to Waller for a first down. Really nice process
(14:37):
on that play. Before the Theo Wiese pick, he jams
won into double coverage to Waller. I think that was
just a misread because they crashed on it the whole
way and he didn't have a good feel for how
that play was unfolding. I thought the waist throw the
pick was actually pretty good, right on target, good timing
on it, and the defender did arrive early, so it
could have been DPI, but I do think wee could
also help his quarterback out by coming back to the
(14:58):
football a little bit more.
Speaker 1 (14:59):
The quarterbacks nenak unfortunate.
Speaker 2 (15:00):
You got a wet field because the rain had just
begun begun, and it's on the midfield logo paint, so
like you see Quinn's left foot that he tries to
stick in the ground and drive from totally slip out
from underneath him, and he can't getting leverage and push
and so it's an automatic like turnover on downs because
of that. Then I thought the one real poor choice
was the picky through to waddle that was trying to
(15:22):
catch a spark down thirty eight to fourteen. It was
a kin to the wall or throw. But when you
give a five foot ten guy chance, it's a lot
different than giving a six foot five guy chance, and
the dB took advantage of that. So I thought, pretty
solid start, plenty to grow from. Placement could be better,
just to hair off on a few timing plays, but
all in all, a couple of rookie decisions that he made,
it didn't look too fast for him, a pretty good start.
(15:42):
I'm excited to watch him in Tampa should he get
that nod, which I believe he will.
Speaker 1 (15:46):
That's I think so right, We don't know for sure.
Speaker 2 (15:48):
Let's go ahead and take our first break rate there,
come back and talk about the stands on offense, because
the defensive side as well. Drivetime Podcast brought to you
by AutoNation. Offensive standouts for the Miami Dolphins and a
forty five twenty one loss of the Cincinnati Bengals. Darren Waller,
that first third down is instructive to a point that
we the Royal Wii once again have been harping on
(16:11):
on this podcast.
Speaker 1 (16:12):
How the game has changed.
Speaker 2 (16:13):
Right. Everything is more contested, everything is more condensed. Deep
shots are scarce. The run game is in vogue, and
it's the era of the return of bully football, and
guys that can make catches like this are probably going
to be more valuable than speedsters. Eat your heart out, Travis,
My favorite kind of player is going to be extinct
here in a couple of years. His next third down
catch was even better. He wins in an out against
(16:35):
outside leverage, which that's tough to do, and the balls
way back inside plucks it, holds it away from the
defender so he can't knock it away. Although I will
say the point of attack stuff was pretty much a
wash for Darren Waller, but his receiving prowess is on
tape every single week.
Speaker 1 (16:48):
Aaron Brewer, I want to.
Speaker 2 (16:50):
See say there's been like one or two games where
he hasn't been in here in the standouts portion the
Waller player on the first drive, they double mug, both
linebackers bail and he becomes a four man rush with
three overloads to the left side. He takes his set
to the right, sees the backside looper, feels it coming
on a stunt, winding back inside it and goes and
parks him, puts him on his.
Speaker 1 (17:11):
Butt.
Speaker 2 (17:12):
Backside. Man, it was awesome to watch all the blocks
out in space. This guy is a man. He better
go to the Pro Bowl. Devon h Chan, the way
he polished up his game this offseason was outstanding. His
pass pro assignments are better. He's even more patient when
he lets blocks develop and can burrow and drive on
an inside dive play. He was already special, and he
got better this year. He makes the crack defender driving
(17:33):
on him, missing the backfield, which turns a possibly three
or four yard loss into a forty eight yard touchdown.
Jukes the safety that turns it from a ten yard
game to a forty eight yard touch Like just crazy,
crazy talent for this guy. Patrick Paul steady as she
goes man key blocks at the point of attack on
big runs, completely unbothered in pass pro. I have noticed
a small trend in his game, and this happened on
the all the Gordon stuff. I believe it was where
(17:57):
he can kind of lose the inside, like the slant
on a five technique, crossing his face on some of
those inside runs. That's I mean, it's trying to hit
a ninety eight mile hour fastball because it happens so
quick and you have to make a snap decision. If
your first step is not to the right to cut
it off, then it's tough to get there. But it's
led to a tackle for loss each of the last
two weeks. But buying large, Patrick Paul, he is the
man we hit YACHTSI on that draft pick Jalen Waddle.
(18:20):
I covered his game in the offensive section. He had
seventy two yards, easily could have had two more plays
of twenty five plus, could have had a couple of
more explosives or catches. I should say as well in there,
like he could have had one hundred and thirty hundred
and forty yards in this game. He just gets open
and sure enough, after the second one of those plays
I'm talking about, he spin cycles a cornerback for another
explosive play on a corner route, which, by the way,
alec Ingold that fumble is a turnover if ingle's not
(18:43):
a picture of consistency and effort. Man the way he
ran after that thing and had some big blocks at
the point of attacking this game as well, including devon
ah Chan's touchdown run. I like Jalen Wright, and this
is like a case of never being wrong, just early.
He popped so much in rookie camp, and we've seen
these flashes for two years with the screen past that
he caught, the tackle, he evades while he's like spinning
(19:03):
from an off target throw that he's trying to gather
his balance from, someone hits him in the thigh pad
and just bounces off of him like that'll play, man,
that'll play. I'm not putting Jonah in the standouts. I
just want to talk about his game for a second.
I think the growth in his game has been measurable.
It's not there yet, but there's things that have shown
me real like demonstrable growth that has me excited about
(19:24):
twenty six for him, his pass pro anchor has gotten
so much better. I think if there's one thing he
you know, that could be next for him. He's attaching
much better in the running game too, but if he
could sink his hips a little bit more into these
drive blocks and play from a lower pad level with
better leverage, he could finish these the way you've seen
Aaron Brewer do apposed to kind of falling off some
of the blocks at the point of attack when the
(19:46):
running back gets to the point of attack that you
see him get disengaged and his man can make the
play sometimes, but man, you see him on some of
those like run him off blocks and the ability to
reposition his hands and strain through the rep until he
does have the leverage advantage. That's come a long way.
If you're a tape head, just watch his hands. They've
gotten so much better from week one to now. Very
very valuable rookie campaign for Jonah. I'm glad that he's
(20:08):
gotten every single snap and didn't miss any time with
an injury because this is all going to add up
to make him a better football player next year. And
again there's times where he falls off, but the trajectory
of his improvement tells me that come twenty twenty six,
we're going to have left tackle, left guard, and center
as like walk down study positions for us going forward.
The misses offensively Cole Strange, I think he's earned like
(20:29):
the right to at least compete for the swing interior
job and maybe even a spot starter at parts on
the offensive line, although that's a wild assumption given where
we are right who knows what the hell of team
looks like next year. But there's consistent footwork shortcomings that
show up that get him off balance or overextended where
he has like immediate bad losses right sometimes on the
offensive line, it's not about how many losses you have,
(20:50):
but how bad the losses are, and his losses tend
to be pretty bad. He's been the most consistent leak
in passpro. I'd say Austin Jackson was up and down,
just kind of late to detach on some of the
first level blocks he made and unable to get to
the second level defender, but he also had some really
good play, So up and down for him, thought Julian
Hill struggled to get movement on why blocks and just
wasn't as sharp with his assignments as we've seen from
(21:11):
him this year. And then Malik Washington, like there's not
a lot of juice there as a receiver obviously, but
I don't think it's his fault. But he gets he
gets asked to, like, you know, win against these outside
linebackers at the point of attack, and he's He's a
five foot eight guy, one hundred and eighty five pounds, right,
Like not gonna happen that often on a call you
typically make for like a Juwan Jennings. So I just
thought that was interesting, theois that the interception we got
(21:32):
to be stronger, gotta be more detailed in that route.
Speaker 1 (21:34):
He stands out there as well.
Speaker 2 (21:35):
Snapcounts quarterback and offensive line with the distance fifty nine snaps.
Daniel Brunskill played ten as the extra offensive lineman running
backs eight Chan forty two, Right eighteen, Gordon three, alec
Ingold eighteen, Wattle played forty two, Malik thirty one, Cedric
Also thirty one, Theowiese twenty one, and d Scrig five,
and then at tight end twenty nine to twenty eight
(21:55):
for Waller and Hill and Dulswitch played seventeen. Let's keep
going here with the defense. General points a lot of
interesting stuff in this one from a scheme perspective, and
you could tell it kind of rattled the Bengals early
on in this game. We got to this inverted Tampa two. Look,
that's Cover two with the cornerbacks playing the deep half
(22:15):
and the safety stepping down playing the underneath cloud in
the curl flat area. And they got to this from
a single high presentation. And by the way, Tampa two,
you also have a pipe runner, someone that runs the
middle of the field and splits those split field safeties
to account for a possible you know, seam shot down
the middle of the field. But we present single high
where Jason Marshall's lineup in the slot, he inverts back
(22:38):
into the deep half. Ashton Davis is your other slot
where it looks like he could possibly be the invert guy.
But he does an invert, he winds the pipe and
one of the half field safeties stays home. That's a
lot to decipher for a quarterback after showing man coverage
from the slot. So that's typically a mink of Fitzpatrick
duty that you know it, but it seemed pretty clear
they were not going to deviate from their typical like
(22:59):
structure and game plan without the guy that kind.
Speaker 1 (23:01):
Of makes all that go.
Speaker 2 (23:02):
And I think it kind of bit them a couple
times because Davis was out of position a lot in
this game. But it makes all the variety possible, and
that's the calling card of the scheme. Man presentation, one thing,
post snap something else. They also got a sack on
Joe Burrow on that same inverted two look before the
McPherson field goal off the upright and in Burrow has
a good pocket, but the coverage is solid across the board.
(23:23):
He tries to move. Kenneth Grant gets off the block
and meets the quarterback with Chop Robinson for a sack.
And I will say the part that made it easier
on Burrow was just the lack of pressure. I mean,
we'll get to that here in one second, but their
first third down a conversion, both edges ran around the
quarterback and fell down behind him, easy pocket to operate from.
That happened too frequently in this game, whether it was choppin' Chubb,
(23:45):
whether it was your heavy looks with Zach Seeler out
there and Quentin Bell just no pressure off the edge
of the Dolphins all day long. The Sealer sack was
another great disguise and execution. Combination combination, split field presentation
that turns into brackets on both Chase and Higgins. Pretty
good concept. Right man coverage across the board. We're gonna
have to win against Kasiki and Josevash and Chase Brown
(24:05):
one on one. Essentially it became a zero look. There
was no safety help from what was a too high
pre snap look and they get pressure with the two
games both stunts. That's the outside guy looping in, inside
guy crashing out, and Sealer just explodes through the pickstunt
as he usually does for the sack. They had another
play well sniffed out on the first touchdown drive where
it was man to the boundary quarters to the field
(24:28):
fields the wide side. That's two quarter defenders, so I'll
take a one quarter, you take the other quarter, and
they were man to the backside of the formation. It's
a hybrid coverage and Burrow was perplexed by it. But
again he steps up off the spot and hits Jamar
Chase off script and guess who's covering that hook zone,
completely blind to what's going on Tyrel Dotson in that spot.
Speaker 1 (24:47):
More on that in a moment.
Speaker 2 (24:48):
The way t Higgins high points that first catch was
honestly amazing, like what a football player, full extension top
of his jump. I'd estimate he caught that ball around
like nine or ten feet off the ground.
Speaker 1 (24:59):
How the hell's Jack Joe's supposed to content with that?
He can't.
Speaker 2 (25:02):
Same thing with Darren Waller on our first possession, and
I think you can see the gravity of the constant
turnovers begin to take hold on the Dolphins defense in
that third quarter. The Bengals stayed on blocks longer, we
tackled worse, they broke more tackles. There was just a
kind of a deflated effect from those turnovers, and the
Levy eventually broke. What you want to take from that,
I guess is up to you. I kind of just think, like,
(25:23):
I guess I get it. But at the same time,
I'm like, no, excuse, I don't know. It's a tough
back and forth, not great, but I can kind of
also understand it. Last break right there, come back and
talk about the standouts, the stand downs. Top five tapes.
That's next Drive Time Podcast brought to you by AutoNation.
All right, as far as the individuals go on defense,
I've got three standouts.
Speaker 1 (25:45):
Rasul Douglas.
Speaker 2 (25:45):
You guys know how much of an affinity I have
for players that play with anticipation off of film study
and FBI football intelligence.
Speaker 1 (25:54):
That's suel Man.
Speaker 2 (25:55):
He makes that stick for a short gain on the
opening jet sweep. Then he reads a hook lat combo
knowing there's no routes behind him, so I can drive
downfield on that hook throw before the ball even gets there.
His ability to lock in on his job but also
fall off of his opportunity, off of his responsibilities to
free lance off of that and into different roles than
the defense. That's like that helps a play caller so
(26:17):
much because you know that job's taken care of and
I'm gonna get some help from other areas. It was
one of the things I talked about on Javon Hollins
college tape in Oregon. That kind of wasn't on his
Dolphins tape very often, but it's so valuable when you
have a defender who can do that, and then some
it's it really takes your defense to a different level
when you have that Kenneth Grant each more, each week
I see it more and more with this guy. There's
(26:38):
a double team on a run right at him on
the opening drive, and he pops the initial block and
stands him straight up rock'm sockem Robot style. Then the
combination block that comes at his side just looks like
he ran to a brick wall, no movement on ninety
He's the one enforcing the action. He's getting the power
you'd think he would from that body composition. And that's
a testament to Austin Clark, Anthony Wee and all the
(27:00):
coaches that work with him and himself to put the
work in to get the technique up to standard. Because
his his traits, his skills, they are there, the technique
keeps coming along. He'll be a nice player for your
Miami Dolphins. Jordan Brooks. The tangibles are obvious, obviously, but
if you're not tape dogging and you don't see the
way he impacts multiple gaps on every single play against
the run, then the football IQ, you know, in physical
(27:23):
traits to impact coverage and expand the hooks on twenty
yards down the field. I mean that rep where he
damn near picks it off to carry it twenty yards,
To have the eyes, like the right zone eyes to
know where the combination is going to take you, to
realize the ball's coming away and get more vertical depth,
make a play on the ball.
Speaker 1 (27:39):
That is rare, rare, rare talent.
Speaker 2 (27:41):
And I wouldn't say standouts, but I liked a couple
things about Jack Jones and Jason Marshall junior. With Marshall
the competitiveness up and press. I'm excited to watch him
next spring in summer and see how he develops his game.
I think there's a lot to work with there. He
had a pressed up two way go rep on Jamar
Chase where he presses and re routes him and he
kind of gets him off balance and burrows throw doesn't
(28:02):
time up because he's not, you know, on the right
path of his route and it forces an incompletion. And
then Jack Jones. Jack's gonna be in the negative category
today as well. But I want to say this about him,
his ability to mix his looks and the constant competitive
fire it plays for me. Man Like he had a
rep on Mike Gaziki in the slot where he's in
man coverage on Gasiki, and he's like playing with this
(28:23):
fake blitz because he knows I have the tight end.
I'm not worried about recovery speed. I can get back
over the top. Fakes the blitz, wheels back out and
it kind of confused Burrow. So he does some fun
stuff to mess with quarterbacks. We'll talk about him more
here in just one second. In fact, right now, because
the individual misses the catch point plays, I'm kind of like,
you know whatever, I guess it's it's not ideal, but
(28:43):
he's he's in a bad spot right there, right like
t Higgins has you know what, seven inches of height
on him. He just got caught up in some conflict
as well. Bad job all around to allow that. There
was a play where he turned a wheel route with
no help over the top to go cover the curl flat,
like you can't do that, man. Luckily A Burrow missed
that throw. Tyrrel Dotson is the big one here today.
(29:04):
I sometimes wonder if you guys think I just put
the same guys in here every single week, because I
kind of do. But I promise it's not copy and paste.
Like every week in coverage, there's these gaping holes in
the hook zone and Jordan Brooks is usually covering somebody,
and I don't know the exact responsibilities. So I can't
like definitively pound the table here, but I feel pretty
good about it. I have enough of an idea to
know there's often a culprit wearing number twenty five. They
(29:27):
throw a dig to Chase when we're in Tampa two
and he carries the route twenty five yards downfield. The
number three, you're supposed to carry that thing and pass
it off right to the safety. Like the safety is
not further than twenty yards down the field, So what
are we doing? That's why we call to So Burrow
just throws the end cuts Jamar Chase, who runs to
vacated space in the middle of the field, literally completely
vacated the hook's own ten yards down the field over
(29:47):
the ball. There are like seven or eight plays in
this game where I can point to that, and maybe
that's just me, but there's one where Yoseavash runs over
on Jason Marshall and we're covering caterpillars.
Speaker 1 (29:58):
Man, I just don't get it.
Speaker 2 (30:00):
Dante Trader had some bad eyes in this game, got
off an easy slide, got caught on an easy slide
off of play action, which is the route underneath the
formation into the flat where there's nothing there to hold him.
He just takes the cheese and the fake on the
play side. That's a bit disappointing given what his game
is like trades and study wise, He's supposed to be
sharp in that area of his game. He's a rookie,
so hopefully he gets better. But it wasn't great in
(30:20):
this game. I had Zeke Biggers getting washed with bad
gap discipline, freelancing, not a good game for him, but
Hedo Jones more of the same.
Speaker 1 (30:27):
Ifi Mela fan Wou as well.
Speaker 2 (30:28):
Just thought we'd see more of what Rasul Douglas does
from him in terms of like the FBI at this
stage of his career, Quentin Bell stuck in the mud
on rush games any rushes for that matter. Chop and
Chubb needs so much more from those guys and Zach
Steedler after his sack got caught on a lot of blocks.
Snap counts sixty one the distance for Ifi Mela fan Woom,
Jack Jones, and Rasul Douglas. Other safeties. Davis played forty seven.
(30:49):
Trader at corner played thirty three rather at safety. I
should say Marshall at corner played thirty one on the
inside Seiler forty kg, twenty eight Biggers and Phillips twenty
five and twenty four apiece, but he played sixteen snaps
at linebacker. Brooks and Dotson both played fifty eight. Both
Gay and Britt played three Chubb forty three, Chop forty two,
Bell twenty and Good seventeen. My top five tapes Rasul
(31:12):
Douglas number one this week, Aaron Brew at number two,
Jalen Waddle number three, Devon h At number four, and
Patrick Paul number five. And I realize this final note
here kind of flies in the face of something I
said ahead of the Pittsburgh game. But with new information
we adapt, right, And at six and eleven, you could
be getting the eighth pick in the draft. That's right
in the range of finding a blue chip player like
(31:34):
you pick eighth, you're probably gonna get one of r
vl Rees, David Bailey, Ruben Bain, Caleb Downs, maybe a
quarterback falls, who knows. But given the situation, it's all circumstantial, right.
I think the best thing now is to get up
there and try to get a blue chip at that
edge position, long way to go. I'm not gonna paint
myself into a corner positionwise, but watching this tape, this
(31:55):
team badly needs pass rush help and that's gonna be
the best spot to get it this offseason, all right.
Subscribe to the podcast, leave us a rating, Lewis a review,
Follow me on social at Winkle NFL, the team at
Miami Dolphins. Check out the YouTube channel for Dolphins HQ,
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Miami Dolphins dot Com Until next time finds up Caroline,
Cameron and Willow Daddy's Coming Home.
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