Ignore the poor offensive line play, and the injury-decimated receiver unit the Miami Dolphins had all final season.
All of that’s fixable with higher expertise, and higher teaching — we hope.
However don’t overlook the truth that Miami had an anemic speeding assault, one which couldn’t be relied on frequently as a staple of the run-pass-option (RPO) offense.
A brand new head coach, one who's seen as a run-game specialist, is in management now.
Mike McDaniel has employed a stable offensive workers, one which comes with a formidable resume and a monitor report of success for many of its leaders.
So, the hope is that these coaches will have the ability to get the Dolphins’ offense out of second gear, serving to prop up the aspect of the ball that has held this franchise down like an anchor pins a ship to the underside of the ocean and grow to be a prime 15 unit.
If Miami’s protection is respectable shifting ahead, that’s all Tua Tagovailoa ought to have to show he’s a quarterback price constructing round due to the effectivity he’s delivered to the crew the previous two years as its starter.
Tagovailoa’s arm power won't be sensational, however there’s loads of analytical knowledge that goes in his favor so it’s scary to assume what could possibly be on the horizon if the Dolphins mounted the offensive line and set up a forceful speeding assault.
Don’t consider me? Then reply this riddle.
How is it that the Dolphins offense ranked sixteenth in time of possession (30:18) final season whereas possessing the Twenty ninth-worst speeding offense within the NFL?
Time of possession is a crucial statistic in soccer as a result of it often correlates to wins. If you're controlling the ball it implies that the opposite crew doesn't have the ball, and it is vitally laborious to attain if you end up not in possession of the ball.
The reply is Tagovailoa, whose fast, correct throws and pocket presence saved drives alive.
Take the three video games the place Tagovailoa didn’t play final season — a 27-17 loss to the Indianapolis Colts, a 45-17 beatdown the Tampa Bay Buccaneers gave Miami, and a 31-28 extra time loss to the Las Vegas Raiders — out of the equation and the Dolphins’ time of possession with Tagovailoa goes to 31:54, which might be tied for fourth greatest within the NFL.
That’s proper up there with Inexperienced Bay, Tennessee, Baltimore and Indianapolis. That’s among the many greatest offenses within the NFL, and three of probably the most bodily speeding groups in 2021.
And remember Tagovailoa did that with the NFL’s Twenty ninth-worst speeding offense, a crew that averaged 92.2 speeding yards per sport and three.5 yards per try, which was the second-worst common within the NFL, forward of solely Houston (3.4).
Final season San Francisco, which is the franchise whose speeding assault McDaniel led, had the seventh-best speeding assault within the NFL, averaging 124.6 speeding yards per sport.
The Los Angeles Chargers, who's the place new offensive coordinator Frank Smith got here from, averaged 107.9 speeding yards per sport, which ranked twenty first within the NFL.
However speeding yards isn’t the gold commonplace. Philadelphia led the NFL in speeding, but have been a backside 10 crew in time of possession.
Why? As a result of Eagles quarterback Jalen Hurts accomplished simply 61.3 % of his passes, which ranked him twenty seventh amongst NFL starters. These incompletions led to clock stoppages, and drive-killing performs.
Tagovailoa’s 67.8 % completion proportion ranked him seventh greatest within the NFL final season. Pair that with Miami’s third-down effectivity (40.8 %) and it explains why the Dolphins offense was on the sphere a lot, and oftentimes ready to attain.
Think about how rather more efficient Tagovailoa could possibly be if the run sport balanced out the offense, and probably gave him shorter down-and-distance conditions to transform?
Take into consideration what Miami’s offense may grow to be if McDaniel brings a bodily speeding assault, just like the one had with the 49ers, which averaged 4.3 yards per carry final season, and a play-action primarily based offense that retains defenses off-balanced, to Miami.
It’s a stable blueprint, and justifies Miami’s rational behind hiring McDaniel, and their insistence that this franchise be constructed round Tagovailoa, who owns a 13-8 report as an NFL starter the previous two seasons.
By now we should always have discovered that cute, finesse, fancy soccer isn’t taking this franchise anyplace.
Let’s hope McDaniel is ready to construct a crew that’s capable of roll up its sleeves and get just a little dirty as a result of that’s the very best recipe for the Dolphins to grow to be a winner with Tagovailoa on the helm.