Initial return is excellent. Showing a lot of promise. Obviously its a combined effort from the FO and coaching staff but most wont credit Tannenbaum for doing a good job. Grier and Gase will get all the credit lol.
Can we talk about the draft class
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TannDaMan17
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Super impressed with this draft class, Charles Harris was a brilliant pick. The thought of him being groomed by Wake gives me goosebumps. For my whole football watching life (basically post Marino) the defense has been the strength of the Miami Dolphins, with the exception of last year. With the 2017 draft class, it looks like that won't be changing for a least another couple of years which is great. Starting to love Chris Grier like I loved Ireland and I am not ashamed of that. Both men have a special eye for talent (Watch Reshad and OV), and luckily for Grier, he has a competent coach to work with which helps a little bit in this business lol.
I’ve been excited about this draft class since the pads came on in training camp. It was at that point we began to hear about Godchaux and his surprising rise to something more than a backup. He’s been everything any team would hope to find in the 5th round. Harris has begun to translate his talent he displayed during OTAs on actual game day. No questions about his talent but after a pre season where he disappeared, his resent play has been encouraging. Vincent Taylor has become the wildcard with his steady play. He’s been a real find and a player to watch in the future. I can’t say enough about Tankersley who worried most fans with his rep as a being afraid to tackle. This kid has been assignment sound and has really shown great coverage ability. He’ll only get better with experience. Love his attitude too. He’s been a quick learner and has allowed the team to potentially move on from Maxwell. His play has also allowed Jones to play at another level. He’s locked down that CB spot. Hopefully Asiata is able to lose some weight and take a starting spot next year. McMillan hopefully return to full health. Great draft class. Great potential.
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I hate to think about hypothetical's but your probably right in that 5-0 comment. Hard to imagine if #17 was healthy that our offense would be very dynamic.
As an Ohio State fan I was most excited about Raekwon, still am, but certainly thought he would change the way we play defense with his leadership and intangibles. That will have to wait a season. I was a Charles Harris guy so I am hoping he continues with steady improvement week in and week out and he should be worth the pick we used no question.
Tank is looking like our best third round pick in years (OV in 2012). We have struggled mightily in the third but mostly with failed attempts to find interior OL.
Godchaux is a bonus right now. What's really encouraging is seeing Jordan Philips getting excited and high fiving guys even when he's not involved in a play as if he wants to be a part of our future or something.
Thankfully, this draft give's us the flexibility to address offensive issues with more assets in 2018.
Dolph N.Fan
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Next year I want a TE, QB, LB, G and another CB in next year’s draft.
Need insurance for Tannehill and McMillan. And I want McCain gone. And for the love of god at least attempt to find a decent TE in the draft.
Need insurance for Tannehill and McMillan. And I want McCain gone. And for the love of god at least attempt to find a decent TE in the draft.
TannDaMan17
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Been saying that since last year, he's O.K I guess, but a quality slot CB would really elevate this defense.
On defense yes, but on offense we are still waiting to see how our offensive lineman does and if Forde our 7th round steal works out. We can certainly use offensive line help and another good reciever as Caroo has not shown up yet and Parker gets injured.
John813
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Too early to say. Last year, Cowboy fans were claiming 2016 was one of their best ones ever.
Zeke is lacking his elite speed(skill) and has the DV case, Jaylon Smith would drive Sons of Shula insane, Collins(3-tech) still struggles against the run and has disappeared from the pass rush, Tapper is out again for the year, Dak is having some accuracy issues and A. Brown is getting burned in coverage.
so far, I'm impressed, but way too early to judge it against other classes.
Zeke is lacking his elite speed(skill) and has the DV case, Jaylon Smith would drive Sons of Shula insane, Collins(3-tech) still struggles against the run and has disappeared from the pass rush, Tapper is out again for the year, Dak is having some accuracy issues and A. Brown is getting burned in coverage.
so far, I'm impressed, but way too early to judge it against other classes.
You really need two in a division with the Patriots.
ckparrothead
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I'd like a little more time (that's an understatement, as it could take years) to see what Charles Harris's ceiling will be and that's the biggest question mark to me.
But as things stand you evaluate a draft class anymore by what they can give you in their first four seasons, because that's the amount of time that you get these players at pre-market price tags. After that, you're paying for whatever you get.
On that basis we're about 1/13th of the way through and the returns have been tremendous.
Cordrea Tankersley has now started three games and been very, very good. As I said when he was drafted, he was the best value pick Miami made in that entire draft. The tackling issue was FAR overblown, as were the schematic fit issues people raised (especially since Matt Burke had given us a lot of signals that he was bringing more man coverage to the table), and given the lack of reliability of a Byron Maxwell, this kid could be on the field a LOT sooner than people thought.
That's not to say Charles Harris wasn't/isn't a good player. He is. But they traded a good asset (first round pick) for a good player. He's a part-timer, and he's coming along kind of steadily. If you look at the last two games in particular though, he MAY be starting to compel a re-rating of his stock based on the tremendous strides he's taken as a run defender. He seems to have examined that particular weakness in his game, and begun to successfully work on it. That would be a big deal for him.
The real icing has come from the defensive tackle pair, Davon Godchaux and Vincent Taylor. Of the two I thought Taylor would be ahead of Godchaux, as I thought Davon was destined to be more of lateral mobility and run defense guy than a heavy-handed strength guy. In preseason he looked Herculean. But Vincent Taylor also looked good in preseason, just overshadowed by the sheer number of plays Godchaux kept making even against some starters and rotation players. Come the regular season that flipped a bit. Vincent Taylor had played better. But then against the Titans, I thought we started to see Preseason Godchaux once again. He followed up well yesterday. Yet Taylor has continued to be steady and to make plays. And what's nuts is the competition really has inspired the best out of Jordan Phillips, who stuck his own nose into the mix in a big way yesterday.
That's a big return because you're not just getting great rotation minutes from Godchaux and Taylor, you're getting great minutes out of Jordan Phillips because you lit a fire under his ass.
No idea what Raekwon McMillan is going to be at this point. Based on what I've seen out of Rey Maualuga in this scheme under Matt Burke, I can see why they were attracted to Raekwon at MLB though.
But as things stand you evaluate a draft class anymore by what they can give you in their first four seasons, because that's the amount of time that you get these players at pre-market price tags. After that, you're paying for whatever you get.
On that basis we're about 1/13th of the way through and the returns have been tremendous.
Cordrea Tankersley has now started three games and been very, very good. As I said when he was drafted, he was the best value pick Miami made in that entire draft. The tackling issue was FAR overblown, as were the schematic fit issues people raised (especially since Matt Burke had given us a lot of signals that he was bringing more man coverage to the table), and given the lack of reliability of a Byron Maxwell, this kid could be on the field a LOT sooner than people thought.
That's not to say Charles Harris wasn't/isn't a good player. He is. But they traded a good asset (first round pick) for a good player. He's a part-timer, and he's coming along kind of steadily. If you look at the last two games in particular though, he MAY be starting to compel a re-rating of his stock based on the tremendous strides he's taken as a run defender. He seems to have examined that particular weakness in his game, and begun to successfully work on it. That would be a big deal for him.
The real icing has come from the defensive tackle pair, Davon Godchaux and Vincent Taylor. Of the two I thought Taylor would be ahead of Godchaux, as I thought Davon was destined to be more of lateral mobility and run defense guy than a heavy-handed strength guy. In preseason he looked Herculean. But Vincent Taylor also looked good in preseason, just overshadowed by the sheer number of plays Godchaux kept making even against some starters and rotation players. Come the regular season that flipped a bit. Vincent Taylor had played better. But then against the Titans, I thought we started to see Preseason Godchaux once again. He followed up well yesterday. Yet Taylor has continued to be steady and to make plays. And what's nuts is the competition really has inspired the best out of Jordan Phillips, who stuck his own nose into the mix in a big way yesterday.
That's a big return because you're not just getting great rotation minutes from Godchaux and Taylor, you're getting great minutes out of Jordan Phillips because you lit a fire under his ass.
No idea what Raekwon McMillan is going to be at this point. Based on what I've seen out of Rey Maualuga in this scheme under Matt Burke, I can see why they were attracted to Raekwon at MLB though.
ckparrothead
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I say this in genuine honesty, but I was surprised by the reaction from (what certainly seemed to be) most Dolphins fans to the drafting of Cordrea Tankersley.
The center of the narrative about their drafting Tankersley, between fans, draft media, and Dolphins media, seemed to be in the negative. I was genuinely surprised by that, and not just because default sentiment about draft picks seems to be homer-ish. It was like being at a basketball game and watching a player hit a three pointer, putting your hands up and cheering, and turning around to find the rest of the crowd were all booing. I guess I was just that insulated from whatever the primary narrative had come to be on the player.
Later people started informing me that Mel Kiper basically did a hit job on Tankersley on national television about his run support (I didn't really watch the coverage), and there was also a perception setting in that Tankersley was a terrible scheme fit for the Dolphins.
That started to make a LITTLE more sense, but still didn't pass the smell test. Tankersley made tackles against the run and pass that resulted in offensive failure with regularity at Clemson. Statistically he was among the very best at that among all corners. You can look that up if you want. And as for the scheme fit, did people really think the Dolphins would have been targeting Cordrea (to the point they were even considering the guy in the 1st round) if the player didn't match the scheme they planned to run under the new defensive coordinator?
The future is now for the young guy. I've been hearing him compared favorably to Sam Madison and I can certainly see that.
The center of the narrative about their drafting Tankersley, between fans, draft media, and Dolphins media, seemed to be in the negative. I was genuinely surprised by that, and not just because default sentiment about draft picks seems to be homer-ish. It was like being at a basketball game and watching a player hit a three pointer, putting your hands up and cheering, and turning around to find the rest of the crowd were all booing. I guess I was just that insulated from whatever the primary narrative had come to be on the player.
Later people started informing me that Mel Kiper basically did a hit job on Tankersley on national television about his run support (I didn't really watch the coverage), and there was also a perception setting in that Tankersley was a terrible scheme fit for the Dolphins.
That started to make a LITTLE more sense, but still didn't pass the smell test. Tankersley made tackles against the run and pass that resulted in offensive failure with regularity at Clemson. Statistically he was among the very best at that among all corners. You can look that up if you want. And as for the scheme fit, did people really think the Dolphins would have been targeting Cordrea (to the point they were even considering the guy in the 1st round) if the player didn't match the scheme they planned to run under the new defensive coordinator?
The future is now for the young guy. I've been hearing him compared favorably to Sam Madison and I can certainly see that.
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I'd like to add one other point that hasn't been discussed. I think a big difference now is in player development. I feel like Miami finally has the coaching to help players reach their potential. This has been sorely missing for a long, long time.
The way the young defensive players are developing, the Dolphins may finally be able to fix the offensive line and get that seam busting tight end in the next draft. Let Pouncey go and there's money to sign Landry.
The way the young defensive players are developing, the Dolphins may finally be able to fix the offensive line and get that seam busting tight end in the next draft. Let Pouncey go and there's money to sign Landry.
I like the class so far and yesterday Phillips did a good job too. I'm not the biggest fan of our FO but they deserve some credit so far for this class. They drafted the positions we needed on defense but there's something we need to think about and that is our veteran players and how that goes hand in hand with the rookies.
You have two rookie DT's plus Phillips and you have Suh for them to learn from
You have a 1st round pick DE and you have Wake and Branch to learn from
You have a rookie corner plus Howard and you have Jones to learn from
Wish we had Mcmiilan as we have Timmons to learn from
I believe is very important to have the right kind of veterans to take the young guys under their wings.
Untill yesterday I was a little skeptical of the defense but they're looking good and that is a combination of the rookies AND the veteran players
Ozzy rules!!
You have two rookie DT's plus Phillips and you have Suh for them to learn from
You have a 1st round pick DE and you have Wake and Branch to learn from
You have a rookie corner plus Howard and you have Jones to learn from
Wish we had Mcmiilan as we have Timmons to learn from
I believe is very important to have the right kind of veterans to take the young guys under their wings.
Untill yesterday I was a little skeptical of the defense but they're looking good and that is a combination of the rookies AND the veteran players
Ozzy rules!!
ebozzz
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Langford still has a roster spot in the league. So does Henne. We had so many coaching issues during that period of time that my opinion is that if the staff had been more solid, maybe some of those guys would have developed to become more useful to our team. Eddie Moore? Was he always hurt or did he just get ktfo? :D