11/16 Sports Buzz

[Daytona Fin]

Cowboys owner Jerry Jones said he expects Tony Romo to play Sunday against Miami after missing seven games with a clavicle injury. That means the Dolphins, over the final seven weeks, will face quarterbacks who have accounted for seven Super Bowl wins and 25 Pro Bowl appearances.

That’s worrisome for a Dolphins defense that’s not only dealing with injuries, but also ranks just 20th in pass defense and has allowed a 96.3 opponent passer rating (23rd-worst in the league).

Here’s another way of looking at it: Excluding Brady’s 190-55 career record, the quarterbacks the Dolphins faced in their eight other games had a career record of 93-140, according to footballdatabase.com. That twice counts the record of Tyrod Taylor, who beat Miami twice.

Excluding Brady’s record, the other quarterbacks that Miami is expected to play the rest of the season (Romo, Ryan Fitzpatrick, Joe Flacco, Eli Manning, Phillip Rivers and Andrew Luck) have a career record of 437-338.

Two important caveats:

### Romo and Indianapolis’ Luck might be rusty when they play the Dolphins. Sunday would be Romo’s first game since Sept. 20 against Philadelphia. And Luck is expected to miss two to six weeks with a lacerated kidney; if he’s out the full six, he would return Dec. 27 at Miami.

### Though San Diego’s Philip Rivers (94-68) and Baltimore’s Joe Flacco (84-52) have excellent career records, their teams are both 2-7. But all seven of Baltimore’s losses have been by eight points or fewer. And Flacco is 4-0 against the Dolphins with a 105.6 passer rating.

Romo’s value to the Cowboys, which was already obvious, was reaffirmed in his absence, when Dallas lost seven games started by Brandon Weeden (four) and Matt Cassel (three). Dallas is 15-3 in the last 27 games that Romo has started, 0-9 in the others.

Romo, incidentally, has faced the Dolphins twice before and has four touchdowns, two picks and an 84.9 rating.

On Sunday, the Dolphins will need to defend Romo and his dangerous weapons (receiver Dez Bryant, tight end Jason Witten) with a short-handed defense.

Already without their most productive pass rusher (Cam Wake) because of a season-ending Achilles’ injury, the Dolphins also are dealing with injuries at linebacker (Jelani Jenkins) and cornerback (Brice McCain).

Jenkins has an ankle injury, Brice McCain a knee injury, and their status for Sunday remains to be seen, though Jenkins’ teammates expressed optimism that he will play.

In their absence, young players capably filled in during Miami’s 20-19 win against Philadelphia.

With Brent Grimes sidelined by food poisoning, rookie Bobby McCain ended up playing 95 of Miami’s 96 defense snaps. He was going to play a lot regardless but ended up playing more than any Dolphins defensive player except safety Reshad Jones.

Among Miami’s other cornerbacks, Jamar Taylor logged 79 snaps, Brice McCain 43 before his injury, rookie Tony Lippett 22 and Zack Bowman 21.

With Jenkins limited to 17 snaps at linebacker, undrafted rookie Neville Hewitt played 65 snaps after logging 40 combined over the first eight weeks. Kelvin Sheppard played 70, Koa Misi 48 and undrafted rookies Mike Hull and Zach Vigil played 13 and 5, respectively.

Some other notes:


### Pro FootballFocus gave Vernon Miami’s highest grade Sunday (a plus 6.9) largely because he had six quarterback hurries. The rest of the top five Dolphins grades: Suh at plus 4.2, Shelby at plus 4.1, Jones at plus 3.1 and Taylor at plus 2.7.

PFF said Shelby is now grading out among the top 10 defensive ends who play in a 4-3 defense.

### PFF said guard Billy Turner, who had two false start penalties, was Miami’s only offensive lineman with a positive grade in pass protection.

http://miamiherald.typepad.com/spor...day-grades-snap-counts-and-other-tidbits.html

 

[fishfanmiami]

from the article

### PFF is down on Mitchell, whom it ranks worst among all defensive tackles against the run. PFF said Mitchell “pulled another disappearing act” Sunday. He had no tackles in the game.

Time to give Mosley or Phillips a start. Mitchell's done squat all season.

Thanks for posting Daytona :up:

 

[The Ghost]

from the article



Time to give Mosley or Phillips a start. Mitchell's done swat all season.

Thanks for posting Daytona :up:

Yeah, seriously. Phillips and Mosley should be playing a lot down the stretch, especially Phillips. He's the only DL on the team with the top end kind of talent to help alleviate the loss of Cameron Wake.

 

[Nawledge]

from the article



Time to give Mosley or Phillips a start. Mitchell's done swat all season.

Thanks for posting Daytona :up:

Idk why our team loves to stick with guys who are highly insufficient, like dallas thomas...sheppherd, mitchell, walt aikens...

 

[Kdawg954]

Idk why our team loves to stick with guys who are highly insufficient, like dallas thomas...sheppherd, mitchell, walt aikens...

In the case of Dallas Thomas, do you really think we have better sitting on our bench? At least the guy does flash some ability when asked to move . . . he's just cotton against the bull rush and gives up too much ground. Still you could easily argue he's the best option.

In the case of Mitchell . . . I'd bet money that CJ Mosley and Jordan Phillips improves the position right now.
Also on Sheppard I agree . . . at least with tiny Mike Hull you know he'll be in the area and he's a sound tackler . . . just worry about him shedding blocks, but not like Sheppard is doing well at anything.
Aikens, meh, our safety situation outside of Jones is pretty blah . . . Walt should have the highest upside of whats there but he's been disappointing to me.

 

[VBCheeseGrater]

Hard to argue against benching Mitchell with what Phillips has shown. Can't say I've been watching Mitchell much at all, but the fact that I forgot he was on the team yesterday watching the game does not bode well. Those announcer didn't even get a chance to butcher his name, ala "Jamar Jenkins".

 

[Kdawg954]

Hard to argue against benching Mitchell with what Phillips has shown. Can't say I've been watching Mitchell much at all, but the fact that I forgot he was on the team yesterday watching the game does not bode well. Those announcer didn't even get a chance to butcher his name, ala "Jamar Jenkins".

Announcers were terrible yesterday . . . at one time Kevin Harlan referred to the Eagles as the Jets

 

[Mogwai]

In no sense did Vernon have a better game than Suh. It's difficult to take pff seriously when they are so fundamentally flawed.

It's amazing luck that we somehow manage to miss backup qbs this year. We can only hope that Romo is rusty.

I've been pushing for us to play our young scrubs instead of our old scrubs and it paid off. Different energy to the D as the game wore on. Mitchell has been a dog for 2 years now it's time to bench him and give Phillips more burn.

 

[Bob512]

In no sense did Vernon have a better game than Suh. It's difficult to take pff seriously when they are so fundamentally flawed.

It's amazing luck that we somehow manage to miss backup qbs this year. We can only hope that Romo is rusty.

I've been pushing for us to play our young scrubs instead of our old scrubs and it paid off. Different energy to the D as the game wore on. Mitchell has been a dog for 2 years now it's time to bench him and give Phillips more burn.

Your right....Suh had a great game yesterday.

 

[AEGBRG]

Announcers were terrible yesterday . . . at one time Kevin Harlan referred to the Eagles as the Jets

When you are not a good team you are going to get crap announcers.

 

[Tannchise]

Idk why our team loves to stick with guys who are highly insufficient, like dallas thomas...sheppherd, mitchell, walt aikens...

nailed it!

---------- Post added at 12:41 PM ---------- Previous post was at 12:41 PM ----------

When you are not a good team you are going to get crap announcers.

unless you're playing a sexy team like Cowboys

 

[DuderinoN703]

About the QBs and the Pro Bowl numbers and all, the combined record of the final opponents is 29-35. The Patriots record skews the overall record and without them the final 6 are 20-35.

Miami is an average team with a lot of injuries but 5 of the last 7 at home gives them a chance. Dan Campbell has been coach for 5 games now and 4 of them were on the road. That's brutal.

 

[ANUFan]

from the article



Time to give Mosley or Phillips a start. Mitchell's done squat all season.

Thanks for posting Daytona :up:

This is one of the things that has me worried about D.Campbell. He seems to be really loyal to veterans which is good but bad when they need to get less snaps or sit. He doesn't seem like the type of coach that would sit or give Mitchell less snaps in favor of someone else. D.Williams is a GREAT example of that. He shouldn't be anywhere near the ball(A liability in the KR and as a backup to L.Miller)

Mitchell has been a HUGE disappointment this season especially when you consider Suh is getting double and triple team leaving him 1 on 1 for most of the season. If you can't produce next to a guy like that then you don't deserve to start. The same holds true for OV although he seems like he's getting closer to the QB every week.

 

[CANDolphan]

This is one of the things that has me worried about D.Campbell. He seems to be really loyal to veterans which is good but bad when they need to get less snaps or sit. He doesn't seem like the type of coach that would sit or give Mitchell less snaps in favor of someone else. D.Williams is a GREAT example of that. He shouldn't be anywhere near the ball(A liability in the KR and as a backup to L.Miller)

Mitchell has been a HUGE disappointment this season especially when you consider Suh is getting double and triple team leaving him 1 on 1 for most of the season. If you can't produce next to a guy like that then you don't deserve to start. The same holds true for OV although he seems like he's getting closer to the QB every week.

If this were true, he wouldnt have sat Jennings for Matthews. Remember, it was Jennings + Stills that were starters on the season.

 

[NRA]

from the article



Time to give Mosley or Phillips a start. Mitchell's done squat all season.

Thanks for posting Daytona :up:

Sorry FFIM, but your way, waaaaayyyyy off the mark on mitchell.

Mitchell's been $hit since DAY ONEin miami. He is the worst of the run stopers on this line. Guy has one move, his bull rush butllland unfortunately, teams are now scheming this, just let him bull rush his man, double suh just enough so the rb can slip by him and through the hole created by allowing mitchells bull rush to push his man just far enough back for the rb to slip under. And this leaves mitchell flailing his arms like a wounded squid trying to get a hand grab or an arm tackle once he's realized he's been duped. He's to far out of the play that's designed to happen right behind him as he's bull rushing forward.

That play where he was in coverage at phillies endzone and watched the wr go into the end zone and starts to come across the back of the endzone but mitchell has turned around, then looks back, sees him, doesnt make a move until the ball hits the wr's hands and then hobbles towards him looking lazy and stupid. That play should have been the coffins nail for him. Hopefully we shall see much diminished playing time from him here on out.

Glad i'm not the only one Tired of mitchell. I was positive they drafted Philips to be Suh's partner and making mitchell the rotation man but like most rookies and youngsters, he got Philbined. As of now, i don't care, start Philips or Mosely and get mitchell out of there.