Dolphins sign Long Snapper Rex Sunahara | FinHeaven - Miami Dolphins Forums

Dolphins sign Long Snapper Rex Sunahara

umpalu

umpalu

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MIAMI GARDENS, Fla. - The Miami Dolphins today announced they have signed long snapper Rex Sunahara.
Sunahara is an undrafted free agent from West Virginia, where he was a semifinalist for the 2019 Patrick Mannelly Award, given annually to the nation's top long snapper. Sunahara played in 25 career games at West Virginia and handled long snapping duties for punts, field goals in extra points in all 24 games as a junior and senior. He originally began his collegiate career at Rhode Island before transferring to West Virginia in 2016.
 
Still find it odd we used a draft pick on a LS. Nothing against the kid but I’m guessing we could have picked him up as an UDFA - and if not, picked this guy up. Or last years guy Pepper as GG just mentioned. Or brought Denney out of retirement. You know what I’m saying.,,,
 
Unless you're competing for a playoff spot does it really matter who your snapper is? Even a bad long snapper at the NFL level might cost a team just one win over the course of a season. Of course we notice things because we're Dolphin fans, but when you think of the other 31 teams how many times have you really noticed the long snapper? I've can probably count on one hand the number of times I've said that long snapper isn't just having a bad game, he's just really no good and needs to go.

As for Pepper in Miami last season, I can't recall many overtly bad snaps, but there must have been something there that coaches think threw off the timing and cause Sanders accuracy to drop.
 
royalshank said:
Still find it odd we used a draft pick on a LS. Nothing against the kid but I’m guessing we could have picked him up as an UDFA - and if not, picked this guy up. Or last years guy Pepper as GG just mentioned. Or brought Denney out of retirement. You know what I’m saying.,,,
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Your plan makes sense to me. Does he do anything else? OL depth?
 
The kicking game is more important than many posters here seem to acknowledge. It's more then just the kickers who are involved. The center has to be good at long snaps and is still responsible for the correct offensive line responsibilities.

You ignore good centers at the risk of limiting the offensive lines cohesion, be they long snappers or first line offensive players.
 
First Dan Marino retires and we rotate QBs for two decades.

Now John Denney retires and we are 1 year in and already 3 long snappers.
 
Well... John didn't exactly retire, and cutting him is still showing itself to have been a questionable decision.
 
Not questionable to me.

This was coming just due to our long term long snappers age and expected years of functional play left. It was a business decision and represents a method we should expect to see in the future, where we release aging players BEFORE their performance drops off, to be replaced with players we have as backups or have just drafted. This is one of the things our new coaching staff had used in New England quite effectively.

With the effects of the pandemic on player availability, keeping depth at all positions is EXTREMLEY important. That certainly would account with what we just saw the front office do in free agency to assure we have a competent long snapper along with what's happening at some other positions on the team.

We need to get used to this kind of mind set from the front office. It insures a consistency of performance at a lower cost due to the limiting of the effect of the amount and duration of contracts of experienced players on our ability to always bring in a free agent in an emergency and to help control cap space.
 
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