Just watched the Sunshine Network Live Scrimmage Between Tennessee and Miami... | FinHeaven - Miami Dolphins Forums

Just watched the Sunshine Network Live Scrimmage Between Tennessee and Miami...

ckparrothead

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Alright I gotta say that I'm not all that happy with how our first teams looked out there. For what its worth, I'll try and recap because I know that a lot of people dont live in FL and had trouble with the internet feed.

The first series was Titans offense against Dolphins D, 8 snaps from their own 35 yd line, first teams. They nickel and dimed us. For some reason, our guys were not only refusing to tackle them, but for the most part were just satisfied with merely TOUCHING them...Zach Thomas included. I'm sorry but our guys are probably thinking to themselves "I touched him, in a game he'd have been down" but that just not true because we're talking about EDDIE GEORGE here, and our guys usually were not in position to square up on him which you need to do against Eddie George. Larry Chester didn't make himself standout much. We weren't putting pressure on with the front four. It almost seemed like our guys entered the series half-@ssed and didn't decide to play until later. The Titans scored on a 19 yd dumpoff to Eddie George and the homer announcers tried to say that in a real game Zach would have had George but the truth of the matter is no, its a game of inches and George had enough inches to catch that ball cleanly hitting or no and Zach probably wouldn't have caught up cuz of the angles. The bright spot on this series? Arturo Freeman looked very impressive...very impressive to me.

The next series was also frustrating. It was our offense against their defense. Jay Fiedler did not play at all, it was the Ray Lucas show. And if the defense looked like they began their first series half-@ssed, the offense did as well. One of the first plays Lucas tosses a bullet to the flats where Rob Konrad is wide open and ready to run untouched for probably 5-10 yards. What happens? Lucas guns it too much which everyone screams about, and Rob "I think I'll turn around and start running before I've actually caught the ball" Konrad lets the ball go in and out of his wide open hands. Lucas was having accuracy issues left and right, overthrowing very badly an open Ricky Williams crossing in the middle when the pressure was on, leaving our superstar Chris Chambers hanging to be pummelled by 3 defenders (he almost came up with the ball anyway and one of the defenders had his mits all over the ball too...impressive to me), and etc. We didn't run the ball much but when we did, it was not good...give Ricky credit he bowls but he wouldn't have averaged 3 yrds if there was hitting. The REALLY disappointing part had to be Brent Smith. He was getting absolutely manhandled by Jevon Kearse. I realize Kearse is the freak and all but I'm not sure there was a single play where Kearse rushed to the outside and did NOT totally beat Brent Smith. He sacked Lucas, maybe twice don't know, and another time give Lucas credit for the presence he stepped up just enough to get the ball off without Kearse pummelling him. But there were bright spots. A few small completions and then the Titans threw a monster blitz package at us which we picked up beautifully in no small part thanks to Ricky Williams' blocking, Lucas stepped up and lofted a 20 yarder to Chambers on a fade route on the sidelines, who was just inching past Dainon Sidney who was on single zone coverage, and Chambers catches the ball and just gets his feet in the lines before falling out of bounds with two defenders coming at him.

Then we started tossing in the backups. I think it was the same drill. Overall I won't go over anymore play by play description but just to say what stood out and an overall feel. The backups played well, both sides of the ball for us with the exception being Zak Kustok who though he made a very nice looking scramble for about 20 yards, also just was throwing errant passes all over the place including a real wobbling duck that sat in the air forever that a 70 yr old blind man could have hobbled from one side of the field to the other to intercept. I'll concentrate on offense right here. Leonard Henry had some impressive runs and I can definitely see where some people have claimed he looks very tough to bring down as he showed that on some plays. On another play though he ran into a blocker and got completely bounced backwards onto his butt so there's consistency issues there. Randy McMichael looked very athletic had 1 or 2 catches not for big yardage but you can tell he's fast and he DID have some excellent downfield blocking on Zak Kustok's big run. However he also had a bad play play where it was either him or Albert Johnson (probably McMichael from what I've heard he's been known to line up in the wrong spot) but the ran right into each other with their routes. The OL started looking better. Sulecio Stanford and Margin Hooks made two good plays as Stanford got wide open and caught a ball and had to dive for it but popped back up within a milisecond and was running for extra yardage. Margin Hooks took a pass thrown at the 1 foot line and though he had two defenders with leverage against him he used sheer strength to bull his way in.

Tim Levcik looked real good in my opinion and reminded me a lot of Rich Gannon without the mobility. This was the first opportunity I had to see him but I'm already very high on him just from this performance. At first I was saying to myself, this kids arm doesn't look as strong as everyone says it is. But then I realized, its because he actually VARIES his throws according to whats NECESSARY, an idea that seems to be completely lost on Ray Lucas who throws his fast ball for every pass. Levcik was doing it all, sidearming short ones, throwing a nice looking long ball to Sulecio who had gotten wide open (props to Levcik for recognizing that the DB had tripped and throwing it to Sulecio on the run), and then throwing the gun when needed which included a laser beam that split two defenders...the aforementioned Margin Hooks reception where Margin bulled into the end zone. This kid better be on the roster come season opener. He won't be hidden on the psquad. I didn't see any accuracy problems whatsoever, and he seemed to have a good grasp on the plays and knew where to throw, varying his targets.

The first team offense came back onto the field a second time and looked a little better but couldn't put the ball in the endzone in the two minute drill. Konrad caught a nice pass while getting pounded by a defender. Chambers looks like Tim Brown to me, Tim Brown in his prime...But anyway, the OL did better I believe. Don't think anyone in particular stood out. If I dont mention them its cuz they didn't stand out to me.

Second team defense a number of players stood out. That new kid Jason Moore I think his name is, made a very nice interception...kept his eyes on the QB the whole time and made the play. I would say keep an eye on him just cuz this is the second time I've heard he's been impressive. Henry Taylor was doing quite well he made a number of plays in the backfield and was beating their second team very nicely. Seaverns stood out to me a little bit he seems like he hits the whole nicely and also is not half bad at being able to hold his ground against a big OLman. James Atkins was solid, can't really think of anyone else who stood out.

There was an odd period where the first team defense stepped back onto the field while the Titans had mainly their second stringers in there at the skill positions (I think the OL was same). Neil O"Donnell was doing the passing, Skip Hicks, Holcombe, and Alexander doing the running. McCareins was in there catching but I think Dyson might have been in there. If there was an absolute brightest spot of the scrimmage it was this portion. We absolutely hammered them on defense. I think the reason we had all 1st string in there is to try out some new kinks along the defensive line rotation. We put four defensive ends in the game during the 2 minute drill. Thats right, 4 DEs just as I had speculated might be done if Ernest Grant doesn't look good as a pass rusher and Dave Bowens continues to impress. For those doubters it was right there in front of us. David Bowens, Jay Williams, Rob Burnett, and Jason Taylor at the DL, stunting and twisting using their incredible speed and guess what happened. We sacked the QB. A lot. They absolutely could NOT block this 4 man rush during the 2 minute drills. Seriously it was unbelievable. They even tried to take advantage by running the ball, didn't work. As I said before both Rob Burnett and Jay Williams on their respective teams were often moved to DT during nickel rushes, and I speculated that we may see this exact setup should Dave Bowens continue to impress (which he did some more...as did all four of the DEs that played, plus Larry Chester when he came back in the game he really made his presence felt). Some said that I was crazy that we need at least one beefy man in there, however I would not be surprised to see exactly this formation during 2 minute drills during the season. It looked pretty deadly.

Who's Hot (in no particular order): Tim Levcik, Randy McMichael, Chris Chambers, Henry Taylor, Todd Wade, Leonard Henry, the 4-DE DL, Chester, Seaverns, Hooks, the second team OL (who made MARLON BARNES look good), and Stanford.

Who's Not (in no particular order: Brent Smith (who looked aweful), Ray Lucas, Zach Thomas (IMO, he wasn't trying during the first series), Rob Konrad, Randy McMichael (he's schizo, looks good then looks like a bonehead), Zebbie Letheridge, and Tim Bowens (out yet again).

Thats my opinion and I'm stickin to it.
 
Good job on the revue. Tell me this, who the heck is this Henry Taylor and is he a DE or DT? I haven't heard of him until a day or two ago.
 
Pretty crude stuff you said about zach......... if their is one thing that describes zach, it his drive to make the play. That one play when eddie scored the TD, zach would have gotton him if it counted. you can not judge the defense in scrimmages......... thats my opinion at least......... Surtain had a few nice plays and so did freeman. Our Dline had like 5 sacks, chester, jason(2), williams, and someone else, oh yeh that grant guy.......
Our offense would have looked better if we didnt have bonehead lucas in there. Chambers........ duh........ Ricky had like an 8 yard run...... He ran the ball twice....... thats pretty good. He had an outstanding block on the td pass to chris and i was amazed. McMichael looked fine, he caught everthing except 1 bobbled pass..... Henry looked good for the amount of time he played........ Gadsten got 1 catch for a nice gain........ I do not like lucas at all......... he threw an int that my grandmother could have caught...... Thats my perspective and im sticking too it :)
 
Nice updates "CK" and "5434"! I did post a little blurb on another thread after I watched the scrimmage. "CK" nice play by play on the first team. It was hard for me to guage when contact was made because it was touch football. I agree with you on Freeman. He played well and was in the backfield quite a few times. As you said, Zack was barely trying. I'll forgive him though. I know when thinks start to count he will be "balling".
I also agree with you on Levcik. This guy will be okay. Hell, he's just a rookie and they say he is making very good progress lately. I think his arm and accuracy make up for any footwork and decision making issues he has right now. For me the other young rook Kustok has just to weak of an arm, even weaker than Fiedlers.

I'm a little disapointed to here the Roussel hasn't been doing all that well after all. I thought we had a keeper there. I don't know if Royals will be a Matt Turk, but as long as he's solid, I can live with that until we can try again next year.

I thought overall we did pretty good. I think the Titans will have a good team this year, but if we did play...the phins will take 'em because we match up well.
 
@Dol Fan5434

sorry man that is not Chambers on his first catch as it was a sunday night game and it was already dark and I think he didn´t had to jump that much to get it. I knew he was jumping for it but not so far. Also I think it was on the other side of the field.

Ciao alex from Berlin , Germany
 
Originally posted by SWS84

I also agree with you on Levcik. This guy will be okay. Hell, he's just a rookie and they say he is making very good progress lately. I think his arm and accuracy make up for any footwork and decision making issues he has right now.

I can think of another Dolphins QB who had very similar qualities/weaknesses... cannon for an arm, but used a nice touch when needed... good decision making and field presence, not much mobility, and he did pretty well...

Sound familiar?
 
And I think I have the right to be tough on Zach Thomas. Lets be honest when he's not doing the job. He's a great player but that doesn't mean that he never does anything wrong. That TD? Zach would simply NOT have gotten George on that TD. George had outright beaten him on the route and had the running head start and the angle to go in for the TD. Zach wasn't even within reach to touch Eddie's jersey. And too many other plays Zach just casually ran up and smacked his jersey, often at a poor angle to be making a tackle from if it were real, and was satisfied with himself. Sorry I know this is a scrimmage but you've got to show me a little better than that. And when he went back out there when the coaches put the 1st team defense back in the game, he was actually tackling and squaring up and not doing this half-@ssed baby love tap thing, so I think the coaches may have come up to him and said something. I'll give Zach a break because you know he won't be half-@ssed during actual games however even for the Pro Bowler these scrimmages are tryouts to make sure he can get the job done. Its important for Bates to see NOW whether or not we'll be stopping the run and short pass enough with the front 7 so that we can keep our safeties back most of the time which is when our pass D is best. How can we tell if Zach's not even giving 70% out there?

Henry Taylor's a 3 yr veteran played with Detroit his rookie year then ATL then he played some for us last year we rostered him during the regular season at some point. He did alright in action if I remember correctly. He and James Atkins are both battling with Ernest Grant for the 4th DT spot. I've heard his name mentioned twice in glowing terms now (well, once, then saw the scrimmage) and I haven't heard Grant's name mentioned though some said that James Atkins looks real good. I honestly think some people might be waiting a little bit for us to release Atkins...

The thing that really impressed me about Levcik is his touch. He's got the cannon when he needs it, but when he doesn't he puts excellent touch on passes and varies his throw according to what NEEDS to be done. Lucas throws 100mph every single throw even dumpoffs and he wonders why his arm hurts after only a week or two of taking first team snaps. Truth be told I didn't see Levcik do much if anything wrong yesterday so I dont think I'm comfortable making any critiques of him, but I guess people most often mention that his mobility is in question, and his decision making. I say if he packs on about 10-15 more pounds (though to be completely honest I thought he looked fine out there not nearly as emaciated as some made him out to be) he could be quite a force...guy's situation reminds me a lot of Kurt Warner.
 
Yeah, Zach's finished. His performance in this scrimmage will put him on the practice squad.
 
Originally posted by ckparrothead
Don Strock?

and before you start on me... No, I am not comparing this kid to any former Dolphins QB... I am making no claims that he is, or will ever be as good as Dan...I was merely commenting on some similarities in the type of QB...
 
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