Looking back at the 2021 draft

[mwestberry]

MSN

The Dolphins only had 3 draft selections in 2021.

The team selected one OL. While the Dolphins selected Eichenberg, five other OL were selected that apparently make up half of the 5 best players from that particular draft.

Without physically looking at everything that happened, I wonder what the thought process might have been, having drafted a QB the prior year?

I was shouting for Micah Parsons along with others.
The team definitely needed to shore up the OL.
Eich certainly hasn't "risen to the top".

With only 3 picks, in retrospect, how would you have approached the 2021 draft?

 

[BahamaFinFan78]

MSN

The Dolphins only had 3 draft selections in 2021.

The team selected one OL. While the Dolphins selected Eichenberg, five other OL were selected that apparently make up half of the 5 best players from that particular draft.

Without physically looking at everything that happened, I wonder what the thought process might have been, having drafted a QB the prior year?

I was shouting for Micah Parsons along with others.
The team definitely needed to shore up the OL.
Eich certainly hasn't "risen to the top".

With only 3 picks, in retrospect, how would you have approached the 2021 draft?

We had 7 picks in this draft. I'm not sure where you got 3 from. We drafted Waddle, Phillips, Holland, Eich, Long, Coleman and Doaks.

 

[JamesWsenior]

I don't look back. OTAs have started.

 

[Finsup1981]

MSN

The Dolphins only had 3 draft selections in 2021.

The team selected one OL. While the Dolphins selected Eichenberg, five other OL were selected that apparently make up half of the 5 best players from that particular draft.

Without physically looking at everything that happened, I wonder what the thought process might have been, having drafted a QB the prior year?

I was shouting for Micah Parsons along with others.
The team definitely needed to shore up the OL.
Eich certainly hasn't "risen to the top".

With only 3 picks, in retrospect, how would you have approached the 2021 draft?

Think you are looking at 2022 and the Tindall/Ezukamna draft

 

[Springveldt]

MSN

The Dolphins only had 3 draft selections in 2021.

The team selected one OL. While the Dolphins selected Eichenberg, five other OL were selected that apparently make up half of the 5 best players from that particular draft.

Without physically looking at everything that happened, I wonder what the thought process might have been, having drafted a QB the prior year?

I was shouting for Micah Parsons along with others.
The team definitely needed to shore up the OL.
Eich certainly hasn't "risen to the top".

With only 3 picks, in retrospect, how would you have approached the 2021 draft?

The thought process was to get their young QB some help as he had absolutely nothing at WR.

In the end it looks like Grier chose the worst option of the 4 available to him.

1. Stay at #3 and take Chase or Sewell.
2. After the awesome trade down to #12, stay there and select best player available, Parsons or Slater.
3. After wasting picks to move up to #6 at least take Sewell.
4. He takes Waddle at #6

I don't blame him for going after a WR at all, we had absolutely nothing and Tua desperately needed the help. I'm guessing he didn't go OL as he had took Ajax the season before (who was looking like a bust until McDaniel hid his pass protection deficiencies) but really Chase or Sewell should have been the pick if staying at #3.

Waddle was a good pick in the grand scheme of things but hindsight has shown there were better options available and Grier ended up taking the guy who is good, not great like he does a lot of the time.

 

[Mello Yello]

The thought process was to get their young QB some help as he had absolutely nothing at WR.

In the end it looks like Grier chose the worst option of the 4 available to him.

1. Stay at #3 and take Chase or Sewell.
2. After the awesome trade down to #12, stay there and select best player available, Parsons or Slater.
3. After wasting picks to move up to #6 at least take Sewell.
4. He takes Waddle at #6

I don't blame him for going after a WR at all, we had absolutely nothing and Tua desperately needed the help. I'm guessing he didn't go OL as he had took Ajax the season before (who was looking like a bust until McDaniel hid his pass protection deficiencies) but really Chase or Sewell should have been the pick if staying at #3.

Waddle was a good pick in the grand scheme of things but hindsight has shown there were better options available and Grier ended up taking the guy who is good, not great like he does a lot of the time.

A personal pet peeve of mine are the people who try to judge a GM by the production of his selections.

(1) Many selections are the result of other factors (Owner, HC, Scouting Dept, etc.).
(2) Many selections are made because the priority target just got drafted 1-2 spots ahead.
(3) Many selections end up booming/busting as a result of coaching, scheme, etc.
(4) A GMs job is really to manage so it's the logic behind the decision in the moment that matters, not the production years later.


One of the reasons I don't necessarily credit the Dolphins with Waddle as a "hit" is exactly what you say...basically any of the alternatives would've been equally as appealing.

The options were essentially Sewell (who was projected to be be very good) alongside the 4 receiving options: Pitts, Chase, Smith and Waddle. Every single one of those names has been a productive player. In that sense, failure wasn't in the cards at all, but as you say, there were certainly alternatives.


One thing I'll say is that having drafted two OL the year before, the Dolphins really weren't going OL again using their highest pick. Both of the guys they drafted (Ajax & Rob Hunt) were drafted highly and went on to be good players so spending another pick on OL the very next year within the Top-10 just wasn't in the cards.

That also means you weren't staying at 12 and taking Slater. That too just wouldn't have been in the cards.

The idea of selecting Parsons at 12 may have been an option but the downside of that is that you would've probably selected a WR at 18 and that would've assuredly been a bust. Everyone forgets that after Pitts, Chase, Waddle and Smith were off the board the next available options were Kadarius Toney, Rashod Bateman and Elijah Moore...none of whom were very good.

So, as much as we may be frustrated by the OL performance in recent years, you just can't spend picks on the OL over and over without neglecting other areas and truth is, this was a great chance to get a premier receiver for Tua....we just missed.

Waddle is good but he is no Ja'Marr Chase, a player who's probably destined for the HOF.

This is kind of another example of how the Dolphins drafting is perennially mid....we do a good job of avoiding the unproductive busts but it seems to come at the cost of always missing on the great players and it's just really hard to be a special team without those kinds of guys.

 

[Scotty_P]

 

[The Ghost]

I don't look back. OTAs have started.

Here, here.

 

[Mello Yello]

A lot of people baulked when I said 50% of this is luck but that's how the draft really works out most of the time.

#1 - You weren't going OL with your highest pick. Long & Pouncey had their careers limited by injury. Tunsil ended up on another team. You just drafted Ajax and Hunt the year before, both inside the Top-40. You just weren't going to spend another pick on the OL. Sewell and Slater are cool players but Miami just wasn't in position to draft OL given their history. No GM would've been likely to do that given the team's other glaring needs.

#2 - The need for a weapon was obvious and this draft was loaded. There was just very little chance of passing over not just 1, but 4 premium weapons in Pitts, Chase, Smith and Waddle, all of whom had big-time play-making ability. The least sexy of those 4 had just won the Heisman for goodness sake. It was a ridiculous set of options you were unlikely to pass over given you had a glaring need at receiver.

#3 - People will moan about Waddle but they forget he came with an extra R1 pick. You got 2 for trading back with SF and only gave back 1 in the trade-up to #6. So you netted 1 extra R1 pick alongside Waddle. So, it's not really Waddle-vs-Chase or Waddle-vs-Sewell. In this context, Waddle+R1 probably makes about as much sense as anything, especially when the options down the board were gross and disgusting. Toney, for instance, is one of the most prolific busts in recent history.

#4 - People who complain about not getting Parsons are also being unrealistic because it would've been Parsons alone (with the adjoining WR being a bust). While Parsons is great, the alternative of Waddle + Phillips + extra R1 pick was actually probably better...until you get to Phillips recent lower body injuries which had nothing to do with his college concussions. So don't tell me the "injury prone" labeled really tells us any kind of sensible narrative there. Nobody was thinking, 'in 3 years Jaelen is going to tear his Achilles.'


At the end of the day you just make the most reasonable and rationale decisions you can and hope for the best. Sometimes it works out and sometimes not. Currently, neither the Bengals nor the Cowboys are really in significantly better shape than the Dolphins in terms of their rosters. The difference is exclusively at QB where only 1 of those teams (Bengals) seems to have won the lottery.

You can make the most reasonable decisions in the world and sometimes fate just doesn't give you the breaks you need to get to the top. This is why it's so pointless to simply blame a GM for an apparent lack of success.

There's plenty for which we can indict Grier, but the '21 Draft really isn't it. On paper, securing Waddle, Phillips, Holland and an extra R1 down the road is a pretty darn good draft. Pretty much everyone approved of those moves at the time (for obvious reasons).


Don't be mad at the '21 Draft....be mad at the team these players went to. The decline of '17 and '18 followed by the outright Tank in '19 is really what killed the Dolphins. The hiring and subsequent firing of not just 1 but 2 problematic first-time coaches (Gase & Flores) also caused huge issues around the development of the roster. Again, there's plenty to lay at the feet of management here.

Perhaps there's logic in a GM taking over an already declining team and just flat out tanking but to me it always seemed like a mistake. Nonetheless, fans who blame relatively solid and logical drafting are just moaning about the wrong stuff IMHO.

 

[Finswatch]

A lot of people baulked when I said 50% of this is luck but that's how the draft really works out most of the time.

#1 - You weren't going OL with your highest pick. Long & Pouncey had their careers limited by injury. Tunsil ended up on another team. You just drafted Ajax and Hunt the year before, both inside the Top-40. You just weren't going to spend another pick on the OL. Sewell and Slater are cool players but Miami just wasn't in position to draft OL given their history. No GM would've been likely to do that given the team's other glaring needs.

#2 - The need for a weapon was obvious and this draft was loaded. There was just very little chance of passing over not just 1, but 4 premium weapons in Pitts, Chase, Smith and Waddle, all of whom had big-time play-making ability. The least sexy of those 4 had just won the Heisman for goodness sake. It was a ridiculous set of options you were unlikely to pass over given you had a glaring need at receiver.

#3 - People will moan about Waddle but they forget he came with an extra R1 pick. You got 2 for trading back with SF and only gave back 1 in the trade-up to #6. So you netted 1 extra R1 pick alongside Waddle. So, it's not really Waddle-vs-Chase or Waddle-vs-Sewell. In this context, Waddle+R1 probably makes about as much sense as anything, especially when the options down the board were gross and disgusting. Toney, for instance, is one of the most prolific busts in recent history.

#4 - People who complain about not getting Parsons are also being unrealistic because it would've been Parsons alone (with the adjoining WR being a bust). While Parsons is great, the alternative of Waddle + Phillips + extra R1 pick was actually probably better...until you get to Phillips recent lower body injuries which had nothing to do with his college concussions. So don't tell me the "injury prone" labeled really tells us any kind of sensible narrative there. Nobody was thinking, 'in 3 years Jaelen is going to tear his Achilles.'


At the end of the day you just make the most reasonable and rationale decisions you can and hope for the best. Sometimes it works out and sometimes not. Currently, neither the Bengals nor the Cowboys are really in significantly better shape than the Dolphins in terms of their rosters. The difference is exclusively at QB where only 1 of those teams (Bengals) seems to have won the lottery.

You can make the most reasonable decisions in the world and sometimes fate just doesn't give you the breaks you need to get to the top. This is why it's so pointless to simply blame a GM for an apparent lack of success.

There's plenty for which we can indict Grier, but the '21 Draft really isn't it. On paper, securing Waddle, Phillips, Holland and an extra R1 down the road is a pretty darn good draft. Pretty much everyone approved of those moves at the time (for obvious reasons).


Don't be mad at the '21 Draft....be mad at the team these players went to. The decline of '17 and '18 followed by the outright Tank in '19 is really what killed the Dolphins. The hiring and subsequent firing of not just 1 but 2 problematic first-time coaches (Gase & Flores) also caused huge issues around the development of the roster. Again, there's plenty to lay at the feet of management here.

Perhaps there's logic in a GM taking over an already declining team and just flat out tanking but to me it always seemed like a mistake. Nonetheless, fans who blame relatively solid and logical drafting are just moaning about the wrong stuff IMHO.

It's the same argument as the 2020 draft. Grier didn't do enough and picked the wrong players.
Wirfs and Herbert and Jonathan Taylor in 2020 and the up and down trades that left Chase out of reach the next year. How is it possible to have 6-7 first or second round picks in consecutive years and not come away with ONE consistent Pro-Bowl player or franchise player? Sorry fellas, the QB doesn't count bc he isn't a franchise QB.

We had so many first and second round picks in the 20 and 21 drafts that Grier should have been able to set us up for a decade of success but he doesn't have the vision and foresight that good GMs have.

Good managers make their own luck. Grier isn't that guy. And what happened to that first we got for trading down to #12? did we waste that when Mr Magoo tampered? Just a hapless, dumb org with a less than average GM and an owner is anything but a football guy.

Our "luck" will change when we get competent managers running this team.

 

[Mello Yello]

It's the same argument as the 2020 draft. Grier didn't do enough and picked the wrong players.
Wirfs and Herbert and Jonathan Taylor in 2020 and the up and down trades that left Chase out of reach the next year. How is it possible to have 6-7 first or second round picks in consecutive years and not come away with ONE consistent Pro-Bowl player or franchise player? Sorry fellas, the QB doesn't count bc he isn't a franchise QB.

We had so many first and second round picks in the 20 and 21 drafts that Grier should have been able to set us up for a decade of success but he doesn't have the vision and foresight that good GMs have.

Good managers make their own luck. Grier isn't that guy. And what happened to that first we got for trading down to #12? did we waste that when Mr Magoo tampered? Just a hapless, dumb org with a less than average GM and an owner is anything but a football guy.

Our "luck" will change when we get competent managers running this team.

Meh...Herbert sucks IMHO. Nobody really seems to disagree much these days. At least we tried going for something with Tua. At least we took someone with real upside. We just got unlucky. Love was the real alternative but even he's far from elite. Hurts (the real gem) just wasn't apparent to anyone...including the Eagles who spent their R1 pick on a WR bust.

Denying the reality that Tua really was the right choice is where people go wrong. Sometimes the right choice doesn't work out. Imagining those other alternatives were likely is just fantasy. Miami was taking Tua or Herbert and Herbert just kind of sucks no matter how much Tua's injuries limit his viability.

It was always Tua (if the hip looked okay). Herbert looked like Tannehill 2.0 as a prospect and he's pretty much been exactly that. He's unlikely to win anything of note in his career given that he tends to shrink the more you try to rely on him. That was only further emphasized last year as he was carried to the Playoffs by the #1 defense where he promptly completed 40% of his passes and threw 4 INTs.

Yeah, no thanks...


That said, I largely agree with you about Dolphins Leadership / Management. They own the vision and that vision has been hard to stomach:

(1) Missing the superstars (Chase, Parsons, Taylor, etc.)
(2) Protecting bad OLs
(3) Trading away picks
(4) Letting homegrown talent escape
(5) Lots of other things


I wish I saw the talent there with Jonathan Taylor. I definitely wanted a RB but I fully admit I would've taken Clyde Edwards-Helaire who basically washed out as a relative bust. Still, the team that has an extra R1 pick and passes on a might-be elite RB candidate when they've got a young passer who could use the help is a team that's hard to root for. I can promise nobody wanted Noah Igbinoghene and here we are talking about how we have to get more physical and run the ball more.

 

[hoops]

A personal pet peeve of mine are the people who try to judge a GM by the production of his selections.

(1) Many selections are the result of other factors (Owner, HC, Scouting Dept, etc.).
(2) Many selections are made because the priority target just got drafted 1-2 spots ahead.
(3) Many selections end up booming/busting as a result of coaching, scheme, etc.
(4) A GMs job is really to manage so it's the logic behind the decision in the moment that matters, not the production years later.


One of the reasons I don't necessarily credit the Dolphins with Waddle as a "hit" is exactly what you say...basically any of the alternatives would've been equally as appealing.

The options were essentially Sewell (who was projected to be be very good) alongside the 4 receiving options: Pitts, Chase, Smith and Waddle. Every single one of those names has been a productive player. In that sense, failure wasn't in the cards at all, but as you say, there were certainly alternatives.


One thing I'll say is that having drafted two OL the year before, the Dolphins really weren't going OL again using their highest pick. Both of the guys they drafted (Ajax & Rob Hunt) were drafted highly and went on to be good players so spending another pick on OL the very next year within the Top-10 just wasn't in the cards.

That also means you weren't staying at 12 and taking Slater. That too just wouldn't have been in the cards.

The idea of selecting Parsons at 12 may have been an option but the downside of that is that you would've probably selected a WR at 18 and that would've assuredly been a bust. Everyone forgets that after Pitts, Chase, Waddle and Smith were off the board the next available options were Kadarius Toney, Rashod Bateman and Elijah Moore...none of whom were very good.

So, as much as we may be frustrated by the OL performance in recent years, you just can't spend picks on the OL over and over without neglecting other areas and truth is, this was a great chance to get a premier receiver for Tua....we just missed.

Waddle is good but he is no Ja'Marr Chase, a player who's probably destined for the HOF.

This is kind of another example of how the Dolphins drafting is perennially mid....we do a good job of avoiding the unproductive busts but it seems to come at the cost of always missing on the great players and it's just really hard to be a special team without those kinds of guys.

How can you assume that the dolphins would have taken a wr at 18 had they taken parsons?

Cherry pick much?

 

[hoops]

It's the same argument as the 2020 draft. Grier didn't do enough and picked the wrong players.
Wirfs and Herbert and Jonathan Taylor in 2020 and the up and down trades that left Chase out of reach the next year. How is it possible to have 6-7 first or second round picks in consecutive years and not come away with ONE consistent Pro-Bowl player or franchise player? Sorry fellas, the QB doesn't count bc he isn't a franchise QB.

We had so many first and second round picks in the 20 and 21 drafts that Grier should have been able to set us up for a decade of success but he doesn't have the vision and foresight that good GMs have.

Good managers make their own luck. Grier isn't that guy. And what happened to that first we got for trading down to #12? did we waste that when Mr Magoo tampered? Just a hapless, dumb org with a less than average GM and an owner is anything but a football guy.

Our "luck" will change when we get competent managers running this team.

It’s pointless til they are gone.

 

[Bumpus]

Don't be mad at the '21 Draft....be mad at the team these players went to. The decline of '17 and '18 followed by the outright Tank in '19 is really what killed the Dolphins. The hiring and subsequent firing of not just 1 but 2 problematic first-time coaches (Gase & Flores) also caused huge issues around the development of the roster. Again, there's plenty to lay at the feet of management here.

Perhaps there's logic in a GM taking over an already declining team and just flat out tanking but to me it always seemed like a mistake. Nonetheless, fans who blame relatively solid and logical drafting are just moaning about the wrong stuff IMHO.

Hell, we still haven’t recovered from what Wanny did to us

 

[hoops]

A lot of people baulked when I said 50% of this is luck but that's how the draft really works out most of the time.

#1 - You weren't going OL with your highest pick. Long & Pouncey had their careers limited by injury. Tunsil ended up on another team. You just drafted Ajax and Hunt the year before, both inside the Top-40. You just weren't going to spend another pick on the OL. Sewell and Slater are cool players but Miami just wasn't in position to draft OL given their history. No GM would've been likely to do that given the team's other glaring needs.

#2 - The need for a weapon was obvious and this draft was loaded. There was just very little chance of passing over not just 1, but 4 premium weapons in Pitts, Chase, Smith and Waddle, all of whom had big-time play-making ability. The least sexy of those 4 had just won the Heisman for goodness sake. It was a ridiculous set of options you were unlikely to pass over given you had a glaring need at receiver.

#3 - People will moan about Waddle but they forget he came with an extra R1 pick. You got 2 for trading back with SF and only gave back 1 in the trade-up to #6. So you netted 1 extra R1 pick alongside Waddle. So, it's not really Waddle-vs-Chase or Waddle-vs-Sewell. In this context, Waddle+R1 probably makes about as much sense as anything, especially when the options down the board were gross and disgusting. Toney, for instance, is one of the most prolific busts in recent history.

#4 - People who complain about not getting Parsons are also being unrealistic because it would've been Parsons alone (with the adjoining WR being a bust). While Parsons is great, the alternative of Waddle + Phillips + extra R1 pick was actually probably better...until you get to Phillips recent lower body injuries which had nothing to do with his college concussions. So don't tell me the "injury prone" labeled really tells us any kind of sensible narrative there. Nobody was thinking, 'in 3 years Jaelen is going to tear his Achilles.'


At the end of the day you just make the most reasonable and rationale decisions you can and hope for the best. Sometimes it works out and sometimes not. Currently, neither the Bengals nor the Cowboys are really in significantly better shape than the Dolphins in terms of their rosters. The difference is exclusively at QB where only 1 of those teams (Bengals) seems to have won the lottery.

You can make the most reasonable decisions in the world and sometimes fate just doesn't give you the breaks you need to get to the top. This is why it's so pointless to simply blame a GM for an apparent lack of success.

There's plenty for which we can indict Grier, but the '21 Draft really isn't it. On paper, securing Waddle, Phillips, Holland and an extra R1 down the road is a pretty darn good draft. Pretty much everyone approved of those moves at the time (for obvious reasons).


Don't be mad at the '21 Draft....be mad at the team these players went to. The decline of '17 and '18 followed by the outright Tank in '19 is really what killed the Dolphins. The hiring and subsequent firing of not just 1 but 2 problematic first-time coaches (Gase & Flores) also caused huge issues around the development of the roster. Again, there's plenty to lay at the feet of management here.

Perhaps there's logic in a GM taking over an already declining team and just flat out tanking but to me it always seemed like a mistake. Nonetheless, fans who blame relatively solid and logical drafting are just moaning about the wrong stuff IMHO.

Sorry parsons is better than any of that combo of two or three you are trying to sell to folks.

Hell the only guy this team has even drafted that had elite potential (swinging for the fences) was Philips but he despite his injury woes is still to this day more athlete than technician and pass rush polish.