Te Desmond Clark Will Be Activated... | Page 2 | FinHeaven - Miami Dolphins Forums

Te Desmond Clark Will Be Activated...

I'm going to go out on a limb and say that Ricky will have a big day. I'm talking over 100 yards at 4+ ypc, with a TD or two. Sounds a bit homeristic of me when we're facing the undisputed best run defense in the league, right?

Well, I guess hear me out. I just have a firm belief that, we're THAT damn good at running the ball this year. When you think about it, Ricky has yet to be stopped for the whole game. Sure, the ypc was low against New England, but he was consistently getting yardage, and keeping the chains moving forward, and he STILL got that 100 yard day. When you held the ball for 40 minutes on offense, and your top runner had 100+ yards, I really don't care what the YPC is in that case because you HAD a running game going...a good one at that. And sure, Ricky only got 61 yards against the Chiefs. But his YPC was up there and the whole game Ricky was punching them in the mouth running and receiving, but in the 2nd half we were down by too much and went away from the running game because the defense did its best impression of a sieve. No team, of 5 different teams, has successfully stopped Ricky.

Does this mean he can't be stopped? Of course not. But Denver enters this game with a front seven that has played the run spectacularly. They faced the likes of Marshal Faulk, LaDainian Tomlinson, Garrison Hearst, Jamal Lewis, and Travis Henry. See a pattern there? The only one of those that runs with any kind of power is Jamal Lewis, and he's had town ACLs in both knees. Their run defense is good because its quick, which makes it a lot like ours. But they will be heading into this game thinking that they are going to stop our run with nothing but their front seven, and that is a mistake against a team that can run like we can. New England schemed to stop Ricky and came the closest of any team so far. The Broncos won't scheme, they'll play Cover 2 with help on the outside. They'll line up thinkin they can hold us to 60 yards rushing.

It'll be more like 160 yards rushing.
 
I hope so Parrothead. Im afraid that with Dixon out again, it will make it even tougher for us to gain yards on the ground.

Though I was looking at some statistics that said that Ricky has run with more success to the right side (Wade and Perry's side) than to the left. Not sure what that means, but its interesting.

Do you think Dixons injury will make it harder for us to run the ball?
 
A little bit. But I'm also confident in Spriggs going against Pittman. I don't think the LT will come into play much. It will be done all up the gut, with Nails-Ruddy-Perry dominating the center of the field and hopefully Konrad disciplined and skilled enough to get his hands on the gap linebacker. I think short-yardage situations will be ours. But running Ricky toward the outside would mean certain death, unless they start seriously selling out against the inside run like Detroit.
 
Originally posted by Surferosa


Do you think Dixons injury will make it harder for us to run the ball?
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I watched the tape of lasted week game and it looked like Spring's did well. Dixon is better at making the second block and a better down field blocker. Springs is good at the point of attack. He also seems to be a better pass blocker. Which might help in this game.
 
Thanks DCH for the info...hope this works out in our favor..Go phins..this will be a tough game, even Marino don't think we'll win this one.
 
After yesterday, one down and one to go.
In two prior meetings, Griese has been susceptible to pressure and in particular, Zach blitzing up the middle -- Like to see some of that today. Of course, we would have to make sure a safety covers Sharp if Zach does blitz.
 
Denver has been vulerable to the blitz.

Anderson isn't getting the job done at FB as far as a blocker goes, and neither has Gary.

You will see Portis and Droughns in together, to have the FB hit the hole quicker. Anderson will be used as a single tailback, and Gary will appear in the backfield, only to move into a split end position to create a mismatch.

I don't think Miami can create holes thru Denver's line, and they can't run outside. If Miami CAN open holes thru the interior defense, they will win, Denver's linebackers are not big enough to hit Williams 1 on 1, and other than Kennedy, who has been fined twice allready for what actually were good hits, the secondary doesn't have a run stuffer, and Denver doesn't have a run stuffing LB on the roster, period.

I think Miami's best play is to do what Baltimore did, play action to Williams and go to McMichael on the post against the cover two, it should be an easy touchdown.

Defensively, Miami needs to test the interior blocking with loops inside against the rookie Hamilton at LG, and test Gary, Portis, Anderson and Droughns to pick up blitzes. Portis is willing but a little small and will be featured in other ways.

Denver WILL be able to run the ball, they have all year, and Portis has been in the doghouse since preseason when he fumbled three times. He is out now, and IMO, probably will have an average higher than Williams.

Blitz inside and shake Griese's confidence, and bring the inside looping blitz, and go over the middle to McMichaels off play action.
Those are mock's keys for miami.

You might throw in something for ex-bronco Clark as well, noone is expecting him.

And BTW, if you think Clark can block, your kidding yourselves, he is strickly a recieving TE.
 
BTW, Sonic(Portis) is just a ankle touch from going the distance about 5 times so far, and he has only touched the ball 45 times or so.

Of course, you probably remember Clinton from his brief stay at Miami....you better.
 
Interestingly enough, Mock seems to have been right. We brought inside looping blitzes throughout the game testing the interior line as well as Anderson, Gary, and Portis in picking up blitzers, and it worked for us. It shook Griese and he threw a couple of costly picks. We also used play-action passes to hit McMichael who once again had a bunch of catches for 60+ yards and probably would have had more were it not for uncharacteristic drops on his part. Overall Denver was able to run the ball, with Portis going 18 runs for 75 yards. That is indeed a higher average than Ricky's.

And to top it off, much like Mock predicted, we could not open holes through Denver's defensive line consistently, but when we did, Ricky DID make some of the linebackers and some of the guys in the secondary (Izell Reese) look silly.

The only thing that it looks like mock predicted wrong here is Desmond Clark who didn't really do much of anything, and I didn't see Olandis Gary split out wide much

Overall, kudos to Mock for perhaps the most expert prediction/analysis that I've seen to date about the Dolphins going up against a team. Better than anything I've ever seen from DCH...
 
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