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The Dolphins Defense Is Better Than The Dolphins Offense

phinsforlife

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This simple statement of fact will make heads explode. Nobody should care that the defense is better than the offense, but some will find this statement offensive (pun intended), and try to argue it away. What people should care about is how good the team is, regardless of which side of the ball is making them good. Having a good defense should be a point of pride. Good defense was the identity of a lot of good Super Bowl winning teams, including some Miami teams.

There are two reasons the defense is better:

-The first is quite simple, and a simple statement of fact. The defense is the 10th ranked scoring defense in the NFL (and 7th in yards per game). The offense is the 23rd ranked scoring offense in the NFL. Therefore the defense is better. This is not complicated. For those who will reflexively argue it is because Tua was out 4 games, it doesn't make up the difference. And if you want to play that game and assume all sorts of things about what the offense would have done in those 4 games, boost the defensive stats too, because there would have been less pressure on them with the offense controlling the ball more. The defense has not gotten enough attention or credit, because the identity of the team seems to rest with McDaniel, Tua and the offense.

-The defense also does not regress against the better teams. The offense does. Same thing the last two years as well. I touched on this issue before in the last section of this thread on regression: https://finheaven.com/threads/misguided-notions-and-offensive-vs-defensive-regression.385674/

Whatever the defense is, they are unaffected by their opponent. They play like they should play for the most part, with some randomness, regardless of the quality of the opponent. Ergo if our defense is average, they play like an average defense should against a good team, and they play like an average defense should against a bad team.

The defense also holds up OK despite injuries. They were pretty good down the stretch last year for the most part even after Phillips and Chubb went down (on balance did better than the offense down the stretch and I provided the data in the prior post I referenced), and the same thing this year without Phillips and Chubb. The offense, all we hear are excuses about injuries, which was last years excuse (OL injuries) for fading down the stretch, and that was total baloney. If you cannot hold up against better teams with injuries, with every team has, that also speaks to an issue with the offense.

The offense is a different deal. They are lights out against lesser opponents, especially at home, in perfect conditions. Against good defenses, especially on the road, they tend to be not very good. Other offenses do not regress like this. What value is the offense, regardless of the video game stats they can put up, if it can rarely function well in the situations that are important against the type of teams you need to beat? Despite the stats this type of offense can put up, they are pretty empty if they cannot deliver the stats when they matter.

This year, for example, here is what the offense has done against better teams: Against non-playoff teams this season, Tagovailoa has 12 touchdowns and no interceptions. He has seven touchdowns and seven interceptions in five games against teams currently in playoff position.

Why does this happen with the offense?

I had a bit of a revelation watching the 49ers game. The first pass Tyreek dropped was a dime by Tua. He had about 1mm to fit the ball in there. The ball was thrown before Tyreek came out of his break. It was all about anticipation. Tyreek had about a millisecond after his head was turned to see the ball, and then catch it. Easy to do, no, but a ball Tyreek should catch. But, for this to work, everything has to be so perfect. The degree of difficulty to execute this play is off the charts. Tua is one of the few QBs that can do it with some regularity.

But that is also the problem. Tua's skill set is really his ability to throw with anticipation, and do it with accuracy as well. The offense is designed around this strength. Tua is probably the best in the NFL with regard to his ability to throw with anticipation. Tua's accuracy is over-rated. Tua is accurate, but there are other QBs that are also very accurate. Most of the good ones are. Jared Goff actually scored ahead of Tua on the accuracy attribute in ESPNs latest attribute rankings. Where Tua is really off the charts is anticipation.

But for anticipation to matter, everything has to be so perfect. The passes have to be perfect. The routes the receivers run have to be perfect. Then all the bells and whistles wrapped around this construct also require perfection, like all the motion. And the spacing of the receivers. It is a highly complex offense.

This stuff works great against bad teams, especially at home. But that is not every game.

It is akin to having a choice between a scalpel and a hammer. A scalpel is a wonderfully elegant instrument, and you can do all sorts of things with it that you could never do with a hammer. You can cut with surgical precision, but only in perfect conditions. You need an operating room. The patient needs to be anesthetized and cannot move. And the surgeon needs skilled hands. On the other hand, any idiot can use a hammer. It takes no skill. The hammer is easy to use, no matter what the conditions, including the freezing cold. You don't even have to be accurate to make the hammer work correctly.

Tua, McDaniel, and this offense, are all scalpel, and not enough hammer. But with a QB like Tua, given his skill set, this is what you have to do. Tua's elite skill set is his ability to anticipate. So it makes sense to design the offense around Tua's strenghts. You cannot design the offense around strong armed throws (outisde the numbers or downfield) or the QB extending plays or running. Heck, we cannot even run a QB sneak with Tua, which is embarrassing (and the result is we struggle to convert 3rd and 1 all the time too). So we have ended up with what makes sense, given the QB we have.

But the end result is the offense will always be limited against better defenses. The scalpel does not work well against them. Everything gets disrupted, so the degree of precision this offense requires, is not achievable. On the road, there is crowd noise, and bad weather. Tua cannot make the strong armed throws, which render timing and precision less relevant. And he cannot run and extend plays with regularity. Or they can't do all the motion. So Tua and the offense break down. We have seen this game after game, for the last three years.

For those that say, give Tua a better OL and a running game and a big third receiver, and everything will change, nope. That does not work. When you pay the QB $55mm you do not get all the toys. That is the trade. If you want to pay a QB $55mm a year, you better believe said QB can carry the team with alot of deficiencies around them. Mahomes can do it with no WRs and no tackles. Josh Allen can do it with nobody on the offense I have even heard of. Those are the guys you give the big money to. The math works in those cases, it will not and cannot work with a QB like Tua. Heck, it didnt even work with Tua's $9mm cap hit last year, and last year we had the guards, and the running game, and the same thing still happened to the offense against the better teams - as soon as we hit the better teams down the stretch, the offense imploded. The challenge only grows now as Tua's cap hit increases. Give Tua all of those things, with his cap hit, then we will have no defense, and people will have to whine about that instead, I guess. It is an unsolvable problem with Tua making this kind of money.

To be clear, nowhere did I say Tua stinks. But he has certain limitations. Those limitations will lead to him and this offense really regressing against better defenses. The proof is already in the pudding. It is tough to argue this point.

This tweet has it right. Listent to what the speaker has to say. If it makes it easier for people, subsitute the word "offense" for "Tua."

Thusly, the Dolphins defense is better than the Dolphins offense. They are statistically better, and also are not feast or famine and they can hold up ok against better teams.

 
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Wish we could see how much better we'd be with Phillips playing and Chubb at the very least in rotation. I'd put it at an above average defense.
 
well statistically, even without those guys, i gave you the data.
No I agree with everything you said, especially the Tua part. Purdy out played him with an inferior O-Line and arguably the same or weaker receiving core. But he shows no sign of being able to establish any form close to elite play unless he has an elite cast which we can't afford with his contract/tyreeks. He's not a good enough long passer to ever utilize a WR like that at full efficiency. We are going to have to let people/not sign some defensive players to give everything Tua needs to succeed when he's not that kind of elite QB. Burrow himself plays much better and with an inferior cast as well. But they can keep retooling the defense through the draft/signing cheap vets. He's never going to be the guy that does more with less but we pay him like he's an elite QB regardless of the cast and he's not. There's never a moment I see him against good teams that wows me. People just love what we have now because we've had nothing at QB for decades. Dink and dunk offense vs mediocre teams isn't going to get you anywhere. We are stuck with his contract and hoping we lit the lottery with every pick in order to find him one of the greatest cast assimilated. The eye test is pretty obvious once you see him play against good defenses. No killer instincts whatsoever and he played a terrible Cardinal defense, had the chance to put the game away against them before AZ last drive and nothing came of it. He makes throws occasionally that good QBs should be able to make and people associate those limited throws as his general ability. We are kinda ****ed long term. Our offensive play calling was so pitiful on our last drive before the Purfy INT and the last drive of the first half but I fully believe it's because McD knows his limited skillset. It's easy to have low turnover numbers when you're barely risking throwing the ball downfield.
 
No I agree with everything you said, especially the Tua part. Purdy out played him with an inferior O-Line and arguably the same or weaker receiving core. But he shows no sign of being able to establish any form close to elite play unless he has an elite cast which we can't afford with his contract/tyreeks. He's not a good enough long passer to ever utilize a WR like that at full efficiency. We are going to have to let people/not sign some defensive players to give everything Tua needs to succeed when he's not that kind of elite QB. Burrow himself plays much better and with an inferior cast as well. But they can keep retooling the defense through the draft/signing cheap vets. He's never going to be the guy that does more with less but we pay him like he's an elite QB regardless of the cast and he's not. There's never a moment I see him against good teams that wows me. People just love what we have now because we've had nothing at QB for decades. Dink and dunk offense vs mediocre teams isn't going to get you anywhere. We are stuck with his contract and hoping we lit the lottery with every pick in order to find him one of the greatest cast assimilated. The eye test is pretty obvious once you see him play against good defenses. No killer instincts whatsoever and he played a terrible Cardinal defense, had the chance to put the game away against them before AZ last drive and nothing came of it. He makes throws occasionally that good QBs should be able to make and people associate those limited throws as his general ability. We are kinda ****ed long term. Our offensive play calling was so pitiful on our last drive before the Purfy INT and the last drive of the first half but I fully believe it's because McD knows his limited skillset. It's easy to have low turnover numbers when you're barely risking throwing the ball downfield.
yup agree thanks. the offense is a big illusion. the stats come, when it doesn't matter. the stats don't come when it does matter. it is a big fraud!
 
No I agree with everything you said, especially the Tua part. Purdy out played him with an inferior O-Line and arguably the same or weaker receiving core. But he shows no sign of being able to establish any form close to elite play unless he has an elite cast which we can't afford with his contract/tyreeks. He's not a good enough long passer to ever utilize a WR like that at full efficiency. We are going to have to let people/not sign some defensive players to give everything Tua needs to succeed when he's not that kind of elite QB. Burrow himself plays much better and with an inferior cast as well. But they can keep retooling the defense through the draft/signing cheap vets. He's never going to be the guy that does more with less but we pay him like he's an elite QB regardless of the cast and he's not. There's never a moment I see him against good teams that wows me. People just love what we have now because we've had nothing at QB for decades. Dink and dunk offense vs mediocre teams isn't going to get you anywhere. We are stuck with his contract and hoping we lit the lottery with every pick in order to find him one of the greatest cast assimilated. The eye test is pretty obvious once you see him play against good defenses. No killer instincts whatsoever and he played a terrible Cardinal defense, had the chance to put the game away against them before AZ last drive and nothing came of it. He makes throws occasionally that good QBs should be able to make and people associate those limited throws as his general ability. We are kinda ****ed long term. Our offensive play calling was so pitiful on our last drive before the Purfy INT and the last drive of the first half but I fully believe it's because McD knows his limited skillset. It's easy to have low turnover numbers when you're barely risking throwing the ball downfield.
Would you say this if Hill caught his other potential 2 TD drops? Rofl. And no the defense is not better than the offense. Quite frankly it isn't even close.

You guys point to the offense not doing well against good teams... guess what ? The defense also sucks against good teams, hell they suck against bad teams too. Did you folks forget how LV constantly matched down the field with ease? Remember old man Rodgers? Hate to break it to you Weaver fans but this defense is ass. Poor stunt plays, no disguise blitz, secondary constantly confused, they always seem to play back and not to mention missed tackles.
 
So, just to be sure that I understand this argument. Because Tua will be making $55m, we can’t properly draft two guards and roll with a good OL of Paul (post-Armstead), Austin Jackson, Aaron Brewer, and two solid drafted guards. And we can’t afford a bigger RB, one of the more undervalued and easy to acquire late in the draft positions in the game. And a WR like, say, Mack Hollins or DeVante Parker are cost-prohibitive?

I’d also note that while the offense was not a thing of beauty during Tua’s first two seasons, he wasn’t running this offense. The Dolphins were 13-8 in his starts, running a basic and nearly talentless offense.
 
Would you say this if Hill caught his other potential 2 TD drops? Rofl. And no the defense is not better than the offense. Quite frankly it isn't even close.

You guys point to the offense not doing well against good teams... guess what ? The defense also sucks against good teams, hell they suck against bad teams too. Did you folks forget how LV constantly matched down the field with ease? Remember old man Rodgers? Hate to break it to you Weaver fans but this defense is ass. Poor stunt plays, no disguise blitz, secondary constantly confused, they always seem to play back and not to mention missed tackles.
and the defense is 10th and the offense is 23rd.
 
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So, just to be sure that I understand this argument. Because Tua will be making $55m, we can’t properly draft two guards and roll with a good OL of Paul (post-Armstead), Austin Jackson, Aaron Brewer, and two solid drafted guards. And we can’t afford a bigger RB, one of the more undervalued and easy to acquire late in the draft positions in the game. And a WR like, say, Mack Hollins or DeVante Parker are cost-prohibitive?

I’d also note that while the offense was not a thing of beauty during Tua’s first two seasons, he wasn’t running this offense. The Dolphins were 13-8 in his starts, running a basic and nearly talentless offense.
the defense is 10th, and the offense is 23rd. draft the guards, guess you are not drafting the defensive tackles again, because all you care about is tua and the offense, not the team. there is no free lunch. deal with the fact that tua is not what you think he is. enough with the excuse making. he is not a $55mm a year QB. this offense does not perform against good defenses. and we had the guard last year too (and the running game), and the same thing happened!
 
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I can't argue the OP's point. However, it is such a "downer" knowing we probably run it back with Coach and the GM hoping for the "perfect result". Last year, IF we had secured home field advantage, we might have made some noise.
 
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the defense is 10th, and the offense is 23rd. draft the guards, guess you are not drafting the defensive tackles again, because all you care about is tua and the offense, not the team. there is no free lunch. deal with the fact that tua is not what you think he is. enough with the excuse making. he is not a $55mm a year QB. this offense does not perform against good defenses. and we had the guard last year too, and the same thing happened!
Not surprisingly, you missed the point. You claimed we can’t have a better offensive line, running game, or bigger #3 WR because of Tua’s salary. I pointed out that you are incorrect. It’s not an argument that he’s worth $55m or isn’t worth $55m. It’s that it is quite simple to draft a few good guards, a late-round or even free agent “bigger back”, and a bigger WR #3.

Did we have “the guard” last year? Are you referring to Robert Hunt, who missed 7 games last season?

And I’m not arguing that this specific offense can perform against good teams. I think it’s a poor design for cold weather games and against well-coached good defenses. Hence, we’d be better off acquiring better guards, a bigger back, and WR #3 with size.

Also, to reiterate, Tua did not play in this “anticipation-based” offense during his first two seasons in the NFL.
 
Not surprisingly, you missed the point. You claimed we can’t have a better offensive line, running game, or bigger #3 WR because of Tua’s salary. I pointed out that you are incorrect. It’s not an argument that he’s worth $55m or isn’t worth $55m. It’s that it is quite simple to draft a few good guards, a late-round or even free agent “bigger back”, and a bigger WR #3.

Did we have “the guard” last year? Are you referring to Robert Hunt, who missed 7 games last season?

And I’m not arguing that this specific offense can perform against good teams. I think it’s a poor design for cold weather games and against well-coached good defenses. Hence, we’d be better off acquiring better guards, a bigger back, and WR #3 with size.

Also, to reiterate, Tua did not play in this “anticipation-based” offense during his first two seasons in the NFL.


As stubborn as mcdaniel has proven to be, he could add those things and still abandon the run game as soon as a team takes the lead against us and/or continue to run Achane up the middle and never use his bigger RBs because he prefers speed. Do we really think mcdaniel is going to change his entire offense scheme philosophy? Especially in one off season. No, I predict more of the same on offense because that's what.we.continue to see every year mcdaniel has been here.
 
Not surprisingly, you missed the point. You claimed we can’t have a better offensive line, running game, or bigger #3 WR because of Tua’s salary. I pointed out that you are incorrect. It’s not an argument that he’s worth $55m or isn’t worth $55m. It’s that it is quite simple to draft a few good guards, a late-round or even free agent “bigger back”, and a bigger WR #3.

Did we have “the guard” last year? Are you referring to Robert Hunt, who missed 7 games last season?

And I’m not arguing that this specific offense can perform against good teams. I think it’s a poor design for cold weather games and against well-coached good defenses. Hence, we’d be better off acquiring better guards, a bigger back, and WR #3 with size.

Also, to reiterate, Tua did not play in this “anticipation-based” offense during his first two seasons in the NFL.
the defense is better than the offense. defense is 10, offense is 23. lets give all those things to the defense too, then the gap would only increase for the defense. obviously, you do not care about the defense or the team. just tua. and no matter what you do, it won't be enough with him back there. for all his positives, he is not a playoff QB, and he is certainly not a $55m a year QB.
 
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