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Fins offense consistently inconsistent

BY ARMANDO SALGUERO
Miami Herald

There were moments that made you shake your head, like when Samson Satele snapped the ball five feet over Chad Henne, starting what looked like a play out of football follies.

There was the moment a receiver named Anthony Armstrong, open and streaking deep down the sideline, dropped a pass that would have been the singular most spectacular play of Saturday's scrimmage. And some of the former Dolphins watching started snickering and joking and making the point that maybe Armstrong should have just kept running out of the Nick Saban Memorial Bubble and off the team after that misdeed.

Are you getting the idea the Dolphins' offense is not so good right now?

It doesn't have a starting quarterback. It doesn't have a receiver that consistently can separate from a defensive back, much less guarantee he'll hold onto a pass.

And the offensive line is experimenting with different combinations, using players that might be starters in the regular-season opener or, as coach Tony Sparano noted Saturday, might not be on the team at all.

''The offense is struggling and we know that,'' said Vonnie Holliday, whose perch at defensive end has given him a pretty good view of the muddle. ``We knew that coming into the season. This offense has a lot of new players, a new offensive line, and a lot of young receivers. We kind of know that it's going to be a building process for this offense. And so that's where we are.''

We are seemingly in trouble.

But we are not yet in panic mode.

THINGS WILL SETTLE

The Dolphins eventually will settle their right guard issues and Sparano eventually will select a starting quarterback and the offense will start running plays against a defense that doesn't know what's coming -- unless, of course, they're playing the Patriots.

So in that respect, Saturday's scrimmage was not a fair representation of what to expect in 2008 from Dan Henning's offense.

This group won't always look like there should be circus music playing in the background when they take the field. They will have a plan, they will have a lineup, and they will have a chance.

But the gap between that day and today is scary wide.

Miami's biggest problem now, as it has been the past decade or so, continues to be the search for a quarterback. Dan Marino, the last great quarterback to play for the Dolphins, watched Saturday's scrimmage from a sideline. And although it's been almost a decade since he last threw a pass professionally, one could argue he was still the best quarterback present.

Josh McCown, John Beck and Henne are all vying for the starting quarterback job but none has shown either flashes of brilliance or ordinary consistency.

McCown has had some good moments, like his first series in which he completed 5 of 6 passes and threw a touchdown. And he's had some wretched moments, like when he threw an interception to Travis Daniels and almost threw another to Quentin Moses.

''It wasn't good enough,'' McCown said of his outing. ``It wasn't good enough for me. Some good things happened but not enough. We weren't good enough today. It's something to build off.''

BUILDING PROCESS

At least he and Henne, the rookie out of Michigan, seem to be building toward something. The same is not necessarily true of Beck.

Beck ended the first full week of practice on a high note, completing six of his final eight passes while playing with and against second- and third-team players. But before that string, Beck was terrible for days and days and days.

He started Saturday's work with two completions in his first 10 throws and none of the connections were to a wide receiver. That against the backdrop of last Sunday's practice in which he threw three interceptions and another forgettable day Thursday.

Beck's unspectacular start to camp has led to speculation either McCown or Henne are winning the quarterback derby.

Not true. Not yet.

But it is accurate to say Beck is starting to lose the derby. Perhaps the leading quarterback this offseason, he is now behind the other two and desperately needs to make up ground once the preseason games begin if he wants the starting job.

''We're at a stage where we're starting to see a little bit of separation at times but it's not consistent,'' Sparano said of the competition. ``I feel like we have to get to the games to see what's happening there. The truth be told I'm really anxious to see it in the game.''

Or any other time.

I'm really pulling for John Beck. He got drafted into a crappy situation.

It's hard to throw when you have no offensive line. At BYU, Beck had a great o-line which allowed him to throw the ball downfield. Beck needs stability up front to be a starting QB. It's beginning to look like that Miami MIGHT NOT be the place for him.

It seems like Beck is falling further behind.

 Beck Im afraid will never make the transition to starting QB lets cut our losses now and bring in someone to fill the 3rd string position someone that has a real chance at competeing for a starting job but lets not waste a whole season on Beck.
 IMO he is just not an NFL QB there has to be somebody out there if not Quincey someone the Rams picked up Kurt Warner from the Arena league and he took them to the Superbowl with all the football being played around the world I find it hard to believe this is the best we can come up with.
 

I admit that we seem to have a problem at the QB position, but I don't think Carter or some other undiscovered talent is going to fix it.  A QB is only as good at the offensive line and wide receivers.

Warner was in the right place at the right time.  The Rams had one of the best offensive lines ever.  If you look at the QBs that seem to play at another level, they all play behind dominant offensive lines.  Warner, Manning, Aikman, Brady and dare I say it....Marino, certainly benefited from time to throw.  Look at film of Brady over the past few years.  It's amazing how much protection he gets.  Rarely is there someone in his face.  Most QBs will look good if you give them time.  Conversely, very few can get it done when they don't have time.  Brady was exposed in last years Super Bowl, and Warner looked like a different player when he wasn't playing behind a superstar offensive line. 

Next, look at the recievers (and running backs) these guys had. 

Marino - Duper/Clayton
Warner - Bruce/Holt/Hakim (Faulk)
Aikman - Harper/Irving (Smith)
Brady - Moss/Welker
Manning - Wayne/Harrison (James)


This brings me to my point........it won't matter who the quarterback is in Miami if we don't get good play from the line and find some WRs that can catch the ball.  Last year you could see improvement from the line, but the news I'm reading from training camp is pretty disturbing.  Why did we ever let Hudson Houck leave?  I think he is one of the best line coaches in the game, and it would have been great to see what he could do with Long.  The WR story looks even worse.

I think there is a silver lining.  I believe one of the easiest things to fix is the WR mix.  We may find that one of the QBs currently on the roster will be okay.  That leaves the offensive line.  Depsite losing Houck, it's apparent that fixing the line is a priority.  I think if we can continue to improve the line, the rest will follow.

Being that Sparano was an O-Line coach I'm sure he did not want to mix his theories with Houck's ways. Plus I think they wanted (and needed) a complete wholesale change. I'm a huge Houck fan but as usual ... he didn't do near the great things in Miami that he did elsewhere ... we just weren't bringing in the talent. I think this OL will do as well or better than last years but it needs to start doing it earlier.

I would love for Beck to succeed because I don't like McClown and then I'd like to see Henne beat him out later in the season or next year. That way we could have a good young QB and a relatively young capable backup (or trade bait). Probably not gonna happen but other than Favre coming here for a straight up trade (McClown for Favre ... fair, right) and letting Henne have a year or two to develop then we better start digging. And start kicking the crap out of our WRs for dropping balls ... been a problem for a long time now. R & R are not going to be able to run when the D has 22 ppl in the box.

I have been saying all along Beck will not win the starting position, he will be #2 behind McCown and Henne due to being a rookie will be #3 on the depth chart.
I heard allot of post on here about how hard Beck is working in the off season, but if you don't have the talent to be a starter all the hard work in the world will not make it so. But what's even scarier is our WR roster, that is scarier than seeing Phylis Diller naked!!! Why isn't anyone questing why golden boy Ted Ginn Jr can't even win the #1 wide receiver for this team? If Glenn does land on the dolphins I wouldn't doubt seeing Ginn drop to #3, sad but most likely true. It is still early in training camp, but it is looking real ugly under center, somebody needs to step up.

Consistently inconsistent?  Wasn't that how we defined the David Woodley era?

It's funny that you bring up Warner, who is the prototypical pocket quarterback. He's absolutely horrible unless the offensive line is very, very good. If the offensive line is *great*, Warner was pretty much the best quarterback in the league. Put him under pressure, however, and he sucked. Sound like someone we know?

Becasue he is the #1 receiver on the team and your misinformation is what we should question.