Training camp/practice news

[CF DolFan]

Tua started off very nervous and a bit shaky but settled down to hit Jakeem Grant with a TD bomb. Expectedly so ... I read he had good mobility on play-action and roll-outs to the left but Fitzpatrick and Rosen actually had more eye-opening deep passes. Preston Williams looked to be back to where he left off when he got hurt.




BY ADAM H. BEASLEY, BARRY JACKSON, AND ARMANDO SALGUERO
AUGUST 17, 2020 11:30 AM , UPDATED 1 MINUTE AGO

For the first time since late December, the Dolphins held a practice in pads on Monday and for 90 minutes, all seemed right with the world.

Armando Salguero will have details on how the quarterbacks looked in a post shortly.

Some other highlights:

▪ DeVante Parker and Preston Williams caught beautiful, contested throws from Ryan Fitzpatrick. Parker also caught a deep ball from Fitzpatrick, with cornerback Byron Jones in coverage. The Parker/Jones matchup will be one of the delicious subplots of camp.

▪ Williams looks good after ACL surgery in November. Among his other receptions Monday: a slant against rookie cornerback Noah Igbinhoghene.

Williams ran routes crisply and maneuvered in and out of breaks cleanly, showing no ill effects of the major knee procedure.

He seems on pace to be available to open the season, barring a setback.

Williams also worked as a punt returner.

▪ Receiver Jakeem Grant had a very good day, including a reception on a bomb from Tua Tagovailoa, the first of what the Dolphins hope will be zillions of long TD passes thrown by the Alabama rookie. He caught a deep pass from Josh Rosen, too.

▪ Jamal Perry -- the cornerback formerly known as Jomal Wiltz - had multiple pass break-ups but was then shook by Grant, who got wide open on a comeback route. Perry entered camp competing with Igbinoghene, Nik Needham and others for the nickel job. Deatrick Nichols also has joined that competition.

The Dolphins want to give Perry another long look in this camp.

▪ Second-year cornerback Ken Webster had a pretty good session, including tight coverage on multiple throws and a pass breakup on another. But he also allowed Grant to get by him on one long throw.

Webster, the Patriots’ seventh-round pick 16 months ago who was claimed by Miami on waivers Labor Day weekend, went on IR last December after appearing in eight games, with five starts.

He’s one of seven young cornerbacks competing for the fourth through sixth cornerback jobs behind Jones, Xavien Howard (who’s both on the COVID-19 and PUP lists) and Igbinoghene, who had a rough first padded practice as a Dolphin.

▪ Jones had very good coverage on Williams on one play on Monday. You can see why the Dolphins made Jones the highest-paid corner in football; he only has one interception the past two years but is always around the ball.

▪ Safety Eric Rowe forced a Kalen Ballage fumble. Ballage needs a strong camp to stick. The physicality is good to see from Rowe; his pass metrics were among the best of all safeties when he moved there from cornerback last October.

The question is whether Rowe and Bobby McCain hold up well against the run.

▪ Linebacker Kyle Van Noy had a terrific run stop on Ballage on one sequence. Van Noy is going to be helpful in so many ways to this defense.

▪ We’re not permitted to identify starting groups, but we can go as far as to say there were no surprises on defense in that regard.

We can also say that rookies are being given every opportunity to win starting jobs.

▪ Guard Ereck Flowers, who spent two weeks on the COVID-19 list before coming off on Saturday, participated briefly in team drills but then was pulled to the side for conditioning work. Understandably, he appeared winded.

▪ Other than Xavien Howard, everyone else was present at practice.

https://www.miamiherald.com/sports/nfl/miami-dolphins/article244946767.html

[Fau Teixeira]

fantastic !

[CF DolFan]

It's kind of nice listening to Joe Rose's take on players since he has been around the team since before Marino. With that said he was talking about Tua today and says the guy is doing well and he hopes he turns out to be a great QB but he isn't turning heads like Danny did.  He said Dan immediately made people go "wow" and everyone knew from the beginning Shula would turn the reigns over pretty quickly. Not sure what it means in the whole scheme of things but it was an interesting take. Tua isn't getting to play with the top receivers and is definitely behind the learning curve with the way this season has played out.

The one person he has been consistently praising is Noah Igbinoghene. He says this kid will go through a learning curve but so far has been doing really well in camp. Seems to be having a Preston Williams type first camp. Probably not much of a story when you realize he was taken in the first round but most people for get that and only remember Tua and that we drafted a LT.

[Tenshot13]

Some tidbits from yesterday's practice:

▪ Solomon Kindley continues to get every chance to win the right guard job. I would make him the very early favorite, which obviously could change at any time if he begins to struggle.
He had a false start Wednesday but clearly has not been overwhelmed by the assignment.
^^^From what I've read, he's looked really good so far.  People said he was a reach when we drafted him, but he's looking like a diamond in the rough

▪ Kindley, a fourth-round pick, appears ahead of rookie second-rounder Robert Hunt, but Hunt is still getting a look in prominent roles. The Dolphins are intent on seeing Hunt at tackle and guard.

Jesse Davis remains the front-runner to start at right tackle, as he did much of last season. But Hunt is getting a look; we cannot go farther than that because of the Dolphins’ policy prohibiting us from specifically saying who is getting first- and second-team reps and at what positions, unless a player or coach says it first.
^^^Hunt will likely be our RT by mid season.

▪ Rookie Curtis Weaver destroyed left tackle Julien Davenport, who continues to struggle. It appears (from our perspective) that the Dolphins would prefer rookie Austin Jackson win the left tackle job, though they would never say that publicly. Davenport has had a tough start to camp.
^^^I'm glad to see Weaver doing well, he had huge production in college.

▪ Jordan Howard had a long run and continues to look good. The run blocking seems much improved. So, of course, are the top two backs — newcomers Howard and Matt Breida. Which of those two is the starter remains to be seen.
^^^I'm confident we'll actually have a running game this season.  Ballage has still looked terrible in other things I've read.

▪ Rookie third-round safety Brandon Jones is getting a long look and has not done anything to hurt his chances.

--Raekwon Davis is trying to push Davon Godchaux and Wilkins at defensive tackle, but the rookie is an underdog to win a starting job in the next few weeks, though he has had some good moments
^^^Personally, Raekwon Davis is the most I'm excited about from the draft not named Tua, he's really been pushing guys around out there


https://www.miamiherald.com/sports/nfl/miami-dolphins/article244947472.html

[Dolphster]

Good info from the board bros.  I really liked both Robert Hunt and Kindley coming out of college and I think they will both work out really well.  But I'm not surprised that Kindley is ahead of Hunt at this point.  Hunt has excellent potential, but coming out of a small school, it is going to take him longer to acclimate to the speed of the NFL game. 

Usually I hate pre season games but with so many really young guys on this team, I think the lack of pre season games will really hurt the team this year.  Not like I had playoff ambitions for the team this year anyway.  But I think it would have been very helpful for the young guys to get game reps in pre season. 

The whole runup to the season this year has been so weird that it doesn't even seem like the season is starting in about 3 weeks.  This may be a really strange season in the NFL. 

[Pappy13]

It's kind of nice listening to Joe Rose's take on players since he has been around the team since before Marino. With that said he was talking about Tua today and says the guy is doing well and he hopes he turns out to be a great QB but he isn't turning heads like Danny did.  He said Dan immediately made people go "wow" and everyone knew from the beginning Shula would turn the reigns over pretty quickly. Not sure what it means in the whole scheme of things but it was an interesting take. Tua isn't getting to play with the top receivers and is definitely behind the learning curve with the way this season has played out.

I'm gonna take this one step further and say that some people have been impressed with Josh Rosen. Says that he looks better running this offense then he did last year where he struggled. Maybe that's because Chan Gailey's offense is just simpler then the offense we had last year, that is the reason that Chan was brought in supposedly. The other thing to mention is that Fitz hasn't looked that great. He has great command of the offense, he has the most experience running Chan Gailey's offense of anyone, but he doesn't have the arm that Josh Rosen does. Neither does Tua for that matter. Remember that it's never been about Josh Rosen's physical abilities/tools he has them all, it's been about running the offense and he's looking good this year. It's too early to make any predictions but I think there's a good chance that Tua is the #3 QB week 1 and there's a possibility albeit a small one that Fitzpatrick is the #2 QB week 1.

[CF DolFan]

I've heard both good and bad for Rosen. He led the first day but hasn't much competition. I've also heard he resorted back to the bad decision guy for a while and just sends it out there when nothing is open.



Not sure this is breaking news but Fitzpatrick is not at practice for "personal reasons". The other odd part to this story is Jake Rudock has been brought back. Barry Jackson reported last night of a rumor of one of the QBs having a "dead arm" issue. If Fitz has Covid issue the Dolphins would have to announce it. (His agent just confirmed it is NOT Covid related but wouldn't elaborate)

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Per source, Dolphins have not to this point re-signed Jake Rudock, who visited today. To be determined if they will. Unclear if dead arm an issue with Tua/Fitzpatrick/Rosen.

Just to be clear ...  Rudock would have to pass Covid testing before signing.

[CF DolFan]

Gisecki was on the Joe Rose show this morning. Interesting thing he said was that Tua throws such a tight spiral that he hasn't noticed it being a different spin than from a right handed thrower.

[CF DolFan]

Safid Deen from the Sun Sentinel just tweeted this

Hope Ryan Fitzpatrick isn’t gone for too long.

Today’s QB stats in 11-on-11:

ROSEN 6 of 14, 104 yards, 1 TD, INT, sacked three times.

TUA 6 of 15, 99 yards, 0 TDs, two INT, one near INT, sack.

[Pappy13]

It was Fitzpatrick that was said to be having the dead arm issues. I don't know that this is related to that, might be but just as well might not be. However I do think that has a bearing on Rosen at this point. It was in that same conversation that I saw that Fitzpatrick was struggling with the strength of his throws that I heard that Rosen was looking good. The only thing mentioned about Rosen was that once or twice he still seemed to be a tad late with making decisions. Other then that they've said that he looked good. If Fitz really is suffering from dead arm, then the possibility of seeing Rosen as the day 1 starter just increased.

[CF DolFan]

I don't doubt Rosen would start of Tua but he sure didn't look very good today.

ROSEN 6 of 14, 104 yards, 1 TD, INT, sacked three times.

[Pappy13]

I don't doubt Rosen would start of Tua but he sure didn't look very good today.

ROSEN 6 of 14, 104 yards, 1 TD, INT, sacked three times.

It wasn't as bad as the stats looks though. In his last series which was a hurry up drill he threw 3 incompletions and an interception. He also had a TD pass dropped earlier. If you take that last series away and that TD pass isn't dropped he's 6 of 11 for 104 yards and 2 TD's. That's pretty darn good. So it wasn't all bad. He had a bad series in the 2 minute drill is all really.

[Tenshot13]

"If "ifs" and "buts" were candy and nuts, wouldn't it be a Merry Christmas?"