Speaker 1: To on the move, Dylan Deep Speedless Hell.
Speaker 2: From the Baptist Health Studios inside the Baptist Health Training Complex.
Speaker 1: This is Drivetime with Travis Wingfield. He's got my avns
Speaker 1: in the playoffs.
Speaker 2: What is up, Dolph Fans? And welcome to the Draft
Speaker 2: Time Podcast. I am your host, Travis Wingfield. And on
Speaker 2: today's show, we're gonna get into the weeds here a
Speaker 2: little bit, and I'm gonna tell you some thoughts that
Speaker 2: percolated throughout the course of a forty eight hour weekend
Speaker 2: where I tried my best to distract myself all weekend long.
Speaker 1: We'll discuss that.
Speaker 2: We're gonna discuss trends of the run game across the
Speaker 2: league and how that could suit Skyler Thompson's skill set.
Speaker 2: And we'll also just kind of discuss where we are today.
Speaker 2: That's kind of the general topic of the podcast. From
Speaker 2: the Baptist Health Studios inside the Baptis Health Training Complex.
Speaker 1: This is.
Speaker 2: The Draft Time Podcast. So I have some Dolphins fan
Speaker 2: friends faithful from back home. In fact, one of my
Speaker 2: best buddies moved back from Seattle down to Florida, and
Speaker 2: we discuss life as a Dolphins fan. This game, this team,
Speaker 2: Dolphins fans a little bit of everything as well as
Speaker 2: our lives. And I told him on Wednesday or Thursday
Speaker 2: before the Bills game, after doing all my study and
Speaker 2: looking at their defense and all the pieces that were down,
Speaker 2: and I think I put up my keys too, like
Speaker 2: we were. This thing had been built this offseason to
Speaker 2: beat the Buffalo Bills. And after considering all of those factors,
Speaker 2: I text him and I said, you know what, but
Speaker 2: if the Dolphins don't like move the ball consistently, I'm
Speaker 2: gonna heal turn on these guys because with the caveat that,
Speaker 2: I do believe that there are reinforcements coming that could
Speaker 2: be the next thing that kind of got some over
Speaker 2: that hump. But they did exactly what I said I
Speaker 2: didn't want them to do in order for me to
Speaker 2: stay on board with like, oh, this is an all
Speaker 2: time historic offense, which you know it had been the
Speaker 2: last couple of years they were trading in that direction,
Speaker 2: and I thought that all the added skill pieces and
Speaker 2: the third year in the system, all that stuff, I
Speaker 2: thought it was going to be just another step in
Speaker 2: the right direction for the Dolphins offense. Not only is
Speaker 2: there a heel turn with that in mind. I think
Speaker 2: the Dolphins broke me like I had to actively avoid
Speaker 2: football matters and Twitter. I didn't delete the app, but
Speaker 2: I might as well have over the weekend because I've
Speaker 2: been thinking about this, that same friend that I text with,
Speaker 2: you know, when Tua got his extension and last year happened,
Speaker 2: you know all the results we didn't get, you still
Speaker 2: were this considerable part of the NFL conversation. Every single week.
Speaker 2: You were mentioned in power rankings, you were mentioned in
Speaker 2: big matchups of the weekend. That's the luxury of being
Speaker 2: or you know, I guess the primetime games never go
Speaker 2: our way, but you get those because you're good in
Speaker 2: every other game and you earn those through being a
Speaker 2: good football team. And that's who the Dolphins had become
Speaker 2: and established themselves over the last couple of years. And
Speaker 2: I'm not riding the obituary today. I just think it's
Speaker 2: worth putting our thoughts out there because I know, just
Speaker 2: like every single person listening to this podcast today, you're
Speaker 2: in a tough spot. You are really down about the
Speaker 2: thing that has the potential to bring you the most
Speaker 2: joy in your life outside of your children or your
Speaker 2: family or you know whatever other major pillars in your life.
Speaker 2: You may have if it is the Dolphins, that probably
Speaker 2: means you're nineteen years old like I was once upon
Speaker 2: time and had no responsibility outside of a part time
Speaker 2: job and try to figure away through junior college and
Speaker 2: just love football. But I cannot fathom right now going
Speaker 2: back to the era of twenty fifteen or twenty eighteen,
Speaker 2: or two thousand and nine or two thousand and five
Speaker 2: and this team that maybe they can get nine wins
Speaker 2: and get into the playoffs and then be two touchdown
Speaker 2: underdogs in Foxboro and get slacked by the Patriots. Maybe
Speaker 2: they can do that. Nah, I just have no interest
Speaker 2: in that thought, that conversation to have finally uncovered a
Speaker 2: true franchise quarterback, someone that moves the needle, someone that
Speaker 2: get you excited to go to the ballpark, someone that
Speaker 2: you know that when you're down by twenty one points
Speaker 2: in the fourth quarter at Baltimore, you can come back
Speaker 2: and win that game. When you need a touchdown on
Speaker 2: back to back drives in Los Angeles in the opener,
Speaker 2: you can come back and you can win that game.
Speaker 2: To to lose that you know, I don't know what's
Speaker 2: gonna happen quite frankly, you know, to put the news
Speaker 2: out there that he doesn't intend to retire. That came
Speaker 2: out Sunday morning, But like to live in that gray
Speaker 2: area forever now with every single hit and I just
Speaker 2: I just I thought I thought it was over because
Speaker 2: of last season, the way he protected himself, the fact
Speaker 2: that he endured an NFL season and we see we
Speaker 2: see guys take these hits all the time, and guys
Speaker 2: get hurt, guys get concussions, guys get knocked out of games.
Speaker 2: It just felt like different that time, right, And so
Speaker 2: I just keep thinking about where we were and where
Speaker 2: we have, where we've come from, where we are and
Speaker 2: where we're going.
Speaker 1: And for me, like.
Speaker 2: This weekend, I wanted to I was on the beat
Speaker 2: at the beach with my family on Saturday morning, had
Speaker 2: a great day, went to Flannagan's, got lunch with the kiddos,
Speaker 2: my wife, watched the Apple Cup. Was completely distracted for
Speaker 2: like eight hours and it was marvelous. But then you know,
Speaker 2: everyone goes to bed and you're with your thoughts and
Speaker 2: you're like, damn, I gotta go do content on this
Speaker 2: team that I'm just like kind of broken up with.
Speaker 1: Over the weekend, and.
Speaker 2: I just keep thinking about where I started this job,
Speaker 2: and you know, twenty nineteen was probably like the most
Speaker 2: zeal I had for this profession. When I pledged to
Speaker 2: every Dolphins fan Lockdown Dolphins, and I was going to
Speaker 2: take you through what's going to be a tough season
Speaker 2: from a wins lost perspective, from matchups getting destroyed like
Speaker 2: nine times out of ten, But I was always going
Speaker 2: to find that tenth one where Devon Godshot got a
Speaker 2: good run stop, or Eric Rowe showed us that he
Speaker 2: could be a potential safety of the future or whatever
Speaker 2: whatever the hell it was. And watching all the college
Speaker 2: prospects that year, and watching all the quarterbacks in college
Speaker 2: and deciphering Tua and Burrow and Herbert and Jordan Love
Speaker 2: and all these quarterbacks that were so much fun to watch,
Speaker 2: and all these prospects and all these draft picks we had,
Speaker 2: and we were building, We're building, We're building. They have
Speaker 2: this multiple war chest of draft picks that even if
Speaker 2: they bat four hundred in the drafts, they're gonna be
Speaker 2: a great team because they're gonna get valuable resources at
Speaker 2: low cost and they have all these free agent dollars
Speaker 2: and they can do it. Throughout the course of two
Speaker 2: oswickiy contract and we're gonna build and then the head
Speaker 2: coach turned out to be a total loser. All right,
Speaker 2: we'll reset, go back and try it again. We find
Speaker 2: this guy, Mike McDaniel. Oh my goodness, record pacing offense
Speaker 2: top ten offenses back to back year's number one offense.
Speaker 2: I've been waiting twenty five years for this, since I
Speaker 2: had peaches and NFL team themed pencils doing fucking freaking
Speaker 2: you know, learn how to write cursive.
Speaker 1: Been waiting for that. And to think.
Speaker 2: That my fifteen year projection of well, if the Dolphins
Speaker 2: you know, to and McDaniel going to be here for
Speaker 2: fifteen years, they'll probably get a trophy. Over that time,
Speaker 2: we'll get the culmination of Dolphins fandom is going to
Speaker 2: be great. But when I turn fifty years old and
Speaker 2: my kids are in high school or whatever, they'll be
Speaker 2: at that point close to it, and I've got all
Speaker 2: these Dolphins accolades, and my career is what it is
Speaker 2: at that point, probably not going to really care that much, right,
Speaker 2: you probably check out at that point. It's like how
Speaker 2: I imagine a Patriots fan might feel today, Like did
Speaker 2: they really care? Anymore like they won six championships. Is
Speaker 2: it ever going to get better than that? I don't know,
Speaker 2: existential crisis, ma'm because throughout that rebuild and throughout the
Speaker 2: picks and the free agency signings and the pivot to
Speaker 2: the new coach and the options and the ability to
Speaker 2: get out of contracts and the good contracts and the
Speaker 2: way they structure things and just continue to build this
Speaker 2: thing forward to what I still feel is a really
Speaker 2: good football team with a massive question hanging over its head.
Speaker 2: And just look at we're six and a half point
Speaker 2: dogs of the Seahawks. You know, like, I don't I
Speaker 2: don't want to go back to watching like I remember
Speaker 2: last year watching this like the Saints and Panthers in
Speaker 2: Week two and the Saints just couldn't move the ball
Speaker 2: and that was the whole entire year for them, And
Speaker 2: I was just like, I can't go back to watching
Speaker 2: this stuff, dude, I can't go back to watching Chad,
Speaker 2: Henny John Beck, Cleo Lemon say, I mean, you know
Speaker 2: the names.
Speaker 1: I just didn't want to do it, ma'am.
Speaker 2: And so I keep like tying my life to where
Speaker 2: the Dolphins are right now and my job where in
Speaker 2: twenty twenty. They began this whole thing right really a
Speaker 2: twenty nineteen in Arnest, but in twenty twenty and I
Speaker 2: grew and I developed, and I got to know the
Speaker 2: players and the picks and the coaches and all along
Speaker 2: with it, and we like did it.
Speaker 1: We made it.
Speaker 2: We were a team that was even if the results
Speaker 2: weren't what you wanted the last couple of years in
Speaker 2: the postseason, which they none of us would say they were,
Speaker 2: at least you were always part of the conversation. You
Speaker 2: were always one of those teams that was, oh, well
Speaker 2: the Dolphins are you know that's a team in the
Speaker 2: AFC that I could see that's a dark horse team.
Speaker 2: Or you know, Lewis Riddick last year in Week fourteens,
Speaker 2: and this is a team that's going to really surprise
Speaker 2: look down Like being part of those conversations made everything
Speaker 2: else more fun because all the content was so much
Speaker 2: more fun to watch.
Speaker 1: The games were obviously great.
Speaker 2: You could root against other teams with much more rooting
Speaker 2: interest at the top of the league, opposes like, oh,
Speaker 2: I hope the seven and six Chargers loose and we
Speaker 2: can move into a tiebreaker for the eighth steed in
Speaker 2: the AFC, and I'm not saying the Dolphins are done
Speaker 2: by any stretch of the imagination, but these are all
Speaker 2: the thoughts that came across the mind over the weekend.
Speaker 2: Just I don't I don't know when the quarterback comes back,
Speaker 2: but when he if he's not, I don't know how
Speaker 2: I can pick this team to win football games because
Speaker 2: I just don't see it, And so all these thoughts
Speaker 2: have gone through the head. I've thought about the prospects,
Speaker 2: I thought about the veterans, the trade possibilities. Something to
Speaker 2: put a band aid over the gaping wound in Dolphins
Speaker 2: fans hearts right now, I think was what from my perspective,
Speaker 2: the weekend was all about trying to find and the
Speaker 2: more I tried to find it, the more I found
Speaker 2: that I just wanted to be in the Atlantic Ocean
Speaker 2: with my two year old who was having an absolute blast.
Speaker 1: So I didn't script this.
Speaker 2: I just wanted to get on the mic and talk
Speaker 2: about it, and it just felt like a good chance
Speaker 2: to kind of connect with you all about the morning
Speaker 2: process that it kind of still feels like we're in
Speaker 2: I saw someone tweeted at me that they weren't going
Speaker 2: to be checking out any content this week, and I'm like, yeah, dude,
Speaker 2: I don't blame you.
Speaker 1: How I wouldn't do it either. You must excuse me.
Speaker 1: I've grown quite aware, you know.
Speaker 2: I my wife's grandparents, her great grandparents called no her grandparents,
Speaker 2: so my kid's great grandparents, and they were like, how's Travis,
Speaker 2: And they were like asking about me and the job,
Speaker 2: and they watch all my YouTube stuff, and I'm just like, I.
Speaker 1: Don't I don't want to do it.
Speaker 2: Guys, Like, I appreciate the call, it's good to see y'all,
Speaker 2: but I don't want to talk about the Dolphins right now.
Speaker 2: And I think the most sobering part about that is
Speaker 2: this was before the Rappaport thing came out Sunday, when
Speaker 2: I was like, we're gonna see two again. I just
Speaker 2: can't really fathom going back and doing it all over
Speaker 2: again without any trophies or any division titles or any
Speaker 2: playoff wins to show for this. I just can't imagine
Speaker 2: getting gung ho about it. I'm sure I'll get there.
Speaker 2: You know, every year we say I'm done buying any
Speaker 2: of this team. I'm not going to predict them to
Speaker 2: win these games until they and then the year comes around,
Speaker 2: you're like freaking awquall painted face paint.
Speaker 1: You know.
Speaker 2: It's just like I just wanted to come on the
Speaker 2: mic and drop some sorrow on you guys because I
Speaker 2: need to get it out myself, and.
Speaker 1: I don't know. We'll see, we'll see.
Speaker 2: I also had this note written down about you get
Speaker 2: did you guys realize? And this will get some backlash
Speaker 2: from that, you know, One game at a time, folks.
Speaker 2: The bills have ended like the last five seasons for
Speaker 2: the Dolphins, and I'm not saying this season's over, but
Speaker 2: it kind of feels like it if depending on when
Speaker 2: TWA comes back, right, So so many caveats to this,
Speaker 2: But in twenty twenty elimination game Week seventeen, an absolute
Speaker 2: beat down in Buffalo embarrassing fashion right literally end of
Speaker 2: the season. Twenty twenty one broke tw was Ribs in
Speaker 2: Week two and gave Brian floor As the opportunity to
Speaker 2: sit him for longer than he should have sat. And
Speaker 2: that effectively made you one in seven and then two
Speaker 2: it comes back in and you win eight games, seven
Speaker 2: games in a row. Big surprise flow, right, And that
Speaker 2: season was ended right there because of the Buffalo Bills
Speaker 2: injury to two in week number two. This is the
Speaker 2: one year you can argue it as the Titans in
Speaker 2: Week seventeen that year.
Speaker 1: I digress.
Speaker 2: For the point of this argument, We're gonna call it
Speaker 2: to Buffalo Bills in week two in twenty twenty two.
Speaker 2: Literally beat you in the playoffs in twenty twenty three
Speaker 2: because you lost to Buffalo twice. Really, but in Week
Speaker 2: eight team you had to go play a game that
Speaker 2: you were never gonna win where it was negative twenty
Speaker 2: five degrees in Kansas City. Right, So Buffalo, once again,
Speaker 2: thank you. We'll see you a good next year. Twenty
Speaker 2: twenty four. Number two, our quarterback that has gotten over
Speaker 2: all the ailments and woes of his career and bad
Speaker 2: coaching and injuries and all these things. Week two goes
Speaker 2: right back to the issue that made twenty twenty two
Speaker 2: a miserable roller coaster ride of a season with all
Speaker 2: the ups and downs following the health of the quarterback.
Speaker 2: So yeah, it's basically a Buffalo Bills problem. In fact,
Speaker 2: if you go to I think Warren Sharp tweeted it
Speaker 2: to my bookmarks, just give me a second, I'm gonna
Speaker 2: find it. Of course, now it's gone, I can't find it. Essentially,
Speaker 2: the Dolphins have like a five ninety winning percentage against
Speaker 2: the rest of the NFL, but are one and eleven
Speaker 2: against the Bills over the last twelve games over that
Speaker 2: same spans, Like they're basically a top five team against
Speaker 2: everybody else, but they cannot beat the Buffalo Bills. And
Speaker 2: how sad is that that it comes off the heels
Speaker 2: of Tom Brady literally handing over the keys in twenty
Speaker 2: nineteen is last year and Josh Allen's breakout year comes
Speaker 2: in twenty twenty, Like, does it ever get better? No? God, man,
Speaker 2: I don't know. Yeah, the Kugs won the Apple Cup.
Speaker 2: Let's go ahead and take a break. Comeback on the
Speaker 2: other side. I'm gonna tell you about how this trend
Speaker 2: of the running game in the National Football League could
Speaker 2: be the Dolphins path to finding victories without QB one.
Speaker 2: That's Next Draft Time podcast, your host Travis Wingfield, brought
Speaker 2: to you by AutoNation. We are two weeks into a
Speaker 2: brand new NFL season, and we've got a pretty significant
Speaker 2: trend developing across the league and it might coincide with
Speaker 2: how the Dolphins can carve out some paths to victory
Speaker 2: over the coming weeks or for as long as QB
Speaker 2: one is down, and I want to start with this.
Speaker 2: You'll notice this through the life of the NFL. It
Speaker 2: is a league of cycles and trends. Because Dan Marino
Speaker 2: ushered in the era of the long ball, and though
Speaker 2: it took a while for the NFL to catch up
Speaker 2: to that and through various routes of the passing game,
Speaker 2: we eventually did see the spawn of the aerial attack.
Speaker 2: In the nineteen nineties with Jim Kelly and the Buffalo Bills.
Speaker 2: We saw Brett farre introduce a new style of quarterback play.
Speaker 2: We saw Warren Moon carry on Dan's approach and legacy
Speaker 2: into the nineties. But then came the bell Cow running
Speaker 2: back em At Smith, Terrell, Davis Ladany, and Tomlinson, Priest Holmes,
Speaker 2: Ricky Williams. For all you youngsters out there, there was
Speaker 2: a time where your perception across the media was tied
Speaker 2: to the quality of your running back and usually paired
Speaker 2: with a stout defense. Look at those early two thousands
Speaker 2: Dolphins teams and how they were built. And when Ricky
Speaker 2: Williams hung it up in two thousand and four, look
Speaker 2: at what happened to a team that had won eleven, nine, eleven,
Speaker 2: and ten games the four years prior four wins, nine wins,
Speaker 2: six wins, one win, and by that point Peyton Breeze, Roethlisberger, Brady.
Speaker 2: The passing era had arrived, and then it peaked, and
Speaker 2: that peak was lengthy. It's difficult to say exactly where
Speaker 2: it culminated because Patrick Mahomes toppled the records set by
Speaker 2: Manning in twenty thirteen in the twenty eighteen season, and
Speaker 2: those Manning records toppled the Brady records of two thousand
Speaker 2: and seven and that unprecedented season they had that year.
Speaker 2: I think we're seeing the cycle accelerate early in twenty
Speaker 2: twenty four, when early in twenty twenty three that was
Speaker 2: the beginning of the pendulum swing.
Speaker 1: Twenty twenty three was the lowest total for a.
Speaker 2: League leader, our own to a tongue I loap with
Speaker 2: over forty six hundred passing yards, since Drew Brees led
Speaker 2: the league with just over forty four hundred passing yards.
Speaker 2: We had double digit five thousand yard passing seasons over
Speaker 2: that span. You might recall Dan Marino had the first
Speaker 2: one in nineteen eighty four, and it didn't happen again
Speaker 2: for another twenty four years. One instance of five thousand
Speaker 2: passing yards through the NFL's first ninety three seasons, and
Speaker 2: then thirteen of them in the next sixteen seasons. But
Speaker 2: it's been it gets Barron a year since our last one.
Speaker 2: Twenty twenty three was just one of two seasons since
Speaker 2: twenty seventeen that didn't have a five thousand yard passer.
Speaker 2: If you can believe it, Jameis Winston was once a
Speaker 2: five thousand yard passer, and if trends are any indication,
Speaker 2: we ain't getting one in twenty twenty four either. But
Speaker 2: why might you think that is here's one place to start.
Speaker 2: The number of two high shells has increased by over
Speaker 2: twenty percent inside of a five year period. In twenty nineteen,
Speaker 2: teams ran too high or more at thirty eight percent
Speaker 2: of the time. Through two weeks of the new season,
Speaker 2: teams are running too high at a sixty two percent clip,
Speaker 2: and it has caused this ripple effect on numbers, effectively
Speaker 2: changing the game. Depth of target averages are way down.
Speaker 2: It's under seven for the first time in two decades.
Speaker 2: In fact, the lowest it got prior to twenty twenty
Speaker 2: four was seven and a half. It's six point eight rate.
Speaker 2: Now it's trending towards being a full yard lower. And
Speaker 2: the reason you've been told for a decade plus now
Speaker 2: that running backs don't matter comes squarely from the analytics
Speaker 2: community that focuses on a stat called EPA expected points added.
Speaker 2: The math behind it is that a good run is
Speaker 2: four yards, right. A back who averages four yards per
Speaker 2: carry is a good back, but a quarterback that wants
Speaker 2: to be a good quarterback needs to be around seven
Speaker 2: and a half yards per attempt or so. So pretty
Speaker 2: basic to look at that and say our good runs
Speaker 2: are half as effective as our good passes while teams
Speaker 2: taking shorter, quicker throws and the implementation of penalties or
Speaker 2: misses on those throws on top of what teams are
Speaker 2: willing to give up in the running game to prevent
Speaker 2: those big plays, Well you're getting this inverse of EPA
Speaker 2: per run play compared to EPA per pass play. It's
Speaker 2: a fascinating dichotomy, but also kind of a simple one.
Speaker 2: Offenses began to spread things out, defenses didn't adjust, and
Speaker 2: explosive plays were the result. Ten to fifteen years ago,
Speaker 2: then defenses adjusted because they have the tangible proof that
Speaker 2: they have to play lighter boxes to contend with all
Speaker 2: the speed and skill on the perimeter. So they remove
Speaker 2: hats from the box to match. And what does the
Speaker 2: offense's focus then become? You guessed it to run into
Speaker 2: those looks. It's a cycle that will never die in
Speaker 2: this sport. Create overplay, react to overplay. But there's more.
Speaker 2: It's not as simple as too high equals run. Don't
Speaker 2: get this twisted? The spread revolution one and long gone
Speaker 2: are the days of Mike Allstatt donning shoulder pads of
Speaker 2: Jake Berman in Little Giants. That's the kid that shows
Speaker 2: up to practice in Bubble Rap. By the way, I
Speaker 2: could have sworn he had a name like Squints and Sandlot.
Speaker 2: I just feel like you have to give that character
Speaker 2: a more defining name than Jake Berman.
Speaker 1: But I digress.
Speaker 2: We aren't going back to that, but we are definitely
Speaker 2: in the zag era of defenses to the offense's zig,
Speaker 2: and they're starting to zag back. Still with me, When
Speaker 2: teams can limit the explosives, force the offense into longer drives,
Speaker 2: which creates more chances for errors, right penalties, drops missed
Speaker 2: assignments leads to negative plays. It's a lot tougher to
Speaker 2: be perfect on twelve plays than it is to get
Speaker 2: behind a defensive back for one play. On Thursday, the
Speaker 2: Buffalo Bills refuse to let Miami do to them what
Speaker 2: the Dolphins did to the Jaguars. We saw the eighty
Speaker 2: yard touchdown the Tyreek hill, the sixty three yard play
Speaker 2: to Jalen Waddle. The Bills played too high at a
Speaker 2: rate of seventy five percent and stayed in Cover two
Speaker 2: two man or quarters. Cover two is a high low
Speaker 2: concept and zone safeties take half the deep field. The
Speaker 2: underneath cornerbacks play the curl flat. They can re route
Speaker 2: through press from here or playoff. It doesn't matter. It's
Speaker 2: a zone coverage all the way across the board. That's
Speaker 2: different than two man, which keeps those same half field
Speaker 2: safeties up high in the top of the defense. But
Speaker 2: you play man coverage with those cornerbacks, and they typically
Speaker 2: do so with press to funnel those routes to their help.
Speaker 2: This is a big reason why Miami was able to
Speaker 2: run the ball for over one hundred yards in the
Speaker 2: first half against Buffalo, and had Miami stayed in the
Speaker 2: game on the scoreboard and not had those errors in
Speaker 2: the passing game, it probably would have continued all night long.
Speaker 2: Hence why defenses are willing to do this. It opens
Speaker 2: up more opportunities for mistakes for posterity. Quarters coverage is
Speaker 2: a four high look where the defense puts four deep
Speaker 2: zone defenders down the field, each covering a quarter of
Speaker 2: the deep part of the field.
Speaker 1: Four quarters.
Speaker 2: You paired those coverages that limit the vertical attack. With
Speaker 2: a league chalk full of elite pass rushers, if quarterbacks
Speaker 2: can't get through their process through their progression quick enough,
Speaker 2: then the negative plays come into play and few things
Speaker 2: kill a drive like eating sacks. To protect against that.
Speaker 2: To get more pass protectors, to get more run blockers,
Speaker 2: teams have called upon more fullbacks and tight ends. The
Speaker 2: Dolphins saw three tight ends play over twenty snaps each
Speaker 2: in the game last Thursday. We know alec Ingold's role
Speaker 2: in the offense. The World Champs kept an undrafted rookie
Speaker 2: and Carson Steele to play full back in an offense
Speaker 2: that has not rostered a fullback in the Patrick Mahomes era.
Speaker 2: The defense's counter highbrid off ball linebackers who can play
Speaker 2: the edge. Players that allow the defense to counter the
Speaker 2: offense's use of versatile players like a George Kittle, who
Speaker 2: can be one of the game's best blockers one week
Speaker 2: and one of the game's best pass catchers the next.
Speaker 2: So you get players like July Tavia in New England
Speaker 2: who typically aligns in an off ball position but can
Speaker 2: also condense down off the edge to change the front
Speaker 2: and the count for the quarterback, for the quarterback to
Speaker 2: assess all of that within a forty second shot clock.
Speaker 2: Defenses all over the league have these guys Caden Ellison Atlanta,
Speaker 2: Leoschanel in Kansas City, Pete Werner in New Orleans, and
Speaker 2: Frankie Luvu Go Koog's in Washington. Just like Mike Allstatts
Speaker 2: type are extinct, so too is the neck rolled shoulder
Speaker 2: pad shelf higher than my helmet nasal strip I black
Speaker 2: wearing Mike linebacker. And that's before we get to the
Speaker 2: big nickels from the safety position like Brian branch or
Speaker 2: Kyle Hamilton or Buffalo's do it all slot cornerback Taron Johnson.
Speaker 2: It's a game of constant cat and mouse. Offenses have
Speaker 2: to start to incorporate motion or have begun. I should say,
Speaker 2: in corporate motion to give them information pre snap. Defenses
Speaker 2: are starting to play half field structures that allow them
Speaker 2: to not react to the motion, and quarterbacks will then
Speaker 2: have to win post snap, which is usually around two
Speaker 2: and a half seconds. By the way, and I'm not
Speaker 2: sure which is tougher picking up a ninety nine mile
Speaker 2: per hour fastball or figuring out a defense in two
Speaker 2: and a half seconds with my.
Speaker 1: Well being being on the line.
Speaker 2: And if you don't get an answer by the time
Speaker 2: that it takes you to buckle your chin strap, then
Speaker 2: here comes Miles Garrett, Dexter Lawrence, or Micah Parsons ready
Speaker 2: to put you on a stretcher. So the results of
Speaker 2: all this reduced pass rates through two weeks, teams are
Speaker 2: averaging thirty pass attempts per game. There was sixty six
Speaker 2: touchdown passes in the NFL through two weeks in twenty
Speaker 2: twenty four, last year eighty six, twenty twenty two a
Speaker 2: bucko five, twenty twenty one one ten, the same as
Speaker 2: twenty twenty and twenty nineteen. It was still triple digits
Speaker 2: at a bucko five. Again, rushes per game are up
Speaker 2: twenty seven and a half rushes per game we are
Speaker 2: knocking on the door of a fifty to fifty split.
Speaker 2: Points per game are down twenty one point four per game.
Speaker 2: That's lower than last year's lowest in a decade of
Speaker 2: twenty one point eight, and if you go back at
Speaker 2: twenty twenty, teams were scoring just a hair under twenty
Speaker 2: five points per game. As for the rush and pass disparity,
Speaker 2: last year it was thirty four to twenty seven in
Speaker 2: favor of the pass. In two weeks, that seven play
Speaker 2: gap has shrunk to less than three. It's more than
Speaker 2: cut in half. And if you go back just a
Speaker 2: few years in twenty twenty, it was thirty six pass
Speaker 2: attempts per game and twenty six rush attempts per game.
Speaker 2: So in less than half of a decade, we've gone
Speaker 2: from a sixty to forty split to fifty two forty eight.
Speaker 2: That's not just a pendulum swing. That's Dan Marino taking
Speaker 2: the pendulum, rearing it back behind his ear and humming
Speaker 2: it in the other direction like one of those nerve
Speaker 2: vortex footballs that you had as a kid back in
Speaker 2: the nineteen nineties. If you're my age, it's fitting, isn't it.
Speaker 2: When they were inventing a fantasy football to give you
Speaker 2: and your friends more long bombs in your backyard game.
Speaker 2: The NFL was a three yards and a cloud of
Speaker 2: a dust league. Now, after a decade of the aerial revolution,
Speaker 2: just like high wasted baggy jeans, we're right back where
Speaker 2: we were in the era of TGIF programming. Boy meets world,
Speaker 2: pleated khakis and undercut hairstyles. Just like the game of football,
Speaker 2: we are a people of cycles. Let's go ahead and
Speaker 2: take our last break right there. Come back on the
Speaker 2: other side. Tell you about Tyler Huntley and how we
Speaker 2: can craft an offense with all this information in mind
Speaker 2: to try to win games with both Tyler Huntley and
Speaker 2: Scalar Thompson. That's next Draft Time podcast, your host Travis Wingfield,
Speaker 2: brought to you by Auto Nation. Not exactly fresh off
Speaker 2: the wire, but since we're doing this podcast on Tuesday morning,
Speaker 2: I think is when it comes out. The news that
Speaker 2: came across the wire on Monday was the Dolphins acquisition
Speaker 2: of quarterback Tyler Huntley off the Baltimore Ravens practice squad.
Speaker 2: Let's go ahead and open this segment with coach McDaniel
Speaker 2: on Tyler Huntley.
Speaker 3: If you're not gonna adhere to timelines based upon you know,
Speaker 3: what the science tells us and how we want to
Speaker 3: approach individual uh situations and and and player injuries with
Speaker 3: that unknown, you know that that was something that's you know,
Speaker 3: he ever since he he's it's been a parent from
Speaker 3: afar and then having a couple or having some coaches
Speaker 3: that have been around him. You know, I shoot, he
Speaker 3: was replacing the league MVP, and you could tell from
Speaker 3: far away that that he was a guy that the
Speaker 3: team absolutely believed could lead them to victory. I think
Speaker 3: that's a very huge tangible thing for a non QB
Speaker 3: one necessarily, and so for us without knowing exact timelines,
Speaker 3: you know, we got to learn firsthand a nice nice
Speaker 3: reminder of uh, how how it only takes one play
Speaker 3: and uh, you're you're what you think, your your depth
Speaker 3: is changes abruptly. So this was you know, that's a
Speaker 3: that's a move for you know, moving forward to to
Speaker 3: secure some depth you know, in case of the unforeseen,
Speaker 3: which is timelines for for us as as it relates
Speaker 3: to a.
Speaker 2: To me, the interesting thing about Huntley is I think you,
Speaker 2: for the first time have a square peg in a
Speaker 2: round hole in this offense. He is not like these
Speaker 2: other quarterbacks that we've had here. I do think he
Speaker 2: instantly becomes the best quarterback on the roster while two
Speaker 2: was down, which is a problem in and of itself, right,
Speaker 2: But I think you essentially have to scrap your offense
Speaker 2: as you know it, which I don't know exactly what
Speaker 2: that looks.
Speaker 1: Like, but I'll take a shot at it.
Speaker 2: It's going with Huntley here. First, he is a just
Speaker 2: different quarterback than what you seen here under Mike McDaniel.
Speaker 2: Even back to Utah, his game was creating, incorporating an
Speaker 2: extra threat in the running game, quarterback scramble and hit
Speaker 2: the deep ball at an efficient level. Although his mechanics
Speaker 2: on the deep shots are kind of wonky, so you're
Speaker 2: gonna get your misses, but he does have some hits
Speaker 2: as well. I actually find it to be an interesting
Speaker 2: pairing with the whole bit I just did on the
Speaker 2: podcast here talking about the shifting landscape of football schema.
Speaker 2: I don't think Huntley's game is one where he's going
Speaker 2: to one hitch timing, dial up deep shots, or rip
Speaker 2: these anticipation shots that look like they're heading for a
Speaker 2: triangle of defenders only to be perfectly cut off and
Speaker 2: intersected by a Dolphins wide receiver for eighteen yards. But
Speaker 2: I think you can parse out his game from both
Speaker 2: the stats and the tape, and the tape tells me
Speaker 2: that he is a creator and a big play hunter.
Speaker 2: I hate comparing anybody to this guy because he's the
Speaker 2: worst human being in the league. But it reminds me
Speaker 2: of Deshaun Watson when he was with the Houston Texans,
Speaker 2: where he would just drop back and look around and
Speaker 2: move and shuffle and create space and hit the big
Speaker 2: play with his arm and then have a big run
Speaker 2: that changes the game as well. That's basically Huntley is
Speaker 2: a prime to Shaun Watson, a poor man's prime to
Speaker 2: Shaun Watson, minus all the other stuff. He has a
Speaker 2: twenty percent pressure to sack rate in his career and
Speaker 2: a two point nine to three average time to throw
Speaker 2: rate to A Conversely, just a fifteen percent sack rate,
Speaker 2: which also is more impressive because he takes so many
Speaker 2: fewer pressures because of how fast he plays the position.
Speaker 2: But he also to A has a two point four
Speaker 2: to five career time to throw and actually just the
Speaker 2: last two years is two point three to two, so
Speaker 2: literally more than a half second more or less that
Speaker 2: he gets rid of the ball than Tyler Huntley. So
Speaker 2: it's a complete land shape landscape shift for Huntley. But
Speaker 2: here's my thing. We lose all that stuff with Skyler two.
Speaker 2: So why not take the guy that actually adds an
Speaker 2: element to your offense. One thing that he has that
Speaker 2: no other quarterback has in this roster is the running ability.
Speaker 2: And I'm not even talking about scrambling. Yes, that is
Speaker 2: a big part of his game. Obviously in his career
Speaker 2: he has fifty two scrambles on four hundred and sixty
Speaker 2: eight dropbacks and thirty two sacks taken. His rushing splits
Speaker 2: go like this, though, three hundred and fifty six of
Speaker 2: his rushing yards career are on scrambles and two thirty
Speaker 2: five are on designed runs. The quarterback he backed up
Speaker 2: in Baltimore the greatest running quarterback of all time. I
Speaker 2: will hear the argument from Mike Vick, but I think
Speaker 2: it's Lamar Jackson is split at twenty three hundred yards
Speaker 2: on scrambles and thirty seven hundred yards on designed runs. Obviously,
Speaker 2: nobody is Lamar except Mike Vick. But I think that's
Speaker 2: more in line with how you'd expect Huntley to look
Speaker 2: in Miami. He can create when things break down. But
Speaker 2: I think the best thing that he adds to your
Speaker 2: offense is the ability to run the football with the
Speaker 2: quarterback and then what that does to the defense's fits
Speaker 2: against the actual run game, one more complex run game,
Speaker 2: one of the more complex run games, I should say,
Speaker 2: in the entire business, because suddenly the quarterback becomes part
Speaker 2: of the misdirection, part of the keys, and the manipulation
Speaker 2: of the defense's eyes and all the short motion, all
Speaker 2: these things that he can in corporate. So I'm intrigued
Speaker 2: by that. I'm intrigued by how it pairs with his
Speaker 2: deep passing abilities that are okay, because when he goes
Speaker 2: off script, the best thing that we can do is
Speaker 2: attack the vulnerabilities down the field. And he has that
Speaker 2: pliability slash elasticity in his arm that I don't think
Speaker 2: Skyler has. I know too, it doesn't have it in
Speaker 2: this way to fire that thing deep down the field
Speaker 2: from awkward positions.
Speaker 1: Now, the NFL numbers are bad.
Speaker 2: It's a small sample size, but he does not have
Speaker 2: good deep passing numbers at this level.
Speaker 1: But if you go back to his.
Speaker 2: College tape, I know Travis, it was five years ago, whatever,
Speaker 2: I don't care.
Speaker 1: It still is informative.
Speaker 2: He finished out his last year at Utah inpleting forty
Speaker 2: six percent of his deep shots for nine touchdowns and
Speaker 2: two picks. And I think if you watch him on
Speaker 2: tape as a pro, you see that ability to create
Speaker 2: those chances. You had to remember the offense that he
Speaker 2: was in. It didn't care to that very much. It
Speaker 2: was all run game all the time. Most of all,
Speaker 2: I think it pairs with the entire segment we just
Speaker 2: did there. If you play an offense that has Tyler Huntley,
Speaker 2: Devon eight, chan alec Ingold and Julian Hill in the game,
Speaker 2: you better bring that safe down in the box. And
Speaker 2: if they do that, it means that someone has to
Speaker 2: cover ten or seventeen solo. And that's where I think
Speaker 2: you can live in this world between run heavy occasional
Speaker 2: deep shop. It's kind of like Russell Wilson for the
Speaker 2: Seattle Seahawks for all those years, but obviously again a
Speaker 2: poor man's version of it. That's how I'd envision the
Speaker 2: offense for hunting. But we also have to envision an
Speaker 2: offense for a skyler who will get his shot at
Speaker 2: it after waiting since the playoff game in twenty twenty two.
Speaker 2: Now record this on a Monday, I'm pretty sure he'll
Speaker 2: be Skyler in the game on Sunday. But for him,
Speaker 2: I think it looks a lot different. More so the
Speaker 2: offense that you're run with Tua, primarily because of his
Speaker 2: familiarity with it, not because of the skill set. But
Speaker 2: I think you do have to adapt to his skills.
Speaker 2: And I go back to that Vikings game in twenty
Speaker 2: twenty two, and there was all kinds of play action
Speaker 2: boot get him on the move, more half field reads,
Speaker 2: less static pockets. This offense already plays with a limited
Speaker 2: drop back game, and that's what the whole league is
Speaker 2: doing now. If you haven't noticed by the way talked
Speaker 2: about it all summer long, look at the Saints. They
Speaker 2: just threw up forty seven points in the Cowboys, and
Speaker 2: they called three true in the game and never once
Speaker 2: put an offensive lineman on Micah Parsons. It was a
Speaker 2: combination of unblocked with movement or backs and tight ends
Speaker 2: chipping multiple pieces at the time. Parsons actually after the
Speaker 2: game called it a maze to get through their plan.
Speaker 2: He was really impressed by it, but with Skyler Thompson,
Speaker 2: I think a strong running game is paramount and the
Speaker 2: play action boot game off of that, not to mention
Speaker 2: all the different ways we have of getting the balls
Speaker 2: to the two playmakers on the outside and the screen
Speaker 2: game jet sweep all that fun stuff. So yeah, I
Speaker 2: think you have the option to lean into this trend
Speaker 2: of the running game coming back to life at least
Speaker 2: while QB one gets healthy.
Speaker 1: And that's what I would do. So there you go.
Speaker 2: Let's go ahead and get the hell out of here.
Speaker 2: We have a podcast for you guys tomorrow. John Boyle
Speaker 2: of the of Seattle Seahawks dot Com joins me, I'll
Speaker 2: have the game preview on Thursday Friday. The Great Kevin
Speaker 2: Harland joins us he'll also do HQ with us too,
Speaker 2: so plenty of content coming your way. Starting to get
Speaker 2: a little bit of life back into me. I know
Speaker 2: that first segment was a brutal one, so I appreciate
Speaker 2: you guys for staying with me on that. But it's
Speaker 2: been a tough few days trying to had to get
Speaker 2: back to to feeling like I didn't just break up
Speaker 2: with A didn't just get divorced like it felt like
Speaker 2: a breakup. Didn't It didn't this week for like this weekend,
Speaker 2: for like a breakup like you were still in love
Speaker 2: with someone that you couldn't have, Like that's what it
Speaker 2: felt like. So starting to feel a little bit normal.
Speaker 2: The boys took you out to the club over the weekend.
Speaker 2: Whatever the comparisons are you want to call. That's that's
Speaker 2: where we are right now. So you all please be
Speaker 2: sure rambling to subscribe to the podcast, leave us at
Speaker 2: ranting and leave us a review. You can follow me
Speaker 2: on social at Wingfield NFL and the team at Miami Dolphins.
Speaker 2: Check out the fish Tank podcast with my guys Seth
Speaker 2: and Juice. Check out the YouTube channel for Media Availabilities
Speaker 2: and Dolphins h Q. We have tons of breakdowns devon
Speaker 2: achan this game. It's going up on the fillustration for
Speaker 2: this week. For me, I cannot wait to break it
Speaker 2: down for you guys. Also check out where we at
Speaker 2: Miami Dolphins dot com. Until next time, fins.
Speaker 1: Up Carolina and Cameron Daddy just coming home.
Speaker 3: Oh thebody kill me please