Speaker 1: You are listening to the Miami Dolphins Podcast Network.
Speaker 2: This is Drive Time with Travis Wingfield. Back to throw
Speaker 2: to a looking whips about a wide Dolphin touchdown? Tyrequel uncrelievable,
Speaker 2: just blue fire for a second time. Don't know where
Speaker 2: he was going right away?
Speaker 3: Want to hit that though, Man, I'm gonna help you.
Speaker 4: Someone stump on your man wagon Wattle Wattle to a
Speaker 4: shot Gutch back to throw looking at them's.
Speaker 2: Up fires touchdown. It's Waddle his six touchdown pass. This thing.
Speaker 2: Drive Time with Travis Wingfield begins.
Speaker 1: Now let me check your pulse if enough for.
Speaker 2: What is up? Dolphins?
Speaker 4: And welcome to the Drive Time podcast, part of the
Speaker 4: Miami Dolphins podcast Network, covering your team, your Miami Dolphins.
Speaker 4: How's it going everybody? I am your host, Travis Wingfield.
Speaker 4: And on today's show, we welcome in a member of
Speaker 4: the Carolada Panthers beat Mike Kay from the Charlotte Observer
Speaker 4: joins us to break down this matchup on Sunday. Plus
Speaker 4: we'll hear from the assistant coaches. We'll also pick the
Speaker 4: week six games. Man, it goes by faster every single year.
Speaker 4: From the Baptist Health Studios inside the Baptist Health Training Complex.
Speaker 2: This is the Draft Time Podcast. Maye Geffe.
Speaker 4: Really quickly want to apologize for the audio on yesterday show.
Speaker 4: I'm quite sick about it. I did one thousand tests
Speaker 4: on the sure mic with the Zoom recorder and found
Speaker 4: out only after the fact because I didn't test with
Speaker 4: earbuds in. I listened back to it on my desktop,
Speaker 4: on my laptop, on my phone. All sounded good, but
Speaker 4: apparently stereo mode comes in one ear and not the other,
Speaker 4: and you have to plug in multiple mics to accomplish
Speaker 4: that with the Zoom recorder.
Speaker 2: I don't know.
Speaker 4: I thought it sounded great, but obviously it did not,
Speaker 4: so I apologize for that. Let's go ahead and get
Speaker 4: to my guest today. Mike k from the Charlotte Observer,
Speaker 4: joining us now on the Draft Time podcast. Is a
Speaker 4: member of the Charlotte Observer, a beat writer for the
Speaker 4: Carolina Panthers. He's my kay and according to his Twitter bio,
Speaker 4: he's fond of fullbacks and the Foo Fighters and Mike,
Speaker 4: I start that way to tell you that I hope
Speaker 4: you one day get a chance to meet alec Ingold,
Speaker 4: because he's one of the best human beings on this
Speaker 4: entire planet. And also I have to ask you what
Speaker 4: is the greatest song all time by the Food.
Speaker 1: Well, I should tell you that I have talked to
Speaker 1: Alec a couple of times, but back when I covered
Speaker 1: the entire league before I got this job, I did
Speaker 1: a whole takeout on Fullbacks and he was one of
Speaker 1: the lead voices. So it's cool to watch him do
Speaker 1: what he does in Miami. Everybody. The classic answer for
Speaker 1: your second question is ever long. But to me, The
Speaker 1: Pretender holds a very important spot in my life because
Speaker 1: the song came out my freshman year of college. I
Speaker 1: got to see them for the first time in person
Speaker 1: in college right as they were touring with the Echo
Speaker 1: Silence Patients and Grace tour pretty special, So that song's
Speaker 1: always been very important to me.
Speaker 4: That was also my pick, But for the same reason
Speaker 4: you listed The Pretender. My hero just instantly transports me
Speaker 4: back to my high school days, like John mock Style
Speaker 4: from Varsity Blues.
Speaker 2: So I mean that band.
Speaker 4: Man, I don't know how many old heads we have
Speaker 4: as we I think now are officially Mike on the
Speaker 4: podcast here, but the Foo Fighters, man, that's the classic
Speaker 4: band right there.
Speaker 1: Yeah, amen, And you know you're Washington State. I know
Speaker 1: you're a big Washington State guy. I made sure to
Speaker 1: go out to the sub Pop Museum when I was
Speaker 1: out there when the Panthers played the Seahawks last year
Speaker 1: because Subpop put out the first Nirvana album, which doesn't
Speaker 1: feature Dave Grohld, but just kind of a cool interconnecting thing.
Speaker 2: That's awesome, man, that's good to hear. Yeah.
Speaker 4: Seeah, that was a fun time in the Pacific Northwest.
Speaker 4: Obviously holds holds tight to my heart, near and dear.
Speaker 4: There so really good stuff. Let's go ahead and break
Speaker 4: right into this Dolphins and Panthers matchup coming up on
Speaker 4: Sunday here at hard Rock Stadium, and Mike you probably
Speaker 4: can assume this. I always start these interviews with the
Speaker 4: opposing beat writers at the quarterback position, and I want
Speaker 4: to start just with your general assessment of Bryce Young,
Speaker 4: his growth five year or five games, I should say,
Speaker 4: into the NFL career, what have you seen so far
Speaker 4: from the rookie number one overall pick Well.
Speaker 1: I think he has shown his elusiveness for the most
Speaker 1: part in the pocket. I think that's been the most
Speaker 1: impressive thing about him. When we talk about Bryce Young.
Speaker 1: We talk about his processing ability. I think he's doing
Speaker 1: that well, but it's hard to process and then be
Speaker 1: efficient when guys aren't really getting open. We really if
Speaker 1: you watch tape, Adam Fieln's the only guy that's consistently
Speaker 1: getting open. He plays mostly out of the slot. They're
Speaker 1: working with rookie Jonathan Mingo on the outside. He missed
Speaker 1: one game with a concussion, but he's been extremely inconsistent.
Speaker 1: DJ Sharks dealt with his own injury stuff and been
Speaker 1: pretty inconsistent. The running game is absolutely just a letdown.
Speaker 1: Miles Sanders is gotten off to a good start. He's
Speaker 1: also now dealing with a shoulder injury. But what I
Speaker 1: think is impressive about Bryce Young is that while he
Speaker 1: is not taking shots down field, he's performing better than
Speaker 1: I think he did on college shape in the short
Speaker 1: to intermediate game from an accuracy standpoint. Like to me,
Speaker 1: when he was a prospect, his ability to make off
Speaker 1: schedule throws downfield was his like superpower. Here they've got
Speaker 1: him kind of refining the short to intermediate route and
Speaker 1: he's not really taking the shots that you'd liked him
Speaker 1: to see, But I think he has improved that area
Speaker 1: of his game.
Speaker 4: Yeah, that can be an area that's tough to kind
Speaker 4: of translate over right away because of just the speed
Speaker 4: of the game and how fast things happen, and obviously
Speaker 4: trying to get an offense, you know, down pat early on. Like,
Speaker 4: I think that a few rookie quarterbacks over the last
Speaker 4: couple of decades have kind of, I don't want to say,
Speaker 4: spoiled our minds in terms of how these guys progress
Speaker 4: and learn and grow. But it's supposed to be a process.
Speaker 4: Like rookie quarterbacks are not supposed to perform at a
Speaker 4: high level. When they do, it's it's always very surprising.
Speaker 4: And I saw Mike that there's you know, one of
Speaker 4: the stories around the Panthers this week is the simplification
Speaker 4: of the offense, or at least in the way they
Speaker 4: communicate the calls into the huddle.
Speaker 2: Can you give us an update on that.
Speaker 1: Yeah, So a couple of weeks ago they started using
Speaker 1: basically a cheat sheet if you want to call it
Speaker 1: for a risk band. So like this is just an example.
Speaker 2: I'm you know, let's.
Speaker 1: Say they have like a a dagger concept and that's
Speaker 1: that's number thirty one. Frank Wright can say, run play
Speaker 1: thirty one or run play blue or whatever they call it,
Speaker 1: as opposed to him delegating you know, every single motion
Speaker 1: and route for each receiver and the blocking scheme, right,
Speaker 1: so you're simplifying the amount of information given to you
Speaker 1: so you can just kind of paint by numbers each play.
Speaker 1: And I think that that's actually a relatively mature approach
Speaker 1: to limiting mistakes, limiting communication issues, limiting pre snap penalties,
Speaker 1: which have been an absolute killer for this team. And
Speaker 1: I think that you know, you want to avoid delay
Speaker 1: a game as much as you can, and the Panthers
Speaker 1: have really struggled with operational football, and I think limiting
Speaker 1: the amount of language is really.
Speaker 2: Good for them.
Speaker 4: Yeah, something the Dolphins kind of went through last year
Speaker 4: in McDaniel's first year here calling plays the pre snap operation.
Speaker 4: They were one of the most penalized pre snap teams.
Speaker 4: This year, they've cleaned up a big time and I
Speaker 4: see the Panthers are currently number one in the league
Speaker 4: in terms of pre snap infractions. And like I said,
Speaker 4: like these are things that you have to just kind of,
Speaker 4: you know, grow with and learn with the rookie quarterback,
Speaker 4: especially when they're so talented like Bryce Young, is And
Speaker 4: you know another thing that sometimes these teams that are
Speaker 4: kind of in rebuild modes have to accept is trying
Speaker 4: to you know, find pieces along the way. And for Bryce,
Speaker 4: like he's been under a lot of pressure this year
Speaker 4: so far, I just wanted to get your assessment of
Speaker 4: the offensive line we expect to see in terms of
Speaker 4: the personnel on Sundays. I know there's some injuries up front.
Speaker 4: What have you made so far this offensive line of
Speaker 4: the Carolina Panthers.
Speaker 1: I mean, it's been extremely disappointing to last year, but
Speaker 1: it's a completely different offense. They're playing a lot more
Speaker 1: zone blocking concepts they are not. This is what's interesting
Speaker 1: is is there's a lot of power personnel. If you
Speaker 1: were just looking at them camp like on tape, on
Speaker 1: previous work, on their measurements, all that stuff. Bradley Boseman
Speaker 1: had an incredible run the second half of last season
Speaker 1: because they ran the ball so effectively. Austin Corbett, who's
Speaker 1: on pup and probably isn't returning until after the bye,
Speaker 1: was the best player on offense last year. He's been
Speaker 1: gone for five games, he'll probably miss this sixth one.
Speaker 1: And then you've had a rookie guard Chandler Zavala moving
Speaker 1: from right guard to left guard, playing well at right
Speaker 1: guard in week one, but struggling mightily over the last
Speaker 1: few weeks. He also suffered a neck injury. I don't
Speaker 1: expect him to play. Chances are it'll either be Kade May's,
Speaker 1: last year's sixth round pick, or Justin McCrae, a journeyman
Speaker 1: backup guard slash center who's on the practice squad IKEI
Speaker 1: Kwani was kind of taking a step back from pass
Speaker 1: protection standpoint. He's the former first round pick. I think
Speaker 1: he'll be fine long term. It's just been a problem.
Speaker 1: Taylor Mowten's probably their most consistent offensive line men right
Speaker 1: now at right tackle, but he even had his struggles
Speaker 1: last week against Detroit.
Speaker 2: Just real quick, Mike, is Zavala gonna be He's okay?
Speaker 5: Right?
Speaker 2: Like I saw. The injury was pretty serious when it happened.
Speaker 1: Yeah, we didn't see him on the practice field on Wednesday,
Speaker 1: But every indication we've gotten is that he is okay
Speaker 1: from a from a at least, you know, from the
Speaker 1: worst scenario, you know, I mean, listen, with a neck injury.
Speaker 1: He hasn't practiced, We haven't seen him, so it's kind
Speaker 1: of hard to get like that update. But he was
Speaker 1: moving all of his extremities. He flew home with the
Speaker 1: team from Detroit like they were able to avoid like
Speaker 1: disaster there. But we don't really have an like an
Speaker 1: actual update on them.
Speaker 4: I don't know if it's like getting older, being a parent,
Speaker 4: or being around the guys so much as I am now,
Speaker 4: but like seeing those injuries like every single year, it's
Speaker 4: harder on me to witness that. And I was just
Speaker 4: a scary scene there. You never want to see that.
Speaker 4: So glad to hear he's doing better. Let's go ahead
Speaker 4: and flip over the defensive side of the football now.
Speaker 4: My guest today Mike k from the Charlotte Observer, a
Speaker 4: Carolina Panthers beat rider, and on the defensive side, My
Speaker 4: first question is what happened in the run game department
Speaker 4: on the defensive side against the Lions, because all the
Speaker 4: lines kind of went off in that game and had
Speaker 4: a big offensive output, but mostly on the ground. What
Speaker 4: happened to the Panthers' run defense last week?
Speaker 1: I mean, and the same thing that's kind of happened
Speaker 1: every week. This team is giving up huge yardage on
Speaker 1: the ground, they give up nearly five yards per carry,
Speaker 1: and while they have the second best red zone or sorry,
Speaker 1: third down defense in the league, teams are like avoiding
Speaker 1: the money down because they're picking up huge chunks of
Speaker 1: yardage on first and second down on the ground. Of
Speaker 1: their twenty one explosive runs runs of ten yards or more,
Speaker 1: twenty of them have come on either first or second down,
Speaker 1: which really plays into the Dolphins strength. And Reike noted
Speaker 1: yesterday when I asked him about it, and he said, look,
Speaker 1: the Dolphins have the fewest third down opportunities in the
Speaker 1: league because they're doing so well on first and second down.
Speaker 1: And the issue for the Panthers defense if you watch
Speaker 1: the Lions game, is they're just struggling to tackle and
Speaker 1: get to their spots and it is becoming a chronic
Speaker 1: problem for this team, something that they're gonna have to
Speaker 1: really fix because frankly, the Dolphins are very good on
Speaker 1: the ground, but they also have dates against Jonathan Taylor
Speaker 1: after the bye, Derrick Henry, those type of players, and
Speaker 1: it's just like they're not able to get the ball
Speaker 1: back for the offense because the opposing offense is just
Speaker 1: running over them.
Speaker 4: It's I mean it's it's funny how much it's the
Speaker 4: league has become such a passing league, but at the
Speaker 4: same time, I feel like there's a little bit of
Speaker 4: a zig where other teams are zagging in terms of
Speaker 4: success in the running game. The Dolphins have certainly found
Speaker 4: that good mix and balance of both, and of course,
Speaker 4: without Devon a Chan this.
Speaker 2: Week, that'll be a little more difficult.
Speaker 4: But Raheem Moster is currently rolling Savon akh medback in
Speaker 4: Rolling two, and then Chris Brooks and Jeff Wilson just
Speaker 4: had his twenty one day window opened as well. So
Speaker 4: the Dolphins running back room is pretty deep right now,
Speaker 4: despite the fact that the sensational rookie is going to
Speaker 4: be down.
Speaker 2: And I wanted to.
Speaker 4: Ask you a couple more questions here, Mike, about the
Speaker 4: Panthers defense and mainly the system, because I know zero
Speaker 4: Everro's name was a hot candidate for a lot of
Speaker 4: DC jobs across the National Football League. Just kind of
Speaker 4: wanted to get your bird's eye view of how that
Speaker 4: system is taking hold and the fingerprints that he's put
Speaker 4: on this Carolina defense.
Speaker 1: Well, he likes using shells. He's a zone coverage kind
Speaker 1: of guy, and they frankly, they needed to be a
Speaker 1: zone heavy team with the injuries they've in the secondary
Speaker 1: EI there without J. C. Horn, who's on IR, Xavier
Speaker 1: Woods is probably gonna miss this game with the hamstring
Speaker 1: injury of his own. Dante Jackson's back at practice, but
Speaker 1: he missed the game against the Lions.
Speaker 2: CJ.
Speaker 1: Henderson is wildly inconsistent. They had a rookie starting last week,
Speaker 1: Deshaun Jamison, who was underrafted out of Texas and was
Speaker 1: claimed off waivers following the final cuts. Like the second,
Speaker 1: the cornerback group is not particularly solid right now, and
Speaker 1: so you know, playing more zone coverage has allowed them
Speaker 1: to kind of make up for some lack of talent.
Speaker 1: I think Von Bell, after a really rough week one,
Speaker 1: has played extremely well. Sam Franklin, who's kind of known
Speaker 1: as a special teams days, It's done kind of a
Speaker 1: nice job taking over for Zavier Woods. I think for them,
Speaker 1: they've done a really good job of mitigating the big
Speaker 1: play downfield from a passing standpoint, and it's forcing teams
Speaker 1: to rethink the way they attack this team, because if
Speaker 1: you're only picking up six point seven yards per pass
Speaker 1: and you're picking up five yards per run and you
Speaker 1: don't have to risk your quarterback getting hit. Plus you
Speaker 1: know that the Panthers aren't putting up a lot of points.
Speaker 1: What call are you gonna make. You're gonna probably hand
Speaker 1: the ball off, right, And so the Panthers are getting
Speaker 1: run off. Like the run to pass ratio against the
Speaker 1: Panthers is the heaviest run versus an opponent in the league.
Speaker 1: They're getting run on forty eight point whatever percent of
Speaker 1: the time, while fifty one percent is going towards the
Speaker 1: pass because they're seeing this disadvantage, and so you could
Speaker 1: say some of that factors into the low passing yards.
Speaker 1: They're only allowing one hundred and eighty five passing yards
Speaker 1: per game. But I think they've actually done a really
Speaker 1: nice job mitigating what's going on on the back end.
Speaker 4: That makes it really interesting because for this Dolphins team,
Speaker 4: and you know, fans will tell you lastly, they want
Speaker 4: run the ball more, and they have run the ball
Speaker 4: a little bit more this year, but really it's just
Speaker 4: about the efficiency and having a game script that allows
Speaker 4: them to Because as much as I love seeing the
Speaker 4: Dolphins pile up three hundred and fifty yards on the
Speaker 4: ground and like they did a couple weeks so against Denver,
Speaker 4: like I also don't want to take the ball out
Speaker 4: of Tyreek Hill and Gillen Wattle's hands. So it's an
Speaker 4: interesting dynamic there in terms of how you attack a
Speaker 4: defense with this Dolphins weaponry they have on what has been,
Speaker 4: you know, a historic offense for the first five games.
Speaker 4: A couple of names here real quick, and then I'll
Speaker 4: ask you the Panthers can win this game if questioned,
Speaker 4: Mike is you mentioned it off the top of that
Speaker 4: last answer with Von Bell? Gosh, I've always loved his
Speaker 4: game so so much. There's a few guys on this
Speaker 4: defense so I think are really damn good football players.
Speaker 4: Just want to get your take so far on how
Speaker 4: Brian Burns, how Derek Brown, and how Von Bell have performed.
Speaker 4: And also my guy you mentioned this off the top
Speaker 4: as well, Frankie Luvu go kooks.
Speaker 1: So let's start with Burns. Burns got off to an
Speaker 1: impressive start against Atlanta. He had two sacks and of
Speaker 1: course fumble. He's kind of ebbed and flowed since then.
Speaker 1: He got a sacked in this last game. I think
Speaker 1: he's played well as an outside linebacker. I think it
Speaker 1: fits him more this is more of a hybrid front,
Speaker 1: and I think it's served Derek Brown very very well.
Speaker 1: I think him rushing from that four I five technique
Speaker 1: position has really brought out his pass rushing motor. Frankie
Speaker 1: Lubu has done an incredible job as a blitzer. I
Speaker 1: think he is so unique and that he is not
Speaker 1: a natural pass rusher, but he's such a good blitzer
Speaker 1: from the inside, he's playing inside linebacker. They're moving him
Speaker 1: kind of around a little bit, but for the most part,
Speaker 1: he's attacking from the inside, you know, double a gap
Speaker 1: sort of stuff. If he can get there.
Speaker 2: They're trying to be creative with him.
Speaker 1: And then I think from from the standpoint of von Bell,
Speaker 1: I think he's an expert communicator. He's not really a ballhawk,
Speaker 1: but I think he's like the one guy who's kind
Speaker 1: of had to take on the role of being a communicator.
Speaker 1: With Check Thompson being out, he's made up for some
Speaker 1: injuries on the back end.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's Shack.
Speaker 4: Thompson is also a guy that I've always had had
Speaker 4: a of a soft spot for. I mean, I'm Washington
Speaker 4: State Cougar, but I will give a husky some pop
Speaker 4: props and.
Speaker 2: They're a good football player there, Mike.
Speaker 4: The Panthers will win this game if and then you
Speaker 4: can fill in the blank however you see fit.
Speaker 1: If they can stop the run, I mean, like, if
Speaker 1: they can really limit the run, I think they have
Speaker 1: a shot, but I don't think it's a good shot.
Speaker 1: And I just like this Dolphins team is just a juggernaut.
Speaker 1: I don't know if the Panthers can put up enough
Speaker 1: points to even like come up with like a reasonable
Speaker 1: expectation for this game, because like the Dolphins defense isn't
Speaker 1: poor either. I mean there's there's players everywhere on that
Speaker 1: on that on that group, and I think, you know,
Speaker 1: it's not just the offense. I know the offense gets
Speaker 1: all the buzz, but I just like struggle to see
Speaker 1: how guys are gonna get open regularly. Hayden Hurst has
Speaker 1: been a disappointment, Miles Sanders has struggled with injuries, Jonathan
Speaker 1: Mingo is still kind of learning. Terrace Marshall didn't even
Speaker 1: see the field last week. Is a healthy guy in
Speaker 1: a jersey. It's just it's tough, and Bryce Young is
Speaker 1: really taking his lumps as a rookie. And I don't
Speaker 1: know if this is the team to get off the
Speaker 1: winless you know streak.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 4: I mean we've been waiting a long time to hear
Speaker 4: someone talk about us like that, so it's, uh, it's
Speaker 4: just it's nice to hear Mike. But at the same time,
Speaker 4: you know, they play the games on Sunday for a reason,
Speaker 4: so we'll see Panthers and Dolphins out there.
Speaker 2: You're gonna be in town, Mike, I'm not.
Speaker 1: We just had our kid about a week and a
Speaker 1: half ago, or second son a week and a half ago,
Speaker 1: so I will not be down there, which is a
Speaker 1: bummer because I went to high school in Coral Springs
Speaker 1: and so it's a bummer my. You know, my parents
Speaker 1: are up here and then they're gonna go back to Boca.
Speaker 1: So yeah, it's a bummer because everybody's down like a
Speaker 1: lot of families down there. But I'm sure it'll be
Speaker 1: a great game.
Speaker 4: Well, hey man, congrats on the new the newborn, and
Speaker 4: try gets sleep when you can and tell the folks
Speaker 4: where they can find your work out my friend.
Speaker 1: Yeah, you can follow me on Twitter at Mike underscore
Speaker 1: e underscore. Ka Ye. It's the worst Twitter Twitter handle
Speaker 1: in the history, but it's mine and I love it.
Speaker 1: You can also read my work on the Charlotte Observer
Speaker 1: dot com. Also make sure to check out my partner
Speaker 1: Alex Zitlow on Twitter as well. It's a ZiT Low,
Speaker 1: I believe five. And then Scott Feller or columnist who's phenomenal,
Speaker 1: so uh, Scott will be down there. He'll be covering
Speaker 1: the game from the Panthers perspective, so make sure you
Speaker 1: give him a follow up.
Speaker 4: You could have been really creative like me and gone
Speaker 4: last name NFL. So good on you for not doing
Speaker 4: that seven years ago and being stuck with it forever.
Speaker 4: So Mike, appreciate your time today. Man, Like I said,
Speaker 4: get some rest and we'll talk to you soon. Thanks,
Speaker 4: and away he goes really fun in of your there,
Speaker 4: getting know the Carolina Panthers a little bit more in depth.
Speaker 4: And uh yeah again, so the audio yesterday, I'm not
Speaker 4: feeling so great today, so it's kind of a rough
Speaker 4: week for your boy. Hopefully the podcast still comes across
Speaker 4: in a good way. I have some fun stuff coming
Speaker 4: up as well. We're gonna have Daniel Oyafusi in the
Speaker 4: podcast tomorrow. I have some really fun locker room audio.
Speaker 4: I had a good chat with the Shaun Elliott. That'll
Speaker 4: be out on tomorrow's podcast as well, So we're soldoing
Speaker 4: on game on Sunday. I should be better by then,
Speaker 4: but in the meantime, lets go ahead and take our
Speaker 4: first break right here. Come back on the other side,
Speaker 4: and here from the assistant coaches. That's Next Draft Time podcast,
Speaker 4: your host Travis Wingfield, brought to you by Autnation. Thursday,
Speaker 4: we heard from Dolphin's assistant coaches. I'm gonna play you
Speaker 4: a few soundbites from Frank Smith, Vic Fangio, and John Embry,
Speaker 4: and we start here with Dolphins OC Frank Smith, who
Speaker 4: I essentially don't really have anything for you guys regarding
Speaker 4: the upcoming game on Sunday, but we got like an
Speaker 4: education from this coach with regards to teaching principles, the
Speaker 4: impact of motion and shifting and intent of offense and creating reactions.
Speaker 4: So I'm just gonna go down the list here and
Speaker 4: play a few of these soundbites for you because on
Speaker 4: this podcast, my overall goal is to make you a
Speaker 4: smarter Dolphins fan, a smarter football fan, and Coach Smith
Speaker 4: is one of the best in the business at doing
Speaker 4: that and communicating that. So I'm gonna go ahead and
Speaker 4: let him talk here. First, I wanted to run this
Speaker 4: audio from a question that was posed to him about
Speaker 4: the timing element of all of the action on some
Speaker 4: of those reverses where you get pre snap motion a
Speaker 4: running back or rather a wide receiver going to the
Speaker 4: backfield and then motioning out and taking a hand off
Speaker 4: inside and flipping the ball back around the other side.
Speaker 4: How do you fine tune and cue up all those
Speaker 4: things to be a sweet symphony.
Speaker 2: Here's coach teach the defense.
Speaker 5: So we understand reactions, what we anticipate, show it to him,
Speaker 5: and show it to him on paper. Show the clip
Speaker 5: of the reaction you think you're gonna get walk through
Speaker 5: at one time, run in practice, and then go into
Speaker 5: a game, and then follow your rules and adjust if
Speaker 5: it's not what we thought it was going to be.
Speaker 5: So it's kind of again process driven. So you have
Speaker 5: that concept that we've run out of different variants, and
Speaker 5: then now you put in that grouping and you know,
Speaker 5: if they understand the defense and they understand the play's intent,
Speaker 5: they can handle the variation. And was it a variation
Speaker 5: that we didn't inspect? So how do we move and
Speaker 5: how do we operate. I mean, that's kind of it
Speaker 5: starts with back in spring when we teach how do
Speaker 5: we move in stat points, who's move and when why.
Speaker 5: I mean, if you were to put that play in
Speaker 5: by itself in the season, I think it would be
Speaker 5: a lot harder as opposed to that's part of our process,
Speaker 5: of our whole system of why we move to move,
Speaker 5: It's because we're moving for reactions to defense and what
Speaker 5: we anticipate.
Speaker 4: Let's go ahead and follow up there with coach and
Speaker 4: the teaching process of knowing how to impact the defense
Speaker 4: and how you install an offense that has that level
Speaker 4: of I suppose intricacy to it. Let's go back to
Speaker 4: coach once more.
Speaker 5: Circually, if you don't know your job, you can't look
Speaker 5: past and learn. You have to get to a point
Speaker 5: at which I know what I'm doing. Okay, now I
Speaker 5: know what I'm doing my intent. Now I can see
Speaker 5: what my defender's trying to do. It's always hard, and
Speaker 5: the hardest time is when you're coming together in year
Speaker 5: one and you're trying to learn your system and you're
Speaker 5: trying to learn or what I'm trying to do the
Speaker 5: intent and purpose of this play and the technique you're
Speaker 5: asking me to do the evolution, and that's where it's
Speaker 5: constant teaching, because when you can start to understand the
Speaker 5: defense and what they're trying to accomplish where they're vulnerable,
Speaker 5: that's where now the player can play with reaction because
Speaker 5: he's he's not thinking about it, He's reacting to what
Speaker 5: he's seeing because his anticipation level is heightened because I
Speaker 5: know what I'm trying to do. Now. My vision is
Speaker 5: focused on these maybe two or three variables that I'm
Speaker 5: expecting and that I think ultimately is what you're allowed
Speaker 5: to do, especially in this second year of the system,
Speaker 5: is now guys have a greater understanding of what we're
Speaker 5: doing and they're really diving into the intent of the
Speaker 5: defense and how they fit and you know, in the
Speaker 5: concept to attack whether it's run or pass.
Speaker 4: And we finish up here with a question I had
Speaker 4: for coach about a potential correlation between being aggressive offensively
Speaker 4: and turning the football over. Is there a correlation and
Speaker 4: if there is, how do you calibrate those two things together.
Speaker 5: I don't know if it's really they follow with each other.
Speaker 5: I think it's more of just why do things occur
Speaker 5: and it's easy to say, you know, my knee hurt, okay, why, Okay,
Speaker 5: we'll throw some ice on it and then maybe you
Speaker 5: feel better. Okay, well I act my knee hurts still. Okay,
Speaker 5: Well maybe you need to look at it some more
Speaker 5: and you see, okay, well you need surgery to fix it.
Speaker 5: So ultimately, when you're looking at things, you got to
Speaker 5: look at why and not just kind of gloss over things,
Speaker 5: because it's easy to look at something and go, hey,
Speaker 5: it's this, Well, what was the root of it? I mean,
Speaker 5: was it Ultimately, when you have a turnover? Was it
Speaker 5: poor fundamental? Was it a game plan specific play to
Speaker 5: the week that maybe that our understanding wasn't as good?
Speaker 5: Was it playing outside of the progression. There's many variables
Speaker 5: to go into it. And that's ultimately what we're looking
Speaker 5: at is making sure how do we ensure turnovers are
Speaker 5: minimizing turnovers. And it all starts with fundamentals in the
Speaker 5: ten and that's always what we go back to, and
Speaker 5: it always seems so simple because you know, I know
Speaker 5: around here you guys hear us talk a lot about
Speaker 5: our process and our fundamentals and technique. But I mean,
Speaker 5: ultimately that is offensive football. It's our execution of these
Speaker 5: simple things collectively to make something come to life. Because
Speaker 5: if ten are doing the right thing and one's not,
Speaker 5: one player should say then it's that's where you can
Speaker 5: get off. So ultimately, that's where, like you know, as
Speaker 5: a quarterback's playing, he's counting on everyone. Guy's blocking, guys
Speaker 5: running routes, timing distributions. So you know, I don't think
Speaker 5: it's ever something as hey, we're aggressive, so this happens,
Speaker 5: it's more of okay, why did that happen here? And
Speaker 5: then you get to the bottom of it together.
Speaker 4: Moving on to Dolphins tight ends coach John Embry, and
Speaker 4: I feel like this should be music to every single
Speaker 4: person on this podcast ears unless you are a rival
Speaker 4: listening in, in which case welcome Buffalo, New York and
Speaker 4: New England. But coach Embrey talked about Chase Claypool and
Speaker 4: working with him as a tight end, which, again, what
Speaker 4: are we doing?
Speaker 2: The guy's a receiver.
Speaker 4: But either way, the conversation shifts towards positionless football, and
Speaker 4: there was a really cool development across this press conference
Speaker 4: about how the Dolphins have this approach that maybe isn't
Speaker 4: that common in the national Football league. We're different coaches
Speaker 4: coach different players regardless of what room they exist in.
Speaker 2: Let's go to coach Embrey for that.
Speaker 3: You know, it's really unique what Mike's been able to
Speaker 3: get done in the last couple of years. As you notice,
Speaker 3: as he continues to build this, we're gonna have a
Speaker 3: lot of players that really are positionless when you think it,
Speaker 3: whether Chase is with me or doing stuff, whether they're
Speaker 3: Alec you know, I do stuff with him. Uh, some
Speaker 3: of my guys to do stuff with uh Eric uh
Speaker 3: s Studentsville West will work with my guys on certain things.
Speaker 3: So it's, uh, it's a really unique thing that we
Speaker 3: have gone here. A lot of selfless players and coaches
Speaker 3: don't care who's coaching who. We're just trying to get
Speaker 3: our guys to uh go out and execute place. And
Speaker 3: I think that's what makes our offense so dangerous is
Speaker 3: that Tyreek Hill could be pen blocking, then he's fifty
Speaker 3: yards down the field on the route. Same with uh
Speaker 3: our running backs. Sometimes they're blocking, sometimes they're running it.
Speaker 3: You know, it's just all over the place with it.
Speaker 3: So that gives us a lot of uh flexibility within
Speaker 3: our offense. So I'm sure at some point Clay uh
Speaker 3: Chase and I will be uh doing something together. Uh.
Speaker 3: I haven't even met him yet. I mean, I've seen
Speaker 3: him on the field, but haven't really introduced myself to
Speaker 3: him yet. But uh so I'm just excited cause that's
Speaker 3: just another chess piece for uh McDaniel to use and
Speaker 3: uh give us a new advantage.
Speaker 4: Let's go ahead and just play one more of these here,
Speaker 4: because coach was great and I could play ten of
Speaker 4: these soundbites, but that's not a very fun podcast.
Speaker 2: I don't think.
Speaker 4: Let's go ahead and play one more fallow up on
Speaker 4: how they execute that and what that might look like
Speaker 4: in training camp, practice during the season, all of the above.
Speaker 3: No, it hasn't always been like that, but I think
Speaker 3: what it is is when you find guys that love football,
Speaker 3: you know, and just don't care and just want to
Speaker 3: be in the field and do whatever it is that
Speaker 3: they can to be able to be a part of
Speaker 3: something special. That's what we've been able to do in
Speaker 3: these last couple of drafts and free agencies bringing guys in.
Speaker 3: They just love football. They don't care if they get
Speaker 3: fifty targets or one, or if I get to carry
Speaker 3: the ball fifteen times, and you never see anybody like, well,
Speaker 3: how come I'm not. You know, when you see Devon
Speaker 3: when he scored, one of the first guys to grab
Speaker 3: him is Raheem Moster, right. I mean, yet they're supposed
Speaker 3: to be competing against each other. It really has you know,
Speaker 3: like again talking about Coz McDonnel really has done a
Speaker 3: good job of getting people in here that are about
Speaker 3: just one thing. Let's just go win and let's have
Speaker 3: fun while we do it. I think as you see
Speaker 3: college football continue to evolve, and you're starting to see that,
Speaker 3: like with with coach Primes doing it in Colorado, with
Speaker 3: like Travis Hunter playing both ways. There's a lot of
Speaker 3: kids that I shouldn't say lot, there's a good amount
Speaker 3: of kids that would probably love to play the whole game, right,
Speaker 3: And so when you get your hands on someone like that,
Speaker 3: you want to let them, you know, use their skill
Speaker 3: set as much as they can. And for us, it's
Speaker 3: not a both sides of the ball thing, but it's
Speaker 3: playing multiple positions on the offense and having fun doing
Speaker 3: it all.
Speaker 4: Right, So there you go, let's go ahead and take
Speaker 4: our last break right there and come back on the
Speaker 4: other side and pick the week six games. That's next
Speaker 4: Draft Time Podcast, your host Travis Wingfield, brought to you
Speaker 4: by Auto Nation. Third and final segment here on a
Speaker 4: Thursday edition of the Drive Time Podcast. Big thanks again
Speaker 4: to Mike Ka and of course all the Dolphins assistant
Speaker 4: coaches we speak to every single Thursday here during the
Speaker 4: regular season.
Speaker 2: Let's do the week six picks. Week five?
Speaker 4: Should I play some sad music here? Seven and seven?
Speaker 4: The wheels fell off? What the hell happened out there?
Speaker 4: We are fifty four and twenty four. That drops us
Speaker 4: down to sixty nine point two percent. Why do I
Speaker 4: say we when it's only me? I don't know, but
Speaker 4: the goal was seventy two percent. Let's try to get
Speaker 4: back to that this week with another slate of games that,
Speaker 4: quite frankly, I think are harder than last week's games were,
Speaker 4: but we're gonna do it anyway. We start tonight Thursday
Speaker 4: Night Football. Go ahead and cue the music. Cheaps over
Speaker 4: the Broncos, That one feels pretty obvious, and the Ravens
Speaker 4: over the Titans from the UK, another nine to thirty
Speaker 4: kickoff here in the East six thirty four. U folks
Speaker 4: out west, rest up. If you're gonna watch that game
Speaker 4: on a Sunday morning. But give me the Ravens in
Speaker 4: that one. I was a little bit conflicted there. I
Speaker 4: could see both those offenses struggling in that game because
Speaker 4: of the long trip over and they've just been kind
Speaker 4: of stuck in the mud for the last couple of weeks,
Speaker 4: both those teams. But give me the Ravens with Lamar
Speaker 4: Jackson to make the last play at the end to
Speaker 4: get that big victory. Dolphin's over Panthers. I'll take the
Speaker 4: Commanders over the Falcons. Do I feel good about it? Nope,
Speaker 4: sure don't, but I'm taking it. Give me the Bears
Speaker 4: over the Vikings. Do I feel good about that one?
Speaker 4: The Justin Jefferson injuries swayed me and pushed me over
Speaker 4: the edge, and I think the Bears might have found
Speaker 4: something in terms of how to call a game for
Speaker 4: Justin fields that was encouraging to get him his first
Speaker 4: big statistical day of the season. I'm still a big
Speaker 4: believer in what he can accomplish, in what he can do.
Speaker 4: So it gave me Chicago to get their second straight
Speaker 4: win after going essentially twelve months without a victory. Seattle
Speaker 4: over Sincy again, do I feel good about this one?
Speaker 4: Is it the Bengals we saw in the first four
Speaker 4: weeks of the season, or do you get the Bengals
Speaker 4: who beat a pretty punchless Cardinals team. I see people
Speaker 4: saying their back because of that win, but are they
Speaker 4: really Plus the Seahawks coming east for a ten am
Speaker 4: body clock time, I don't love that. But what I
Speaker 4: do love is Geno Smith and that offense that has
Speaker 4: been rolling against a Bengals defense that, besides that Rams game,
Speaker 4: has been kind of struggling, and then defensively, I just
Speaker 4: kind of like what the Seahawks do from a scheme standpoint,
Speaker 4: from an execution standpoint, and I don't believe that Joe
Speaker 4: Burrow and the Bengals offense is all the way back.
Speaker 4: I think it was a product of playing the Cardinals.
Speaker 4: So give me the Seahawks and that one. Niners over
Speaker 4: the Browns. Gosh, they are the best team in football,
Speaker 4: aren't they. I keep saying the Dolphins, But Dolphins.
Speaker 2: Niners Super Bowl? Maybe could be Colts over the Jags.
Speaker 4: Gardner Minshew, baby, I just I'm gonna go ahead and
Speaker 4: take the Jags. Having some jet lag jet lag, Jags
Speaker 4: coming back from London after two weeks. Give me the
Speaker 4: Saints over the Texans. The Texans have been the team
Speaker 4: that I've gotten wrong the most this year, like what's
Speaker 4: going on there.
Speaker 2: I love CJ. Stroud, but last week they kind of
Speaker 2: had let down.
Speaker 4: I'm gonna go against them this week after going against
Speaker 4: the Saints as well on that Patriots game.
Speaker 2: Yikes.
Speaker 4: Speaking of the Patriots, we're gonna take them on the
Speaker 4: road over Las Vegas because one, I don't like anything
Speaker 4: about the Raiders team right now, and the decision making
Speaker 4: late in games to kick field goals from fifty five
Speaker 4: yards when you're up by four makes no sense, and
Speaker 4: they've been not a couple times now. So give me
Speaker 4: the Patriots to bounce back in Belichick to get one
Speaker 4: over his old pupil. Give me the Rams over the Cardinals.
Speaker 4: I'll take the Eagles over the Jets.
Speaker 2: Duh. I'll take the.
Speaker 4: Lions over the Bucks, even though they're in Tampa. Tampa's
Speaker 4: off of bye week. I just think Detroit's a pretty
Speaker 4: damn good football team right now. They keep it rolling,
Speaker 4: get to five and one.
Speaker 2: What a world.
Speaker 4: Lions and Dolphins could be five and one at the
Speaker 4: end of this week. Bill's over Giants. Why the hell
Speaker 4: is that Sunday Night football? And the Cowboys over the Chargers.
Speaker 2: He's gonna do it. Yeah, I'm gonna do it.
Speaker 4: I don't like it, I don't trust it, but I'm
Speaker 4: taking the Cowboys over the La Chargers because I think
Speaker 4: it's gonna come down to a late game situation and
Speaker 4: the Chargers always seem to get wonky in those spots.
Speaker 4: So just go ahead and pick the Cowboys. Will we
Speaker 4: go seven to seven again? Maybe hopefully not, but that's
Speaker 4: kind of where we're looking at last week, and I'm
Speaker 4: hoping to bounce back this week, just like your Miami
Speaker 4: Dolphins bounce back against the Giants a week ago.
Speaker 2: So there you go.
Speaker 4: Those are the week six picks. That's the Thursday edition
Speaker 4: of the Draft Time podcast. Again, apologies for the audio
Speaker 4: on the Wednesday show.
Speaker 2: It won't happen again. In the meantime, It's going to
Speaker 2: be my time you all.
Speaker 4: Please be sure to subscribe to the podcast on Apple, Spotify,
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Speaker 4: Miami Dolphins dot com. Until next time, fins up, Carolyn
Speaker 4: and Cameron Daddy ascrib