Most veteran newcomers off to shaky start for Dolphins
Dolphins fans, scarred by years of regrettable personnel decisions, might have begun to naturally fear the worst after watching the uninspired debut of some of the team’s veteran free agent pickups in Week 1.
The new edge guys — Emmanuel Ogbah and Shaq Lawson — graded out 87th and 93rd among 100 edge defenders evaluated by Pro Football Focus.
One of the Dolphins’ new outside linebackers, Elandon Roberts, was rated by PFF as the fourthworst performing NFL linebacker in Week 1.
Linebacker Kyle Van Noy wasn’t awful by any means but couldn’t do anything to slow New England’s running game.
Offensively, Matt Breida was fine but underutilized and fellow running back Jordan Howard managed the unimpressive feat of averaging less than 1 yard per carry (7 yards, eight carries).
At least cornerback Byron Jones (just one completion allowed) and left guard Ereck Flowers (no sacks or pressures allowed) were solid in their Dolphins debuts.
So it’s natural — albeit entirely premature — to wonder if the Dolphins made the type of free agent mistakes we’ve seen over the past decade, from
Mike Wallace to Phillip Wheeler to Jordan Cameron to Lawrence Timmons to Josh Sitton.
But here’s the good news: The Dolphins were smart enough to cover themselves if some of these moves don’t work out.
For example, even though Howard was given a two-year, $10 million deal, his $4.9 million salary for 2021 is non-guaranteed, and the Dolphins would clear out his entire $5 million 2021 cap hit by cutting him after the season if they choose to do so.
And the Dolphins so far have bypassed giving Breida an extension, meaning they can do whatever they want at running back next spring without any dead money consequences. Smart!
With the edge guys, keep in mind that Ogbah’s entire $7.5 million salary and $7.5 million cap hit for
2021 would disappear if he’s released after this season.
Roberts and linebacker Kamu Grugier-Hill were given only one-year deals, so there’s no cause for concern if those don’t work out. Safety Clayton Fejedelem’s $2.3 million salary and cap hit would disappear if he’s released after this season.
What’s more, none of next year’s salaries are guaranteed for Xavien Howard ($12.1 million), Bobby McCain ($6.4 million), DeVante Parker ($7.8 million), Jakeem Grant ($3.6 million) and Jesse Davis ($3.1 million) if injuries or ineffectiveness make Miami want to move on next spring. But unlike with Jordan Howard and Ogbah and Roberts, there would be dead money involved in cutting any of those five veterans.
Same with Van Noy; his $12.5 million salary next season is non-guaranteed, though it would be almost unfathomable for him not to be on the team next season.
The Dolphins need to make it work with Byron Jones, Flowers and Lawson because all of their salary is guaranteed next season and all have deals running more than two seasons.
Jones (due $14 million next season) and Flowers ($8.9 million in 2021) are long-term pieces. Lawson ($7.9 million in 2021) needs to play better, beginning on Sunday against his former Bills team.
CHATTER
• Quick Fins stuff: Noah Igbinoghene, 20, was the youngest player to appear in an NFL game in Week 1 and the youngest in Dolphins history; he said he has been practicing only on the boundary and not in the slot, where Jamal Perry and Nik Needham are getting work. … Even with capacity limited to 13,000, Ticketmaster was selling plenty of seats to Sunday’s game, with prices dropped as low as $60.
• Entering Game 3 on Saturday, Heat guard Tyler Herro already had set the record for most clutch three-pointers, as defined by the NBA, for any rookie in a single playoffs since the league started keeping track of this stat in 1997. He entered Game 3 having made 5-of-11 clutch threes, defined as the final five minutes of games with a margin of five points or fewer. He entered the Eastern finals tied with former Houston guard Matt Maloney for that record.
Herro was 9 of 19 of those clutch three-point attempts in the regular season (47.4 percent), which was the fifth-best percentage in the league.
• Kentucky coach John Calipari recently told ESPN’s Jordan Schultz that “I swear to God [Herro] never left the gym” during his one season there and that “he had a chip. I always tell him he’s got elephant balls.” Herro says that amuses him.
• Andre Iguodala sees some similarities between this Heat team and his Golden State teams that won three championships. “The main similarity is the depth. We go nine, 10 deep. Derrick Jones, we haven’t seen a guy jump like him since Vince Carter. Offensively Bam Adebayo has a Draymond Green skill set being able to pass the ball.”
Iguodala told Bill Simmons that the Heat likes to identify players who fit their DNA and “they call it, ‘That’s a Heat guy.’ They identify those guys early on. Even if you’re not on the team, they’re identifying those guys on other teams they go up against as potential acquisitions.”
• Appreciation for the Heat grows league-wide. “Miami is a good [butt] team,” Portland’s Damian Lillard tweeted last week.
• What are the Marlins getting in outfielder Griffin Conine, who was announced Friday as the player to be named in the Jonathan Villar trade with Toronto?
The good news on Conine, who was selected in the second round of the 2018 draft by the Blue Jays: He has 29 homers and 97 RBI and seven steals (in seven attempts) with a .266 average in 518 at-bats and 137 games over two minorleague seasons in the lowlevel minors.
The bad news: He has
190 strikeouts during that time. But he worked last winter to shorten his swing to try to cut down on the
K’s.
His father, popular former outfielder Jeff Conine (known as Mr. Marlin) “thinks Griffin can be better than he was,” former Marlins president David Samson told me. “Jeff was an unbelievable player. He would view Griffin as having better physical tools and more power and a better arm. Griffin has an amazing future.”
At the start of this season, Baseball America ranked Griffin Conine 15th among Blue Jays prospects. The magazine praised his arm in right field and his power potential. At the start of last season, Conine served a 50-game suspension for testing positive for Ritalin.
As for Conine’s father, he served as a special assistant to Samson for nine years before the team was sold (and also worked as a studio analyst for Fox Sports Florida’s Marlins coverage) but is now out of baseball.
• The Dolphins still get more viewers than Heat playoff games, though the Heat being mostly on cable skews those numbers. Dolphins-Patriots was viewed in 10.7 percent of Dade/Broward homes with TV sets, compared with 8.7 for Game 1 of Heat-Celtics and 8.3 for Game 2.