Mike Pouncey practices briefly on Day 3 of camp
DAVIE — Miami Dolphins Pro Bowl center Mike Pouncey, who is still recovering from a hip ailment that limited him to five games last season, went through a few individual drills in Saturday’s training camp practice. But it was nothing strenuous, and Pouncey quickly left the practice field after his brief participation.
“We’re trying to like work him into some individual things,” coach Adam Gase said.
“We’ve kind of got some time limits there we’re trying to stick to because anytime Mike does anything if you say, ‘Hey, you’ve got 10 minutes,’ he figures out a way to get 30 minutes worth of work in 10 minutes.”
Gase has maintained throughout the offseason they’d treat Pouncey with lots of caution in training camp and the regular season, even once cracking they’d put bubble wrap around him.
Pouncey has been on the field all three days of training camp but Saturday was the first time he took part in a drill even though there was no contact and no physical exertion (running, blocking, etc).
“We’re trying to go through a certain progression,” Gase said.
“Guys are doing a good job of making sure they’re watching what he does and how much he does because he’ll go past kind of what we want to do, and that’s why he is who he is and the kind of player he is. We’re just trying to make sure we keep an eye on him and go through our progression the way we’ve been talking about the last month or so.”
Line drills
The defensive line might have gotten the best of the offensive line in 1-on-1 drills, but if they did it wasn’t by much.
Among the highlights were three battles between
left tackle Laremy Tunsil, the 2016 first-round pick from Ole Miss, and defensive end Charles Harris this year’s first-round pick from Missouri. It appeared Harris won the first matchup, Tunsil the second and Tunsil perhaps won the third.
There was also at least one good matchup between defensive end Cameron Wake and right tackle Ja’Wuan James that appeared to end in a stalemate.
Aside from Harris and Tunsil, reserve center Jake Brendel, who is getting some looks with the first team, seemed to perform well in the drill.
Gase said he likes the competition, and so do the players.
“I really like the competition … you get a lot of good back and forth going on,” he said.
Ford sidelined, Tankersley back
Rookie wide receiver Isaiah Ford, the seventhround pick from Virginia Tech, sat out practice due to a swollen knee. Gase said the team isn’t yet sure how Ford sustained the injury.
“We’re still trying to figure out really what happened,” Gase said. “He came in this morning, his knee was a little swollen up so we held him out. I’ll probably know more [Saturday night]. It kind of came up out of nowhere.”
Rookie cornerback Cordera Tankersley, the third-round pick from Clemson, returned to practice, a day after leaving early due to hydration issues. Tankersley completed the entire practice Saturday with no apparent issues, and just in case there were, the Dolphins were ready.
“It throws like a big red flag for us,” Gase said of hydration problems, “so now he’s probably got about 20 people on him. It’s like your worst nightmare if that happens, you’ve got so many people like coming at you with water, Gatorade, all kinds of things to make sure you’re hydrated.”