‘Missing’ white board gives Gesicki an edge
Dolphins’ rookie tight end and roommate call out, draw up plays at night.
DAVIE — If anyone is searching for that missing white board at the Dolphins’ training facility, the mystery can now be solved. Tight end Mike Gesicki made off with it after receiving permission that sounds only marginally convincing.
Tight ends coach Shane Day had suggested Gesicki get a white board so he and his hotel roommate, Durham Smythe, could review plays at night during the offseason training program. Rather than head to Target, Gesicki noticed there was a white board in the tight ends room.
“Hey, coach, can I have it?” Gesicki asked.
“I’m not using it,” Day said. “So I grabbed it and brought it home,” Gesicki said.
While it’s entirely possible there’s also an Xbox in their room, the tight ends spend a chunk of most nights playing a little game on the white board.
“Calling it out quick and you draw it up,” Gesicki said of the Dolphins’ plays. “We’re just trying to simulate the huddle and simulate knowing everything on the fly and
not just your job, but knowing everybody’s job.”
While that can only be a plus, the Dolphins would love for Gesicki to be able to do his job. He’s 6-feet-6 and 252 pounds. He caught 14 touchdown passes his final two seasons at Penn State. Put them together and it gives the Dolphins hope for a receiving threat at tight end they’ve lacked for ages, with the brief exception of Charles Clay.
“When the ball comes my way, it’s my job to make the play, whether it’s one-handed, two-handed, low, high or whatever it is,” Gesicki said.
Gesicki’s downfield ability hasn’t been on display often in practices open to the media, but quarterback Ryan Tannehill mentioned a one-handed catch from a closed workout.
“Honestly, I’m not worried about the production on field right now,” Gesicki said. “I’m not worried, ‘Man, I only had one catch yesterday. I didn’t score a touchdown today.’ Or anything like that because we’re sitting here and it’s June.
“We don’t have a game for another three months. What I’m most concerned about right now is just showing the coaches, showing the quarterbacks, the guys around me, my teammates, and trying to earn their respect that this kid knows what he’s doing, he knows his job, he knows his role, his assignment and I want him on the field. I want him to make a play for us.”
The white board helps make sense of the blur that often comes in the morning, when coaches dish out new concepts to absorb. “You’re getting it 20 minutes once you come in,” Gesicki said. “You look through it and then you go out there. There’s a lot going on.”
But by the end of the week, players will scatter. OTAs and minicamps will be over. The players will be off until training camp.
Vacation? Hardly. “There’s zero unwinding going on,” Gesicki said of his summer plans. “I promise you that. My foot is on the gas from now until February.”