Bringing passion — and edge
Rizzi drives Dolphins’ success on special teams units.
Sure, you know Darren Rizzi. The “maniacal coach,” as he puts it, getting in a player’s face on Sunday. The “crazy’’ special teams assistant — again, his word — crumbling to his knees after a near-miss big play. Even his five kids joke about his, “veins sticking out on his neck,” during a sideline rant, he says.
But you don’t really know Darren Rizzi.
“That’s game-day Rizzi,” as Miami Dolphins long snapper John Denney says of the wild man.
The other Rizzi, the Mondayto-Saturday Rizzi, might surprise you. A typical special teams meeting starts with players saying, “We need a Little Johnny story.” Rizzi, you see, has a talent beyond making Dolphins special teams the one winning branch of this team.
He remembers jokes. Lots of jokes. It’s an odd trait, he admits. But he estimates to have 200 jokes in his arsenal. Little Johnny is the recurring character in many. Little Johnny at work. Little Johnny at school. Little Johnny does many things that won’t fit in a newspaper, but that’s not that point.
“That’s part of the atmosphere he creates,’’ says special teams star Walt Aikens. “He creates a relaxed atmosphere to learn and makes it fun for everyone. At least if you pay attention and know what you’re doing, it’s fun. If you don’t do your job, well …”
The Dolphins’ offense and defense each rank 29th in the league. Their special teams are in the top five by various measurements. There’s the short answer, along with being plus-8 on turnovers, for how the Dolphins are 6-6 and still with a whiff of playoff hope.
For all the talk of finding players on this roster, of replacing talent again this season, Rizzi did his work. He needed successors for two prime players, Michael Thomas (signed with Giants) and Mike Hull (injured), who finished second- and third- in the special teams tackles in 2016 with 19
each. Aikens and Stephone Anthony stepped in nicely.
The headline void was the kicker. Cody Parkey, who Rizzi grabbed off the trash heap days before the 2017 opener, signed a $16 million deal with Chicago last offseason. The Dolphins wouldn’t match. So Rizzi went on the road last offseason, working out six college kickers. He brought in two to camp: Jason Sanders and Florida Atlantic’s Greg Joseph.
Joseph was cut, but signed on with Cleveland, further proof of Rizzi’s eye for talent. Sanders seemed the furthest off the grid when the Dolphins made him a seventh-round draft pick. He missed 25 of 35 kicks at New Mexico. He worked out with just one other team, the New York Jets, who said they wouldn’t draft him.
Yet Sanders has been money for the Dolphins, making 16 of 17 field goals. That included a 47-yarder to beat Chicago in overtime on the series after Parkey missed a 53-yard attempt. That’s one win directly on special teams.
In a field-position win over the New York Jets in November, second-year punter Matt Haack placed seven of his nine punts inside the Jets’ 20-yard line (Haack has landed a Dolphins-record 31 punts inside the 20). Throw in two Sanders field goals in a 13-6 win, and that’s two wins led by special teams.
Jakeem Grant returned a fourth-quarter kickoff 102 yards for the go-ahead points in the seasonopener against Tennessee. A third win with special teams as the central play. Grant went untouched, too, proof as Denny says, of Rizzi coaching every detail, “telling a player what gap to be in, where to place his head, how your role affects everyone else.”
“One-eleventh,” the special teams players say at the end of meetings and in-game huddles as a reminder of their role in a bigger picture.
It’s not perfect, Rizzi notes. It never is. But the telling point is special teams aren’t just making big plays, as he says, but that, “It hasn’t been onesided. It’s been a lot of different people that have affected games in different ways, whether it has been the kicker, the punter, a returner, a core player.”
New England comes to town Sunday. Rizzi doesn’t need a primer on the challenge. Special teams are Bill Belichick’s baby. They’re why Rizzi is the Dolphins special teams coach, too. He was promoted from its assistant in midseason in 2010, the day after New England blocked two kicks and had a 103-yard kickoff return in a Dolphins meltdown.
Now the only special teams meltdowns involve the coach whose sideline rants are social-media favorites. Call him maniacal or crazy for his Sunday looks. But call him effective, too. His units are the one area the Dolphins win this year.