How the Dolphins are quietly winning the offseason
Yes, the focus in the AFC East is on a certain veteran quarterback exiting the division. Meanwhile, the Miami Dolphins have been aggressive in free agency.
The New England Patriots are in the midst of a huge transition. The Buffalo Bills made one of the bigger trades of the offseason. The New York Jets have a new general manager and are trying to fix their offensive line.
Meanwhile, a franchise that has made the playoffs just twice since 2002 and one that spent the first half of 2019 playing forgettable football has been scooping up plenty of talent. Led by head coach Brian Flores and general manager Chris Grier, the Miami Dolphins were 5-4 in their last nine outings a year ago after a cringing 0-7 start. Now the club looks to build off that second-half success with a slew of new veterans and eventually, a lot of young talent thanks to a bevy of draft choices.
So far, free agency has netted running back Jordan Howard and guard/tackle Ereck Flowers on offense and defensive ends Shaq Lawson and Emmanuel Ogbah, linebackers Kyle Van Noy and Kamu Grugier-Hill (from Eagles), talented cornerback Byron Jones and safety Clayton Fejedelem. Howard could certainly help the league’s worst ground attack from a year ago while the team looks to revamp a defense that was 30th in the NFL in total yards allowed and a club that surrendered the most points in the league.
But wait, there’s more. Barry Jackson and Armando Salguero of the Miami Herald remind people that the team owns 14 picks – including three in the first round – in this year’s draft. And you get the sense that Flores and Grier are just getting warmed up in terms of movement, be it in free agency or in selecting college talent.
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Simply put, this is a franchise – which hasn’t won a division title since 2008 – that overhauled its roster a year ago and was able to pick up many of those aforementioned draft choices in the process. Meanwhile, the team entered this year with plenty of salary cap room and has taken advantage of that in a big way. The quest to change the culture in South Florida is well underway and you saw that late in ’19. And it’s going to be a fascinating late April for Flores, Grier and this organization. So far, the Dolphins have seized the moment this offseason and somehow managed to go under the radar in the process.