Miami Dolphins, Michael Crabtree a fit?

The Miami Dolphins had no issues with letting Brandon Gibson and Brian Hartline leave this offseason after neither of them played well last season, and they added to their overhaul of the pass-catchers around Ryan Tannehill by replacing Mike Wallace with Kenny Stills and Charles Clay with Jordan Cameron, though they did try to put both on the squad.

Jarvis Landry, Stills, and Cameron are good enough to form a decent pass-catching trio on offense, but the Dolphins work at the WR position understandably isn’t done due to the underwhelming Rishard Matthews‘s current standing as the No.3 receiver on the depth chart.

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According to Yahoo! Sports’s Rand Getlin, Crabtree is taking a visit to the Dolphins today, and the consensus seems to be that Crabtree would be a good fit for a team that lacks depth at the position. It’s been a dry market for veteran receivers, as Wes Welker, Dwayne Bowe, and Crabtree have found extremely little interest. In fact, outside of the San Diego Chargers, who ultimately chose a different former San Francisco 49ers WR in Stevie Johnson, the Dolphins are the only team to be strongly linked to Crabtree.

This seems to be his best chance of latching onto a team, even if he would have to be the No. 3 receiver and No. 4 overall target on the offense, assuming Cameron is healthy (and that’s admittedly a kind assumption). At this point, nobody can trust Crabtree to be anything more than a No. 3 guy despite his strong play in the 2011 and 2012 seasons, since he’s done a whole lot of nothing since then.

To be fair, Crabtree played reasonably well in 2013 after returning from a major injury, as his insertion into the lineup greatly boosted Colin Kaepernick‘s numbers and the fluidity of the offense as a whole. That said, he undid that quietly positive work with a horrific 2014 season, as he had under 700 receiving yards. He wasn’t used frequently enough and was the victim of a terrible, direction-less offense and organization, but Crabtree averaged just 6.5 yards per target and has evidently become an attitude concern.

That said, the Dolphins need help at the wide receiver position, and, more specifically, they need veteran help. Those are the kinds of players available on the open market, and they could really use a possession-based outside receiver to function as a “Z” in three-wide sets. The Dolphins lack depth and don’t have any sure-fire contributors outside of talented youngsters Stills and Landry, who would move into the slot on three-wide sets if Crabtree were signed.

Since he’s a smooth route-runner and was once a blue-chip prospect coming out of college, Crabtree has upshot to him, which is more than what can be said for most 27-year-old receivers. It’s fair to wonder how much explosiveness Crabtree has in the tank and if he can stretch the field in any way, but the Dolphins are mainly focused on adding a solid wideout who can work the intermediate ranges of the field.

Back in 2012, Crabtree was excellent, catching 85 passes for 1,100 yards and nine touchdowns, but that oft-cited season is starting to look more like the exception than the rule. But since he is theoretically in the prime of his career at 27, those numbers from 2012 are his upside, so, in a best-case scenario, that’s what he could offer a team. In a worst-case scenario, he would be a plodding grumbler who is good for ten yards per completion but won’t catch enough of what is thrown at him to make that middling clip worth it.

There are teams out there who need wide receiver help, and the Miami Dolphins are one of those teams even after acquiring Stills and receiving an amazing season out of Landry, who could be the league’s best pure possession wideout in the near future. Adding an experienced hand with a two-time 70-catch, former first-round pick pedigree could help this organization, and they are probably the best fit for him on paper. Tannehill knows how to use intermediate receivers like Crabtree, and the Dolphins would be able to use him in a role that allows him to face easier coverage assignments.

It makes sense for the Dolphins to sign Michael Crabtree, use him in three-wide sets as the “Z” across from Stills, and see what he can do in a less-than-100-targets role against opposing No. 2 cornerbacks. He would help take some pressure off of Stills, who will be playing a huge role in an offense for the first time in his career.

There’s a good chance that Crabtree’s subpar 2014 season was caused by the situation around him, and I think it’s worth it for the Dolphins to figure out if that’s the case. I would be surprised if the Dolphins would have to give more than a cheap, one-year deal for a player who is simply looking to prove himself, as this is Crabtree’s first reported visit. He doesn’t have many options, and the Dolphins present him the best fit as an opportunity to rehab his value and put himself back on the map in 2016.

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