The Miami Dolphins are clueless when it comes to offense

The box score shows that the Miami Dolphins put up 24 points on the New York Giants in their Monday Night Football loss, but the points hide the fact that the ‘Fins passing attack had another inefficient outing, failing to take advantage of a defense that is 29th in net yards per pass attempt allowed.

Miami Dolphins signal-caller Ryan Tannehill had something of a breakout campaign in 2014, earning himself a hefty paycheck this past offseason. Sold on their young quarterback, the Dolphins did whatever they could to assemble a variety of weapons around him, replacing the poached Charles Clay with the ostensibly more dynamic Jordan Cameron at tight end, drafting DeVante Parker in the first round instead of going with a bigger position of need, adding budding deep threat Kenny Stills, and scooping up previously reliable veteran wideout Greg Jennings.

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Instead of watching Tannehill rise in his fourth season in the league, the Dolphins have witnessed regression from their 27-year-old quarterback. His interceptions are down, his completion percentage is up, and he’s averaging more yards per game. However, those numbers are the reflection of obvious talent upgrades around him, because the fact of the matter is that he quietly remains one of the NFL’s least efficient quarterbacks.

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Firstly, Tannehill is 22nd in the league in quarterback rating with an average of just 6.9 yards per attempt, as he picks up just 11.3 yards per completion. And unlike Aaron Rodgers, Joe Flacco, or Sam Bradford, he absolutely cannot blame his sub-7.0 Y/A on his pass-catchers. He literally has every weapon he could ask for, even including Jennings’s utter flop of a season. Jarvis Landry is a high-end slot receiver, Rishard Matthews has blossomed (though he is currently injured), and the trio of Cameron, Parker, and Stills has clear talent.

But the larger problem with the Dolphins goes beyond Tannehill, because it’s far too easy to pin everything on him. The quarterback always attracts the most praise and blame, and we tend to overreact to apparent ascension and regression. For example, I probably hyped Tannehill too hard after he showed noticeable growth in 2014, and, likewise, I’m trying not to be as overly critical of him this season.

When a young quarterback who has steadily progressed every year suddenly regresses despite a huge investment in weapons, my first inclination is to check how these new faces are doing.

Not well.

Ignoring Parker, who has missed time this season due to injuries and is just a rookie, the Dolphins have done a dreadful job of utilizing Cameron and Stills. Part of the reason why they are a completely unacceptable 28th in the league in net yards per pass attempt is the fact that they don’t even seem to care about using their two best playmakers and field-stretchers. Instead, their passing attack has been entirely based on short passes to Landry, Matthews, and Lamar Miller, tasking those three reliable and talented weapons to make something happen after the catch.

That’s not a winning recipe, especially if you don’t challenge defenses vertically enough. While Tannehill had a nice, long touchdown pass to Stills against the Giants, that MNF game serves as a frustrating reminder of just how poorly this Dolphins offense has been set-up.

Knowing they were going up against Eli Manning, Odell Beckham Jr., and a Giants offense that was clicking, the Dolphins opted to go with an awkward approach to throwing the football. Interim head coach Dan Campbell gave us all this lip service about finally getting Cameron more involved, but that proved to be a load of hot garbage.

Facing an extremely favorable matchup against the Giants safeties, Cameron earned just four targets. He had one ghastly drop that will be quickly pointed out by fans, but his 8.75 yards per attempt were a good bit better than Tannehill’s putrid 5.8 Y/A. I mean, the Dolphins only have Miller to thank for that game being as close as it was, especially since it almost seemed as if the coaching staff wanted to sabotage the team’s chances.

I mean, how else can you explain the fact that Miller, who astonishingly averaged more yards per carry than Tannehill did per pass attempt, received just 12 carries?

Or, worse yet, how can you explain the fact that Dion Sims had more targets (5) than Cameron? Sims! He has absolutely no business getting that many looks in a game, particularly when he isn’t even averaging three yards per target. This decision from the Dolphins is, quite frankly, equal parts disturbing and moronic. Sims inexplicably had just two fewer snaps than Cameron, despite the fact that he’s obviously been the Dolphins worst skill position player in 2015.

Meanwhile, the Dolphins went into full-blown, dink-and-dunk mode, dialing up under ten yards per completion. Landry was targeted a whopping 18 times, turning all of those looks into just 11 receptions for 99 yards. It would, of course, be foolish to blame Landry for his average of 5.5 yards per target or for his inefficient 6.8 yards per target this season.

Dec 14, 2015; Miami Gardens, FL, USA; Miami Dolphin running back Lamar Miller heads to the end zone for a second quarter touchdown as New York Giants safety Cooper Taylor (right0 gets beat on the play at Sun Life Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Robert Duyos-USA TODAY Sports

No, the blame for Landry’s low yards per target averages both against New York and this season go to Tannehill and the coaching staff. Honestly, how can you expect to win games if all you do is throw short passes that go nowhere to your slot receiver? I understand the importance of getting a talented, reliable weapon like Landry involved, but do you really need to do it 18 times in a game at the expense of throwing the ball to your other receivers? Or, why not throw more aggressive passes?

Perhaps the Dolphins feel like Tannehill is too limited, and that would make sense. His pass to Stills was excellent, but, for the most part, he’s taken a step back with his deep ball this year. Targeting Stills and Cameron up the seam more often would help, but it is worth pointing out that he was just 3-12 on deep passes against the Giants this past week.

Dec 14, 2015; Miami Gardens, FL, USA; Miami Dolphins quarterback Ryan Tannehill (17) throws a pass against the New York Giants during the first half at Sun Life Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Steve Mitchell-USA TODAY Sports

Tannehill deserves to shoulder blame for his lack of vertical effectiveness, but he completed a higher percentage of deep balls both last season and in the previous year, even though Mike Wallace is gone and he has more weapons.

But despite having a breakout star in Matthews and a player who was one of the league’s most efficient deep threats with the New Orleans Saints (Stills), Tannehill’s numbers have taken a step back.

To me, it falls on a larger issue that is harder to pinpoint. We have to seriously question Tannehill’s leadership, especially when he keeps falling out with offensive coordinators, and the numbers are hard to shake off.

Equally hard to shake off are his 2014 numbers, his steady progress earlier in his career, and that perfect 47-yard toss to Stills on Monday night.

Tannehill is frustratingly inconsistent, but the above tweet from Rotoworld’s Evan Silva is yet another reason why I’m inclined to go after the organization as a whole.

How can you absolve them of blame when they are simultaneously preventing a legitimate superstar running back from taking over close games when he’s dominating? But oh yeah, you are too busy throwing short passes to Landry and Sims, thinking that will move the chains.

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It’s decisions like these that make it difficult to make any definitive proclamations on Tannehill this season, because for as discouraging as his season, Stills’s season, and Cameron’s season have been, it can’t be that all of them have suddenly “gotten worse”. There’s another factor at play here, and, again, I just can’t trust the coaching staff. After all, they decided to play Sims (an obvious backup) over Cameron  (a 70-catch TE for the Cleveland Browns).

Maybe I need to be more critical of Tannehill, who has been a real disappointment this season, but he looked excellent to start the game on MNF. Then, the Dolphins stopped running and started with their questionable, dink-and-dunk play calls again.