Miami Dolphins: Still Trying to Fix the Ground Game
It’s not for a lack of trying. But the Miami Dolphins have yet to solve their issues when it comes to the running game. Unless…
The Miami Dolphins have a new head coach…again.
The team is coming off a season in which they failed to post a winning record…again.
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And one of the club’s biggest issues heading into 2016 is the running attack. The club finished 6-10 this past seasons and ranked 23rd in the league in rushing offense. That was quite a drop-off from the previous year, when just 11 teams in the NFL gained more yards on the ground than the ‘Fins.
This offseason, executive Mike Tannebaum did his damnedest to offset the free-agent departure of running back Lamar Miller. The young performer inked a four-year deal to be the new workhorse for the Houston Texans.
So far, the Dolphins have signed Denver Broncos restricted free agent C.J. Anderson to an offer sheet, but it was matched by the defending Super Bowl champions. The four-year pro played under Adam Gase (now the Dolphins head coach) in the Mile High City.
Miami talked to Chris Johnson, who spent the first half of 2015 with the Arizona Cardinals and the remainder of the season out of action. He still led the NFC West champions with 814 yards rushing and opted to re-sign with Bruce Arians’ squad.
The team has also met with former Texans’ running back Arian Foster, still recovering from an Achilles injury suffered at Miami last October. Nothing appears imminent.
However, there is one sage of the gridiron that believes Tannebaum and the Dolphins may be getting to work their way up the board in Chicago on April 28.
“There’s been talk they can move up to get Ezekiel Elliott, moving up from 13 and getting in to that maybe top-6, top-7,” said NFL draft expert Mel Kiper Jr. of ESPN recently via conference call (and documented by Andrew Abramson of the Palm Beach Post).
It’s been more than a decade since the franchise invested a first-round pick on a running back. It was back in 2005 that the Dolphins used the second overall selection on Auburn’s Ronnie Brown.
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Miami’s current depth chart at the position doesn’t offer a lot of promise. It’s led by 2015 fifth-round pick Jay Ajayi, who ran for 187 yards and a score on 49 carries during his rookie campaign. Damien Williams rushed for 49 yards this past year but did catch 21 passes for 1423 yards and one touchdown.
The other names include Jahwan Edwards, Isaiah Pead and one-time Dolphins’ runner Daniel Thomas.
Gase knows of the importance of the ground attack. He also knows there are different strokes for different folks when it comes to styles.
“For us if a guy comes up in the draft, we’re going to adapt to what that guy does well,” said Gase to Abramson last month. “What C.J. Anderson and Chris Johnson did were two completely different things. We were ready to go in either direction.
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“What Jay (Ajayi) does was different than what both those guys did. So we’re ready to go in multiple directions. That’s the beauty part of this offense – there’s some fluidity to it.”
The Miami ground attack was far from a thing of beauty in 2015. Be it Foster or Elliott or some other unexpected arrival, it’s an area that the Dolphins haven’t had much luck making better this offseason.