The Miami Dolphins are being led into a new era by some talented young players.
It’s no stretch to say that the future of the Miami Dolphins will be written by the youth on their roster. While the franchise may have been aggressive in free agency in the 2020 offseason, signing the likes of Byron Jones, Kyle Van Noy and Shaq Lawson, none of those players are older than 29 years old. But it goes beyond those guys.
After general manager Chris Grier deconstructed the roster to gain draft capital, the Dolphins had their first massive haul of draft picks come to the team in 2020. And how those newcomers perform alongside a select few young players will likely determine where Miami goes from this point forward.
Looking at the youth on the Dolphins roster, it’s hard not to be both impressed and optimistic. But as we also look at these players, many of them are question marks as of now in terms of their talent. Still, there are a number of young players, specifically those under 25 years old, who do have bright futures.
These are the five best Miami Dolphins players under 25 entering the 2020 season. (Note: These players will all be under 25 by Sept. 10 when the first Week 1 game is played.)
5. Christian Wilkins, DL, Miami Dolphins
While so much focus was placed on the Dolphins’ first-round picks in the 2020 NFL Draft, that trio joins the 2019 top selection, Christian Wilkins. The Clemson product was in the middle of a defense largely devoid of talent, by design, in his rookie season but still showed some good things.
For his rookie campaign, Wilkins notched 56 total tackles while starting in 14 of the 16 games he played in addition to registering 2.0 sacks and three tackles for loss on the year. You’d like to see more but, given what was around him, it’s hard to blame him for not wholly showing out.
There is room for improvement with Wilkins as he comes into his second year in the NFL. However, his pedigree coming out of Clemson is that of a leader who may never be an NFL sack leader but will always be in the mix and helping to make plays. He showed enough signs of that in 2019 for him to make this list.