Episode 479 Waddle McDaniel Weather Injuries and More

Episode 479 Waddle McDaniel Weather Injuries and More

And we’re off. And I forgot to put it the old logo up. So, let’s do it this way. Today on the latest episode of the All Dolphins podcast. It’s a very busy Thursday with the coordinators talking. A lot of very revealing comments. We have the latest injury report. Some nasty weather potentially on the way in Cleveland. Another report involving Mike McDaniel. What to make of all that trade chatter. some legit, some ridiculous. Let’s get it going after we do this. There we go with the old logo. This is where if if this was all about production, I would have had a really really impressive uh intro song, but I don’t. Hi everyone. Again, uh before we get going, please like, subscribe, comment, share, and if you’re going to comment, as always, I’m going to ask disagree all you want. can call takes or comments ridiculous if you want. Leave the personal insults out of it. It’s it’s a bad look and it’s gonna get your comment probably removed if I feel like it. If it becomes too disrespectful. Um let’s be let’s be better than that, shall we? Okay, on that note, let’s get cranking. We’ll start with the injury report on this Thursday, October 16th. And it’s nothing but good news on the Dolphin side with three changes from Wednesday. All of them are positive and they invol they include first and foremost fullback Alec Engold back at practice as a full participant after being out Wednesday with an issue that was described as neck slash rest. Additionally, linebacker Jordan Brookke was limited in practice Wednesday with a neck issue. He was a full participant in practice on Thursday. Safety Dante Trader Jr. we’ll talk about a little bit later as well. On another matter, also upgraded from limited to full. Everybody else is the same as it was Wednesday. That includes the one player who is still out who will not play. That’s safety Elijah Campbell who has a quad injury sustained in practice last week. And among the very revealing comments from Anthony Weaver, defensive coordinator Anthony Weaver, who was very, very, very insightful in his weekly media session on Thursday, they were going to give Elijah Campbell a look as another option at Nickel Corner last week heading into the game against the Chargers. Boom. Gets injured in practice. He didn’t play against the Chargers after two DNPs. Certainly doesn’t look like he’s going to play against Cleveland. right now he’s probably the only player who’s not going to play because every again everybody else was full on Thursday other than Campbell tight end Darren Waller with that’s been the routine ever since he gotten back into the action uh limited with the hip slower who was limited Wednesday and Thursday with a pectoral injury that was an issue last week as well he wound up playing against the Chargers I would expect that unless there’s a setback of some kind he would play against the Cleveland Browns as well coming up on Sunday. Uh I can give you the names of the other players on the injury report. Again, I would expect all of those players to play and that includes Tyrell Dodson, who missed a game against the Chargers because of a concussion. It would include cornerback Storm Duck, who hasn’t played since the opener against the Indianapolis Colts because of an ankle injury. It also would include wide receiver Cedric Wilson Jr. who was actually a healthy scratch for the game against the Chargers. This was after being signed off the New Orleans Saints practice squad. Whether he’s going to be active against the Browns on Sunday, who knows? That’s going to be a coach’s decision. If he wasn’t active against the Chargers, I don’t know that I see a major reason to think that’s going to be different against Cleveland, but who knows? And then two is also on the injury report again, but he’s listed as a full participant, so no reason for concern there. He’s got the left thumb issue. The Browns have some uh issues as well. They have a lot longer injury report and they have two players now who have not practiced so far this week and their two starters. One of them is right tackle Jack Conklin who’s dealing with a concussion and based on the steps of the protocol. I don’t know exactly what two straight DNPs to start the week mean beyond it’s highly unlikely he plays against the Dolphins. David and Jooko, their tight end from the University of Miami who makes a nice two tight end set with rookie Harold Fannon Jr. He hasn’t practiced this week so far. He has a knee injury. The Browns had one, two, three, four, five, six, six changes on their injury report from Wednesday to Thursday. And most of them involved guys who went from limited to full. The most notable of those being defensive end Miles Garrett who dealing with an elbow issue. Again, he was full on Thursday. So, he’ll be out there against Patrick Paul in what could be right now the biggest challenge so far of Patrick Paul’s young career. And if he passes this test with flying colors or very well, um it certainly would be a gigantic step towards further stamping Patrick Paul as a left tackle of the future for the Dolphins for several years to come. We’re almost already there. The dude has a very very good more so in pass pro than in run blocking. Um but I think this is one of the positions the Dolphins can feel very comfortable with moving forward and I don’t know that there are that many of those where we could make that statement. Patrick Paul most definitely is one of those guys the Dolphins no matter how bad it gets between now and the NFL trading deadline on November 4th where they tell other teams sorry he’s off limits and sure I’m going to go straight into that one. Another one they should with whom they should do the same thing is Jaylen Wadd. uh his name has popped up all of a sudden. There’s a report out of New York uh the outlet is SNY that he could be or will be among quoteunquote the uh potential wide receiver targets for the New York Giants who are looking to bolster that group in the aftermath of losing Malik Neighbors to a knee injury in week four. Now, that’s all great for the New York Giants, but as you’ve heard me say before, if you’re a longtime follower of the All Dolphins podcast or follow me on X or read the content on miam Dolphinsson onsi.com, which I forgot to plug, that’s the lifeblood of everything we do here. Please go check out the content. It’s free uh and there’s a lot of it um from myself and my staff at Miami Dolphins on SI. It takes two teams to make a trade. So, it’s all great. And this is that happens a lot when I hear Dolphin fans talking about it would be great to go get that guy and then you My point is always well okay but why would the other team make the trade? In this case, it’s all great. If I’m a New York Giant Giants fan, I’m like absolutely go get me Wadd the Penguin and start doing, you know, the Penguin dance, but then you look at the Dolphins and it would be why, okay, why would the Dolphins be crazy borderline to trade Jill model and everything I say when I talk about trade situations, scenarios, possibilities obviously involves a caveat that somebody makes you an offer you can’t refuse where the value is too good to pass up. Obviously, that’s a different story. That’s what happened with Laramie Tonsel in September 2019 because you remember the story as it goes that the Texans didn’t get that trade consummated with the Dolphins the first time they called Chris Greer. It took a couple of times, couple of conversations, and the Texans kept upping their offer to a point where Chris Guru at some point said, “Yeah, let’s do it.” And if you recall what the Dolphins got, and that’s been chronicled and everything they were able to do off the branches of that, again, no, it was not a trade that they could turn down. Even though one can make the argument that the left tackle position was problematic for three years after that until Terron Armstead showed up because of losing Laram Tonsil but what they gained in return again that couldn’t be passed up. You’re not getting two first round picks for General Model. You’re probably you’re not getting one first round pick for J model. The trades we’ve seen put out there on social media those doing hypothetical trades those are always fun. Some of those are not based in reality. however, uh suggested basically the Giants and they also was also put out there involving the Buffalo Bills and the compensation was the same in both. It’s a second round pick and a fifth round pick which if you recall history lesson here 2019 what the Dolphins gave up to acquire quarterback Josh Rosen from the Arizona Cardinals. Um, and my take on that particular trade always has been the Dolphins were seeking a quarterback for the longest time. Zero issue with taking a shot at a guy who was a 10th overall pick the year before regardless of the fact that he struggled in Arizona as a rookie. Again, if you don’t swing for the fences, you’re not hitting a home run or something like that. Uh, and actually that could have turned out to be a very good trade had the Dolphins been wise enough and everybody been on board with keeping Josh Rosen in the starting lineup the entirety of the that 2019 season because it was pretty clear early on that the dude didn’t have it. um physical traits were there, but uh the intangibles absolutely were not even close to being there. And had the Dolphins simply stayed the course and stayed with him as a starting quarterback instead of going to Ryan Fitzpatrick after or was it late in a game against the Washington football team? I don’t remember what they were called at the time, but against Washington and then they decided to go with Ryan Fitzpatrick because he gave him a better chance to win games. that cost him a chance perhaps at landing the number one overall pick in the 2020 draft which would have given them the opportunity to draft Joe Burrow. Entirely different topic for an entirely different time. So going back to Jaylen Wadd the issues we’re dealing with is number one the Dolphins are not exactly overloaded with high-end players right now. jail model. Regardless of what you want to consider him in terms of his ability level among his NFL peers, whether you consider him low-end pure number one receiver, mid-tier number one receiver, I don’t know if anybody would go so far as to classify him as a high-end number one receiver, but even then at worst, he’s a high-end number two. Okay. So, in terms of ability, the Dolphins, even if they start over with a whole new regime, and we’re going to get to that as well a little bit further on, with a whole new regime and rebuild even more massively than this reset of 2025, still need some players to get, you know, to get through the 2025 season, hopefully to win some games in the meantime. General model most definitely is one of those. And here’s the other part, maybe the most important part. His cap number is really low. cap number for 2025 is $8 million. His cap number for 2026 jumps to 11.6 or 11.7, I don’t recall exactly which of the two. And then it jumps up into the 30s in 2027, which is not good. except by then he’s got no more guaranteed money left which means it’s a restructure or if you have reached a point where you want to move on from him you move on from him and it’s very painless unlike what it would be for other players on the current roster who shall remain nameless who you know you know I’m talking about where the Dolphins don’t have that luxury for example even if they wanted to move on from from Tua after the 2025 season they can but it’s going to be very painful with Jay Wadd if they want to move on from him in 2027 seven not painful in the least and next year he counts 11 million against the cap. So again, young player, he’s going to be 27 in November is another factor, too. It’s not like he’s got a lot of wear and tear on, you know, 27 years old in November. Low cap number and he’s a good player. Why or why would you not want to have him on board for 2026? Whatever the Dolphins look like, it makes zero sense. and he of the names we’ve heard and going back for those not familiar the names that we’ve heard as far as dolphin trade candidates mostly put out by national outlets it’s Shayon Phillips it’s Bradley Chub Jaylen Wright’s name has been thrown out there Rasul Douglas has one that’s very interesting and then Devon Chan also has been thrown out there and then Jay Wall and out of those Jaylen Wadd makes the absolute least sense for the Dolphins to even consider making a move Chan is the best Dolphin player right now. He’s going he’s on track to become the team MVP without question. So the question becomes why would the Dolphins consider trading him? It’s very simple because Ivan Chen is is in his third NFL season. He’s going to be eligible for an extension after the season. His agent’s going to want one. Chances are they’re going to want a lot of money. Running backs tend to be very recyclable. you can it’s not that difficult to find a good running back as it is other positions. And then the other part of it too, so the question is going to become whoever is running the Dolphins, is there going to be a hesitation to give a big money contract at the running back position, which is not something that’s done that often anymore? And then you also have the issue of Devon Chan’s market value will never be higher than it is right now because he’s performing at a very high level. So, I still wouldn’t expect him to be traded, but if he were to be traded, there’s more of a rationale than there is for a Jaylen model, which makes zero sense. Okay, let’s move on. I I teased something about Mike McDaniel. Again, I know there’s a lot of Dolphin fans who keep every game thinking, well, if they lose this game, he’s out. If they lose this game, he’s out. And I I’ve been pretty consistent in saying I’m not so sure. it would something would have to be really really bad and embarrass Steven Ross to a level they were where it would become untenable to keep him as head coach before a move is made. And the latest reporting is from NFL insider Jordan Schultz, uh, who’s pretty plugged in, who said that while there are issues in terms of chemistry among the locker room and lack of togetherness among the players, that his understanding is that Steven Ross is not in a in a hurry to make a move with Mike McDaniel anytime soon. And I made the point this week. I don’t remember if it was Wednesday with Perker earlier that we let’s not lose sight of the fact that Stephven Ross gave Mike McDaniel a contract extension in 2024 last year when he still had two years left on his contract, which tells you a little bit of just how how high of a regard uh he holds Mike McDaniel. And then it’s not an issue of money for Steven Ross. A dude’s got more money than he can waste. It’s an issue of he kind of put his stamp on the guy and he’s going to want to try to see it through with a successful end as opposed to cutting bait uh earlier than later. So again, is it possible Mike McDaniel will get fired during the 2025 season? Absolutely. But I think this notion that he’s like on a on a clock and every loss could be the triggering point, I I don’t know. I really don’t know. even the loss against the Cleveland Browns against the lowly Cleveland Browns who I think is are going to be like not an easy matchup because the defense is very very good and they’re playing at home for the first time since tber since September 21st. Um and in their last home game they defeated the Green Bay Packers. So we got that. And the other issue is the weather. According to Andy Slater, who is a South Florida radio talk show host, if you’re not familiar with him, who’s get very, very plugged in as well. And the apparently some sort of advisory from the National Weather Service of a nasty storm headed around the Cleveland area where we could be looking at I believe it’s a 94% chance of rain and some nasty nasty winds with gusts. Uh the the report said along the lines of 40 50 miles an hour. I mean that’s borderline. It’s not quite tropical storm. Yeah, it might be tropical storm. Actually, it is tropical storm territory here. So the weather conditions are going to be nasty and it’s actually kind of ironic that you look at the schedule go, “Oh, Dolphins get Cleveland on October 19th. It’s going to be fine.” Did not like December last year. And then last year they played him in December and they completely locked out where the weather was like in the 50s. And this year, while the weather is going to be in the 60s, could be nasty in terms of precipitation, and that’s always a great equalizer. So, who know who knows what happens with that particular situation. So, um in that vein, and then we’re now going to get a little bit into what the coordinator had to coordinators had to say and the uh the two assistant coaches we had. And if you don’t know the routine, every Thursday, the Dolphins bring out for their weekly media sessions in order. special teams coordinator Craig Aerman, defensive coordinator Anthony Weaver, offensive coordinator Frank Smith, and then two assistant coaches. And today we got uh linebackers coach Joe Barry, followed by offensive line coach Butch Barry. So, uh, Craig Aerman was first and I asked him the question of how can you possibly prepare for that kind of, uh, those kind of weather elements and he basically not a whole lot you can do about the wind, but they are dipping the footballs in water all week, you know, practicing handling the wet balls, particularly when it comes to long snapper Joe Cardona, the last thing he wants like, you know, one of those dribblers on a snap where the, you know, the snapper can’t grip the football well enough. So, but that could be a factor. And of course, if there’s a if there’s massive wind that’s going to impact the kicking game and the punting game, Jake Bailey has been tremendous so far this season. Um, but if he’s punting against a, you know, tropical storm type wind, then this is going to affect it going to affect the kickers as well. And this is where again having a bigger leg comes into play. And this is where the one nugget of information was interesting because we’re now in week seven and Jason Sanders is still on IR. If you recall the reports at the time he sustained the hip injury in the preseason was four to six weeks. This was per Adam Shfter of ESPN. Well, we’re now in week seven. He’s still on IR. He’s been eligible to come off since that week five game at Carolina. Still not happening. Craig Aerman was asked, uh, is he close? When do you expect him back? And these are not answers that, uh, an assistant coach is going to provide. They’re going to defer it to Mike McDaniel. Let him make that announcement. Um, but this is where, as I chronicled on Miami Dolphins on SI.com, that Riley Patterson’s been good for the Dolphins. He’s seven of eight on field goals, but he’s not Jason Sanders. And the biggest difference comes in terms of the long range field goals. Jason Sanders was an absolute beast from long distance last year. He was 12 for 14 from 15 and beyond. Uh the number 17 for 21 the last two years from 15 beyond. That’s really really good. And now the league has gone to a mode where pretty much every NFL kicker will make I don’t want to say with relative ease because that’s not fair, but routinely make 50 plus yard field goals. That is not Riley Patterson’s game. We saw the miss. It was from 57, but he still missed it. And then last year with the Atlanta Falcons, he was one for three. So, that’s a disadvantage the Dolphins will have until Jason Sanders come back that they do not have. I don’t want to say that automatic guy, but that’s the guy who’s really good from long distance in terms of the field goal kicking that Jason Sanders provides. So, hopefully he comes back sooner rather than later. Um, the Dolphins put him on IR. Remember when they made the cuts to 53, designating him to return at that time used up one of their eight for the season. One would think they did that with a pretty good understanding and a high degree of confidence that he indeed would be back at some point in the regular season. But it’s week again, it’s week seven. If he doesn’t come back next week, at some point it’s going to be a little bit worrisome that is going to be a seasonl long thing here. In that case, Dolphins would would have wasted one of those eight return designations. And if my math is correct, the Dolphins have made four so far. Him, Ethan Bonner, also at the time they went to 53. And then once the season starts, you do that. You can put as however many players you want on IR, but then you have the limited number of designations from that point on up to eight in the regular season. Since the start of the regular season, the Dolphins uh have not designated anybody to return. They will do so with Austin Jackson and James Daniels when they’re ready to come back. One would highly suspect. Beyond that, I don’t know that they have any players who would qualify as slam dunks um for that particular situation. Another nugget. This from um this from defensive coordinator Anthony Weaver. No, this was from Joe Brady. Sorry, the linebacker’s coach. And actually, shame on me. Bad Allen. I’m gonna uh ever since he was resigned to the practice squad, I’d noticed Jordan Colbert was kind of doing the stretching in the last line of the linebackers and now with the DBs. And it kind of struck me as odd and I was like, “No, I guess it’s practice quad play.” And it’s never really never really lit up on me that and now Joe Brady confirmed it today when talking about what was happening at the inside linebacker spot that Jordan Colbert is working as a linebacker. That’s where the Dolphins see him. That’s a position switch. He was a safety at Rhode Island. That’s where the Dolphins um initially signed him as a UDFA to play and then now this year they brought him back with the idea clearly they’re they’re using him as linebacker. That’s where they see his NFL future would be a little bit on the undersized uh side for a inside linebacker certainly not for a safety. Um, and very interesting, he was the emergency linebacker uh against inside linebacker against the Chargers. And Joe Brady shed some light on why it was that Tyrell Dodson played, pardon me, KJ Britt played every snap at inside linebacker alongside Jordan Brooks with Willie Gay not mixing mixing in um as we had been led to believe. And basically the reason is that they’re Dolphins are very specific in their roles and Datson and Britt practice at middle linebacker. Jordan Brooks, Willie Gay Jr. practice at weak side linebacker or uh dime linebacker when they’re in the nickel situation. So where so there was never according to Joe Brady an idea of switching switching rotating them both or whatever. If KJ Brit got hurt against the Chargers and Willie Gay Jr. obviously would have come in in an sort of an emergency role and if something happened to both of them then it would have been Jordan Colbert as far as that is concerned. This is UDFA making a position switch. It’s certainly very very interesting to discuss. However, uh let hopefully this pans out and Joe Brady made the point that the real development for Jordan Colbert’s going to come next OTAA uh when he can devote his full-time practicing the Dolphin scheme because right now what he’s doing is doing scout team work where he’s mimicking participating in the opponent’s defense that they do. Mentioned Dante Trader Jr. a little bit earlier and very interesting to note that he got a lot of snaps, more snaps than ify Milifanu against the Chargers. Is Ma Fitzpatrick got the most snaps at safety of course than the National Davis and it was Dante Trader Jr. Let me tell you, Anthony Weaver likes him some Dante Trader Jr. quite a bit. Uh keeps talking about he’s got something there which is very good. And Weaver made the point that he hopes that Dante Trader Jr. is not going to get fixated on that missed tackle in the open field that he had in the game against the Chargers that set up the game-winning field goal. Same goes with Jaylen Phillips. You don’t want him to like go in a funk because he missed the sack. Unfortunately for Jaylen Phillips who will get some calls, who will produce some calls said Chris Greer before the trade deadline because he is very active because he gets some pressure on the quarterback even though finishing has been an issue. It was an issue in that game uh against the Chargers on Sunday. It’s another part where Weaver said he immediately went to him and said, “Listen, this is one play out of however many in the game. Game wasn’t won or lost on one play. You know, it’s in the past. F focus focus forward. The flip side of the Dante Trader thing though is what’s going on with if Milanu. This was a guy when the Dolphins signed him. There were some of us guilty uh who thought that had the potential to be a very good signing because it was a guy who flashed a little bit with the Detroit Lions when he wasn’t bogged down by injuries. And lo and behold, he was bogged down by injuries in training camp at one point early in the season. But even now that he’s come back, the impact has been very, very minimal. And for him to get two snaps on defense in the entire game on Sunday, it’s not great. And then the same can be said about Nick Westbrook Aina in a different type of way. uh for the last two weeks, not sure you guys are aware of this, he’s the one who’s played the most snaps at wide receiver after Jaylen Wadd with Tyreek Elon IR Sunday he got one target and I think against the Carolina Panthers if memory serves he got zero targets. So, he’s doing an awful lot of stuff in run blocking, which is great, but it’s a free a free free agent acquisition with where the hope was that maybe provides a different dimension in the passing game. That clearly clearly has not happened. And in fact, the Dolphins are back to the same spot they’ve been many times where, okay, who’s your lead guy after your big guy after Hill and Wadd? Malik Washington. Um, it’s been very effective as a utility type Debo Samuel type of player. What was it that uh he was nicknamed um Malibbo I think may have been thing is he’s averaging 4.6 yards per reception and a lot of I mean a lot of his catches are at the line of scrimmage. They were almost like glorified handoffs. Um who else who else is making plays down the field? It’s not Dias. not Taj Washington. Senator Coulson Jr. hasn’t in it yet. So basically the passing game has been Han Waller and Waddle which it’s fine if all three of them are producing. It certainly wouldn’t hurt to have a little bit more variety and more options. So uh and then as I look at my notes, I wrote notes here. As I look at my notes, the last thing I’m going to end it with was the obligatory Jonas Savania conversation. this one with with with Butch Barry um who was asked about Jonah’s progress and got very animated and when he got to talking about wanting him to be more consistent with the hand punching one way or the other uh with all of the technique and but his overriding point was it takes time. Not everybody progresses at the same rate. And then to the question, the never- ending question of why would he was he placed on the left side of the offensive line when he played a lot more on the right side at the University of Arizona, though not exclusively. And basically, but Barry said that whatever issues are that Jonah is having, they would be occurring. There’s not an issue of the side, it’s an issue of technique and fundamentals as the Dolphins stress. So, uh, hopefully again it gets better sooner rather than later. As I wrote on Miami Dolphins onsi.com, both he and Kenneth Grant are struggling. It’s not like they’re they’re the first first or second round picks for the Dolphins who didn’t get off their great starts using the first six games as a gauge. So, the idea of like automatically deciding that they’re bust is way, way, way premature. So hopefully, you know, the the the progress starts happening Sunday when the Dolphins face the Cleveland Brown in a matchup of one of five teams, but we shall see. So that’s going to wrap it up for today. We’ll be back on Friday. Thinking I’ll probably be joined by Chris Perkins from the Salenol, assuming he wants to come back on here, but I’ll I’ll put it put out the invite. Hopefully he says yes. If not, we shall see what we’ll do. In the meantime, please check out the website mmy dolphinssonsi.com. Uh, all content, it’s free and there’s a lot of it for the podcast for those who prefer the audio version of the podcast. You know where to get those? Wherever you get your podcast, Spotify, Apple and and I I don’t know whatever other uh outlets do those things. I should know, but I don’t. Bad Allen again. Bad Allen. And it for the uh v video portion. Again, as always, please like, subscribe, helps with the uh algorithm and all that good stuff. Comment, please do so respectfully. And that’s about it. So, I’m going to wish everyone a great rest of your Thursday.

Miami Dolphins on SI Publisher Alain Poupart (@PoupartNFL) breaks down a busy Thursday at Miami Dolphins headquarters, the Jaylen Waddle speculation, interesting situations at safety and linebacker, the McDaniel watch, and more. sure to follow Alain on Twitter at @PoupartNFL and Blusky at @alainpoupart.bsky.social, and read his stories (free content) on Miami Dolphins on SI at si.com/nfl/dolphins/onsi.