Tony Sparano wasn’t kidding around when he said last week the starters will play in the final preseason game “until I’m satisfied.”
Even with the Cowboys resting their starters, Brandon Marshall and the Dolphins' offense had a hard time clicking Thursday night / AP
There was Chad Henne and Brandon Marshall, playing three full series while counterparts Tony Romo and Miles Austin laughed it up in street clothes on the sideline. There was Cameron Wake and Jared Odrick playing the entire first half, while DeMarcus Ware and Jay Ratliff didn’t break a sweat.
“We talked about how we, as a first team unit, needed to come in and be efficient, real effective real fast,” receiver Davone Bess said. “However long it took, that’s how long we were going to be in the game.”
Sparano may be the only coach in the NFL who likes to get his starters significant repetitions in the final preseason game, and he doesn’t really care what you think about it.
“They worry about their team, I worry about mine,” he said. “When you come into this fourth game and don’t play it, and people who don’t play go out and lay an egg in Week 1, people are going to say, ‘You should’ve done this.’”
After an inconsistent showing by the Dolphins’ first-team offense led by Chad Henne and a better one by backups led by Chad Pennington, the Dolphins and Cowboys played a see-saw final exhibition game Thursday night at Cowboys Stadium that wasn’t settled until the final seconds.
David Buehler’s fourth field goal of the game, this one from 31 yards, as time expired gave the Cowboys a 27-25 victory. Dallas finished the preseason 3-2, while Miami wound up 2-2.
Tony Sparano and his bosses have a couple big decisions to make next week, and not just deciding who the last roster cuts will be as the team finalizes its 53-man roster on Sept. 4.
The Dolphins have two key players injured right now – cornerback Will Allen, who had his knee scoped three weeks ago, and Nate Garner, the team’s most versatile offensive lineman who is out until early October with a broken foot.
The problem for Sparano is that the NFL does not have an equivalent of Major League Baseball’s 15-day disabled list. In the NFL, it’s all or nothing – players are either placed on Injured Reserve, ending their season, or carried on the 53-man roster, taking up a valuable roster spot.
So the Dolphins must decide soon if it is worth carrying an injured Allen and Garner on the active roster as they rehab their injuries.
“It’s a difficult decision … if you don’t really know timetables,” Sparano said. “You have to evaluate maybe the amount of players that you have for those spots.”
Just two weeks remain before the Dolphins’ season kicks off in Buffalo. Prior to Friday night, that was something to get excited about; now it might be something to get concerned about. Other than the first half at Jacksonville, Miami has been wildly inconsistent this season, and the tone for that inconsistency has been set by quarterback Chad Henne. That’s where we start our Sunday talking points:
1. Henne has yet to find his rhythm.
Henne was the first to admit afterward that Friday’s game didn’t unfold as planned.
“Missing some throws, sacks, penalties,” he said. “Just a team effort on offense. We just didn’t execute.”
Not all of that comes back to Henne - the offensive line had its poorest game in recent memory, for starters - but when a team is struggling early it’s up to the quarterback to lead it out of its funk, and that never happened. (more…)
For four weeks during Organized Team Activities this spring and four weeks this training camp, the buzzwords used in every article about Mike Nolan’s new defense were “blitzing” and “fast-paced” and “attacking” and “offensive mentality.”
One of the few times the Dolphins got any pressure on Matt Ryan / Bill Ingram, Post Staff
The question after three preseason games: When are the Dolphins going to show any of this?
The Dolphins have totaled just three sacks in three games, and only one by a starter – Randy Starks in the first game. They had zero sacks last night in an ugly 16-6 loss to Atlanta, and barely laid a finger on Matt Ryan, whose uniform probably doesn’t need to be washed before his team’s next game.
No question, Nolan has not opened up his playbook this preseason. The Dolphins are not blitzing much, trying to see if their front three (or four) can win their individual battles and get to the quarterback.
But so far, not so good. Josh Freeman: 4 for 4 for 53 yards and a touchdown. David Garrard: 6 for 8 for 79 yards and a touchdown. Ryan: 13 for 26 for 103 yards and a touchdown, and it would have been much, much worse if Ryan could hit the broad side of a barn. The Dolphins have been out-sacked 8-3.
Knock on wood, the weather is perfect at Sun Life Stadium 2 hours before kickoff
…. And we’re live from Sun Life Stadium for tonight’s crucial preseason game No. 3 between the Dolphins and Atlanta Falcons!
Hold your breath, because while the weather.com forecast calls for 30 percent chance of storms tonight in Miami Gardens, the weather is actually quite nice right now, a sunny 88 degrees with a just a few scattered clouds. I can guarantee you the Dolphins would appreciate a dry evening tonight after playing their first two preseason games in the rain.
Why is tonight crucial? Because this is the starters’ final tune-up before the regular season, since the starters won’t play in the final preseason game, this Thursday in Dallas, for fear of injury. The starters will likely play well into the third quarter, and the main backups will finish out the game. Chad Henne will likely give way to Tyler Thigpen tonight sometime in the third quarter. Chad Pennington may play a series or two but no more, and Pat White almost definitely won’t play, in what could be his last game in a Dolphin uniform.
The Dolphins won’t have many players inactive tonight. Linebacker Channing Crowder likely will miss his second straight game with a hamstring injury, and Quentin Moses likely won’t play after sitting out of practice all week with a hamstring injury. Otherwise, the Dolphins are fairly healthy entering tonight’s game.
But the Dolphins do have a couple surprises in the starting lineup. Veteran Jason Allen replaces Sean Smith at cornerback opposite Vontae Davis, and Jake Grove returns to the starting center spot after backing up Joe Berger the past two games. Allen’s movement up the depth chart perhaps signifies that he is on the roster bubble following the trade for Benny Sapp, and the coaches need to see him perform tonight to determine his fate.
The teams will kick off in about 90 minutes. Check back here after each quarter, as we will post play-by-play, scoring updates and separate the players into Winners and Losers — who helped their chances of making the roster tonight, and who hurt them.
And for other updates, make sure you follow me on twitter @BenVolinPBP. Enjoy the game!
What does $29.5 million, with a $12 million signing bonus, get you these days? Jake Grove is finding out that it certainly doesn’t guarantee a starting job at center for the Miami Dolphins.
Grove, who was one of the Dolphins’ big free agent signings in 2009 after five mostly productive seasons in Oakland, has taken a back seat to the much cheaper Joe Berger this training camp, and faces an uphill battle to win back his starting job.
Grove, who has already pocketed $14 million from the Dolphins – his signing bonus plus $2 million base salary last year – said he didn’t think he’d have a competition for his job when he signed his contract.
“No, I didn’t know that, but they’re the coaches. They can do whatever they want,” Grove said after Tuesday’s practice. “That’s out of my control, so I don’t even worry about it. I just come to work and line up wherever they tell me to line up.”
No question, the Dolphins performed better last night against Jacksonville than they did in their first preseason game against Tampa Bay.
The Dolphins’ starters gained 245 total yards Saturday, compared to just 19 against the Bucs, and out-scored the Jaguars’ starters 24-12. Chad Henne was on fire, completing 11-of-14 passes for 151 yards and two touchdowns. Brandon Marshall was a Beast, as his nickname suggests, catching four passes for 66 yards and throwing two crucial blocks that led directly to touchdowns.
But let’s not crown the Dolphins as Super Bowl champs just yet. There was still plenty of ugliness in Saturday’s 27-26 win, in all three phases of the game, and the Dolphins weren’t satisfied with their performance.
“We have a long ways to go,” head coach Tony Sparano said. “We’re nowhere near where we plan to be, but I do believe we made some progress tonight.”
Coach Tony Sparano said he expects to play starting quarterback Chad Henne for as much as a half Saturday night at Jacksonville, then switch to Tyler Thigpen. He didn’t even mention Pat White’s name. Which raises the question, could the end of the Pat White Era be close at hand?
Just as he did last Thursday, White got the majority of reps in Thursday’s final workout of training camp, and gave a brutal performance, throwing several interceptions and ill-timed passes. Of course, White wound up playing only the final meaningless series of the opening preseason game against Tampa Bay two nights later.
Sparano also made a point of saying his quarterbacks have to be very conscious of cutting down turnovers this season. Considering White continues to be extremely scatter-armed when it comes to hitting receivers, that’s another black mark on his ledger.
With the end of two-a-day workouts meaning fewer reps for the quarterbacks, it’s hard to imagine Sparano keeping four much longer.
Updates from Thursday’s practice, which is officially the final practice of the Dolphins’ training camp:
Dolphins Talking Points heading into Thursday’s practice, which will entail a practice in the morning and a walk-through in the afternoon. Today is technically the last day of training camp:
1. Decision Time for Jake Grove, Joe Berger and Nate Garner is coming soon — real soon.
Tony Sparano has a few position battles to settle, but none may be more important than the battle going on at center between Grove and Berger. The Dolphins would probably prefer Grove, whose $2.66 million salary is more than three times that of Berger ($700k), win the job, but Grove can’t stay healthy. Last year he sat out four games with an ankle surgery, and this training camp he has been slowed by a bruised knee.
Sparano said he wants to settle the center battle earlier than most.
“I’d like to get it settled as fast as I can, because I do think that that’s a position like the quarterback that you need, you need a lot of reps,” he said Wednesday. You need the majority now, not splitting them; you need the majority. … Now the hard thing with the two players that are there right now is they’re both very, very smart. They are smart, it’s just that they do need to see those pictures, and more importantly, the rest of the group needs to hear it out of their mouth consistently.”
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