Omar Kelly: Dolphins must find someone to lead this franchise out of the wilderness

Omar Kelly, Miami Herald on Dec 17, 2024

Published in Football

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MIAMI — “[Expletive] man,” Tyreek Hill yelled in the locker room minutes after Sunday’s 20-12 loss to the Houston Texans, which virtually eliminated the Miami Dolphins from the postseason equation.

“This was supposed to be our year,” the five-time first-team All-Pro receiver said in a moment of transparency before taking his postgame shower, likely to wash of the disappointment of another season that fell short of expectation.

The Dolphins had the hottest offense in the NFL in 2023 and added tight end Jonnu Smith and Odell Beckham Jr.

De’Von Achane, who set a NFL record for yards per carry as a rookie, was going to be a year older and more experienced, and the offensive line was entering its second season under coach Butch Barry, who worked miracles with that unit in 2023.

The Dolphins defense set a franchise record for sacks last season and pushed out out the old curmudgeon in Vic Fangio, replacing him with a younger, more relatable defensive coordinator in Anthony Weaver.

Sure, the Dolphins had a ton of free agent defections, and starting players were released as cap casualties, but from Hill’s perspective, Miami clearly had enough to challenge Kansas City, Baltimore and Buffalo as an AFC supremacy.

Especially with a more polished Tua Tagovailoa, who was coming off his first Pro Bowl season, at the helm, beginning his third season in the same offense.

This was supposed to be the season the Dolphins turned the corner, winning the franchise’s first playoff game in 24 years. But what South Florida got from it’s NFL franchise was the same ole’, same ole’, a Dolphins team that belly flopped in December for whatever reason.

Four turnovers from Tagovailoa doesn’t help, and neither did the receiver injuries (Jaylen Waddle’s knee and Grant DuBose’s head trauma that got him hospitalized), or playing with a depleted offensive line, which was missing Terron Armstead (knee) and Kendall Lamm (back).

And it doesn’t help that Miami has averaged 3.0 yards per carry for the past six contexts since starting right tackle Austin Jackson sustained his season-ending knee injury in Miami’s second loss to the Buffalo Bills.

For the season, the Dolphins are averaging 3.86 yards per carry, which is more than half a yard behind the NFL average of 4.42 yards per carry this season.

None of this is ideal, especially since a quarterback’s best friend is a forceful and consistent rushing attack. But we will probably pretend none of this is relevant and blame everything on Tagovailoa, and maybe coach Mike McDaniel.

However, the root of the problem starts with how this team was built, and it was built to be a loser from the beginning based on how general manager Chris Grier conducted himself last offseason.

Football games are won and lost in the trenches, and Miami’s terrible at the line of scrimmage, on both sides of the ball.

The Dolphins are a disaster in the trenches because management neglected those areas in the offseason, ignoring glaring holes like Miami’s offensive guards, and nose tackle, and signing stopgap players to cheap deals.

If there’s one thing life has taught me it’s that you get what you pay for unfortunately.

The Dolphins went to the Dollar Tree to address the trenches, and now that Miami’s unable to protect the quarterback, run the ball, pressure the quarterback, and stop the run (on occasion) this franchise is on the verge of producing a losing record (Miami can’t afford one more loss).

And if that happens it should cost someone his job.

This team was never built properly from the beginning, and the buck stops with Grier, who has served as general manager, main grocery picker, since 2016, and has been the top decision-maker on the football side of the organization since 2019.

We can run this back one more season, max out another one of Steve Ross’ credit cards by restructuring deals to make more moves to patch holes, but the problem with that is we have no proof Grier has learned anything from his mistakes.

McDaniel has to realizes that his finesse, speed-oriented team will always take a back seat to the tough, physical ones that usually thrive in December, when the contenders separate themselves from the pretenders.

We know which one the Dolphins are in 2024. The main question we need answered is who will help the Dolphins change the pretender status this franchise had had for two-plus decades?

Who will lead the Dolphins out of the wilderness?

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