The Miami Dolphins Doomsday Meter: Brian Flores’ seat is rapidly heating up
6 min read
#NFLBeast #NFL #NFLTwitter #NFLUpdate #NFLNews #NFLBlogs
#Miami #Dolphins #MiamiDolphins #AFC #ThePhinsider
By: Marek Brave
Sitting at just one win on the season, things were bad before Sunday’s game against the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. Well, after a 28 point loss – another in a string of embarrassing flops – things have gotten significantly worse. No, many of us didn’t expect a win against the defending Super Bowl Champions, however we were hoping for a significantly closer margin of defeat. What we got was Tom Brady slicing and dicing our once vaunted Dolphins defense and turning them into tiny bits of rotting ceviche.
This team stinks, and they’re going to continue to stink even with the return of starting quarterback, Tua Tagovailoa. I’m sorry to break it to you, but Tua isn’t a shutdown cornerback (remember when we had one of those?) or a linebacker who can excel in coverage (have we ever had one of those?) or even just an offensive tackle who can stand his ground for more than 0.3 seconds (we miss you Brandon Albert). This team needs a lot more than quality quarterback play to measure up to the standards that were set before the season started.
As an aside, I find it funny that the same people who bemoaned Tua’s performances during wins, claiming that he wasn’t good enough and that the team’s victories should be attributed to the defense or to Brian Flores’ coaching, are now clinging to the laughable notion that Miami would have won two or three of the last four games if Tagovailoa had lined up under center. If I recall correctly, Flores was still coaching the team and Xavien Howard, Jerome Baker, Byron Jones, Eric Rowe, Christian Wilkins and others were still fully dressed and active for those last four contests. ***shrug***
Now that I’ve gotten that rant off of my chest, let’s dive into this week’s Miami Dolphins Doomsday Meter ratings. As a reminder, these aren’t the only individuals who are currently on the hot-seat for our once proud franchise, they’re just the ones I’m choosing to evaluate this week. The higher the score on the 0-10 scale, the hotter the seat – and some of these seats are scorching.
Brian Flores – HC
MDDM level – 7.0
Last week, Head Coach Brian Flores checked in at a mere 3.75 on the MDDM. Well, after just one week, and one more complete and utter failure of a product put forth on the playing-field, Flores’ rating has jumped significantly.
A supposed defensive mastermind, Flores’ prized unit has given up 35, 31, 27 and 45 points in four consecutive weeks. Tom Brady, a quarterback who has played in 351 games over 21+ seasons in the NFL, just passed for over 400 yards and 5 touchdowns in a single game for the FIRST TIME in his long and illustrious career. You’ve got to be a special kind of bad to allow that to happen.
On top of that, there are rumblings around the team that Brian Flores may be losing – or may have already lost – his locker room. His hard-headed, no-nonsense attitude seems to be wearing thin on a lot of the players now that the team is no longer winning football games. After their poor showing on Sunday, Tua Tagovailoa’s personal trainer, Nick Hicks (@PER4ORM) blew up on Twitter, claiming that Flores is “hard to even talk to” while going on to question, “How much harder do you think he is to play for?” He would also reply to a tweet from another fan asking if Flores had lost the locker room with a resounding, “YES.” Considering Hicks trains Tua, Dolphins’ wide receiver, Will Fuller, and various other Fins players, it is safe to assume that he is getting his information from sources very well connected to the team. Whether you agree with his stance or not, his series of now deleted tweets were very revealing, and frankly, quite shocking.
The seat that Flores sits upon has been steadily heating up since Miami’s Week 17 loss to the Buffalo Bills last season, and it has reached sizzling levels in 2021. However, winning cures all ills and if Miami can go on a run in the next few weeks, Flores’ rating will correspondingly fall. For the sanity of us all, let’s hope that happens.
George Godsey – OC
MDDM Level – 7.75
While grasping for straws, plenty of fans on this site and others were somewhat encouraged by last week’s showing by the Dolphins’ offense, giving reported play-caller George Godsey credit for Miami looking “better” on that side of the football.
Let me check my notes here – ah, yes, here we go… I see that Miami scored… 17 points… again… Which is the exact same amount of points they scored the week before when everyone was rightfully up in arms.
Have our standards really fallen that much that we credit George Godsey and the rest of the Miami Dolphins’ offense for scoring a mere 17 points in an entire football game? If that’s all it takes to impress some people, then I shouldn’t see anymore complaining on the world wide web for the rest of the season, as I’m sure Miami has a good shot of averaging 17 or more points the rest of the way.
C’mon, folks! Don’t settle for mediocrity. We were promised an improved team this season after adding electric playmakers on the offensive side of the ball. We were sold visions of playoff games, yet Miami sits at 1-4 with little to no hope of finding their way to the postseason in 2021.
Although he hasn’t been officially named by Brian Flores as the play-caller for this squad – because all of this secrecy is surely going to pay off soon – Godsey has been pegged as the man in charge of calling plays by multiple opposing coaches this season. He needs to call a more balanced attack, while also finding more ways to take shots deeper down the field. Also, it would be lovely to see him find a way to better use the number six overall pick in this year’s draft, Jaylen Waddle, so that his stat line doesn’t see him averaging 6.4 yards per target like he currently is.
If this offense doesn’t have a good showing against Jacksonville in London, and Miami happens to lose that game, I wouldn’t at all be surprised to see George Godsey take the fall.
Jesse Davis – RT
MDDM Level – 7.0
Pro Football Focus would like you to believe that Jesse Davis is playing well, laughably giving him a 74.1 pass-blocking grade for the game against Tampa this past Sunday. Well, I have eyeballs, and I watched that game, along with the rest of the games this year, and I can tell you, as can many others, that Jesse Davis is a liability and needs to be replaced along the offensive line if Miami hopes to keep Tua Tagovailoa – and his fractured ribs – safe and healthy going forward this season.
Right tackle is the second most important position on the offensive side of the football when you have a left-handed quarterback. Tua will most likely be back this week in London, and having to trust Davis to protect your blindside when the last snap you saw had Davis giving a free pass to Buffalo pass-rusher, A.J. Epenesa – a hit that sidelined Tua for the better part of four games – is a big ask.
The Dolphins have already shown that they are willing to make drastic changes along the offensive line, moving former first round pick, Austin Jackson, to left guard while tasking rookie Liam Eichenberg to man the left tackle spot last week, so replacing Davis with Robert Hunt while bringing in Solomon Kindley, Robert Jones or moving Davis to right guard would be a decision that wouldn’t be all too surprising. Keep an eye on practice reports this week, as this move may already be in the works.
After everything that has gone down this season, do you feel Brian Flores is still the right man for the Dolphins’ head coaching job going forward? If he was replaced, who would you like to see take the position? Do you still have hope that Miami can somehow sneak into the playoffs this year? Let me know on Twitter at @MBrave13 or in the comments below! Fins up!
Originally posted on The Phinsider
