The Miami Dolphins have conducted a hard reset of the organization. The team looks more like an expansion roster than a team with a rich history of winning over the course of nearly 30 years spanning the Don Shula era. But those Don Shula years are long gone, friends. And what the Dolphins were left with was a heaping mess of a team — one that kicked contract down the road and pushed cap space restrictions until things finally came to a head.
And when the Dolphins relieved Mike Tannenbaum, new head honcho Chris Grier took a look around and decided Miami needed to whitewash any evidence of the 2009-2018 Miami Dolphins before moving forward.
Mission accomplished. But Grier’s not planning on slowly, meticulously building this team back up. He wants to win. Hell, he needs to win. It’s hard to image owner Stephen Ross tolerating two years of football as bad as what Miami fans will see the rest of this calendar year.
And with three 1st-round picks, two 2nd-round picks and a projected surplus of more than $120M in cap space next winter — Grier wants Dolphins fans to know one thing: he’s going to use it.
“We’ve talked about building this long-term with sustained success right away, and for us, we’ll be very aggressive. We’re not going to sit here on a bunch of money or anything. The plan is to build a winner here. No one likes losing,” said Grier yesterday in meeting with the media.
“We’ve positioned ourselves to where we think the organization will be in a good place here shortly. How long that takes – like I said, we’ll be aggressive (in) free agency. Again, we’re not going to sit back and not do anything. We’re going to be very proactive and try and get this turned quickly.”
It’s exciting to hear. Suddenly the prospects of potentially tanking two seasons or anything along those lines go out the window. And it’s very clear — this is as bad as things will get. Once the draft order is locked into place, Miami can flip the switch and attack adding players — not stripping them away. And with a promising free agent class lying ahead as well, Miami can target talent who fits the long-term vision.
And while the stink of Miami’s 2019 season won’t go away, it will be a lot easier to ignore when Miami is offering front-loaded contracts (a wise decision to keep them flexible and out of cap hell down the road) and so many picks to add young talent into the fray.
