"You have to tip your hat to their defense. They're really good, Dolphins left guard Justin Smiley said. These guys get paid tons of money for a reason. They're great players.''

No, that wasn't a quote from yesterday. That was last week. And yes, Tampa Bay's defensive is also good. I guess we can plug that excuse in every week. The thing is, OUR line also gets paid tons of money. There's something like 80 million dollars invested in that line.

The whole concept of our offense is based upon a strong running game. We pass up elite wide receivers in drafts, and refuse to bring in stars from free agency. We have a veteran QB who is a game manager. We have Brown, Williams and Cobbs. We pass up on Matt Ryan and make the number one pick in the draft an offensive lineman. We're designed to run, we even fired our O line coach and hired another one just to underline the point. Yet....here we are!

Jake Long - Highest paid tackle in the league. He was a solid draft pick, but isn't he better at run blocking, and don't guys like him in college transition to LT because that's where the money is? And if he is so good at blocking, why can't we run on his end either?

Justin Smiley - Solid starter I guess, but not anything to brag about. He's also coming off an injury.

Jack Grove - Just got here, so maybe there's some excuse for him because he needs time to play with the unit, but come on, for 30 mil is he that much of an upgrade over Satele? Why didn't we just draft somebody? If highly paid vets can't block, then what's the difference? Just like cutting Eric Green in favor of Sean Smith, why not use the draft if you're not going to have veterans who make a difference?

Donald Thomas - Couldn't ask for more for a 6th round draft pick. But Thomas can't do it alone.

Vernon Carey - I don't think Vernon is anything beyond a solid starter. He wants to be considered elite and is pushing for more and more compensation, but why hasn't he stepped up his play?

I agree we have a solid o-line that is at this point overpaid underachiving, guess we will wait and see how the season pans out.

I was disappointed to know that this is a good preview of the starters.

Aside from that the defense did well, except for the DB's getting burned sometimes.

Defensive line didn't start playing until they had been solidly handled for 2 1/2 series.

The secondary was loose, but the Tampa's offensive line solidly handled the FINS pass rush for 1st 3 possessions.

Sparano has got to be pissed this morning over OL and DL play.

Still at halftime it was just 6-3. I will take that anyday.

Realy sam sam? you would take that agaisnt the Pats, or Carolina, or the Saints, or the Texans, or the Steelers, or the Falcons? Any team that has a solid offense, besides the Buccaneers third stringers?

I HAVE been concerned about us sinking so much money into the O-Line. I know Sparano is an ex-O-Line coach, but I haven't seen the results from the O-Line that I would like.

Well possibly game day it will pan out.....with the performance last night setting a precedence for what is to come, any caliber team will kill us in the passing game.

I HOPE NOT.

Oh lol im deff going to go on and just say it, yeah where going to get burned a good bit this year. Maybe by midseason our rookies will come around, Will Allen ? I mean i thought he is better than how he has been playing? Did hitting the 30+ mark realy change him that much?

MiamiThunder Wrote:
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> Oh lol im deff going to go on and just say it,
> yeah where going to get burned a good bit this
> year.

You wish!

Yesterdays game reminded me alot about the beginning of last year. Our DB's were constantly getting burnt till Goodman stepped up and ended up having a good year. Then we trade him. Now we have some talent back there, but again, need time to gel and develop.

I think Wake is going to be a beast for us at some point. Merling and Langford are coming on as well in pass rush, but our run defense is suspect.

On the offensive side, I am led to believe they played it conservative last night, maybe not trying to show to much. I don't remember seeing a single Wildcat play, or really anything out of the ordinary. I do not think we are seeing everything they have in store this year.

Lastly, I would like to see them bring Chris Williams back. While he did have some goofs in the return game, those errors can be fixed. But that explosiveness he brings cannot be replace, at least not by who we have. You could tell the offense had a pep in their step after his returns. That energy he brings seemed to tranfer to the offense.

Miamithunder is right, the score meant nothing, you can bet when we play other teams they won't be dropping passes.

But I'm more worried about the offense. We got by last year by the skin of our teeth, and I was really hoping we would keep rebuilding the offense. We needed a playmaker WR, and we needed to keep working on the O line. Hartline is ok, but he's not what I had in mind.

You can't stop great offenses, so forget about the idea of shutdown corners, we need need to keep up with other teams in terms of offensive scoring ability and big play ability. We can't spend all day marching down the field for a lousy field goal, or occasional TD, and expect our Defense to force a turnover or special teams to save us. We need to be clicking on offense.

Ginn needs to get the ball, period. And if the excuse is, well he's covered because he's our only deep threat, then we should have thought about that before and drafted or signed out of FA a wide receiver.

SigKash Wrote:
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> Yesterdays game reminded me alot about the
> beginning of last year. Our DB's were constantly
> getting burnt till Goodman stepped up and ended up
> having a good year. Then we trade him. Now we
> have some talent back there, but again, need time
> to gel and develop.
>
> Merling and Langford are coming on as well
> in pass rush, but our run defense is suspect.
Yep! Our run defense is poor because of our LB corp. Ayodele actually had a decent game and actually made a tackle for a loss. Crowder looked good in pass coverage, but his run stopping was terrible. I'm starting to think they need to switch positions. Move Ayodele to SILB and Crowder to WILB. Porter also let the RB by him a number of times.


>
> Lastly, I would like to see them bring Chris
> Williams back. While he did have some goofs in
> the return game, those errors can be fixed.
Dude's got a broken hand. He'll probably be out half the year.

If you're talking about run stopping ability, one small change they can make is to put Vonte in in place of Sean, in situations where we need more help defending the run. Because Vonte Davis clearly is capable of putting a hit on a player in run support. Just like he did when Sean was sick. I mean, I love Sean, but we need the right matchups.

And let's not forget that our players practice against EACH OTHER, so as one side of the ball is weak, the other side doesn't get any stronger because they're practicing day in and day out against that. We didn't practice against Cadillac Williams, and we won't be practicing against Moss or Owens either. Our defense practices against superstar names like Hartline, Turner, Camarillo, Bess, and until recently, Wilford.

How can you love Smith when he hasnt produced much? I feel if Roth was back, we could move in inside with Crowder, and that would shore up our run d.

Coming into this training camp I thought WR would be our worst position but clearly the staring offensive line was the worst part of our team the last couple games...followed by our secondary.

I've been especially concerned about Jake Long's play. He is clearly not living up to his "pro-bowl" status.

I'll give Jake Grove more time to get his thing together.

He produced an interception.

True True.