FOF 2004 - The "Magic Beans" Challenge - Page 3

CentralMassHokie · 07-14-2004, 03:36 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by sidtian

I limit myself to franchising a player once during his career.

I, too, am digging this dynasty purely out of interest in Copeland now, and to see how far, if at all, the team falls when he finally hangs it up.

But, it's easy to see that one place that AI is lacking is in the response to being franchised.

NFL players hate being franchised. It would have been nice to see Copeland hold out at one point due to being franchised, which would have put you in a huge bind - cut the QB who's been the most successful ever, or dump half of your team hoping to sign him to a deal.

I think, in that situation, that you may not have been able to simply renegotiate enough players to get Copeland in.

QuikSand · 07-14-2004, 04:02 PM

But once you force a player to play under the one-year franchise tender, my understanding is that this counts as an "injustice" and he will never even consider accepting an offer from you again. So, if what you describe, CMH, happened to us and Copeland held out - we'd just be fucked. No hard decisions to make, no agony, just fucked. Our only choices would be to keep him and see if he eventually comes back, or to cut him and use the cap space. Re-signing wouldn't be an option anyway.

I see your point... but the number of real life instances where legitimate players actually sat out a year over a contract are pretty few, right? Sean Gilbert, Bobby Hebert... ummm...

CentralMassHokie · 07-14-2004, 04:17 PM

True. The whole injustice bit is really an artificial AI limitation and does sort of blow my whole theory.

But, I was thinking less guys holding out for a whole year and more the guys (Galloway, being a recent example) who piss and moan their way to a trade after being franchised or threatened with a franchise.

Wow, Bobby Hebert ... haven't thought about him in a while.

QuikSand · 07-15-2004, 09:19 AM

2023

This year’s retirement class is pretty modest – I’m surprised, actually:

S Orlando Bullock was our top pick in 2008 (ahead of QB Mel Copeland, even) Bullock started 170 games over 15 seasons, earning all-pro honors twice and posting 40 interceptions and 867 tackles. He retires as yet another Miami “legend of the game.”
CB Maurice Diehl was a nice surprise when he stepped in and started after three seasons as a fourth-round benchwarmer. Longtime reserve and role player, he leaves after 10 seasons with 40 picks in 53 starts.

MLB Ray Ireland is the first of my players to be inducted into the Hall of Fame. Ireland managed 1,174 tackles in his 13 seasons, 11 of which were with us. Never a major pass rush threat, Ireland was nonetheless an effective inside presence for us, and centered a very strong defense for many, many years.

We have $3 in usable cap space, and 41 players signed. A once-through the contracts, and we open up to $6.4 – not bad to start off. Our ordered target list for this offseason: RB Bruce Pietrzyk, WR Harris Hansen, DE Pat Wayne, P Jeremy Shaw, and RG Melvin Ahn. Pietrzyk is just an unlikely case – I can’t see paying top dollar (bidding starts at $8m a year) for him to keep doing what he’s doing -- rushing for 800 yards and catching passes underneath. He’s never show the explosiveness that he promised, and he certainly never really changed our team that much. S, he’s almost certainly a goner.

Harris Hansen is asking for $10 million a year. Two straight pro bowls have him in the catbird seat. My thinking is that we simply cannot afford that – we’ll wait him out, and hope he crashes to earth. Tito Taylor is looking for less than $1.4 per year – he’ll get an offer right away, coming off his third 1,000+ yard season. I’ll also work to lock up DE Pat Wayne, who we may need on the left side, as starting LDE Emmitt Summers is permanently slowed by his latest injury, and is no longer an impact player.

After two weeks, we have WR Taylor and DE Wayne tied up, and we see San Francisco put in a $7m/yr offer to RB Pietrzyk. I decide to assemble a deal for Pietrzyk, and he at least listens to my backloaded deal. I won’t be surprised if he goes to SF anyway – but we’ll have an offer on the table.

In week 8 Pietrzyk finally decides to take our deal, to my surprise. I offered him only $5 million in signing bonus, and he’ll only hit our cap for $3m this year and next – that seems like quite a deal to me. It does, however, chew up nearly all of the cap space that we had left.

With the new contract, I decide to make a pretty daring move. I switch Bruce Pietrzyk over to play wide receiver – he converts at 75% of his previous skills, and when I go ahead with the switch, I am pretty favorably impressed. He looks like he will be a pretty impressive receiver for us – he will have some learning to do to develop his current skills, but I think this could work out just fine, really. I expect that he will take over as our starting split end, assuming that we are unable to get Harris Hansen to re-sign for anything approaching a reasonable price. An interesting twist in this drama – something I have considered several times, but finally pulled the trigger. (As a very weird aside – in the switch, Pietrzyk went from having zero ratings in both punt and kick off returns to have very high ratings in both – and now he will take over those duties for us as well)

That wraps up the early FA process – we will try to fill some holes with the draft, and then come back and see what we can do with guys like WR Hansen and RG Ahn.

In the draft, we desperately need a middle linebacker – Cole Westbrook will miss this whole season with an extended injury (probably a career-ender for him, but we will keep him around just in case). That’s far and away our top priority – but I don’t see a true standout in this draft at all, so there’s not even a guy for us to mortgage the draft to go up and get there.

When we are up, three linebackers have been selected – and there’s nothing to like there for us at #32. SO, I move down into the middle of the second round, and pick up a middle round pick for doing so. We pick up DB Richie Manning in round two, but have to sit back at LB, since there’s nobody here who moves me at all.

Code:


Pick Pos Player                  Board    Dash    Sole    Strg    Agil    Vol   Draft   After   PostCamp
2.16  CB Richie Manning           4.5     4.44+    23      12     7.20     65   13/55   13/52    15/46
3.20  FB Jerry Wells              6.1     4.67+    29      29     7.45     50   36/68   36/68    
                                                                                to TE   22/64    26/65
4.16  DE Ellis Winters            3.2     5.13     15      28     7.60     59   22/37   22/37
                                                                                to MLB  10/41    11/38
5.32 SLB Bryan Lengfelder         3.6     4.68     33+     16     7.42     77   13/43   13/42
                                                                                to MLB  14/46    16/42
6.32  TE Zach Rose                3.2     5.07     25      37++   8.46     33   19/38   19/35    20/33
URFA  WR Pat Richardson           3.1     4.52     15       6     7.03     69   13/36   13/35    13/30
URFA   C Norman Crane             3.6     5.10     24      26     7.90     33   22/42   23/45    25/46
URFA   C Bobby McWilliams         3.7     5.09     26      30     7.96     80   24/43   25/45    
                                                                                To LG   20/39    23/41 
URFA SLB Bucky Benton             2.7     4.65     28      20     7.77     43   19/30   19/29    19/27
URFA  SS Gino Bloomgarden         2.8     4.55     38      16     7.22     45   20/32   19/30    21/28

I’m not sure we landed any breakout candidates – here, we were mostly drafting based on overall potential and good matches at the specific skills. My two best MLB prospects, who will probably compete for the starting job, are both converts from other positions. TE Zach Rose might be a breakout type – we’ll watch him closely.

After the draft, we lock up P Jeremy Shaw and RG Melvin Ahn to fairly cheap deals. We wait until the very end of the late free agency period, but I still can’t work out a deal with WR Harris Hansen. He’s still asking for $27 over five years – I can’t commit to that, by any means. In the very final stage, I finally get in an offer he will listen to – but he then rejects it, and the FA stages finishes with him remaining unsigned. It’s impossible – we will have to let him go, and hope that Pietrzyk can step into the starting split end role right away.

After training camp, it looks like this will be our weakest rookie crop ever. All but one of our new players dipped in camp, which isn’t a good sign. Richie Manning looks like a special teamer and deep reserve, and perhaps we’ll get something out of a guy like G Bobby McWilliams, our only bump-up in the lot. But the two rookie middle linebackers are both disappointing – I don’t know what we ought to do there – we’ll probably end up starting mediocre holdover Luke Swift, as I have already switched Jerome Maxwell back to SLB, where he is far better than he is at MLB.

The preseason looks pretty good for our backfield switchover – Pietrzyk seems to be learning the ropes quickly at WR, while new starting RB Bo Brewster (an undrafted free agent from the same rookie class as Pietrzyk) seems to be stepping well into the starting RB role. I expect a pretty good season from our receiving corps this year – Brewater is not the receiving threat out of the backfield that Pietrzyk was, so we should be going downfield a bit more. WR Archie Broenkow should be primed for a breakout season.

In our opener, Copeland throws for 5 TDs, all to wideouts – including 138 yards and TD for Broenkow. And in week two, we have a very unusual stat: RB Bo Brewster has a 100+ yard rushing day, totaling 123 yards and 3TDs, even without a huge breakaway run (in fact, nothing over 15 yards). Bruce Pietrzyk never had a single 100 yard day rushing the ball – this is unusual for us. Brewster is now by far our best rushing threat – so that helps explain that he’s getting the lion’s share of the work at RB now.

We get to 6-0 on the year – Mel Copeland’s knee bursitis is acting up again, but he will play through it as usual. We’re still unbeaten at the halfway point, and Archie Broenkow leads the league in receiving with 738 yards and 7 TD. Our defense is #1 against eth run and #1 against the pass – very impressive, especially considering the hobos we have playing at MLB.

After our next game, WR Bruce Pietrzyk is lost for the season with a wrist injury. His year was pretty good – 8 starts at WR, with 29 catches for 440 yards. We’ll shuffle the lineup to fill the spot (we’re a little thin at WR now) but it looks like he will be declared a success at wideout.

In the final week, we eke out a 24-21 win over New England, to complete the regular season sweep at 16-0 again. Copeland’s knee problems continue, but he managed to start every game all season. We will get our needed week off, and gear up for another playoff run.

Code:


Front Office Football 2004
2023 Summary for Miami Dolphins
   
Record: 16-0
Winning Pct.: 1.000
   
Miami Dolphins          Team      Rank  
Rushes                  401       29 (T)      
Rushing Yards           1646      22          
Yards Per Carry         4.10      11 (T)      
Pass Attempts           580       2           
Completions             376       1           
Passing Yards           4852      1           
Yards Per Attempt       8.36      2           
3rd Down Conversions    45.0      7           
Points Per Game         29.6      1           
Turnovers               20        10 (T)      
Turnover Margin         +20       1           
   
Opponents               Team      Rank  
Rushes                  379       1           
Rushing Yards           1252      1           
Yards Per Carry         3.30      1           
Pass Attempts           588       31          
Completions             300       11 (T)      
Passing Yards           3310      6           
Yards Per Attempt       5.62      1           
3rd Down Conversions    36.4      2           
Points Per Game         10.0      1           
Turnovers               40        1           
   
Week  Team  Versus        Oppnt  
1     35    NYJ           21      
2     31    at DAL        3       
3     23    TEN           17      
4     38    BUF           13      
5     10    at SDO        7       
6     34    DEN           7       
8     34    KCY           6       
9     31    at OAK        0       
10    31    at NED        14      
11    38    at NYJ        7       
12    33    PHI           10      
13    27    at BAL        7       
14    28    at NYG        7       
15    27    at BUF        13      
16    31    WAS           7       
17    24    NED           21      
   
Passing             Pos   Att   Comp  Yards Y/Att TD    Int  
14 Copeland         QB    564   365   4769  8.45  37    11      
**Team              ---   580   376   4852  8.36  37    12      
   
Rushing             Pos   Att   Yards Y/Att TD  
28 Brewster         RB    264   881   3.33  9       
27 Beyer            FB    47    334   7.10  1       
14 Copeland         QB    41    193   4.70  3       
32 Wright           RB    35    132   3.77  0       
**Team              ---   401   1646  4.10  14      
   
Receiving           Pos   Targ  Catch Yards Y/Ctc YAC   TD  
86 Broenkow         WR    137   90    1600  17.7  432   16      
82 Barker           WR    114   73    948   12.9  90    3       
27 Beyer            FB    74    53    341   6.4   123   3       
85 Taylor           WR    69    36    393   10.9  55    4       
29 Pietrzyk         WR    42    29    440   15.1  45    2       
45 Wells            TE    42    29    310   10.6  52    5       
87 Horner           WR    43    27    409   15.1  54    2       
28 Brewster         RB    39    23    247   10.7  157   2       
**Team              ---   580   376   4852  12.9  1050  37      
   
Defense             Pos   Tack  Asst  Sack  Hurr  Ints  Defn  
47 Harper           S     91    26    0.0   1     2     16      
49 Veen             OLB   66    23    3.5   7     1     6       
25 Sims             CB    55    19    1.0   0     14    20      
92 Jamison          OLB   54    21    0.0   1     1     3       
71 Halpin           DT    53    22    2.0   9     0     1       
41 Banks            CB    50    18    0.0   1     9     15      
59 Swift            ILB   47    16    5.5   2     0     2       
91 Wayne            DE    46    15    13.5  13    0     0       
79 Ljunghammar      DT    45    18    4.5   11    0     0       
93 Maxwell          OLB   41    15    4.5   1     0     3       
78 Curtis           DE    32    17    8.0   22    0     0       
42 Money            CB    27    9     0.0   0     3     6       
52 Lengfelder       ILB   23    7     0.0   0     0     2       
26 Torretta         CB    17    3     0.0   0     1     5       
48 Crute            S     17    8     0.0   0     1     1       
83 Giles            TE    16    0     0.0   0     0     0       
23 Bloomgarden      S     16    3     0.0   0     1     1       
**Team              ---   823   264   51.0  80    34    83

Another strong year for Mel Copeland – again nibbling toward 5,000 yards but not quite getting there. This ranks as the sixth-highest yardage total in league history (behind five other of his own years), all within 250 yards of 5,000. WR Archie Broenkow breaks the league record with his 16th TD catch – eclipsing the record held by a long-lost tight end of mine, Thomas Newnam (who had 42 TD in 14 seasons). RB Bo Brewster got nearly all the work, and was good, but not great – 3.33 yard per carry is a little lower than we’d prefer to see.

CB Mickey Sims had an unbelievable season – 14 interceptions, 4 for touchdowns, and 20 passes defensed. He ought to be a lock for the pro bowl, and probably defensive player of the year, I’d think. Stephen Banks joins him to make by far the best CB combo in the league – no contest at all. DE Pat Wayne had a nice year, leading our defensive front to another solid performance. #1 in yards allowed both per carry and per attempt – that’s unbelievable defensive domination, considering our very weak linebacking situation.

Unsung heroes: FB Rick Beyer had a few breakout runs and ended up with a solid 675 total yards on the year, his best season to date… C Deon Flint was again a stalwart on the line, with 30 KRBs and only 3 sacks allowed… LT Eddie Wickes stayed healthy and was dominant again at LT… we were among the lowest in sacks allowed – and this from a team that passes all the time, the OL did a great job this year… P Jeremy Shaw.s 42.8 yard average is among the league leaders, again.

Postseason

Miami 27, New England 24 – Another tough game from the Pats, we needed a FG with 12 seconds left to pull it out. Copeland’s 372 yards passing helped, too.

Miami 27, Pittsburgh 24 – Yikes! A TD interception return from Stephen Banks gives us enough cushion to withstand Pittsburgh’s late rally, and we hold on for the win. Pietrzyk, back healthy, had 90 yards receiving.

…and now, trying to secure our first ever “threepeat” ® here are Mel Copeland and your Miami Dolphins…

Miami 20, Detroit 13 – We wrap up a nail-biting postseason with another close win. Up 14-10 at the half, we endured a battle of defense in the second half, won the FG battle 2-1, and came away with the win for our tenth championship. Mel Copeland gets the game ball yet again, though my vote would have been for FB Rick Beyer (103 total yards).

So, we finally get over the hump, and win a third straight title. This was also our fifth perfect season, and the first time we’ve done it back-to-back ever. We now have a 42-game winning streak, dating back to week 13 of the 2021 season. And also, we have posted a tenth league championship for QB Mel Copeland and RB Pat Noccolino. That’s a lot of bling, folks.

Marvelous Mel Copeland racks up three awards this year – offensive player of the year goes to Pittsburgh’s RB Aaron Bradford, who broke the league rushing record with 1,925 yards and also had 481 yards receiving – a pretty darned good season, I’ll admit. WR Archie Broenkow made the first team, of course, while CB Mickey Sims gets first team honors as well (he was beaten out for DPOY by a LB with 145+38 tackles and 9.5 sacks).

What a year. What a run. Crossing fingers for the retirement list now…

Bee · 07-15-2004, 09:45 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by QuikSand

2023
And also, we have posted a tenth league championship for QB Mel Copeland and RB Pat Noccolino. That’s a lot of bling, folks.

And posters go up across Miami saying "Next: One for the toe"

JAG · 07-15-2004, 09:59 AM

Ho Hum, a 41-game winning streak (incl. postseason)

CraigSca · 07-15-2004, 02:11 PM

FWIW, in all my years of playing FOF, I have NEVER seen a string of success like this. In fact, I've never had an undefeated season (and sometimes wondered if ANYONE ever had).

Like the others, I'll throw in that I too am very interested to see if this continues after the retirement of Copeland. Keep up the good work!

QuikSand · 07-15-2004, 04:01 PM

For what it's worth... I'm into another offseason, and Copeland has stayed. So, we get him for his 17th season... but the clock has to be ticking.

nfg22 · 07-15-2004, 04:28 PM

MEL COPELAND....Dean who?

Chas in Cinti · 07-15-2004, 04:59 PM

Dean who? Jeez... I haven't even THOUGHT of Dean Houston in years... hahaha...

Quiksand, just read the whole thread back to back (been gone for a while)... thanks for the entertainment as always, and let's keep this thing going past the Copeland-era. I agree with the others that the best part of this thing is the fact that ALL the players are familiar to us ALL the time... because they rarely leave.

Nice touch... regardless of how hard things are, etc...

Regards,
Chas

Alf · 07-15-2004, 05:19 PM

yep, QS, make Mel Copeland totaly eclipse Dean Houston (you know, the child molestor).

Buzzbee · 07-15-2004, 05:35 PM

Yeah, I'd like to see just how incredible Mel's career stats are when he does retire. I'm guessing they will be near tops in FOF history.

One thought, probably more for the FOFC members than for QS himself, since I don't really peg QS as the nostalgic type, but I'd love to see Cuervo or sfl-cat create an end of career "card" for Mel. It be great to see him on the front of the card, poised and ready to deliver a bullet, with his career stats on the back of the card. Some sort of Topps premium line might do him justice. It would certainly become part of FOFC history. Perhaps even both Cuervo AND sfl_cat could design cards. One each from a different card company. Don't know who does football cards other than Topps.

Just a thought.

QuikSand · 07-15-2004, 07:40 PM

2024

And we check out the retirement list, once again. We have plenty of players at that age.

Relief! Mel Copeland will return for his 17th season! We can try to extend this run we’ve been on!

We do have some retirements:
RB Pat Noccolino was a 7th round breakout, started for us for 80 games, and posted 4,834 yards rushing in his career. He later settled in as a nice mentor and special teamer, getting a little reserve RB duty also.
RB Lamar Wright got 35 starts at RB, posting 3,234 rushing yards in his career. Solid all-around back, he was also a mentor and good contributor on the downside of his ten year career.
TE Roderick Giles had 4,953 yards receiving in his 13 year career, including a great year in 2014 when he caught 70 balls for 858 yards and earned first team all-pro honors. Always solid – our best TE.
WR Tito Taylor retires with 9,807 yards receiving and 75 TD, making him the career leader in both categories for our team. An undrafted rookie free agent, he broke out and developed into a very consistent performer for us for many years, posting three 1,000+ seasons along the way.

We have to bring in a new scout – Derek Wilburn will have a good eye for young talent, and has few weaknesses (maybe linebackers, unfortunately). He ought to be fine.

As we begin the FA period, we have 36 players signed, and a whopping $17.2 million in usable cap space. That undoubtedly means that we will have a number of critical players without contracts – that kind of cap room doesn’t come from nowhere. Our list of FA targets, again in order is here: RB Bo Brewster, LT Eddie Wickes, C Deon Flint, S Derek Harper, S Drew Griffith, SLB Jerome Maxwell, and RT Marshall Goodwin, and FB Rick Beyer. Brewster has been pretty good, but right now we don’t have a single player on the roster signed to play running back – so we’re suddenly in real trouble there. (Oh, Bruce…?)

RB Brewster is looking for a long-term deal, but not really a big fat one – that’s good, at least.

I start the FA process without any offers in – I’m going to react to the market this year, I think. I end up with a pretty expensive contract for S Derek Harper, but I don’t see any other way – he’s easily our best player there. I end up acceding to the exact demands of not only Harper, but also RB Bo Brewster and C Deon Flint as well – all positions where I don’t have much luxury of movement.

It takes until week 14, but we do lock up LB Maxwell, also. SO, we head to the draft without a deal for LT Eddie Wickes – we did this before, and ended up re-signing him fairly cheaply in the late FA stages. I’m hoping against hope that this works again – he’s been very good for two seasons now, and we don’t have a capable option on hand other than him, really, especially with starting RT Goodwin also still unsigned. This promises to be a very active late FA year for us – we have $11m in usable cap space targeted for the two tackles and probably FB Beyer as well.

In the draft – we’d like to pick up some help at LB. I have re-signed Col Westbrook to a new deal, and he looks like he’s fully back from injury – but there’s no way we can really expect him to stay out there all year. In fact, I’d be shocked if he doesn’t go down right away and possibly miss the season. So – the starting MLB job is basically vacant – guys like Luke Swift and Brad Lengfelder are band-aids. Safety would be another good target area – behind Derek Harper was have very little of note. We are thin at WR, and could use an infusion there, and we have only one RB signed to our roster. Those are our many priorities – and all that assumes we can re-sign both starting offensive tackles. If not, then we have a big hole there. More to do than one might expect on a team with a 42-game winning streak.

My top “realistic” target player, middle linebacker A.J. Newton, gets taken by NE at #22. It seemed like a reach pick for them, I thought he’d be there for us at #32. Damn.

Code:


Pick Pos Player                  Board    Dash    Sole    Strg    Agil    Vol   Draft   After   PostCamp
1.32  WR Dave Harney              4.9     4.45+    34+     23++   7.04+    99   29/56   29/54    31/52
2.32  FB Lincoln Connell          7.8     4.58++   32+     26+    7.22+    27   50/82   49/81    
                                                                                to RB   41/58    42/55
3.32  DT Brian Yates              4.1     5.29     20      28     7.35++   71   20/50   20/48    22/45
4.32  SS Ian Peralta              4.0     4.47+    37+     13     7.35     81   17/46   17/41    18/35
5.32 MLB Bart Colley              3.2     5.10     18      22     7.68     14   19/37   19/36    20/33
6.32  RB O.J. Burroughs           3.5     4.53     14      10     7.19     10   27/38   26/35    27/32
7.32  TE Neal Rasmussen           4.0     4.95     28      35++   7.51+    32   25/46   26/44    28/40
URFA  QB Cris Prior               2.9     4.49     30      10     7.44     89   04/33   04/34    07/39
URFA  RB Dan Crawford             2.9     4.71     21      15     7.40     11   24/31   24/31    25/32
URFA  FB Clyde Carillo            3.0     4.96     28      16     7.39     47   20/34   20/32    21/31
URFA  LT Marty Carter             3.0     5.19     10      32     7.72     55   12/34   12/37    15/40
URFA  LT Jon Manning              2.8     5.15     35      30     7.72     49   10/34   10/39    13/44
URFA MLB Moe Lyle                 2.4     4.94     24      18     7.77     38   07/26   07/25    08/25
URFA  CB Carlos Harper            3.0     4.47     32      14     7.20     54   14/34   14/37    17/43

So, I end up trying to grab a player I think can help us right away in WR Dave Harney – he’s the top-rated wideout left, he has some standout skills, and he could end up being a serious target (he has a super-high apparent potential in route running). He might have breakout potential to exceed his decent-looking ratings – so I figure he’s worth a whirl.

FB Lincoln Connell ought to be a complete monster there – the question is whether to switch him over to play RB. Our current starter Rick Beyer is too fat to play RB, but Connell is only 225, and would be a somewhat chunky back but could be effective. Tough call there.

The rest are mostly skill-driven picks, where we’ve had lousy results lately. We’ll see if we grab any diamonds in the rough here – but I don’t see anyone who stands out, really.

Among the URFA group, I find a few guys to bring aboard, including yet another fleet-footed QB in Cris Prior. I grab a couple fairly promising prospects at offensive tackle – and we might be able to survive if we cannot re-sign LT Eddie Wickes after all (though I still want him back, of course).

In the late free agency stages – we manage to get in pretty affordable offers to both starting tackles, and we lock up Marshall Goodwin right away. Eddie Wickes signs in week three – it’s a time bomb contract, but it won’t blow up for three seasons, so we ought to be okay there.

I have to go back to the URFA pile and scoop up a kicker, as Marcus Knox is looking to be paid something like Fort Knox. Too much – we’ll go with another rookie, pally.

So – we really don’t end up losing anyone this offseason through free agency. We even work out a deal with FB Rick Beyer, who will play for cheap for the next few years after all. And that signing cinches my decision – I have to send rookie Lincoln Connell into camp as a halfback – he’s almost certain to be our #2 option for this season, the way things look now. The switch looks pretty good – he won’t be the most elusive back, but he has nice potential most everywhere else. A 41/58 running back could help us a whole lot.

Training camp reveals – a lot of whimpers at the top of our draft list. Harney and Connell should be good, but I don’t see either one developing into a major star for us. As usual, the best news from camp comes from the unheralded free agents – guys like Clyde Harper and linemen Manning and Carter – those three ought to be worth something in a little time.

Also, we had a veteran breakout this year – S Derek Harper made a pretty big jump, and is now pretty much the complete package, including the coverage skills he once lacked. Makes me feel even batter about investing pretty big money into him this offseason – a good URFA player who has really panned out.

It’s a little tougher than usual to get to our final cut-down – we end up with a few marginally injured players placed onto IR, just to make roster space. But we get there, and head into yet another season, looking for an angle to the title once again.

Code:



Front Office Football 2004
Miami Dolphins Roster, Scout Overview
   
  Player                #   Pos   Start Exp  Current Estimate  Future Estimate Cntrct 
Copeland, Mel           14  QB    QB    17   80                80                1 yr.
Huffman, Greg           13  QB          6    43                49                1 yr.
Sampson, Ronald         1   QB          3    20                49                1 yr.
##Prior, Cris           15  QB          1    7                 39                2 yrs
Brewster, Bo            28  RB    RB    7    53                53                6 yrs
Connell, Lincoln        38  RB          1    42                55                3 yrs
Burroughs, O.J.         43  RB          1    27                32                3 yrs
**Crawford, Dan         33  RB          1    25                32                2 yrs
Beyer, Rick             27  FB    FB    6    52                52                5 yrs
Wells, Jerry            45  TE    TE    2    51                65                2 yrs
Rasmussen, Neil         89  TE          1    29                40                3 yrs
Broenkow, Archie        86  FL    FL    4    57                58                1 yr.
Barker, Brant           82  FL          9    39                39                1 yr.
Harney, Dave            85  FL          1    34                52                4 yrs
Horner, Chad            87  FL          8    32                32                3 yrs
Pietrzyk, Bruce         29  SE    SE    7    44                63                5 yrs
Flint, Deon             50  C     C     11   70                71                3 yrs
Crane, Norman           54  C           2    33                46                2 yrs
**Lofton, Ross          69  LG          11   28                29                1 yr.
McWilliams, Bobby       56  LG          2    28                43                2 yrs
Blackwell, Leroy        57  LG    RG    3    23                41                3 yrs
Ahn, Melvin             73  RG    LG    6    46                46                2 yrs
Wickes, Eddie           70  LT    LT    10   83                85                4 yrs
##Carter, Marty         64  LT          1    16                40                2 yrs
Manning, Jon            63  LT          1    13                44                2 yrs
Goodwin, Marshall       62  RT    RT    5    61                61                4 yrs
Shaw, Jeremy            17  P           13   82                85                3 yrs
Benson, Darnell         16  K           1    51                53                2 yrs
Curtis, Ken             78  LDE   LDE   12   60                60                1 yr.
Summers, Emmitt         96  LDE         8    34                34                4 yrs
Wayne, Pat              91  RDE   RDE   6    57                58                2 yrs
Fulton, Mike            75  RDE         4    11                20                2 yrs
Halpin, Sammy           71  LDT   LDT   8    57                57                1 yr.
##Vaughn, Kendrick      98  LDT         3    29                36                1 yr.
Ljunghammar, Roger      79  RDT   RDT   3    48                53                2 yrs
Cowley, Bo              72  RDT         3    27                36                2 yrs
##Yates, Brian          99  RDT         1    23                45                4 yrs
Westbrook, Cole         55  MLB   MLB   9    70                70                3 yrs
Swift, Luke             59  MLB         5    37                37                1 yr.
##Colley, Bart          90  MLB         1    21                33                3 yrs
##Lengfelder, Brad      52  MLB         2    19                40                2 yrs
Veen, Burt              49  SLB   SLB   13   51                51                1 yr.
Maxwell, Jerome         93  SLB         10   51                52                3 yrs
##Benton, Bucky         94  SLB         2    21                23                1 yr.
Jamison, Nicky          92  WLB   WLB   4    36                44                3 yrs
**Beethoven, Bobby      97  WLB         14   26                26                2 yrs
Banks, Stephen          41  LCB   LCB   3    82                92                3 yrs
Money, Arnie            42  LCB         3    42                62                1 yr.
Sims, Mickey            25  RCB   RCB   9    75                76                2 yrs
Torretta, Carl          26  RCB         4    27                38                2 yrs
Harper, Carlos          35  RCB         1    18                43                2 yrs
**Peralta, Ian          34  RCB         1    15                36                3 yrs
Griffith, Drew          31  SS          13   37                37                2 yrs
Bloomgarden, Gino       23  SS          2    25                25                1 yr.
Manning, Richie         36  SS          2    18                41                2 yrs
Harper, Derek           47  FS    SS    8    83                84                4 yrs
Crute, David            48  FS    FS    4    35                42                1 yr.

So, we head into another season. As has been the case for some time, we have outstanding cohesion – it’s the nature of the beast with this challenge, I keep lots of players a long time, and we build up quite an esprit de corps. We are rated 100 in every group, with the next-highest team in each in the 80s. Our roster rating is also 100, with Carolina next at 81. So – we look to be the favorites to win it all, once again.

After five weeks, five wins, and Mel Copeland has a broken hand. He’s probable, and will go anyway – as has usually been the case with his injuries (mostly knees). A wonderful surprise, though, has been MLB Cole Westbrook – who seems to be completely healthy and productive once again. After two offseasons trying to find a starting MLB, it looks like the guy is right here after all. Great!

At 8-0, we continue cruising along – but Copeland’s hand hasn’t gotten any better. The stats aren’t showing any really ill effects, though –his rating is over 93 (good, but not great for him, I suppose). For our week 11 game, Copeland is finally declared 100%, along with a few others who are nursing injuries.

So, of course, we lose. It’s been a long time coming – 52 games in a row, including playoffs. But we slip in Arizona and get beaten 20-9 by the 5-5 Cardinals. Not a real impact in meaningful terms, but it does end one heck of a streak. Oddly, we outgained the Cards by 416-237 yards, and only had one turnover – but we sputtered on third downs and couldn’t convert scoring chances into scores.

We bounce back and beat two good teams in Pitt and St. Louis, but drop one more down the stretch against Seattle. We finish up the season at 14-2, which is good enough to claim the top seed, as we would expect.

Code:



Front Office Football 2004
2024 Summary for Miami Dolphins
   
Record: 14-2
Winning Pct.: .875
   
Miami Dolphins          Team      Rank  
Rushes                  392       31          
Rushing Yards           1602      27          
Yards Per Carry         4.08      13 (T)      
Pass Attempts           640       1           
Completions             401       1           
Passing Yards           4626      1           
Yards Per Attempt       7.22      7           
3rd Down Conversions    43.6      15 (T)      
Points Per Game         26.2      1           
Turnovers               20        8 (T)       
Turnover Margin         +6        8 (T)       
   
Opponents               Team      Rank  
Rushes                  378       1           
Rushing Yards           1379      1           
Yards Per Carry         3.64      1           
Pass Attempts           546       29          
Completions             273       2           
Passing Yards           3455      15          
Yards Per Attempt       6.32      6           
3rd Down Conversions    34.0      1           
Points Per Game         12.0      1           
Turnovers               26        11 (T)      
   
Week  Team  Versus        Oppnt  
1     27    at BUF        20      
2     27    SFO           3       
3     24    at OAK        0       
4     30    at NED        3       
5     20    at JAX        13      
6     35    TEN           27      
7     34    BUF           31      
8     36    IND           10      
10    35    at HOU        7       
11    17    at NYJ        13      
12    9     at ARI        20      
13    31    PIT           7       
14    23    STL           7       
15    36    NED           10      
16    10    at SEA        13      
17    26    NYJ           9       
   
Passing             Pos   Att   Comp  Yards Y/Att TD    Int  
14 Copeland         QB    636   400   4621  7.26  26    15      
**Team              ---   640   401   4626  7.22  26    15      
   
Rushing             Pos   Att   Yards Y/Att TD  
28 Brewster         RB    154   629   4.08  5       
38 Connell          RB    128   437   3.41  1       
14 Copeland         QB    57    318   5.57  4       
27 Beyer            FB    43    197   4.58  2       
**Team              ---   392   1602  4.08  12      
   
Receiving           Pos   Targ  Catch Yards Y/Ctc YAC   TD  
27 Beyer            FB    120   90    681   7.5   225   9       
86 Broenkow         WR    122   68    1041  15.3  170   2       
29 Pietrzyk         WR    103   60    845   14.0  116   5       
82 Barker           WR    91    53    636   12.0  49    4       
85 Harney           WR    74    42    524   12.4  47    1       
45 Wells            TE    49    31    343   11.0  47    1       
28 Brewster         RB    34    26    213   8.1   108   4       
**Team              ---   640   401   4626  11.5  855   26      
   
Defense             Pos   Tack  Asst  Sack  Hurr  Ints  Defn  
55 Westbrook        ILB   100   29    8.0   5     1     14      
47 Harper           S     78    26    0.0   0     5     18      
49 Veen             OLB   56    20    10.0  6     0     9       
79 Ljunghammar      DT    51    18    8.0   8     0     1       
41 Banks            CB    51    21    0.0   0     4     12      
78 Curtis           DE    48    11    9.0   18    0     0       
93 Maxwell          OLB   47    8     2.0   0     1     6       
25 Sims             CB    47    26    0.0   0     1     23      
92 Jamison          OLB   45    12    0.0   0     1     1       
71 Halpin           DT    34    15    4.0   9     0     1       
31 Griffith         S     30    12    0.0   0     1     0       
91 Wayne            DE    28    8     7.0   11    0     0       
42 Money            CB    25    3     0.0   1     2     5       
23 Bloomgarden      S     19    2     1.0   0     0     5       
82 Barker           WR    17    0     0.0   0     0     0       
**Team              ---   777   228   55.0  67    16    104

Mel Copeland had a relative down year – he’s still good for close to 300 yards a game, but he worked underneath more than I would have liked, and our downfield production suffered. FB Rick Beyer had nice stats, but loyal readers know how much it irks me to see the FB getting the ball this much – 120 targeted passes? Ridiculous! The result is that not enough passes went to guys like Broenkow, who could have done things with them. The running game was pretty shaky – but Brewster was up over 4ypc at least.

Cole Westbrook was a welcome sight in the middle of the defense, and we were again very strong against the run, and good against the pass. We didn’t have the gaudy interception totals like last season (Mickey Sims – one pick?) but were still tough to pass against. Great season from DT Roger Ljunghammar – he’s the guy who emerged from our mad scramble to secure a starting DT, and he is doing well. S Derek Harper had a good season, and is locked in as perhaps our defensive leader overall.

Unsung heroes: Bruce Pietrzyk played in 14 games, but was solidly productive as our starting split end, and would have had a better year with more downfield action – he also was very productive with kick and punt returns… CB Arnie Money played well as our nickel back, with a PDPct of 20.9… our line was effective again, with our four regular starters (ignoring the rookie platoon at LG) posting fewer that 1% sacks allowed.

Postseason

Copeland is probable with a weak knee, but will certainly go in the opener…

Miami 31, Jacksonville 17 – Copeland airs it out for 4 TD, as we keep things right on pace.

Miami 21, Indianapolis 14 – Copeland is 27 of 34 for 355 yards to lead the effort again.

In eleven tries, we have only lost one Superbowl – to Green Bay. They are back, and we take on the Packers in the final game, looking to end our run of titles.

Miami 24, Green Bay 10 – No such luck, Packer fans. Marvelous Mel hits Archie Broenkow twice, and Mickey Sims returns a pick for a TD to seal up the win over the outgunned Packers. Copeland is the easy choice for MVP, taking home a staggering 11th piece of Superbowl hardware for his troubles.

In the season awards – Mel Copeland gets the first team QB honor, but loses to two different running backs for MVP and OPOY. FB Rick Beyer makes the first team, as does K Darnell Benson, shockingly (he had to punt twice – and hit them for 50 and 48 yards - that must be why). I’m not wild about either guy, really.

Another excellent season – we take home title number eleven, and four in a row. Copeland is the only player who has lasted through the entire series of titles, now that Pat Noccolino is gone.

Unbelievable – but I have to think that the time has come. Copeland is in his 17th year – and I don’t recall seeing many (any?) QBs make it past that season. I think it might be time to write up another career player card – this could be it…

cthomer5000 · 07-15-2004, 08:58 PM

I have seen the very rare QB go to year 18, but never beyond (to my knowledge). If he's under contract beyond this season that would be a big help (as this appears [to me] to be a pretty big factor in whether a player hangs it up or not).

QuikSand · 07-15-2004, 09:00 PM

He's been tagged year to year ever since his rookie contract ended, so no such luck.

cthomer5000 · 07-15-2004, 09:02 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by QuikSand

He's been tagged year to year ever since his rookie contract ended, so no such luck.

Since I've been reading, I obviously knew that. Completely slipped my mind. I'd put the odds at about 30-1 at him returning then.

edit - and just to be sure I fired up a solo career where there is an active 18 year veteran starter. I would say I've only seen about 10 guys play that long in 200+ years of (FOF2004) solo play.

cthomer5000 · 07-15-2004, 09:13 PM

dola.

I opened up the last year of my lengthiest solo career (year 2057) and took a look at the all-time leaders in games started. Here is a breakdown of the longest tenured QB's (I was limited to the qualifiers on the games started page obviously).

19 years - 3 QB's (1 guy even started every single game)
18 years - 4 (1 active in 2057)
17 years - 7

QuikSand · 07-16-2004, 06:29 AM

Maybe not quite as much a longshot as I had thought... Copeland still has ratings about 80% as good as his max... most of his main skills are still 70 or better. He certainly still seems to be in good form...

cthomer5000 · 07-16-2004, 08:05 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by QuikSand

Maybe not quite as much a longshot as I had thought... Copeland still has ratings about 80% as good as his max... most of his main skills are still 70 or better. He certainly still seems to be in good form...

I honestly didn't recall any of the 19 year guys, but seeing them makes me think you definitely have some hope of Copeland returning for year 18.

Still, my incredibly unscientific observations leads me to believe guys who do not have a contract are more likely to retire... so you seem to have that working against you.

QuikSand · 07-16-2004, 08:07 AM

I've just started the 2025 season... Copeland is back.

I even saved the game and re-ran the "end season" routine a few extra times, just to see if we had gotten lucky -- Copeland stuck around every single time.

So, one more year!

cthomer5000 · 07-16-2004, 08:12 AM

Great news. Can he make it a dozen?

MIJB#19 · 07-16-2004, 08:16 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by QuikSand

I've just started the 2025 season... Copeland is back.

I even saved the game and re-ran the "end season" routine a few extra times, just to see if we had gotten lucky -- Copeland stuck around every single time.

So, one more year!

Right.

Alf · 07-16-2004, 09:30 AM

Woot : Champaign in Miami !

Buzzbee · 07-16-2004, 10:31 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Alf

Woot : Champaign in Miami !

[Sidebar]
You live it France, famous for it's fermented grapes. Obviously there are differences between the French and English spellings of various words, but isn't champagne a french word? And shouldn't someone living in France spell it correctly?

[/sidebar]

Glad to see Mel dust off the oxygen tank for another year! I just hope he avoids serious injury. Would be terribly anti-climatic (and a tad tragic) for him to have a season/career ending injury after fighting through the nagging injuries to make it this far.

MIJB#19 · 07-16-2004, 10:41 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Buzzbee

[Sidebar]
You live it France, famous for it's fermented grapes. Obviously there are differences between the French and English spellings of various words, but isn't champagne a french word? And shouldn't someone living in France spell it correctly?

[/sidebar]

[Sidebar reply]
Not so fast. If the English talking people decide to butcher how it's pronounced, no wonder if a Frenchmen starts misspelling the translation from spoken to written language.

[/Sidebar reply]

nfg22 · 07-16-2004, 10:42 AM

Mel Copeland eats injuriesfor breakfast....heck he didnt miss a game with a broken hand....even if it isnt his passing hand....handoffs and taking the snap affect that hand...

Pyser · 07-16-2004, 11:57 AM

quik - i read all of your dynasties (long time, first time?), but have to say this has been my favorite. 11 superbowl mvps. ridiculous. what i find interesting is that there were certainly a few games where copeland didnt deserve the hardware, but got it anyway...which makes me wonder if "reputation" is somehow factored into all of the awards. regardless, excellent job. ill be reading till the end.

QuikSand · 07-16-2004, 04:11 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Pyser

quik - i read all of your dynasties (long time, first time?), but have to say this has been my favorite.

Favorite? Geez, I'd say that my writing here has been probably the least inspired of just about any dynasty thread of mine I can think of... but to each his own. The content is definitely different, and that might be what has kept it interesting. (Maybe my being more concise helps here, too?)

As for your "reputation" theory - I think it's really just a QB bias showing up. Lots of people complained about the MVP selection in older versions of the game (especially that defensive players scoring a TD got it too frequently) and I'd guess that when it was rewritten, the bias swung a bit too far toward the winning team's QB. Not a bad default, but it seems a bit too prevalent, to me.

QuikSand · 07-17-2004, 05:13 AM

2025

We start off the season, as always, with a look at the retirement list.

This year – we have only one retirement. But it’s not QB Mel Copeland – he’s back for an 18th season!

(After saving my game at the start of 2025, I decide to see if we got lucky, or if he was really just going to play anyway – I ran the “end season” routine three more times, and Copeland did not retire in any of them, so I tally this up to his real desire to keep playing, not just dumb metagame luck)

LB Bobby Beethoven played 15 seasons with us, starting out as an undrafted roster filler, and working his way up to the starting job on the strong side. When he was displaced by Burt Veen, he moved over to the weak side and started five more seasons there, racking up 514 tackles and 28.5 sacks in his career.

We retain our staff, of course – new contracts all around!

We have $8.6m in usable cap space this season, with 41 players signed. I make my usual pruning through the roster, but I only get us up to about $9.2 million – so there’s not that much cash out there.

Our FA targets are: WR Archie Broenkow, DE Ken Curtis, LB Burt Veen, DT Sammy Halpin, RG Melvin Ahn, WR Brant Barker, and LB Luke Swift – more or less in that order of importance. QB Greg Huffman is a special case – he’s the guy on board best prepared to take over for Mel Copeland, perhaps after this year, but I don’t think I can afford to pay a backup QB too much right now – so we might be in a tough spot with him.

I am once again going to just react – I don’t have the liberty to overpay anyone this year, I don’t think. WR Broenkow gets an $8m/yr offer, and I cannot match that by any means. My sense is that re-signing DE Ken Curtis is probably the single most important thing we can do here, as we have nothing behind him at DE, really. So, I put in my offer for Curtis, and get him locked up – but that eats up over $4m in cap space right there.

DT Sammy Halpin signs with Chicago, so he is gone – but the offer to Broenkow disappears, as the Giants have used up their cap space elsewhere, apparently. But New England comes in with a big bid for Broenkow, and we again are bracing to lose him. In week six, he signs with New England – so there are two pretty good players gone this year. In the late stages, we also see S David Crute and LB Luke Swift depart – guys I would have re-signed later if there was money around to do it.

The balance of the early FA stages are uneventful – we still have money set aside to re-up with LB Burt Veen, WR Brant Barker, and RG Melvin Ahn. And we might even be able to work things out with QB Greg Huffman, is he goes unclaimed.

So, looking at the draft – where do we have immediate needs? Well, DT just became one, with the loss of Halpin, who had been our best run stopper inside. WR is another need, with the loss of Broenkow. And we probably need to replenish at LB, too – we are pretty thin there, too. We could go with a standout cornerback, also, as we may lose both our star starters in the next two years to monster contract demands. Sevral options – close to BPA for us, I think.

I see two linebackers in the draft who suit my needs pretty well, and are pretty equally rated. When one goes at #21 overall, I decide to pull the trigger and move up to get the other guy, getting Detroit’s top two picks for our top two and a couple later selections.

Code:


Pick Pos Player                  Board    Dash    Sole    Strg    Agil    Vol   Draft   After   PostCamp
1.22 SLB Rufus Giles              5.7     4.52+    36+     18     7.03++   73   18/69   18/67   
                                                                                to MLB  17/70    21/67
2.16  DE Anthony Carlson          4.2     4.97     27      30+    7.28+    93   22/50   22/49
                                                                                to DT   22/54    24/51
4.32  CB Irv Givens               3.4     4.60     29      22++   7.46     54   14/39   14/33    15/29
6.32  DT Charlie Elliott          2.7     5.07     20      32+    8.50     68   23/29   23/29    23/30
URFA  FB Skillethead Giese        3.3     4.78     28      16     7.29     63   16/39   16/39    18/40
URFA  WR Norm Perkins             2.8     4.72     15      14     7.32     84   11/32   13/34    15/35
URFA  WR Stephen Boynton          3.0     4.59     18      12     7.50     85   09/34   09/31    10/28
URFA  DE Daryl Gonzalez           2.0     5.15     23      27     7.59     35   12/19   12/20    13/20
URFA  DT Freddie Byette           2.8     5.19     25      24     7.57     26   12/32   12/33    14/33
URFA  DT Eugene McCormick         3.1     5.16     15      24     8.15     91   10/35   09/30    10/24
URFA  DT Dean Fennell             3.0     5.07     25      26     7.65     87   16/35   16/36    18/35
URFA  LB Frankie Hughes           3.4     4.83     24      22     7.32     46   19/40   19/40    21/41
URFA MLB Deon Segura              2.5     4.81     14      18     7.60     28   07/27   08/27    09/22

DE Carlson is a run-stopper whom we quickly slide over to play DT, where he has some promise to step in for Sammy Halpin and play right away. I pick up a number of DL reaches, hoping to strike gold with one – the best candidate might be URFA Dean Fennell.

In the late FA stages, we lock up everyone – LB Burt Veen gets an offer from Indy, so we have to pay him more than I had hoped, but everyone else is easy, including QB Huffman, who takes a decent three year deal, and all but ensures himself the starting job in a season.

Training camp reveals – a little disappointment. I don’t see any real breakout candidates – all our draft picks are going to drop a bit, except DT Charlie Elliott, perhaps. WR Norm Perkins might be a keeper – he can help on special teams, at least.

LB Frankie Hughes is going to move up and play at DE for us – he’s 277 pounds, and makes the switch pretty seamlessly. He might actually have some potential, and we are thirsty for cheap help at DE, of course. I also switch CB Carlos Harper, who isn’t a great coverman but does have potential to strong safety, where we are thin and need a body.

We are already pretty dinged up as we prep for our opener, but once again have a veteran, cohesive ballclub. Our LB corps will be Westbrook, Veen, and Maxwell (stepping in at the sam, while Veen moves to the willie) – but all three guys are hurt, so we will have backup chumps in for a while.

This season, I’m planning to start young Skillethead Giese at FB – he’s much more to my liking than Rick Beyer, as he won’t mess up the downfield passing game as much. I expect to see ol’ Skillethead (nice nick, too) develop nicely, and stay out of the way of the better players. Good boy.

In our opener, we post a good win over NE wit 4 TD passes from Copeland, but lose DE Pat Wayne for three months. At four weeks and 4-0, we are really banged up on defense, with five starters out – but we keep on moving ahead, and pound unbeaten Buffalo 35-0. But in the Buffalo game, we lose Copeland – only for a few weeks, but it’s his first missed time in several seasons – with an elbow injury.

In Huffman’s fist start at QB, we win on the road to Cleveland, behind 127 yards rushing from Bo Brewster. But then Huffman gets hurt the next week – and even our defense can’t win with super-green Ronald Sampson in there. After a bye week, we are home to New England, a game we’d really like to win. I decide against activating the improving Copeland until he’s totally ready to go. We are run over by the Pats 23-10, and slip to 6-2 on the season.

Copeland is back, but we’re now without WR Bruce Pietrzyk – who has blown out a knee, and is gone for at least this season. What a career of wasted opportunities. We manage, though, to marhc through the rest of the season in good form, and reach the postseason with a solid 14-2 mark behind more great play from our defense, and of course from Mel Copeland.

Code:



Front Office Football 2004
2025 Summary for Miami Dolphins
   
Record: 14-2
Winning Pct.: .875
   
Miami Dolphins          Team      Rank  
Rushes                  377       30          
Rushing Yards           1612      27          
Yards Per Carry         4.27      10          
Pass Attempts           614       1           
Completions             384       1           
Passing Yards           4262      2           
Yards Per Attempt       6.94      17          
3rd Down Conversions    41.6      16 (T)      
Points Per Game         25.1      3           
Turnovers               24        19 (T)      
Turnover Margin         +4        9 (T)       
   
Opponents               Team      Rank  
Rushes                  433       10          
Rushing Yards           1558      2           
Yards Per Carry         3.59      2           
Pass Attempts           544       26          
Completions             296       7           
Passing Yards           3148      2           
Yards Per Attempt       5.78      1           
3rd Down Conversions    36.9      2           
Points Per Game         13.6      1           
Turnovers               28        3 (T)       
   
Week  Team  Versus        Oppnt  
1     35    at NED        16      
2     24    at TBY        10      
3     20    IND           18      
4     21    at CIN        11      
5     35    BUF           0       
6     21    at CLE        14      
7     7     PIT           21      
9     10    NED           23      
10    16    BAL           10      
11    34    at NYJ        3       
12    26    CAR           13      
13    24    at KCY        6       
14    30    ATL           14      
15    30    NYJ           6       
16    38    at NOS        27      
17    31    at BUF        27      
   
Passing             Pos   Att   Comp  Yards Y/Att TD    Int  
14 Copeland         QB    481   320   3651  7.59  34    7       
13 Huffman          QB    124   60    567   4.57  2     8       
**Team              ---   614   384   4262  6.94  37    17      
   
Rushing             Pos   Att   Yards Y/Att TD  
28 Brewster         RB    199   902   4.53  6       
38 Connell          RB    112   392   3.50  1       
14 Copeland         QB    34    166   4.88  0       
**Team              ---   377   1612  4.27  8       
   
Receiving           Pos   Targ  Catch Yards Y/Ctc YAC   TD  
85 Harney           WR    136   88    1112  12.6  132   8       
82 Barker           WR    137   78    885   11.3  124   7       
45 Wells            TE    94    61    569   9.3   124   6       
87 Horner           WR    95    59    764   12.9  89    7       
83 Perkins          WR    53    32    373   11.6  41    2       
29 Pietrzyk         WR    34    22    266   12.0  31    3       
**Team              ---   614   384   4262  11.0  661   37      
   
Defense             Pos   Tack  Asst  Sack  Hurr  Ints  Defn  
41 Banks            CB    80    15    1.0   0     5     23      
49 Veen             OLB   75    24    2.0   1     0     2       
47 Harper           S     71    32    0.0   0     3     13      
25 Sims             CB    59    9     0.0   2     2     21      
93 Maxwell          OLB   58    22    2.0   7     0     5       
79 Ljunghammar      DT    54    25    5.5   10    0     0       
53 Giles            ILB   52    12    2.5   3     0     1       
35 Harper           S     37    10    0.0   0     3     3       
94 Benton           OLB   36    9     0.0   1     0     3       
55 Westbrook        ILB   34    13    2.0   1     0     3       
92 Jamison          OLB   29    4     1.0   0     0     2       
78 Curtis           DE    24    13    4.5   8     0     0       
96 Summers          DE    22    13    4.5   11    0     0       
72 Cowley           DT    22    13    2.5   4     0     0       
36 Manning          S     22    5     0.0   0     1     1       
40 Givens           CB    18    3     1.0   0     0     3       
42 Money            CB    17    3     0.0   0     1     3       
**Team              ---   839   265   40.0  60    17    88

On offense, we struggled without Copeland, but ended up okay for the season after all. Copeland had a pretty good year – his stats are for only 13 games, and include one where he played less than half—so the 34 TDs is pretty strong, really. Huffman was awful.

Bo Brewster was on pace most of the year to top 1,000 yards rushing – which we haven not see inn quite some time. But he fell short as we shifted back to more passing down the stretch. WR Dave Harney, now apparently our best receiving target, topped the mark, though. Pretty good year of spreading it around, again.

The defense was once again really tough - #2 against the run, #1 against the pass. CB Stephen Banks had a superstar season, leading the team in tackles as well as being our ace coverage man (his ratings are all 99 or better, save in returns and an 88 in endurance – he’s a monster). We failed to get the top-tier pressure on the QBs that we are used to (losing Pat Wayne hurt, but he’ll return for the playoffs). Our shuffled group of linebackers got the job done pretty well, including Jerome Maxwell in his first year as a starter – a late bloomer, since he’s an 11th year player at this point. DT Ljunghammar had another good year in the middle, but we need someone to step up to play next to him at DT.

We’re ready for another run at the big one…

Postseason

Miami 19, Tennessee 3 – The defense came up huge here, holding them to 214 total yards and grabbing four turnovers along the way. The offense was a little flaccid, but we’ll take the win. Mel is hobbling on that knee again – but wild horses couldn’t keep him from playing on.

Miami 34, Baltimore 7 – Another dominating defensive effort, wow. 260 yards and 3 turnovers give us all the room we need. Copeland is sharp again, throwing for 280 and 3 TD – and we’re in the big one again.

Arizona was the team who ended our big win streak last season – now they are our rivals in the Superbowl.

Arizona 31, Miami 17 – Copeland is 17 of 24 in the big game, and we are right in the game trailing 14-10 in the third quarter, when it all falls apart. Copeland is flattened and out with another injury to the same elbow that he hurt earlier in the season. With Huffman at the helm, we aren’t the team at all, and Arizona pulls away to get the comfortable win.

A disappointing end to the season, and perhaps to the dynasty. But we did win four in a row, and 11 in 16 seasons. An 11 of 13 mark in the big game isn’t too bad, either – but of course we wanted this one, too.

Mel Copeland is going to have to get used to something new. He’s on the second team of the all-pro squad after his 12+ game campaign. CB Stephen Banks makes the first team all-pro squad, after a fabulous season.

That’s the end of our title run of four in a row – we’ll see where things go from here…

Barkeep49 · 07-17-2004, 12:51 PM

I think Mel does put any other FOF player, including Darkiller's QB (whose name i am forgetting) and the immortal, not to mention immoral, Dean Hutson, to shame.

I just can't see him sticking around for another season though.

cthomer5000 · 07-17-2004, 12:55 PM

I hope he comes back for one more revenge season.

QuikSand · 07-17-2004, 07:24 PM

MEL COPELAND PLAYER CARD

Hometown: Springville, Utah
College: Clemson
Drafted: 2008 Round 1, #18 overall by Miami

Statistics
18 seasons, 274 games played (all starts)
6,340 / 9,865 = 64.2% completions
75,824 passing yards = 7.68 ypa
578 touchdowns, 169 interceptions
1,074 carries for 6,505 yards = 6.0 ypc
Career passer rating = 100.0
Record as starting QB = 282-41-0

Awards
2025 Retired as Legend of the Game
2025 All-league Second Team QB
2024 Superbowl MVP
2024 All-league First Team QB
2023 Solecismic MVP
2023 Superbowl MVP
2023 All-league First Team QB
2022 Solecismic MVP
2022 Superbowl MVP
2022 Offensive Player of the Year
2022 All-league First Team QB
2021 Solecismic MVP
2021 Superbowl MVP
2021 Offensive Player of the Year
2021 All-league First Team QB
2020 All-league First Team QB
2019 Solecismic MVP
2019 Superbowl MVP
2019 Offensive Player of the Year
2019 All-league First Team QB
2018 Superbowl MVP
2017 All-league First Team QB
2016 Solecismic MVP
2016 Superbowl MVP
2016 Offensive Player of the Year
2016 All-league First Team QB
2015 Solecismic MVP
2015 Superbowl MVP
2015 Offensive Player of the Year
2015 All-league First Team QB
2014 Solecismic MVP
2014 Offensive Player of the Year
2014 All-league First Team QB
2013 Solecismic MVP
2013 Superbowl MVP
2013 All-league First Team QB
2012 Solecismic MVP
2012 Superbowl MVP
2012 Offensive Player of the Year
2012 All-league First Team QB
2011 Solecismic MVP
2011 Offensive Player of the Year
2011 All-league First Team QB
2010 Solecismic MVP
2010 Superbowl MVP
2010 Offensive Player of the Year
2010 All-league First Team QB

QuikSand · 07-17-2004, 07:26 PM

After saving my game, I again ran the "end season" routine a few extra times, just to see if there was any chance that he would have stayed. Turns out he stayed in 3 out of 10 times I ran it.. just not the "official" one. Oh, well.

Only thing missing from the career player card above is the inevitable HOF induction. Has there ever been a more secure lock for the HOF?

nfg22 · 07-17-2004, 07:35 PM

I dont think he will make it

cthomer5000 · 07-17-2004, 10:29 PM

Please run this career at least until he is inducted. If he doesn't get 100% of the votes, there is something wrong with that aspect of the game.

Vince · 07-17-2004, 10:48 PM

Amazing...truly amazing. 100.0 Career rating...fitting

MIJB#19 · 07-18-2004, 04:01 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by cthomer5000

Please run this career at least until he is inducted. If he doesn't get 100% of the votes, there is something wrong with that aspect of the game.

Actually, from here I can't see what the popularity rating is for Mel Copeland, but if he's (for example) even after these outstanding stats and number of awards just average in popularity (though because of the total of award I suspect he's in the Idolized category), I'd say the game engine would make a mistake with a 100% induction.

QuikSand · 07-18-2004, 08:44 AM

2026

We have one retirement. Mel Copeland.

For a long time, I would recoil at the degree to which the QB position is overvalued in this game. I know it’s pretty indisputably #1, but I’ve always felt that the QB simply meant too much in FOF. I love to invest in other places, and to get by with quarterbacks who are values, or late round finds, or that sort of thing. Just seems more colorful.

But I have to say – Mel Copeland is easily the best player I have ever had in any FOF career. The numbers speak for themselves, it’s been a staggering run. And it’s also very clear that quite a lot of the credit for this team’s dominance goes to Copeland – we have immediately struggled when using even our pretty solid backup quarterbacks over the years. His career records are all in another stratosphere beyond anything I’ve ever seen from a player in any career I’ve ever had – really leaps and bounds. So godspeed, Mr. Copeland.

It would be so cool to have him come back as a coordinator or coach…

My defensive coordinator is hired away by Philly to be their head coach – I offered the max my owner would allow, but they gave him the top job, which I could not do. We hire Baltimore’s guy – a 17 year veteran, who should be very good as well.

We start the free agency period with only $3.3 million in space – and that’s without using the franchise tag on anyone. Renegotiations gets us to about $5.5 million – but nowhere near enough to manage the free agenct class we have to deal with this offseason. Even setting aside the monumental loss of QB Mel Copeland, we have a lot of other key players on the bubble here as well. CB Mickey Sims, DE Pat Wayne, and DT Roger Ljunghammar have all become important parts of our defense – losing two of those guys would really hurt.

I decide that the guy we have to return is Ljunghammar – and that we can get by without Mickey Sims, and we simply won’t be able to afford Pat Wayne. I’ll wait all three guys out and hope their offers come to earth, but for now – my target is to match Ljunghammar if he gets pursued, but to let the others go. At CB, we have Arnie Money pretty ready to step in and start, so I feel okay there even if we lose Mickey Sims (a player I really like).

Right away, DE Pat Wayne gets signed by Denver, and CB Mickey Sims is being pursued by Green Bay. In week two, DT Ljunghammar gets an offer from Cinti, and I go ahead and make my pitch to keep him as cheaply as I can. We get Ljunghammar re-signed to a pretty bonus-leaden contract, probably locking him to us for the next four years no matter what. And, CB Sims sees his Green bay offer sheet disappear – so we might have some shot there also.

The early FA stages end – and Mickey Sims is getting more reasonable. What I’d really like is to see him accept a deal that would still allow us some hope of re-signing our other starting CB Stephen Banks, after his deal runs out following this season.

In the draft – we probably need to help out the offense, really. Greg Huffman holds the starting QB job now, but based on his on-field results to date, that might be a tenuous hold. LT, WR, RB, and TE are all potential target areas, too. On defense – maybe an outside linebacker or a safety, and we can always use another decent defensive lineman, of course.

I like a fair number of players who are available at our top pick, but decide to draft into a relative need area, and take the safety I liked best in this whole draft. When all but one of the defensive linemen I looked at in late round one is gone, I move up to the middle of round two to grab the quick-footed run stopper who I project to step right in and start for us at DE.

Code:


Pick Pos Player                  Board    Dash    Sole    Strg    Agil    Vol   Draft   After   PostCamp
1.31  SS Peter Brown              5.0     4.47+    29      25++   7.03+    45   27/60   27/61    30/61
2.12  DE Gilbert Dotson           4.2     4.63++   24      29+    7.32+     9   27/49   27/46    29/46
3.31  CB Wayne Ridings            4.3     4.42+    25      18++   7.00+    77   22/51   23/55
                                                                                to FS   24/64    29/71
4.31  DE Darren Bernard           3.6     4.86     19      31+    7.47      1   26/41   26/41    27/41
6.31  WR Norbert Bowling          2.8     4.58     30+     23++   7.30     95   14/33   16/37    18/40
URFA  QB Britt Meier              4.2     4.68     39      10     7.60     23   05/50   05/42    07/34
URFA  RB Louis Dillon             3.0     4.70     24      30     7.35     74   23/34   23/34    25/35
URFA  RB Winston Finch            3.1     4.80     17      12     7.25     23   21/36   21/33    21/30
URFA  RB Charles Comer            3.2     4.74     23      17     7.27     40   20/36   19/32    
                                                                                To WR   13/33    14/27
URFA  RG Louis Flowers            2.5     5.46     45      42     8.27     79   16/27   16/25    16/23
URFA  RT C.J. Newman              2.9     5.56     28      43     7.72     64   16/33   16/29    17/28
URFA  DE Mario Nesbit             3.3     4.85     36      27     7.88     33   21/44   21/37    23/37
URFA  LB Tom Stimson              2.9     5.10     23      21     7.66     25   11/33   11/31    
                                                                                To SS   06/37    07/33
URFA  LB Rico Poole               2.7     4.71     29      32     7.57     50   18/30   18/30    19/31

Well, despite my initial claims that the offense needed the help – we ended up piling on the defense with the early picks. Regardless, I like this crop a lot – several players I considered with my pick in the fourth round were there after the draft, so we have a number of intriguing guys – including bench press standouts LB Rico Poole, RB Louis Dillon, G Louis Flowers, and T CJ Newman. This was largely a draft dominated by pursuit of strength, as we are trying to get a shade tougher.

Three weeks into late free agency, we are amidst signing rookies, but nothing is happening with CB Mickey Sims yet. He’s thinking $5m per year – I’m not. So, I make some more room – in part by releasing veteran DE Emmitt Summers, who started last season but really isn’t starting caliber any longer. We’ll be depending on young players at DE, but that helps us get CB Mickey Sims re-signed for a new deal.

Training camp tells us a bit more of the story. We see a huge breakout from third round DB Wayne Ridings, who probably shows more potential than our top pick at safety, Peter Brown. So, the safety position quickly moves from a serious weakness to a potential strong suit.

During the preseason, we get WR Bruce Pietrzyk back healthy – we could really use him back to 100% cfor this season, with our depleted receiving corps. I’m not expecting much, but if he really could play, that would be very nice.

So, we take the field for our first season of the post-Copeland era, with QB Greg Huffman at the helm. His career record is an uninspiring 1-2, and his career passer rating is an equally uninspiring 42.3 – we’ll hope to improve on those numbers, pronto. One other change – after a great preseason, RB Lincoln Connell has been tabbed as the starting RB over Bo Brewster, so we’ll see two new faces in key backfield positions.

We get two narrow wins in our first three games – but this is definitely not the same team at all. We make it to 6-2 at our halfway point, though, and are looking okay – Huffman is rightside-up with TDs and picks, and WR Dave Harney is off to a pretty good season thus far. A losing skid in the second half drops us to 7-5, though, and we relinquish the lead in the division standings. However, we get a win at home over Buffalo to get back on top in that fight. We finish up 10-6, enough for a postseason berth, but certainly not the caliber of team that we have grown accustomed to, by any means. (We haven’t lost 6 games in a season since 2009) But oddly enough, 10-6 turns out to be good enough for a bye week as the #2 seed in the AFC behind Pittsburgh.

Code:


Front Office Football 2004
2026 Summary for Miami Dolphins
   
Record: 10-6
Winning Pct.: .625
   
Miami Dolphins          Team      Rank  
Rushes                  377       29          
Rushing Yards           1672      25          
Yards Per Carry         4.43      6           
Pass Attempts           657       1           
Completions             388       1           
Passing Yards           4119      1           
Yards Per Attempt       6.26      28          
3rd Down Conversions    40.2      24 (T)      
Points Per Game         22.6      6 (T)       
Turnovers               28        25 (T)      
Turnover Margin         -3        21          
   
Opponents               Team      Rank  
Rushes                  417       3           
Rushing Yards           1403      1           
Yards Per Carry         3.36      1           
Pass Attempts           541       27          
Completions             255       1           
Passing Yards           3285      4           
Yards Per Attempt       6.07      1           
3rd Down Conversions    31.9      1           
Points Per Game         14.5      2           
Turnovers               25        14 (T)      
   
Week  Team  Versus        Oppnt  
1     10    at NYJ        9       
2     6     CHI           19      
3     24    at IND        19      
4     15    at BUF        21      
5     20    SDO           6       
6     31    DEN           0       
8     34    at KCY        13      
9     17    at OAK        16      
10    31    NED           3       
11    6     NYJ           20      
12    12    at MIN        17      
13    34    BAL           35      
14    33    DET           9       
15    24    BUF           6       
16    22    at GBY        26      
17    43    at NED        14      
   
Passing             Pos   Att   Comp  Yards Y/Att TD    Int  
13 Huffman          QB    653   386   4107  6.28  26    21      
**Team              ---   657   388   4119  6.26  26    21      
   
Rushing             Pos   Att   Yards Y/Att TD  
38 Connell          RB    152   643   4.23  5       
28 Brewster         RB    119   494   4.15  4       
13 Huffman          QB    49    250   5.10  2       
**Team              ---   377   1672  4.43  13      
   
Receiving           Pos   Targ  Catch Yards Y/Ctc YAC   TD  
85 Harney           WR    156   91    1056  11.6  132   7       
82 Barker           WR    110   68    779   11.4  94    1       
45 Wells            TE    94    57    533   9.3   107   6       
29 Pietrzyk         WR    104   53    732   13.8  105   5       
27 Beyer            FB    74    51    371   7.2   111   3       
87 Horner           WR    64    34    310   9.1   38    3       
**Team              ---   656   388   4119  10.6  699   26      
   
Defense             Pos   Tack  Asst  Sack  Hurr  Ints  Defn  
55 Westbrook        ILB   91    28    5.5   5     0     7       
93 Maxwell          OLB   77    17    5.0   11    1     8       
25 Sims             CB    69    17    1.0   0     4     29      
41 Banks            CB    60    26    0.0   0     8     33      
22 Ridings          S     59    25    2.0   2     0     14      
79 Ljunghammar      DT    55    17    8.0   7     0     0       
49 Veen             OLB   45    17    1.0   1     0     6       
47 Harper           S     44    14    0.0   0     0     11      
99 Yates            DT    39    21    4.5   4     0     0       
42 Money            CB    32    7     0.0   0     3     4       
21 Brown            S     28    13    0.0   0     1     4       
91 Dotson           DE    27    8     7.5   13    0     0       
76 Nesbit           DE    26    15    6.5   9     0     0       
78 Curtis           DE    18    6     2.5   7     0     0       
35 Harper           S     18    3     2.0   0     0     1       
92 Jamison          OLB   17    7     0.0   2     0     0       
82 Barker           WR    16    0     0.0   0     0     0       
**Team              ---   807   251   48.0  68    17    119

So, Greg Huffman – okay, we can make do with a so-so quarterback, I guess. 4,000 yards passing with a bunch of mistakes is okay. We didn’t really have anyone around him step up and be counted – we don’t have a single standout player at the skill positions, at all. So, we’ll be okay with a pass-heavy offense.

Our defense, though, continues to turn heads -- #1 in yards allowed per rush and per attempt. Great season. Our top cornerbacks, Banks and Sims, paired up for 62 passes defensed – that has to be the highest figure I have ever seen, period: 33 is a league all-time record, and 29 is the fourth-highest figure in league history. Now that’s a pair of shut-downs, which makes for a tough time passing against us, period. We shared the load in the pass rush, but still were pretty solid there, and we got a nice season out of Cole Westbrook again in the middle. Great season by our defense – maybe the best we have had.

Unsung heroes: WR Bruce Pietrzyk continues to excel in the return game, posting a league-high average in punt returns… DE Gilbert Dotson played well his first season, getting pressure from the right side with only part time chances to play… DE Mario Nesbit shared the platoon with Sotson, and provided help against the run as well as the pass… S Wayne Ridings stepped in and played well his first year, and our two rookies have the reins as veteran leaders Derek Harper and Drew Griffith are both on IR.

Postseason

Miami 24, Houston 13 – Legendary RB Amos Sherman isn’t enough for Houston to topple us, despite his 67 yards. We play a nearly error-free game, and come away with the upper hand.

Miami 6, Pittsburgh 0 – We need absolutely everything our defense can give us, and we get it here. We manage only 151 yards on offense, but hold Pitt to 186… we are 2 for 2 on field goals, they are 0 for 1. Wow.

Miami 27, Carolina 6 – Inexplicably, we get to take home the title once again. Greg Huffman is 28 of 40 for 265 and 2 TDs to get the MVP honors, and we manage to get through the playoffs without a single turnover.

CBs Stephen Banks and Mickey Sims both make the all-pro team, Banks as a first teamer. QB Huffman gets the Superbowl MVP, and that’s our only representation on the awards board.

Surprising finish to a predictable season. We certainly don’t have the offense to dominate, but when our defense plays this well and we don’t make mistakes on the other side, we’re a tough out.

duckman · 07-18-2004, 01:08 PM

Makes you wonder if it is the system as well as the quarterback.

QuikSand · 07-18-2004, 04:11 PM

I know it's the system in part -- I've worked on the gameplan for some time, and probably more importantly, I have always been looking to acquire players who match up well with the specific needs of this gameplan. So, it stands to reason that there is a certain element of "system" behind the success.

Plus, we have cohesion through-the-roof for this team, which is bound to have a positive effect, too, though the degree is obviously uncertain.

Warhammer · 07-19-2004, 10:56 AM

Cohesion is one of those items that people tend to overlook. I have had a few teams on which I had great talent, but poor cohesion, and every close game I lost. I had teams with great cohesion and poor talent, but if I stayed close, I normally won.

Kevin · 07-19-2004, 12:59 PM

Those stats are just amazing. I hope the Hall of Fame doesn't find out Mel was betting on his own games to supplement his income because his oppressive GM kept putting the Franchise tag on him.

rjolley · 07-19-2004, 01:13 PM

Great dynasty, QS. Enjoyed reading the career of Mel Copeland.

Hope you keep it going for awhile to see if the team can keep producing titles.

QuikSand · 07-19-2004, 09:34 PM

2027

Okay, we’re getting the hang of this post-Mel thing.

One quick update – I have neglected to mention a couple of HOF inductees from our team. DE Tommie Browder and DT Courtney Malan came aboard together, and were titanic playing together on our line. They both get into the HOF – that was a great draft day, as we parlayed the #1 overall pick into picks #4 and #5 to pick up two DL studs, who both paid off in spades.

We start off the new season, and look over the retirement list: we have two names on there.

LB Burt Veen was a first round pick who needed a few seasons to develop, but took over as our strong-side starter in his 6th year and played well for us from that point on, garnering 732 tackles and 66.5 sacks.
SS Drew Griffith was an unheralded DB we grabbed as a free agent, who just managed to stick around, play pretty well, and developed into a team leader. He notched 107 starts, 13 interceptions, 431 tackles in 15 seasons.

I use the tag on CB Stephen Banks – we will make every reasonable effort to lock him up to a long term deal. The tag offer puts us down to $7.2m to spend, though – and we have quite a number of free agents, including our two remaining starters at LB (in addition to Veen, who has retired). Our top targets are: LT Eddie Wickes, MLB Cole Westbrook, SLB Jerome Maxwell, RG Melvin Ahn, WR Brant Barker, and LG Leroy Blackwell – all starters.

I decide that we probably cannot afford Eddie Wickes, and we have 4th year man Jon Manning ready to step in – so I won’t be putting up $9-10m a year for Wickes. If he changes his tune, we’ll talk. LB Westbrook also has a backup behind him – Rufus Gules has been on the bench for two years after being taken with our top draft pick, and he’ ready to step in when we need him.

I decide to once again sit back and see who gets interest on the market, and only then decide whether I want to match. This is going to be a fairly flexible season for free agency, so I have the luxury of sitting back, with bucks to spend if we need to.

My inaction, though, costs me LT Eddie Wickes right away – he signs a huge deal with Atlanta. Would we have matched it? Almost certainly not, but it would have been nice to have a chance to think about it. He has battled injuries, but he was very good when he was able to play.

I do put in an early offer for WR Brant Barker, and lock him up to an affordable three year contract. After a few weeks, I have to outbid Cinti for RG Melvin Ahn, which I do to keep the unit together. But with no bids in for guys like LB Jerome Maxwell and LB Cole Westbrook, I am getting optimistic that both will return, in time.

But we head into the rookie draft with other things on our mind.

I think we need to get an impact player in this draft, and I think we need him on the defensive line. I have assembled a bunch of junk there, but we don’t have a real standout player on the DL. It would be very good to grab such a player in this draft – if I can do so without dealing away the entire draft, I plan to move up to get an impact player for the defensive front. If not – we’ll look at a WR or OL with our top pick, wherever we get better value.

I target two defensive linemen who would be worth the jump up – not a very deep draft there, I fear. I’ll wait for one of them to go off the board, and then see what it would take – but I expect I can’t make this big a move.

Turns out I’m right – I try to deal up to #4, but the price is just too steep, and I watch the top two defensive linemen go off the board by that very pick. Tough luck.

I turn my attention to WR, where there are a few pretty solid guys in this draft. Moving up to #11 isn’t as hard as #4 was – and we pull the trigger to get there to take the faster of the two standouts I see. We even keep our second rounder on hand, for a (hopefully) useful player as well.

Code:


Pick Pos Player                  Board    Dash    Sole    Strg    Agil    Vol   Draft   After   PostCamp
1.11  WR Cris Cascini             6.5     4.42+    33      12     6.87++   66   37/71   37/70    36/70
2.32  LB Tyrus Newhart            4.1     4.85     18      25     7.38+    82   24/48   25/48
                                                                                to DE   26/59    28/56
4.32 SLB Lewis Woodard            3.4     4.58     14      18     7.33      4   23/39   23/38    24/37
URFA  QB Burt Waas                3.2     4.69     36      14     7.40     37   17/37   17/40    21/43
URFA  RB Tommy Hatcher            2.4     4.62     26       9     7.33     63   17/26   17/23    17/22
URFA  RB Jon Harper               3.2     4.77     15       9     7.38     12   26/35   26/33    26/30
URFA  RB Bryan Samuels            2.6     4.90     29      16     7.52     26   20/29   20/27    
                                                                                To WR   15/35    16/30
URFA  TE James Shannon            3.4     5.07     29      24     7.81     80   13/39   13/35    14/31
URFA  RT Jessie Horn              2.9     5.14     26      29     7.79      1   10/34   10/37    13/41
URFA  DT Marcus Daniels           3.2     4.93     13      26     7.62     14   11/37   11/37    13/37
URFA MLB Shawn Dotson             2.8     4.74     26      23     7.56     90   20/32   18/28    20/28
URFA  SS Craig Hennessee          3.2     4.82     23      16     7.32     48   14/39   14/36    15/33
URFA  FS Dean Doyle               2.9     4.68     32      13     7.21     81   17/33   16/30
                                                                                To CB   12/27    13/24

When I get to my second round pick, I’m shocked by the several pretty-good receivers around, and at the utter void at DE. We probably could have done better selecting one of the decent DE in round one, and gotten a decent wideout here. Alas. I end up taking a heavy linebacker, with hopes that he can switch to DE and become a pass rusher for us. Fortunately, the switch goes pretty well – he looks like he may well step right in and start. Probably not a major impact player, but new DE Tyrus Newhart might give us a little boost in the pass rush.

In the URFA crop – I like the looks of QB Burt Waas (not Waas) and pick up a few guys with some potential, including RT Jessie Horn, who will be our top reserve tackle right away.

In late free agency, we lock up MLB Cole Westbrook for two more years, and later follow suit with SLB Jerome Maxwell. Both should end their careers with us, I expect. LG Leroy Blackwell takes a three year deal, and will stay in as our starter there. We actually wrap up every single player on our roster – and head into camp with a bulging roster of 63 players.

Into the preseason, we’ll be looking at a number of young players. I move young LB Rufus Giles to the weak side, where he will (hopefully) start this season, and start developing his fairly considerable talent.

I have to release WR Chad Horner – we’re just out of slots, and he’s getting pushed out of his role anyway. An 11th year guy with no leadership, no mentoring and not enough ability to play just isn’t worth much. That’s the last guy out – and we are ready for the season.

On opening day, Greg Huffman zings five TD passes to crush Buffalo, 35-3. In week 2, though, we lose to Dallas, who are led by QB Gabe Glenn, another former Dolphin.

After three weeks, MLB Cole Westbrook goes down with an injury. So, Rufus Glenn is moved back to the middle, where he will have to start the rest of the way, it seems. We go on without both Maxwell and Westbrook – our LB corps is in shambles, really.

Regardless, we go on winning – and get to a big matchup in week 12, where we give Philly their first loss of the year. A follow-up win in Pittsburgh puts us in really good shape to claim a bye week – we’re one game up on Oakland for the conference top spot. We run the streak of wins out farther, ans wrap up another excellent season at 15-1. This team just keeps on ticking…

Code:


Front Office Football 2004
2027 Summary for Miami Dolphins
   
Record: 15-1
Winning Pct.: .937
   
Miami Dolphins          Team      Rank  
Rushes                  388       31          
Rushing Yards           1614      28          
Yards Per Carry         4.15      14          
Pass Attempts           635       1           
Completions             387       1           
Passing Yards           4474      1           
Yards Per Attempt       7.04      10          
3rd Down Conversions    41.4      12          
Points Per Game         25.6      1           
Turnovers               24        13 (T)      
Turnover Margin         +6        10 (T)      
   
Opponents               Team      Rank  
Rushes                  432       6 (T)       
Rushing Yards           1461      2 (T)       
Yards Per Carry         3.38      1           
Pass Attempts           518       22          
Completions             263       1           
Passing Yards           3034      2 (T)       
Yards Per Attempt       5.85      1           
3rd Down Conversions    31.3      2           
Points Per Game         13.0      1           
Turnovers               30        7           
   
Week  Team  Versus        Oppnt  
1     35    BUF           3       
2     16    at DAL        21      
3     30    SDO           27      
4     24    at NED        10      
5     27    at JAX        24      
6     17    TEN           13      
7     31    at BUF        17      
8     41    IND           10      
10    35    at HOU        0       
11    35    at NYJ        14      
12    16    PHI           15      
13    19    at PIT        14      
14    17    at NYG        15      
15    16    NED           7       
16    15    WAS           12      
17    37    NYJ           7       
   
Passing             Pos   Att   Comp  Yards Y/Att TD    Int  
13 Huffman          QB    628   384   4460  7.10  30    21      
**Team              ---   635   387   4474  7.04  30    21      
   
Rushing             Pos   Att   Yards Y/Att TD  
38 Connell          RB    187   738   3.94  10      
28 Brewster         RB    113   401   3.54  1       
13 Huffman          QB    64    407   6.35  3       
**Team              ---   388   1614  4.15  15      
   
Receiving           Pos   Targ  Catch Yards Y/Ctc YAC   TD  
45 Wells            TE    119   80    812   10.1  191   5       
85 Harney           WR    130   78    1075  13.7  136   8       
29 Pietrzyk         WR    107   55    709   12.8  111   2       
27 Beyer            FB    61    50    299   5.9   60    5       
86 Cascini          WR    92    50    621   12.4  82    4       
38 Connell          RB    31    23    129   5.6   78    3       
83 Perkins          WR    38    23    376   16.3  76    0       
82 Barker           WR    42    19    336   17.6  59    2       
**Team              ---   635   387   4474  11.5  799   30      
   
Defense             Pos   Tack  Asst  Sack  Hurr  Ints  Defn  
47 Harper           S     89    25    1.0   0     5     19      
22 Ridings          S     74    28    0.0   0     0     14      
92 Jamison          OLB   72    18    0.0   0     1     3       
41 Banks            CB    68    17    0.0   0     5     26      
79 Ljunghammar      DT    52    23    7.5   7     0     0       
53 Giles            ILB   45    29    1.0   2     0     2       
99 Yates            DT    43    19    4.5   3     0     0       
59 Newhart          DE    42    11    11.0  8     0     1       
90 Woodard          OLB   41    11    3.5   4     1     6       
42 Money            CB    34    6     0.5   0     2     10      
91 Dotson           DE    29    9     8.5   14    0     0       
35 Harper           S     28    3     0.0   0     2     3       
25 Sims             CB    27    9     0.0   0     1     13      
94 Benton           OLB   25    7     0.0   1     0     0       
**Team              ---   824   248   48.0  47    17    101

We’re not all that efficient on offense, but we still manage to score more points than anybody out there. Huffman continues to make mistakes, but we are still pretty prolific inn the passing game – system, personnel, whatever – it works. Lincoln Connell had a pretty nice season, but he’s just another fill-in guy at Rb in this offense, really.

The defense held the opposition to 3.21 yards per carry – a really strong number, even for us. Tops in yards per attempt, too – this defense remains a monster, no matter how you slice it. DE Newhart had a pretty nice rookie season, stepping right into the starting lineup at RDE. The LB group played okay – with everyone in and out all year, and eventually Cole Westbrook out for good, I think. S Derek Harper played great, after a bad injury last year that had us scared – the secondary was outstanding even after Mickey Sims went down.

Unsung heroes: WR Norm Perkins is quietly earning more time – he’ll stay in our plans in the years to come… DE Gilbert Dotson is developing rapidly into a serious threat on the end… CB Arnie Money came off the injured list to start for Mickey Sims, and looked great in there…

Postseason

Miami 31, Cincinnati 3 – Lincoln Connell gets his first 100-yard game, at a good time. Bruce Pietrzyk has 129 yards receiving, and we keep this one in control the whole way.

Miami 10, Cleveland 7 – Our defense gets all the credit here, and our only TD when DE Tyrus Newhart scoops up a fumble and takes it home. We win it with a buzzer-beater FG, and move on. (whew)

Miami 24, Philadelphia 13 – We bring it down again, with a great game from LB Jerome Maxwell earning him a rare MVP trophy for a defensive player. 15 tackles and a sack will do that – the announcer called his name an awful lot. Bruce Pietrzyk has 150 yards in a pretty big game – we handle thr Eagles again and take another title.

Greg Huffman takes his proper position as the first team QB in the league – it’s a little weird, but it’s what the Miami QB is supposed to do, right? TE Jerry Wells is a second team selection, as is S Derek Harper.

Well, now we have to wonder where we go from here. Greg Huffman seems to have thing well in control, and now he’ll be looking to get paid. I’m really not convinced that he’s really anything special. Could this team keep on winning big even with a complete novice in there at QB throwing 600 passes a year? Hard to imagine, really. But this defense, posting monster numbers each season, is getting it done year in and year out.

MIJB#19 · 07-20-2004, 04:13 AM

That was a a great move with LB->DE Tyrus Newhart, QS.

Question: What's the deal with picking up 3 URFA rookie RBs every second draft, just a bit of roster filling, or some success with converting RB to WR for a price you can't get "real" WRs for at the same talent level? ("Bite" me if I missed your explanation for doing so.)

wade moore · 07-20-2004, 05:22 AM

Is anyone else reading this and feeling like the IHOF is in REAL trouble when QS gets the right talent to fit this gameplan?

QuikSand · 07-20-2004, 06:34 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by MIJB#19

That was a a great move with LB->DE Tyrus Newhart, QS.

Question: What's the deal with picking up 3 URFA rookie RBs every second draft, just a bit of roster filling, or some success with converting RB to WR for a price you can't get "real" WRs for at the same talent level? ("Bite" me if I missed your explanation for doing so.)

I have generally had some success in pickinng up players are fairly deep positions like RB and LB and switching them to play fairly rare positions like WR and DE. It's a little bit hit-or-miss...sometimes they come through with practically nothing in the "supporting" areas (receivers with virtual zeroes for things like courage) and are marginal at best, sometimes things work out. The switch from LB to DE is basically just a contraction of relevant skills, meaning that you already see everything that's relevant for the DE position -- so if the guy makes the switch fairly well, you ought to be okay.

Why pick up running backs every so often? Variety of reasons. Some I switch to WR, if they look better than the dregs at that position. Some are there as insurance policies for the return positions... I want to have a guy on hand who can return kicks or punts in case my current starter there gets cut. And it's also just a position that, visually, tends to look a little alluring after the draft - if you do a sort by "current skill" you tend to see a bunch of kickers and punters, followed by a number of running backs -- it's human nature to fall for a few of these guys from time to time, and my algorithms are programmed to mimic human nature.

QuikSand · 07-20-2004, 08:49 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by MIJB#19

("Bite" me if I missed your explanation for doing so.)

I'm guessing this is a colloquialism that didn't translate too well from the Dutch. Either that, or I've done something to upset you... I thought the eye-rolling was bad enough, but now you're saying "bite me?"

cthomer5000 · 07-20-2004, 08:57 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by wade moore

Is anyone else reading this and feeling like the IHOF is in REAL trouble when QS gets the right talent to fit this gameplan?

If I were in his conference (or worse, his division) I'd be terrified. I've got my own counter-intelligence working on a new gameplan though, and I think I've made a real breakthrough in my solo career. Still, my level of attention to Chesapeake has gone from "passing" to "magnifying glass." I also feel fortunate that if my defense is built to stop one thing - that one thing would be a heavy air attack.

wade moore · 07-20-2004, 09:49 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by cthomer5000

If I were in his conference (or worse, his division) I'd be terrified. I've got my own counter-intelligence working on a new gameplan though, and I think I've made a real breakthrough in my solo career. Still, my level of attention to Chesapeake has gone from "passing" to "magnifying glass." I also feel fortunate that if my defense is built to stop one thing - that one thing would be a heavy air attack.

I guess the other thing to note is that it should be atleast marginally more difficult for Quik to get the players he wants with Humans instead of the AI.

07-15-2004, 09:19 AM	#104
QuikSand lolzcat Join Date: Oct 2000 Location: Annapolis, Md	2023 This year’s retirement class is pretty modest – I’m surprised, actually: S Orlando Bullock was our top pick in 2008 (ahead of QB Mel Copeland, even) Bullock started 170 games over 15 seasons, earning all-pro honors twice and posting 40 interceptions and 867 tackles. He retires as yet another Miami “legend of the game.” CB Maurice Diehl was a nice surprise when he stepped in and started after three seasons as a fourth-round benchwarmer. Longtime reserve and role player, he leaves after 10 seasons with 40 picks in 53 starts. MLB Ray Ireland is the first of my players to be inducted into the Hall of Fame. Ireland managed 1,174 tackles in his 13 seasons, 11 of which were with us. Never a major pass rush threat, Ireland was nonetheless an effective inside presence for us, and centered a very strong defense for many, many years. We have $3 in usable cap space, and 41 players signed. A once-through the contracts, and we open up to $6.4 – not bad to start off. Our ordered target list for this offseason: RB Bruce Pietrzyk, WR Harris Hansen, DE Pat Wayne, P Jeremy Shaw, and RG Melvin Ahn. Pietrzyk is just an unlikely case – I can’t see paying top dollar (bidding starts at $8m a year) for him to keep doing what he’s doing -- rushing for 800 yards and catching passes underneath. He’s never show the explosiveness that he promised, and he certainly never really changed our team that much. S, he’s almost certainly a goner. Harris Hansen is asking for $10 million a year. Two straight pro bowls have him in the catbird seat. My thinking is that we simply cannot afford that – we’ll wait him out, and hope he crashes to earth. Tito Taylor is looking for less than $1.4 per year – he’ll get an offer right away, coming off his third 1,000+ yard season. I’ll also work to lock up DE Pat Wayne, who we may need on the left side, as starting LDE Emmitt Summers is permanently slowed by his latest injury, and is no longer an impact player. After two weeks, we have WR Taylor and DE Wayne tied up, and we see San Francisco put in a $7m/yr offer to RB Pietrzyk. I decide to assemble a deal for Pietrzyk, and he at least listens to my backloaded deal. I won’t be surprised if he goes to SF anyway – but we’ll have an offer on the table. In week 8 Pietrzyk finally decides to take our deal, to my surprise. I offered him only $5 million in signing bonus, and he’ll only hit our cap for $3m this year and next – that seems like quite a deal to me. It does, however, chew up nearly all of the cap space that we had left. With the new contract, I decide to make a pretty daring move. I switch Bruce Pietrzyk over to play wide receiver – he converts at 75% of his previous skills, and when I go ahead with the switch, I am pretty favorably impressed. He looks like he will be a pretty impressive receiver for us – he will have some learning to do to develop his current skills, but I think this could work out just fine, really. I expect that he will take over as our starting split end, assuming that we are unable to get Harris Hansen to re-sign for anything approaching a reasonable price. An interesting twist in this drama – something I have considered several times, but finally pulled the trigger. (As a very weird aside – in the switch, Pietrzyk went from having zero ratings in both punt and kick off returns to have very high ratings in both – and now he will take over those duties for us as well) That wraps up the early FA process – we will try to fill some holes with the draft, and then come back and see what we can do with guys like WR Hansen and RG Ahn. In the draft, we desperately need a middle linebacker – Cole Westbrook will miss this whole season with an extended injury (probably a career-ender for him, but we will keep him around just in case). That’s far and away our top priority – but I don’t see a true standout in this draft at all, so there’s not even a guy for us to mortgage the draft to go up and get there. When we are up, three linebackers have been selected – and there’s nothing to like there for us at #32. SO, I move down into the middle of the second round, and pick up a middle round pick for doing so. We pick up DB Richie Manning in round two, but have to sit back at LB, since there’s nobody here who moves me at all. Code: Pick Pos Player Board Dash Sole Strg Agil Vol Draft After PostCamp 2.16 CB Richie Manning 4.5 4.44+ 23 12 7.20 65 13/55 13/52 15/46 3.20 FB Jerry Wells 6.1 4.67+ 29 29 7.45 50 36/68 36/68 to TE 22/64 26/65 4.16 DE Ellis Winters 3.2 5.13 15 28 7.60 59 22/37 22/37 to MLB 10/41 11/38 5.32 SLB Bryan Lengfelder 3.6 4.68 33+ 16 7.42 77 13/43 13/42 to MLB 14/46 16/42 6.32 TE Zach Rose 3.2 5.07 25 37++ 8.46 33 19/38 19/35 20/33 URFA WR Pat Richardson 3.1 4.52 15 6 7.03 69 13/36 13/35 13/30 URFA C Norman Crane 3.6 5.10 24 26 7.90 33 22/42 23/45 25/46 URFA C Bobby McWilliams 3.7 5.09 26 30 7.96 80 24/43 25/45 To LG 20/39 23/41 URFA SLB Bucky Benton 2.7 4.65 28 20 7.77 43 19/30 19/29 19/27 URFA SS Gino Bloomgarden 2.8 4.55 38 16 7.22 45 20/32 19/30 21/28 I’m not sure we landed any breakout candidates – here, we were mostly drafting based on overall potential and good matches at the specific skills. My two best MLB prospects, who will probably compete for the starting job, are both converts from other positions. TE Zach Rose might be a breakout type – we’ll watch him closely. After the draft, we lock up P Jeremy Shaw and RG Melvin Ahn to fairly cheap deals. We wait until the very end of the late free agency period, but I still can’t work out a deal with WR Harris Hansen. He’s still asking for $27 over five years – I can’t commit to that, by any means. In the very final stage, I finally get in an offer he will listen to – but he then rejects it, and the FA stages finishes with him remaining unsigned. It’s impossible – we will have to let him go, and hope that Pietrzyk can step into the starting split end role right away. After training camp, it looks like this will be our weakest rookie crop ever. All but one of our new players dipped in camp, which isn’t a good sign. Richie Manning looks like a special teamer and deep reserve, and perhaps we’ll get something out of a guy like G Bobby McWilliams, our only bump-up in the lot. But the two rookie middle linebackers are both disappointing – I don’t know what we ought to do there – we’ll probably end up starting mediocre holdover Luke Swift, as I have already switched Jerome Maxwell back to SLB, where he is far better than he is at MLB. The preseason looks pretty good for our backfield switchover – Pietrzyk seems to be learning the ropes quickly at WR, while new starting RB Bo Brewster (an undrafted free agent from the same rookie class as Pietrzyk) seems to be stepping well into the starting RB role. I expect a pretty good season from our receiving corps this year – Brewater is not the receiving threat out of the backfield that Pietrzyk was, so we should be going downfield a bit more. WR Archie Broenkow should be primed for a breakout season. In our opener, Copeland throws for 5 TDs, all to wideouts – including 138 yards and TD for Broenkow. And in week two, we have a very unusual stat: RB Bo Brewster has a 100+ yard rushing day, totaling 123 yards and 3TDs, even without a huge breakaway run (in fact, nothing over 15 yards). Bruce Pietrzyk never had a single 100 yard day rushing the ball – this is unusual for us. Brewster is now by far our best rushing threat – so that helps explain that he’s getting the lion’s share of the work at RB now. We get to 6-0 on the year – Mel Copeland’s knee bursitis is acting up again, but he will play through it as usual. We’re still unbeaten at the halfway point, and Archie Broenkow leads the league in receiving with 738 yards and 7 TD. Our defense is #1 against eth run and #1 against the pass – very impressive, especially considering the hobos we have playing at MLB. After our next game, WR Bruce Pietrzyk is lost for the season with a wrist injury. His year was pretty good – 8 starts at WR, with 29 catches for 440 yards. We’ll shuffle the lineup to fill the spot (we’re a little thin at WR now) but it looks like he will be declared a success at wideout. In the final week, we eke out a 24-21 win over New England, to complete the regular season sweep at 16-0 again. Copeland’s knee problems continue, but he managed to start every game all season. We will get our needed week off, and gear up for another playoff run. Code: Front Office Football 2004 2023 Summary for Miami Dolphins Record: 16-0 Winning Pct.: 1.000 Miami Dolphins Team Rank Rushes 401 29 (T) Rushing Yards 1646 22 Yards Per Carry 4.10 11 (T) Pass Attempts 580 2 Completions 376 1 Passing Yards 4852 1 Yards Per Attempt 8.36 2 3rd Down Conversions 45.0 7 Points Per Game 29.6 1 Turnovers 20 10 (T) Turnover Margin +20 1 Opponents Team Rank Rushes 379 1 Rushing Yards 1252 1 Yards Per Carry 3.30 1 Pass Attempts 588 31 Completions 300 11 (T) Passing Yards 3310 6 Yards Per Attempt 5.62 1 3rd Down Conversions 36.4 2 Points Per Game 10.0 1 Turnovers 40 1 Week Team Versus Oppnt 1 35 NYJ 21 2 31 at DAL 3 3 23 TEN 17 4 38 BUF 13 5 10 at SDO 7 6 34 DEN 7 8 34 KCY 6 9 31 at OAK 0 10 31 at NED 14 11 38 at NYJ 7 12 33 PHI 10 13 27 at BAL 7 14 28 at NYG 7 15 27 at BUF 13 16 31 WAS 7 17 24 NED 21 Passing Pos Att Comp Yards Y/Att TD Int 14 Copeland QB 564 365 4769 8.45 37 11 Team --- 580 376 4852 8.36 37 12 Rushing Pos Att Yards Y/Att TD 28 Brewster RB 264 881 3.33 9 27 Beyer FB 47 334 7.10 1 14 Copeland QB 41 193 4.70 3 32 Wright RB 35 132 3.77 0 Team --- 401 1646 4.10 14 Receiving Pos Targ Catch Yards Y/Ctc YAC TD 86 Broenkow WR 137 90 1600 17.7 432 16 82 Barker WR 114 73 948 12.9 90 3 27 Beyer FB 74 53 341 6.4 123 3 85 Taylor WR 69 36 393 10.9 55 4 29 Pietrzyk WR 42 29 440 15.1 45 2 45 Wells TE 42 29 310 10.6 52 5 87 Horner WR 43 27 409 15.1 54 2 28 Brewster RB 39 23 247 10.7 157 2 Team --- 580 376 4852 12.9 1050 37 Defense Pos Tack Asst Sack Hurr Ints Defn 47 Harper S 91 26 0.0 1 2 16 49 Veen OLB 66 23 3.5 7 1 6 25 Sims CB 55 19 1.0 0 14 20 92 Jamison OLB 54 21 0.0 1 1 3 71 Halpin DT 53 22 2.0 9 0 1 41 Banks CB 50 18 0.0 1 9 15 59 Swift ILB 47 16 5.5 2 0 2 91 Wayne DE 46 15 13.5 13 0 0 79 Ljunghammar DT 45 18 4.5 11 0 0 93 Maxwell OLB 41 15 4.5 1 0 3 78 Curtis DE 32 17 8.0 22 0 0 42 Money CB 27 9 0.0 0 3 6 52 Lengfelder ILB 23 7 0.0 0 0 2 26 Torretta CB 17 3 0.0 0 1 5 48 Crute S 17 8 0.0 0 1 1 83 Giles TE 16 0 0.0 0 0 0 23 Bloomgarden S 16 3 0.0 0 1 1 Team --- 823 264 51.0 80 34 83 Another strong year for Mel Copeland – again nibbling toward 5,000 yards but not quite getting there. This ranks as the sixth-highest yardage total in league history (behind five other of his own years), all within 250 yards of 5,000. WR Archie Broenkow breaks the league record with his 16th TD catch – eclipsing the record held by a long-lost tight end of mine, Thomas Newnam (who had 42 TD in 14 seasons). RB Bo Brewster got nearly all the work, and was good, but not great – 3.33 yard per carry is a little lower than we’d prefer to see. CB Mickey Sims had an unbelievable season – 14 interceptions, 4 for touchdowns, and 20 passes defensed. He ought to be a lock for the pro bowl, and probably defensive player of the year, I’d think. Stephen Banks joins him to make by far the best CB combo in the league – no contest at all. DE Pat Wayne had a nice year, leading our defensive front to another solid performance. #1 in yards allowed both per carry and per attempt – that’s unbelievable defensive domination, considering our very weak linebacking situation. Unsung heroes: FB Rick Beyer had a few breakout runs and ended up with a solid 675 total yards on the year, his best season to date… C Deon Flint was again a stalwart on the line, with 30 KRBs and only 3 sacks allowed… LT Eddie Wickes stayed healthy and was dominant again at LT… we were among the lowest in sacks allowed – and this from a team that passes all the time, the OL did a great job this year… P Jeremy Shaw.s 42.8 yard average is among the league leaders, again. Postseason Miami 27, New England 24 – Another tough game from the Pats, we needed a FG with 12 seconds left to pull it out. Copeland’s 372 yards passing helped, too. Miami 27, Pittsburgh 24 – Yikes! A TD interception return from Stephen Banks gives us enough cushion to withstand Pittsburgh’s late rally, and we hold on for the win. Pietrzyk, back healthy, had 90 yards receiving. …and now, trying to secure our first ever “threepeat” ® here are Mel Copeland and your Miami Dolphins… Miami 20, Detroit 13 – We wrap up a nail-biting postseason with another close win. Up 14-10 at the half, we endured a battle of defense in the second half, won the FG battle 2-1, and came away with the win for our tenth championship. Mel Copeland gets the game ball yet again, though my vote would have been for FB Rick Beyer (103 total yards). So, we finally get over the hump, and win a third straight title. This was also our fifth perfect season, and the first time we’ve done it back-to-back ever. We now have a 42-game winning streak, dating back to week 13 of the 2021 season. And also, we have posted a tenth league championship for QB Mel Copeland and RB Pat Noccolino. That’s a lot of bling, folks. Marvelous Mel Copeland racks up three awards this year – offensive player of the year goes to Pittsburgh’s RB Aaron Bradford, who broke the league rushing record with 1,925 yards and also had 481 yards receiving – a pretty darned good season, I’ll admit. WR Archie Broenkow made the first team, of course, while CB Mickey Sims gets first team honors as well (he was beaten out for DPOY by a LB with 145+38 tackles and 9.5 sacks). What a year. What a run. Crossing fingers for the retirement list now…

07-15-2004, 04:59 PM	#110
Chas in Cinti High School Varsity Join Date: Oct 2000 Location: Cincinnati, OH	Dean who? Dean who? Jeez... I haven't even THOUGHT of Dean Houston in years... hahaha... Quiksand, just read the whole thread back to back (been gone for a while)... thanks for the entertainment as always, and let's keep this thing going past the Copeland-era. I agree with the others that the best part of this thing is the fact that ALL the players are familiar to us ALL the time... because they rarely leave. Nice touch... regardless of how hard things are, etc... Regards, Chas

07-15-2004, 05:19 PM	#111
Alf Pro Starter Join Date: Jan 2001 Location: Rennes, France	yep, QS, make Mel Copeland totaly eclipse Dean Houston (you know, the child molestor). __________________ FOFL - GML - IHOF - FranceStats

07-15-2004, 05:35 PM	#112
Buzzbee College Starter Join Date: Jun 2002	Yeah, I'd like to see just how incredible Mel's career stats are when he does retire. I'm guessing they will be near tops in FOF history. One thought, probably more for the FOFC members than for QS himself, since I don't really peg QS as the nostalgic type, but I'd love to see Cuervo or sfl-cat create an end of career "card" for Mel. It be great to see him on the front of the card, poised and ready to deliver a bullet, with his career stats on the back of the card. Some sort of Topps premium line might do him justice. It would certainly become part of FOFC history. Perhaps even both Cuervo AND sfl_cat could design cards. One each from a different card company. Don't know who does football cards other than Topps. Just a thought. __________________ Ability is what you're capable of doing. Motivation determines what you do. Attitude determines how well you do it. - Lou Holtz

07-15-2004, 07:40 PM	#113
QuikSand lolzcat Join Date: Oct 2000 Location: Annapolis, Md	2024 And we check out the retirement list, once again. We have plenty of players at that age. Relief! Mel Copeland will return for his 17th season! We can try to extend this run we’ve been on! We do have some retirements: RB Pat Noccolino was a 7th round breakout, started for us for 80 games, and posted 4,834 yards rushing in his career. He later settled in as a nice mentor and special teamer, getting a little reserve RB duty also. RB Lamar Wright got 35 starts at RB, posting 3,234 rushing yards in his career. Solid all-around back, he was also a mentor and good contributor on the downside of his ten year career. TE Roderick Giles had 4,953 yards receiving in his 13 year career, including a great year in 2014 when he caught 70 balls for 858 yards and earned first team all-pro honors. Always solid – our best TE. WR Tito Taylor retires with 9,807 yards receiving and 75 TD, making him the career leader in both categories for our team. An undrafted rookie free agent, he broke out and developed into a very consistent performer for us for many years, posting three 1,000+ seasons along the way. We have to bring in a new scout – Derek Wilburn will have a good eye for young talent, and has few weaknesses (maybe linebackers, unfortunately). He ought to be fine. As we begin the FA period, we have 36 players signed, and a whopping $17.2 million in usable cap space. That undoubtedly means that we will have a number of critical players without contracts – that kind of cap room doesn’t come from nowhere. Our list of FA targets, again in order is here: RB Bo Brewster, LT Eddie Wickes, C Deon Flint, S Derek Harper, S Drew Griffith, SLB Jerome Maxwell, and RT Marshall Goodwin, and FB Rick Beyer. Brewster has been pretty good, but right now we don’t have a single player on the roster signed to play running back – so we’re suddenly in real trouble there. (Oh, Bruce…?) RB Brewster is looking for a long-term deal, but not really a big fat one – that’s good, at least. I start the FA process without any offers in – I’m going to react to the market this year, I think. I end up with a pretty expensive contract for S Derek Harper, but I don’t see any other way – he’s easily our best player there. I end up acceding to the exact demands of not only Harper, but also RB Bo Brewster and C Deon Flint as well – all positions where I don’t have much luxury of movement. It takes until week 14, but we do lock up LB Maxwell, also. SO, we head to the draft without a deal for LT Eddie Wickes – we did this before, and ended up re-signing him fairly cheaply in the late FA stages. I’m hoping against hope that this works again – he’s been very good for two seasons now, and we don’t have a capable option on hand other than him, really, especially with starting RT Goodwin also still unsigned. This promises to be a very active late FA year for us – we have $11m in usable cap space targeted for the two tackles and probably FB Beyer as well. In the draft – we’d like to pick up some help at LB. I have re-signed Col Westbrook to a new deal, and he looks like he’s fully back from injury – but there’s no way we can really expect him to stay out there all year. In fact, I’d be shocked if he doesn’t go down right away and possibly miss the season. So – the starting MLB job is basically vacant – guys like Luke Swift and Brad Lengfelder are band-aids. Safety would be another good target area – behind Derek Harper was have very little of note. We are thin at WR, and could use an infusion there, and we have only one RB signed to our roster. Those are our many priorities – and all that assumes we can re-sign both starting offensive tackles. If not, then we have a big hole there. More to do than one might expect on a team with a 42-game winning streak. My top “realistic” target player, middle linebacker A.J. Newton, gets taken by NE at #22. It seemed like a reach pick for them, I thought he’d be there for us at #32. Damn. Code: Pick Pos Player Board Dash Sole Strg Agil Vol Draft After PostCamp 1.32 WR Dave Harney 4.9 4.45+ 34+ 23++ 7.04+ 99 29/56 29/54 31/52 2.32 FB Lincoln Connell 7.8 4.58++ 32+ 26+ 7.22+ 27 50/82 49/81 to RB 41/58 42/55 3.32 DT Brian Yates 4.1 5.29 20 28 7.35++ 71 20/50 20/48 22/45 4.32 SS Ian Peralta 4.0 4.47+ 37+ 13 7.35 81 17/46 17/41 18/35 5.32 MLB Bart Colley 3.2 5.10 18 22 7.68 14 19/37 19/36 20/33 6.32 RB O.J. Burroughs 3.5 4.53 14 10 7.19 10 27/38 26/35 27/32 7.32 TE Neal Rasmussen 4.0 4.95 28 35++ 7.51+ 32 25/46 26/44 28/40 URFA QB Cris Prior 2.9 4.49 30 10 7.44 89 04/33 04/34 07/39 URFA RB Dan Crawford 2.9 4.71 21 15 7.40 11 24/31 24/31 25/32 URFA FB Clyde Carillo 3.0 4.96 28 16 7.39 47 20/34 20/32 21/31 URFA LT Marty Carter 3.0 5.19 10 32 7.72 55 12/34 12/37 15/40 URFA LT Jon Manning 2.8 5.15 35 30 7.72 49 10/34 10/39 13/44 URFA MLB Moe Lyle 2.4 4.94 24 18 7.77 38 07/26 07/25 08/25 URFA CB Carlos Harper 3.0 4.47 32 14 7.20 54 14/34 14/37 17/43 So, I end up trying to grab a player I think can help us right away in WR Dave Harney – he’s the top-rated wideout left, he has some standout skills, and he could end up being a serious target (he has a super-high apparent potential in route running). He might have breakout potential to exceed his decent-looking ratings – so I figure he’s worth a whirl. FB Lincoln Connell ought to be a complete monster there – the question is whether to switch him over to play RB. Our current starter Rick Beyer is too fat to play RB, but Connell is only 225, and would be a somewhat chunky back but could be effective. Tough call there. The rest are mostly skill-driven picks, where we’ve had lousy results lately. We’ll see if we grab any diamonds in the rough here – but I don’t see anyone who stands out, really. Among the URFA group, I find a few guys to bring aboard, including yet another fleet-footed QB in Cris Prior. I grab a couple fairly promising prospects at offensive tackle – and we might be able to survive if we cannot re-sign LT Eddie Wickes after all (though I still want him back, of course). In the late free agency stages – we manage to get in pretty affordable offers to both starting tackles, and we lock up Marshall Goodwin right away. Eddie Wickes signs in week three – it’s a time bomb contract, but it won’t blow up for three seasons, so we ought to be okay there. I have to go back to the URFA pile and scoop up a kicker, as Marcus Knox is looking to be paid something like Fort Knox. Too much – we’ll go with another rookie, pally. So – we really don’t end up losing anyone this offseason through free agency. We even work out a deal with FB Rick Beyer, who will play for cheap for the next few years after all. And that signing cinches my decision – I have to send rookie Lincoln Connell into camp as a halfback – he’s almost certain to be our #2 option for this season, the way things look now. The switch looks pretty good – he won’t be the most elusive back, but he has nice potential most everywhere else. A 41/58 running back could help us a whole lot. Training camp reveals – a lot of whimpers at the top of our draft list. Harney and Connell should be good, but I don’t see either one developing into a major star for us. As usual, the best news from camp comes from the unheralded free agents – guys like Clyde Harper and linemen Manning and Carter – those three ought to be worth something in a little time. Also, we had a veteran breakout this year – S Derek Harper made a pretty big jump, and is now pretty much the complete package, including the coverage skills he once lacked. Makes me feel even batter about investing pretty big money into him this offseason – a good URFA player who has really panned out. It’s a little tougher than usual to get to our final cut-down – we end up with a few marginally injured players placed onto IR, just to make roster space. But we get there, and head into yet another season, looking for an angle to the title once again. Code: Front Office Football 2004 Miami Dolphins Roster, Scout Overview Player # Pos Start Exp Current Estimate Future Estimate Cntrct Copeland, Mel 14 QB QB 17 80 80 1 yr. Huffman, Greg 13 QB 6 43 49 1 yr. Sampson, Ronald 1 QB 3 20 49 1 yr. ##Prior, Cris 15 QB 1 7 39 2 yrs Brewster, Bo 28 RB RB 7 53 53 6 yrs Connell, Lincoln 38 RB 1 42 55 3 yrs Burroughs, O.J. 43 RB 1 27 32 3 yrs Crawford, Dan 33 RB 1 25 32 2 yrs Beyer, Rick 27 FB FB 6 52 52 5 yrs Wells, Jerry 45 TE TE 2 51 65 2 yrs Rasmussen, Neil 89 TE 1 29 40 3 yrs Broenkow, Archie 86 FL FL 4 57 58 1 yr. Barker, Brant 82 FL 9 39 39 1 yr. Harney, Dave 85 FL 1 34 52 4 yrs Horner, Chad 87 FL 8 32 32 3 yrs Pietrzyk, Bruce 29 SE SE 7 44 63 5 yrs Flint, Deon 50 C C 11 70 71 3 yrs Crane, Norman 54 C 2 33 46 2 yrs Lofton, Ross 69 LG 11 28 29 1 yr. McWilliams, Bobby 56 LG 2 28 43 2 yrs Blackwell, Leroy 57 LG RG 3 23 41 3 yrs Ahn, Melvin 73 RG LG 6 46 46 2 yrs Wickes, Eddie 70 LT LT 10 83 85 4 yrs ##Carter, Marty 64 LT 1 16 40 2 yrs Manning, Jon 63 LT 1 13 44 2 yrs Goodwin, Marshall 62 RT RT 5 61 61 4 yrs Shaw, Jeremy 17 P 13 82 85 3 yrs Benson, Darnell 16 K 1 51 53 2 yrs Curtis, Ken 78 LDE LDE 12 60 60 1 yr. Summers, Emmitt 96 LDE 8 34 34 4 yrs Wayne, Pat 91 RDE RDE 6 57 58 2 yrs Fulton, Mike 75 RDE 4 11 20 2 yrs Halpin, Sammy 71 LDT LDT 8 57 57 1 yr. ##Vaughn, Kendrick 98 LDT 3 29 36 1 yr. Ljunghammar, Roger 79 RDT RDT 3 48 53 2 yrs Cowley, Bo 72 RDT 3 27 36 2 yrs ##Yates, Brian 99 RDT 1 23 45 4 yrs Westbrook, Cole 55 MLB MLB 9 70 70 3 yrs Swift, Luke 59 MLB 5 37 37 1 yr. ##Colley, Bart 90 MLB 1 21 33 3 yrs ##Lengfelder, Brad 52 MLB 2 19 40 2 yrs Veen, Burt 49 SLB SLB 13 51 51 1 yr. Maxwell, Jerome 93 SLB 10 51 52 3 yrs ##Benton, Bucky 94 SLB 2 21 23 1 yr. Jamison, Nicky 92 WLB WLB 4 36 44 3 yrs Beethoven, Bobby 97 WLB 14 26 26 2 yrs Banks, Stephen 41 LCB LCB 3 82 92 3 yrs Money, Arnie 42 LCB 3 42 62 1 yr. Sims, Mickey 25 RCB RCB 9 75 76 2 yrs Torretta, Carl 26 RCB 4 27 38 2 yrs Harper, Carlos 35 RCB 1 18 43 2 yrs Peralta, Ian 34 RCB 1 15 36 3 yrs Griffith, Drew 31 SS 13 37 37 2 yrs Bloomgarden, Gino 23 SS 2 25 25 1 yr. Manning, Richie 36 SS 2 18 41 2 yrs Harper, Derek 47 FS SS 8 83 84 4 yrs Crute, David 48 FS FS 4 35 42 1 yr. So, we head into another season. As has been the case for some time, we have outstanding cohesion – it’s the nature of the beast with this challenge, I keep lots of players a long time, and we build up quite an esprit de corps. We are rated 100 in every group, with the next-highest team in each in the 80s. Our roster rating is also 100, with Carolina next at 81. So – we look to be the favorites to win it all, once again. After five weeks, five wins, and Mel Copeland has a broken hand. He’s probable, and will go anyway – as has usually been the case with his injuries (mostly knees). A wonderful surprise, though, has been MLB Cole Westbrook – who seems to be completely healthy and productive once again. After two offseasons trying to find a starting MLB, it looks like the guy is right here after all. Great! At 8-0, we continue cruising along – but Copeland’s hand hasn’t gotten any better. The stats aren’t showing any really ill effects, though –his rating is over 93 (good, but not great for him, I suppose). For our week 11 game, Copeland is finally declared 100%, along with a few others who are nursing injuries. So, of course, we lose. It’s been a long time coming – 52 games in a row, including playoffs. But we slip in Arizona and get beaten 20-9 by the 5-5 Cardinals. Not a real impact in meaningful terms, but it does end one heck of a streak. Oddly, we outgained the Cards by 416-237 yards, and only had one turnover – but we sputtered on third downs and couldn’t convert scoring chances into scores. We bounce back and beat two good teams in Pitt and St. Louis, but drop one more down the stretch against Seattle. We finish up the season at 14-2, which is good enough to claim the top seed, as we would expect. Code: Front Office Football 2004 2024 Summary for Miami Dolphins Record: 14-2 Winning Pct.: .875 Miami Dolphins Team Rank Rushes 392 31 Rushing Yards 1602 27 Yards Per Carry 4.08 13 (T) Pass Attempts 640 1 Completions 401 1 Passing Yards 4626 1 Yards Per Attempt 7.22 7 3rd Down Conversions 43.6 15 (T) Points Per Game 26.2 1 Turnovers 20 8 (T) Turnover Margin +6 8 (T) Opponents Team Rank Rushes 378 1 Rushing Yards 1379 1 Yards Per Carry 3.64 1 Pass Attempts 546 29 Completions 273 2 Passing Yards 3455 15 Yards Per Attempt 6.32 6 3rd Down Conversions 34.0 1 Points Per Game 12.0 1 Turnovers 26 11 (T) Week Team Versus Oppnt 1 27 at BUF 20 2 27 SFO 3 3 24 at OAK 0 4 30 at NED 3 5 20 at JAX 13 6 35 TEN 27 7 34 BUF 31 8 36 IND 10 10 35 at HOU 7 11 17 at NYJ 13 12 9 at ARI 20 13 31 PIT 7 14 23 STL 7 15 36 NED 10 16 10 at SEA 13 17 26 NYJ 9 Passing Pos Att Comp Yards Y/Att TD Int 14 Copeland QB 636 400 4621 7.26 26 15 Team --- 640 401 4626 7.22 26 15 Rushing Pos Att Yards Y/Att TD 28 Brewster RB 154 629 4.08 5 38 Connell RB 128 437 3.41 1 14 Copeland QB 57 318 5.57 4 27 Beyer FB 43 197 4.58 2 Team --- 392 1602 4.08 12 Receiving Pos Targ Catch Yards Y/Ctc YAC TD 27 Beyer FB 120 90 681 7.5 225 9 86 Broenkow WR 122 68 1041 15.3 170 2 29 Pietrzyk WR 103 60 845 14.0 116 5 82 Barker WR 91 53 636 12.0 49 4 85 Harney WR 74 42 524 12.4 47 1 45 Wells TE 49 31 343 11.0 47 1 28 Brewster RB 34 26 213 8.1 108 4 Team --- 640 401 4626 11.5 855 26 Defense Pos Tack Asst Sack Hurr Ints Defn 55 Westbrook ILB 100 29 8.0 5 1 14 47 Harper S 78 26 0.0 0 5 18 49 Veen OLB 56 20 10.0 6 0 9 79 Ljunghammar DT 51 18 8.0 8 0 1 41 Banks CB 51 21 0.0 0 4 12 78 Curtis DE 48 11 9.0 18 0 0 93 Maxwell OLB 47 8 2.0 0 1 6 25 Sims CB 47 26 0.0 0 1 23 92 Jamison OLB 45 12 0.0 0 1 1 71 Halpin DT 34 15 4.0 9 0 1 31 Griffith S 30 12 0.0 0 1 0 91 Wayne DE 28 8 7.0 11 0 0 42 Money CB 25 3 0.0 1 2 5 23 Bloomgarden S 19 2 1.0 0 0 5 82 Barker WR 17 0 0.0 0 0 0 Team --- 777 228 55.0 67 16 104 Mel Copeland had a relative down year – he’s still good for close to 300 yards a game, but he worked underneath more than I would have liked, and our downfield production suffered. FB Rick Beyer had nice stats, but loyal readers know how much it irks me to see the FB getting the ball this much – 120 targeted passes? Ridiculous! The result is that not enough passes went to guys like Broenkow, who could have done things with them. The running game was pretty shaky – but Brewster was up over 4ypc at least. Cole Westbrook was a welcome sight in the middle of the defense, and we were again very strong against the run, and good against the pass. We didn’t have the gaudy interception totals like last season (Mickey Sims – one pick?) but were still tough to pass against. Great season from DT Roger Ljunghammar – he’s the guy who emerged from our mad scramble to secure a starting DT, and he is doing well. S Derek Harper had a good season, and is locked in as perhaps our defensive leader overall. Unsung heroes: Bruce Pietrzyk played in 14 games, but was solidly productive as our starting split end, and would have had a better year with more downfield action – he also was very productive with kick and punt returns… CB Arnie Money played well as our nickel back, with a PDPct of 20.9… our line was effective again, with our four regular starters (ignoring the rookie platoon at LG) posting fewer that 1% sacks allowed. Postseason Copeland is probable with a weak knee, but will certainly go in the opener… Miami 31, Jacksonville 17 – Copeland airs it out for 4 TD, as we keep things right on pace. Miami 21, Indianapolis 14 – Copeland is 27 of 34 for 355 yards to lead the effort again. In eleven tries, we have only lost one Superbowl – to Green Bay. They are back, and we take on the Packers in the final game, looking to end our run of titles. Miami 24, Green Bay 10 – No such luck, Packer fans. Marvelous Mel hits Archie Broenkow twice, and Mickey Sims returns a pick for a TD to seal up the win over the outgunned Packers. Copeland is the easy choice for MVP, taking home a staggering 11th piece of Superbowl hardware for his troubles. In the season awards – Mel Copeland gets the first team QB honor, but loses to two different running backs for MVP and OPOY. FB Rick Beyer makes the first team, as does K Darnell Benson, shockingly (he had to punt twice – and hit them for 50 and 48 yards - that must be why). I’m not wild about either guy, really. Another excellent season – we take home title number eleven, and four in a row. Copeland is the only player who has lasted through the entire series of titles, now that Pat Noccolino is gone. Unbelievable – but I have to think that the time has come. Copeland is in his 17th year – and I don’t recall seeing many (any?) QBs make it past that season. I think it might be time to write up another career player card – this could be it…

07-14-2004, 04:02 PM	#102
QuikSand lolzcat Join Date: Oct 2000 Location: Annapolis, Md	But once you force a player to play under the one-year franchise tender, my understanding is that this counts as an "injustice" and he will never even consider accepting an offer from you again. So, if what you describe, CMH, happened to us and Copeland held out - we'd just be fucked. No hard decisions to make, no agony, just fucked. Our only choices would be to keep him and see if he eventually comes back, or to cut him and use the cap space. Re-signing wouldn't be an option anyway. I see your point... but the number of real life instances where legitimate players actually sat out a year over a contract are pretty few, right? Sean Gilbert, Bobby Hebert... ummm...

07-14-2004, 04:17 PM	#103
CentralMassHokie High School JV Join Date: Jul 2001 Location: Massachusetts	True. The whole injustice bit is really an artificial AI limitation and does sort of blow my whole theory. But, I was thinking less guys holding out for a whole year and more the guys (Galloway, being a recent example) who piss and moan their way to a trade after being franchised or threatened with a franchise. Wow, Bobby Hebert ... haven't thought about him in a while.

07-15-2004, 09:59 AM	#106
JAG Grizzled Veteran Join Date: Nov 2000 Location: St. Paul, MN	Ho Hum, a 41-game winning streak (incl. postseason)

07-15-2004, 02:11 PM	#107
CraigSca Pro Starter Join Date: Jul 2001 Location: Not Delaware - hurray!	FWIW, in all my years of playing FOF, I have NEVER seen a string of success like this. In fact, I've never had an undefeated season (and sometimes wondered if ANYONE ever had). Like the others, I'll throw in that I too am very interested to see if this continues after the retirement of Copeland. Keep up the good work!

07-15-2004, 04:01 PM	#108
QuikSand lolzcat Join Date: Oct 2000 Location: Annapolis, Md	For what it's worth... I'm into another offseason, and Copeland has stayed. So, we get him for his 17th season... but the clock has to be ticking.

07-15-2004, 04:28 PM	#109
nfg22 College Benchwarmer Join Date: Mar 2004	MEL COPELAND....Dean who?

07-15-2004, 09:00 PM	#115
QuikSand lolzcat Join Date: Oct 2000 Location: Annapolis, Md	He's been tagged year to year ever since his rookie contract ended, so no such luck.

07-16-2004, 06:29 AM	#118
QuikSand lolzcat Join Date: Oct 2000 Location: Annapolis, Md	Maybe not quite as much a longshot as I had thought... Copeland still has ratings about 80% as good as his max... most of his main skills are still 70 or better. He certainly still seems to be in good form...

07-16-2004, 08:07 AM	#120
QuikSand lolzcat Join Date: Oct 2000 Location: Annapolis, Md	I've just started the 2025 season... Copeland is back. I even saved the game and re-ran the "end season" routine a few extra times, just to see if we had gotten lucky -- Copeland stuck around every single time. So, one more year!

07-16-2004, 09:30 AM	#123
Alf Pro Starter Join Date: Jan 2001 Location: Rennes, France	Woot : Champaign in Miami ! __________________ FOFL - GML - IHOF - FranceStats

07-16-2004, 10:42 AM	#126
nfg22 College Benchwarmer Join Date: Mar 2004	Mel Copeland eats injuriesfor breakfast....heck he didnt miss a game with a broken hand....even if it isnt his passing hand....handoffs and taking the snap affect that hand...

07-16-2004, 11:57 AM	#127
Pyser Pro Rookie Join Date: Oct 2000 Location: Los Angeles	quik - i read all of your dynasties (long time, first time?), but have to say this has been my favorite. 11 superbowl mvps. ridiculous. what i find interesting is that there were certainly a few games where copeland didnt deserve the hardware, but got it anyway...which makes me wonder if "reputation" is somehow factored into all of the awards. regardless, excellent job. ill be reading till the end.

07-17-2004, 05:13 AM	#129
QuikSand lolzcat Join Date: Oct 2000 Location: Annapolis, Md	2025 We start off the season, as always, with a look at the retirement list. This year – we have only one retirement. But it’s not QB Mel Copeland – he’s back for an 18th season! (After saving my game at the start of 2025, I decide to see if we got lucky, or if he was really just going to play anyway – I ran the “end season” routine three more times, and Copeland did not retire in any of them, so I tally this up to his real desire to keep playing, not just dumb metagame luck) LB Bobby Beethoven played 15 seasons with us, starting out as an undrafted roster filler, and working his way up to the starting job on the strong side. When he was displaced by Burt Veen, he moved over to the weak side and started five more seasons there, racking up 514 tackles and 28.5 sacks in his career. We retain our staff, of course – new contracts all around! We have $8.6m in usable cap space this season, with 41 players signed. I make my usual pruning through the roster, but I only get us up to about $9.2 million – so there’s not that much cash out there. Our FA targets are: WR Archie Broenkow, DE Ken Curtis, LB Burt Veen, DT Sammy Halpin, RG Melvin Ahn, WR Brant Barker, and LB Luke Swift – more or less in that order of importance. QB Greg Huffman is a special case – he’s the guy on board best prepared to take over for Mel Copeland, perhaps after this year, but I don’t think I can afford to pay a backup QB too much right now – so we might be in a tough spot with him. I am once again going to just react – I don’t have the liberty to overpay anyone this year, I don’t think. WR Broenkow gets an $8m/yr offer, and I cannot match that by any means. My sense is that re-signing DE Ken Curtis is probably the single most important thing we can do here, as we have nothing behind him at DE, really. So, I put in my offer for Curtis, and get him locked up – but that eats up over $4m in cap space right there. DT Sammy Halpin signs with Chicago, so he is gone – but the offer to Broenkow disappears, as the Giants have used up their cap space elsewhere, apparently. But New England comes in with a big bid for Broenkow, and we again are bracing to lose him. In week six, he signs with New England – so there are two pretty good players gone this year. In the late stages, we also see S David Crute and LB Luke Swift depart – guys I would have re-signed later if there was money around to do it. The balance of the early FA stages are uneventful – we still have money set aside to re-up with LB Burt Veen, WR Brant Barker, and RG Melvin Ahn. And we might even be able to work things out with QB Greg Huffman, is he goes unclaimed. So, looking at the draft – where do we have immediate needs? Well, DT just became one, with the loss of Halpin, who had been our best run stopper inside. WR is another need, with the loss of Broenkow. And we probably need to replenish at LB, too – we are pretty thin there, too. We could go with a standout cornerback, also, as we may lose both our star starters in the next two years to monster contract demands. Sevral options – close to BPA for us, I think. I see two linebackers in the draft who suit my needs pretty well, and are pretty equally rated. When one goes at #21 overall, I decide to pull the trigger and move up to get the other guy, getting Detroit’s top two picks for our top two and a couple later selections. Code: Pick Pos Player Board Dash Sole Strg Agil Vol Draft After PostCamp 1.22 SLB Rufus Giles 5.7 4.52+ 36+ 18 7.03++ 73 18/69 18/67 to MLB 17/70 21/67 2.16 DE Anthony Carlson 4.2 4.97 27 30+ 7.28+ 93 22/50 22/49 to DT 22/54 24/51 4.32 CB Irv Givens 3.4 4.60 29 22++ 7.46 54 14/39 14/33 15/29 6.32 DT Charlie Elliott 2.7 5.07 20 32+ 8.50 68 23/29 23/29 23/30 URFA FB Skillethead Giese 3.3 4.78 28 16 7.29 63 16/39 16/39 18/40 URFA WR Norm Perkins 2.8 4.72 15 14 7.32 84 11/32 13/34 15/35 URFA WR Stephen Boynton 3.0 4.59 18 12 7.50 85 09/34 09/31 10/28 URFA DE Daryl Gonzalez 2.0 5.15 23 27 7.59 35 12/19 12/20 13/20 URFA DT Freddie Byette 2.8 5.19 25 24 7.57 26 12/32 12/33 14/33 URFA DT Eugene McCormick 3.1 5.16 15 24 8.15 91 10/35 09/30 10/24 URFA DT Dean Fennell 3.0 5.07 25 26 7.65 87 16/35 16/36 18/35 URFA LB Frankie Hughes 3.4 4.83 24 22 7.32 46 19/40 19/40 21/41 URFA MLB Deon Segura 2.5 4.81 14 18 7.60 28 07/27 08/27 09/22 DE Carlson is a run-stopper whom we quickly slide over to play DT, where he has some promise to step in for Sammy Halpin and play right away. I pick up a number of DL reaches, hoping to strike gold with one – the best candidate might be URFA Dean Fennell. In the late FA stages, we lock up everyone – LB Burt Veen gets an offer from Indy, so we have to pay him more than I had hoped, but everyone else is easy, including QB Huffman, who takes a decent three year deal, and all but ensures himself the starting job in a season. Training camp reveals – a little disappointment. I don’t see any real breakout candidates – all our draft picks are going to drop a bit, except DT Charlie Elliott, perhaps. WR Norm Perkins might be a keeper – he can help on special teams, at least. LB Frankie Hughes is going to move up and play at DE for us – he’s 277 pounds, and makes the switch pretty seamlessly. He might actually have some potential, and we are thirsty for cheap help at DE, of course. I also switch CB Carlos Harper, who isn’t a great coverman but does have potential to strong safety, where we are thin and need a body. We are already pretty dinged up as we prep for our opener, but once again have a veteran, cohesive ballclub. Our LB corps will be Westbrook, Veen, and Maxwell (stepping in at the sam, while Veen moves to the willie) – but all three guys are hurt, so we will have backup chumps in for a while. This season, I’m planning to start young Skillethead Giese at FB – he’s much more to my liking than Rick Beyer, as he won’t mess up the downfield passing game as much. I expect to see ol’ Skillethead (nice nick, too) develop nicely, and stay out of the way of the better players. Good boy. In our opener, we post a good win over NE wit 4 TD passes from Copeland, but lose DE Pat Wayne for three months. At four weeks and 4-0, we are really banged up on defense, with five starters out – but we keep on moving ahead, and pound unbeaten Buffalo 35-0. But in the Buffalo game, we lose Copeland – only for a few weeks, but it’s his first missed time in several seasons – with an elbow injury. In Huffman’s fist start at QB, we win on the road to Cleveland, behind 127 yards rushing from Bo Brewster. But then Huffman gets hurt the next week – and even our defense can’t win with super-green Ronald Sampson in there. After a bye week, we are home to New England, a game we’d really like to win. I decide against activating the improving Copeland until he’s totally ready to go. We are run over by the Pats 23-10, and slip to 6-2 on the season. Copeland is back, but we’re now without WR Bruce Pietrzyk – who has blown out a knee, and is gone for at least this season. What a career of wasted opportunities. We manage, though, to marhc through the rest of the season in good form, and reach the postseason with a solid 14-2 mark behind more great play from our defense, and of course from Mel Copeland. Code: Front Office Football 2004 2025 Summary for Miami Dolphins Record: 14-2 Winning Pct.: .875 Miami Dolphins Team Rank Rushes 377 30 Rushing Yards 1612 27 Yards Per Carry 4.27 10 Pass Attempts 614 1 Completions 384 1 Passing Yards 4262 2 Yards Per Attempt 6.94 17 3rd Down Conversions 41.6 16 (T) Points Per Game 25.1 3 Turnovers 24 19 (T) Turnover Margin +4 9 (T) Opponents Team Rank Rushes 433 10 Rushing Yards 1558 2 Yards Per Carry 3.59 2 Pass Attempts 544 26 Completions 296 7 Passing Yards 3148 2 Yards Per Attempt 5.78 1 3rd Down Conversions 36.9 2 Points Per Game 13.6 1 Turnovers 28 3 (T) Week Team Versus Oppnt 1 35 at NED 16 2 24 at TBY 10 3 20 IND 18 4 21 at CIN 11 5 35 BUF 0 6 21 at CLE 14 7 7 PIT 21 9 10 NED 23 10 16 BAL 10 11 34 at NYJ 3 12 26 CAR 13 13 24 at KCY 6 14 30 ATL 14 15 30 NYJ 6 16 38 at NOS 27 17 31 at BUF 27 Passing Pos Att Comp Yards Y/Att TD Int 14 Copeland QB 481 320 3651 7.59 34 7 13 Huffman QB 124 60 567 4.57 2 8 Team --- 614 384 4262 6.94 37 17 Rushing Pos Att Yards Y/Att TD 28 Brewster RB 199 902 4.53 6 38 Connell RB 112 392 3.50 1 14 Copeland QB 34 166 4.88 0 Team --- 377 1612 4.27 8 Receiving Pos Targ Catch Yards Y/Ctc YAC TD 85 Harney WR 136 88 1112 12.6 132 8 82 Barker WR 137 78 885 11.3 124 7 45 Wells TE 94 61 569 9.3 124 6 87 Horner WR 95 59 764 12.9 89 7 83 Perkins WR 53 32 373 11.6 41 2 29 Pietrzyk WR 34 22 266 12.0 31 3 Team --- 614 384 4262 11.0 661 37 Defense Pos Tack Asst Sack Hurr Ints Defn 41 Banks CB 80 15 1.0 0 5 23 49 Veen OLB 75 24 2.0 1 0 2 47 Harper S 71 32 0.0 0 3 13 25 Sims CB 59 9 0.0 2 2 21 93 Maxwell OLB 58 22 2.0 7 0 5 79 Ljunghammar DT 54 25 5.5 10 0 0 53 Giles ILB 52 12 2.5 3 0 1 35 Harper S 37 10 0.0 0 3 3 94 Benton OLB 36 9 0.0 1 0 3 55 Westbrook ILB 34 13 2.0 1 0 3 92 Jamison OLB 29 4 1.0 0 0 2 78 Curtis DE 24 13 4.5 8 0 0 96 Summers DE 22 13 4.5 11 0 0 72 Cowley DT 22 13 2.5 4 0 0 36 Manning S 22 5 0.0 0 1 1 40 Givens CB 18 3 1.0 0 0 3 42 Money CB 17 3 0.0 0 1 3 Team --- 839 265 40.0 60 17 88 On offense, we struggled without Copeland, but ended up okay for the season after all. Copeland had a pretty good year – his stats are for only 13 games, and include one where he played less than half—so the 34 TDs is pretty strong, really. Huffman was awful. Bo Brewster was on pace most of the year to top 1,000 yards rushing – which we haven not see inn quite some time. But he fell short as we shifted back to more passing down the stretch. WR Dave Harney, now apparently our best receiving target, topped the mark, though. Pretty good year of spreading it around, again. The defense was once again really tough - #2 against the run, #1 against the pass. CB Stephen Banks had a superstar season, leading the team in tackles as well as being our ace coverage man (his ratings are all 99 or better, save in returns and an 88 in endurance – he’s a monster). We failed to get the top-tier pressure on the QBs that we are used to (losing Pat Wayne hurt, but he’ll return for the playoffs). Our shuffled group of linebackers got the job done pretty well, including Jerome Maxwell in his first year as a starter – a late bloomer, since he’s an 11th year player at this point. DT Ljunghammar had another good year in the middle, but we need someone to step up to play next to him at DT. We’re ready for another run at the big one… Postseason Miami 19, Tennessee 3 – The defense came up huge here, holding them to 214 total yards and grabbing four turnovers along the way. The offense was a little flaccid, but we’ll take the win. Mel is hobbling on that knee again – but wild horses couldn’t keep him from playing on. Miami 34, Baltimore 7 – Another dominating defensive effort, wow. 260 yards and 3 turnovers give us all the room we need. Copeland is sharp again, throwing for 280 and 3 TD – and we’re in the big one again. Arizona was the team who ended our big win streak last season – now they are our rivals in the Superbowl. Arizona 31, Miami 17 – Copeland is 17 of 24 in the big game, and we are right in the game trailing 14-10 in the third quarter, when it all falls apart. Copeland is flattened and out with another injury to the same elbow that he hurt earlier in the season. With Huffman at the helm, we aren’t the team at all, and Arizona pulls away to get the comfortable win. A disappointing end to the season, and perhaps to the dynasty. But we did win four in a row, and 11 in 16 seasons. An 11 of 13 mark in the big game isn’t too bad, either – but of course we wanted this one, too. Mel Copeland is going to have to get used to something new. He’s on the second team of the all-pro squad after his 12+ game campaign. CB Stephen Banks makes the first team all-pro squad, after a fabulous season. That’s the end of our title run of four in a row – we’ll see where things go from here…

07-17-2004, 12:51 PM	#130
Barkeep49 Coordinator Join Date: Jan 2001 Location: Not too far away	I think Mel does put any other FOF player, including Darkiller's QB (whose name i am forgetting) and the immortal, not to mention immoral, Dean Hutson, to shame. I just can't see him sticking around for another season though. Last edited by Barkeep49 : 07-17-2004 at 12:51 PM.

07-17-2004, 07:24 PM	#132
QuikSand lolzcat Join Date: Oct 2000 Location: Annapolis, Md	MEL COPELAND PLAYER CARD Hometown: Springville, Utah College: Clemson Drafted: 2008 Round 1, #18 overall by Miami Statistics 18 seasons, 274 games played (all starts) 6,340 / 9,865 = 64.2% completions 75,824 passing yards = 7.68 ypa 578 touchdowns, 169 interceptions 1,074 carries for 6,505 yards = 6.0 ypc Career passer rating = 100.0 Record as starting QB = 282-41-0 Awards 2025 Retired as Legend of the Game 2025 All-league Second Team QB 2024 Superbowl MVP 2024 All-league First Team QB 2023 Solecismic MVP 2023 Superbowl MVP 2023 All-league First Team QB 2022 Solecismic MVP 2022 Superbowl MVP 2022 Offensive Player of the Year 2022 All-league First Team QB 2021 Solecismic MVP 2021 Superbowl MVP 2021 Offensive Player of the Year 2021 All-league First Team QB 2020 All-league First Team QB 2019 Solecismic MVP 2019 Superbowl MVP 2019 Offensive Player of the Year 2019 All-league First Team QB 2018 Superbowl MVP 2017 All-league First Team QB 2016 Solecismic MVP 2016 Superbowl MVP 2016 Offensive Player of the Year 2016 All-league First Team QB 2015 Solecismic MVP 2015 Superbowl MVP 2015 Offensive Player of the Year 2015 All-league First Team QB 2014 Solecismic MVP 2014 Offensive Player of the Year 2014 All-league First Team QB 2013 Solecismic MVP 2013 Superbowl MVP 2013 All-league First Team QB 2012 Solecismic MVP 2012 Superbowl MVP 2012 Offensive Player of the Year 2012 All-league First Team QB 2011 Solecismic MVP 2011 Offensive Player of the Year 2011 All-league First Team QB 2010 Solecismic MVP 2010 Superbowl MVP 2010 Offensive Player of the Year 2010 All-league First Team QB

07-17-2004, 07:26 PM	#133
QuikSand lolzcat Join Date: Oct 2000 Location: Annapolis, Md	After saving my game, I again ran the "end season" routine a few extra times, just to see if there was any chance that he would have stayed. Turns out he stayed in 3 out of 10 times I ran it.. just not the "official" one. Oh, well. Only thing missing from the career player card above is the inevitable HOF induction. Has there ever been a more secure lock for the HOF?

07-17-2004, 07:35 PM	#134
nfg22 College Benchwarmer Join Date: Mar 2004	I dont think he will make it

07-17-2004, 10:48 PM	#136
Vince Pro Starter Join Date: Aug 2001 Location: Willow Glen, CA	Amazing...truly amazing. 100.0 Career rating...fitting __________________ Every time a Dodger scores a run, an angel has its wings ripped off by a demon, and is forced to tearfully beg the demon to cauterize the wounds.The demon will refuse, and the sobbing angel will lie in a puddle of angel blood and feathers for eternity, wondering why the Dodgers are allowed to score runs.That’s not me talking: that’s science. McCoveyChronicles.com.

07-18-2004, 08:44 AM	#138
QuikSand lolzcat Join Date: Oct 2000 Location: Annapolis, Md	2026 We have one retirement. Mel Copeland. For a long time, I would recoil at the degree to which the QB position is overvalued in this game. I know it’s pretty indisputably #1, but I’ve always felt that the QB simply meant too much in FOF. I love to invest in other places, and to get by with quarterbacks who are values, or late round finds, or that sort of thing. Just seems more colorful. But I have to say – Mel Copeland is easily the best player I have ever had in any FOF career. The numbers speak for themselves, it’s been a staggering run. And it’s also very clear that quite a lot of the credit for this team’s dominance goes to Copeland – we have immediately struggled when using even our pretty solid backup quarterbacks over the years. His career records are all in another stratosphere beyond anything I’ve ever seen from a player in any career I’ve ever had – really leaps and bounds. So godspeed, Mr. Copeland. It would be so cool to have him come back as a coordinator or coach… My defensive coordinator is hired away by Philly to be their head coach – I offered the max my owner would allow, but they gave him the top job, which I could not do. We hire Baltimore’s guy – a 17 year veteran, who should be very good as well. We start the free agency period with only $3.3 million in space – and that’s without using the franchise tag on anyone. Renegotiations gets us to about $5.5 million – but nowhere near enough to manage the free agenct class we have to deal with this offseason. Even setting aside the monumental loss of QB Mel Copeland, we have a lot of other key players on the bubble here as well. CB Mickey Sims, DE Pat Wayne, and DT Roger Ljunghammar have all become important parts of our defense – losing two of those guys would really hurt. I decide that the guy we have to return is Ljunghammar – and that we can get by without Mickey Sims, and we simply won’t be able to afford Pat Wayne. I’ll wait all three guys out and hope their offers come to earth, but for now – my target is to match Ljunghammar if he gets pursued, but to let the others go. At CB, we have Arnie Money pretty ready to step in and start, so I feel okay there even if we lose Mickey Sims (a player I really like). Right away, DE Pat Wayne gets signed by Denver, and CB Mickey Sims is being pursued by Green Bay. In week two, DT Ljunghammar gets an offer from Cinti, and I go ahead and make my pitch to keep him as cheaply as I can. We get Ljunghammar re-signed to a pretty bonus-leaden contract, probably locking him to us for the next four years no matter what. And, CB Sims sees his Green bay offer sheet disappear – so we might have some shot there also. The early FA stages end – and Mickey Sims is getting more reasonable. What I’d really like is to see him accept a deal that would still allow us some hope of re-signing our other starting CB Stephen Banks, after his deal runs out following this season. In the draft – we probably need to help out the offense, really. Greg Huffman holds the starting QB job now, but based on his on-field results to date, that might be a tenuous hold. LT, WR, RB, and TE are all potential target areas, too. On defense – maybe an outside linebacker or a safety, and we can always use another decent defensive lineman, of course. I like a fair number of players who are available at our top pick, but decide to draft into a relative need area, and take the safety I liked best in this whole draft. When all but one of the defensive linemen I looked at in late round one is gone, I move up to the middle of round two to grab the quick-footed run stopper who I project to step right in and start for us at DE. Code: Pick Pos Player Board Dash Sole Strg Agil Vol Draft After PostCamp 1.31 SS Peter Brown 5.0 4.47+ 29 25++ 7.03+ 45 27/60 27/61 30/61 2.12 DE Gilbert Dotson 4.2 4.63++ 24 29+ 7.32+ 9 27/49 27/46 29/46 3.31 CB Wayne Ridings 4.3 4.42+ 25 18++ 7.00+ 77 22/51 23/55 to FS 24/64 29/71 4.31 DE Darren Bernard 3.6 4.86 19 31+ 7.47 1 26/41 26/41 27/41 6.31 WR Norbert Bowling 2.8 4.58 30+ 23++ 7.30 95 14/33 16/37 18/40 URFA QB Britt Meier 4.2 4.68 39 10 7.60 23 05/50 05/42 07/34 URFA RB Louis Dillon 3.0 4.70 24 30 7.35 74 23/34 23/34 25/35 URFA RB Winston Finch 3.1 4.80 17 12 7.25 23 21/36 21/33 21/30 URFA RB Charles Comer 3.2 4.74 23 17 7.27 40 20/36 19/32 To WR 13/33 14/27 URFA RG Louis Flowers 2.5 5.46 45 42 8.27 79 16/27 16/25 16/23 URFA RT C.J. Newman 2.9 5.56 28 43 7.72 64 16/33 16/29 17/28 URFA DE Mario Nesbit 3.3 4.85 36 27 7.88 33 21/44 21/37 23/37 URFA LB Tom Stimson 2.9 5.10 23 21 7.66 25 11/33 11/31 To SS 06/37 07/33 URFA LB Rico Poole 2.7 4.71 29 32 7.57 50 18/30 18/30 19/31 Well, despite my initial claims that the offense needed the help – we ended up piling on the defense with the early picks. Regardless, I like this crop a lot – several players I considered with my pick in the fourth round were there after the draft, so we have a number of intriguing guys – including bench press standouts LB Rico Poole, RB Louis Dillon, G Louis Flowers, and T CJ Newman. This was largely a draft dominated by pursuit of strength, as we are trying to get a shade tougher. Three weeks into late free agency, we are amidst signing rookies, but nothing is happening with CB Mickey Sims yet. He’s thinking $5m per year – I’m not. So, I make some more room – in part by releasing veteran DE Emmitt Summers, who started last season but really isn’t starting caliber any longer. We’ll be depending on young players at DE, but that helps us get CB Mickey Sims re-signed for a new deal. Training camp tells us a bit more of the story. We see a huge breakout from third round DB Wayne Ridings, who probably shows more potential than our top pick at safety, Peter Brown. So, the safety position quickly moves from a serious weakness to a potential strong suit. During the preseason, we get WR Bruce Pietrzyk back healthy – we could really use him back to 100% cfor this season, with our depleted receiving corps. I’m not expecting much, but if he really could play, that would be very nice. So, we take the field for our first season of the post-Copeland era, with QB Greg Huffman at the helm. His career record is an uninspiring 1-2, and his career passer rating is an equally uninspiring 42.3 – we’ll hope to improve on those numbers, pronto. One other change – after a great preseason, RB Lincoln Connell has been tabbed as the starting RB over Bo Brewster, so we’ll see two new faces in key backfield positions. We get two narrow wins in our first three games – but this is definitely not the same team at all. We make it to 6-2 at our halfway point, though, and are looking okay – Huffman is rightside-up with TDs and picks, and WR Dave Harney is off to a pretty good season thus far. A losing skid in the second half drops us to 7-5, though, and we relinquish the lead in the division standings. However, we get a win at home over Buffalo to get back on top in that fight. We finish up 10-6, enough for a postseason berth, but certainly not the caliber of team that we have grown accustomed to, by any means. (We haven’t lost 6 games in a season since 2009) But oddly enough, 10-6 turns out to be good enough for a bye week as the #2 seed in the AFC behind Pittsburgh. Code: Front Office Football 2004 2026 Summary for Miami Dolphins Record: 10-6 Winning Pct.: .625 Miami Dolphins Team Rank Rushes 377 29 Rushing Yards 1672 25 Yards Per Carry 4.43 6 Pass Attempts 657 1 Completions 388 1 Passing Yards 4119 1 Yards Per Attempt 6.26 28 3rd Down Conversions 40.2 24 (T) Points Per Game 22.6 6 (T) Turnovers 28 25 (T) Turnover Margin -3 21 Opponents Team Rank Rushes 417 3 Rushing Yards 1403 1 Yards Per Carry 3.36 1 Pass Attempts 541 27 Completions 255 1 Passing Yards 3285 4 Yards Per Attempt 6.07 1 3rd Down Conversions 31.9 1 Points Per Game 14.5 2 Turnovers 25 14 (T) Week Team Versus Oppnt 1 10 at NYJ 9 2 6 CHI 19 3 24 at IND 19 4 15 at BUF 21 5 20 SDO 6 6 31 DEN 0 8 34 at KCY 13 9 17 at OAK 16 10 31 NED 3 11 6 NYJ 20 12 12 at MIN 17 13 34 BAL 35 14 33 DET 9 15 24 BUF 6 16 22 at GBY 26 17 43 at NED 14 Passing Pos Att Comp Yards Y/Att TD Int 13 Huffman QB 653 386 4107 6.28 26 21 Team --- 657 388 4119 6.26 26 21 Rushing Pos Att Yards Y/Att TD 38 Connell RB 152 643 4.23 5 28 Brewster RB 119 494 4.15 4 13 Huffman QB 49 250 5.10 2 Team --- 377 1672 4.43 13 Receiving Pos Targ Catch Yards Y/Ctc YAC TD 85 Harney WR 156 91 1056 11.6 132 7 82 Barker WR 110 68 779 11.4 94 1 45 Wells TE 94 57 533 9.3 107 6 29 Pietrzyk WR 104 53 732 13.8 105 5 27 Beyer FB 74 51 371 7.2 111 3 87 Horner WR 64 34 310 9.1 38 3 Team --- 656 388 4119 10.6 699 26 Defense Pos Tack Asst Sack Hurr Ints Defn 55 Westbrook ILB 91 28 5.5 5 0 7 93 Maxwell OLB 77 17 5.0 11 1 8 25 Sims CB 69 17 1.0 0 4 29 41 Banks CB 60 26 0.0 0 8 33 22 Ridings S 59 25 2.0 2 0 14 79 Ljunghammar DT 55 17 8.0 7 0 0 49 Veen OLB 45 17 1.0 1 0 6 47 Harper S 44 14 0.0 0 0 11 99 Yates DT 39 21 4.5 4 0 0 42 Money CB 32 7 0.0 0 3 4 21 Brown S 28 13 0.0 0 1 4 91 Dotson DE 27 8 7.5 13 0 0 76 Nesbit DE 26 15 6.5 9 0 0 78 Curtis DE 18 6 2.5 7 0 0 35 Harper S 18 3 2.0 0 0 1 92 Jamison OLB 17 7 0.0 2 0 0 82 Barker WR 16 0 0.0 0 0 0 Team --- 807 251 48.0 68 17 119 So, Greg Huffman – okay, we can make do with a so-so quarterback, I guess. 4,000 yards passing with a bunch of mistakes is okay. We didn’t really have anyone around him step up and be counted – we don’t have a single standout player at the skill positions, at all. So, we’ll be okay with a pass-heavy offense. Our defense, though, continues to turn heads -- #1 in yards allowed per rush and per attempt. Great season. Our top cornerbacks, Banks and Sims, paired up for 62 passes defensed – that has to be the highest figure I have ever seen, period: 33 is a league all-time record, and 29 is the fourth-highest figure in league history. Now that’s a pair of shut-downs, which makes for a tough time passing against us, period. We shared the load in the pass rush, but still were pretty solid there, and we got a nice season out of Cole Westbrook again in the middle. Great season by our defense – maybe the best we have had. Unsung heroes: WR Bruce Pietrzyk continues to excel in the return game, posting a league-high average in punt returns… DE Gilbert Dotson played well his first season, getting pressure from the right side with only part time chances to play… DE Mario Nesbit shared the platoon with Sotson, and provided help against the run as well as the pass… S Wayne Ridings stepped in and played well his first year, and our two rookies have the reins as veteran leaders Derek Harper and Drew Griffith are both on IR. Postseason Miami 24, Houston 13 – Legendary RB Amos Sherman isn’t enough for Houston to topple us, despite his 67 yards. We play a nearly error-free game, and come away with the upper hand. Miami 6, Pittsburgh 0 – We need absolutely everything our defense can give us, and we get it here. We manage only 151 yards on offense, but hold Pitt to 186… we are 2 for 2 on field goals, they are 0 for 1. Wow. Miami 27, Carolina 6 – Inexplicably, we get to take home the title once again. Greg Huffman is 28 of 40 for 265 and 2 TDs to get the MVP honors, and we manage to get through the playoffs without a single turnover. CBs Stephen Banks and Mickey Sims both make the all-pro team, Banks as a first teamer. QB Huffman gets the Superbowl MVP, and that’s our only representation on the awards board. Surprising finish to a predictable season. We certainly don’t have the offense to dominate, but when our defense plays this well and we don’t make mistakes on the other side, we’re a tough out.

07-18-2004, 04:11 PM	#140
QuikSand lolzcat Join Date: Oct 2000 Location: Annapolis, Md	I know it's the system in part -- I've worked on the gameplan for some time, and probably more importantly, I have always been looking to acquire players who match up well with the specific needs of this gameplan. So, it stands to reason that there is a certain element of "system" behind the success. Plus, we have cohesion through-the-roof for this team, which is bound to have a positive effect, too, though the degree is obviously uncertain.

07-19-2004, 10:56 AM	#141
Warhammer Pro Starter Join Date: Feb 2004 Location: Dayton, OH	Cohesion is one of those items that people tend to overlook. I have had a few teams on which I had great talent, but poor cohesion, and every close game I lost. I had teams with great cohesion and poor talent, but if I stayed close, I normally won.

07-19-2004, 12:59 PM	#142
Kevin High School JV Join Date: Oct 2000 Location: Nova Scotia	Those stats are just amazing. I hope the Hall of Fame doesn't find out Mel was betting on his own games to supplement his income because his oppressive GM kept putting the Franchise tag on him. __________________ It seems more like today than it did all day yesterday.

07-19-2004, 01:13 PM	#143
rjolley College Starter Join Date: Dec 2000 Location: Roseville, CA	Great dynasty, QS. Enjoyed reading the career of Mel Copeland. Hope you keep it going for awhile to see if the team can keep producing titles.

07-19-2004, 09:34 PM	#144
QuikSand lolzcat Join Date: Oct 2000 Location: Annapolis, Md	2027 Okay, we’re getting the hang of this post-Mel thing. One quick update – I have neglected to mention a couple of HOF inductees from our team. DE Tommie Browder and DT Courtney Malan came aboard together, and were titanic playing together on our line. They both get into the HOF – that was a great draft day, as we parlayed the #1 overall pick into picks #4 and #5 to pick up two DL studs, who both paid off in spades. We start off the new season, and look over the retirement list: we have two names on there. LB Burt Veen was a first round pick who needed a few seasons to develop, but took over as our strong-side starter in his 6th year and played well for us from that point on, garnering 732 tackles and 66.5 sacks. SS Drew Griffith was an unheralded DB we grabbed as a free agent, who just managed to stick around, play pretty well, and developed into a team leader. He notched 107 starts, 13 interceptions, 431 tackles in 15 seasons. I use the tag on CB Stephen Banks – we will make every reasonable effort to lock him up to a long term deal. The tag offer puts us down to $7.2m to spend, though – and we have quite a number of free agents, including our two remaining starters at LB (in addition to Veen, who has retired). Our top targets are: LT Eddie Wickes, MLB Cole Westbrook, SLB Jerome Maxwell, RG Melvin Ahn, WR Brant Barker, and LG Leroy Blackwell – all starters. I decide that we probably cannot afford Eddie Wickes, and we have 4th year man Jon Manning ready to step in – so I won’t be putting up $9-10m a year for Wickes. If he changes his tune, we’ll talk. LB Westbrook also has a backup behind him – Rufus Gules has been on the bench for two years after being taken with our top draft pick, and he’ ready to step in when we need him. I decide to once again sit back and see who gets interest on the market, and only then decide whether I want to match. This is going to be a fairly flexible season for free agency, so I have the luxury of sitting back, with bucks to spend if we need to. My inaction, though, costs me LT Eddie Wickes right away – he signs a huge deal with Atlanta. Would we have matched it? Almost certainly not, but it would have been nice to have a chance to think about it. He has battled injuries, but he was very good when he was able to play. I do put in an early offer for WR Brant Barker, and lock him up to an affordable three year contract. After a few weeks, I have to outbid Cinti for RG Melvin Ahn, which I do to keep the unit together. But with no bids in for guys like LB Jerome Maxwell and LB Cole Westbrook, I am getting optimistic that both will return, in time. But we head into the rookie draft with other things on our mind. I think we need to get an impact player in this draft, and I think we need him on the defensive line. I have assembled a bunch of junk there, but we don’t have a real standout player on the DL. It would be very good to grab such a player in this draft – if I can do so without dealing away the entire draft, I plan to move up to get an impact player for the defensive front. If not – we’ll look at a WR or OL with our top pick, wherever we get better value. I target two defensive linemen who would be worth the jump up – not a very deep draft there, I fear. I’ll wait for one of them to go off the board, and then see what it would take – but I expect I can’t make this big a move. Turns out I’m right – I try to deal up to #4, but the price is just too steep, and I watch the top two defensive linemen go off the board by that very pick. Tough luck. I turn my attention to WR, where there are a few pretty solid guys in this draft. Moving up to #11 isn’t as hard as #4 was – and we pull the trigger to get there to take the faster of the two standouts I see. We even keep our second rounder on hand, for a (hopefully) useful player as well. Code: Pick Pos Player Board Dash Sole Strg Agil Vol Draft After PostCamp 1.11 WR Cris Cascini 6.5 4.42+ 33 12 6.87++ 66 37/71 37/70 36/70 2.32 LB Tyrus Newhart 4.1 4.85 18 25 7.38+ 82 24/48 25/48 to DE 26/59 28/56 4.32 SLB Lewis Woodard 3.4 4.58 14 18 7.33 4 23/39 23/38 24/37 URFA QB Burt Waas 3.2 4.69 36 14 7.40 37 17/37 17/40 21/43 URFA RB Tommy Hatcher 2.4 4.62 26 9 7.33 63 17/26 17/23 17/22 URFA RB Jon Harper 3.2 4.77 15 9 7.38 12 26/35 26/33 26/30 URFA RB Bryan Samuels 2.6 4.90 29 16 7.52 26 20/29 20/27 To WR 15/35 16/30 URFA TE James Shannon 3.4 5.07 29 24 7.81 80 13/39 13/35 14/31 URFA RT Jessie Horn 2.9 5.14 26 29 7.79 1 10/34 10/37 13/41 URFA DT Marcus Daniels 3.2 4.93 13 26 7.62 14 11/37 11/37 13/37 URFA MLB Shawn Dotson 2.8 4.74 26 23 7.56 90 20/32 18/28 20/28 URFA SS Craig Hennessee 3.2 4.82 23 16 7.32 48 14/39 14/36 15/33 URFA FS Dean Doyle 2.9 4.68 32 13 7.21 81 17/33 16/30 To CB 12/27 13/24 When I get to my second round pick, I’m shocked by the several pretty-good receivers around, and at the utter void at DE. We probably could have done better selecting one of the decent DE in round one, and gotten a decent wideout here. Alas. I end up taking a heavy linebacker, with hopes that he can switch to DE and become a pass rusher for us. Fortunately, the switch goes pretty well – he looks like he may well step right in and start. Probably not a major impact player, but new DE Tyrus Newhart might give us a little boost in the pass rush. In the URFA crop – I like the looks of QB Burt Waas (not Waas) and pick up a few guys with some potential, including RT Jessie Horn, who will be our top reserve tackle right away. In late free agency, we lock up MLB Cole Westbrook for two more years, and later follow suit with SLB Jerome Maxwell. Both should end their careers with us, I expect. LG Leroy Blackwell takes a three year deal, and will stay in as our starter there. We actually wrap up every single player on our roster – and head into camp with a bulging roster of 63 players. Into the preseason, we’ll be looking at a number of young players. I move young LB Rufus Giles to the weak side, where he will (hopefully) start this season, and start developing his fairly considerable talent. I have to release WR Chad Horner – we’re just out of slots, and he’s getting pushed out of his role anyway. An 11th year guy with no leadership, no mentoring and not enough ability to play just isn’t worth much. That’s the last guy out – and we are ready for the season. On opening day, Greg Huffman zings five TD passes to crush Buffalo, 35-3. In week 2, though, we lose to Dallas, who are led by QB Gabe Glenn, another former Dolphin. After three weeks, MLB Cole Westbrook goes down with an injury. So, Rufus Glenn is moved back to the middle, where he will have to start the rest of the way, it seems. We go on without both Maxwell and Westbrook – our LB corps is in shambles, really. Regardless, we go on winning – and get to a big matchup in week 12, where we give Philly their first loss of the year. A follow-up win in Pittsburgh puts us in really good shape to claim a bye week – we’re one game up on Oakland for the conference top spot. We run the streak of wins out farther, ans wrap up another excellent season at 15-1. This team just keeps on ticking… Code: Front Office Football 2004 2027 Summary for Miami Dolphins Record: 15-1 Winning Pct.: .937 Miami Dolphins Team Rank Rushes 388 31 Rushing Yards 1614 28 Yards Per Carry 4.15 14 Pass Attempts 635 1 Completions 387 1 Passing Yards 4474 1 Yards Per Attempt 7.04 10 3rd Down Conversions 41.4 12 Points Per Game 25.6 1 Turnovers 24 13 (T) Turnover Margin +6 10 (T) Opponents Team Rank Rushes 432 6 (T) Rushing Yards 1461 2 (T) Yards Per Carry 3.38 1 Pass Attempts 518 22 Completions 263 1 Passing Yards 3034 2 (T) Yards Per Attempt 5.85 1 3rd Down Conversions 31.3 2 Points Per Game 13.0 1 Turnovers 30 7 Week Team Versus Oppnt 1 35 BUF 3 2 16 at DAL 21 3 30 SDO 27 4 24 at NED 10 5 27 at JAX 24 6 17 TEN 13 7 31 at BUF 17 8 41 IND 10 10 35 at HOU 0 11 35 at NYJ 14 12 16 PHI 15 13 19 at PIT 14 14 17 at NYG 15 15 16 NED 7 16 15 WAS 12 17 37 NYJ 7 Passing Pos Att Comp Yards Y/Att TD Int 13 Huffman QB 628 384 4460 7.10 30 21 Team --- 635 387 4474 7.04 30 21 Rushing Pos Att Yards Y/Att TD 38 Connell RB 187 738 3.94 10 28 Brewster RB 113 401 3.54 1 13 Huffman QB 64 407 6.35 3 Team --- 388 1614 4.15 15 Receiving Pos Targ Catch Yards Y/Ctc YAC TD 45 Wells TE 119 80 812 10.1 191 5 85 Harney WR 130 78 1075 13.7 136 8 29 Pietrzyk WR 107 55 709 12.8 111 2 27 Beyer FB 61 50 299 5.9 60 5 86 Cascini WR 92 50 621 12.4 82 4 38 Connell RB 31 23 129 5.6 78 3 83 Perkins WR 38 23 376 16.3 76 0 82 Barker WR 42 19 336 17.6 59 2 Team --- 635 387 4474 11.5 799 30 Defense Pos Tack Asst Sack Hurr Ints Defn 47 Harper S 89 25 1.0 0 5 19 22 Ridings S 74 28 0.0 0 0 14 92 Jamison OLB 72 18 0.0 0 1 3 41 Banks CB 68 17 0.0 0 5 26 79 Ljunghammar DT 52 23 7.5 7 0 0 53 Giles ILB 45 29 1.0 2 0 2 99 Yates DT 43 19 4.5 3 0 0 59 Newhart DE 42 11 11.0 8 0 1 90 Woodard OLB 41 11 3.5 4 1 6 42 Money CB 34 6 0.5 0 2 10 91 Dotson DE 29 9 8.5 14 0 0 35 Harper S 28 3 0.0 0 2 3 25 Sims CB 27 9 0.0 0 1 13 94 Benton OLB 25 7 0.0 1 0 0 Team --- 824 248 48.0 47 17 101 We’re not all that efficient on offense, but we still manage to score more points than anybody out there. Huffman continues to make mistakes, but we are still pretty prolific inn the passing game – system, personnel, whatever – it works. Lincoln Connell had a pretty nice season, but he’s just another fill-in guy at Rb in this offense, really. The defense held the opposition to 3.21 yards per carry – a really strong number, even for us. Tops in yards per attempt, too – this defense remains a monster, no matter how you slice it. DE Newhart had a pretty nice rookie season, stepping right into the starting lineup at RDE. The LB group played okay – with everyone in and out all year, and eventually Cole Westbrook out for good, I think. S Derek Harper played great, after a bad injury last year that had us scared – the secondary was outstanding even after Mickey Sims went down. Unsung heroes: WR Norm Perkins is quietly earning more time – he’ll stay in our plans in the years to come… DE Gilbert Dotson is developing rapidly into a serious threat on the end… CB Arnie Money came off the injured list to start for Mickey Sims, and looked great in there… Postseason Miami 31, Cincinnati 3 – Lincoln Connell gets his first 100-yard game, at a good time. Bruce Pietrzyk has 129 yards receiving, and we keep this one in control the whole way. Miami 10, Cleveland 7 – Our defense gets all the credit here, and our only TD when DE Tyrus Newhart scoops up a fumble and takes it home. We win it with a buzzer-beater FG, and move on. (whew) Miami 24, Philadelphia 13 – We bring it down again, with a great game from LB Jerome Maxwell earning him a rare MVP trophy for a defensive player. 15 tackles and a sack will do that – the announcer called his name an awful lot. Bruce Pietrzyk has 150 yards in a pretty big game – we handle thr Eagles again and take another title. Greg Huffman takes his proper position as the first team QB in the league – it’s a little weird, but it’s what the Miami QB is supposed to do, right? TE Jerry Wells is a second team selection, as is S Derek Harper. Well, now we have to wonder where we go from here. Greg Huffman seems to have thing well in control, and now he’ll be looking to get paid. I’m really not convinced that he’s really anything special. Could this team keep on winning big even with a complete novice in there at QB throwing 600 passes a year? Hard to imagine, really. But this defense, posting monster numbers each season, is getting it done year in and year out.

07-20-2004, 04:13 AM	#145
MIJB#19 Coordinator Join Date: Oct 2000 Location: Maassluis, Zuid-Holland, Netherlands	That was a a great move with LB->DE Tyrus Newhart, QS. Question: What's the deal with picking up 3 URFA rookie RBs every second draft, just a bit of roster filling, or some success with converting RB to WR for a price you can't get "real" WRs for at the same talent level? ("Bite" me if I missed your explanation for doing so.) __________________ * 2005 Golden Scribe winner for best FOF Dynasty about IHOF's Maassluis Merchantmen * Former GM of GEFL's Houston Oilers and WOOF's Curacao Cocktail

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