New Dolphins Career

[JDStang]

I have read this entire thread twice... why... it's awesome, i hope you either keep it going or start another. Either way i enjoy the way you put it all together and hope to hear more.

[burnum]

Alright, I'm back...

Game Review:

Dolphins 31
Bills 13

We scored 2 early TDs to go up 14-0 in Q1 and held the Bills' rushing attack in check all game (Lynch: 14 for 20). Once we established that lead, Buffalo was forced to pass more and Matt Hasselbeck moved the ball surprisingly well. He led them to 2 consecutive long drives to make it 14-10 but just as the Bills seemed to be back in the game, Sanrick Raines returned an interception for a TD to make it a two-score game again. In Q4 I changed my playcalling to get more pressure on the QB and it worked well. Hasselbeck picked my pass defense apart when he had time to throw in the 2nd and 3rd quarter but he was forced into some bad throws under pressure in the fourth.
Offensively, we relied on the rushing game with the carries shared between RBs Kenton Kasom, Andre Granderson and Wildcat QB Josh Johnson. QB John Scotland only threw the ball when needed and had a solid game without any turnovers. He made one great play in the 4th quarter, eluding a defender and connecting with Darrell Ogunleye for a long gain. Ogunleye was finally tracked down from behind deep into Buffalo territory.
On defense rookie OLB Mychal Greenlaw had a coming out game with 7 tackles and 2 sacks. CB Waddell held Lee Evans to only 1 catch for 11 yds.

Record: 12-1


During the week:
FS Sanrick Raines was named AFC Defensive Player of the week with 8 tackles and an INT returned for a TD.
OLB Shawne Merriman suffered an injury in the game against Buffalo and will be out for 3 weeks. He'll be replaced by rookie Mychal Greenlaw.


Game Preview, Week 14 at Denver:
The Broncos provide a difficult task. Their passing attack features several speedy WRs, including rookie sensation Syndrick Johnson who already has more than 1500 yds receiving. Their rushing offense also relies on speed with Cyrus Jones (he had a Reggie Bush comparison when he came out of FSU 2 drafts ago). On defense Champ Bailey is getting up in age but is still a great player.
As a subplot Brandon Marshall and Elvis Dumervil return to their former team.


Game Review:

Dolphins 13
Broncos 28

Quite a disappointing game. Our ground game worked well early on but QB John Scotland was intecepted twice in the opposing endzone, so Denver was up 21-7 at halftime and we had to focus more on the pass in the second half. Jay Cutler tore our defense apart, throwing for 305 yds, 4 TDs and 1 INT. Rookie WR Syndrick Johnson was unstoppable, racking up 11 receptions for over 200 yds against DeMario Waddell. He caught all 4 Denver TDs. If you can't stop the opponent from passing all over the field, you usually don't have a chance to win - that's exactly what happened.

Record: 12-2


During the week:
Despite our loss to the Broncos we clinched a playoff birth.


Game Preview, week 15 at New York Giants:
Both teams are missing a very good pass rusher (Merriman & Osi Umenyora). Eli Manning is having a great season so far for the Giants and he has some nice weapons in Plaxico Burress, Steve Smith, Mario Manningham and Kevin Boss. The ground game relies on a smash & dash attack with Jacobs and Bradshaw. They have a very good O-Line and defense but their interior D-Line might be a weak link. Also their DEs (Tuck & Kiwanuka) are good pass rushers but vulnerable against the run. Let's see of we can get something going on the ground early... FS Kenny Phillips and CB Aaron Ross (both 90+ OVR) should be avoided in the passing game.

[burnum]

Game Review:

Dolphins 10
Giants 24

An old saying in football is that the team that wins the turnover battle usually wins the game. We lost 3 fumbles and threw a pick-6 while the Giants didn't turn the ball over at all. They had 2 long scoring plays, where the ballcarrier (RB on one play, WR on the other) broke free from a tackle and took it all the way. Aside from that we held them in check, their scores came from a pick-6, a 70yd run and a 54yd catch and run. Unfortunately, our offense didn't produce any big plays as our longest run of the game went for 16 yds and our longest pass for 30. Justin Tuck had a great game for the Giants with 4 TFL, a sack and 2 FF. For our defense, Gino King and David Finley had 2 sacks each. It seems that I can't get any pressure to the QB without using an all-out blitz. There might be a huge changeup coming to our defensive playbook in the offseason...

Record: 12-3


During the week:
The Pro Bowl voting is in and the following Dolphins are invited to make the trip to Hawaii (* denotes a Pro Bowl starter):
QB John Scotland
FB Korey Hall*
WR Darrell Ogunleye
LB Gino King*
FS Sanrick Raines*
SS Marcus Lopez
K Dan Carpenter*
RET Demario Waddell

I felt that G Alfred Craig would also deserve to go but, as usual, most of the O-Line spots in the AFC are occupied by all the Chargers' guys.


Game Preview, week 17 vs the green Jersey boys:
Shawne Merriman is still out, I hope he'll be back for the playoffs. The Jets are the worst team in the league and they're missing several starters. Among them are their starting HB, FB and RT. Anything but a clear win would be a disappointment and I hope to be able to rest some of my starters in the second half if we have a solid lead. We should be able to handle Sage Rosenfels and LenDale White (although he perfectly fits their scheme).


Game Review:

Dolphins 10
Jets 17

This is a shocker! John Scotland threw 3 INTs (two of them to Revis), Dan Carpenter missed 2 easy FGs and we had a punt return for a TD wiped out by a penalty. The team is really slumping right now, losing the final 3 games of the regular season. Let's hope they can refocus for the playoffs. We had no problems to stop the Jets' running game but Sage Rosenfels did a surprisingly good job in moving the ball when needed. He converted several 3rd & long passes and didn't turn the ball over. In the last 2 games we have a combined turnover ratio of 0-7. If we continue to play like that in the playoffs our season will soon be over and changes will be coming in the offseason.

Final Record: 12-4, top seed in the AFC


Note: I'm planning to change my defensive playbook to a 4-3 base after the season. Can anyone give me some advice how to do it properly? At the moment I only have one single 4-3 play in my PB (4-3 Cover 2). Any way to add more plays?

[burnum]

2011 Season stats:

Passing:
John Scotland 59% comp., 33 TD, 20 INT, 4282 yds, 92.7 rating
Josh Johnson 66% comp., 2 TD, 0 INT, 604 yds, 125.6 rating as a wildcat QB

Rushing:
Kenton Kasom 211-639 (3.0 avg), 8 TD, 7 FUM
Andre Granderson 35-150 (4.2 avg), 0 TD, 1 FUM
Josh Johnson 33-104 (3.1 avg), 2 TD, 4 FUM
Granderson's downhill style seems to work better for my offense, his role will increase next season.

Receiving:
Darrell Ogunleye 78-1428, 9 TD, 19 drops
Brandon Marshall 74-1250, 7 TD, 15 drops
Kenton Kasom 62-836, 5 TD, 9 drops
Skyler Cofield 36-396, 5 TD, 13 drops
Vernon Davis 33-348, 4 TD, 2 drops
James Hardy 31-407, 3 TD, 1 drop

Defense:
Tackles: Jeremy Leman 78, Ellis Hobbs 76, Sanrick Raines 73, Gino King 69
Sacks: Gino King 14 (leads NFL), David Finley 5, Elvis Dumervil 4
INTs: Sanrick Raines 9, Marcus Lopez 5, DeMario Waddell 3

Special Teams:
Dan Carpenter 27-32, 52 yd was his longest
Brandon Fields 52 punts, 41.4 avg, 34.5 net, no blocks but only 4 inside 20
DeMario Waddell 26.2 yds on KR, 8.8 yds on PR, no TDs


JaMarcus Russell threw for 6072 yds and 59 TDs in Gary Hammermill's offense.
Marshawn Lynch led the league in rushing with 1525 yds and 15 TDs.
rookie Syndrick Johnson led the NFL in receiving with 123 for 2000 yds and 20 TDs & 25 drops, playing in Denver's offense where the #1 WR always has unreal numbers.


Next game:
Divisional Playoffs vs Denver

Game Preview:
The Broncos really crushed us 3 weeks ago, we had no chance to stop the Cutler to Johnson connection. Obviously my main focus this week will be to stop that from happening again. Syndrick Johnson will see a lot of double teams which might make us vulnerable to the run (Cyrus Jones).
Kenton Kasom is out for the game so Andre Granderson has to carry the load. This probably means less outside runs and more between the tackle running. Denver plays a man cover defense, so expect a lot of curl routes and slants in the passing game. If John Scotland can't stop his recent slump, we might run more wildcat plays with Josh Johnson. Shawne Merriman is back in action, hopefully he can boost our mediocre pass rush.

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Game Recap:

Broncos 7
Dolphins 28

Both teams scored on long, time consuming opening drives to make it 7-7 midway through the 2nd quarter. As already predicted in the pre-game post, I double covered their star #1 WR all game. I had Waddell on him and either a LB or S. This strategy worked great as we held him to only 2 catches for 24 yds and Jay Cutler struggled to find other receivers, taking too long to get his passes off and getting sacked 4 times in the game. Gino King had a great game on defense, he recorded a sack, recovered a fumble and returned an INT for a TD in the 4th quarter to seal the game.
John Scotland threw for 203 yds, without any scores or picks but he simply wasn't asked to do any more because we were able to run the ball with great success against their 4-3 man defense. The workload was shared between Andre Granderson (14-66, TD), Sedrick McCoy (13-91, TD) and Josh Johnson (6-35) with Granderson mostly running inside out of power formations and Johnson/McCoy working the outside on option runs.
On the downside, Dan Carpenter missed 2 makeable FGs, which doesn't help him getting a new contract after the season. I'll probably let him test the market before making an offer. Shawne Merriman played well in the first half but got injured again. I don't see a future for him with this team because he just can't stay on the field. If I can get a decent offer for him and the cap hit isn't too big I'll probably trade him in the offseason.


During the week:
Gary Hammermill and his Raiders lost to the Colts in overtime in the other AFC matchup. So we'll play the Colts in the AFC Conference game. In the NFC it's the Philly at the Bucs.


Game Preview, AFC Conference Championship vs Indianapolis:
Shawne Merriman & Kenton Kasom return from minor injuries so we are at full strength. Indy has it's 2 top RBs injured but they're a pure passing team anyway.
The gameplan is put together quite simple: stop Peyton Manning and don't turn the ball over!!! As long as Manning is their QB, the Colts will always have a dangerous passing attack. The same applies to their defense. With Tony Dungy and his Cover 2 scheme they always have a great defense. Especially their secondary is amazing, so I hope John Scotland picks his opportunities wisely.


Game Review:

Colts 18
Dolphins 16

What a strange game... The great Peyton Manning threw 3 INTs in the first half but we couldn't capitalize on that. It looked as if we might have a lead at halftime but a fumble on a punt return set up a short TD to give Indy their first lead just before halftime. In the second half both defenses continued to dominate and after giving up a safety on a bad Kenton Kasom run (he tried to do a Barry Sanders impersonation from his own 7, running backwards and getting tackled in our own endzone) we were up 16-15 with 2 minutes to go. Peyton Manning found Reggie Wayne on a curl route and Ellis Hobbs missed the tackle. 37 yds later Wayne was brought down at our 20, setting up a short FG to give the Colts a 1 point lead with 48 seconds to go, out of timeouts. DeMario Waddell returned the kickoff to midfield so all we needed was about 15-20 yards to give Dan Carpenter a chance for a game winning FG. Unfortunately, John Scotland was sacked on 1st down and threw incompletions on 2nd and 3rd down. We converted a 4th and 16 to get to the 33 but before we were able to send out the kicker the clock had expired and the game was lost. 5 more seconds may have won us the game...


The season is over for us, the Colts will play the Buccaneers in the Superbowl.

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Offseason Roundup:
The Buccaneers beat the Colts 20-6 in the Superbowl.
I tried to bring back my entire coaching staff but unfortunately DB coach Todd Bowles and trainer Robert Wyman decided the want to move on. Bowles will coach the linebackers in Washington and Wyman now works for the Vikings
Chuck Cecil was hired as our new DB coach and Ian Baker is our new trainer.


Free Agency:
placed the 1st & 3rd round tender on RFA FS Sanrick Raines (86 OVR)
resigned LB Maurice Holt (79 OVR) to a 5 yr contract.
resigned K Dan Carpenter (83 OVR) to a 1 yr contract.
signed DE Mario Williams (91 OVR) to a 5 yr, 48 mil. contract.
signed WR DeSean Jackson (82 OVR) to a 4 yr, 19 mil. contract.
signed TE Joshua Brandt (77 OVR) to a 5 yr, 10 mil. contract.
lost FA CB Cortland Finnegan (82 OVR) to the Saints.

[JDStang]

Tough luck with that loss to Indy, they are a pain most of the time but at least you kept in till the end.

BTW signing DE Mario Williams.......... EPIC AWESOME!!!

I am a huge Mario fan, he is a beast in the game just as much as in real life. He can single handedly take over the game, especially if you move him to LE. For some reason the pass rush in the game is backwards, normally the RE and the ROLB are the sack masters but the O-Line AI blocks the weak side very good, so if you put your pass rushers on the strong side they will do way better. Either way he is a great addition!

[burnum]

Thanks for the feedback. Yes, I know about the inverted pass rush bug. I have indeed moved Mario Williams to LE, because I have David Finlay (89 OVR, 6'6, 286 lbs) at RE. Now I have Finlay (89), Tribble (90) and Williams (91) as my 3 DL. I'll give the 3-4 scheme another shot but if I still can't get to the QB without selling out on the blitz with that DL I'll probably move to a 4-3 later.
I know that in a 3-4 the DL are usually not the ones to get big sack numbers. But those great DL should at least occupy enough blockers to enable my OLBs (Dumervil & Greenlaw) to get to the QB more often.