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Marcel Louis-JacquesESPN
MIAMI — The Miami Dolphins haven’t fielded a top-10 offense since 1995, the longest drought in the NFL. If that streak extends another season, it won’t be for lack of talent.
In a 24-hour span, Miami signed Pro Bowl tackle Terron Armstead to a five-year contract, then traded five draft picks to the Kansas City Chiefs for All-Pro wide receiver Tyreek Hill on Wednesday to officially become an AFC contender.
Considering the moves playoff hopefuls such as the Chargers (Khalil Mack), Broncos (Russell Wilson), Bills (Von Miller), Raiders (Davante Adams, Chandler Jones) and Browns (Deshaun Watson) have all made, Dolphins general manager Chris Grier needed to make a splash in coach Mike McDaniel’s first season.
McDaniel made it clear from his introductory news conference what his team’s needs were. When asked about his belief in third-year quarterback Tua Tagovailoa, he reminded everyone listening that Tagovailoa was not solely responsible for this offense’s success.
“I haven’t seen a quarterback win a football game by himself ever, really,” he said. “He has to have somebody to throw to. He better not be getting tackled before he throws, so somebody better block.”
With Hill and Armstead, alone, the Dolphins are better off in both departments — but these are just the latest moves in what has been a weeklong offensive identity shift.
The Dolphins improved their backfield by adding Chase Edmonds and Raheem Mostert, bolstered their offensive line with Connor Williams and added another speedster at receiver in Cedrick Wilson. Paired with Armstead and Hill, that’s six likely new starters taking the field for Miami next season, most of whom have one thing in common — speed.
“Absolutely blazing speed fast,” fullback Alec Ingold said. “Everyone’s going to be running. Shoot, the entire offense is going to be running.”
And Ingold, another likely starter for Miami in 2022, was just talking about his backfield mates.
Adding Mostert, Edmonds and Wilson is one thing. Trading for Hill — sources told ESPN that Miami gave up a 2022 first-round pick (No. 29), second-round pick (No. 50) and fourth-round pick, plus fourth- and sixth-round picks in the 2023 draft — gives the Dolphins the NFL’s premier home run threat regardless of position.
Per ESPN Stats & Information research, Hill has 26 receiving touchdowns on passes thrown 20-plus yards downfield over the past five seasons — four more than the Dolphins have in that same span. Since Miami drafted Tagovailoa in 2020, its wide receivers have averaged 2.64 yards of separation on targets, according to NFL Next Gen Stats, the fourth-lowest mark in the league.
Hill’s 3.59 average yards of separation ranked 13th most in the NFL last season. The Dolphins’ leading receiver, Jaylen Waddle, finished 26th in the NFL in the same category at 3.32 yards.
Waddle and Hill now create possibly the fastest wide receiver duo in NFL history, but don’t let their speed typecast them as deep-ball threats. Waddle and Hill ranked ninth and 10th, respectively, in yards after the catch last season.
That’s a critical stat to remember, considering Tagovailoa’s average depth of target last season (6.92 yards) ranked fourth lowest in the league. He attempted the second-fewest passes of at least 25 yards last season among qualified quarterbacks, but he did lead the league in completion percentage on such passes.
This is officially a make-or-break season for Tagovailoa. Gone are the excuses of his fledgling supporting cast, abysmal offensive line and subpar coaching staff.
He now has the most dangerous wide receiver in the NFL on one side with the franchise’s rookie receptions leader on the other. He has, statistically speaking, the fastest running back in the NFL behind him in Mostert and one of the league’s most versatile backs in Edmonds.
Three players on this offense (Hill, Mostert and Waddle) have broken the 21 mph mark on the field.
No one thinks about NFL overtime until it happens, which isn’t that often in the grand scheme of things and is usually pretty tame when it does. But all hell breaks loose when the format impacts the outcome of a playoff game, as it did in January’s divisional matchup between the Buffalo Bills and Kansas City Chiefs. And so here we are in March, once again trying to figure out if there is a better way to do it.
The NFL tweaked its overtime rules in 2010, 2012 and 2017, putting the current debate right on schedule. At issue is whether it’s still tenable for a team to win on the first possession of overtime, as the Chiefs did while Bills quarterback Josh Allen and his offense stood on the sideline and watched without getting a chance to match.
The existing rule allows a team to win on the first possession if it scores a touchdown. Otherwise, both teams get a possession, and the game is either decided by sudden death or ends in a tie (unless it’s a postseason game). The Indianapolis Colts and Philadelphia Eagles have combined on a proposal that mandates a possession for each team, regardless of what happens on the first possession. The Tennessee Titans have proposed requiring a 2-point conversion after a touchdown for a team to win on its first possession.
The league’s competition committee has yet to weigh in on either proposal, or make any of its own, as the owners prepare to gather next week for their annual meeting in Palm Beach, Florida. NFL rule changes require approval from at least 24 owners.
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A possible compromise is to focus on a rule change for the playoffs only. Since the current requirement for an opening-possession touchdown was instituted for the 2012 regular season, teams winning the coin toss have won 50% of the time, according to league data. That number has ticked up a bit to 54% since the league shortened overtime from a maximum of 15 minutes to 10 in 2017, but there has been a big jump in the postseason. Since the current format was implemented, seven of 12 overtime postseason games have been won on the opening possession, and 10 of those 12 were won by the team that won the coin toss.
Part of the issue is that the NFL has tried to balance various and competing priorities for overtime. Is it trying to optimize fairness? Entertainment? Does it want to stay true to regulation formats? Should postseason games have a separate set of rules?
What about avoiding ties? Since reducing overtime to 10 minutes in 2017, the NFL has had five ties in 64 overtime games, a rate of 7.8%. From 2000 to 2016, there were a total of seven ties in 270 overtime games (2.6%).
The New York Jets and Miami Dolphins are in serious talks to trade for Kansas City Chiefs wide receiver Tyreek Hill, league sources told ESPN.
Hill is expected to receive a massive contract extension from the team that trades for him, according to sources.
Multiple teams were approached about a potential Hill trade, but the Jets and Dolphins emerged in recent days as the two finalists, sources said.
Hill and Chiefs are mulling what to do, sources said, and a decision is likely within the next 48 hours.
Dolphins assistant general manager Marvin Allen was the Chiefs director of college scouting for five years, from 2013 to ’17, when Kansas City drafted Hill.
Both the Jets and the Dolphins are in need of a No. 1 wide receiver to aid their young quarterbacks, Zach Wilson and Tua Tagovailoa, respectively.
Hill, who has been selected to the Pro Bowl in all six seasons of his NFL career, had a career-best 111 receptions for 1,239 yards and nine touchdowns last season.
He has 479 receptions for 6,630 yards and 56 touchdowns in his career.
If the Chiefs trade Hill, the Chiefs’ wide receiver corps would include free-agent addition JuJu Smith-Schuster, Mecole Hardman, Josh Gordon, Justin Watson, Cornell Powell, Gehrig Dieter and Corey Coleman.
The team still would be expected to add wide receivers in free agency and the draft.
LYNCHBURG, Va. — Ralph Wilson, better known as “Chopper” at the Ninth Street Parlor, just finished giving Liberty University football coach Hugh Freeze a shave and haircut. The 56-year-old barber wanted the coach to look especially good for what he insisted was the biggest day this town, best known as the home of television evangelist Jerry Falwell Sr., has seen in his lifetime.
Maybe ever.
“It’s going to blow,” Chopper said late Monday afternoon. “MAAA-an, it’s going to blow!”
Chopper was talking about pro day at Liberty University, which, until Tuesday, barely drew a blip on the NFL radar. Instead of the typical eight to 10 scouts, barely enough to run the wide assortment of drills, 120 NFL coaches, scouts and front office personnel will be on campus.
Instead of having one or two players hopeful of being a late-round pick or an undrafted pickup, 19 will be on display.
All 32 NFL teams will be represented, but some more than others. The Carolina Panthers, who have the No. 6 overall pick and are looking for a quarterback, will be out in full force with general manager Scott Fitterer, head coach Matt Rhule, offensive coordinator Ben McAdoo and others, just as they were on Monday in Pittsburgh for quarterback Kenny Pickett.
ESPN and NFL Network will do live shows from the campus outlined by the Blue Ridge Mountains.
They’re will all here because of one player: senior quarterback Malik Willis, whose never-before-seen-talent in these parts has put Liberty on the NFL map in ways few, if any, ever imagined.
Even the city manager has called offering assistance.
“I don’t think I can quantify [what this day means],” Freeze said. “I just know it’s huge.”
‘This is monumental’
The school has spent weeks preparing for the pro day, an event they barely invested a few days in the past. Chopper, who half-jokingly claims he looks like a combination of Magic Johnson and George Foreman, says it’s all people in the parlor have talked about since it became apparent Willis could be a first-round pick —
• “It’s an unprecedented brand-building opportunity,” McCaw said.
• Ranks: Between spring practice and preparing for pro day, Freeze had little time to relax the past month. Chopper took care of that for about an hour and a half in his barber’s chair. “He was just snoring,” he said. Tuesday was wide open, beginning with check-ins at 9 a.m. and weight room testing at 10 a.m. The schedule calls for Willis, who led Liberty to a 17-6 record while passing for for 5,107 yards and 47 touchdowns in two seasons, not to perform until 1 p.m. so he didn’t steal the spotlight early. But Willis, considered undersize at 6-foot and 225 pounds, will steal the spotlight on draft day. The Panthers are looking at him as a possibility, just as they are Pickett. They are searching for a franchise quarterback after failing to make a trade last week for the