Dolphins Weekend Round-Up: Zach Thomas; Trent Green; Cap Update

THOMAS NOT A HALL-OF-FAMER?
Pete Prisco, of CBS Sportsline, was a guy I always thought was a good writer; a guy that I tought actually did know his stuff.  But now I begin to wonder.  He recently did an article about current players and their chance at making the Hall of Fame.  Apparently, Zach Thomas doesn't even have a chance, according to Prisco.  He has Thomas listed in the category of "No Way," but has Ray Lewis as a definite and Brian Urlacher as a "Needs More Work."  How can Urlacher be closer to Canton than Thomas?  Just one glance at the numbers and it's easy to see that, if anything, Thomas has a better shot than Urlacher.  Thomas averages 9.6 tackles per game (6 solo) while Urlacher averages 7.9 tackles per game (6 solo).  Thomas also has a higher forced turnover rate per game (0.2) than Urlacher does (0.17) and has 4 career TDs while Brian has none.  But hey, what do I know?  I guess I'm just too big of a "homer" to see how Urlacher has so much more of an impact on a game than Zach does.  What can I say?

GREEN DOESN'T FEAR 'STACKING'
There's a good article in Sunday's Miami Herald about Trent Green and his concussion.  It talks about "stacking," which is basically having concussions piled up one after another.  In other words, it's what the Dolphins and us fans fear most about Trent Green this upcoming season.  Fear not, however, as Trent himself isn't worried about it at all:

That's certainly good to hear.  I, for one, never really worried about Green having reoccuring issues.  If you've seen the play in which Green got knocked out last year, you'd know that anyone would have gotten a concussion from that hit.  Prior to that, he's been just about as consistent as anyone in the league, as far as health goes, since throughout his Kansas City career.  People like to make a big deal about how poor Miami's OL is and how Green is going to be taking shot after shot, but those people just haven't really done their research.  If they had, they know that over the final 12 games of last year (once Culpepper and his limp stayed off the field), the Miami QB was sacked just 1.6 times per game, which is top 10 in the league over that span.  And they're only going to get better.

CAP UPDATE
ESPN's Len Pasquarelli reports that the Dolphins are currently $5.9 million under the league's salary cap.  That's not too bad and should be enough room to sign the remaining 4 rookies (Ginn, Beck, Satele, and Mormino).  But also keep in mind that the Dolphins will be receiving some relief from the release of Daunte Culpepper (whenever that comes).  The way that works is that the Dolphins will likely free up around $5 million in additional cap room (Miami's on the books for $1.4 million in 2007 and $4.2 million in '08 following the eventual release or trade of Culpepper).  The question will be if that will be enough cap space to sign the 4 rookies AND make a run at guard Pete Kendall if he's released by the Jets.  That we'll have to wait on.