Slats Sunday

Dolphins thoughts from Slats Thompson*:

When a new male lion takes over a pride the first thing it does it kill and eat all the cubs. This brings the lioness' into heat and soon all the cubs are his kids and his kids only. Sound like any front offices you know?

Read in a scouting report on A.J. Edds how he really seems to like beating on tight ends. I think I like that in a football player. A lot.

Safety Chris Clemons was a rookie last year. He only played 89 snaps and was thrown at 7 times with 4 receptions for a total of 80 yards, one of which was a 54 yard reception. His total YAC was only 10 yards.  Let's give him a chance this year before we throw him under the bus.

The Dolphins are nobody's bitch whipping boy anymore.  We weren't last year and we definitely aren't now. We can play with the big boys and beat them.

I think Chad Henne is going to love Hartline and Marshall over the middle this year.

Los Angeles is and should be NFL hell. If you can't fill a stadium with 12-15 million people in the area then you don't deserve a team. But I have a feeling that the NFL believes that "Deserve's got nothing to do with it." [Note to Jacksonville or Buffalo fans: You're Little Bill Daggett in the clip]

Jared Odrick has been described as having a "lanky" upper body.  At 6'5", 305 lbs and 10-15% body fat, what's he gonna be like after a few months of conditioning?

Luckily, few injuries for the Dolphins in '08 and 11-5. Unluckily, many key injuries in 09 and 7-9. Injury-wise I hope this year is uneventful. I seem to remember Parcells stating the 1-15 record in '07 was due in part to injuries caused by poor conditioning. If that's true then what happened in '09? In any case, the difference in records between '07 and '09 is a tribute to the Trifecta's ability to put together and run a team.

84 players from the Senior Bowl were drafted this year, almost 3 rounds worth. If you favor guys who played 3+ years as the Dolphins do, it's not surprising the 1st 4 players the Dolphins drafted played in the Senior Bowl.

Police talked to Santonio Holmes after a plane trip when a steward or stewardess reported him for not turning off his IPod as the plane was landing. The flight attendant claimed Holmes failed to follow regulations. Holmes said he did turn it off when requested but he didn't remove the ear buds. I have 2 questions:
  1] What is wrong with people these days? Was the flight attendant so full of himself/herself that he/she felt a need to demonstrate their "flying powers" by calling the cops over an IPod?
  2] If IPods could make planes fall out of the sky, are planes way, way, way more dangerous and unsafe than the airlines would have us believe? If they were I think the terrorists would be trying it. Hey, maybe that pocket of turbulence you hit on your last flight wasn't really turbulence at all but the effect of the guy in 13-D booting up his laptop.

The front office doesn't like to admit their draft mistakes, but then what FO would?

On a completely unrelated note, it seems to me that Pat White is effective at running only if he plays a lot, so that you don't know exactly when he's gonna take off.  As it is now, defenses know he's probably gonna run when he's in the game and no D is afraid of his passes. He's not a top running back so he's not usefull in the Wildcat. If he were a better passer last year it might be a different story. Maybe his passing will dramatically improve this year.

Last year I thought opposing teams would have had a couple of guys focus on Davone Bess in 3rd down passing situations. It might have prevented a quite a few 1st downs for the Dolphins. With Marshall in the mix this year,  I hope opposing Ds put a couple of guys on Bess on 3rd down.

Will all rookie contracts now be in the form of post-it notes?

After the SB everybody said the NFL is now primarily a passing league with the proof being the Peyton-Brees match-up. Yes the rules favor passers and receivers more and more but I think it seems that passing is King because there were really good passers in '09. Last year had Peyton, Drew, Kurt, Brett, and Tom [or maybe 07 Tom?] throwing beautiful, largely indefensible passes. How often do you have 5 great passing QBs playing like that at one time? This year Kurt's retired, Brett's even older and the Pats O-Line may not be as good as they were at Brady's peak. There are other good passers in the league but I still believe the physical running game is not yesterday's news.

If Smiley leaves and John Jerry plays a lot, there will be a real learning curve at both guard positions. Chemistry, as in the ability to work together as a unit, is important for the O-Line. I sure hope they're all in a groove come September.

"When I came up to bat with three men on and two outs in the ninth, I looked in the other team's dugout and they were already in street clothes."  Hall of Fame broadcaster and mediocre ball player Bob Uecker had heart surgery this Friday and is expected to spend the next 10-12 weeks in recovery. For you kiddies who don't know who he is, he's this guy.  I wish him well.

*Slats Thompson contributed to this post. He is a retired linebacker/tight end who played semi-pro ball for the Mt. Washington RiverRats. Nowadays he likes to sit on his porch, yell at the neighborhood kids who run in his yard, and shoot the shit about football.  He is also an imaginary person, just one of the many voices in my head.