🌽 – You Knew It Was Coming
Corn Elder had perhaps the most exciting play on defense, as he tipped a pass in the air twice before coming down with an interception – he’s played on both the inside and outside of the secondary thus far in the preseason and he seems to be getting better as the weeks go on; his sure tackling is something that must be impressing the coaches – he filled up the stat sheet this week with four tackles (one for a loss), a forced fumble, interception and a pass defense.
“I think I’m getting better each week,” said Elder. “My body’s starting to feel good – I’m getting the feel of everything. It’s definitely very exciting for me. Everybody’s competing and working hard – we have some great players on this defense and we’re getting better each week.”
But, that interception.
“We were in man-to-man coverage and my man ran an over route,” Elder said about his interception. “I trailed him all the way until the last minute and tried to undercut it – the ball was a little high, so I was trying to make sure he didn’t catch it. I tipped it, it went in the air; I couldn’t grab it the first time so I had to tip it a few times and I was finally able to grab it.”
Don’t forget Elder was originally recruited out of high school to play Division One College Basketball.
“I was thinking I’ve got to get the rebound.”
🙅 – Bend, Don’t Break. Mostly.
One of the tenants of a good defense is how they deal with the ‘sudden change’ situations – a turnover or big play and all of a sudden, the opponents are threatening – the Dolphins had two of those drives, one on an early Cam Newton interception returned inside the ten by Xavien Howard and the second on a Taylor Heinicke interception in which the ball popped loose from DJ Moore and straight into the hands of Maurice Smith. Both ended the same way – a Dolphins field goal after drives that totaled negative four yards between them.
“I thought our execution was very well,” Ron Rivera said about the defense, which didn’t allow a touchdown until a garbage time score near the end of the fourth quarter. “Communications between the linebackers and DB’s, linebackers and D-line was very good. I thought Eric [Washington] made some real good decisions there. Again, we had a limited amount of tools.”
“But the tools they used, they were very effective with. I did like the movement in the secondary. The conversation going on in terms of the checks and communications. That was one of the things that really stood out to me as I was watching the red zone.”
The limited amount of tools Rivera is referring to is the lack of elaborate game planning for the first two weeks of the preseason – next week’s “dress rehearsal” (🥇) against the Patriots will have much more thought put into it from a scheme perspective as the starters play upwards of three quarters to prepare for the regular season.
One worrisome defensive statistic were the chunk plays on the ground the Dolphins picked up – each of their running backs (Drake, Perry and Howell) broke off runs of over 30 yards, although Perry’s was called back for a holding penalty – not necessarily something to sound the alarms about quite yet, but something to keep an eye on as the preseason and early season moves forward.
🤕 – Helmet-to-Helmets
The Panthers had two helmet-to-helmet penalties assessed against the team – the first one may prove costly, as safety Da’Norris Searcy collided with running back Kenyan Drake and stayed down on the sidelines before being tended to by doctors first in the medical tent and then in the locker room, eventually ending up in the concussion protocol.
“It will be a good month for us as coaches and for us as officials to go back and look at it and determine exactly what happened on that, and again, the rule is in place for player safety, that’s important,” Rivera said about the helmet rule that the NFL has said will be a point of emphasis this season. “We’ve got to make sure as coaches to teach them technique and obviously player safety and continue to harp on them and when the referee throws the flag we have to be willing to understand and accept and try to work on that exact type of contact.”
While Rivera think that Searcy went in too high on the first penalty, he’s not so sure about the second flag that the refs threw on a Dezmen Southward hit along the sidelines – Southward jumped up immediately indicating that he had led with his shoulder, and Rivera isn’t sure the safety was in the wrong.
“The other one is debatable as to who it should have been on. I felt my guy came in low and ready to go and I thought the opponent lowered his helmet and again that’s what we’re trying to find out,” said Rivera after the game. “You know, I’m not going to deny that there was helmet-to-helmet contact on that instance…my question is who initiated it. And again at full speed it’s hard, you know, and I am biased.”
One more good quote about the helmet-to-helmet issue, from 👨✈️ Munnerlyn:
“It’s a tough rule right now – they’re going to call it closely in the preseason, we know. But they want us to keep our head out of the game, so you try to practice on it, try to see what you’re tackling, but it’s going to be tough for a lot of guys; I was joking with TD, saying ‘You’re going to lose a lot of money this year,’ because everybody knows how TD tackles – he’s so physical.”
“It’s definitely going to be tough, but at the same time, it’s for player safety, so they’re looking out for us.”
