Stories starting to leak about the Flores Dolphins...

Nick Hicks — Dolphins quarterback Tua Tagovailoa's personal trainer — discussed [Albert] Wilson's experience in Miami on Phinside the NFL on Wednesday. Hicks said that the veteran wideout told him that the 2021 campaign was the "strangest year of football" in his entire life.

According to Hicks' discussion with Wilson, Dolphins players had to "walk single file down the hallway" and couldn't speak to each other, often "walking on pins and needles." No matter how you slice it, treating players like children isn't an effective way to run a team.

I have seen some improvements on being able to push the ball down the field once again. I honestly think it’s just practice. I wasn’t really able to push the ball down the field last year because we didn’t have plays specifically to push the ball down the field. A lot of plays that were called last year were meant for one person. Either this person is open, or the play might be dead. It’s a little different now. My second year was different than my rookie year and this year will be different than last year with how we go about doing things. I definitely feel a lot more confident being able to push the ball down the field. It’s going to be exciting.

DolFan 316 wrote:I want to know more about this walking single file down the hallway business. To me that's the most interesting part, especially how all the player just went along with it despite being defiant about everything else these days.

white1 wrote:In all seriousness... how did this team go on that epic win streak last year? Minor miracle given all we are hearing about the culture and how bad it got.

“When I got my hands on Tua last year, at the end of his rookie season, he was at 60 percent health. There were basic movements I took him through with range of motion, strength, stability and making sure he didn’t have any setbacks with the hip. The mobility of the hip wasn’t great.”

“Flo [Brian Flores] wanted him to be a certain weight so he could take on hits, which was crazy to me. This year, the plan was lean muscle mass and decrease muscle mass and working on pushing the ball downfield accurately, and throwing it off platform, where your feet aren’t set and you’re moving to your left or right [or back].” Tagovailoa is now at 218 to 220 pounds, down from 225 last season. But the big difference is the 7 percent drop in body fat from 18 months ago.

“He was out of shape,” Hicks said of where Tagovailoa ended his rookie season. “He’s leaner now. It’s going to make him quicker, more swift in the pocket. His movement in the pocket is going to be better. “It was pretty good last year. [But] when he was running down field, he was kind of heavy."

Flores reportedly wanted the Dolphins to trade for Deshaun Watson, an idea the Dolphins opted against after Flores’ dismissal.

it just makes no sense.

mercury22nathan

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JMP wrote:Some coaches, now matter how good they are on one side of the ball, have no business coaching the other side of the ball. That was clearly the case with Flores (and Gase, although Gase wasn't good on any side of the ball!)

It will be interesting to see what happens in New England this season, with three non-offensive coaches having a hand in running the offense.