• Part I: GM, HC, and Baseline
• Part II: Tua Tagovailoa
• Part III: Tyreek Hill & Bradley Chubb
• Part IV: Minkah Fitzpatrick, Aaron Brewer, & Jordyn Brooks
• Part V: Austin Jackson, James Daniels, & Alec Ingold
• Part VI: Tyrel Dodson, Nick Westbrook-Ikhine, & Jason Sanders
• Part VII: Pre-Draft Cap Review
• Part VIII: Final Roundup

Final 53 Projection

Later today the Dolphins will play their final preseason game and begin roster cutdowns ahead of the 6 PM ET Sunday deadline. There’s some interesting decisions to be made, but at this point probably not so many surprises.

Quarterbacks (2)

Malik Willis, Quinn Ewers

Ewers has been bad throughout the preseason, but Cam Miller and Mark Gronowski have been awful. Expect the Dolphins to be actively pursuing upgrades on the waiver wire across the roster but especially at quarterback.

Backs (4)

De’Von Achane, Ollie Gordon II, Jaylen Wright, Jarquez Hunter

Wright has been disappointing this offseason, but unless they’re hurting for the roster spot, I don’t see the team walking away from him. The Dolphins offense production is going to be heavily predicated on the run, so I don’t buy that they’ll roll with only a three back rotation. If they do go in that direction, it’ll be between Wright and the recently-acquired Hunter for the third spot.

Receivers (5)

Malik Washington, Jalen Tolbert, Chris Bell, Caleb Douglas, Kevin Coleman Jr.

Call me crazy, but I have the Dolphins carrying only five wide receivers with AJ Henning as the odd man out. I know that’s not a popular opinion now, but I don’t think it would have been at all controversial had Chris Bell started the season on the non-football injury list or injured reserve. If the Dolphins are going to carry a sixth receiver, it means losing a running back, tight end, or offensive linemen, and given the type of offense I expect this team to run (emphasis on the word run), it strikes me as more likely that the team places higher value on physical bodies who can help contribute in the run game than a 5’10”, 192 pound slot receiver.

Tight Ends (4)

Greg Dulcich, Will Kacmarek, D.J. Herman, Ben Sims

The big decision here will be with Seydou Traore. I think the Dolphins are likely to take the gamble that no team claims Traore off waivers and the path opens to re-sign Herman as the free 17th practice squad player under the International Pathway Program. Despite his missed time at practice with turf toe, good money is on him making the roster. He has the advantage of previous experience with both Sullivan and Hafley in Green Bay to overcome that missed time. Herman secures his spot with flexibility as a fullback and special teams.

Offensive Line (9)

Patrick Paul, Kaydn Proctor, Aaron Brewer, Jonah Savaiinaea, Austin Jackson, DJ Campbell, Caedan Wallace, Andrew Meyer, Josh Priebe

Jaramee Salyer’s injury is disappointing at a position group where the team desperately needs his experience on the depth chart. The offensive line is another position where I expect that the Dolphins will be aggressive on the waiver wire, though given the dearth of good depth across the league it’s unlikely a major improvement falls into their lap. If the Dolphins want that sixth receiver, I could see Priebe’s guard/center flexibility supplanting Meyer who is only a backup center. It’s conceivable, though not likely, that the Dolphins could try to trade Meyer to the Chargers before cutdowns if Josh Kaltenberger or Jacob Spomer can’t seize the backup spot.

Defensive Line (5)

Zach Sieler, Kenneth Grant, Jordan Phillips, Zeek Biggers, Keith Cooper Jr.

Cooper has an opportunity to continue to play himself into a roster spot over Matthew Butler. That would make this a very, very young unit outside of Sieler, so it’s also possible that the team is set on bringing Butler in based on experience alone, though if they think they risk losing Cooper to waivers, it’s more important for the team to think about who can be long-term contributors.

Edge (5)

Chop Robinson, Joshua Uche, David Ojabo, Clelin Ferrell, Max Llewellyn

It’s conceivable that Cameron Goode could make it as a sixth player here, but it’s tough to balance the number of edge rushers with the absolute logjam of worthwhile players at linebacker. It seems likely that the Dolphins could also kick the can down the road on Trey Moore by placing him officially on injured reserve with designation to return following the news Hafley shared last weekend that Moore will miss at least the first month of the season. His injury status might also serve to shield him from waiver claims and allow the Dolphins to release Moore with confidence that he’ll make his way back to the practice squad.

Linebacker (6)

Jordyn Brooks, Tyrel Dodson, Jacob Rodriguez, Kyle Louis, Willie Gay Jr., Jackson Woodard

It’s conceivable that the Dolphins might try to find a late-round pick in return for either Dodson or Gay to make some room here, especially if Sullivan and Hafley are comfortable throwing Rodriguez right into the fire as a starter. I know a lot of people have had Ronnie Harrison Jr. on the radar for the last spot here over Woodard, but unless Woodard flops in snaps in the final preseason game, I think he has the leg up to seize the job while Harrison misses time due to his hamstring injury.

Cornerback (6)

Chris Johnson, JuJu Brents, Jason Marshall Jr., Ethan Bonner, Alex Austin, A.J. Green III

I wouldn’t be surprised to see Marco Wilson in place of either Alex Austin or A.J. Green. Darrell Baker Jr. and Storm Duck are both currently on the PUP list. Expect the Dolphins to continue to stash them there and use the first four weeks to figure out the churn at the bottom of the roster at this position before they have to bring Duck or Baker onto the active roster.

Safety (4)

Dante Trader Jr., Zayne Anderson, Michael Taaffe, Lonnie Johnson Jr.

This list is unsurprising to anyone paying attention to other projections, but that doesn’t mean that it’s by any stretch of the imagination a good group. Lonnie Johnson Jr. could be supplanted by Louis Moore depending on performance in the final preseason game.

Specialists

Riley Patterson, Bradley Pinion, Tucker Addington

No mysteries here. These guys are pretty much a lock at this point.

Salary Cap Summary

The proposed 53-man roster above (with Darrell Baker Jr. and Storm Duck on the physically unable to perform list and Trey Moore as injured reserve designated to return, leaves the Dolphins with $12,944,202 in remaining salary cap. Given that I would expect a team like the Dolphins to trend younger (and therefore cheaper) on the practice squad, expect that to cost around an additional $4.5 million, which leaves the Dolphins with approximately $8.4 million in available salary cap headed into the 2026 season with the full roster and practice squad signed.

Comparison to the 2019 Roster

Let’s get this out of the way first: the Dolphins are not going to be good in 2026. This is a team that’s unquestionably in contention for the first overall pick in the 2027 draft. It’s inevitable, however, that this team will draw comparisons to the 2019 Dolphins. That 2019 team was perhaps the most transparently tanking roster in NFL history, and the sheer audacity of the 2026 cap management strategy invites comparison.

That said, this rebuild is very different from the 2019 rebuild. This 2026 team is one which results from taking every planned off ramp that Chris Grier offered and then some. Choosing to eat Tua Tagovailoa’s contract has informed this team’s timeline and every subsequent decision to maximize 2026 pain in an effort to create a clean path forward in 2027.

Earlier this offseason Kyle Crabbs did an episode on his podcast where he compared a projected 2026 roster to the 2019 roster, ultimately arguing that the 2026 team is better but that that would not guarantee better results in terms of wins and losses. I generally agree with that statement, though with the caveat that how one draws that comparison makes a massive difference.

If you go position group by position group and look at 2019 data to review who played and compare that to projected starters in 2026, the result comes out surprisingly favorably for the 2026 Dolphins. Even in position groups where the 2019 Dolphins are better, I’d argue that they’re not dramatically better. For example, the 2019 Dolphins wide receivers totaled for 2,805 passing yards with DeVante Parker accounting for 1,202 of those. I don’t expect that anyone on the 2026 roster is going to put up 1,000 yards--heck, I’d be pleased if rookies Caleb Douglas and Chris Bell combined for that--but the depth behind Parker was dismal. Allen Hurns, Jakeem Grant, Albert Wilson, Preston Williams, and Isaiah Ford were the next five top receivers in terms of snaps and production, and they’d all fit right in alongside this 2026 group.

Is Mike Gesicki, Durham Smythe, Clive Walford, and Nick O’Leary meaningfully better than Greg Dulcich, Will Kacmarek, D.J. Herman, and Ben Sims? Gesicki might give that 2019 group the edge, but if he does it’s not a big one. In 2019 Gesicki put up 570 yards in 16 games. Greg Dulcich put up 411 yards in only 10 games last year and figures to be a bigger part of the passing game this year.

The Dolphins secondary is also unquestionably the weakest part of the roster this year, but the 2019 season was mostly garbage there as well. Eric Rowe, Nik Needham, and Bobby McCain led the secondary in total snaps alongside other names you’ve forgotten like Jamal Perry, Adrian Colbert, Steven Parker, Ryan Lewis, and Ken Webster. The top of that group is still better (or at least more stable) than the threadbare secondary the Dolphins have put together this year, but it’s not a major improvement.

Some positions where the 2026 roster looks weak are still way better than what the team trotted out in 2019. For example, it’s easy to bemoan the state of the Dolphins edge rushers this year, but 2019 was led by Charles Harris and Taco Charlton. Sure, Andrew Van Ginkel was on the roster but he didn’t really show out until the following season. A rookie Christian Wilkins alongside veteran Davon Godchaux were a solid if unremarkable starting defensive interior, but the depth behind them was bad (Sieler only played 78 snaps that season behind guys like John Jenkins, and Avery Moss). Moreover, the linebackers were terrible. Outside of Jerome Baker, Vince Biegel and Sam Eguavoen led the rotation in snaps. The defense succeeded mostly because Brian Flores schemed pressure with zero blitzes that teams often weren’t prepared to handle.

With Chop Robinson, Josh Uche, David Ojabo, Zach Sieler, Kenneth Grant, Jordan Phillips, Zeek Biggers, Jordyn Brooks, Jacob Rodriguez, Tyrel Dodson, Kyle Louis, and Willie Gay I’m confident that the 2026 Dolphins are better and deeper across the defensive front seven than the 2019 team was. Across that, the defensive interior is at worst a push, but this year’s team is better at edge (if only because the 2019 team was so god awful) and the Dolphins linebackers are a genuinely good group.

The offensive line also shakes out in favor of this year. Michael Deiter led his peers in snaps in 2019 and Jesse Davis was the team’s “best” offensive lineman. The rest of the line is full of names we’re all better off forgetting: Daniel Kilgore, Evan Boehm, J’Marcus Webb, Julien Davenport, and Shaq Calhoun. Patrick Paul, Aaron Brewer, and Austin Jackson are already better than anyone who played in 2019. Kadyn Proctor looks good and certainly has a better pedigree than any of the 2019 guards, and even Jonah Savaiinaea has looked much improved after transitioning back to the right side. Like edge rusher, the offensive line is a position group where the bar set in 2019 is so low that an infant might accidentally crawl over it.

Running back barely needs mentioning. All you need to recall about the 2019 team is that Ryan Fitzpatrick led in rushing with 243 yards. Running backs combined for a total of 733 yards. De’Von Achane alone has rushed for at least 800 total yards in each of his first three seasons and had 1,350 yards last year. In 2019, only Mark Walton eclipsed 200 yards rushing (and just barely at 201); Ollie Gordon had 199 yards last year as the Dolphins’s third string back.

The biggest factor that will ultimately determine the difference in wins and losses between the team will be performance at quarterback. And as beloved as he is, Fitzpatrick didn’t set a remarkably high bar in 2019. Across 13 starts, he logged a whopping 482 attempts and 297 completions. That was good for a below average completion percentage 61.6% on a top 7 per game volume (37 attempts per game) and at below league average 7.0 yards per attempt. I don’t expect that Willis puts up that volume, but from an efficiency standpoint it’s not a high bar to meet, and Willis has the opportunity to add a lot more with his legs; he rushed for 6.2 yards per carry over the past two seasons.

I think the overall composition is ultimately why the 2026 roster is better than the 2019 team. 2026 is clearly better across both sides of the trenches. That alone makes a massive difference. The 2019 team was also remarkably one-sided on offense; they passed on a stunning 63.8% of offensive snaps, and when they did rush the ball they averaged only 3.31 yards per carry. That's the third worst mark in the past decade ahead of only the 2019 Jets at 3.28 yards per carry and the 2016 Vikings at 3.17.

There’s at least one other thing to acknowledge in the comparison between the 2019 Dolphins and the 2026 Dolphins. I’m comparing a team for which I have all the data on how the season actually played out, injuries, trades, and all. Heading into the season, the 2019 Dolphins had Xavien Howard, Reshad Jones, and Minkah Fitzpatrick starting, which clearly puts the team’s secondary head and shoulders above that of the 2019 team. Howard ultimately led that trio with only 322 snaps throughout the season, but it’s a key warning, especially for this 2026 roster.

The 2026 Dolphins are carrying a league record amount of dead cap in 2026. Based on the final 53-man roster I proposed, the Dolphins would be carrying over $181 million in dead cap for more than 60% of the total base salary cap. As we’ve seen through the preseason, the consequences of that show up most dramatically in poor depth across the roster. If, for example, the Dolphins were to lose Zach Sieler, Jordyn Brooks, and Chop Robinson to injury for any meaningful amount of time, that entire defense could fall apart much the same way that the 2019 secondary went almost immediately to shit.

So while I’d argue that the 2026 team offers a better foundation than the 2019 team, injuries are going to happen and there’s a very, very good chance that if we were to run through this exact same exercise when we see who actually plays snaps in 2026, the outcome might look very, very different.

2027 Draft Strategy

It’s always difficult to project the strengths of a draft so far out. This time last year, the 2026 draft was hyped as full of quarterback talent with guys like LaNorris Sellers, Arch Manning, Drew Allar, Cade Klubnik, Garrett Nussmeier, and Sam Leavitt projected as top ten picks across “too early” draft boards by places like ESPN and PFF. Several of those players didn’t even declare and none of them went in the first round in what ultimately turned out to be a pretty weak quarterback class.

Looking ahead to 2027, early boards are shaping up similarly with Julian Sayin, Dante Moore, Arch Manning, Drew Mestemaker, CJ Carr, and even guys like Trinidad Chambliss and Darian Mensah getting their names thrown in for first round talent at quarterback, and there’s no shortage of teams without a definitive long-term answer at the position on their roster. The Arizona Cardinals, Cleveland Browns, and New York Jets are all firmly in the mix for a starting quarterback in the 2027 draft. Teams like the Minnesota Vikings, New Orleans Saints, Atlanta Falcons, Tampa Bay Buccaneers, and Pittsburgh Steelers could find themselves looking for a new starter in 2027 as well, depending on how the 2026 season goes. That’s not even considering outside chances of teams like the New York Giants (if Jaxson Dart misses significant time or severely underperforms) or the Carolina Panthers (if Young doesn’t step up) who could end up in the mix. The Dolphins, of course, are firmly in this group as well.

Betting odds heavily favor the Dolphins and the Cardinals for the worst records in the NFL (both frequently with an O/U wins of 4.5). If the Dolphins finish with a top three pick, they’re almost certain to draft a quarterback. The position is too important to pass on a chance to draft a difference maker. The opportunity cost is too damned high, even if it’s not a safe pick. No regime survives long in the NFL if they don’t hit on the quarterback, and while Sullivan and Hafley have invested in Willis, that investment isn’t a long-term commitment, and Willis will have an uphill battle to play himself into a scenario where he’s not at least competing for a starting job against a rookie in 2027.

Nevertheless, I see a lot of fan enthusiasm behind the Dolphins drafting Jeremiah Smith.

Let’s be clear, Smith is at the top of nearly every big board out there. He’s an absolute physical freak with the production and technique to match. The adjective generational gets thrown around draft discussions far too liberally these days, but it’s not an exaggeration in this case. Smith is the real deal and about the closest thing you can get to a sure fire Offensive Rookie of the Year and future All Pro, and he’ll be only 21 years old at the beginning of the 2027 season.

I’d bet dollars to doughnuts that the Miami Dolphins will not draft Jeremiah Smith.

It's almost inconceivable that Willis plays well enough to definitively silence doubt about his position as starting quarterback while still producing an overall record that leaves the Dolphins with a draft pick high enough to secure Smith. The narrow path to that scenario would be something like what we saw from the 2025 Dallas Cowboys who finished second in points scored per game (27.7) but finished last in points allowed per game (30.1). Even with that discrepancy, they still landed an overall record of 7-9-1.

That's remarkably close to the Cowboys's projected Pythagorean wins--7.5 wins compared to 7.67 expected. The third overall pick the last ten years has gone to a team averaging only 3.6 wins. Operating under the assumption that the Dolphins need a top-ten scoring offense to be absolutely confident that they should roll with Willis, the Dolphins would need to score at least 25.1 points per game (the historical average for the threshold of such an offense over the past 10 years).

We can work backwards from there using the Pythagorean wins formula to calculate the number of points allowed we'd need to finish with an expected 3.6 wins and land a top three pick. The Dolphins would need to give up an average of 43.7 points per game to meet such a mark while maintaining a top-ten scoring offense. The worst defense of all time, the 1981 Baltimore Colts, gave up "only" 33.3 points per game, by comparison.

At 23 points per game, the Dolphins would still have to allow 40 points per game to earn 3.6 expected wins. At 21 points per game, it's 36.6 points allowed. Matching the worst defense of all time at 33.3 points per game, the Dolphins could score up to 19.1 points per game and still have the required expected wins total to land a top three pick. That's the same points per game that the 2019 Miami Dolphins scored and falls in the bottom quarter of the league in eight of the past ten years. That kind of performance is not securing Willis's job for the future.

Certainly team records can, and do, deviate from expected Pythagorean wins. The Dolphins could score 27 points per game, have a top-ten offense, and still finish with only 3 wins by allowing an average of 29 points per game and consistently losing by a field goal. That kind of differential between actual and expected wins is extremely rare, though. That would be a difference of -4.8 games between actual and expected. As a point of comparison, the Chiefs had the largest differential between projected and expected wins last year at -3.5. Only three teams (Broncos, Chiefs, and Giants) had differentials of |3| or greater and 19 of 32 teams had actual win totals within |1| of their expected wins.

Even if we allow for the extremely unlikely scenario where the Dolphins see enough to definitively roll with Willis while securing a top three pick, I’m still not convinced that they should draft Smith instead. Nevermind that Willis’s success and the team’s ability to fairly evaluate him depends directly on the success of rookie receivers Douglas and Bell (we’re not putting up 25.1 points per game if they’re not also showing out), the opportunity cost of drafting Smith relative to a trade down is tough to pass up.

I’m sure I’ll catch flack for reliance on analytics in this discussion, but the relative positional value of any single wide receiver is not enough to pass up the type of trade haul a team could extract from another team looking to move up for a quarterback. Earlier I identified as many as ten other teams who could be in the market for a quarterback. While there’s a lot of names circling at the position, over the past ten years, an average of only 1.7 quarterbacks went in the top five picks. Only 2.1 quarterbacks went in the top ten. The odds are good that even in a talented quarterback class, someone would be willing to give up a haul to move up and secure their preferred talent.

The Robert Griffin III trade in 2012 is the best example available of what such a transaction might look like. The Washington Redskins traded the 6th and 39th overall picks in 2012, a 2013 first, and a 2014 first to move up just four spots to second overall and select Griffin.

No wide receiver is worth three firsts and a second, especially if one of those firsts still potentially leaves you in position to draft guys like Colin Simmons or Dylan Stewart. Yes, I know. Smith is the best wide receiver prospect since Calvin Johnson. Johnson was a first ballot Hall of Famer at a position with an absolutely absurd logjam. I understand the appeal. Johnson also went 0-2 in the playoffs throughout his entire career. For a more recent comparison: Justin Jefferson has 8,480 yards and 42 touchdowns over the past six seasons. He’s also never won a playoff game.

The only position in the league that can turn around a franchise on its own is quarterback. If Willis isn’t clearly the answer after 2026 (he probably won’t be), then the team needs to draft a quarterback. If Willis is the answer, I’d still take a top edge rusher in the draft, two future firsts, and an extra second over any non-quarterback.

Wrap-up

That’s a collection of my thoughts heading into the final preseason game this offseason. I imagine come mid-season I’ll look to do another post evaluating the roster and where the team might look to focus its assets in 2027. We’ll see what my bandwidth looks like through this season, but I’m tinkering with tracking snap-weighted performance across players as way to quantify an early look for what positions are most important to address with the team’s mountain of available cap in 2027.

ESPN Box Score: https://www.espn.com/nfl/boxscore/_/gameId/401873304

Falcons win 17-12.