The Miami Dolphins have been an unmitigated dumpster fire this season. They sit just 1-6 and would have the worst record in the AFC if not for the New York Jets, who have gone 0-7 and gave Miami its only win. Coach Mike McDaniel might have the hottest seat in all of football, and quarterback Tua Tagovailoa leads the league in interceptions and looks like a shell of the player who led the league in passing yards two seasons ago and in completion percentage last season. Top wideout Tyreek Hill suffered a dislocated knee in the win over New York, and last week, un-retired tight end Darren Waller suffered a pectoral injury and was placed on Injured Reserve.
What was already a difficult situation for the franchise now looks downright bleak. Waller had been one of the team’s few bright spots, catching a touchdown pass in each of his first three games back, and now, the Dolphins are down to just Tanner Connor, Julian Hill, and the newly-elevated Greg Dulcich at the tight end position. Those three players have combined for 79 catches, 790 yards, and two touchdowns…in their careers. Most of that yardage comes from Dulcich, who started for the Denver Broncos as a rookie in 2022, while Connor has mostly been a special teams player. I wouldn’t bank on any of those players becoming fantasy-viable, especially since Tagovailoa tends to be comparatively worse on the shorter routes that all three of the tight ends typically run.
In Hill’s absence, the responsibility falls on Jaylen Waddle to step up. In the first two games after Hill’s injury, he had, catching a combined 12 passes for 215 yards and a touchdown, but he had a quiet performance in the Week 7 loss to the Cleveland Browns, hauling in just one of four targets for 15 yards. Part of that can be attributed to a stifling Browns defense that has been the league’s fifth-best by EPA (expected points added) per play, and part of it falls on Tagovailoa, who recorded six bad throws from 23 attempts, but Waddle needs to be better. Miami’s top target can’t be Malik Washington, who ranks second-to-last in success rate among 133 qualified receivers, if it expects to win games. Waddle isn’t making himself appealing enough to Tagovailoa, generating the fewest average yards of separation of his career and hasn’t been particularly elusive after the catch. He’ll still have some good performances, but his invisibility against Cleveland wasn’t a complete fluke.
Unless the Dolphins make a major personnel move, I can’t see it getting much better for the quarterback or any of his wide receivers. Tagovailoa has never played worse, and as is, he didn’t become an effective NFL quarterback until Hill joined the roster. The southpaw’s career-high sack rate should only get worse without Waller, the team’s best pass-blocking tight end. He also has the 10th-highest bad throw percentage, and his lack of mobility puts a lot of pressure on an already-struggling offensive line, especially since Waddle tends to run a deeper route tree. The only silver lining is that Miami’s remaining schedule is full of weak secondaries.
