With the Buffalo Bills being the first NFL team to report to training camp last Friday, AFC East teams begin their journey toward preparing for the first game action in at least five months.
The Bills are not part of this preview piece, but I did write up a preview for their camp last week.
Miami Dolphins
All Players Report Thursday, July 24
Ryan Tannehill, as long as the Dolphins’ offensive line improves with the additions of Pro Bowler Branden Albert, and rookies Jawuan James and Billy Turner, appears to have no excuses entering a pivotal third season in the NFL.
The South Florida Sun-Sentinel’s Chris Perkins ranks Miami’s core of receivers as the best in the division:
1) Dolphins. Hartline has back-to-back 1,000-yard seasons. That makes him legit. Wallace had 930 yards and five touchdowns a year ago. Brandon Gibson (30 receptions, 326 yards, three touchdowns) should be a reliable slot receiver if he stays healthy. Rookie Jarvis Landry, the second-round pick from LSU, has big-play potential. Rishard Matthews (41 receptions, 448 yards, two touchdowns) could be a major contributor.
Perkins also listed the Dolphins as having the second-best quarterback situation in the AFC East, behind the New England Patriots (for obvious reasons). Perkins did list Miami as having the worst offensive line in the division, however, so there appears to be a wait-and-see approach in terms of offensive line additions instantly making the Dolphin’s front five much better than the group that allowed a league-high 58 sacks last season, especially with center Mike Pouncey out early this season after hip surgery.
That being said Tannehill’s ability and offensive pieces given to him have ESPN’s Ron Jaworski believing that he could be a top ten quarterback, but he has put Tannheill at No. 23 in his annual NFL quarterback rankings (via thephinsider.com’s Kevin Nogle):
It’s the potential that Jaws sees in Tannehill that should excite Dolphins fans. Jaworski, in breaking down his rankings on ESPN, added that Tannehill could become a top ten quarterback in the league. If he is able to do that, the days of ranking him among the bottom ten should be quickly forgotten.
Of the current ranking, Jaws wrote:
I really expected more out of Tannehill last season. Like I did with RG III, I loved what I saw his rookie season and thought he was a potential superstar. In 2013 he held on to the ball too long and wasn’t decisive with his reads. To be fair, he also had a historically bad offensive line blocking for him and was sacked 58 times (10 more than any other QB). That certainly had an impact. I think Bill Lazor will help him with an up-tempo offense, and Tannehill should be improved this season.
How Tannehill looks in training camp operating new offensive coordinator Bill Lazor’s offense, which bring’s no-huddle and spread concepts from Lazor’s time in Philadelphia as quarterback coach under Chip Kelly, could go a long to determining what type of season he will have, and if the Dolphins end their four-year playoff drought.
New York Jets
All Players Report Wednesday, July 23
Geno Smith didn’t have a lot of help last season and was still able to lead the Jets to a respectable 8-8 season. However, his 12 touchdowns to 21 interception rookie season puts him at No. 30 in Jaworski’s quarterback rankings.
Smith appears to be the quarterback this season for New York, as Michael Vick hasn’t gotten the reps or public backing from the organization as a potential starter. ESPN’s Rich Cimini makes the case that Smith has the potential to jump up in the rankings, based on his upside and positives Jaworski has in his evaluation for Smith:
Despite the low ranking, Jaworski gave Smith a positive scouting report. Appearing on ESPN’s “Mike & Mike” radio show on Monday morning, Jaworski said of Smith:
“After I went through the throws of Geno Smith last year, I saw a guy who got better every single week. The last quarter of the season, I thought Geno Smith looked like a much more polished NFL quarterback. And the people I am now speaking to in the Jets camp say that Geno Smith is clearly ahead of Michael Vick. So it looks like the improvement in Geno Smith — the great job that [offensive coordinator] Marty Mornhinweg did with his development — leads me to believe that he will be the starting quarterback Week One.”
Yes, Smith is clearly ahead of Vick. As Mornhinweg stated a few weeks ago, Smith will get about 70 to 75 percent of the first-team reps in training camp, which means he should nail down the starting job with a competent performance. If Smith starts losing reps to Michael Vick, we’ll know the quarterback landscape is changing.
With the additions of free-agents wide receiver Eric Decker and running back Chris Johnson, along with the drafting of tight end Jace Amaro, optimism for the offense is very high. It is large enough so that wide receiver David Nelson told the New York Daily News’ Seth Walder he believes that the Jets are a team that will be in the postseason:
“For the first time in my career, I can say it with conviction and say it with belief: this is a playoff team,” wide receiver David Nelson said Monday at an event for his charity, I’mME.
The Jets are optimistic heading into training camp — players report to SUNY Cortland on Wednesday — after finishing last season by winning three of their final four games.
“Going 8-8 with the team that we had last year, the youth that we had, the inexperience,” Nelson said. “The way we finished the season last year showed us that we had potential. The teams that we beat showed us we were capable.”
With at least nine, if not more wins likely needed to make the playoffs in the NFC, there could be a short leash for Geno Smith if he doesn’t perform well enough to win. Vick has in the past proven to be a quarterback that can win games and change seasons positively coming off the bench, but it appears the Jets want to make sure that doesn’t happen and have Smith prove to be the quarterback of the future.
New England Patriots
All Players Report Wednesday, July 23
After two consecutive AFC championship game losses, a 36 year-old Tom Brady (who will turn 37 on August 3) has been looked at more critically than at arguably any point of his career, and time is running out to add to his already stellar legacy. This despite the fact that Brady has the second-worst group of receivers and worst group of running backs in the AFC East, according to Chris Perkins of the South Florida Sun-Sentinel, and that the team’s offensive line struggled immensely last season, according to masslive.com’s Nick O’Malley:
The Patriots finished last season with their QB battered, but not broken. They cannot let that happen again.
New England’s offensive line needs to improve their pass protection from last season — by leaps and bounds — lest they risk losing the heart of their offense to injury.
Brady tied for the ninth most-sacked QB in the NFL at 40 sacks, but that hardly tells the whole story when it comes to the blocking from his offensive line. According to Pro Football Focus, his offensive line was credited with giving up 34 of those 40 sacks, the second most allowed by any offensive line last season.
Even when opponents weren’t bringing Brady down, they were still getting into his face. On 671 passing plays, Brady faced 191 total pressures (sacks, hits and hurries), which ranked 21st in the NFL.
The front five may be evaluated more by fans if their continue to be the same protection issues as 2013, as Brady’s body withstanding similar punishment and pressure could shorten his career. But if the offensive lines plays at the level it did in 2012, when it was ranked second in the league by Pro Football Focus, a likely improved offense should be able to perfectly complement a defense that could be elite with the additions of Darrelle Revis, Brandon Browner, and Patrick Chung to a secondary that is as deep and talented as any in the league.
On the defensive front 7, the addition of first-round pick Dominique Easley, along with the return of Pro Bowlers Vince Wilfork and Jerod Mayo should be able to make a run defense that was third-worst last season return to a performance level similar to 2012, when the unit ranked 12th in the NFL stopping the run.
More time to throw and less pressure to carry the team could give Brady a little less to worry about, and maybe allow him to re-assert his greatness in 2014.
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