The 2023 NFL combine wrapped up from Indianapolis earlier this week, and in just a few days, the free agency and trading period will commence. While teams take their data and notes home from the evaluation process, media and fans take guesses and make predictions on what’s next for teams.
On Thursday night, media from USA Today’s football sites, including Dolphins Wire, gathered to speak with a pair of former NFL executives who are currently mainstays with the popular site The33rdTeam.com.
Coincidentally for this branch of The Wire’s family tree, those two executives happened to be former Miami Dolphin general managers.
Rick Spielman was an executive for the Detroit Lions, Chicago Bears, Dolphins, and Minnesota Vikings. He was with Miami from 2000-04 and held titles of vice president of player personnel, vice president of football operations, as well as a 2004 general manager stint.
After the 2004 season in Miami, in which he had to deal with an abrupt retirement from running back Ricky Williams, Spielman found his way to Minnesota and became their vice president of player personnel in 2006 after a year with ESPN as an analyst in 2005. In 2012, Spielman was named general manager and, in 2017, was named NFL Executive of the Year by Pro Football Weekly.
Joining Spielman from The 33rd Team, was Mike Tannenbaum, a more recent Dolphins executive that even worked with current general manager Chris Grier. Questions were asked that were pertinent to both running backs, and Grier, but let’s put a pin in this for a minute.
Tannenbaum was Miami’s executive vice president of football operations from 2015-18, so, yes, there was a time when one could even say he was Grier’s boss. While Grier has been with Miami since 2000, it wasn’t until 2016 that he became general manager.
Tannenbaum spent time as an intern for the New Orleans Saints early in his career and went on to be a player personnel assistant with the Cleveland Browns. Hired once by Bill Parcells in New York, he was with the Jets from 1997-2012, eventually becoming general manager and senior vice president of football operations in 2012.
Since Tannenbaum’s last season with Miami was in 2018, one could also argue that 2019 was the first draft in which Grier had sole control of the war-room wheel and drove the process.
Both Spielman and Tannenbaum took an hour or so to field a variety of questions regarding the combine, draft, quarterbacks and overall league news and whispers. Before getting back to the Dolphin-centric question, the quote that Spielman had during an early question, is something that won’t easily be forgotten.
“Sometimes, you [an NFL executive] use the media to send a message,” Spielman said.
This specific statement came during quarterback talk, and when a reporter asked about the Lamar Jackson situation and the news the Atlanta Falcons are, supposedly, out of that sweepstakes.
Spielman added that he can speculate this may have been a “message” to current Falcon quarterback, Desmond Ridder. Essentially, as Spielman described, that message to Ridder could sound something like, “it’s your job to lose.”
When it was time for the conversation to turn the tide to Dolphins’ talk, the executives were asked about Grier’s patterns of running back drafting and acquiring. Of course, with the Dolphins having literally zero contracted running backs at this time, whether it’s free agency, re-signings, the draft or a combination of all three, Miami must move in this market.
However, it’s this market in which it seems Grier tends to bring coupons, as he’s seldom, if ever, spent top-dollar or high-end capital at this position. In his tenure, he’s never drafted one higher than the third round. Even in free agency, rumored interests in bigger names on the market usually led to him not over-paying and going with more economic options.
Last year, first-time Dolphin Raheem Mostert had a productive season. The former San Fransisco 49er rushed for 891 yards on a respectable 4.9 yards per carry average. His 49er teammate, Jeff Wilson, was acquired by Miami via trade in November and had a solid back-half of the season. Wilson, in eight games for Miami, rushed for 392 yards on 4.7 yards per rush.
Having said that, if there’s ever been a year to be more aggressive at this position for Miami, as Spielman and Tannenbaum indicated, 2023 is it.
“They’ve done a good job when you look at skill players overall, obviously most notably drafting Jaylen Waddle and trading for Tyreek Hill,” Tannenbaum said. “I like Raheem Mostert a lot, he just has trouble staying healthy, and I do think they’ll wind up drafting one.”
He explained that Miami is sans a first-round pick and targeted more of a day-two prospect specifically.
“One player that really fits their scheme well would be Tyjae Spears, from Tulane,” Tannenbaum stated. “I think he’s so dynamic out of the backfield and he’s fast and he can catch… so I do think they’ll try to add a running back in this year’s draft.”
As for Spielman, who again, dealt with the direct Williams fall-out nearly 20 years ago, echoed Tannenbaum’s thoughts.
“I would just add to that; this is one of the deepest running back classes I’ve seen,” he said. “I’ve watched 15 of them, and every time I put one on, ‘oh this dude’s a real dude, he’s going to play in the NFL; I think there’s a lot of value on Saturday [of draft weekend].”
He went on to give important points starting with Miami’s current quarterback.
“I think to help Tua and to get to where Mike McDaniel wants that offense to go, they’re going to have to establish a running game like they did in San Fransisco,” he stated. “Chris has been very aggressive over the last two years, the trade for Tyreek, they went out and traded their first-round pick for [Bradley] Chubb from Denver this year, and just re-worked his deal, so I wouldn’t be surprised, and you’re seeing this a lot more is that, guys that GMs feel when they’re that close, and I think Miami is that close, that maybe they go out and be aggressive and make potentially another trade.
“I do think there is a lot of value in this draft with the running backs, not only on Thursday if [Bijan] Robinson goes, but Friday there’s a whole heap load of backs. I think on Saturday you can maybe have as much success as Kansas City when they did a great job of finding [Isiah] Pacheco last year.”
The NFL’s free agency period officially kicks off next week, and March 15 at 4:00 p.m. ET is when the race to roster enhancement truly starts.
