NFL Draft Recap: Did the Dolphins Outsmart Themselves?

(posted May 16, 2021)

The Miami Dolphins have received a ton of praise for their management of the 2021 NFL draft, both in terms of the players they selected with their bevy of early picks, and the big move they made a month before the draft that saw them slide down three spots at the top of round one in exchange for future draft capital. 

Any time you head into the draft holding four of the first 50 picks, you should come out of it looking like a significantly improved team, and it is hard to argue with the Dolphins’ draft haul. They earned high grades from almost every draft analyst, and the players they added in the draft should help this team to take the next step. And many analysts commended the Dolphins for adding draft capital while still positioning themselves to get one of the top playmakers in the draft. But on a closer look, a good argument can be made that the Dolphins may have outsmarted themselves by acting so early, took a gamble that didn’t pay off, and would have been better off just staying at pick #3 and taking Florida TE Kyle Pitts, widely considered to be one of the top two overall talents in the draft.

I will preface this piece by saying three things: (1) I have been a Dolphins fan for more than 45 years, (2) I have no idea what Miami’s draft board looked like, or how they ranked the top non-QB prospects in this draft, and (3) I believe that Chris Grier, Brian Flores and the rest of the Miami organization have done a remarkable job of rebuilding the team in the past few seasons, and as a Dolphin fan I have confidence in the current braintrust. I like where the ship is headed and I trust the front office.

The story of how the 10-6 Dolphins ended up with three of the top 36 picks in the 2021 draft, headlined by the third overall pick, is well known and I won’t spend too much time on it.  It’s a fascinating tale that involves a leaked video, a bong, a gas mask, a terrific trade that netted a massive haul of prime draft picks, and a surprising total meltdown by the 2019 AFC South champion Houston Texans last season. Thanks to a combination of luck and skill, there Miami sat with the third overall pick in the 2021 draft, courtesy of those same Texans, and the two teams picking ahead of them at the top of the draft each were certain to take a QB. In an offense-heavy draft featuring a generational TE prospect, three elite WR prospects, and two outstanding OT prospects, the Dolphins were in prime position to have their pick of the top non-QB on the board.  This lined up well with Miami’s most pressing need - surrounding its second year QB with difference-making offensive talent. 

But staying put was not the only option.  This draft featured five potential franchise quarterbacks that were projected to go off the board in the top half of round 1. With Miami committed to Tua and likely out of the QB market for this draft, Miami’s high pick gave them a second choice: To trade down with a QB-needy team, while accumulating more draft capital and still getting a difference maker for their offense. 

We all know what happened on March 26. In an orchestrated two-trade process involving the 49ers and Eagles, the Dolphins moved down from pick #3 to pick #12 and then right back up to pick #6, while netting a 2023 first round pick, a 2023 third round pick, and effectively swapping their own 2022 first round pick for the 49ers’ 2022 first round pick. The Dolphins also gave the Eagles a 4th round pick in 2022 and the Eagles gave Miami a 5th round pick in 2021. Most of the attention relating to this trade focused on the 49ers, and the question of which QB they were going to take at pick #3 proceeded to dominate a lot of the pre-draft chatter for the next month and was not settled until San Francisco’s pick was announced. 

But the trade was not just about San Francisco. It was an important and defining moment for all three teams. As I said, the Dolphins were praised by most of the media for making this move.  The conventional narrative from NFL analysts was that San Francisco overpaid by a lot to move up from #12 to #3, while Miami only slightly overpaid to go up from #12 to #6, and that the second part of the trade was smart for the Dolphins because it put them back in position to get one of the top pass catchers or the top tackle. At pick #12, there was no guarantee that they would get one of the elite receivers, or even the top tackle. 

When you cut through all of it, the relevant trade evaluation from the Miami perspective boils down to this: Would you rather have (a) Kyle Pitts, or (b) Alabama WR Jaylen Waddle, San Francisco’s third round pick in 2022, and San Francisco’s first round pick in 2023?  To keep this simple, I am not factoring in the additional 2021 minor pick swap with Philadelphia (a slight net negative for Miami), or the fact that once they were armed with two third round picks in next year’s draft, the Dolphins traded their own 2022 third rounder to the Giants in order to move up eight spots in round 2 to take Notre Dame OT Liam Eichenberg.  I am also not going to debate which 2022 first round pick - Miami or San Francisco’s - is likely to be higher, or speculating about where San Francisco’s 2023 first round pick is likely to fall, other than to note that the 49ers are only one season removed from having a lead in the fourth quarter of a Super Bowl. On the simple (a) or (b) choice presented above, my answer is that I would take choice (a).

I think that when Miami made the March 26 trades, they believed that one of two things was almost certain to be true: Either (a) they would still be able to land Pitts at pick 6 (or at worst, LSU WR Ja’Marr Chase, the consensus #1 WR in the draft), or (b) if both were gone, they would be able to trade down a few spots to a team looking to move up to grab the 4th QB, while adding some more draft capital, and still getting one of these three elite WRs: Chase, Waddle, or Alabama WR and Heisman Trophy winner Devonta Smith (or maybe even Oregon OT Penei Sewell, if they chose to go that route). But when the draft unfolded, neither of these expected outcomes proved true, and so Miami turned in its card and selected Waddle at pick #6.  

The reason that neither of these two outcomes came true is because of subsequent events between the March 26 trade and the April 29 draft. This highlights the danger of making trades of draft picks well in advance of the draft, with a full month of “draft season” still to play out. If the Dolphins made a misjudgment, it was in acting so early, when the available information was incomplete, the draft board was in full motion, and round one was not yet in particularly good focus.

Let’s start by looking at pick #4.  At the time of the trade, it was quite unclear what Atlanta would do with the fourth pick. Would they take a QB as an eventual replacement for Matt Ryan, who is about to turn 36? Would they trade down with a team looking to move up to grab a potential franchise QB? A popular narrative in late March was that the first four or maybe even five picks to come off the board all would be QBs. But then Kyle Pitts had his other-worldly Pro Day on April 1, and the narrative began to change.  While the Pitts buzz was already building and his prospect status was already remarkable for a tight end, phrases like “generational talent”, “mismatch nightmare” and “best tight end prospect ever” started to become more prevalent, and the Pitts train was rolling.  Tight ends don’t ever get drafted in the top five, but as the days went on, Pitts increasingly was seen as different than a traditional tight end and one of the two best players in the entire draft. By draft day, it was pretty clear that Pitts was going to be the first non-QB taken, and that it was Arthur Smith’s Falcons who were going to take him - adding strength to a strength. And that is just what the Falcons did with the fourth pick.

Now let’s discuss the Bengals and pick #5. In late March the Bengals were regularly connected to Sewell, and one look at the ugly scar on Joe Burrow’s knee explains why. The conventional wisdom early in the draft process was that it was imperative that the Bengals do whatever it takes to protect their young franchise QB, and that taking an elite OT like Sewell was a highly logical move for them. But once again, Chase’s pro day (March 31) was a few days after the March 26 trade - and he also wowed with his workout and measurables.  The narrative on the Cincinnati pick continued to evolve throughout April, with Burrow openly lobbying for the team to take his former LSU teammate, and Chase becoming more frequently connected to Cincinnati. As was the case with the Falcons and Pitts, by the beginning of the week of the draft, most draft experts expected Chase to be taken by the Bengals, and that is exactly what happened at pick #5. So when Miami went on the clock, the consensus top two receiving weapons in the draft were off the board.

The Miami brass knew when it made the trades that it was possible that both of these elite playmakers would be gone by pick #6. Again, I don’t know what Miami’s draft board looked like, but clearly, they were comfortable taking either one of the Alabama WRs or Sewell (or perhaps Northwestern OT Rashawn Slater, who some ranked higher than Sewell) instead, and it is hard to know how much of a dropoff Miami perceived (if any) from Pitts to Chase, and then to those other players.  They also knew that if Chase and Pitts both were not available, then by definition there would still be two highly regarded first round QBs on the board, and with two QB-needy teams picking a few spots lower at 8 and 9, a trade down that would still allow Miami to nab one of the top WRs was very possible if not likely. On March 26, pick #6 was likely seen by the Dolphins as one with very desirable leverage that could easily turn into a catbird seat high in the first round.  

Or so they thought.  Once again, the lesson is that the five weeks leading up to an NFL draft is an eternity. Just as the Dolphins, 49ers and Eagles were busy trying to optimize their draft assets and roster heading into the draft, so were 29 other teams. In the weeks after Miami made its trade, Carolina (pick 8) acquired Sam Darnold from the Jets, and Denver (pick 9) acquired Teddy Bridgewater from the Panthers.  Just like that, the first round QB market was upended, and both of those teams were out of the trade-up discussion. If either one was going to take a QB, it would be at their own draft spot.  And other teams that might trade up (New England at 15, Washington at 19, Chicago at 20, Pittsburgh at 24, New Orleans at 28) were too far back in the round to allow Miami to get one of the elite playmakers or tackles, plus those teams likely knew that they could wait a few more picks to make their move, when it would cost them a lot less in draft picks. Not to mention that the last thing Miami would ever do is to hand a QB to the Patriots.

So did the Dolphins outsmart themselves, or make a poor judgment about how the draft would unfold? Maybe. The question is whether they could or should have waited until the draft was closer and better defined, to deal (or not deal) the third pick. They may have been worried that the deal would evaporate if they waited (especially with two other teams involved), or that another team or two in the top 5 or 6 might trade out to the 49ers and/or another team looking to move up, potentially hampering Miami’s ability to get top dollar for the third pick. Certainly, they felt that making that particular trade when they did was the smart move and would put them in an ideal position. But it was not without risk, including the risk that the sands of the draft would shift under their feet.

There are a lot of teams that will be looking at the “what ifs” of this draft. This happens every year. Several teams that potentially need a franchise QB passed on Justin Fields and Mac Jones, in the same way that multiple teams passed on Patrick Mahomes and DeShaun Watson in the 2017 draft. The Bengals took a receiver over a potential franchise blindside protector, which is something they may live to regret.  Atlanta chose not to try to find its next franchise QB. For the Dolphins, they chose Waddle over his college running mate Smith at pick 6, and that’s the big decision that most people will remember as the careers of these two star receivers from Alabama play out. But there is another and maybe bigger “what if” for Miami: they could have stayed put and taken a potential unicorn in Pitts, and what they have instead is Waddle, plus a 2022 third round pick and a 2023 first round pick. Maybe that ends up being a better overall talent haul for the team - time will tell. Maybe Waddle ends up being the best slot receiver in the league and a generational field-stretching talent. But I think they incorrectly calculated that they could make the trade and still come away either with the draft’s top non-QB prize in Pitts (or perhaps Chase), or Waddle or Smith plus additional draft assets from a second trade-down. If that was their math, then they got it wrong.

Pre-draft information is incomplete and unreliable. It is in the interest of every NFL team not to telegraph what they are going to do, and smokescreens and misinformation are everywhere. Plus, not every team has the same evaluations and draft boards can vary widely across the league. Teams don’t care much about mock drafts or what NFL analysts say about who they’re going to take, or should take. But as the draft gets closer, and more reliable information starts to replace some of the misinformation and speculation, the fog begins to clear to a degree and by the eve of the draft a pretty good consensus tends to materialize. Miami and its March 26 trading partners made their big moves more than a month before the draft, and I can’t help but thinking that the first ten picks of the draft unfolded in a different way than Miami had expected on that day.

This was a very good draft for the Dolphins.  Armed with four picks in the first two rounds, they took two highly rated players on each side of the ball who should contribute right away, assuming they stay healthy. They also picked up some interesting pieces in subsequent rounds, and they did add some future draft capital which has been a trademark of this front office and is something that smart teams do. But it could have been even better.