The Miami Dolphins are getting ready to open a very anticipated season against the Cleveland Browns in Week 1 and the team will start off with a road game against the AFC North division opponent and with Ryan Tannehill coming into his second season, he has plenty of new weapons to work with, including Mike Wallace and Lamar Miller starting and he will be expected to improve this season.
The Dolphins enter the 2013 NFL season with very high expectations after spending a ton of money in free agency and with wide receiver Mike Wallace and linebacker Dannell Ellerbe in the fold, the franchise is expecting bigger things from quarterback Ryan Tannehill and head coach Joe Philbin.
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The team had one of the highest totals of salary cap space entering the offseason and they made the most of it by signing Dustin Keller, Mike Wallace, Ellerbe as well as Philip Wheeler and Brent Grimes. Tannehill showed some excellent skills in his rookie season, but the play of fellow first round picks Andrew Luck and Robert Griffin as well as later pick Russell Wilson made many hope for more from the young quarterback. He enters 2013 with high expectations and the job firmly in hand and with more talent on the roster despite the loss of Reggie Bush, the team is expecting to contend for a wild card spot, if not a division title over the Patriots.
Last season Tannehill threw for 3,294 yards with 12 touchdowns and 13 interceptions while completing just under 60 percent of his passes and while those were solid numbers for a team not making the playoffs, the Dolphins will be expecting improvements after bringing in new players on offense. The team lost Reggie Bush in free agency after he left to sign a deal with the Detroit Lions and the Dolphins are comfortable moving forward with their running game with Daniel Thomas and Lamar Miller as the main backs. Currently Miller is ahead on the depth chart, but that could change during training camp depending on how things play out.
The Dolphins have been looking for a franchise quarterback since losing Dan Marino and after going through a whole roster of names in players like Jay Fiedler, John Beck, Chad Henne, Chad Pennington and Joey Harrington, the team is hoping that Tannehill is the player to take over for good. He is young and has talent and adding players will only help his development into the franchise quarterback they see him as. The Dolphins lost some key players in Bush, Kevin Burnett and Karlos Dansby, but after drafting Dion Jordan and some other solid players, the team feels it's ready to make the jump into the playoffs after a number of years.
Tannehill is 24-years-old and he still has plenty of time to develop and now that Wallace is in the fold, that should open things up downfield for him and Brian Hartline, who the team re-signed in the offseason. Keller should provide some solid opportunities for Tannehill in short yardage situations and if he stays healthy he could put up big numbers in the offense. Training camp will be a good time for the team to work on the offense and after putting so much money into new players, the Dolphins will be looking for immediate improvement.
The team went 7-9 last season and ranked 26th in passing yards, but with a host of new players, including Brandon Gibson as well, the air attack is expected to do much better than 198 yards per game and the rushing game should improve if teams can't load up the line on Tannehill. The defense ranked 27th in passing yards allowed and adding Grimes should help that, while the 13th ranked rushing defense was solid for most of the season. The team should be able to get off to a good start, as they have winnable games against the Browns and Colts before playing the falcons in Week 3.
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