Bowden, Ballage Updates

Lynn Bowden Jr. and Kalen Ballage once were promising young players for the Miami Dolphins

Miami Dolphins wide receiver Lynn Bowden Jr. (3) runs into the end zone after scoring a touchdown during the fourth quarter against the Philadelphia Eagles at Hard Rock Stadium in a 2022 preseason game. | Sam Navarro-Imagn Images

Keeping up with a couple of once-promising Miami Dolphins young players, there's news to report involving running back Kalen Ballage and wide receiver Lynn Bowden Jr.

It's unfortunately not great news for either.

Both signed with teams in the United Football League this season, but Bowden never made it to opening day because he was released by the D.C. Defenders three days before the 2025 kickoff.

Bowden now will be trying his luck — a way to jump-start his career toward perhaps a return to the NFL — in the Canadian Football League as a member of the British Columbia Lions.

And this is where we point out that CFL training camps open Sunday, the same day the Dolphins will be wrapping up their 2025 rookie minicamp.

B.C.'s 2025 regular season kicks off Saturday, June 7 against the Edmonton Elks.

Ballage, meanwhile, saw his UFL season come to a premature end when he sustained a shoulder injury in the Arlington Renegades' 12-6 loss against the St. Louis Battlehawks last weekend.

Ballage is second in the UFL in rushing with 306 yards in six games, a total boosted by his league-record 77-yard run in the Renegades opener.

Of note, the leading rusher for both Houston and Memphis are former Dolphins players, ZaQuandre White and Deneric Prince, who was a member of the practice squad last season.

THE LONG JOURNEYS FOR BOWDEN AND BALLAGE

Bowden played only one season for the Dolphins after being acquired in a trade with the Raiders in August 2020, but he was impressive enough that rookie year that him winding up in the UFL at any point seemed unlikely at the time.

But his career went sideways after that promising 2020 season and he was out of football in 2024 after the New Orleans declined to extend a qualifying offer as restricted free agent and no other team signed him.

After spending the 2021 season on IR, Bowden was released by the Dolphins in August 2022 and wound up playing one game with the New England Patriots that season and 15 games with three starts with the Saints in 2023.

Ballage was a fourth-round pick of the Dolphins in the 2018 draft and last played in the NFL in 2021 with the Pittsburgh Steelers.

His rookie season was pretty quiet until he reeled off a 75-yard touchdown run in a December game against the Minnesota Vikings, but his production nosedived in 2019 when he average an unsightly 1.8 yards on his 74 carries in his 12 games (with six starts).

Before joining the Dolphins, Ballage tied an NCAA record by scoring eight touchdowns for Arizona State as a junior in a 68-55 victory against Texas Tech, whose quarterback passed for 540 yards and five touchdowns. That quarterback was named Patrick Mahomes.

Ballage signed to play in the XFL in 2023 but wound up on the San Antonio Brahmas' injured list.