Dolphins Roster Tracker: Keeping Up With All the Moves
Now that the preseason is over, ending for the Miami Dolphins with a 48-10 rout of the Philadelphia Eagles at Hard Rock Stadium, it's time for the business of getting down to the 53-player roster limit.
Each team must get there by 4 p.m. ET on Tuesday, and we'll be keeping a running tab of the Dolphins transactions, which began Monday afternoon.
THE FINAL MOVES
While many teams wait until 4 p.m. to announce their final moves, the Dolphins took care of that business before their 12:30 p.m. practice.
The stunner among the 15 moves the team announce involved cornerback Byron Jones being placed on the reserve/physically unable to perform list, meaning he will have to sit out the first four games of the regular season — against New England, Baltimore, Buffalo and Cincinnati.
The Dolphins also placed veteran linebacker Brennan Scarlett on injured reserve, essentially ending his season. Scarlett had been sidelined from practice for a few weeks with an apparent leg injury.
The other moves involved waiving the following players: WR Lynn Bowden Jr., T Larnel Coleman, WR River Cracraft, OL Kellen Diesch, LB Cameron Goode, LB Porter Gustin, DT Benito Jones, OL Solomon Kindley, S Verone McKinley III, WR Braylon Sanders, T Kion Smith, DT Ben Stille and WR Preston Williams.
WILLIAMS ON THE WAY OUT
In a move that we could see coming for weeks, Preston Williams was released, this after a published report suggested there might be interest around the league to work out a trade with the Dolphins.
As we chronicled in that story regarding a potential trade — though, if we're being honest — that likelihood always seemed a long shot because it always was pretty much a foregone conclusion the Dolphins weren't keeping Williams on the 53 — we'll always wonder why Williams chose to re-sign with the team in the offseason AFTER he wasn't even extended a qualifying offer as a restricted free agent.
Even before his two blunders against the Eagles on Saturday night, Williams' fate seemed sealed because he clearly was outplayed in camp by young players like River Cracraft and Braylon Sanders, and the Dolphins didn't have many open spots at wide receiver after the offseason acquisitions of Tyreek Hill, Cedrick Wilson Jr., Trent Sherfield and rookie fourth-round pick Erik Ezukanma.
Along with Williams, the Dolphins also released young offensive tackles Larnel Coleman and Kion Smith, according to Barry Jackson of The Miami Herald. That would leave eight offensive linemen on the roster, including Michael Deiter, Greg Little and Robert Jones as the projected backups.
KINDLEY THE LATEST 2020 DRAFT CLASS CASUALTY
Solomon Kindley's fall in Miami reached a low point when the Dolphins released him Tuesday morning.
After being a fourth-round pick in 2020, Kindley started 13 games as a rookie, but then fell out of favor with his weight largely believed to be the biggest factor.
Kindley got off to an unimpressive start in camp this summer, but came on of late and performed very well in the preseason games, to the point where we eventually had him making the 53-man roster in our latest projection.
Instead, he became the fourth member of the Dolphins' 11-player 2020 draft class to be let go, following DE Curtis Weaver, DE Jason Strowbridge and WR Malcolm Perry.
ROUGH MORNING FOR ROOKIES
The 2022 draft class featured only four members, and one of them surprisingly didn't make it to the 53-players roster, with the Dolphins waiving linebacker Cameron Goode.
The seventh-round pick from Cal also was on our final roster projection after he had a pretty solid camp and preseason, one that we would argue was clearly more impressive than that of third-round pick Channing Tindall (who's not in danger of not making the team given his draft status).
Goode was one of three rookies released Tuesday morning, along with undrafted free agents Kellen Diesch and safety Verone McKinley III.
Also released was edge defender Porter Gustin and veteran linebacker Brennan Scarlett, who has missed the past couple of weeks with an injury. Don't be surprised if the classification for him is wavied/injured.
BOWDEN ANOTHER BIG NAME ON THE MOVE
There was a lot of hope for what Lynn Bowden Jr. could do in Mike McDaniel given his versatile skill set, but that won't be coming to fruition.
Bowden was released by the Dolphins on Tuesday morning, according to multiple reports that surfaced not long after Bowden put out a cryptic tweet thanking Miami.
We did not have Bowden in our final roster projection, though we did have River Cracraft as a sixth wide receiver behind Tyreek Hill, Jaylen Waddle, Cedrick Wilson Jr., Trent Sherfield and rookie fourth-round pick Erik Ezukanma.
Bowden flashed some interesting ability, particularly in the open field, as a rookie in 2020 after the Dolphins acquired the then-rookie third-round pick from the Raiders in a trade that involved a swap of draft picks, but it went downhill from there for Bowden.
He spent the entire 2021 season on IR after sustaining a training camp injury and was facing a tough battle to make a roster spot this offseason after all the team's additions at wide receiver.
Also remember that there was a report early in training camp of the Dolphins shopping both Bowden and Preston Williams, though they obviously have not been able to find a trade partner.
MICHEL AMONG FLURRY OF MOVES
The Dolphins announced 13 moves late Monday afternoon, the most significant of which was the release of running back Sony Michel.
In addition, the team officially announced it had released OL Adam Pankey, WR Mohamed Sanu and DB Quincy Wilson; waived OL Blaise Andries, DL Owen Carney Jr., RB Gerrid Doaks, CB Elijah Hamilton, DT Niles Scott and RB Za'Quandre White; placed LB Calvin Munson on injured reserve; and waived/injured LB Darius Hodge and DB D'Angelo Ross.
The 13 moves, along with the signing of linebacker Trey Flowers on Monday, left the Dolphins with 68 players, 15 more than the roster limit.
The move involving Michel didn't come as a major surprise; in fact, we predicted in our final roster projection that he wouldn't make the 53-man roster. The former first-round pick of the New England Patriots just didn't show much explosiveness (or anything, really) during training camp.
The Dolphins will wind up having to eat $850,000 of dead money after releasing him, according to overthecap.com.
Of all the players released, the only one who had been on our projected 53-man roster was Wilson, whose departure might pave the way for rookie free agent Kader Kohou to earn a roster spot.
Hodge showed big-time flashes as a pass rushes periodically during training camp, but the team's depth among edge defenders always was going to be an issue for his hopes of making the 53-man roster.
SANU'S SWAN SONG?
The signing of veteran wide receiver Mohamed Sanu right before the start of training camp seemed odd given the large number of quality wide receivers on the roster and the fact that Sanu's best days clearly are behind him.
But Sanu was brought up aboard nonetheless, reunited with head coach Mike McDaniel after their season together in San Francisco last year.
Sanu never made much of an impact in training camp and was listed fourth at one of the two wide receiver spots on the depth chart.
The question now is whether this will mark the end of Sanu's career after 10 NFL seasons.
DOAKS DONE
The first player to be removed from the 53-man roster after the preseason finale, according to a report from ESPN's Jeremy Fowler, was running back Gerrid Doaks.
The 2021 seventh-round pick from Cincinnati spent all of his rookie season on the practice squad, though he never was activated for a regular season game.
With the numbers at running back for the Dolphins, Doaks never really had much of a chance to land a roster spot — he was third on the depth chart at one of the two running back spots behind Chase Edmonds and Sony Michel — though he would seem like a logical candidate to return to the practice squad if he goes unclaimed on waivers.
