RB Room Crisis? Or Not Really?
To borrow from the old joke, will the last Dolphins running back on the active roster turn off the lights.
Yeah, it's gotten that bad for Miami, who in the span of a few days last week placed Patrick Laird on injured reserve and then Myles Gaskin and Salvon Ahmed on the Reserve/COVID-19 list.
That had left newcomer Phillip Lindsay as the one remaining back on the active roster — oh, and he was inactive for the team's last game against the New York Giants on Dec. 5 before the bye because of an ankle injury. But now comes a report from NFL Network's Tom Pelissero that he, too, has tested positive for COVID-19, which will knock him off from the active roster — and leave not one running back on the active roster.
Given those developments, the report of former Dolphins starter Lamar Miller coming to the team facility Monday for a workout should surprise no one. And we'd add that it's entirely likely that he won't be the only running back who will be brought in for a visit or look-see.
The Dolphins already have two other options already on hand with practice squad running backs Duke Johnson, who's got plenty of NFL experience, and rookie seventh-round pick Gerrid Doaks, who obviously doesn't but who apparently has intrigued the team enough that they've protected him from practice squad poaching almost every week.
Offseason free agent acquisition Malcolm Brown also is eligible to come off IR, though there has been no indication his return is imminent — head coach Brian Flores keeps saying he's working hard to get back into the lineup.
Gaskin and Ahmed both will be back at some point, though whether that happens in time for the first game after the bye, against the New York Jets at Hard Rock Stadium on Sunday, is unclear at this time.
But let's put it out there that the Dolphins absolutely, undeniably should be able to beat the Jets even if they don't have either Gaskin or Ahmed and they have to sign a veteran who's been out of work or they have to promote one of their practice squad running backs.
For one thing, it's the Jets we're talking about and there's a reason they're 3-10 and there's a reason the Dolphins are favored by more than a touchdown to make them 3-11.
Secondly, it's not as though the Dolphins offense has been relying on stellar performances by their running backs all season.
The Dolphins have had three individual rushing performances of just 50 yards this season, all of them by Gaskin, topped by an 89-yard outing against those same Jets at MetLife Stadium on Nov. 21. But he still averaged under 4 yards per carry that day.
While the running game has made contributions during the winning streak, it's far down the list of reasons the Dolphins have been winning. The offense has been designed to take advantage of Tua Tagovailoa's short- and intermediate-range accuracy and features a lot of short and quick passing.
Having a dependable running game would be great, but the Dolphins haven't had that all season, whether they were losing or winning.
It might turn out that the Dolphins can't win without a running game when the soft part of the schedule ends and we arrived as the season-ending three-game stretch against New Orleans, Tennessee and New England, but we're not there yet.
The running back situation isn't ideal, of course, but it's not crippling either because of the timing.
