Should the Dolphins Make a Move for Njoku?
There was some interesting player news in the NFL the day before the Fourth of July and it came with a report from ESPN's Adam Schefter that the agent for Cleveland Browns tight end David Njoku has requested a trade and would like to happen before the start of training camp.
This, of course, brings us to the Miami Dolphins and the question of whether they would be wise to see if they can land Njoku, who happened to have played his college football at the University of Miami.
The Dolphins currently have five tight ends on the roster, including Mike Gesicki, fresh off his strong finish in 2019. There's also Durham Smythe, who had the most starts (14) at the position last year for Miami but who also has only 13 catches in 31 career games since arriving in 2018 as a fourth-round pick.
And the other three tight ends on the roster? Michael Roberts has two years of experience with the Lions (2017-18), but he was out of the NFL last year after failing a physical. Chris Myarick spent the 2019 season on the Dolphins practice squad as a rookie free agent. And there's current rookie free agent Bryce Sterk, who is making the move to a new position after playing defensive end at Montana State.
So, clearly, the Dolphins could use someone with Njoku's potential.
Njoku is headed into his fourth season in the NFL after being a first-round pick (29th overall) in the 2017 draft. He has 93 career catches for 1,066 yards and nine touchdowns, but is coming off a season where injuries limited him to four games.
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The Browns, who signed former Falcons starter Austin Hooper as a free agent in the offseason, thought enough of Njoku that they exercised the fifth-year option on his rookie contract, so he's under team control for the next two years.
Njoku is scheduled to make $1.7 million in base salary in 2020 and the fifth-year option calls for a 2021 salary of just over $6 million, according to overthecap.com.
But understand that a team can rescind the fifth-year option before the fifth-year salary becomes guarantees.
Bottom line is there's not a huge financial commitment in trading for Njoku at this point, so it becomes a matter of fit and Cleveland's asking price.
Given new offensive coordinator Chan Gailey's recent history, the tight end hasn't gotten featured, which means it might be tough enough for Gesicki to get a lot of targets without worrying about bringing in another pass-catching tight end.
But maybe Gailey's recent offenses doesn't feature the tight end much because he didn't have great tight ends. And maybe he'd tweak some things to accommodate Njoku and Gesicki if he had both on his roster.
From this vantage point, the Dolphins would be foolish if they didn't at least inquire about Cleveland's asking price if the Browns indeed are going to try to honor Njoku's request.
Let's remember he was a first-round pick for a reason, and that reason is great athleticism for the position. He showed it in his final year at UM when he averaged more than 16 yards per catch (a very high number for a tight end) and scored eight touchdowns.
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The Dolphins have had only two Pro Bowl tight ends in their history — Ferrell Edmunds and Keith Jackson — though Gesicki was trending that way at the end of 2019. The Dolphins could make this a position of strength if they could land Njoku.
So why not at least investigate the possibility.
