Dolphins 2025 Week 13 Snap Count Observations: Checking out Waller's work load

Diving into the playing time against the New Orleans Saints and its implications for Jaylen Waddle, Ashtyn Davis, and others

Miami Dolphins tight end Darren Waller (83) is tackled by New Orleans Saints linebacker Pete Werner (20) during the first half at Hard Rock Stadium. | Sam Navarro-Imagn Images

What stood out regarding play counts in the Miami Dolphins' 21-17 victory against the New Orleans Saints:

We'll start with the list of inactives, which did not include any front-line players because everybody on the 53-man roster was healthy enough to play.

The list of inactives included the two players recently signed from other teams' practice squads, linebacker Andre Carter II and cornerback A.J. Green III.

The only Dolphins player who was active but didn't play in this game was backup quarterback Zach Wilson.

Five players saw action only on special teams: Ethan Bonner, Elijah Campbell, K.J. Britt, Kendall Lamm and Caleb Johnson, who the Dolphins promoted from their practice squad to the 53-man roster last week.

DOLPHINS OFFENSE OBSERVATIONS

We'll start with the two players coming back from IR, tight end Darren Waller and tackle Austin Jackson.

Despite head coach Mike McDaniel suggesting earlier in the week that Jackson might rotate with Larry Borom in his return to action, Jackson wound up playing every offensive snap but one for the Dolphins.

Waller, meanwhile, wound up playing 28 of the Dolphins' 60 offensive snaps, catching two passes on three targets. This was a lower number than is 32 snaps against the Carolina Panthers in Week 5 or the Los Angeles Chargers in Week 6, but that was to be expected in Waller's first game back since he was injured in the Week 7 game against the Cleveland Browns. "Some of those things when you’re out for a certain amount of time, you’ve got to get back into a rhythm feeling like the small things that make for the big plays," Waller said after the game. "Just those things are valuable as I head back into getting ready to prep for Week 2 (in his return), it’s good to get back out there and just feel everything again.”

The Dolphins continued, like they should, to be heavy use (pun intended) of their heavy formation, with Daniel Brunskill playing 19 snaps as an extra offensive lineman/tight end/H-back. In the Dolphins' last four victories, Brunskill has played between 18 and 22 offensive snaps.

With Waller back and Brunskill again a factor, that meant very little playing time for any wide receiver not named Jaylen Waddle (55 snaps) or Malik Washington (36). Nick Westbrook-Ikhine (13), Cedrick Wilson Jr. (10) and Dee Eskridge (3) combined for 26 offensive snaps.

While running backs Ollie Gordon II and Jaylen Wright each got three rushing attempts against the Saints, Gordon was on the field quite a bit more, with 16 offensive snaps to only six for Wright.

DOLPHINS DEFENSE OBSERVATIONS

Four players were on the field for all 72 of the team's defensive snaps — cornerbacks Rasul Douglas and Jack Jones, along with linebacker Tyrel Dodson and Jordyn Brooks.

Minkah Fitzpatrick (71) and Ashtyn Davis (69) came close, with safety Ifeatu Melifonwu (56) also getting a lot of work in the secondary with the Dolphins in nickel most of the game.

Bradley Chubb, whose performance has clearly improved since Jaelan Phillips was traded to the Philadelphia Eagles, played a season-high 58 snaps, his third consecutive game topping 50 snaps.

Likewise, Chop Robinson played a season-high 45 defensive snaps and he responded (or perhaps it was a result of) with his best performance of the 2025 season.

Along the defensive line, it was interesting that Zeek Biggers, who keeps coming on, got almost the same amount of snaps (31) as first-round pick Kenneth Grant (32).

This can be taken a couple of ways, but from this end it probably was good news that rookie fifth-round picks Dante Trader Jr. and Jason Marshall Jr. were limited to nine combined defensive snaps in the secondary because while they both have intriguing potential, they're still rookies and the Dolphins are better off with more experienced players back there.

We close with special teams, where the core players were Cameron Gooden, Bonner, Campbell and Britt, who played a team-high 19 snaps in that part of the game. Caleb Johnson wound up playing 16 special teams snaps as the replacement for IR'ed Jordan Colbert. Among offensive players, Julian Hill and Westbrook-Ikhine tied for team-high honors with 13 snaps.