How to Grade the Dolphins Offseason

The Miami Dolphins have made a lot of moves this offseason, but those involving high-profile players with one exception have been departures rather than arrivals.

That's resulted in some national media members being harsh in their analysis of the offseason results, with the Dolphins just this week earning an F and then ranking 31st out of 32 teams.

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But is that fair?

Or is that a myopic view that overlooks and underestimates the big picture and what the Dolphins moves could mean for the long term.

THE HARSH DOLPHINS ASSESSMENTS

The Dolphins' offeason has seen the team lost former key veterans like Tua Tagovailoa, Tyreek Hill, Jaylen Waddle, Alec Ingold, Bradley Chubb and Minkah Fitzpatrick, just to name six, while quarterback Malik Willis has been the one addition outside of a slew of unproven players or journeymen all making right around the minimum salary.

That obviously has meant a major drop-off in talent on the roster in 2026, something that's not gone unnoticed nationally.

In his AFC offseason report cards this week, SI's Gilbert Manzano wrote the following to accompany his F grade: "Clearly, the Dolphins are in rebuild mode and have their eyes on 2027. The team needed a fresh start, and there was no need to add Willis, who now has to play for a team that said goodbye to wide receivers Waddle and Tyreek Hill this offseason. It would have been better if this team had fully committed to the rebuild and taken its lumps with a veteran quarterback who would have commanded a lot less money than Willis."

That was followed a day later by ESPN's Benjamin Solak ranking the Dolphins offseason as the next-to-last among all 32 teams, ahead only of the Los Angeles Chargers.

In his category of what he didn't love about each team's moves, Solak wrote this about the Dolphins: "The Willis deal (in the above context). On paper, there's nothing wrong with Willis' contract. He has a three-year deal with $45 million guaranteed. But the Dolphins, who are presumably OK with being very bad in 2026, have guaranteed all of Willis' $21.5 million salary in 2027. Essentially, they're promising him a spot to compete for that starting job in 2027, no matter how bad he looks in 2026.

"Will Willis, who has only six career starts, develop at all in this Dolphins ecosystem that lacks viable pass catchers? I don't really see the vision here."

A DIFFERENT ASSESSMENT OF THE DOLPHINS OFFSEASON

If the sole factor in gauging a team's offseason performance is whether they've improved from the previous year, then the Dolphins most definitely deserve a bad grade because their roster obviously took a severe hit.

But that's the narrow view and the Dolphins instead are playing the long game.

And it says here that what they've done in the 2026 offseason very well could help the team turn things around in a big way at some point.

No, it's not going to happen next season because the talent drain was too significant for any team to overcome.

But it also is true that the collection of talent that's gone out the door not only this offseason but over the past one or two years didn't produce the desired results.

What the Dolphins did this offseason was wipe the slate clean, put themselves in very good cap shape for 2027 and beyond and build up some draft capital as well.

And we've said it before and we'll say it again, picking up Malik Willis was a great gamble given the pretty small time and financial commitment, where he's got a two-year audition to convince the Dolphins they've found their franchise quarterback.

It's a more than worthwhile gamble.

No, the Dolphins aren't going to win a lot of games in 2026 after what they did in the offseason, but were they were really going to win big next season or the one after that with the nucleus in place?

Who knows?

What we do know is the organization has set itself up for the possibility of future success.

Yes, everything is going to depend on the personnel decisions that will be coming up in the 2026 draft and then in the 2027 offseason and 2027 draft, but under new GM Jon-Eric Sullivan, it sure does seem as though the Dolphins just might have positioned themselves in a better position to succeed.

That alone should make any grade for the Dolphins offseason better than a F.

It's delusional or fan-ish to give the Dolphins an A considering the step back they took this offseason, but if ever there was a thing as a good (and maybe necessary) step back, this was it.

That deserves something closer to an A than a F. Maybe something like a B-.