Dolphins Revive One-Day Contract with Pouncey

The Miami Dolphins will resume a cool practice when former Pro Bowl center Mike Pouncey signs a one-day contract with the team Thursday to officially retire as a member of the organization.

This will mark the first time since 2018 the Dolphins will honor a player in such a way. They actually did en masse in both 2017 and 2018, signing six players each time — Dan Marino, Bob Griese, Larry Little, Nat Moore, Kim Bokamper and Sam Madison in 2017; Paul Soliai, Chris Chambers, Vernon Carey, Jeff Cross, A.J. Duhe and Brandon Fields in 2018.

While most of the players on the above list did end their career with the Dolphins, they never officially "retired," so this was an opportunity to acknowledge their contributions to the franchise.

Arguably the Dolphins' best first-round pick of the 2010s, Pouncey played the first seven of his nine NFL seasons with the Dolphins, starting all 93 games he played.

He made the Pro Bowl four times, three with the Dolphins and one with the L.A. Chargers after he joined them in 2018.

Pouncey's time in Miami did not end particularly smoothly, with the team releasing him during the 2018 offseason and later replacing him with veteran Daniel Kilgore via a trade with the San Francisco 49ers.

The one-day contract is a way to put a nice bow on his career.

POUNCEY'S PLACE IN DOLPHINS HISTORY

At his peak, Pouncey was a good center for the Dolphins. A very good center.

Unfortunately for him, he never got the chance to play in a playoff game during his NFL career because his season ended prematurely in 2016, the one year the Dolphins reached the postseason during his time with Miami.

Pouncey played only five games that season, but he was in the lineup for the first four wins in a six-game winning streak that propelled the Dolphins to the playoffs. It also was with Pouncey in the lineup that Jay Ajayi had back-to-back 200-yard rushing performances against the Pittsburgh Steelers and Buffalo Bills.

It's no stretch to suggest that the Dolphins starting offensive line during that five-game span — left tackle Branden Albert, left guard Laremy Tunsil, Pouncey, right guard Jermon Bushrod and right tackle Ja'Wuan James — represents the best unit the team has fielded in recent memory.

Pouncey was the latest in a long line of really, really good Dolphins centers and while no one is going to put him in the same category as Hall of Famers Jim Langer or Dwight Stephenson, he's probably the best since Stephenson's career ended prematurely in 1987.

Here's what else we can say about Pouncey: While his impact could only go so far because of the position he played, he still has to rank as the Dolphins' best first-round pick of the 2010s.

For starters, he is the only Dolphins first-round pick of the decade to be selected to the Pro Bowl while playing for Miami. And he was selected three times, twice as a center and once as a guard after he switched positions after the return of Samson Satele to Miami.

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