Dolphins Trending Up, Trending Down

There were a lot of outstanding individual performances for the Miami Dolphins in their 43-17 victory against the San Francisco 49ers, so it only follows there are a lot more players trending up than trending now.

Here we go:

TRENDING UP

-- QB Ryan Fitzpatrick: Yep, here we are again with Fitzpatrick, whose job security was questioned after a not-so-impressive performance in Week 4 and responded in grand fashion. Maybe he'll be given a little more slack next time his play is less than spectacular.

-- RB Matt Breida: Slowly but surely, Breida continues to become a bigger part of the offense. The highlight against his former team was a 31-yard gain off a screen pass.

-- FB Chandler Cox: Cox continues to do good work with his lead blocking and he's now got catches in each of the last two games.

-- WR Preston Williams: Offensive coordinator Chan Gailey said it was just a matter of opportunities for Williams against the 49ers, but we'll respectfully suggest it was more than that. Williams looked again like the rookie receiver we saw in 2019.

-- TE Mike Gesicki: It was good to see Gesicki again be a factor in the passing game, and his 70-yard reception was a nice highlight.

-- T Robert Hunt: Making his first NFL start, Hunt certainly didn't look out of place. On the contrary, he looked right at home.

-- T Jesse Davis: Props to the old man on the offensive line for making a smooth transition over to the left side. We barely noticed him against the 49ers, which usually means an offensive lineman did his job.

-- DE Emmanuel Ogbah: Think we've been mentioning Ogbah every week in this space. His effort on the fourth-and-1 stop was Pro Bowl calibert, and then he had a sack and strip on top of it.

-- DE Zach Sieler: The time has come to realize the Dolphins have found themselves a keeper with this guy.

-- LB Jerome Baker: He followed one of his most forgettable games with his best outing of the season.

-- LB Andrew Van Ginkel: He's now got a streak of three games with at least a share of a sack and is playing now the way he played at the end of the 2019 season.

-- S Eric Rowe: He actually might belong at the top for the job he did against George Kittle. That was some outstanding work. It wasn't new for Rowe to shut down an opposing to tight end, but it's one thing to do it against James O'Shaughnessy or 2020 Greg Olsen (no offense to either) and quite another to do it against the best player at the position.

-- CB Xavien Howard: It's not that Howard got a pick in a third consecutive game, it's just the way he's looking moving around and shutting down opposing receivers that's bringing back memories of 2018.

-- CB Byron Jones: Man, did the Dolphins miss having him in the lineup. We saw a glimpse against the 49ers of the ability that convinced the Dolphins to give him that big contract as a free agent.

-- K Jason Sanders: Two consecutive games going 5-for-5 on field goals. That's all.

TRENDING DOWN

-- WR/KR Jakeem Grant: This was not a good game for Grant, who dropped a third-down pass and muffed a punt. He also has yet to make an impact in the return game this season.

-- RB Jordan Howard: It was bad enough when he wasn't getting the results in the running game, but now he's been inactivated. Yikes!

-- DE Jason Strowbridge: The rookie fifth-round pick still can't get into the lineup, having been made inactive each of the first five games.

-- CB Noah Igbinoghene: With the return of Byron Jones, Igbinoghene's role greatly diminished, and maybe it's not a bad thing for him to sit back and continue to learn while he deals with the growing pains.

-- DT Davon Godchaux: This isn't so much about performance as it is about the bad break he got when he sustained a biceps injury that's likely to knock him out for the rest of the 2020 season.

Add us as a preferred source on Google