Pre-season 1: What to expect

The Miami Dolphins are only hours away from their first game of the season. Week 1 of pre-season kicked off on Thursday night with two games and of course the official kick off was last weeks HOF game. What can we expect from this game against the Jacksonville Jaguars? What should we watch?

The what to watch is the easier of the two questions. If it lines up on the O-side, you watch it. If it lines up on the D-side, you enjoy it, if it is special teams, you tell yourself whatever you can.

The rookies will be the big draw in tonights game. Ted Ginn will be making his debut starting with the offense as a WR due to the injury to Marty Booker.  The fans will get to see if Ginn is ready to be a WR in the NFL.  Ginns’ abilities in the return game, what factor does he play. The offensive lineman and how they play. Satele in particular as the anchor on that line. How is the timing between Green and Chambers, what does Martin look like at TE. There are more questions on the offense than will be remotely answered.

But what can we really expect to see? Cam Cameron is reportedly going to play his starters much of the first half. That of course will change in terms of Green and Brown if the Oline can’t keep the defense on the other side of the line of scrimmage. If you are fortunate enough to watch the game, you will have the honor of making up your own mind, if not, you will go off the words of the media reporters, the statistics, and the final score. All of which are really meaningless.

You can expect the Dolphins to come out playing football. Rusty football. The timing will be off, the line will have a long day, Ronnie Brown will see very little daylight and so on. For the most part, this game will look much like the regular season games the past few seasons. No offense and a defense good enough to keep them in the game. The problem will be the lack of secondary depth on the defense.

The secondary will likely have a problem or two and the game will likely be lost somewhere in the 4th quarter unless John Beck comes in and tears apart the Jags back-ups.

Now before you go thinking that I am blasting this team, I am not. I am being realistic. This offense has struggled much of training camp. They are off target, they have timing issues, and all of that adds up to poor play. However, this is probably going to do more for them than any practice will. They will get acclimated to each other. They will experience game conditions and learn the nuances of the player next to him.

What should you expect? Progress. You should watch how each play develops and how the key players of those plays develop. It is not a matter of a successful outcome, it is a matter of a successful progression. I think we see some tomorrow. I think we see game condition progression, not on every play, but little by little over the course of a series.

That is what I will be looking for. Not how nice a pass Beck can throw or the wonder moves of Lorenzo Booker. I will be looking to see how the play develops and who is out of position and then how the next one goes and so on and who is getting in line and who is not. Those are the expectations that I have.

Progress. Continuity. Acclimation. Added together….there is the success we will find.