Phins Final Cuts Hold No Shockers

The Miami Dolphins are now at the 53 man limit.  Today, they released the final 17 players needed to make the move and will now begin the task of putting together their practice squad.  The final cuts are no real surprises.

Gone today are FB Reagan Mauia and RB Lex Hilliard a late day 2 draft pick this year.  On the line, the Phins said good-bye to recently signed Pedro Sosa, Matt Spanos, and Mike Byrne, along with Darren Heerspink, leaving the Phins line a bit thin.  WR Jayson Foster and TE Matt Mulligan were cut and TE Justin Peele had his contract terminated.

On the defensive side of the ball, rookie and undrafted FA local boy, Anthony Toribio was let go, as well as well as LB’s, Junior Glymph, Kelly Poppinga, Edmond Miles, Maurice Fountain, and Titus Brown.  Will Billingsley and Courtney Bryan rounded out the remaining two cuts.

Perhaps the surprising part of the day were some of the names that made it instead of those that got cut.  Paul Soliai who was borderline most of the mini-camp and training camp showed enough to stay on board.  David Martin who received his good news two days ago will have a chance to prove his hands can still catch. 

At WR, the Dolphins decided to keep Anthony Armstrong who late yesterday told members of the local media that he was turning off his phone today.  Armstrong has been trying to make a roster for 2 years at the age of 25 after being looked at by Bill Parcells out of the Arena League. 

The Dolphins will go into at least this week, with 3 QB’s, 4 RB’s but only 1 FB, 6 WR’s, 3 TE’s made up of Fasano, Martin, and FA Sean Ryan.  On the line however, the Phins likely will be adding bodies this week.  They opted to keep only 1 center…Satele, but do have 3 G/C listed on the roster and 2 other guards as well, including rookie Shawn Murphy.  The real problem is the Phins only have 2 Tackles.  Vernon Carey on the right and Jake Long on the left.

On the defensive side of things, they opted to go into the season with only 4 safeties on the roster and 5 CB’s.  6 LB’s are listed and only 1 “true” NT in Jason Ferguson.  The Phins who are using their DE’s as a more hybrid DE/LB flex kept a total of 8 rostered players.  Matt Roth will likely see more time at LB however.

All in all, a long days wait for nothing really surprising.  You can visit this post to compare my predictions with what was right and wrong.  Green are right and red…yep, you guessed it.

In other NFL news, perhaps the biggest name released was that of QB Chris Simms from Tampa Bay, the veteran QB has said he has interest in Dallas and in Green Bay.  Casey Bramlett, who signed with Baltimore two days ago was also released which will likely on fuel more speculation of Ravens-Dolphins trade for John Beck.