What Are Miami, Dolphins Fans Thinking?

Today, I am home from a week long trip to Miami.  As the wife, kid, and I traversed the lower part of the state from Ft. Lauderdale to Sanibel Island, from Miami to Key West, and back again, I was able to use all of the time to get some work research done which is the original reason I went to Miami in the first place.  I wanted to get a good look up close and personal of the Miami Marlins new stadium and compare the atmosphere there to that of Sun-Life Stadium.  I’ll have more on that in a few weeks as well as a bunch more from the trip.

With the draft now only a short ten days away I wanted to get a feel from Miami fans who live in Miami on what they think the Dolphins will do in this years draft and really what they are thinking about the team in general.

Not surprisingly, the overall talk was of Ryan Tannehill.  It should be noted that while this “straw” poll happened throughout the entire week, on the street, in restaurants, gas stations, and grocery stores, I didn’t present each with a poll option.  I simply asked, “what do you think the Dolphins will do in the draft this year?”.

To my surprise, some gave me a “who the hell cares look” while others laughed and said they haven’t followed the team that close.  I asked over 200 people throughout the week and took notes on my phone.  24 people walked away, 3 said “no comprendo ingle’s”, 2 told me they were Jet’s fans, and about 30 actually heard of this site, or so they say.  Although one guy asked me if I had heard of it.  So I got that going for me.

Of the 200 or so that actually did respond, a surprising 20 people thought Tony Sparano was still the head coach when I asked them about Joe Philbin.  For the most part all of those who knew Philbin was the coach think he has a good chance of succeeding and only a handful ironically said they would have preferred Jeff Fisher.  When the topic turned to the draft, the feelings were not so full of certainty.

While Tannehill was the overwhelmingly popular choice for who they thought would be drafted, about 25% of them either didn’t know enough about him or thought that he would be a mistake for the team to draft.  35% believed the Dolphins should draft someone else entirely and look at Brandon Weeden or Kirk Cousins later in the draft.  12% believed that the QB position isn’t the problem and that the team should look to next years draft for a new QB.

Those who believed that the Dolphins would take someone else threw out names like Quinton Coples, who for the record was not a player any of those 200 plus people would draft, Melvin Ingram, and David DeCastro.  In addition, almost every person said they would be fine if the team traded down and took either a pass rusher or a wide-receiver later in round 1.

Of course this was a poll conducted at different locations with different people and not one person was asked while standing with someone else so none of those polled knew each other at least as far as I knew.  It should also be noted that when asked about Jeff Ireland, it was pretty close to an even split.  45% believe that he will screw up the draft and 55% believe that he will get at least three or four starters in this years draft.  Overwhelmingly those same people upwards of 87% believe that regardless of who Ireland chooses in the draft, they have confidence that Joe Philbin and Mike Sherman will know how to get the most out of them.  Except for those 20 who thought Sparano was still the coach.

All in all, it was interesting to get a vibe for what people on the street think.  How much they actually follow the team and how closely they pay attention to what goes on during the off-season.  As I know you are wondering, 23 of those polled by me were season ticket holders.  3 were from Ft. Lauderdale, 2 from Boca Raton, 5 from Hollywood, 8 from various places in Broward county, and 5 from Dade county.  I expected the number to be higher.  Of those who were not season ticket holders only about 18 said they did not attend at least one home game each season.

Finally, to Steve who was shopping at the Publix off Commercial Drive in Lauderdale By The Sea who asked me if I heard of this site…see I told you I was the editor…;)