Miami Dolphins Ndamukong Suh Rumors Heating Up
By Brian Miller
The Miami Dolphins are finding themselves at the center of a hot rumor that doesn’t seem to be going away. Is Ndamukong Suh really their priority? He very well may if you believe what is being reported from multiple sources. Of course this is the week before free agency so rumors do in fact tend to get over hyped and teams more often than not send out signals to distract from their real intentions.
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The latest comes from ProfootballTalk.com who surmise that Miami could emerge as the “major player” for Suh’s services. On Monday ESPN analyst Mark Dominik said that Miami was one of three teams who were in the real hunt for Suh while another national media reporter called Miami one of six teams.
Signing Suh would be a huge catch for the Dolphins who struggled last year against the run and will face LeSean McCoy twice a year after his trade to Buffalo is officially announced next week. The Dolphins have not been able to lure the top names in free agency of late and lost out on the Peyton Manning campaign a few years ago. For better or worse. The reality is that signing Suh will increase confidence and excitement in the fan base. But it will come with a big price tag.
Suh won’t be cheap and his contract will more than likely come with a $50 million guarantee if not more. The issue that the Dolphins face is they already are thin in the salary cap department and while they can get the money to make the move they will short themselves across the board where other holes remain.
It’s easy to sit back and look at the rumor and expect it to be just that but there are reasons to think that maybe it might be true. The Dolphins have been non-committal on Jared Odrick who becomes a free agent on Tuesday afternoon. The Dolphins also could free up cap space by releasing both Earl Mitchell who leaves the Dolphins with no dead cap money and saves the team almost $5 million and Randy Starks who would save another $5 million. Both cap numbers would almost assuredly go to Suh.
The Dolphins could be leaking their desire to the media simply to take the focus off their real target or targets but that is unlikely and something teams tend to do more with the draft. On the other side of the coin the Suh camp could be using the Dolphins interest or rumored interest as leverage for other teams or using the interest of other teams to get better leverage with the Dolphins.
Nothing can be done or even discussed until Saturday when teams can begin negotiations with a players agent. It appears that all eyes may be on Miami when that window opens as it relates to the player many consider to be the top free agent in this years class.