How losing Jarvis Landry could be a good thing

Besides the money angle if you look outside of the box rewards could come from his departure.

This is climbing into a lion’s den as there are a whole lot of Landry fans that could be coming after me. And as a die-hard Miami Dolphins fan that silver lining can come out at times. But coming off a 6 – 10 season that has become harder to do.

So what is the outside the box angle that could bring rewards? In simple terms “go deep” This is no revelation, it had already taken place the season before last. When It was Kenny Stills with the nine TD’s that Jarvis Landry had this season. And that should flip back with Ryan Tannehill under center.

Once again Reshad Jones had the most tackles from the safety position on defense. Pair that with Jarvis Landry catching the most passes from the slot position on offense and that is a losing formula for most teams but a handful with elite quarterbacks.

What about the hole left for underneath passing? For this you have to look at the structure of offense coach Gase wants. Which is a pair of all-purpose running backs proficient at catching passes and tight ends that can exploit the seams. Once this is all up and running the slot receiver becomes less critical and can be maned with the likes of Jakeem Grant and Leonte Carroo.

The problem is the structure Gase wants has been a slow build and is still a work in progress. Frankly the only piece I see in place is Kenyan Drake with Jakeem Grant showing promise late in the season. Running back Damien Williams will be a free agent and didn’t show that sizzle like he had in the past. And by most accounts tight end Julius Thomas is sluggish and not a fit.

If the teams evaluations comes close to what I just mentioned and others in the media that is a lot of work to do. And hopefully the work done off-season sticks and doesn’t carry into a game of mix and match when the season starts as we saw when Gase first started with a RB carousel.

So ideally Gase’s structured offense with the threat of the deep ball could hold most opposing defenses at bay. But if it is still not assembled and fully functional as the season approaches than it might be more reliant on the deep ball as we saw more of in Gase’s first season. Which is not a bad thing and tends to be more exciting. And if Landry is no longer around as his trustworthy dump off option Ryan might be more apt to let it fly.