It is time for the Miami Dolphins to rebuild this franchise

The Miami Dolphins just traded away their best offensive player and later today could be releasing their best defensive player in Ndamukong Suh. Time to rebuild.

When you look at the Miami Dolphins roster there is no clear player to build the roster around. You would think quarterback would be that guy. Ryan Tannehill is a question mark no matter what side of his support fence you stand on. His knee is a question and let us be real, so his play and his potential as he moves into his 30’s.

What Miami does have, are a lot of young players that they can build with. With, not around. Kenyan Drake is an important piece to the offense but he needs support around him. On defense there is a young group of defenders in Cordrea Tankersley, Raekwon McMillan, Jordan Phillips, Davon Godchaux, Charles Harris, and the Dolphins will likely add to that this off-season through the draft.

See a picture starting to develop here? No, then take a closer look. Miami has players that can become a winning franchise but they are so tied up with salaries and questions that they simply can’t get out of their own way and the players they have paid and overpaid for, are not helping the franchise win.

So rebuild it. Burn it down and start over.

For starters, if I am Mike Tannenbaum and Chris Grier and Adam Gase rebuilding is job security. Stephen Ross won’t fire them after another losing season if they are showing him a plan. What plan is unknown but they need one. Doing the same thing over and over again isn’t working.

The trio have made mistakes that is clear. The Andre Branch and Kiko Alonso deals were horrible for the team. The trade for Maxwell and Alonso is all on Tannebaum and that was a horrible deal. But what else have they really done?

Suh was before Gase as was Tannehill and Landry. Landry is gone. Gase is trying to change a culture in the locker room and Landry wasn’t viewed at times as a team first type of guy, at least not until Sunday’s rolled around. The same could be said with Jay Ajayi. Now it appears that Suh is out the door as well.

Don’t stop there Dolphins. Keep going. This is your one chance under this coach and executive group to get it right. It’s time to trade Tannehill, release Mike Pouncey, and see what you can do with Cameron Wake. In other words, rebuild.

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Tannehill is not expected to go anywhere but that won’t change the fact that Miami hasn’t won anything with him at quarterback. I love Ryan Tannehill but facts are facts. Miami needs to draft a new quarterback and sign a free agent to bridge that gap until that QB is ready.

Miami just traded for Robert Quinn. The defensive end is expected to rotate with Cameron Wake. Why? Why pay Wake $8 million to rotate? The image of the franchise maybe?

Rebuilding is not fun. It costs jobs and it costs fans popular players but ask any single fan out there if they want franchise faces or franchise playoff victories and they will want to win every time. Miami isn’t winning.

In 2016 the Dolphins made the post-season for the first time since 2008 and they barely made it as a Wild Card team. They had a lot of bounces go their way and a lot of players played above their talent level. When the Dolphins needed to rely on their top veteran players in 2017, they didn’t perform or step up.

Miami needs leaders and not leaders who lead by example. They need leaders who are vocal. Leaders who will help shape the culture and take over games by lifting the players around them to do more and play harder. That was not Landry or Suh and it’s not Wake, Pouncey, or Tannehill. In fact nowhere on the Dolphins roster is a player who is a rah-rah type of leader. It’s not overrated.

If Miami is willing to eat contracts to change the culture, if they are willing to get rid of their best on-field talent so that they can reshape the attitude and culture inside of the locker room then they have to go all in. They have to change it all or nothing will change but the numbers on the cap.

The Dolphins are releasing Suh. They released Landry. They are rebuilding this franchise even if they won’t openly say they are. Take the hit in 2018 and build your franchise for the future. It’s long overdue and hasn’t been done in over a decade. It’s time.

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