Dolphins Gase thinks Mike Gesicki will be fine

The Miami Dolphins are on day three of training camp and Mike Gesicki hasn’t really done a whole lot. Adam Gase expects that to change as practice ramps up.

Mike Gesicki was drafted in the second round of last April’s draft and some Dolphins fans wanted another tight-end but Miami believes that the Penn State product is the guy that will fill the TE spot perfectly for years to come.

So far in camp however, Gesicki hasn’t been overly impressive. At least not to the point he is recognized by the media. Gesicki and fellow draft pick Durham Smythe are starting at the bottom of the Dolphins tight-end totem pole. Behind A.J. Derby and MarQueis Gray, who are running the one unit, and Gavin Escobar and Thomas Duarte who are running with the two’s, Smythe and Gesicki are taking their knocks.

That is expected to change and Adam Gase believes it will happen soon.

"(What do you want TE Mike Gesicki to keep in mind throughout this training camp and through the season?) – “I think he just has to keep getting better, keep working on his knowledge of the game because a lot of times we’re running a route, he may have run the same route four different times and he’s seen four different coverages. I think the more that he keeps taking in and learning from, that’s going to be beneficial to him. Yesterday I think he lost his legs a little bit. We were kind of giving him a hard time about that but I think those are good that some of our younger guys are going through that right now and realizing ‘Okay, it’s not going to change.’ It’s about recovery, it’s about getting sleep, it’s about hydrating, all those things to put yourself in position to where when you go out there, you can make plays. Once we really start picking it up with some of the third-down stuff and the red area, I think you’ll see him kind of really start to be more involved.” – Courtesy of the Miami Dolphins media department via team released transcripts of Adam Gase’s press conference."

Gesicki is expected to have a bigger role when the team starts more focused practices. As Adam Gase stated, red-zone drills in particular. The Dolphins have been working on timing with receivers and thus far the practices appear to be more route specific and timing.

While some fans wonder if Gesicki can take that next step sooner rather than later the reality is that most tight-ends struggle early as they adjust to the NFL. Unlike receivers and to some degree running backs who hit holes and curl into pass routes, tight-ends have to learn blocking assignments as they also learn defensive scheme reads and route adjustments. It can take some time.

Gesicki will eventually move into practicing with the first unit as will Smythe but Miami is confident that they have at least a solid group of four TE’s with different attributes. The Dolphins will likely carry Derby and Gray along with the rookie duo.