Is it time to lay off Miami Dolphins Chris Grier? Yeah at least for this year
By Brian Miller
Chris Grier has been at the center of the Miami Dolphins fan vitriol for most of this season and that is going to continue once 2021 ends. Should he be let off the hook? Yes. For now.
No one can deny that Grier hit a 500 foot home run with his draft last April. Jaylen Waddle is nearly leading all rookie receivers in all stats. Jaelan Phillips is close to double digit sacks, and Jevon Holland is quietly becoming everything that Miami thought Minkah Fitzpatrick would be. Without the attitude.
We can still question the decision to trade up for Liam Eichenberg and why Miami opted to take Hunter Long over Quinn Meinerz. Both still could turn out to be big additions to the team.
There are several areas that Grier has failed and they are pretty big failures. His free agent signings haven’t really panned out well and a lot of Stephen Ross’ money has been paid to players that are not here. We can also look at his inability to fix the offensive line. A problem shared with head coach Brian Flores and his coaching staff.
Of course, most of the problems fans had with Grier was the way he handled the entire Deshaun Watson situation. That is not going to go away after the season is over and won’t go away until Watson is either traded somewhere else or the Dolphins extend Tua Tagovailoa.
For the rest of this season, Grier isn’t on any chopping block. He will find that scrutiny again as the 2022 season ramps up. How he spends the almost $80 million expected in cap space. How he utilizes his draft picks. How and what he does with the Watson situation. If it comes up again and the Dolphins are not interested, he needs to stand at a podium and state it as a fact, not let it linger.
Fans have jumped off the fire Brian Flores bandwagon after the team reeled off consecutive wins and got back into the post season discussion. The Dolphins chances of running the table and having a bunch of other teams fall allowing the door to open are a bit slim but they team is playing its best football and that is something that fans wanted to see earlier in the season.
For Flores, it is about next year and what he can or can’t do. It will be his fourth season as the Dolphins head coach and he is on a 5 year deal that is fully guaranteed. Most fans didn’t expect the Dolphins to be legit contenders this year but in 2022 they should be making a serious run at the playoffs. It will all depend on what Grier is able to do this off-season and that is when we will start talking about his future again. For now, there isn’t much need to shake our fists.