3 strategies Mike McDaniel needs to embrace to not have a repeat performance vs. the Chargers
By Matt Serniak
Embrace the checkdown
Mike McDaniel can really make Tua's job so much easier if he just gives him the incentive to check it down to the back on a swing pass or the TE running that Jason Witten five-yard stick route that he parlayed into a hall-of-fame career.
Sure it's neat I guess that Tua led the league in YPA(yards per attempt) but who cares really? I don't. You know what I care about? Getting the ball to the open man especially when the defense isn't allowing you to hit that 14-16 yards ball to the middle of the field like Tua did time and time again last year. Give more of the boring swing pass to Mostert, Ahmed, or Achane(we'd all love to see Achane with a head of steam with the ball so make it happen, Mike) and have them get an easy 7 yards or more. Make one guy miss and now you're talking 13+ yards.
We saw exactly what I speak of earlier in this year's preseason. On a 3rd and three, Tua easily just tossed a ball to the flat to Salvon Ahmed and he took it for 16 yards after he made one guy miss.
Salvon Ahmed on what he does well. Nice catch out of backfield for 16 pic.twitter.com/QAWUg33bMv
— DolFans Weekly - Jason Sarney (@Jason_Sarney) August 19, 2023
Jaylen Waddle wasn't on the field either so there was even more attention to other guys on the field for Miami.
This kind of play is what I need to see more often. The entire world knows Tua is looking for Tyreek and Jaylen. No one is worried, due to having to worry about them, about Ahmed or any running back catching a ball in the flat but it's something that he, Mostert, Achane, and Chris Brooks do well enough to make it really hurt, and frustrate defenses thus keeping them on the field more. Keeping defenses on the field more obviously means good offenses, like the Chargers have, on the sidelines.
The strategies, approaches, and philosophies aren't anything groundbreaking or anything that requires a membership to MENSA. But it does take a bit of will to do these things consistently because it goes against what you really want to do on offense. Again who cares if it gets results? Hill and Waddle will get theirs. Nobody is worried about that. Let's make getting them theirs easier and let's do it against the Chargers.
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