The reasons why Chris Grier's 2024 Miami Dolphins season will be more scrutinized

Chris Grier never truly had to worry about the Miami Dolphins salary cap but he does now.

Since his ascention to the title of GM, Grier has never had to truly worry about the salary cap. In 2019, the team blew it all up with the hopes of starting over. The Dolphins were in cap paradise. They had draft picks coming out of their ears.

The rebuild was supposed to give the Dolphins a big reset. A new head coach and a new attitude. It was all supposed to click. Grier fired Adam Gase and hired Brian Flores. It offered a big change. Instead, the Dolphins fought internally about the quarterback. They couldn't get on the same page over the direction of the team.

Grier spent the money he had but the problem was he handed out big contracts that didn't get the return he had hoped for. He extended Xavien Howard, smart, then signed Byron Jones the following year to a bigger deal. Not smart. That led to Howard wanting more money, and Grier found a way to give it to him. He gave Emmanuel Ogbah a huge contract and Ogbah never came close to playing at that level again.

Now, 5 years into his job, the Dolphins are expected to be nearly $40 million over the cap with several big free agents needing to be signed. The team has holes remaining (more on that with the next slide) than the team has money to fix. Miami will clear contracts this year just to get to a working cap.

No, the cap isn't real for the most part but at some point, it does come back to bite you. For Grier, free spending didn't work out the way it should have and instead of spreading the money he had around, instead of getting players locked up a year early, he waited and overspent instead.