Florida Gridiron | Celebrating the Sunshine State's Proud Football Heritage

What can I say about this game other than wow. I would have to say everyone did a great job. Our starters made some great plays. So did the other strings. Henne looked very solid on all of his throws and i think he did a great job out there. Another player that really did a great job was Lex Hilliard. We already have three very good running backs. Have we found a forth? In the absence of Smith and Jason Allen the other corners were able to show off what they could do. They did quite well at that task. Vontae Davis had a real good game maybe he read my article and it gave him more to prove(pun completely intended).

I do have to say one negative comment. Its just my nature. Chad Henne through a nice pass to Earnest Wilford. Unfortunately Wilford couldn’t get out of turtle speeds to catch up to it.

There is a lot to be said about what i saw in this preseason opener. In my opinion i think both teams played very mediocre. Neither team did anything to spectacular to me. Really all i care about is The Dolphins so let me talk about the pros and cons.

I think the most disappointing player of the night had to be Vontae Davis. All he did in the game was be stupid. I think that’s the best way to describe this player. All he did was produce idiotic mistakes that were overly frustrating. Now, he is a rookie, and maybe he can learn from his mistakes. But as much as it pains me to say this i don’t think he will do very well the rest of the preseason. As soon as i heard his first interview when he was drafted he talked like an uneducated person would. I am not trying to make fun of the fact that he probably is a little mentally challenged. However, I could tell he wasn’t very smart based on the way he spoke and it really showed tonight that he isn’t to bright. I know its his first NFL game and I’m being way to critical, but I really can’t put much faith in him.

Other than Vontae their were a few other noteworthy disappointments. The few passes by Pennington looked pretty crappy, but overlook able. Ronnie Brown did not seem to get much help from our “revamped o-line”. I didn’t see any good throws from Henne. He looked better in his rookie year. Their was other screw-ups but these were the most noticeable from my perspective. All these thing i do believe will improve with a little time.

On a brighter note i think our whole defense did a pretty good job overall. The player that stood out the most was CB Sean Smith our future starting corner. He looked as if he had been playing corner professionally for years. At the end he was interviewed and sounded very well educated and smart about what he was doing. Something Vontae doesn’t know about.

On offense their was a few bright spots. The best was Ricky Williams he did a great job out there. Ted Ginn had a few nice catches against a spectacular corner in Rashean Mathis. Plus he probably would have got a long TD if we had a QB with an arm. On that play though he was smart and drew a pass interference call. Another player who did well was Pat White. He looked like a leader out there with all those future practice squad players.

The release of Madden 10 is right around the corner and I cant wait to get my copy.

What angers me is the ratings of AFC East teams that I discovered. The Patriots’ rank in the 90′s with Tom Brady being the second best QB in the game. The Patriots’ are a good team but how does a player that didn’t play last season have a near perfect rating? It amazes me how they could rate him so highly.

That isn’t what angered me all that much. What was really odd was the rankings of the of the Bills, Dolphins, and Jets. The Dolphins rank 77, the Jets rank 78, and the Bills rank 76. What dumbfounds me is that we won the freaking AFC east! How do we rank so far behind a team with a QB coming off a major injury? Also even though the Jets only rank a point higher, they don’t deserve it. The Jets are not better than the Dolphins. The Dolphins are a team not only a team on the rise but we know we have depth in positions and we also know who can start at quarterback. I don’t think the Jets can say all those things, and another thing that strikes me as odd is that the Bills rank so close to us. I know we are definitely better than them. I think the Dolphins should have ranked in the 80′s at least. I don’t think these game developers watch enough football to understand how players ought to be rated.

Maybe after this season the Dolphins will have a little more respect.

Everyone likes to trash talk. No matter who you are. Usually teams wait at least till the preseason to start taking jabs at one another. In the AFC east we do it in mini camp. Jets head coach Rex Ryan is already boasting that he has the best defense in the division. What is this guy a comedian? A down hasn’t been played and he wasn’t to start saying that he has the best defense. We can’t completely blame him though. His defense is playing against an atrocious offense so of course it looks good. I personally think that the Jets are in last place right now. They gave up a lot to get a QB that could be a hit or miss. They were desperate to find a quarterback. Every other team has changed for the better. I don’t think I could say the same about the Jets.

So LB Channing Crowder had a few words exchanged with Rex Ryan. It was mostly about how the Patriots were considered the team to beat in the AFC East when the Dolphins are the reigning AFC East champs. What was really funny was that Rex said if he was younger he could whoop Channing. I laugh that a guy bigger than his O-linemen, all fat no muscle, thinks he could fight. He’d run out of breath on his first swing.

I like what this division looks like its shaping up to be. I hate the Pats and I hate the Jets. Now that T.O. is with the Bills I will probably hate them, too. I think it is going to get nasty off the field but more importantly on the field. The season can’t come soon enough.