New Miami Dolphins coach Adam Gase wants to see if less could really mean more.
This isn’t an existential riddle Gase is trying to solve. Or a grandstanding ploy by a rookie head coach in a league where egos can be as big as offensive linemen. Because no hotshot new coach on the Eastern seaboard, on a team whose primary color is also a shade of green, has ever done that.
By not having their rookies practice during this weekend’s orientation camp, Gase and the Dolphins are hoping it will make for an easier and quicker adjustment to the NFL — on and off the field. Maybe give them more in the tank at the end of the season, too, a time when rookies typically hit a wall.
The unorthodox move by Gase, first detailed Monday by the Miami Herald, is raising eyebrows because there’s nothing NFL coaches love more than practice. Seriously. Spend more than five minutes talking to almost any coach in the NFL, and odds are he’ll start griping about the reduction in the number and intensity of practices and how it’s ruining the league.
There is, most obviously, the needless injury risk. The Jacksonville Jaguars made Dante Fowler Jr. the No. 3 pick in last year’s draft, only to lose him for the entire season after he tore his ACL the first day of rookie minicamp. No surprise, the Jaguars are also cutting back on their on-field work during rookie camp.
"It's never really made a lot of common sense to me,'' Jaguars general manager Dave Caldwell told The Associated Press. "You always just crossed your fingers and hoped for the best. I think this gave us good reason to do it. Never did you think it would be something that would be season-ending, but even the little stuff. If a guy pulls a hamstring, then all of a sudden he spends the next six weeks rehabbing instead of getting better, stronger and in shape.''
Most of these players have spent the past five or six months training for workouts, not football. First there was the combine. Then their pro day. Then meetings with individual teams. They may be in football shape, but they need time to get in shape to play football.
There also isn’t much long-term benefit. These guys are still trying to figure out the names of their coaches, let alone the schemes and plays they’ll be running.
It might be better, Gase thought, to spend that practice time in the classroom for what amounts to a three-day immersion program on the new offense or defense. That way, when the rookies do get on the field at OTAs or minicamp or training camp, they’ll actually know what a coach means when he barks out a play or instruction.
Might help them stay fresher throughout the season, too.
Because of the whirlwind they’ve been on, most players haven’t had a break since last summer. Between offseason workouts, training camp and, in some cases, finishing school, these players could be looking at 16 months without any significant time off. The NFL season is already about a quarter longer than the college season, no reason to add to that.
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Gase and the Dolphins also hope the time they’re saving on the field will help their new players be successful off the field. There’s a lot that comes with being a professional athlete, and the Dolphins have built in time over the weekend for seminars on nutrition, financial planning and dealing with the media, in all its forms.
These type of sessions have always been part of rookie weekend. But they were usually crammed into the schedule, often at times when players were so overloaded from everything else that whatever was said may as well have been in Sanskrit for as much impact as it made.
But with the NFL doing away with its Rookie Symposium, the responsibility for helping players adjust to their Alice in Wonderland-like existence now falls even heavier on each team. And Gase and the Dolphins want to make sure they’re doing it right.
Gase isn’t professing to have all the answers. He’s not professing anything at all, actually, declining to talk about the Dolphins’ uncharacteristic approach until this weekend.
But it can’t hurt to try. One weekend’s worth of practice isn’t going to make any rookie markedly better, but a weekend without it just might.
Which is hardly the case. And it certainly won’t be the case because rookies forego a couple of practices a week or two after being drafted.
It makes sense that teams want to get their new players into their facility as soon as possible. What has never made sense is sending the rookies right out to the practice field.
This isn’t an existential riddle Gase is trying to solve. Or a grandstanding ploy by a rookie head coach in a league where egos can be as big as offensive linemen. Because no hotshot new coach on the Eastern seaboard, on a team whose primary color is also a shade of green, has ever done that.
By not having their rookies practice during this weekend’s orientation camp, Gase and the Dolphins are hoping it will make for an easier and quicker adjustment to the NFL — on and off the field. Maybe give them more in the tank at the end of the season, too, a time when rookies typically hit a wall.
The unorthodox move by Gase, first detailed Monday by the Miami Herald, is raising eyebrows because there’s nothing NFL coaches love more than practice. Seriously. Spend more than five minutes talking to almost any coach in the NFL, and odds are he’ll start griping about the reduction in the number and intensity of practices and how it’s ruining the league.
There is, most obviously, the needless injury risk. The Jacksonville Jaguars made Dante Fowler Jr. the No. 3 pick in last year’s draft, only to lose him for the entire season after he tore his ACL the first day of rookie minicamp. No surprise, the Jaguars are also cutting back on their on-field work during rookie camp.
"It's never really made a lot of common sense to me,'' Jaguars general manager Dave Caldwell told The Associated Press. "You always just crossed your fingers and hoped for the best. I think this gave us good reason to do it. Never did you think it would be something that would be season-ending, but even the little stuff. If a guy pulls a hamstring, then all of a sudden he spends the next six weeks rehabbing instead of getting better, stronger and in shape.''
Most of these players have spent the past five or six months training for workouts, not football. First there was the combine. Then their pro day. Then meetings with individual teams. They may be in football shape, but they need time to get in shape to play football.
There also isn’t much long-term benefit. These guys are still trying to figure out the names of their coaches, let alone the schemes and plays they’ll be running.
It might be better, Gase thought, to spend that practice time in the classroom for what amounts to a three-day immersion program on the new offense or defense. That way, when the rookies do get on the field at OTAs or minicamp or training camp, they’ll actually know what a coach means when he barks out a play or instruction.
Might help them stay fresher throughout the season, too.
Because of the whirlwind they’ve been on, most players haven’t had a break since last summer. Between offseason workouts, training camp and, in some cases, finishing school, these players could be looking at 16 months without any significant time off. The NFL season is already about a quarter longer than the college season, no reason to add to that.
USA TODAY
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Gase and the Dolphins also hope the time they’re saving on the field will help their new players be successful off the field. There’s a lot that comes with being a professional athlete, and the Dolphins have built in time over the weekend for seminars on nutrition, financial planning and dealing with the media, in all its forms.
These type of sessions have always been part of rookie weekend. But they were usually crammed into the schedule, often at times when players were so overloaded from everything else that whatever was said may as well have been in Sanskrit for as much impact as it made.
But with the NFL doing away with its Rookie Symposium, the responsibility for helping players adjust to their Alice in Wonderland-like existence now falls even heavier on each team. And Gase and the Dolphins want to make sure they’re doing it right.
Gase isn’t professing to have all the answers. He’s not professing anything at all, actually, declining to talk about the Dolphins’ uncharacteristic approach until this weekend.
But it can’t hurt to try. One weekend’s worth of practice isn’t going to make any rookie markedly better, but a weekend without it just might.
Which is hardly the case. And it certainly won’t be the case because rookies forego a couple of practices a week or two after being drafted.
It makes sense that teams want to get their new players into their facility as soon as possible. What has never made sense is sending the rookies right out to the practice field.
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