The Miami Dolphins reset the franchise this season, from the front office through the coaching staff and onto the roster. The reset has brought with it learning curves, struggles, and growing pains. The team started the season 0-5, with talk that they could be the first team to finish a season 0-17. Last Sunday, they ended that talk with a solid win over the New York Jets, with every aspect of the team working together and showing their potential.
Running back Ollie Gordon II, a second-year player,
started the year as a depth player but has thrust himself into a starring role following an injury to De’Von Achane. Earlier this year, he sat down with former Dolphins tackle Terron Armstead on “The Set with Terron Armstead” podcast, and discussed the situation with the team. Released this week, the discussion included a comparison of first-year head coach Jeff Hafley and former head coach Mike McDaniel.
“Haf has definitely tried to connect with us more,” Gordon said. “Every team meeting, he’s up in front of us, he is talking. He’s sitting in offensive meetings. He’ll sit halfway through, he goes to defense, he’ll come back. He puts his two cents in, which is good, you need that. He’s not just a one-sided coach. Obviously he was a defensive guy before, that’s his background, but he comes in, he’s like, ‘If I were scheming against y’all, I would do this and this. So I need y’all to make it look like this.’ I feel like that helps alot, especially coming from a defensive guy.
“He’s lined up against every offense you can in this league, so it’s like he knows what he is talking about. I definitely feel like he is trying to be more connected to us and make us connected as a team.”
Gordon also shared his three “welcome to the NFL” moments:
“I feel like one was being on the field with [linebacker] Bobby Wagner when we played the [Washington] Commanders, bro. As a kid, I watched him. I watched the league, you know what I am saying? All of them. I wanted all of them [the Seattle Seahawks ’Legion of Boom’ defense of the 2010s]. [Safety] Earl [Thomas], [safety] Kam Chancellor, [cornerback] Richard [Sherman]. Being able to be on the field at the same time as him, I feel like that was huge. Just like to little me, like ‘Damn, you’re really on the field with Bobby Wagner.‘”
Armstead, after pointing out that Gordon did not mention a hit or a specific play, but just being on the field with Wagner as a moment he remembers and made the NFL real to Gordon, said, “I love that, for real. People be acting like they are too proud or got too much ego to be like a fan of somebody. First time I played Terrell Suggs, same thing. Like seeing these guys on the other side that are legends, and still actively playing. Jared Allen, Julius Peppers, I’m like ‘Dog, this is dope.’”
Gordon went on to his second and third moments, saying, “Two, the Baltimore game, me and my coach [running back coach Eric Studesville] got into it after I slipped…It was one of those where everyone is a grown man in the party. You can’t talk to one person crazy and if you get talked to crazy, you get a reaction from the other person. I feel like, that was my first time really just getting into it with a coach.”
Gordon added, “I ain’t going to lie, that was so bad. I think I blacked out. I don’t even remember…We was cool, though, we was cool right after. We talked at halftime. We talked after the game. We was good.”
For his third moment, Gordon turned to the team’s Week 10 game last year, when the Buffalo Bills visited Miami. “We ran a little outside zone,” the running back explained, “When I got the ball, [Bills defensive end Joey] Bosa was just looking at me. Bro must have just picked me up and flipped me over. Oh my God. My life flashed before my eyes and when I opened my eyes, I was on the ground.”
Gordon went on to add that he thought the hit from Bosa was payback for earlier in the year when the running back scored his first career touchdown, running through the Bills’ defense – including Bosa.
What do you think of Gordon’s three “welcome to the NFL” moments? Do you think Hafley is connecting with the players and having the players connect with each other better than McDaniel did?
