Can you really never have enough corners?

( A freezing Logan Ryan, photo from usatoday.com)

As many of you have heard, there is a lot of buzz about the Dolphins signing corner Logan Ryan. Ryan is a 7-th year veteran that was a third-round draft pick out of Rutgers in 2013, and started his NFL career with the Patriots but played his last three with the Titans. Logan Ryan is not a long-arm, lock-down corner like Byron Jones, but he can tackle and forced four fumbles in 2019. He gets some picks - more than Byron Jones but not as many as Xavien Howard. However, one of those picks was Tom Brady's last throw as a Patriot that Ryan took in for six. That's worth something. But is it worth $10M/yr?

To put this in perspective, the Dolphins have about $23M left in cap space (from overthecap.com). The secondary is currently about 20% of the salary cap ($50M of $240M) and is already filled with expensive veterans like Xavien Howard and Byron Jones (~$30M cap just for these two!). There is also about $15M of dead money from Reshad Jones and Minkah Fitzpatrick. I'm still sad about Minkah Fitzpatrick. For comparison, the offensive line is less than 10% of the cap with Ereck Flowers taking up half of that. So, adding Logan Ryan at about $10M/yr would make the secondary a quarter of the cap and leave us with little money to strengthen other groups.



(A better duo than Drake and Ninja, Marcus Peters and Marlon Humphrey, photo timeincapp.com)

For comparison, the Baltimore Ravens are considered by many to be the best secondary in the league and have pro-bowl players like Earl Thomas, Marcus Peters, and Marlon Humphrey. Baltimore has also spent about 20% of the salary cap to achieve this success, which is about the amount that Dolphins have spent. So that should mean that we should have just as good of a secondary. Yeah, that's how it works, right?

I like Logan Ryan as a player and a leader, but we have spent enough money on the secondary and need to spend the money elsewhere. We need to start spending on protecting Tua. Austin Jackson was a first round addition to the offensive line, but we need more players with more experience. How about Larry Warford, the three-time Pro Bowl guard? The Saints chose Andrus Peat over Warford, and we may be able to get him at a discount. His slow speed is less of an issue at guard than at tackle.

The Dolphins have spent about $110M of cap space on defense, and many fans are excited about seeing on this money on the field. But at some point we have to ask about the priorities of Coach Flores. Is building up the offensive line a priority for 2020? If Coach Flores does not intend to play Tua this season, he may continue to spend on the defense this year and spend draft picks on the offensive line in 2021. Perhaps the Dolphins won't invest in the offensive line until Tua plays. This could be because Tua and Fitzpatrick have very different play styles, and an offensive line built for Tua won't be effective with Fitzpatrick.If true, we could be in for some low scoring games on both sides of the ball.

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