Dolphins Shut Mike Pouncey Down For Season
Mike Pouncey‘s season is over. After wrestling with how to handle their injured center, the Dolphins will place Pouncey on IR following his meeting with a specialist early Tuesday morning, Armando Salguero of The Miami Herald writes. 
The Dolphins feared that Pouncey would do further damage to his surgically-repaired hip if he continued to play this year. And, if they left the decision up to him, he probably would have let his competitive nature overrule the long-term view. Miami took the decision out of the Pro Bowler’s hands, which will hopefully allow him to return pain-free in 2017. Right now, the belief is that his injury is not career-threatening, despite previous reports to the contrary.
Now that the Dolphins have an open roster spot, they are likely to use that room to sign a quarterback. With Ryan Tannehill likely out of action this weekend, Miami will need a backup QB behind Matt Moore. In theory, the team could promote seventh-round rookie Brandon Doughty from the practice squad to fill that role, but Salguero hears that they are more likely to go out-of-house.
The Dolphins are taking the long view with Pouncey, but their season is far from over. According to Five Thirty Eight, the 8-5 Dolphins have a 27% chance of making the playoffs.
Ryan Tannehill To Miss At Least Two Games
Ryan Tannehill will get a second opinion on his knee Tuesday after learning earlier today he didn’t tear an ACL but rather sprained his ACL and MCL. The plan for now is for the Dolphins to trot out backup Matt Moore in the next two games in which Tannehill will definitely not play, Armando Salguero of the Miami Herald reports, and give the franchise passer a chance to stabilize the knee before contemplating a potential Week 17 return against the Patriots.
Salguero notes if the Week 17 game against the Patriots is meaningful for the Dolphins’ playoff hopes and Tannehill wouldn’t risk long-term knee damage, Adam Gase will hound his training staff with questions and consider starting him in a game that could well have home-field advantage on the line for the Pats. However, Salguero notes Tannehill’s ACL is partially torn since it’s been categorized as a sprain, and there will likely be a risk of a full tear if he returns in three weeks.
Additionally, if Tannehill cannot recover in time for the New Year’s Day tilt, the Dolphins will keep him on the roster in 2017 to guarantee $14.5MM of his salary next season. The team will reinstall the former first-round pick as its starting quarterback next season, Salguero writes, with the Jay Cutler talk no longer being a possibility despite Tannehill’s cap number escalating from $11.6MM to $20.3MM.
Ryan Tannehill Has ACL/MCL Sprain, Not Tear
Dolphins quarterback Ryan Tannehill received some good news today. He has only sprained his ACL and MCL and does not have a tear of the ligaments, coach Adam Gase announced today. There is still no timetable for return and the injury could still keep him out for the remainder of the regular season. 
Tannehill went down during the third quarter of Sunday’s 26-23 win over the Cardinals. The Dolphins feared the worst, but Tannehill has now gotten the best diagnosis possible. Tannehill may or may not be able to return this season, but this injury should be all healed up before the start of next season. An ACL and MCL tear would have put his status for 2017 in jeopardy.
The Dolphins are now 8-5 and are knocking on the door for a Wild Card spot. If the playoffs started today, those spots would be occupied by the Raiders (10-3) and Broncos (also 8-5). According to Five Thirty Eight, Miami has a 30% chance of making the playoffs but just a 2% chance of catching the 10-2 Patriots for the divisional crown.
It stands to reason that Tannehill will miss at least one game. For however long he is out, Matt Moore will handle quarterback duties.
2017 NFL Draft Order Through Most Of Week 14
The final month of the regular season will dictate the playoff futures for teams like the Cowboys, Patriots, Chiefs, and Raiders. For other teams, the postseason is a statistical impossibility. Already, the Jets, Jaguars, Browns, Rams, Bears, and 49ers have been mathematically eliminated. The Chargers, Saints, Panthers, Eagles, Bengals, and Cardinals are not technically out of it, but their chances are remote.
Here’s where those teams and the others not currently ticketed for the playoffs stand in the draft order (Note – Ties are broken by strength of schedule):
- Browns 0-13
- 49ers 1-12
- Jaguars 2-11
- Bears 3-10
- Rams 4-9 (pick belongs to Titans)
- Jets 4-9
- Panthers 5-8
- Chargers 5-8
- Saints 5-8
- Eagles (pick belongs to Browns) 5-8
- Cardinals 5-7-1
- Bengals 5-7-1
- Bills 6-7
- Colts 6-7
- Titans 7-6
- Vikings (pick belongs to Eagles) 7-6
- Packers 7-6
- Redskins 7-5-1
- Ravens 7-5 (Note – The Ravens play their Week 14 game tonight against the Patriots.)
- Dolphins 8-5
Strength of schedule via SB Nation.
Dolphins Want To Extend Stills, Alonso
- Jackson estimates the Fins will possess more than $50MM in cap space if they cut Mario Williams and Koa Misi, as he expects them to. Cutting Williams would save the team $8.5MM, with a Misi release adding $4.2MM to that figure. These moves would cost less than $3MM in terms of dead money.
- The Dolphins managed to move to 8-5 and stand in reasonable position to qualify for the playoffs for the first time since 2008, although Ryan Tannehill‘s possible ACL tear obviously throws cold water on this, and the team wants to retain multiple members of its core. Barry Jackson of the Miami Herald notes the team would like to extend Kiko Alonso, tight end Dion Sims, and potentially Kenny Stills after the season. Stills is the only member of the Dolphins’ receiving corps who is not under contract after the season. He caught six passes for 97 yards and a touchdown against the Cardinals today to bring his season total to over 600. Proving to be a solid fit for Adam Gase‘s offense, Stills unlikely to match the 931 yards he amassed in 2014 with the Saints but could approach it and command a nice payday. Miami also wants to extend Jarvis Landry, whose contract is up after the ’17 season.
Dolphins Fear QB Ryan Tannehill Has Torn ACL
The Dolphins pulled out a last-second win over the Cardinals today, but despite that victory, Miami’s playoff hopes have still taken a massive hit. Dolphins head coach Adam Gase told reporters that the club fears quarterback Ryan Tannehill has suffered a torn ACL, according to Armando Salguero of the Miami Herald (Twitter link).
[RELATED: Dolphins Plan To Extend Jarvis Landry]
Heading into today’s game, the Dolphins had something close to a one-in-five chance of earning a postseason berth — Football Outsiders gave Miami a 31.9% chance, while FiveThirtyEight put the Dolphins’ odds at just 23%. Clearly, those figures will increase after Miami’s win today (plus losses from other AFC contenders such as Denver and Indianapolis), but the club will now likely have to fight its way to into the tournament with its backup quarterback, Matt Moore.
Moore, 32, is one of the more experienced No. 2 signal-callers in the NFL, as he has 25 career starts under his belt. However, the last of those starts came during the 2011 campaign, so it’s fair to wonder what Moore has left in the tank. That 2011 season was a high-water mark for Moore, as he threw 16 touchdowns and led Miami to a 6-6 record in 12 starts. In his small sample against Arizona today, Moore completed three of five passes for 40 yards.
With Moore under center, the Dolphins figure to lean even more heavily on their running game, which ranks third in the league in DVOA and features Jay Ajayi, who is now closing in on 1,000 yards on the ground. Additionally, Miami’s passing attack isn’t short on weapons, as Moore will be throwing to Jarvis Landry, DeVante Parker, Kenny Stills, and emergent tight end Dion Sims.
For Tannehill, the injury obviously marks a disappointing end to what can only be described as a middling season. So far in 2016, the 28-year-old Tannehill has posted numbers right in line with his career marks — through 12 starts, he’d completed 66.7% of his passes for 2,800 yards, 16 touchdowns, and 11 interceptions while ranking 25th in DYAR and 27th in DVOA.
Under the terms of a four-year extension signed in the summer of 2015, Tannehill is under contract with the Dolphins through the 2020 season. He’s guaranteed $3.5MM of his $17.975MM base salary in 2017. Miami wouldn’t be able to part ways with Tannehill while he’s injured, and it likely wouldn’t consider that route given the financial ramifications and the fact that the club showed progress under Gase this season.
Dolphins Plan To Extend Jarvis Landry
The Dolphins’ most consistent receiver during the middle portion of this decade, Jarvis Landry looks to be a candidate to sign an extension during the offseason.
Landry is finishing up the third season of his four-year rookie contract, one that does not contain a fifth-year option since he arrived as a second-round pick as part of a deep 2014 receiver class, and Barry Jackson of the Miami Herald notes the Dolphins are going to allocate money for an extension for their slot receiver.
Miami won’t do any extensions until after the season, per Jackson. But the team will be carrying over some additional cap room from 2016 — which will inflate the total of space in 2017 to at least $36MM, Jackson notes — to aid in re-up talks.
This offseason brought a domino effect for second-tier wide receiver extensions, with Allen Hurns, Keenan Allen, Doug Baldwin, Tavon Austin and Emmanuel Sanders inking new deals, but next year could bring a summer more in line with what occurred in 2015 — when several top-flight wideouts (Julio Jones, A.J. Green, Dez Bryant and Demaryius Thomas) signed re-ups with the franchises that drafted them in the first round.
Odell Beckham, Mike Evans, Sammy Watkins, Allen Robinson, Landry and others will be extension-eligible after the season, and the results for a couple of those targets could well raise the receiver AAV ceiling Green ($15MM per year) currently occupies. Landry won’t command the same kind of deal Beckham or Evans will, but the Dolphins’ inside chain-mover stands to be in position for an eight-figure-per-year deal once talks commence due to the combination of age (24), production and the salary cap being set to rise near $170MM. The LSU product is on pace for a second consecutive 1,000-yard season, sitting at 820 yards on 75 receptions.
He might not match his 110-catch standard of 2015, but Landry’s proven to be a key component in Adam Gase‘s offense. Landry will make $893K next season. Miami’s young core of receivers mostly enters the offseason under contract, but Kenny Stills will be a UFA after this year. DeVante Parker and Stills boast 583 and 501 air yards, respectively, this season.
Dolphins Waive Bryce Harris
- The Dolphins announced that they’ve waived offensive tackle Bryce Harris. Miami had just claimed Harris, 27, off waivers from Jacksonville a few weeks ago. Harris has 34 games of experience under his belt, but has only started four contests during that time.
Dolphins Get Roster Exemption For Jason Jones
The Dolphins have received a roster exemption for defensive end Jason Jones as he returns from a two-game suspension, according to Howard Balzer of BalzerFootball.com (Twitter link). The exemption expires Wednesday, so Jones, who was banned for a substance abuse violation, must be activated by the middle of the week. Jones, 30, has appeared in ten Dolphins games this season, and posted 2.5 sacks, 23 tackles, and a fumble recovery.
NFL Spending By Team Over Last Four Seasons
The NFLPA has released the official data on team spending over the last four seasons. The Collective Bargaining Agreement stipulates that each team must utilize 89% of the salary cap over two four-year periods, 2013-16 and 2017-20. As previously reported, the Raiders are the only team that has yet to satisfy that requirement for the closing period. The CBA also requires the league, as a whole, to spend 95% of the cap, in cash, for the same period. That requirement has been easily met.
Here is the full rundown of every team’s spending in declining order:
Philadelphia Eagles – $613,928,134
Denver Broncos – $587,712,791
Seattle Seahawks – $584,305,975
Green Bay Packers – $583,138,740
Miami Dolphins – $577,975,260
Kansas City Chiefs – $575,541,332
Buffalo Bills – $573,647,850
Chicago Bears – $568,301,610
Cincinnati Bengals – $567,289,411
Baltimore Ravens – $562,425,698
San Diego Chargers – $562,232,116
Indianapolis Colts – $556,335,689
Atlanta Falcons – $550,614,572
New York Giants – $543,787,033
Arizona Cardinals – $543,327,538
Los Angeles Rams – $541,957,711
New Orleans Saints – $539,836,498
Tampa Bay Buccaneers – $539,736,102
Minnesota Vikings – $539,162,454
New York Jets – $533,151,519
Washington Redskins – $532,545,662
Pittsburgh Steelers – $530,698,171
Detroit Lions – $530,210,549
Tennessee Titans – $524,505,256
Dallas Cowboys – $523,033,036
Houston Texans – $517,212,166
Jacksonville Jaguars – $516,908,734
Cleveland Browns – $516,158,864
San Francisco 49ers – $514,488,198
New England Patriots – $500,083,836
Carolina Panthers – $495,149,346
Oakland Raiders – $491,433,408