The Miami Dolphins’ journey to the here and now has been quite the experience. Miami isn’t necessarily out of the woods yet, either. The team has added a good deal of talent across the roster over the course of the past season but all of those additions won’t mean much until the wins start to come. And while Miami has done well to build things back up, part of the rebuilding process was tearing things down, as well.
Even after the initial storm of roster departures in the spring of 2019, two big trades loom as monumental pieces of the Dolphins’ rebuilding effort that could have possibly changed where the Dolphins have ended up today. Those are, of course, the trades of OT Laremy Tunsil and DB Minkah Fitzpatrick. But now that we’re approximately one year removed from the fallout of both deals, we can turn our eyes back and begin to speculate what might have been different had those two players been kept? How different would the roster (and the salary cap) look?
For starters, Miami finished the 2019 season at 5-11. With Tunsil and a bought in Fitzpatrick, Miami adds probably their best player on either side of the football versus what the team actually had to work with. How do you measure that in wins and losses? It is hard to say. But we can, just for the sake of this exercise, assuming Miami wins more with two very good additions — one on each side of the ball. The low-hanging fruit is to say that Miami picks up wins in their two one-point losses last season — one to Washington and the other the the Jets in December. That would put the Dolphins at 7-9 on the season; an equal mark to where the team finished the year prior under Adam Gase.
And while a two win improvement sure sounds nice, let’s look at the fallout this would cause. Miami would hold only one first-round pick and two second-round picks in this past April’s NFL Draft, losing out on two first round picks and seeing their only other 1st-round pick tumble down the draft order — based on their adjusted strength of schedule after adjusting for wins over Washington and New York, Miami would have been slated to pick at No. 11 and the team’s first 2nd-round pick would have been scheduled at No. 48 instead of 39.
Let’s assume Miami still targets a quarterback — they’re not getting Tua Tagovailoa without trading up from 11 to get in front of the Chargers, who now pick at No. 5. So Miami is probably coming home with Jordan Love or Justin Herbert as their next franchise passer, instead and would be lucky to nail down Robert Hunt at the same pick in the 2nd-round. In reality, Miami’s offseason was such a big win because they got their quarterback of choice without giving up assets and were able to double down on cheap rookie talent at key spots early in the draft between Austin Jackson, Hunt, Noah Igbinoghene and Raekwon Davis.
Had Miami kept Tunsil and Fitzpatrick, we’d be looking at clearly better options at left tackle and free safety but either a presumed downgrade at quarterback OR having to pay handsomely to pull the New York Giants out of pick No. 4 or the Detroit Lions out of pick No. 3 to land Tagovailoa (and no extra picks in 2021, either).
Oh, right — and the Dolphins would have presumably paid Laremy Tunsil a contract extension by now. The Texans ponied up for Tunsil and paid him a new contract that averages over $22M per season. Paying Tunsil versus what the team is paying Austin Jackson would leave Miami with somewhere around $5M in salary cap space versus the $24M the team currently holds — plus would push the Dolphins’ 2021 salary cap higher amid the prospect of a reduced 2021 salary cap amid the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic. With roughly $19M less in carryover for 2021 and an additional $18-20M in commitments in 2021 for Tunsil versus Jackson, the Dolphins would absolutely feel the cap squeeze in 2021 versus having a projected $28-30M in cap space next year AFTER the cap reduction to $175M.
So, to sum it up, everything happens for a reason. For Miami, the prospect of trading Tunsil and Fitzpatrick last fall was a tough pill to swallow. But, given the shift in financials and draft assets that would have taken place had Miami kept both players, you could very easily argue that the Dolphins are in a much greater spot moving forward. Here is a summary of some of the outcomes:
TRADE TUNSIL & FITZPATRICK
- Projected $30M in 2021 cap space
- Landed QB Tua Tagovailoa, OT Austin Jackson, DB Noah Igbinoghene in the 1st-round of 2020 NFL Draft, plus OT Robert Hunt in the early 2nd-round
KEEP TUNSIL & FITZPATRICK, TRADE UP FOR TAGOVAILOA
- Approximately -$6M in 2021 cap space (so you’ll need to cut players after the 2020 season to get under the cap)
- Land QB Tua Tagovailoa in the 1st-round of the 2020 NFL Draft
- Trade away pick used to draft OT Robert Hunt, own no additional 2020 or 2021 1st-round draft selections (Trading pick No. 11 to pick No. 3 or No. 4 will require 2020 2nd-round pick & Dolphins’ only 2021 1st-round pick)
KEEP TUNSIL & FITZPATRICK, NO TAGOVAILOA
- Approximately -$6M in 2021 cap space (so you’ll need to cut players after the 2020 season to get under the cap)
- Land QB Jordan Love or QB Justin Herbert in the 1st-round of the 2020 NFL Draft, plus OT Robert Hunt in the early 2nd-round
We’ll let you be the judge of which outcome you’d prefer.