The NFL isn’t the only realm of football that is seeing talent opt out of the 2020 season. The waves of highly talented college football players to announce their decision to skip the 2020 season have begun as well. The first prominent college prospect to announce he was skipping the year was Virginia Tech cornerback Caleb Farley, who is highly gifted but also probably an inconsequential domino for the Miami Dolphins after such a heavy investment in the cornerback position this offseason. But yesterday saw two more potential first-round players announce that they, too, would be skipping any kind of college season — and both are very much relevant to the Miami Dolphins.
First, Minnesota wide receiver Rashod Bateman. Bateman plays in an offensive attack that will sound familiar to Dolphins fans — the Gophers like to run down hill at you and gash you in the passing game with a lot of run-pass options. It isn’t dissimilar to how Tua Tagovailoa made so many waves at Alabama and, more importantly, not necessarily too dissimilar to how Miami is expected to run their offense in 2020. If the Dolphins are going to make the most of Tagovailoa’s talents, they’re going to need more depth and top-flight talent in the skill positions around him. After all, that’s exactly what Tagovailoa was accustomed to having at his disposal throughout the course of his career at Alabama with Jerry Jeudy, Henry Ruggs, Jaylen Waddle and Devonta Smith. Bateman is most similar to Smith — he plays bigger than his size, he wins both at the line of scrimmage and after the catch, shows great hands in traffic and is an expected 1st-round target of NFL teams. If Miami wants to go from good to great in the wide receiver room, Bateman will be a name to watch, even if he’s not someone who you can watch in the college game this fall.
The second report yesterday came from Eric Edholm of Yahoo Sports and it serves as the biggest name to be reported yet: Penn State linebacker Micah Parsons. If the Miami Dolphins are going to be in possession of a top-10 pick and they don’t see a wide receiver that they love available, Parsons is the kind of talent that will likely generate a very strong amount of interest. The Dolphins will have to make a difficult decision with Raekwon McMillan this offseason — but if Miami opted to pass on resigning McMillan with the hopes of landing Parsons in mind, it would be cause for excitement. Parsons is a three-down terror at linebacker who wins as a pass rusher (he was a defensive end in high school), in pass coverage (he’s reported to run in the 4.4s in the 40) and as the quarterback of the defense.
There will be more declarations to come ahead of any kind of college football season this fall. But in the meantime, there are already two prospects in hand that should move the needle for the Dolphins early in next spring’s 2021 NFL Draft — in which the team has two first-round picks at this disposal.