Tag: Jonnu Smith

Jonnu Smith to team up with AFC East QB in Pro Bowl competition

Jonnu Smith will team up with a Dolphins rival on Thursday night in a game called “Passing the Test.”

Miami Dolphins tight end Jonnu Smith will team up with New England Patriots rookie quarterback Drake Maye in a competition called “Passing the Test” at the 2025 Pro Bowl Games, the NFL announced Wednesday.

In the competition, quarterbacks will try to hit targets at various distances and rack up as many points as possible in 40 seconds. But each passer will get an additional 10 seconds if their teammate can answer a Pro Bowl-themed trivia question correctly.

Maye will hope that Smith knows the rest of the Pro Bowl roster well, because the Dolphins tight end will have a chance to add as many as 50 seconds to the Patriots quarterback’s time limit.

For now, that’s the only game Smith is set to play Thursday night when the Pro Bowl Games air from 7 to 8:30 p.m. ET on ESPN.  Smith is also set to play in the flag football game Sunday that serves as the grand finale of the Pro Bowl Games. Coverage on Sunday is set to start at 3 p.m. ET on ESPN and ABC.

Smith earned Pro Bowl honors for the first time after replacing Kansas City Chiefs tight end Travis Kelce on the AFC roster. In his first season with the Dolphins, Smith set franchise records for receptions (88), receiving yards (884), and touchdowns (eight) by a tight end.

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Jonnu Smith takes Travis Kelce’s place in the 2025 Pro Bowl

The Dolphins will have a Pro Bowl representative after all.

Miami Dolphins tight end Jonnu Smith is a Pro Bowler after all.

On Monday, the team announced that Smith will participate in the 2025 Pro Bowl Games, becoming the Dolphins’ only representative at the NFL’s annual all-star competition.

The spot for Smith opened Sunday when the Kansas City Chiefs earned a trip to Super Bowl LIX. That made Chiefs tight end Travis Kelce unavailable for next weekend’s festivities, leaving the AFC in need of an alternate tight end.

In December, Smith called the Dolphins’ exclusion from the Pro Bowl rosters a “slap in the face.” He had a reason to feel jilted after finishing the regular season with better numbers than Kelce by many metrics.

In his first season after signing with Miami in the offseason, Smith recorded 88 receptions for 884 yards with eight touchdowns — all Dolphins single-season records for a tight end. Kelce, who has been voted a Pro Bowler in 10 straight seasons, finished 2024 with 97 receptions for 823 yards and three touchdowns.

Also unavailable to play the Pro Bowl next weekend is Chiefs defensive tackle Chris Jones. But it was New York Jets defensive tackle Quinnen Williams who earned a spot as a replacement instead of Miami Dolphins lineman Zach Sieler. Williams finished the year with six sacks and eight tackles for a loss, while Sieler had 10 sacks and 13 tackles for loss.

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Jonnu Smith still doesn’t think ‘apocalyptic’ Buffalo makes good wings

Jonnu Smith finally had some good wings in Buffalo, but he stands by his opinion that they’re “overrated.”

Miami Dolphins tight end Jonnu Smith stirred things up with his new team’s AFC East rival during the 2024 offseason when he said on a podcast that Buffalo was the “worst place you can be in the world, and the Buffalo wings ain’t even good.” While he’s since had some tastier wings in Upstate New York, Smith’s opinions haven’t changed much.

“Buffalo reminds me of like when you’re watching one of those apocalyptic movies and the world is about to end,” Smith said on Breakin’ House Rules, a podcast featuring NFL Network’s Cameron Wolfe and Dolphins safety Jevón Holland. “There’s just nothing going on.

“The wings ain’t even good. The wings are overrated. Actually, you know what, so the past couple years I’ve been playing Buffalo, I never had good wings. This year, though, I had some when we went to Buffalo. … Those wings was fire. Shout out whatever company that is, but every other wing I had was trash.”

Smith’s strong opinions about Buffalo and the city’s wings earned him a bit of trolling from the Bills after the Dolphins lost 30-27 in November. He also said he’s heard plenty from Bills fans.

“They was at me,” Smith said. “Respectfully, though. They defend their home.”

Smith set single-season franchise records for receptions (88), receiving yards (884), receiving touchdowns (eight) by a tight end in his first year with the Dolphins. In two games against the Bills, he caught 11 passes for 99 yards.

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Mike McDaniel is hunting for an answer to the Dolphins’ discipline issue

Mike McDaniel said he fined certain players multiple times, but it “didn’t move the needle.”

The Miami Dolphins had a discipline issue and head coach Mike McDaniel had a hard time finding a solution during the 2024 season.

“I can fine people til they’re blue in the face,” McDaniel said at a press conference Tuesday. “One thing I did learn during the course of the season is that fining guys … didn’t particularly move the needle in the way we need to, so I’ll adjust as I should as the head coach.”

The exact issues were mostly kept behind closed doors, but several of the team’s leaders told reporters that discipline needs to be a point of emphasis in 2025.

“There was things going on this year, obviously in the background, that needed to get taken care of,” Dolphins defensive lineman Zach Sieler said Monday. “We needed to be on our p’s and q’s earlier in the season and earlier in camp.”

“You definitely need structure any time you’re striving to do something great,” Dolphins tight end Jonnu Smith added. “There’s a lot of things we need to clean up as a team.”

So what comes next if players won’t respond to being fined? Parting ways.

“We’re at the point in our team where guys are firmly aware of the expectations, and if your actions continually lead to finable offenses that you’re telling me without words that you don’t want to be here. I think it’s very clear,” McDaniel said.

Will anything change with both McDaniel and general manager Chris Grier set to return? The latter says that’s largely up to the players.

“Players have to be accountable for each other,” Grier said. “Coaches aren’t around them 24/7. “It’s clearly understood now and Mike’s message to the team was very well received.”

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2 Dolphins deserve to feel like Pro Bowl snub was ‘slap in the face’

It’s been an underwhelming and disappointing year for the Dolphins, but zero Pro Bowlers?

Miami Dolphins tight end Jonnu Smith told reporters it felt like a “slap in the face” that the team had zero players on the 2025 Pro Bowl Games rosters that were released Thursday morning.

He’s got a point.

After the Dolphins had six Pro Bowlers last season, it’s no surprise that an underwhelming season didn’t yield the same amount of individual accolades. After all, Miami went from No. 1 in the NFL in total offense last season to No. 18 in 2024. And even though the Dolphins have a chance at finishing with a winning record, it’d take a small miracle for the team to reach the postseason.

But zero?

That puts the Dolphins in the same boat as the New Orleans Saints, New York Jets, and Tennessee Titans, three teams with 12 wins combined. Even the three-win Patriots, Browns, and Giants have at least one representative each.

Smith may have the most deserved gripe.

The veteran tight end has 79 receptions for 828 yards and seven touchdowns. But Kansas City Chiefs star Travis Kelce got the last spot at tight end in the AFC. Despite getting 34 fewer targets, Smith has more receiving yardage than Kelce (828 to 823) and more than double the touchdowns (seven to three).

Smith has earned a career-best 79.2 grade from Pro Football Focus this season. Kelce has a career-worst 70.9.

Dolphins defensive lineman Zach Sieler also has a justified case to be disgruntled with the result. After notching double-digit sacks last season, Sieler is at 8.5 this season with a career-best 12 tackles for loss.

But the Steelers’ Cameron Heyward, Chiefs’ Chris Jones, and Ravens’ Nnamdi Madubuike were given the nod instead. Not one of those players has more sacks or tackles for loss than Sieler.

There’s still time for some rights to be wronged. If the Chiefs reach the Super Bowl for the fifth time in the last six seasons, neither Kelce or Jones would participate in the Pro Bowl Games, which could open the door for Smith and/or Sieler to get the nod.

For now, though, there’s a pair of Dolphins who have a reason to feel like their performances this season aren’t being properly recognized.

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Jonnu Smith sets 2 Dolphins records in one drive

Jonnu Smith is having the best season any Dolphins tight end has ever had and he made that official in one drive Sunday against the 49ers.

Jonnu Smith is officially having the best season any tight end has ever had with the Miami Dolphins.

With a 22-yard reception in the third quarter Sunday against the San Francisco 49ers, Smith set a single-season franchise record for a tight end. The reception was his 74th of the year, eclipsing the previous record of 73 that was set by Randy McMichael in 2004 and tied by Mike Gesicki in 2021.

Two plays later, Smith caught his 75th pass for a gain of nine that moved him to 797 yards on the year, surpassing McMichael’s record of 791 yards that was also set in 2004.

All that’s left is one more franchise record for touchdowns in a season, which is very much in reach too. Smith entered Week 16 with five touchdown grabs, two behind Keith Jackson’s record of seven, which was set in 1994.

There’s a caveat to these records, though. During the team’s early seasons in the American Football League, it had some prolific numbers put up by players listed at the “left end” position rather than wide receiver or tight end. Jack Clancy racked up 868 yards from the “LE” spot in 1967 and Karl Noonan had 11 touchdowns at that spot in 1968.

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Dolphins roast Jets with late field goal, overtime touchdown

Dolphins rally to wreck Jets in overtime

Minutes after the New York Giants lost to the New Orleans Saints on Sunday at MetLife on a blocked field goal. Their co-tenants at the New Jersey venue matched them with a brutal loss of their own in South Beach.

Jason Sanders kicked a 52-yard field goal as time expired to tie the game and Tua Tagovailoa drove the Miami Dolphins to the winning touchdown in overtime of a 32-26 victory.

The winning score came on a TD pass of 10 yards from Tagovailoa to Jonnu Smith. The tight end had all three of his catches in overtime.

The result was the first 32-26 final in NFL history.

Sanders missed his lone PAT attempt but was four-of-four on field goal tries.

The Dolphins are 6-7 while the Jets are 3-10 and eliminated from postseason contention.

 

 

Only 3 Dolphins are top 10 at their position in early Pro Bowl voting

Dolphins players are off to a rough start in Pro Bowl voting.

The Miami Dolphins’ lackluster 2024 season evidently hasn’t inspired many fans to vote for the team’s players to go to the Pro Bowl Games. In the first release from the NFL, only three Dolphins players were top 10 in voting at their position.

Alec Ingold has the fourth most votes among fullbacks, Jonnu Smith is fifth among tight ends, and Jalen Ramsey is ninth in the cornerbacks race. None of those players being in the mix is a surprise, especially considering there aren’t even 10 fullbacks who qualify for votes.

But only one fullback, two tight ends, and four cornerbacks from each conference will earn a spot. Ingold, Smith, and Ramsey are all currently on the outside looking in.

Fans don’t solely determine the Pro Bowl rosters, though. They account for a third of the formula with votes from NFL players and coaches making up the other two thirds.

Among those currently outside the top 10 at their position with a strong argument for inclusion are Tua Tagovailoa, who leads the NFL in completion percentage, and Terron Armstead, who is the No. 2 graded offensive tackle on PFF.

Pro Bowl voting will remain open for fans until Dec. 23.

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Jonnu Smith says Dolphins teammate is ‘LeBron James of the NFL’

“The guy is 1,000 years old and playing like he’s 21.”

LeBron James will turn 40 next month, but the NBA legend’s production on the court doesn’t show it. The Los Angeles Lakers star is averaging 23.3 points, 9.2 assists, and 8.6 rebounds per game so far in his 22nd career season.

Miami Dolphins tight end Jonnu Smith says there’s a player on his team that has managed similar age-defying play.

“Calais [Campbell] is one of my favorite teammates in all the sports I’ve played,” Smith said Monday during an appearance on The Pat McAfee Show. “He’s like the LeBron James of the NFL right now. As far as his age and the production that he brings to the game, still playing at a high level. The guy is 1,000 years old and playing like he’s 21.

“The best leader I’ve been around. Good dude, good person, deserves everything that’s coming to him.”

Campbell, 38, recorded his fourth sack of the 2024 season in a 34-19 win against the Las Vegas Raiders on Sunday. It brought his career total to 109.5, moving him into a tie for 29th all-time. With two more sacks, he’d pass fellow future Hall of Famer Aaron Donald for 28th.

The Dolphins signed Campbell to a one-year, $2 million contract in the offseason. In August, he revealed it was “the cheapest offer” he received “by a large margin,” but he took the deal because he believed in the team.

When the Dolphins spiraled to a 2-6 start to the year, they reportedly received calls from other teams looking to acquire Campbell before the midseason trade deadline. But Miami spurned those offers to keep the 17th-year defensive lineman.

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Dolphins player of the game, Week 11: TE Jonnu Smith

All six of Jonnu Smith’s receptions Sunday resulted in either a first down or a touchdown.

In a 34-19 victory against the Las Vegas Raiders, the Miami Dolphins offense was surgical and efficient. The most reliable and dynamic target for quarterback Tua Tagovailoa, who had to consistently get the ball out quick, was tight end Jonnu Smith.

The veteran pass catcher finished his big day with six receptions for 101 yards and two touchdowns.

Smith’s first touchdown occurred on the opening drive of the game. Miami embarked on a 14-play, 70-yard drive that took over eight minutes off the clock. The Dolphins found themselves in a fourth-and-goal situation a yard away from the end zone and Tagovailoa connected with Smith for the game’s first touchdown.

Smith’s second touchdown was the dagger of the game when Tagovaioa found the tight end wide open in the middle of the field for a 57-yard touchdown

That touchdown was the final blow and all but sealed a Dolphins victory. All six of Smith’s receptions Sunday resulted in either a first down or a touchdown.

After a slow start to the season, Smith has settled into the Miami offense and has found a significant role, becoming one of Tagovailoa’s favorite targets. That was especially evident Sunday in a stellar performance.

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