The Miami Dolphins are hoping to find more success running the football in 2020. In their effort to do so, Miami completely overhauled the running back room, the offensive line and even the play-calling. This will not look anything like what Dolphins fans endured throughout the 2019 season — and we can all be thankful for that. But while Miami is certainly going to be more physical, the question begs to ask whether or not they’ll be more effective.

Absolutely. Just don’t expect them to be one of the top rushing teams in the NFL. The pathway to a lot of rushing success is aided by creating explosive plays on the ground — and added yardage isn’t exactly the specialty of one of Miami’s biggest additions this offseason. Jordan Howard is expected to be Miami’s primary ball carrier in 2020. With several 1,000 yard seasons under his belt, Howard has been able to showcase his ability to carry the load in Chicago before a brief stop in Philadelphia last season.

Howard can tote the rock. But creating extra yardage isn’t where he’s going to win — and that may limit the ceiling of Miami’s rushing game unless they’re willing to test the durability of RB Matt Breida with a bigger workload. Pro Football Focus ranked all 32 NFL starting running backs as it pertained to elusiveness entering 2020 — and Howard finished 25th on the list.

“You know what you’re going to get with Howard at this point in his career. He ranks third in both rushing attempts and yards since 2016, capable of carrying the load of a lead back, but he’s not someone who is going to make a whole lot of defenders whiff in one-on-one situations. Howard has broken a tackle on just 13% of his carries during those four years — ranking ahead of just two other running backs on this list with 250 or more carries in the same time frame.” – Pro Football Focus 

They say that beggars can’t be choosers. And after a 2019 campaign that saw Miami desperate to find consistency in the ground game, Dolphins fans should be happy to know they’ve found exactly that — both for better and for worse.

The Miami Dolphins’ 2020 season figures to be a whole lot more fun than the 2019 year — even if the team doesn’t rack up wins at an exponentially faster rate than last year’s team did. The Dolphins battled the narrative last season that the team was “tanking” — and for a while it appeared as though perhaps general manager Chris Grier had gone too far in tearing down the roster. There’s little question of Grier’s intent these days — the Dolphins were much more aggressive in adding talent and took advantage of the team’s embarrassment of riches in the NFL Draft to add eleven new players into the fray.

Each unit for the Miami Dolphins figures to be, at the very least, equal to what they were last year. No position group can be pointed to as getting worse, as Miami didn’t lose significant free agents and retooled several key positions with young talent.

One area of the Dolphins’ roster that should be vastly improved is the team’s running back stable. After a disastrous 2019 campaign that saw the Dolphins unable to move bodies along the line of scrimmage. Some of the shortcomings of the running game fall upon the offensive line, but the Dolphins’ backfield wasn’t especially talented, either. The team added two backs this offseason in hopes to ignite the running game and, along with a brand new offensive line, Miami looks to be better off.

But who will lead the team in rushing yards?

QB Ryan Fitzpatrick

Don’t laugh — this man led the Dolphins in rushing last season with 243 yards and 4 scores. But let’s also be honest: Fitzpatrick led Miami in rushing last year because he was running for his life. The Dolphins would have to see the line and backfield go nuclear once again for Fitzpatrick to stand a chance on this front, although if it did we may see more Fitzpatrick than we do Tua Tagovailoa this season.

Bold prediction: 120 rushing yards (5th on team)

RB Matt Breida

Breida is a home run hitter who has averaged over 5 yards per carry in each of his last two seasons. Getting primary ball carrier responsibilities has been the catch for Breida, who started just 18 games in three years in San Francisco and averaged 10 rushing attempts per game in his last two seasons there.

He’ll need to continue to hit home runs if he’s going to lead the team in rushing this season; as his speedy running style isn’t exactly an ideal fit to run downhill between the tackles, which we should expect to see a lot of from the Dolphins. With all of the powerful blockers added to Miami’s offensive line, the tea leaves indicate that Miami will run at the opposition, not necessarily running a lot of wide and outside zone concepts, where Breida’s fit is more pure.

He’s likely to be the change of pace back in Miami.

Bold prediction: 600 rushing yards (2nd on team)

RB Jordan Howard

While Breida has averaged 10 attempts per game over the last two seasons, Jordan Howard averaged over 16 attempts per game over his first three seasons in the NFL with the Chicago Bears. Those three years yielded three seasons in excess of 250 attempts — he’s going to shoulder the brunt of the running game.

A physical runner, Howard will do the dirty work between the tackles and as a result is likely to see the most touches and churn out the most yards. He missed 6 games in 2019 with the Philadelphia Eagles, making him expendable as young RB Miles Sanders stepped up in his absence — but so long as Howard stays healthy he’s going to be a key cog for Miami in the ground game this season.

Bold prediction: 920 rushing yards (team leader)

The 2019 Miami Dolphins boasted one of the most ineffective rushing attacks in recent memory. Yes, some of those issues stemmed from offensive line play and game situations — but at the end of the day there’s little question that the Dolphins’ running back room simply wasn’t good enough either. The Dolphins seem to know it, too — given that they went out this offseason and acquired veteran RBs Jordan Howard and Matt Breida to breath new life into the ground game.

But where does the Dolphins’ overhauled running back room stack up relative to the rest of the NFL? Bleacher Report’s Matt Miller recently stacked up the running back duos from every NFL team to filter out each team’s running back situation.

Miller’s ranking of the Dolphins’ backfield isn’t too gracious, but it’s a hell of a lot better than sitting in dead last. Miller ranks Miami’s duo as the 21st best combo in the league, sandwiched between the Detroit Lions and the Jacksonville Jaguars. Miami’s ranking on Miller’s list is good for 3rd in the AFC East as well; Miami sits comfortably ahead of the Buffalo Bills (25th) in Miller’s assessment.

How did Miller sort the field? He used his own scouting eye and blended it with grades from two separate outlets: Pro Football Focus and Football Outsiders.

How high is the ceiling for Miami’s rushing game in 2020? It depends quite frankly on a few variables: the durability of Miami’s backs and the chemistry of the Dolphins’ new-look offensive line. If all goes well, perhaps Miami can find themselves closer to the middle of the pack. And that in itself would feel like a minor miracle after the struggles of 2019. The Dolphins as a team rushed for 1,156 yards on the season and averaged 3.3 yards per carry. Those figures were 32nd and 31st respectively across the NFL — so the good news is it will be hard to go anywhere but up this season!

The Miami Dolphins suddenly have a very interesting dilemma on their hands. Entering the 2020 offseason, Miami’s run game was underwhelming and the team was sorely lacking in quality ball carriers. There is no greater evidence of Miami’s struggles offensively to run the ball than to look towards Ryan Fitzpatrick’s status as the team’s leading rusher in 2019 — despite not starting three games this past season.

And yet now Miami finds themselves in a different dilemma. The team added RB Jordan Howard in free agency and then promptly traded a 5th-round 2020 NFL Draft selection to secure veteran RB Matt Breida from the San Francisco 49ers. With this dynamic 1-2 punch in the backfield, the Dolphins now have a different problem on their hands.

Trying to find the right balance between these two backs.

The good news is Breida’s workload history makes this a pretty straightforward proposition. In 43 career games, Breida have never carried the football 20+ times. His career high for touches in a game is 22 — 17 carries and 5 receptions in a 2018 win over the Seattle Seahawks. It is the only time in his career he’s exceeded 20 touches.

Meanwhile Howard has carried the ball as a runner 20+ times on fourteen occasions over 57 career contests. His density and physical running style lend better to a more high-volume workload, especially in a Dolphins offense that is going to be predicated on physically challenging tacklers and running downhill into the box. Look for Howard to command the touches, he’s been a player that gets better later into games from time to time and he’s also been a player who has proven to shoulder a significant load on the ground.

Breida, on the other hand, can and should serve as the perfect change of pace back — the lightning to Howard’s thunder who will be looking to make the most out of his presumed 8-12 touches a game in 2020 for the Dolphins.