Business is about to pick up in Davie, Florida. The Miami Dolphins are set to strap on the pads after an extensive acclimation period to ramp up conditioning and ease the NFL players back into the swing of things. And with the pads finally ready to come on, all of the team’s positional battles are suddenly going to heat up here in a hurry — as there are just a few weeks left until the scheduled start of the season.
But which position groups should we be watching most closely? The Dolphins are a team that is going to thrive on competition to win from within — their starters will have claimed their first victory of the season not against anyone on another team, but from a teammate hoping to claim the same role for Miami.
Here are the three hottest position groups to watch on the defensive side of the ball as the Dolphins strap on the pads.
Nickel cornerback
No Dolphin showed greater improvement from the start of the 2019 season to the end of the year than CB Nik Needham. And yet the Dolphins still drafted Noah Igbinoghene in the 1st-round of the 2020 NFL Draft to presumably play the nickel role in their defense along with Xavien Howard and Byron Jones. But Igbinoghene is still a rookie and the Dolphins know Needham well — can he stave off being put into a depth role and command snaps in Miami’s sub-package heavy defense?