*** DOLPHINS NEWS ***
Apr 29, 1998: -- Quarterback Camp - Day 1 --
The Dolphins had their first day of quarterback camp yesterday
and most of the news coming out of camp was about how much better the
new offensive system works and how much easier it is to learn. All
the players interviewed praised the system, saying that the change in
terminology had made their lives much easier.
The old terminology was based on a code system, where the
blocking assignments, pass patterns and running plays were coded. The
only way to learn the code was to memorize it and remember what each
code meant. When the number of codes ran into the hundreds for each
player, it was difficult to remember all of them accurately.
The new system, however, tells the player exactly what he's
supposed to do within the name of the play itself. To take a simple
example, if a run is called to the left, it will have the word "left"
in it. The old system required that each player memorize all the
numbers and the plays they referred to. Unfortunately, the numbers
had no relation to the type of play being called or the schemes they
were supposed to run.
Players such as Ray Nealy, Yatil Green, O.J. McDuffie, Lamar
Thomas, Troy Drayton, and most importantly, Dan Marino, all had praise
for the new system. All agreed that it will make it easier to execute
well and avoid mistakes during the game.
Quarterback camp will last for 3 days, from Tuesday until
Thursday this week and will include only the veterans. The draftees
get to go back to school.
Yesterday, Richmond Webb returned to practice for the first
time following knee surgery at the end of last season. He had sat
out all of this weekends' drills with the rookies but was back on the
field yesterday.
Yatil Green continues to practice and make progress towards a
full recovery. He had a couple of nice catches yesterday, including
one that he snagged over the head of a defensive back that went for a
touchdown. Perhaps more importantly, however, he had his first real
collision with a defensive player when he got tangled up with Jerry
Wilson and the two went down in a pile. Following the collision, he
returned to practice and showed no ill effects.
Lawrence Phillips and Troy Drayton missed both practices again
as Phillips continues to nurse a hamstring pull and Drayton recovers
from knee surgery.
Larry Izzo is participating in camp, but is not fully
recovered from his Achilles injury last summer. However, linebacker
Ronnie Ward does appear to have fully recovered from his broken leg
and Stanley Pritchett is also back to full speed and power after
sitting out most of last season.
My Comments:
The news on the new offense is encouraging, but the real test
won't come until the fall when the Dolphins open the regular season.
Then we'll have the answer that we've all be waiting for for a long
time. Namely, was Gary Stevens as bad as we think he was?
Yatil Green hasn't been progressing as fast as the coaches
would like, but he has been making progress and the big news from
yesterday is not that he caught the ball nor that made a streaking
play for a touchdown, but that he hit Jerry Wilson and went down hard.
Yatil needs to get past that psychological barrier and getting hit
without getting injured is step one.
I hope that Larry Izzo fully recovers. There are almost 3
more months left until the start of training camp and that's a lot of
time for him, but the Achilles injury he had is a tough one to recover
from and he'll need every minute.
Today's trivia quiz - who led all Dolphins rushers in
yards-per-carry average in 1996? Hint: it wasn't a running back.
And now for something completely different....
While I was at the draft, the NFL passed out sheets title
"Draft Notes" each day I was there. These are just tidbits of
information - trivia, one might say - about the draft. The notes
contain mostly useless pieces of information, such as the fact that
this was the third time in the history of the draft that 3 players
from the state of Florida were selected in the top 10.
Anyway, my favorite piece of trivia in the first day's Draft
Notes was this, quoted verbatim from the handout:
"Twenty-nine of the 31 NFL teams were represented by
merchandise worn by fans attending today's draft. The only
teams not represented were Buffalo and Carolina."
Don't ask me why the NFL thinks that it has 31 teams in the
league. I guess the 31st team must be the Cleveland Browns, although
I don't remember any fans in Cleveland Browns merchandise.
And I guess no Bills' fans showed up - that wanted to be
recognized.
Related Info:
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Curt Fennell,
curt@phins.com, DOLFAN in New Rochelle (almost)
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