NFL Head Coach 09: Runnin' with the Dolphins - DJ's Blog

DJ's Blog

NFL Head Coach 09: Runnin' with the Dolphins

Posted on June 3, 2009 at 11:44 AM.

(0)

After a brief hiatus, I've jumped back into NFL Head Coach 09 (360). With a new set of sliders (Claystone's latest), I set out on the task of choosing a team to take over. At the end of the day, I went with the Miami Dolphins.

Miami, fresh off a 1-15 season, is a team that needs a lot of help. Not a lot of skill but a lot of young talent, that, if given time to develop, could turn out to be a good squad in 2-3 years. Hopefully, management will give me that time.

After a terrible 1-3 preseason, my first big move as head coach was to bench Chad Pennington in favor of rookie, Chad Henne. Pennington just couldn't get anything going and threw the ball more to the other team than his receivers. Henne is young and will hold on to the ball too long in some instances, but, has a strong arm and will make smart throws with the ball.

The key to any kind of success lies in the running game. Ronnie Brown and Ricky Williams are both capable of breaking long runs. I've got several Wildcat plays so the opposition will be seeing both Brown and Williams on the field together.

Defensively, the secondary is fragile at best. Currently I'm letting Paul Pasqualoni call the plays (I call offense) but I don't know how long that will last as his constant blitzes leave our DB's on islands and opposing teams are shredding us for big gains. The run defense is adequate, but nothing spectacular.

In the regular season opener, Brett Favre and the Jets torched us for over 300 yards on their way to an easy 45-20 victory. Offensively things were OK; Henne had 220 yards with 2 TDs and 0 INTs but was sacked 6 times.

Clearly, it's going to be a long season. But, if our guys can stay healthy and work hard, we'll build a foundation for the future.