Ravens: Scouting the Miami Dolphins ahead of Thursday’s matchup

The Baltimore Ravens will be playing their fourth primetime game this Thursday night against the struggling Miami Dolphins. Based on the offensive and defensive ranks of Miami this should be a get-right game for Baltimore, but since it’s a primetime game, you never know.

Miami’s Offense

On offense, Miami isn’t great, well, they aren’t even close to being average. They’re ranked 30th in total yards and dead last in rushing. The only players on this team who have been somewhat impressive are tight end Mike Gesicki and rookie wide receiver Jaylen Waddle.

Gesicki currently averages 58.8 receiving yards a game and Waddle is just behind him with 55.1 yards a game. Gesicki is on pace to have his best season by far since being drafted in 2018.

The Dolphins running back, Myles Gaskin, has had a disappointing first half of the year after what many people thought was a breakout season for him last year.

He went from 97.2 total yards a game in 2020 (58.4 rushing yards) to 55.7 total yards a game this year, including a 24 yards per game drop-off in rushing.

Anybody who plays fantasy football will probably disagree with that statement since he is ranked in the top-15 running backs, but stats don’t lie.

Being ranked dead last in rushing yards obviously doesn’t fall all on Gaskin, as Miami’s offensive line can take plenty of that blame. This line has given up 30 more pressures than any other team, and is consistently ranked last in the offensive line power rankings.

Miami has two quarterbacks that have played a significant amount of snaps this year, Jacoby Brissett and Tua Tagovailoa. Neither of them has been impressive, although Tagovailoa averages more passing yards a game with 208 compared to Brissett’s 161.

As of right now, it looks like it will be a game-time decision as to who will start since Tagovailoa is still dealing with a fractured finger. No matter who starts at QB for Miami, the Ravens’ defensive game plan shouldn’t change much.

The only thing that may change with Brissett starting is that Baltimore may dial up more blitzes on him. Brissett has already been sacked this year 16 times, while Tagovailoa has only been sacked seven times.

With Miami’s weak line and struggling quarterbacks, I fully expect defensive coordinator Wink Martindale to send pressure over and over again all game.

He’s shown he isn’t afraid of sending constant pressure against teams who strive against blitzes, so I wouldn’t be shocked if they blitz practically the whole game.