The NFL Scouting Combine is here, and the Miami Dolphins will be busy. They have a roster that needs work and a salary cap that needs finessing. So the 2023 NFL Draft is a big deal for Chris Grier. To get you ready, here are five Dolphins draft prospects to watch.
Dolphins Draft Prospects To Target at 2023 NFL Combine
The Dolphins had a talented team in 2022. They also have a good number of needs in 2023. That’s what happens when nearly a dozen starters/key rotational players are set to become free agents on March 15. And since the Dolphins — at least as of mid-February — were some $13 million over the cap, they likely won’t be huge spenders in free agency.
But Miami likely won’t be big factors in the draft either after the league took one of their first-round picks away for tampering and they traded the other to the Denver Broncos for Bradley Chubb.
The Dolphins (as of now) have just five picks in April’s draft: One in the second round, two in the third, one in the sixth, and one in the seventh.
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That’s not nearly enough to address every need, a list that includes every position on the offensive line and in the defensive backfield, at running back, and in the interior defensive line.
“I think it’s the same process we’ve always had,” Dolphins general manager Chris Grier said the day after Miami’s season ended. “It doesn’t matter how many picks we have or what. You have to go through it because you have to be ready for every scenario.”
Added coach Mike McDaniel at the time: “You don’t plan on having injuries. You just plan on going through the process like they do, and the coaching staff will join eventually. And when you go about it with that diligence and that intent, you wind up with players like Kader [Kohou]. We didn’t go out trying to find a corner that would start for us, but he ended up starting because you’re doing your due diligence.”
Here are five players on whom the Dolphins will surely do that diligence.
RB Israel Abanikanda, Pittsburgh
It’s been 15 years since Chris Johnson clocked a blazing 4.24-second 40 at the Combine, the fastest ever recorded for a running back at the event.
Might that record fall this year? Israel Abanikanda could give it a scare. He ran sub-10.7 second 100-yard dashes as a high schooler, and he definitely hasn’t gotten any slower as he’s developed.
Adding the Day 2/3 prospect to a skill-position group that already includes Tyreek Hill and Jaylen Waddle would just be unfair. But the Dolphins have a need, with both Raheem Mostert and Jeff Wilson Jr. set to become free agents.
Abanikanda made the jump to the NFL after a junior year in which he scored 20 rushing touchdowns and averaged six yards per carry.
OT Cody Mauch, North Dakota State
Injuries crushed the Dolphins at every position but wide receiver in 2022, but particularly on the offensive line. They started six different offensive tackles in 18 regular season and postseason games: Terron Armstead, Austin Jackson, Kendall Lamm, Greg Little, Brandon Shell, and Robert Hunt.
So expect them to add big-time reinforcements this year.
Miami’s scouts already got a sense how Cody Mauch, the small-school mauler with a toothless grin, can fare against NFL-caliber competition at the Senior Bowl. But this week will give McDaniel a chance to meet him, should the Dolphins coach want. Mauch makes a lot of sense with pick No. 52.
LB Noah Sewell, Oregon
Vic Fangio’s system calls for a glass-eating linebacker to patrol the middle, and that’s the biggest void right now on an otherwise talented Dolphins defense.
Noah Sewell — at 6-3, 251 — certainly looks the part. But where he lands in the draft could depend a lot on his measurables. If he runs well, he’ll be a Day 2 pick. The Dolphins have three of those, including two in Round 3.
Sewell, who doesn’t turn 21 until the day before the draft, was all-conference in both 2021 and 2022. While he won’t go in the first round like his big brother Penei, Noah has all the tools to be an effective pro. Sewell recorded 20.5 tackles for loss in 33 career games at Oregon.
DB Tyrique Stevenson, Miami (FL)
Local kid? Check.
Plays a position of need? Check.
Great Senior Bowl? And check.
Tyrique Stevenson is a player on the rise and — as an added bonus — is plenty familiar with Hard Rock Stadium. It’s where he’s played his home games for the last two years of his career. In his final year on campus, the Georgia transfer had two interceptions and seven passes defensed.
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There was talk at the Senior Bowl that he might best be suited at free safety, but Stevenson to us seems like a plug-and-play nickel for a Dolphins team that got meaningful snaps out of the likes of Kohou, Keion Crossen, and Elijah Campbell in their playoff loss to Buffalo.
IOL Andrew Vorhees, USC
The Dolphins had exactly one offensive lineman who played the same position in each of the team’s 18 games: Center Connor Williams.
That stat speaks to the need for position flexibility on the offensive line, and Andrew Vorhees has that. In his 44 career appearances at USC, Vorhees had 25 starts at right guard, eight starts at left guard, and four at left tackle.
Vorhees (6-6, 325) was a first-team All-American in 2022 and won the Morris Trophy, which is awarded to the Pac-12’s top offensive or defensive lineman.