Following Sunday’s blowout loss against the Baltimore Ravens, Pro Football Talk reported that several Miami Dolphins players had contacted their agents about wanting out of Miami. Per the report, they had asked their agent to begin discussions to engineer a trade.
On Monday, several Dolphins players spoke out against these unnamed reports. Perhaps the strongest words came from offensive lineman and captain, Daniel Kilgore.
“My thing is if you don’t want to be here, I don’t want you here. I want to come here and get ready for New England starting today, and we’ll move forward.”
Kilgore went on to explain that players were frustrated with how they played and we’re looking at film to make corrections. Ultimately, he said it comes down to taking ownership of what they did, correct it, and be ready to go tomorrow.
Linebacker Raekwon McMillan, who was exposed several times in coverage during the game on Sunday, also spoke out against the unnamed players.
“I try to stay off social media as much as possible because there can be misleading stories on there. Nobody has come to me about it, so I don’t really know much of it; but like (Daniel Kilgore) said, if they don’t want to be here, it is what it is. We’re going to move along with what we’ve got.”
Minkah Fitzpatrick, who has been moved around the Miami defensive backfield quite a bit, said that the players have to stick together as a team, fight it out and keep moving forward. When asked if he was aware of anyone who was requesting a trade, he said he was not.
As for what went wrong on Sunday, he said the blame could be placed everywhere.
“It was a lot of different things. Guys looking at the wrong – that’s what I did, personally – just looking at the wrong things. Sometimes we weren’t put in the best positon; but even still, we know it’s up to the players to make the play. Coaches can call whatever they want, but like on my play I wasn’t in the best position but I’ve still got to make a play, got to cover my guy. That’s usually what I do. I’ve just got to do my job. That’s what is all boils down to, whether it was with the front, the secondary or the linebackers. Everybody has to do their job. There’s a lot of people just not doing it or trying to do it differently than what we were coached to and that’s what happened.”
When asked how the Dolphins can rebound from this and be competitive against the New England Patriots in Week 2, Fitzpatrick summed it up in a clear and concise manner.
“Do our job. That’s all it boils down to just doing our job.”
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