On Tuesday, Ricky Williams confirmed his retirement from football. The news was not surprising as he found himself on a winning team, but yet in a very limited role with the Baltimore Ravens spelling pro bowler Ray Rice.

He issued a statement to the media:

 "The NFL has been an amazing page in this chapter of my life," ... "I pray that all successive adventures offer me the same potential for growth, success and most importantly fun."

While Ricky had a 12 year career in football, 7 years were spent with the Miami Dolphins.  (One must include his 1 year with the Toronto Argonauts.)

Ricky had many highlights as a Dolphin Running Back including his first big game running-over the New York Jets who at the time owned South Florida and beat the Dolphins continually at Pro Player/Dolphin Stadium.  The game featured the beginnings of his 2002 campaign where he rushed for 1,853 yards and 16 rushing touchdowns. 

 As the season approached to a close and the Dolphins lost a critical final game to the New England Patriots in the closing seconds optimism reigned in South Florida.

 In the 2003 season this optimism was overshadowed with the emergence of Chris Chambers, but Ricky still rushed for 9 touchdowns and 1,372 yards on a whopping 392 carries.  He played a full 16 games.

 The 2003 season was a waste since the Dolphins failed to make the playoffs again and instead had to deal with the unexplainable failed Drug test of Ricky Williams in the off-season that would cost him 5 games of the 2004 season. It was Ricky's second offense in a tightly-held under wraps substance abuse policy by the NFL.

 To the dismay of many fans, Ricky spent much of the off season away from South Florida and consequently taking in more quiet time with his friend and rock star Lenny Kravitz.  (We all know that Ricky was busy enjoying the rock star life with certain things that come with it.)

On the eve of training camp something was amiss. Reports of an abrupt Ricky Williams retirement began to surface on ESPN and NFL Network and Ricky was nowhere to be found. A couple of days later, Ricky communicated with his only trusted reporter Dan LeBatard to get the word out that he was done with football and wanted to find and explore other things in life.  His website that was created for the Run Ricky Run foundation had the message that Ricky had retired at the young age of 29. 

 As Dolfans were greeted with the media's take of Ricky as uncaring, selfish, and letting his teammates down; fans we left watching Dave Wannstedt go into a tailspin as the unfamiliar feelings of going 1-5 settled in our collective stomachs. We learned that Travis Minor was not the great and powerful back that could carry the team and neither was waiver wire pickup Lamar Gordon. Which led to offensive breakdowns with new QB in Jay Feely that were difficult to watch.

However, after a firing of Wannstedt and new life with a new coach in Nick Saban Ricky was asked back to continue his Dolphins career. I remember the footage of him driving up to Dolphins head quarters in Davie on NFL Network heavily bearded and with longer hair lighter and thinner after losing a lot of muscle mass. Ricky checked in at 220 some would say, but was far from football shape.

Together with Ronnie Brown, Ricky Williams was revitalized and got into better game shape to contribute to the offense only to fail another drug test in March and be suspended from the NFL for one season.  It put a damper on Ricky's comeback year of 743 yards rushing and 6 TDs. 

Still hungry to get his game back on track, Ricky took his exploits to Toronto where he dominated sub par defenses in the CFL for the Toronto Argonauts.  At the end Ricky was given another opportunity as Cam Cameron, who had no more healthy backs after Ronnie Browns ACL tear against the Titans, needed a body to run against Pittsburgh.  Unfortunately Ricky's third carry led to a broken chest and rib area after Rookie Lawrence Timmons "accidentally" stepped on his chest.

Then came the Parcells era and three up and down years of the Dolphins.  Ricky played a significant role in the jet sweep of the Wild Cat  formation giving way to Ronnie Brown going up the middle for a career high 5 touchdowns vs. New England in 2008.

Ricky also had key games in 2009 against the Panthers rushing for over 100 yards and keeping the Dolphins in the playoff hunt.  Ricky was carrying the load for Ronnie Brown who was placed on IR for a Lisafranc fracture.

Just last year, Ricky compiled a herculean effort for his age running over the Oakland Raiders and finishing them off with an HB Blast right for a 68 yd. TD run leaving Oakland defenders hobbling in his wake.  

For everything that Ricky went through off the field and everything he put his team through, his numbers don't lie.

Ricky ran for over 4.0 yards per carry in 8 of his 11 seasons.

Ricky rushed for 1,000 yards 5 times.  

Ricky finished his NFL career with 10,009 yards putting him in the company and coversation of the top 10 backs of all time.

Ricky, however, only scored 66 Rushing TDs which will definitely put a damper on his campaign for the Hall of Fame.

I am proud to say that as a Dolfan and huge fan of Ricky Williams, I would not wish that Ricky could change the things he did good or bad.  

Ricky is one of the few guys that you never knew what he was thinking, but he gave it his all and left it all on that football field just as he quietly walked off it. 


For one last time:  "Run Ricky Run!"

A wise proverb reads: "Patience is a virtue..."

Forgive me if this wise man had a different context in mind, but we as Dolfans must not stand for the virtousness of the patient approach that has taken 10 plus years to realize from coach to coach and quarterback to quarterback.

You see, almost every coach good or bad is linked to the play of their QB.  Some coaches can be linked to their defense: see Tampa Bay and Brad Johnson and Baltimore with Trent Dilfer. (Both coaches and QB won the Super Bowl.)

The Miami Dolphins have tried over and over to recycle the coach and recycle the QB. Until the Parcells era, did the coach care more about the overall team building from the line on out. 

Parcells chose Jake Long via the blessing and "Pillar of the Defense" comment by Jeff Ireland.  Thank goodness the Dolphins didn't select Vernon Gholston from Ohio State.  Darn, they did not take Matt Flynn...(maybe that won't haunt Jeff Ireland if Ryan keeps losing playoff games.)

Parcells recommended Chad Henne.  Chad was physically ready to be QB, but not mentally ready which is why when I personally witnessed Chad Pennington go down into the turf in 2009, I knew that Chad Henne, could not lead the Dolphins because he didn't have the moxy to handle the pressure.  To improvise.  To be you know...Dan Marino.  Not even close.

So here we go!  Here we are into the offseason with a plethora of college coaches because they are all good English teachers....

The Dolphins must land the QB.  That's it.  They must.  I'd say take two QBs and run them all in minicamp and get a feel for both of those guys.  Have them throw 100 out-routes in order to envision game time situations.

Don't just settle on Tannehill because Mike Sherman made him a QB...he is an athlete and it should be taken under consideration he does not have but 2 years of high school QB play.  That's it.  College and High school that's close to 5 years!

Don't take a re-tread QB. 

Look at the draft and pick the guy that can help you win in the future.  A guy that has the fire in the belly of Dan Marino, but is willing to listen and learn. 

Take a guy taller than 6'2".  Please, if they guy has to run out of the pocket to see over Jake Long or Vernon Carey (or another RT/RG as big as him), it's not worth the trouble.  We don't need to lead the league in batted balls by a QB.  We need a guy that can hang in the pocket and smell the blitz! 

So who do you take? 

Personally I like raw talent and talent in the same category.  I like Tannehill, but there are questions about his durability and mobility after recent foot surgery.

I would not hesitate to look at Oswiler of ASU and Foles of Arizona.  (These are just suggestions, I leave that draft analysis to the experts like Daniel). 

In free-agency I would be interested to look at potential free agents if Manning is no longer a possibility, or Flynn is too expensive and costs dumping our top players, then I'd say give Kevin Kolb a look.  

Kolb can thrive in this type of offense.  Has a good arm and can run an up-tempo game. 

There are no answers except patience with the money it costs to land a franchise QB and urgency to actually accomplish it!

While all the Dolphins fans really care about are the ongoing news updates on Peyton Manning, we must not all forget an epic game is about to be played this Sunday.

When going down, position by position, here's how these teams break down:

QB: New England (Tom Brady with a slight edge however Eli Manning is probably playing better football.)

RB: Giants

WR: Giants

TE: New England

O Line: New England (not a huge advantage though)

D Line: Giants

Linebackers: Push (neither team is particularly strong here)

Secondary: Giants

Special Teams: Even, maybe New England edge

Coaching: New England (Similar to the QB, New England still holds the edge however I don’t believe Tom Coughlin will be out coached in this game and does have a 2-0 record vs the Pats)

Obviously us Dolphins fans hate the Pats and hate watching BB and Tom Terrific succeed over and over and over again. That being said it’s the Giants that are going into this game red hot and it’s Tom Brady who is coming off a pretty lame game.

With everything taken into consideration including what Madonna will wear at halftime, I have the Giants winning 28 -21 and Eli going 3-0 against Tom.

Hopefully after Peyton watches Eli pass him in Super Bowl wins it will only motivate him even more to come to Miami and win another one. 

Despite the fact that the Super Bowl will be played this Sunday in Indy, there is only one thing everyone is talking about Peyton Manning.

Today there was somewhat breaking news on the Peyton Manning saga as Adam Schefter had some interesting news to spread on Mike and Mike in the morning on ESPN Radio.

This past week Manning spoke about rumors of his retirement and stated "I have no plans on doing that,"

."All the other talk, it is what it is. But my plan hasn't changed. I'm on track with what the doctors have told me to do. I'm rehabbing hard and I'm enjoying this week.''

“I'm very encouraged by what they've said. Everything's right on point that I'll be cleared and ready to play." - Peyton Manning said. Maybe Peyton wants to prove Rob Lowe wrong but it certainly seems Manning won’t go down without a fight.

This morning Adam Schefter said that he also believes Peyton will play next year and that the sweepstakes to land Manning might start earlier than most initially believed.

Shefty stated that it is very possible Manning is released as early as next week as both sides want to finish this as soon as possible after the Super Bowl.

Manning becomes a free agent immediately after being released by Indy and would not have to wait until March to be signed.

Shefty stated he believes the 3 usual suspects or main teams to pursue Manning would be Miami, Arizona and Washington. He also stated he doesn’t believe the 49ers will be in the hunt.

While any team can come from out of nowhere for Manning’s services the Dolphins, Cardinals and Redskins are the 3 teams that keep on coming up.

Evan Silva @evansilva

• More Schefter on Manning: "We could see sweepstakes begin as early as next week." Says "growing signs & evidence" Peyton will play in 2012.

Trent Dilfer added on @MikeAndMike that the Dolphins make a lot of sense for Peyton Manning. Dilfer feels Manning’s knowledge of the AFC and Miami’s strong defense are both factors that could help lure in Peyton.

It will be interesting to see how this all plays out as I am sure it will be topic number one all off season.

No, Dolfans this blog at Phins Phocus is not going to lobby for Zac Taylor getting the starting nod on game day.  Even if yours truly is a Nebraska Cornhusker fan, it won't happen!

Taylor is the Miami Dolphins new Assistant QB Coach as of today. 

Taylor was brought over from Texas A&M where Mike Sherman had him as a Graduate Assistant.

While Taylor has elevated from GA to now Dolphins Assistant QB Coach it really shows that Mike Sherman trusts this guy with the clipboard and the development of the Franchise quarterback the Dolphins sign or draft.

First some background on Zac Taylor:

Zac Taylor was part of a late season switch by then coach Bill Callahan and responsible for engineering a massive comeback to knock off Michigan in the 2006 Alamo Bowl.  He threw three touchdowns in the game, but did not earn the game-high honors. 

Who did, you might ask?  None other than Chad Henne.  In fact Henne threw for 270, 3TD,1INT and was (21-43).

Henne at the time was a Junior, so his best season was yet to come. (Insert foot in mouth and everything about Bill Parcells.)

Henne was part of a team that relied on its defense to stop the Nebraska Cornhusker offense that was powerful with the pass for the first time in its history. No Husker player ever threw for 3 TDs in a bowl game!  Until Taylor! 

Henne got no breaks as a QB of the Dolphins and continually placed the defense in precarious situations because of interceptions and poor play at the QB position. 

However, back to Taylor who threw for 3TD, but only had 167 Yds passing on 14-31 passing. 

More with less or with a running game, Cory Ross ran for 160 plus yards.

Taylor went on to Tampa Bay and was cut in training camp as an undrafted free-agent.


Then went to Canada to play football for the Winnepeg Blue Bombers and in a Grey Cup in 2007.

After his career as a player ended, he went into coaching with Mike Sherman at Texas A&M.

So, as Taylor is given an opportunity to groom and develop all QBs in Miami, why is he so coveted by Mike Sherman?

Because Zac’s father, Sherwood was a DB and lettered at Oklahoma.  Football is in his blood! 

Or because Mike Sherman is his father-in law…or because Ryan Tannehill worked with both Coach Sherman and Zac Taylor.

Ryan Tannehill is the QB prospect from TAMU with a surgically-repaired foot and can't do anything until late March as far as workouts.

Let’s welcome Zac Taylor (and his family) to Miami and be hopeful that he can develop and work under the tutelage of Coach Mike Sherman!