Dolphins vs Eagles game summary
10/23/99
Grading the Dolphins
QB Huard started his first game of his career. He played very conservative. His longest pass was a 26 yarder to TE Drayton, other than that, he didn't throw a pass for more than 20 yards.
He did make a big mistake throwing an INT that was returned almost 70 yards for Phily's only TD of the game. He started OK but it seemed to me that he slowed down at the end. He went 15 of 21 for 142 and 1 INT that computes to 66 rating points. C-
WR A quite day for the recievers because Huard threw very short passes. OJ had 4 rec. for 41 yards, Martin 3 for 26. Drayton is continuing with his good season he caught 4 balls for 38 yards. It's nice to
see him contribute to the passing game. B-
RB The running game was much improved. Collins rushed for 97 yards on 26 carries, but his average was only 3.7 yards per carry. JJ Johnson ran 5 times for 35 yards and a nice 18 yard TD. Pritchett carried twice for 5 yards.
Collins fumbled at the end giving Philadelphia another chance to win. He should learn to protect the ball, especially at the end, when the main objective is to protect the ball and run out the clock. B-
OL The offensive line was good in the run blocking. They helped Collins. Huard was sacked once (on another occasion he was "saved" by an Eagle penalty). 16 points at home is not that good. C+
DL Very good game. under 100 yards passing and rushing (82 pass, 93 run) for the Eagles. They got 4 sacks, 1.5 by Bromell, he has 3.5 in the last two games. The defense didn't give up a TD (they only gave up 1 TD in 3 home games) A
LB Like the D-line they had a good game. Rogers got his first INT, Zach was ,well , Zach and Jones is everywhere as always. A
Secondary The Eagles didn't have a passing game. Johnson had a 30 yard reception , and at that time their entire pass offense had 18 yards... Marion had a sack. A+
Special teams Jacquet was very very good. I know people don't realize but he is doing a good job returning punts he had a 14.3 yard average. Mare was Mare, again he had a 53 yarder equaling his carrer high, I will say it every week, right now he is the best Kicker in the NFL. Phily had only one decent return. A
Coaching A very conservative game from the coaches, not even one long throw, but then again a win is a win, and a win without Marino is even better. Remember not long ago a game without Marino was usually a very bad loss. As I anticipated, it was a low scoring defensive game, a lot of running and clock controling, just like JJ likes.
As he said he likes those kind of games ,as long he is on the winning side... B