The 2023 Miami Dolphins had a field day with opposing defenses for a significant part of the year.  Single high safety defenses – and pretty much anything else that didn't have two deep safeties – was ripe for the pickings for Mike McDaniel and his staff.  

However, things have changed significantly in 2024, with teams employing various two high shell defensive looks against Miami's offense in an attempt to keep Miami's dynamic wide receiver duo of Tyreek Hill and Jaylen Waddle from taking the top off of defenses.  

That's forced the Dolphins to go with a shorter, more controlled passing attack.  And that's resulted in Miami having to put together sustained, longer drives in order to move the football. 

They showed on Sunday in their 34-19 win over the Las Vegas Raiders that, when they're on, they can certainly to that.  Tua Tagovailoa was methodical and precise, completing 28 of 36 attempts for 288 yards with 3 touchdowns. De'Von Achane paced the Dolphins on the ground with 73 yards on 17 carries with a touchdown. Jonnu Smith led all pass catchers with a breakout game, totaling 6 catches for 101 yards with 2 touchdowns. 

However, it was who DIDN'T see the field that spoke volumes on the day: punter Jake Bailey.  Miami didn't punt once in the game, and they didn't have a turnover.  Aside from the drive to end the half, Miami scored on every other drive they had in the game. 

Miami had scoring drives of 16, 14, 14, and 10 plays in the game, with two taking longer than 8 minutes. That's not the Miami offense that fans are used to seeing, but it's one that was highly effective on Sunday afternoon. 

Tua was able to connect with Tyreek Hill on timing routes six times for 71 yards, including an 8-yard touchdown on the Dolphins' first drive of the second half. 

However, Smith was the star of the show for Miami on Sunday, and he orchestrated two of the biggest plays of the game.  On 4th and 1 in the first quarter, he motioned and caught a pass in the corner of the end zone from Tua for the first score of the game.  

He also delivered the dagger late in the fourth quarter.  With the Raiders looking to go with a cover zero defense (no safeties deep to help) on third down, Miami shifted Durham Smythe across the field, which confused the defense and drew the attention of a Raiders defender underneath.  As a result, Smith ran free deep down the field by 20 yards.  Tua saw him and delivered a sure ball, and the big tight end rumbled to the end zone for the game-sealing points. 

McDaniel said after the game that his team is going to have to earn opposing defenses going out of the two high shell defenses, and that's by being effective on time-consuming drives. 

"That's what happens.  You have to earn that situation. So many guys had made the appropriate play versus soft coverage, four-man rush. It forces the defense to try to bring five or six. The way that we operate in our offense and motion guys around makes it difficult to totally play sound.  They dropped a guy, and to his credit he waited an extra tick longer to get the ball to Jonnu.

"If teams want you to earn it, then you need to play that way to have explosives.  Explosives are an important part of winning football. Just because it's hard to execute play in play out five yards a tick, but if a defense wants to commit to playing keeping the ball in front of your defense, then you have to execute in the ways that we did and have long drives to force them to be a little riskier. Like we've seen all year.  They're not going to – we're going to have to earn those types of defenses, which is why I was happy with the collective unit, that they were able to do that this week." – Mike McDaniel

McDaniel and the Dolphins are surely going to continue to see the two-high safety looks throughout the year.  After all, no defensive coordinator is going to be willing to give up the big play when he can try to get 10, 12, 13, etc. plays to try to force a mistake along the way.  That's just a numbers game. 

However, it surely looks like the Dolphins are getting more comfortable transitioning from the "fastest show on surf" (or whatever nickname you saw for them last season) to a team that's willing to go four or five yards at a time.  

But Miami fans surely won't care if the Dolphins are still putting significant points on the scoreboard and winning at the end of the day, just as they did on Sunday.