The Dolphins rank near the top of the league in a valuable tool — but it won’t help them one bit this offseason
A truly bittersweet reality for 2026 and the Dolphins.
The Miami Dolphins are in a bit of a cap crunch.
The team is undertaking a major pivot in their football operation this year, with new management and new leadership taking Miami into the future. The fallout from such a move is, as you’d expect, going to ripple waves across the roster. And with several high-priced veterans and a clogged up salary cap, it’s going to require some aggressive imagination. Which is a shame — given that the Dolphins are otherwise near the top of the list this offseason for wiggle room if they were committed to staying the course.
The Miami Dolphins are among the top teams in the league in restructure ability — but it doesn’t matter
Miami, per the data from OverTheCap, ranks 6th in the NFL this offseason in “simple restructure” potential. What are simple restructures? It is the conversion of base salary to bonuses to be spread out across however remaining years are left on the contract in question. Between QB Tua Tagovailoa, WR Tyreek Hill, EDGE Bradley Chubb, and more, Miami has no shortage of veterans with hefty (and I mean…hefty) veteran players who could have made life this offseason much, much easier for the Dolphins.
But given the struggles of these veterans, a double-down yet again this offseason would instead feel like making a crumbling situation even worse. Between age and injury for Chubb and Hill, plus Tagovailoa’s own regression and durability questions, it’s apparent that this group is not well suited to serve as the centerpiece of a roster any longer. And because the Dolphins were negligent in their usage and investment into draft picks, the roster is woefully lean.
You can’t help but wonder what an alternative universe looks like where Tagovailoa’s slide wasn’t so fast and unforgiving. Miami could otherwise be annually tapping into the salary cap bank of a quarterback contract to create space and keep pushing. Not this Dolphins team. And so instead, the team’s hefty amount of restructure potential is a meaningless footnote to a wholesale reset.
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