Miami Dolphins RPO and Play Action Passing Attack

The Dolphins are having an excellent season and they are because of the improved performance of their qb Tua.  Miami currently has two co-offensive coordinators with George Godsey and Eric Studesville and together they are doing an outstanding job. They are really playing to Tua's strength. 

You can read more about the two of them here.

Their offensive rankings are:

16th in passing yards per game

8th in completion percentage

7th in completions per game

11th in red zone scoring touchdowns

31st in yards per completion but this is because the offense is designed this way for efficiency

They are successful because they are excellent in 2 aspects, the rpo game and their play action components. They are very successful on early downs, which as led them to more favorable 3rd and short situations. Thus, their 13th ranking in 3rd down is very good because of their ability to manage success on early downs.

The Dolphins are one of the best rpo teams in the NFL. They do an excellent job with their concepts and run them very often on 1st and 2nd down. They do a great job scheming and running their rpo's vs different defenses (both man and zone concepts) but also running them out of different formations.

 Here's one of their rpo concepts. The Dolphins will get a ton of cover 2 which makes this rpo very effective. It's a good cover 2 beater.

Route Concept:

#1 runs a slant to occupy the safety

#2 runs a wheel 

#3 tight end runs the chute to the flat

Concept: High-low the cb 

The dolphins run some nice variations and this is one of their best. It is very effective vs cover 2 because the #1 route has to be taken by the safety and they in essence or trying to high low the safety. Now they also run a snag version which makes defending them quite difficult.

They ran it in both meetings with the Jets, here they hit it for a nice 25 yard gain. Again, you know you are getting cover 2 but because they also have the snag option, they put some different concepts into use which causes confusion defensively.

The route combo: #1 on the slant. #2 on the wheel/swing and #3 coming across to the flat. The cb hangs on the slant which opens the swing for a 25 yard gain . The #1 wr occupies the safety and the wheel route beats the cb. The concept has a few variations by #1, glance/post corner/sit down component. 

Very nice design by the Dolphins vs the Jets

2nd and 9

Here they run the glance rpo. The Glance route is an RPO attachment that reads outside linebackers in one-safety looks or third level defenders in two-safety looks. The Glance itself is a five-step skinny post that replaces defenders filling in the run. Here they get cover 2 and the tight end is wide open.

Now,what happens is teams will send the de right for the qb, but with that comes a huge risk because it opens up the running game. Here the Jets try to attack the mesh point and force the give and it's a nice gain in the run game.

Huge hole that is created by the success of the passing gains early. Jets try to adjust and take away the passing piece and Tua makes the read for a nice 11 yard gain.

It's tough to defend because the Dolphins do a really nice job with their scheme and take what you give them.

Vs The NY Giants:

Here's a few examples vs the Giants, again the wr #1 looks like he just reads the defense and can run some type of option route. The giants Cover 2 safety bails so the #1 wr sits it down at 7 yards. Easy completion

In the 2nd example, they run the glance route with #1. Again the qb reads cover 2 and sees the safety drop which opens up the glance window.

Vs the Giants

Here is an example of a similar rpo vs the Giants. Nice read and route for a 12 yard gain.

Play action component:

The Dolphins mix in some really effective play action concepts as well.

It's not just the rpo game which makes their offense so hard to defend. They excel in the boot concepts off their run game and will take their deep shots.

The nice thing they do is they take advantage of coverage as they know many times they are going to get cover 2 with the condensed coverages. Here they run a nice play action scheme. They motion from 3x1 to 2x2 and presnap tell Tua it's zone. Post snap, it's an easy cover 2 read so he know's he will have Parker against the cover 2 safety on the post corner concept.

On the very next series vs the Jets, they run a sequence off the previous one. Instead of having Parker run a post corner, they have him run a sit route where he just reads the defense and sits it down in the zone. 

Here's a nice 16 yard gain to Parker. Again, they get the presnap zone coverage read with the motion. 

Play action vs the Giants

Giants decode go cover 1 and the Dolphins hit the post with the post dig option. This is a nice design and Tua recognizes the coverage right away with the pre snap motion. Nice route combo as the safety overplays the outside and doesn't help inside on the vertical post route. This puts the cb in limbo as he expects help to the inside based on his outside leverage. Tua sees it and throws a good ball for 25 yards.

Here are just some of the Miami Dolphins Run pass options and play action passing attack. Please check back as I plan on adding more to this post with other pertinent clips.