Dolphins special teams unit must rebound from early struggles

Chris Tabor is a bottom-line type of guy.

The job either gets done, or it doesn’t.

That’s why the Miami Dolphins’ special teams coordinator isn’t interested in hearing about how young the Dolphins’ roster is, or how recently his special teams core unit was put together.

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Tabor doesn’t care that a lot of his unit’s members were playing in their first NFL game last Sunday.

Where his focus has been following the Dolphins’ special team unit’s disastrous performance in Miami’s 27-13 loss to the Las Vegas Raiders is patching the leaks that led to three massive returns to the Raiders and a missing a field-goal attempt.

Miami’s punter and kicker saved touchdowns in three instances in last Sunday’s loss by making the final tackle on kickoff and punt returns.

“If it’s gotten to that point the whole movie has gone bad,” Tabor said, referring those touchdown-saving tackles.

Four of Las Vegas’ offensive possessions (before the final possession, which was a kneel-down series in scoring territory) started at midfield, or less than 5 yards shy of it.

The leaky coverage on kickoff and punts got Miami dominated in the field-position battle. Hafley said the Raiders’ average starting line of scrimmage was on the 48-yard line.

“It comes down to just doing our job. Lane integrity, just preparing and doing more during the week. Try harder, that’s ultimately it,” said safety Dante Trader Jr., a core special teams contributor from last year’s Dolphins team. “Special teams is a want to, and a choice at the end of the day.”

When asked if the issues was personnel, in-experience, technique, assignment, discomfort, Tabor, who has been a special teams coordinator for five NFL teams over a 15-year period, brushed off the question.

“When you comment on that you’re making excuses. We are not in the excuse business. We’re in the production business,” Tabor said. “We got to get better. We got to coach better. We’re all in this together.”

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Tabor stresses that he likes the personnel he has available to him for special teams, and stresses that he believes in them and expects improvement each week.

“You always see improvement from Game 1 to Game 2,” Tabor said. “Assignment, alignment and technique. Be a master of those.

“When the noise is going and you’re in a different environment. Or you’re a rookie and you’re playing for the first time, if you can go back to those things, [the game] will slow down for you.”

That has been the message for every Dolphins unit, and player during this week’s preparation for Sunday’s game against the San Francisco 49ers. Not following through could become costly.

Special teams is a back end of the roster player’s way to get on the game day roster.

It’s a critical phase in football because it impacts points (field goals and extra points), and field position. Most of the time special teams units are made up of non-starters, the players who are backups on the 48-player game day roster.

Oftentimes, a backups’ performance on that unit can keep him safe, and on the flip side, it can put his roster spot in jeopardy. That means Sunday’s performance will be scrutinized, especially since general manager Jon-Eric Sullivan have vowed to churn the bottom on Miami’s 53-man roster all season.

It’s a bit early for that at the moment, but the clock is ticking.

“It’s kind of like [playing] defensive football. If you’re supposed to set an edge and keep your outside arm free, you got to set an edge and keep your outside arm free,” coach Jeff Hafley. “So those guys who are in those positions need to be detailed, and they need to execute better than they did, because quite frankly, that’s just not good enough.”

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