The Miami Dolphins have managed to get through the season without any serious injuries, aside from running back De’Von Achane’s knee injury.
Especially this season, it can be absolutely heartbreaking when you have high hopes and your season suddenly falls apart due to a season-ending injury. As a Bengals fan, this is way too real for me, but luckily for Miami, they haven’t lost any key talent to injury so far. Key defensive tackle listed on Dolphins injury reportThat is, until perhaps this moment. Star defensive tackle Christian Wilkins was listed on the injury report Friday with a groin injury. This could mean a long list of things, but one thing to remember is that a key defender on behalf of this defense appears on the injury report. Honestly, it could be as simple as a teammate accidentally hitting Wilkins in the groin and him having to miss a few plays because of the pain. That could mean he’s dealing with a significant muscle injury, but since that’s the only thing you hear about, Wilkins will most likely be out Sunday against the Titans. If a more serious injury were to occur, Wilkins’ absence would be sorely missed by Miami’s defense. Wilkins has established himself as an elite 3 technician, getting to the quarterback position 6.5 times this season and collecting 25 tackles. It may not sound that impressive, but it’s a widely accepted argument that tackles are pretty useless for defensive tackles. Their job isn’t to break down running backs – their job is to plug holes, stuff double teams, and reduce running lanes so that it’s much easier for linebackers to close down space. The other side of the coin is that Miami will once again be without its best defensive lineman. Miami will look to stop perhaps the most talented running back in the NFL when Derrick Henry makes his way through the A-gap on Sunday. Defensive tackle is arguably the most important position on the field when playing against Henry, because Henry’s greatest strength is that once he gets up to speed, he is virtually impossible to bring down without giving up at least 4 yards. As previously mentioned, Wilkins would help fill gaps and prevent Henry from having ample space and a lot of time to get up to speed. In all the games where Henry has struggled, defenders have generally met him at or behind the line of scrimmage. If the linebacker meets him another yard or two from the line of scrimmage, he will undoubtedly flatten the defender and gain two extra yards of body length from him.Ideally, Wilkins will play and this is an entirely precautionary conversation. If Wilkins doesn’t play, Miami will have to blitz the A and B games much more often during the game to try to use more players to do what Wilkins can do on his own.
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