Miami Dolphins wide receiver Tyreek Hill — the NFL‘s No. 1 player entering the season, according to his peers — had one catch for eight yards on Sunday.
Jaylen Waddle — whose 3,385 receiving yards entering 2024 were the most by any Dolphins player through their first three seasons — had one catch for 11 yards on two targets in Miami’s 16-10 loss to the Indianapolis Colts.
Miami Dolphins’ Tyreek Hill, Jaylen Waddle Disappear vs. Colts
It doesn’t matter who the quarterback is (and in the second half Sunday, it was fourth-stringer Tom Boyle). That’s unacceptable.
And it’s the biggest thing that needs to change when Tua Tagoavailoa returns from injured reserve next week.
Hill, after Sunday’s game, is on track for 833 yards this season, which would be the fewest since his rookie season.
Waddle is on pace for 762 — which would be by far the lowest output of his career.
I would love to know what this convo was about between Tyreek Hill, Jaylen Waddle, and Mike McDaniel😂 pic.twitter.com/KmCwkj866b
— Mike Cugno (@MikeCugnoCBS4)
And while Tagovailoa’s absence for the past month is certainly a contributing factor, it’s not the only one. Mike McDaniel acknowledged postgame on Sunday that his playcalling is to blame as well.
“When you run the ball 40 times, it does minimize your opportunities,” McDaniel said. “And then if you’re trying to take advantage of a defense overplaying and doubling them and getting the ball to the tight end, then they have less [opportunities].
“I always look at that part of my job to find ways [to get them the ball],” he continued. “It was frustrating. Didn’t anticipate some of the game shaping out that way. I have to find a way specifically when they are doing their jobs at a high level. … I need to find ways to get them involved.”
Added Waddle: “It’s all about winning, for us. We were in shape to win the game with running the ball. So that’s what we leaned on.”
The attention on Hill and Waddle did allow for a big game from tight end Jonnu Smith, who had a game-high 96 yards and a touchdown on seven catches. Smith was the only Dolphins player with more than two catches Sunday.
Boyle, who completed eight of his 13 passes for 74 yards in nearly a half of play after Snoop Huntley left the game with a shoulder injury, explained what the Colts did to limit Miami’s top two targets.
“I think defenses do a really good job of taking those guys away, and we got to be creative with the ways we get them the ball,” he said. “But when you have really good players like that, the defense is game-planning them too.
“A lot of the game, they were clouding Tyreek. And we see a lot of that. This defense was primarily going into the game of one-high structure defense, and they played as majority two-high and that’s to take away our guys outside.
“We took what the defense gave us, but we got to find ways to get those, the ball because they’re really good players.”
Does the fault lie at all with HIll and Waddle? McDaniel suggested it does not.
“There’s been games in the past that maybe as they reviewed the tape and where they’re at in their careers, where they’re trying to be great, they’ve acknowledged sometimes that they’ve minimized their involvement by certain things that they can do in their game,” McDaniel said.
“However, this game, I didn’t see that. … You have to continue to problem-solve. Sometimes you think that you have solved the problem and you find that you haven’t. I think that will always be the case with them. I have to keep them involved. They were very active in the game without the ball. So that was a good, good thing.”