Wednesday, November 13, 2013

Philbin 'very concerned about missed tackles'

BY NICK ST. DENIS

Past the halfway point of the season, the Miami Dolphins are back to fundamentals.

The Dolphins have accumulated 71 missed tackles in nine games this year, according to ProFootballFocus. Only nine teams have missed more tackles, with three of those teams having played one more game than Miami.

“I’m very concerned about the missed tackles," Dolphins coach Joe Philbin said Tuesday, via The Miami Herald. "It’s a basic fundamental of football that we need to do better."

Per SI, teams may hold just 14 padded practices over the entire season, with 11 happening in the first 11 weeks. Philbin said that rule allows Miami just three more padded practices for the remainder of the year, so "it's not like we are going to go out there and have live tackling for the next seven weeks three times a week."

Regardless, Miami will continue to work on tackling in other ways.

"We still do drill it," Philbin said. "We do it in team periods. We do it in isolated and individual periods and we have to continue our focus on it."

Linebackers Philip Wheeler and Dannell Ellerbe lead the team in missed tackles, though they also lead the team in tackles, period.

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