MIAMI GARDENS — Dolphins players tell me they’ve had a few players-only meetings this season, the most recent Monday.
Players also tell me the meetings have gone well, that they’ve been productive.
I believe them.
My big takeaway from those players-only meetings is these Dolphins players, even amid a three-game losing streak and dwindling playoff hopes, haven’t quit.
I’m always trying to honestly and candidly relay to you what’s going on with this team, good or bad.
I told you earlier that coach Mike McDaniel hasn’t lost the locker room.
I’m telling you now that these players still give a damn.
If you don’t think that’s significant, look at New Orleans (2-7), where the players appeared to have quit on now-fired coach Dennis Allen.
Or look at Jacksonville, where the Jaguars (2-7), from a distance, seem to be playing for a lame duck coach in Doug Pederson.
But let’s be clear on something with the Dolphins: Successful players-only meetings and a “can do” attitude doesn’t mean that I think the Dolphins (2-6) will go on a run, finishing 8-1 while averaging 30 points per game, making the playoffs and winning a road playoff game.
Players-only meetings aren’t miracle cures.
What piqued my interest about this year’s Dolphins players-only meetings is that two players that I trust, fullback Alec Ingold, a team captain, and offensive tackle Kendall Lamm, an 11-year veteran, used the same word to explain why the players-only meetings have been productive: intention.
“I’m going to keep the content to that room,” Ingold said of the meetings. “What’s said in that room stays in that room. But I will harp on that intention.”
Ingold insists he sees tangible results of those meetings.
Left tackle Terron Armstead and defensive lineman Zach Sieler, two other players that I trust to tell the truth, agreed.
“I feel like those timely moments where guys are reminding each other to stay in the fight, to continue on,” Ingold said, “I think that’s where you put Buffalo on the ropes at a time where nobody gives you a chance to do that.”
The “intention” that Ingold and Lamm mention tells me players are still in the fight, they haven’t given up on each other, coach Mike McDaniel or their longshot playoff hopes.
“It’s one thing to be on the same page with your coaches,” Lamm said, “but it’s another thing to be on the same page with just players in the room.”
I tend to believe certain Dolphins players when I ask them about certain topics.
Yes, Ingold is always positive (hey, I like positive people). But he candidly tells you what needs to happen. And whether it’s happening.
Lamm is a straight-shooting, old-school sage vet who can speak on a number of topics.
I trust those guys.
And I have reason to believe them.
I trust Armstead.
I asked Armstead about the offensive line late in training camp. He basically said, “Don’t worry…we’ve got this.”
I believed Armstead to the point I didn’t list the offensive line among my 10 biggest concerns coming out of training camp.
And look at that offensive line now.
In my two-plus decades of covering pro teams I’ve found players-only meetings are generally a waste of time, a desperate attempt to right a wrong whether it’s on-field or off field.
I think this year’s Dolphins’ players-only meetings have been different.
Lamm agrees.
“You can just tell the past few weeks, many people have been locked in in different ways,” he said.
The Leadership Council, not the team captains, usually calls for the Dolphins’ players-only meetings. The meetings take place in a team meeting room, conference room or other place at the facility in Miami Gardens. The topic and length of the meetings varies.
Lamm and Ingold said they’ve been part of numerous unproductive players-only meetings.
“Those are always touchy subjects because we’ve all been a part of them in the past,” Ingold said. “When things aren’t going well, a lot of times it can go in one ear and out the other.”
But Lamm said players-only meetings can be good “especially when you have certain intentions,” he said, citing that magic word.
“I mean, to hear from anyone in the room, have an open form of communication, I mean, if you structure them in the correct manner, that can be a great thing.”
Let me say this again, though: Successful players-only meetings means that your team is still in the fight, it doesn’t mean they’ll win the fight.
But, hey, you gotta be in it to win it, right?
Intention is a strong thing.
It’s a foundational building block.
It’s one of the best things this team has going for it, and one of the best things these players have going for themselves.
Intention shouldn’t be underestimated, and neither should its role in the Dolphins’ players-only meetings.
“What I talked about, I think that is the big takeaway,” Ingold said of intention.
“That’s been the biggest positive is walking out of that meeting and then applying it to the next week. And then no matter what that result is, to apply it again the next week. I think that’s where the true positivity of it really is, because nine times out of 10, past years, past organizations in everyone else’s history, you have those meetings and everyone’s just kind of, ‘All right.’
“It’s words, it’s not actions. And I think we’ve had the actions, we just haven’t had the results yet, which is frustrating for you and I and everyone else included.”
