Dolphins running the Wildcat?

We're taking a break from the Big Ten for this post, and cutting up a much bigger fish (mammal - ed.) whatever. This weekend, as I was flipping around the NFL, I noticed that the Dolphins, pissed about tuna nets and the like, were slaughtering the Patriots. Normally this wouldn't be cause for a post, but it was the way in which they were doing it that was surprising. Why...they were using the Wildcat formation and turning a barely serviceable Ronnie Brown into LT at his most unstoppable!

Conventional wisdom says that the Rich Rodriguez/Urban Meyer/Wildcat Formation/gimmick offense won't work in the NFL. These offenses take advantage of defenses that are out of position and defensive players who are too slow to make adjustments and compensate for it. In the NFL, however, the defenses are too good to be caught out of position regularly, and are fast enough to compensate when they are. And if Pat White couldn't make it a season without getting injured while playing the Big East, think about what happens to a QB playing that way in the NFL.

That is the conventional wisdom. The Miami Dolphins, however, took conventional tossed it to the deep regions of space when they lined Ronnie Brown up at QB not just once or twice, but six times. Four of those went for touchdowns. Exactly how similar was it to the Arkansas Wildcat? Take a peek:



(via: phinphanatic)



Apologies for the poor quality in the Arkansas video - I'm having trouble coming up with a good video that accurately looks at just the wildcat formation. Regardless, it is very interesting to see an offense that is primarily used in college actually work in the NFL.

Could this be the first of a series of teams that look to implement aspects of the spread/zone read/wildcat? Or is this an isolated instance?

Either way, a team that was outmatched on paper used a gimmick offense to neutralize the oppositions superior talent, and it worked. Here's to the college game injecting some fun into the NFL!