The Miami Dolphins figure to have a lot of roster turnover this offseason with 25 players scheduled to become unrestricted free agents.
The Dolphins, in fact, have the third-highest snap percentage from the 2024 headed for free agency, according to Nick Korte of overthecap.com, behind only the Minnesota Vikings and Washington Commanders. The Dolphins have players accounting for 40.3 percent of their snaps headed for free agency.
To replace players or replenish the roster, the Dolphins will use free agency and the draft, but what kind of resources will they have to accomplish that task? More specifically how do the Dolphins resources in terms of cap space available to sign or re-sign players and draft capital compare to the other teams around the league.
Based on a study done by PFF's Timo Riske, the Dolphins come in at 21st among the 32 teams, based mostly on the strength of their draft capital.
The top three teams were the New England Patriots, Las Vegas Raiders and Chicago Bears, with the Seattle Seahawks coming in last. Among AFC East teams, the New York Jets were fifth and the Buffalo Bills came in at 25.
THE DOLPHINS' DRAFT CAPITAL
The Dolphins are expected to have 10 picks, including three compensatory selections, in the 2025 NFL draft and their overall value puts them 12th in the NFL in terms of draft capital, according to PFF.
The Dolphins have the best draft capital among all the teams that won at least eight games in 2024, with the Buffalo Bills next at 14th overall.
Miami is expected to have one pick in each of the first two rounds, along with two in the third as the result of a compensatory pick for the free agent loss of Robert Hunt.
Among other AFC East teams, New England ranks fourth in draft capital and the New York Jets are just ahead of the Dolphins at number 11.
THE SALARY CAP ISSUE
As in well known by Dolphins fans, they are in the red in terms of the salary cap, some $12 million over the cap heading into the March 12 deadline to be compliant with the top 51 cap numbers.
That ranks 27th in the NFL, with only the Buffalo Bills, Seattle Seahawks, Cleveland Browns and (of course) New Orleans Saints having more cap space to cut before the start of the new league year.
One way to cut cap space is to restructure contracts by converting base salary or roster bonuses into signing bonuses that can be spread out over several years, though the drawback is this simply pushes the cap consequences down the line.
But this PFF exercise was about resources each team could have this offseason, and the Dolphins do have several players whose contracts could be restructured to create more cap space. The most obvious is quarterback Tua Tagovailoa, who currently has a 2025 cap number of $39 million.
The Dolphins have the potential to create $103 million in cap space via maximum restructures that would add void years at the end of a player's contract to spread out the cap costs of a new signing bonus, according to overthecap.com.
The Dolphins rank 11th in the NFL, per overthecap.com, in the amount of cap space they could create through restructures.
But their overall cap situation isn't great, which is why they ended up 21st overall in terms of potential resources.
