New Dolphins safety Doug Middleton took part in his first practice Wednesday, a few hours after a successful workout at the Baptist Health Training Facility at Nova Southeastern University.
Middleton, who will turn 26 next Wednesday, got an early birthday present when he was signed to fill the opening on the Dolphins’ 53-man roster.
"I'm happy to be here," Middleton said. "It all happened pretty fast, and I'm just thanking God and thankful for the opportunity to be down here. It's been a crazy 24 hours."
Middleton played 11 games with four starts for the New York Jets over the past three seasons while dealing with a variety of injuries. He was among the Jets' cuts down to the 53-player roster limit Sept. 1.
All four of his starts came last season after he had missed all of 2017 with a torn pectoral muscle.
"In the past I've been playing the post, but I feel pretty confident in being able to go in the box and playing man-to-man on tight ends," Middleton said. "I pride myself on being a versatile safety, so whatever they need me to do, I'm going to do my best to make it happen."
Middleton played collegiately at Appalachian State, the same school that produced starting center Daniel Kilgore.
While the two didn't play together in college, they knew each other.
"We've interacted a bunch at App State events," Middleton said. "We didn't go to school together. I'm pretty cool with him. We know each other pretty well.
"I saw him this morning. I talked to him. He said, 'What are you doing here, man?' "
Injury report
Safety Reshad Jones (ankle) and wide receiver Albert Wilson (hip/calf) were the only two Dolphins players who did not practice Wednesday.
Neither of them played against the New England Patriots on Sunday after playing in the season opener.
According to the team's official injury report, LB Trent Harris (foot), S Bobby McCain (shoulder) and CB Ken Webster (illness) all were limited.
Defensive end Charles Harris (wrist) and quarterback Josh Rosen (knee) both were listed as full participants.
Steady on the O-Line
Even though Evan Boehm played 14 snaps at right guard in a backup capacity last Sunday, the Dolphins starting offensive line will remain the same against the Dallas Cowboys.
That unit consists of Jesse Davis at left tackle, rookie Michael Deiter at left guard, Kilgore at center, Danny Isidora at right guard and J’Marcus Webb at right tackle.
Head Coach Brian Flores said it was important to try to get continuity up front.
"I think that's how you grow, build and improve and get better," he said. "That's the goal here with that. It starts in practice. We've had a couple of good weeks of practice. I think we were better from Week 1 to Week 2. We'll try to just continue to get better week after week after week."
Boehm joined the Dolphins in a trade with the Indianapolis Colts the weekend before the season opener.
"We just wanted to get him in there," Flores said. "You want to get guys some game reps. He's a guy who has practiced well, so we wanted to give him an opportunity to play a little bit in a game. That was the plan there."
Bragging rights
Wide receivers Allen Hurns and Isaiah Ford are pretty passionate about their high school teams, and that got them involved in a battle for bragging rights this weekend.
Miami Carol City, where Hurns played, will travel to Jacksonville to take on Ford's old high school, Trinity Christian.
Hurns wore a T-shirt in the locker room Wednesday that read: "Beat Trinity Christian," while Ford had the exact opposite version.
"We had a big debate probably like a month ago, pretty much just saying, Miami and Broward have the best football teams," Hurns said. "Somehow, they say Jacksonville. So we'll see.
"The first time we had a discussion was who had the best high school football. Of course, I said it was down here. Miami-Dade and Broward County, if you just go by the amount of people we put in the league and things like that. But he's always going to have a debate, his school won the state this amount of times. But down here we have a lot of schools that go to state and do a lot of good things. Even growing up playing little league football, it's just competitive. A lot of parks had a lot of good players."
