The new regime in Miami, which came from Green Bay, made a beeline for Packers backup quarterback Malik Willis in free agency. Now that the Dolphins have opened their offseason program, new coach (and former Packers defensive coordinator) Jeff Hafley had a message for Willis.
“I had a great conversation with him yesterday,” Hafley told reporters on Tuesday, “he came to [the] office. I said, ‘Don’t change who you are.’ I said, ‘Don’t put any extra pressure on yourself. You’ve earned the right to be here and have this opportunity, and you’ve done that by doing all the things the right way — don’t change that. Don’t press, just be you.’
“And I want to make sure that he understands that. It doesn’t have to be perfect. There’s going to be mistakes made, but I want him to play with that confidence and I want him to play the way he’s always done it.”
Willis has played well when his number has been called over the past two seasons. Beyond that, Hafley has been able to study him in practice and elsewhere. He and G.M. Jon-Eric Sullivan (a former Packers exec) had much more to go on than the film of his games with the Packers. The fact that they moved quickly to sign him shows that they believe in him.
That makes it easier to believe that the Dolphins could be in the early stages of turning the team around — and perhaps of ending a streak of years without a playoff win that dates back to the 2000 season.
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