Dolphin Digest 2019 Awards

Fitzpatrick, Baker among winners

MVP

QB Ryan Fitzpatrick

The Dolphins surpassed the expectations of most, if not all, of the outside observers by winning five games in 2019 and it’s pretty obvious why they were able to do so.

The reason was the performance of Fitzpatrick, who delivered a tremendous performance at quarterback after he was reinserted into the lineup in the fourth quarter of the Week 6 game against the Washington Redskins.

While Fitzpatrick’s stats weren’t overly impressive, it can’t be overlooked that he was operating behind a shaky offensive line and he also was the victim of a multitude of dropped passes.

Fitzpatrick delivered some tremendous performances down the stretch, passing for 419 yards and four touchdowns against Cincinnati and then becoming the first quarterback to pass for more than 300 yards against New England while leading the Dolphins to that remarkable comeback victory in the season finale. Oh, and by the way, Fitzpatrick led the Dolphins in rushing and tied a franchise record for QBs with four rushing touchdowns.

DeVante Parker certainly deserves mention for his 1,202-yard receiving performance, but Fitzpatrick is the clear choice here.

DEFENSIVE PLAYER OF THE YEAR

LB Jerome Baker

On the defensive side, there was no clear-cut winner among a handful of candidates.

But we gave the nod to Baker, whose 124 tackles were 43 more than anybody else on the team to go along with 1.5 sacks, an interception, four passes defended and two forced fumbles.

Baker finished with four games in double digits in tackles, including 12 in back-to-back games against the Giants and Bengals in December.

The runner-ups include Eric Rowe, who was very solid at safety after switching over from cornerback in mid-October, and Davon Godchaux, who was one of the NFL’s tackle leaders among defensive linemen.