Chris Perkins: Dolphins’ Zeek Biggers is symbolic of the rebuild in a couple of ways
· Yahoo Sports
MIAMI GARDENS, Fla. — I’ll be excited this season to watch Miami Dolphins defensive lineman Zeek Biggers, the versatile 2025 seventh-round pick. As a draft-and-develop guy, he symbolizes a significant arm of the Dolphins rebuild and an interesting test case in patience.
Biggers, at 6 foot 6, 315 pounds, can stuff the run from the inside as a defensive tackle and set the edge against the run on the outside as a defensive end. He can rush the passer from both spots. He plays with athleticism and physicality. He’s also got a knack for blocking field goals. Oh, and he might be a starter for the Sept. 13 opener at the Las Vegas Raiders. He’s intriguing. But he’s raw. Very raw.
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If Biggers can be successfully developed it’ll speak well for a major aspect of the blueprint envisioned by general manager Jon-Eric Sullivan and coach Jeff Hafley. That’s how Biggers represents the patient part of the rebuild.
But there’s also an impatient aspect of this rebuild. If Biggers develops slowly, you wonder how long he’ll last. Already, Sullivan and Hafley have shown a propensity for shuffling the roster to get their type of player whether it’s at quarterback, defensive back, edge rusher or anywhere else.
We’ll soon see if the 2026 Dolphins cycle through personnel at a rate similar to the 2019 Dolphins, which was the last rebuild for this organization. I remember covering the 2019 season and the personnel turnstile that became typical for that year. In September 2019, for example, the Dolphins made 19 roster transactions in a 24-day period.
We’re still learning about Sullivan and Hafley from the patience aspect.
What we know about them right now is that they like Biggers.
“Zeek is a guy that over time I’ve really, really grown with in terms of my confidence and my belief in him,” Sullivan said. “He plays hard, he’s physical, he’s got length. It’s important to him to be a good player. I think he approaches the game the right way.”
To a certain extent Biggers is a man of mystery. Injuries prevented him from playing in any of the Dolphins’ three preseason games.
Biggers didn’t play until late in the season last year but in his nine games, which totaled 214 snaps from scrimmage and 50 special teams snaps, he was active, recording 20 tackles, 1.5 sacks and five quarterback pressures.
He said the lack of early-season playing time drove him to be successful late last season.
“It definitely pushed me,” Biggers said. “It pushed me to just go out there every day and show what I could do. And now that I’m out here getting those reps, I’m just taking full advantage of it and taking my opportunity.”
Biggers showed he was advantageous last season by blocking a 55-yard field goal attempt late in the second quarter against the Tampa Bay Buccaneers in the Dolphins’ 20-17 win in December. That was nothing new. At Georgia Tech, he blocked four field goals.
This season it’s important to him to be a three-down player.
“I feel like I have that versatility, I’m versatile to do that,” he said, “so it’s definitely very vital for me.”
Biggers has been Darwinian, in more ways than one this season.
The Dolphins opened training camp with five of their seventh-round draft picks on the roster — edge rusher/special teams ace Cameron Goode (2022), wide receiver Tahj Washington (2024), backup quarterback Quinn Ewers (2025), Biggers (2025) and rookie edge rusher Max Llewellyn (2026).
Today, only Biggers remains on the active roster.
And he has a great opportunity.
Biggers joins a young, skeleton defensive tackle crew that’s led by veteran Zach Sieler, Jordan Phillips, a 2025 fifth-round draftee, and Keith Cooper Jr., another NFL newcomer. He entered the league in 2025 with the Detroit Lions as an undrafted rookie out of Houston.
Kenneth Grant, the 2025 first-round pick, is sidelined for at least the first four weeks with a left leg injury.
Biggers is part of the evidence of both the draft-and-develop and youth-movement strategies that Sullivan and Hafley have embraced.
The 53-man roster features 24 Dolphins draftees (45%). None is older than running back De’Von Achane, a 2023 third-round pick, and the only 2023 draftee on the roster.
And 18 of those 24 draftees, not counting rookie linebacker Trey Moore, the fourth-round pick who is on the injured reserve list, have come in the past two seasons. That means 34% of the current roster is Dolphins draftees of the past two years.
I’ll keep an eye on Biggers this season. When it comes to the draft-and-develop philosophy and stocking the roster with versatile young players, Biggers typifies what the rebuild is all about. But if he doesn’t develop at a satisfactory rate, well, he could experience the less tolerant aspect of Sullivan and Hafley, which has also surfaced in this rebuild.
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