Free Agent Defensive Tackle Dontari Poe visited with the Atlanta Falcons today and will be traveling tonight to Miami to visit with the Dolphins front office per a report by Josiana Anderson of ESPN. Most likely the official visit will take place tomorrow. Poe has already visited with Indianapolis, Jacksonville, Atlanta and Miami is next. He also has the Raiders on his wish list of places he would like to visit. Poe is looking for a big money multi-year deal or a one year deal so he can then hit the open market again next year and hopefully cash in then.

In my opinion Miami can add all of the linebackers in the world to with help the Dolphins poor run defense but honestly the biggest fix in correcting the run defense is getting a legit defensive tackle to play next to Suh. Jordan Phillips can only go roughly 20-25 snaps a game for Miami so depth at defensive tackle is a must for the Dolphins. Poe is a pure 1st and 2nd down run stuffer who if playing next to Suh will most likely shine and would have an amazing season. There are some drawbacks with Poe besides a hefty price tag it may take to sign him. For one it is a bit of buyer beware as Poe does have a bad back. Second, if a team runs no-huddle against you with Poe on the field he will become gassed and getting him off the field in those situations are almost impossible. With that said Miami needs a player like Poe who can clog up the middle and prevent teams from running at will on the Dolphins defense. If the price is right Miami should look into giving Poe a solid 1 year deal in my opinion. He is the type of run stuffing defensive tackle that are very tough to find and even harder to find a quality one in the draft who can play right away.

The big thing working in Miami’s favor is Poe’s agent is Jimmy Sexton who represents Adam Gase, Andre Branch, Suh, Laremy Tunsil among others currently on the Dolphins roster. Also, Sexton is very close friends with Mike Tannenbaum as well so Miami does have a bit of an “in” here with Poe’s agent. We should know in the coming days where Poe signs but the fact he is visiting Miami in the next 24 hours is a very good thing.

While we do not have exact numbers Miami is roughly $17-$19 million under the salary cap at this time. They would need $5 million for rookies and the team also wants to extend Jarvis Landry and Kiko Alonso. Oh, and don’t forget they would like to carry over some of the cap savings into next year. So, what can they realistically offer Poe to make him sign?  That is the big question right now. One thing to remember, Miami can cut Koa Misi and Dion Jordan (which they are expected to do at some point this offseason) at any moment and create $7 million more in cap space. Cut those two, give Poe that $7 mill for one year and Miami stands pat at around $17-$19 million in cap space.