Dolphins rookie Elijah Higgins details early steps in conversion to tight end

MIAMI GARDENS — The three months between the NFL draft and the start of Miami Dolphins training camp will be particularly interesting for sixth-round pick Elijah Higgins.

The former Stanford slot receiver who stands at 6 foot 3, 238 pounds is converting to play tight end in the NFL.

Ahead of his first practice with the Dolphins at Friday’s start of rookie minicamp, Higgins said he got his playbook a few days earlier and tight ends coach Jon Embree has had him studying tape of 49ers perennial Pro Bowl tight end George Kittle, whom Embree coached in San Francisco. He hasn’t yet learned all the intricacies of the tight end position in coach Mike McDaniel’s offense, but he’s eager to.

“I’m excited, to be honest. I still don’t know too much,” Higgins said. “The practice plays that we are running right now are pretty minute and pretty straight-forward, so we’ll see how it feels.”

As it turns out, the idea to convert Higgins to tight end was pretty common around league circles. He estimated 28 of the 32 teams were looking at him as a tight end prospect, although he played receiver in college.

And it’s something that had been in the works for the big-bodied slot long before the draft process. He said the first such talks took place for him as a senior in high school, but that was never the plan while at Stanford.

“I ended up playing a big slot role,” Higgins said, “so it was essentially very similar to a flexed-out F tight end minus all of the blocking assignments. That will carry over for sure but obviously we’re going to have to learn how to block on the interior.”

The blocking aspect in McDaniel’s outside-zone scheme will indeed be the key for Higgins, who is a capable pass-catcher with 59 receptions for 704 yards in his final college season. It drove former Dolphin tight end Mike Gesicki, who signed with the New England Patriots in free agency, out of town after diminished playing time in one season under McDaniel and Embree.

Higgins, though, described himself as an “aggressive” blocker.

“I’m willing to get in battles, willing to fight other defenders for position on the field and just body position in general,” he said. “But I would say I am aggressive, willing to block, willing to get my hands dirty and I’m excited to take on that role.”

McDaniel expressed no qualms about the position change when he drafted Higgins.

“This day in age, converting a receiver to a tight end isn’t as abstract as it used to be, only because half the teams are playing spread and two-point (stances) anyway,” McDaniel said at the conclusion of Miami’s four-pick draft. “Even if they’re called a tight end, they’re playing receiver stuff anyway. So you get kind of used to projecting people to do things like that and we felt very comfortable and confident that he fit the bill for that, so we’re excited to have him.”

Listed at 235 pounds, Higgins said he checked into rookie minicamp at 238 and wants to get into the 240-245 range to see if he can maintain his same athleticism with the added weight.

Hayes on early progress

The other Dolphins Day 3 draft pick, seventh-round selection and Michigan tackle Ryan Hayes, also got started with the team at rookie minicamp this weekend.

He said he hasn’t yet heard definitively what his role will be, if a move to guard could be in order, but he expressed that he’s willing to do whatever the coaches ask.

When he was drafted, Hayes said he hadn’t run too much of the wide zone with the Wolverines.

“I definitely know the concept,” he said Friday. “We ran it at Michigan at practice all the time. We didn’t run it much, but I do have a good concept of outside zone, and this last day I’ve learned a lot already.”

Hayes said different aiming points on blocks and footwork changes are the key differences to keep in mind.

Hayes has gotten a glimpse at new Dolphins offensive line coach Butch Barry.

“He seems awesome,” he said. “He really says things that are well thought-out. He has a lot of good information, a lot of techniques. Just soaking everything up. Obviously, he’s coached a long time in this league, so everything he says is valuable.”

—The Dolphins waived three undrafted offensive linemen Saturday after getting a first glimpse at them during rookie minicamp: Jarrett Horst, Alex Jensen and DJ Scaife.

Scaife was a Miami Hurricanes prospect. Horst was a tackle out of Michigan State, and Jensen came out of South Dakota. The Dolphins still have San Diego State’s Alama Uluave and Cincinnati’s James Tunstall as undrafted rookies to go with the seventh-round-drafted Hayes. They may select from a group of linemen invited for tryouts: Wyoming’s Eric Abojei, Vanderbilt’s Jacob Brammer, Pittsburgh’s Marcus Minor and San Jose State’s Jack Snyder, a 2022 prospect who spent time with the Los Angeles Rams last year.