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Former Dolphins kicker Jason Sanders received some good news<\/p>\n
The Miami Dolphins\u2019 offseason plan has potentially been difficult to stomach for fans who might have been hoping the team would be competitive during the 2026 season. Instead of trying to retool the roster after back-to-back seasons of missing the postseason, Miami opted to reset their salary cap situation and start fresh with a new core of young players that they hope to be able to obtain in the upcoming NFL<\/a> Draft.<\/p>\n Resetting the team\u2019s salary cap was a difficult choice, as it led Miami to take some drastic decisions and take on a record setting number of dead money. As a result, the Dolphins parted ways with many talented players, who were quick to find new teams during free agency. Now, a former Dolphins All-Pro, who was released after eight seasons with Miami and over $20 million in earnings, has received some good news with his new team.<\/p>\n Former Miami Dolphins Kicker Jason Sanders Receives Good News<\/p>\n Former Miami Dolphins<\/a> kicker Jason Sanders, who missed the 2025 season with an injury, was released prior to free agency, as the Dolphins tried to lower his salary for the 2026 season and Sanders refused. Sanders was then signed<\/a> by the New York Giants<\/a> to a one-year, $1.4 million contract.<\/p>\n Sanders arrived in a kicker room in New York that featured Ben Sauls and Graham Gano, who also missed most of the 2025 season with an injury. However, the former Dolphins kicker received some good news as the Giants have released the veteran Gano<\/a>, improving Sanders\u2019 chances of winning the starting job in New York.<\/p>\n Gano was in a similar spot to Sanders in Miami, as he was set to carry a $5.75 million cap hit, but after an injured season, the Giants<\/a> preferred a cheaper alternative despite his Pro Bowl past.\u00a0<\/p>\n Additionally, Sanders is younger than Gano, and might potentially be better. In the 2024 season, Sanders went 12-for-14 on field goal attempts of over 50 yards and missed only four attempts all season. He served as Miami\u2019s primary kicker for seven seasons and made 90% or more of his attempts in three seasons. He departed Miami having made his last 27 field goals, including nine from over 50+ yards.<\/p>\n Miami Dolphins Special Teams<\/p>\n As they have with the entire roster, aside from the quarterback position, Miami opted to go with cheaper options at kicker. The Dolphins signed two kickers this offseason, creating a competition. They signed free agent Zane Gonzalez to a one-year, $1.4 million contract and re-signed 2025 kicker Riley Patterson to a one-year, $1.4 million contract. Gonzalez may have the upper hand as he did receive $100 thousand in guaranteed money unlike Patterson.<\/p>\n Aside from the monetary advantage, Sports Illustrated\u2019s Dante Collinelli wrote about Gonzalez<\/a> having a strength over Patterson. He said, \u201cGonzalez\u2019s biggest advantages are leg strength and experience. He\u2019s made 18 of 28 attempts from beyond 50 yards and was seven of nine from that range last season. He\u2019s also got a career-long of 57 yards, which is higher than Patterson\u2019s 54.<\/p>\n \n\t\t\tJose Esquer<\/a> Jose Esquer is a Mexican-American sportswriter and communications student based in San Diego, CA. His work spans football, basketball, baseball, and soccer. He has written for platforms like RotoWire and DolphinsTalk. You can find him on Twitter\/X @JEsquer8, usually talking Dolphins, world football, or both. More about Jose Esquer<\/a>\t\t<\/p>\n \n\t\t\tMore Heavy on Dolphins\n\t\t<\/p>\n \n\t\t\t\tLoading more stories\n\t\t<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Getty Former Dolphins kicker Jason Sanders received some good news The Miami Dolphins\u2019 offseason plan has potentially been…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":212144,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[123,125,124],"class_list":["post-212143","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-miami","tag-miami","tag-miami-headlines","tag-miami-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/212143","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=212143"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/212143\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/212144"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=212143"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=212143"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=212143"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}