The Phinsider
Throughout the 2025 NFL season, SB Nation’s Doug Farrar will write about the game’s Secret Superstars — those players whose performances might slip under the radar for whatever reasons. In this installment, we focus on Miami Dolphins center Aaron Brewer, who came from humble beginnings and an uncertain NFL future early on. Maybe nobody expected Brewer to become the league’s best center, but he’s built a credible case.
There are two things you might not expect about the 2025 Miami Dolphins. First, they’re almost playoff-relevant at 6-7 after a brutal 2-7 start, and second, they’ve become one of the NFL’s best rushing offenses. Maybe that’s less of a surprise if you factor in Mike McDaniel’s history as Kyle Shanahan’s run game coordinator in San Francisco from 2017-2020, but this Dolphins offense really leads with the run right now. Through Week 14, they’ve run the ball on 45.3% of their plays, which ranks 14th, but they rank eighth in rushing yards per game (126.5), third in rushing yards per play (4.9, tied with the Chicago Bears and the Washington Commanders), fourth in run plays of 10 or more yards (47), and first in yards after contact per attempt (3.86).
Another surprise, which is more than tangentially tied to all that rushing success, is the efforts of center Aaron Brewer, because this guy has become the embodiment of the whole Secret Superstar thing. The Dolphins slipped under the national radar with their unfortunate start to the season (except for the inevitable “Will Mike McDaniel be fired in-season?” stuff), but Brewer, the 2020 undrafted free agent from Texas State (Go, Bobcats!), has become one of the game’s best at his position, and quite possibly the best move center the NFL has seen since Jason Kelce’s salad days.
When an O-line authority like Brandon Thorn is on the case, you need to pay attention.
Why was Brewer undrafted? Well, you can start with the size profile. At 6’1 and 274 pounds, Brewer would have been as short as any interior offensive lineman at the scouting combine since 1999 were he actually invited to the scouting combine, and he would have been the second-lightest interior offensive lineman during that time, behind only Air Force’s Ben Miller in 2002 at 263 pounds. By the way, Kelce himself was the third-lightest IOL invited to the combine in that time at 280 pounds.
The Tennessee Titans signed Brewer out of college, and he was primarily an offensive guard for them in his first three seasons, giving up a lot of sacks (11 through 2022) and finding his way. The move to center in 2023 didn’t pay immediate dividends; Brewer allowed six sacks and 34 total pressures in the middle of Tennessee’s offensive line in 2023.
Things started to go in the right direction for Brewer when the Dolphins signed him to a three-year, $21 million contract with $13.18 million guaranteed on March 15, 2024. McDaniel tends to want a more agile center in his offense, and Brewer cut...
