MIAMI GARDENS -- The last time the Miami Dolphins had a Texas Tech linebacker making this many tackles in a season, his name was Zach Thomas.
In his first season with the Dolphins, linebacker Jordyn Brooks is putting up Thomas-like numbers.
The fifth-year pro who came over from the Seattle Seahawks in free agency last March has 121 tackles through 14 games. With three games remaining, Brooks is on pace to have the most tackles by any Dolphins defender in a single season since the Hall of Famer Thomas roamed the middle of Miami's defenses from the late 1990s and through the early 2000s.
With 14 more tackles, which would have Brooks surpass safety Reshad Jones' 135 tackles in 2015, the leaderboard of single-season tackles since Thomas' rookie year in 1996, then has eight different seasons of Thomas totals, topped by his league-leading 165 tackles in 2006.
Brooks actually met the Dolphins' icon, whom he puts up there with Ray Lewis, Luke Kuechly and former Seahawks teammate Bobby Wagner as some of his favorite linebackers, during training camp ahead of the season.
"All positive advice, leadership advice and I'd call it like a welcome moment to Miami," Brooks told the South Florida Sun Sentinel this week, as the Dolphins get set to host the San Francisco 49ers in a must-win game on Sunday.
"It was a lot of things, but the biggest thing was just, being the linebacker of the defense, everybody's looking to you, as far as leadership. But first, you got to lead by action rather than words, and everything else will follow through."
Brooks is no stranger to this level of tackling productivity. In fact, some of his Seahawks seasons make this year pale in comparison. He had 184 tackles in 2021 and 161 in 2022 with Seattle.
To Brooks, that's just him doing his job.
"I just think, as a linebacker, that's your No. 1 job, is to tackle," he said. "That's the most important thing, is to be able to tackle -- with some of the God-given abilities that I have and just playing hard and just love for the game and trying to help us win."
Brooks is more than just a tackling machine. He's the only player in the NFL with at least 100 tackles, five passes defended, two sacks and two fumble recoveries. He recovered one very niftily with one hand in front of a diving Houston Texans player late in the first half of Sunday's loss in his hometown.
Brooks' versatility has made him a valuable asset for Miami's No. 6-ranked defense, which is eighth against the run and pass.
"He's got speed. He's got quickness," said Miami linebackers coach Joe Barry of the 6-foot, 240-pound physical specimen who is a prototype for the new-age linebacker. "There's so many things that an inside linebacker has to do now, in today's football. They not only play the run. They got to play the pass. They get matched up on tight ends. They get matched up on running backs. Even when you get formationally with a receiver in the slot, linebacker gets matched up with a receiver.
"In this scheme, we do a lot of things with our linebackers from a pressure standpoint, so you got to be a good blitzer. You got to be able to beat offensive linemen. You got to be able to beat backs. Got to be able to read protections."
Barry actually wanted Brooks when he was with the Los Angeles Rams the year he went in the draft. The Rams didn't have a first-round pick in 2020, and the Seahawks took him late in the first, with the No. 27 pick. He appreciates that, five years later, he is finally connected with him.
Dolphins defensive coordinator Anthony Weaver revealed Thursday that assistant defensive backs coach DeShawn Shead, who was previously in Seattle, played a role in bringing him across the country.
"(He) told us the type of player he was. So once he got in the building, it certainly wasn't a surprise that he's had the success he's had," Weaver said. "He's a guy that approaches every day the same, gives the same effort, regardless of whether he's dinged, how he feels. It doesn't matter.
"The consistency, the physicality, the temperament. Usually, those things equate."
Brooks is a passionate, intense player. As he was signed in the offseason, video clips circulated of times he was vocal on the Seahawks sideline and in their huddle. When the Dolphins, as a team, had a poor tackling performance in frigid Green Bay last month, he told it like it was in the locker room and said the defense played soft.
With all his activity, Brooks knows to credit the defensive line in front of him for keeping blockers off him.
"Any great defense, it starts with up front," he said. "Any linebacker will tell you, we can't do our job without the big guys in front of us doing theirs. Calais(Campbell), (Zach) Sieler, (Emmanuel) Ogbah, all those guys have done a great job freeing me up to make plays."