David Long Jr. is heading into his second season with the Miami Dolphins with a new defensive coordinator but the same mentality.

The 5-foot-11 linebacker has always seen himself as an underdog since he was taken in the sixth round of the 2019 NFL draft.

Now, the former West Virginia Mountaineer is a contract year.

“[The motivation] is the same,” Long said this week during a Zoom media session. “It hasn’t dropped off, it hasn’t gotten better. It’s the same. But I don’t look at it as that. Over the years I’ve grown … so I don’t really worry too much. I come to work every day.”

Long wears a tattoo on his neck that he considers his motto.

“‘Que sera, sera’ … It means, ‘what will be, will be,’” Long said. “That’s what I believe in, so that’s how I attack every day.”

Long will go into the 2024 season attacking every day with his new defensive coordinator, Anthony Weaver. Weaver was hired in February from the Baltimore Ravens.

Last season, Weaver helped lead a Ravens defense that reached the top of the league in scoring defense with 16.5 points allowed per game.

It is still early, but Long likes where the team currently is.

“We’re on like, phase (two of the offseason program],” Long said. “But right now, everybody is clicking, I would say, and it starts off the field as well. How tight is the team, how good can we communicate, and how fast we can take the classroom to the field. Everyday it’s getting better, and I’m sure it will continuously get better throughout the OTAs, phase three and going into minicamp.”

As Long enters his contract year, he is confident in the changes around him — including whoever winds up replacing his linebacker partner after the departure of Jerome Baker, which is expected to be Jordyn Brooks.

“Of course I had a lot of fun playing with [Baker], but the good thing about the league is there is a lot of good guys in the league,” Long said. “I feel like [Jordyn Brooks] came in, [Anthony Walker] came in and fit right in … As far as play style, [we] haven’t gotten the pads on yet, but as far as how we fit into the defense it’s feeling good right now. Everybody is clicking and learning every day.”

NORTH MIAMI, Fla. – Following a 3-1 termination vote Tuesday night, it’s still unclear why a group of North Miami city councilmembers voted to fire City Manager Rasha Cameau. But Local 10 News has obtained a memo from the now-ousted top administrator that sheds light on her forced departure.

Residents packed Tuesday night’s special city council meeting in an attempt to save Cameau’s job. They credit her with cleaning house and turning the city around.

“You run (the city) like a banana republic,” resident Mary Brown told councilmembers.

Vice Mayor Mary Estimé-Irvin and councilmembers Pierre Frantz Charles and Kassandra Timothe were the deciding votes. Longtime Councilman Scott Galvin voted against firing Cameau.

Mayor Alix Desulme, who wasn’t present at the meeting, had previously expressed opposition to firing Cameau, calling the passage of a motion to consider her firing in April a “sad day” for the city.

Residents booed the council following the vote.

None of the councilmembers have elaborated on why they wanted Cameau out.

Residents point to Cameau declining councilmembers’ requests for unbudgeted money to spend, including for a festival, as she righted the city’s financial decline.

Local 10 News has learned that Cameau, seeing the writing on the wall, memorialized the signs in a memo, in which she described herself as “busy putting out fires.”

The memo is titled “Re: Events That Led Up to My Termination.”

She documented efforts to hold the public works director accountable for failures with a multi-million dollar water project, only to have councilmembers backdoor her to spare him, violating the city charter.

They got outsiders to intervene: one of them was a longtime city lobbyist who claimed people thought her actions were racially-motivated.

She wrote that she was told that “the word on the street is that I am firing Haitians and replacing them with ‘blans,’” the Creole term for non-Haitians.

Cameau is a Haitian-American.

Read the memo:

The council appointed Anna-Bo Emmanuel as interim city manager.

That raised even more questions. If councilmembers collaborated behind the scenes, it would violate Florida’s Sunshine Laws.

Following Tuesday night’s vote, Cameau told local media outlets, “I’ve been a public servant for over 20 years and I will be there to serve the public again.”

Cameau is expected to request a public hearing on her termination, which she is entitled to.

Residents are discussing recalls of the councilmembers, as well as lawsuits.