The reporter wanted to be clear about the Miami Dolphins’ plans for defensive back Minkah Fitzpatrick now that OTAs had started for the NFL team.

"Fitzpatrick will get some reps at corner. Is that accurate?" came the question to Dolphins coach Brian Flores during his Tuesday press conference.

“Ryan Fitzpatrick will not get any reps at cornerback,” Flores answered.

Wrong Fitzpatrick. Ryan Fitzpatrick is a quarterback.

Minkah Fitzpatrick will get reps at cornerback -- and a lot of other positions, based on Flores' second try at answering the question.

“We’re going to move guys around,” Flores said. “It may look like he’s playing corner, he’s playing safety, he could be playing linebacker. It depends. I’ll know what he’s doing. You guys probably won’t.”

As a rookie last season, the former Alabama All-American started five games at safety, three at cornerback and three at nickel back. He was one of the five Miami defensive backs who started at least 11 games in 2018 (and none started more than 14).

“Minkah’s obviously a very versatile player,” Flores said, “but we’ve got a lot of versatile players in the back end. We’ll move guys around and kind of try to get the best four or five guys on the field that we can.”

One of those "guys" will be Xavien Howard, who signed a five-year, $76.5 million contract extension on Monday. The cornerback tied for the NFL lead with seven interceptions in 2018, his third season in Miami.

Fitzpatrick will be one, too. But where?

The Dolphins return their starting safeties of the past two seasons -- T.J. McDonald and Reshad Jones. Jones is a two-time Pro Bowler who's not participating in the voluntary portion of Miami's offseason program (which OTAs are).

The Dolphins used Fitzpatrick and former Oxford High School standout Bobby McCain opposite Howard at cornerback last season. But McCain has spent a much greater portion of his four NFL seasons playing slot corner. McCain starts working on a four-year, $27 million contract with Miami this season.

The Dolphins have four players listed as safeties on their roster -- Fitzpatrick, Jones, McDonald and Maurice Smith, who also played at Alabama. Miami has 12 players listed as cornerbacks and two more as defensive backs.

Among the cornerbacks is Eric Rowe. He joined the Dolphins in free agency in March after three seasons with the New England Patriots, who had Flores helming their defense last season.

“We like what we have, but it’s so early,” Flores said. “It’s OTA No. 2. There’s a lot of time here for guys to improve, get better, learn the system. We’ve yet to play a game, we’ve yet to put on pads. We’re so early in the process that to kind of make an evaluation, you’re just kind of speaking into the air. We’re not there yet to make true evaluations.”

In his first NFL season, Fitzpatrick made 80 tackles, intercepted two passes and broke up nine passes in 2018. He returned one of his interceptions 50 yards for a touchdown.

He joined the Dolphins as the 11th player picked in the 2018 NFL Draft after playing in three straight CFP championship games with Alabama -- the final two as a consensus All-American. Fitzpatrick was a unanimous All-American in 2017 after earning first-team recognition from The Associated Press and American Football Coaches Association in 2016.

In 2017, Fitzpatrick joined Michigan's Charles Woodson and LSU's Patrick Peterson as the only players to win the Thorpe Award, given to the nation's best defensive back, and the Bednarik Award, presented to the nation's best defensive player.

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Mark Inabinett is a sports reporter for Alabama Media Group. Follow him on Twitter at @AMarkG1.