Not Your Usual Signs of Hope

Monday, October 4, 2004
Damon Fairchild
MDBW Staff Writer

Cleveland, Houston, San Diego, Detroit, and Arizona. A group of last year's cellar dwellers who after four weeks of American Football have more wins than the winningest franchise in NFL history. Charlie Frye, Kyle Orton, Andrew Walter, and Dan Orlovski. This years college quarterbacks picked, at least at this point, to go in the first round. Recognize more than two of their names? There are a couple there, but the problem with this group is not just that they are far from being household names, but that none of them are considered to be a top 10 or even top 15 pick. There are no Philip Rivers, Eli Mannings, or Ben Roethlisbergers out there. It is a sad commentary that we are already looking to the draft and upcoming off-season for comfort and hope, and if offensive play in Miami, specifically at the quarterback position, doesn't improve quickly, the Dolphins will be staring at their worst record since they were first an expansion team.

This week with Jay Fiedler under center, the Dolphins had their best offensive output of the year, but the yardage gained didn't translate into points and the offense failed to take full advantage of the one turnover and field position given them by the defense. Three trips into the red zone, one which was set up by Arturo Freeman's interception return to the Jets 8 yard line, amassed just 9 points; only three more than the Jets defense scored.

Although the Jets Defense accounted for 6 of their points, Jay Fiedler should really be given credit for throwing his only TD pass to the wrong team. While Donny Abraham made a good break on Fiedler's pass, he didn't have to work all that hard to get his hands on it. The Jets blitzed, Fiedler turned and threw to Rob Konrad who for some reason was split out to his far right like Chris Chambers normally would be. Needless to say, the combination didn't connect and for the third time this season, a Dolphin quarterback put the game away... by throwing an interception for a touchdown. As if he wasn't satisfied with throwing the game away on that pass, Jay proceeded to throw another pick, which fortunately wasn't returned for a TD, and finally in one of the most athletic and brilliant moves of his career, he tried lateralling the ball to an offensive lineman as he was being sacked for the 4th time of the game.

The bright spots? As usual, the defense played very well totaling 3 sacks, 1 interception, held NY to 1 of 11 on 3rd down conversions, and although Curtis Martin had 110 yards rushing, he had more than 30 of them late in the 4th quarter with the defense tired and discouraged. For the offense, Leonard Henry looked good on his 53 yard run, but averaged only 1.7 yards per carry on his other 17 carries.

So when the Phins put Jay back in as the starter, we all had a glimmer of hope and even though he has proven he does not have the skill to carry the team for a game and win one for us, we still remembered that he had won in the past and hoped he would be the key spark as he was last year against the Redskins. Maybe he needed his orange jersey to give him the strength. What do we do now for hope? Where can we turn for peace? Is there something we can hold onto other than our memories of Dan Marino and the undefeated 1972 team?

One answer I have to offer is change. There will be change in Miami this coming off-season. No, there is no guarantee Dave will be gone as Wayne may feel sympathetic to the facts that Ricky Williams bailed on us and David Boston had a freak injury. But this I will guarantee. Jay Fiedler will not be back. A.J. Feeley might not either (his signing bonus was not big enough to warrant keeping him around for cap reasons). We'll see how the o-line grows together toward the end of the season, and maybe we will find hope in their progress. Consider Chris Chambers, Randy McMichael, David Boston, and Marty Booker to be serious threats in the passing game, but who will throw to them? Although they were not mentioned above, Matt Leinart may be talked out of returning to USC his senior year, and Aaron Rogers is emerging as one of the Nation's best QB's who may also forgo his senior year, but although the Phins will have a good shot at whomever they want, don't expect one of them to come in and change things next year. Unfortunately there appear to be no veteran FA QB's available, so we may have to suffer through a rookie's learning experience, or 10-12 more of A.J.'s passes returned for TD's. Finally, Ricky owes the Dolphins so much freakin' money now, that he may have to come back to football. He won't be running for us though, so we can expect to get at least a couple of draft picks for him.

There, I am feeling better already. The playoffs are already out of the picture for us so now I don't have to get all caught up in the suspense, just to be let down in week 16 or 17. I have come to terms with the fact that this year's offensive unit may be the only team ever to be outscored by their opponents defenses. And we are almost guaranteed change in Miami... Didn't we think that after last year too?