The Miami Dolphins’ next turn taking the field will be several months into the 2021 offseason. The Dolphins found out last night that their playoff hopes were slashed — not that the team deserved to get in after the egg they laid in Buffalo to begin with. But while the Bills loss will sting deeply, it serves as the exclamation point on what these Dolphins need to do differently and who they need to become as compared to who they are.
You are what your record says you are: the Dolphins are a 10-win team in 2020. But there are more than one teams out there with better pure talent than the Dolphins, even some that didn’t necessarily log 10 wins this season. But the Dolphins, who are entering into their third offseason with Chris Grier and Brian Flores at the helm, deserve nothing but credit for how quickly they’ve infused talent into the Miami roster.
In 2019 the Dolphins were bad and needed good fortune and had zero margin for error to win the five football games that they did.
In 2020? The Dolphins are a much more talented team, but there’s still an untapped tier to achieve. Look at Miami’s six losses this season:
2020 Miami Dolphins’ 6 losses:
- 5-11 Denver Broncos (Away)
- 7-9 New England Patriots (Away)
- 12-4 Seattle Seahawks
- 13-3 Buffalo Bills (Away)
- 13-3 Buffalo Bills
- 14-2 Kansas City Chiefs
Two thirds of Miami’s losses in a 10-6 campaign have come against teams with 12 or more wins now that the season has come to a close. The Broncos game was a road contest that undoubtedly served as a letdown game and the Patriots caught Miami in Week 1 with no tape on their new offense. The best teams on Miami’s schedule this year, the Dolphins couldn’t beat.
Credit to the Dolphins for the wins they did collect. There were some mighty impressive ones: including the 10-6 Los Angeles Rams, the 8-8 Arizona Cardinals and the 8-8 Las Vegas Raiders. But that’s the overall theme of the season: the Dolphins were more disciplined and better equipped to tackle fringe playoff teams or worse. But the elite teams on Miami’s schedule still persistently beat the Dolphins — a reminder that this overhauled Dolphins roster is still in just their second year of a rebuild. There’s more room to grow. And the Dolphins must embrace that if they’re going to return in 2021 with a vengeance.