The Miami Dolphins will enter the 2020 season’s second quarter well ahead of the pace they set last year as a team — which is precisely what you’d hope to see from a team that got shredded down to the foundation in 2019. The Dolphins have been close on a number of occasions to pulling out additional wins, but never the less the team has one more win this year than they did last season after four games.
While wins are rightfully the measuring stick used to gauge performance, wins don’t often offer a lot of context. But when you inspect the Miami Dolphins’ statistical production through the first four games of 2020 and compare it to the first four games of 2019, it is clear and obvious that this is a much improved football team.
And that the wins will come as this young, inexperienced group continues to play together and the communication becomes easier.
| 2019 (4 games) | 2020 (4 games) | Improvement | |||
| OFFENSE | |||||
| First Downs | 53 | 96 | Up 181% | ||
| Yardage | 900 | 1388 | Up 154% | ||
| Points | 26 | 93 | Up 357% | ||
| Sacks Allowed | 18 | 6 | Down 67% | ||
| Turnovers | 9 | 5 | Down 45% | ||
| DEFENSE | 2019 (4 games) | 2020 (4 games) | Improvement | ||
| First Downs | 110 | 100 | Down 10% | ||
| Yardage | 1888 | 1639 | Down 14% | ||
| Points | 163 | 96 | Down 42% | ||
| Sacks | 5 | 9 | Up 180% | ||
| Turnovers | 2 | 5 | Up 250% |
The Dolphins are, through 4 games, in the top 12 in NFL scoring defense despite playing two of the top-5 scoring offenses in football between the Buffalo Bills and the Seattle Seahawks and another in New England that ranks just outside the top-10.
The schedule-makers didn’t do the Dolphins any favors and as a result the team’s inexperience has proven costly late in these close contests. But while we wait for the wins to start springing up and reflect the improvement of the team, there’s plenty of other clues that Miami’s team is trending in the right direction and that staying patient this early into a team rebuild would be a wise move.