Dolphins have bigger issues than blowout loss. They must recall they’ve been here before | Opinion

So what did we learn about the Miami Dolphins this season?

Well, they’re not good enough.

They weren’t good enough in any phase on Sunday, allowing 42 points on defense, seven on offense and seven more on special teams, as they got rolled by the Buffalo Bills, 56-26.

And yielding all those points and yards and their postseason chances along with them against a division opponent using its reserves much of this game, the Dolphins couldn’t even match up.

They weren’t good enough in their offensive preparation or coaching because the offense had “a lot of miscommunication on that first drive,” according to quarterback Tua Tagovailoa. They weren’t good enough defensively as the Bills unmasked the No. 1 defense as, well, something much less.

Podcast: ‘The 2020 Dolphins Season Is Over, But The Fun Is Just Beginning’ Edition

The Dolphins weren’t even good enough against Buffalo’s reserves.

Running back Antonio Williams? He’s an undrafted rookie who was playing his first ever NFL game Sunday. He ran 12 times and averaged 5.3 yards per rush while scoring two touchdowns against Miami.

Quarterback Matt Barkley? He’s the backup to Josh Allen. And he’s the guy who threw a 56-yard touchdown pass with 6:27 to play because the Bills got tired of the Dolphins calling timeouts to extend the game when they (the Bills) were trying to run the ball and end game.

And Josh Norman? He was a Pro Bowl player once but is Buffalo’s third-best cornerback now. But on a day CB1 Tre’Davious White was rested, Norman had an interception return touchdown, one of three interceptions Tagovailoa threw.

“We didn’t play well enough in any phase to win the game,” coach Brian Flores understated afterward. “We needed to play well against a good football team. We didn’t do that.

“We’re all disappointed. They are, I am. We didn’t do enough.”

And now I ask you to forget Flores was talking about one game on one disastrous afternoon and think of his comments as the marching orders for the future.

Because, I know how this works: The Dolphins fell in defeat and out of the playoffs this day but if you look at this in perspective of how far they’ve come from a year ago, 10-6 feels like a great advancement from last year’s 5-11.

But I implore you not to see it this way.

And, more importantly, I implore the Dolphins not to see things this way.

Because the real view of where the Dolphins are today is, well, they’re right back in 2016.

That’s right, the Dolphins have merely caught up to themselves four seasons ago. And that grand satisfaction everyone felt when this franchise came out of nowhere to give us a 10-6 season back then was fleeting and unsatisfactory not long afterward.

And it should be unsatisfactory now.

So, you’re asking yourself, how could I possibly compare this young, hopeful Brian Flores and Chris Grier team of 2020 to the young, hopeful Adam Gase and Chris Grier team of 2016?

Because after that fateful 2016 season it was easy to recognize the Dolphins were a plucky but incomplete team that needed a lot of roster attention.

And, guess what, the Dolphins now are a plucky but incomplete team that needs a lot of roster attention in the coming offseason.

Because I see, with the benefit of hindsight to be sure, that the 2016 Dolphins thought they had a stable and improving quarterback situation. And I fear these Dolphins are going to convince themselves they have a stable and improving quarterback situation.

And neither is correct.

So let’s address all of this. And, yes, it might be painful.

This Dolphins roster is clearly in need of upgrade at multiple positions. And it’s actually more troubling than anyone will publicly admit because some positions the Dolphins think are handled are more or less occupied but not particularly manned with game-changing talent.

Don’t believe me?

Is former first round pick Christian Wilkins a game-changer or mostly a solid player like unheralded Zach Sieler?

Is big free agent acquisition Kyle Van Noy a game changer or did his first season with the Dolphins look uncomfortably like that of second-year player Andrew Van Ginkel?

Does any running back on the team scare anyone into thinking they might go 75 yards at any time?

The Dolphins offensive line? It seems fine a year after Grier selected a starting rookie left tackle and right tackle and left guard, and signed a center.

Except this offseason the Dolphins will be doing homework on Oregon left tackle Penei Sewell as a possible top pick. And the team will have to decide whether to re-sign or move on from center Ted Karras.

The receivers? Upgrade, please.

DeVante Parker is fine but he’s not a star. Preston Williams, coming off foot surgery, has missed more games than he’s played his first two seasons. And the Dolphins need to help Tagovailoa by surrounding him with more playmakers.

If that’s the direction they’re going to go.

And we cannot be certain that’s the direction they’re going to go because no one has come out and definitively said Tagovailoa will be the starter for 2021. Even Tagovailoa doesn’t know.

“I don’t think I have control over any of those things,” Tagovailoa said Sunday. “I think all I can do is continue to grow, continue to get better. Then offseason, just get with a good amount of the guys and see what we can do from there going into next season.”

It stands to reason that with the No. 3 overall pick the Dolphins now own, they will do their homework on quarterbacks. Because quarterbacks are the thing in the NFL and to look the other way while in position to find one is personnel department malpractice.

So even if the Dolphins are completely sold on Tagovailoa, this is going to happen.

This also will happen: The Dolphins have to figure out their backup quarterback situation. They have to figure out if they’re going to ask Ryan Fitzpatrick to come back and once again be the safety net for Tagovailoa, or they’re simply going to move in another direction.

I have to tell you, I’d move on. You probably don’t like this thinking and the Dolphins might not like this thinking because we all saw Sunday what the offense can look like when it doesn’t have Uncle Fitz to spot them in case something goes wrong.

Ugly.

But at some point, if the Dolphins are going to commit to Tagovailoa, they have to actually commit to Tagovailoa. They have to free him from the idea Fitz might replace him anytime he’s not playing up to a certain standard.

And if you or the Dolphins think it might be a good idea to keep Fitz just in case, I would tell you and the Dolphins you don’t really believe in Tagovailoa. In which case you drafted the wrong starting quarterback.

All of this will play out over the coming days and months, of course. All of this will be studied and eventually addressed.

My hope is that Grier, who was an architect of that fleeting 2016 success, will remember what it eventually felt like in 2017 and 2018. Because, he must also remember, the 2021 season is coming.

And nobody will stand for a repeat.