Must Win Says Tony Sparano…Why Not Show Up First?

Tony Sparano said to the press last week that he felt the Cardinals game was a “must win“. Well, it was, perhaps, for the Arizona Cardinals. If the Miami Dolphins wanted to win, they should have showed up for the game. 4 quarters after it started, the Dolphins stared at the 31 points on the stadium scoreboard and probably wondered what it would be like to put that many points up themselves. So do the fans.

Miami fans have grown accustomed to losing but it’s not the losses that take are taking their toll as much as the way the team is losing.  The Miami Dolphins have been losing for the last 4 years and 2 games including the anomaly of a 9-7 record in Nick Saban’s first year.  Yesterday, the 31-10 loss to the Cards has sent many fans over the edge.

Wanting answers, Miami fans are at a breaking point.  Fed up with the poor play, the poor preparation, and lack of intensity.  This Miami Dolphins team has no “name”, no identity.  Yesterday, they didn’t even show up to play.  That is not a sour taste left in the mouth of the fan, that is a bitter pill of reality that is being force fed down our throats.  The Miami Dolphins want you to “Believe”.  Fans want to know in what.

The Dolphins bypassed top named free agents despite a 50 million dollar bank account on the eve of free agency.  Outbid by the Jets on LB Calvin Pace, most fans understood the reasons behind not wanting to overpay for an unproven player.  Yet this team also passed on Alan Faneca a solid starting offensive lineman.  Damien Woody, another Olineman.  They failed to spend their money on a top CB or WR opting instead to pursue special team players and second tier free agents.  After 2 games of the regular season and a 23 player turnover, only a handfull of those free agent players are still on the teams active roster.

The Dolphins battled back against the NY Jets on the first weekend of football.  Yesterday, they failed to show up for the game.  The Cardinals blew the game open early with a 60 plus yard strike to Anqan Boldin.  A series later, fans watched as Larry Fitzgerald broke away from 3 would be tacklers to sprint down-field to the 2 yardline.  It was a joke.  By the second half most fans didn’t even care to watch.

I still think that this new coach, Tony Sparano is going to be good for the team.  He won’t quit and he will continue to hold the respect of many of this teams players, but he is already losing the faith of the fans.  Coming out of a Cam Cameron led 2007 1-15 season, the Dolphins faithful are seeing the exact same thing this year and chatter is already building up on the 0-16 watch.

While it hard to talk of tact and patience, it is the only thing that we really can do.  I am sure this front office is none to pleased either.  If there is one thing we can say is that unlike in years past, Bill Parcells has his name attatched to this team and he will not go out looking like this.  Or so we think.

It’s funny, I wrote this early this morning then watched as my computer crashed the second before I clicked “publish”.  For 5 hours I figured that my jets would cool down a bit.  My wanting to rant would subside.  It hasn’t.  Yesterday’s game was as disgusting as anything I witnessed last year.