Parting Shots After Dolphins Loss

Where do you even begin?  I have spent much of the last three weeks realizing that the Miami Dolphins are simply not a good football team.  Losses?  Yeah, no big deal, the team simply hasn’t played well enough to win and to be honest, I’m not going to root for poor play.  Mediocrity yes, but Miami isn’t even mediocre right now.

Today’s loss simply put Miami’s problems into the national spotlight.  Why?  Simple because the Dolphins have been talked about all week as the team that was going to honor their opposing teams QB’s college team.

So there are plenty of parting shots to go around and while I normally don’t do this.  I’m really pissed right now and frankly they all deserve it.

This is not about losing.  I have become numb to that.  This isn’t about giving up two touchdown drives with under 5:00 minutes to play and a two point conversion along with an on-side kick.  This is about the men who supposedly run this franchise.

Mike Dee – Dee did wonders in Boston where he ran the Red Sox and turned sagging ticket sales around and filled the stadium.  His antics in Miami have yet to fruitfully help the home team.  His desire to ask the NFL to move 1:00 PM games in September to 4PM games did not bring fans into a cooler stadium, but it did take away a major advantage for the home team on the field.

Dee also came up with the idea of “Club Liv” the party center on the club level of the stadium that is more a nightclub than a football interior tailgating party.  In fact, there are no seats in the club that provide a sitting view of the game.

If that were not all bad enough, Dee had the brilliant move of creating today’s blunder.  The “Gator Appreciation” game that honored the 2008/09 National Champion Florida Gators who just so happened to be led by Tim Tebow. 

It was evident on the first series of the game that Dee had made a mistake when the “home” crowd cheered loudly when Tebow ran onto the field.  It was deafening on the television late in the game when Tebow brought the Broncos back to tie the game and then finally in OT winning it.

While there is little chance that owner Stephen Ross will fire Mike Dee…he should.  He should very much consider this mistake and get rid of it.  Mike Dee is not a football guy he is a business guy and his acts to bring butts into the stadium are impacting the home field advantage.  It’s no coincidence that the Dolphins have won only one home game in two years.  Today was a massive slap in the faces of Dolphins fans and even the players that play for the team.

Stephen Ross has made one major blunder, that of trying to lure Jim Harbaugh following last season.  He opted to keep Sparano when Harbaugh said no, now, he will need to fire Tony Sparano.  Not at the end of the season but now.  Not because he lost to the Broncos but because once again the team was not prepared and his decisions with time and scores simply showcases that he is out of his league. 

What Ross does now will carve his own future and while I stand to give him a pass until after this season…ie over his minority celebrity owner hires and even the Harbaugh issue, I do take offense to seeing him standing on the sidelines talking with former Gator HC Urban Meyer laughing it up when the team he owns is pissing away a chance at a first win.

Ross is starting to come off like that little kid with a lot of money who can buy anything but the same kid who is never really invested in it.  Ross needs to start showing that he is invested in the teams winning and losing and not the bottom line.

Ross will have this off-season to make fans believe that he truly does care about what is on the field.

If Tony Sparano wasn’t on the chopping block last week, he should be out the door as early as Monday.  Today’s game was an absolute joke and despite the teams short comings, they held a 12 point advantage before Sparano chose to go for two when he didn’t need to.  Add the final FG of the game for Miami, the Broncos would have been trying to carve out a win from 16 down instead of 15.  Meaning they would have needed two, two point conversions and not one to win the game.

The Dolphins are a lifeless football team that can’t put together four quarters of play, that is a reflection on how they are coached and managed.  It starts with Tony Sparano getting this team prepared and it’s something that he simply cannot do.

Sparano doesn’t even look as though he wants to be there and if he can’t exude confidence or desire into his team then his team isn’t going to play with any.  If the team can’t play with confidence then the fans won’t care if they come to the games.

Stephen Ross and the stadium sponsors bought the remaining tickets of the game to make a sell out and thus not blacked out locally.  He needs to let it be blacked out and save himself the money.  Fans are not going to come to watch a football team who doesn’t play to win or a coach who doesn’t motivate his players.

Ross has the rest of the season to start convincing the fans that he cares about this team and wants this team to win because he “wants’ them to as a fan and not because it’s good for business.  Fans won’t buy into the latter and neither will the players or the coaches.  He can start by getting rid of Tony Sparano tomorrow and maybe even start thinking about getting rid of Mike Dee now too as well.

The Dolphins never needed gimmicks to put fans in the stadium, they only needed to see ownership show up on their side.  For all the knocks that Wayne Huizenga took as the teams owner, no one ever questioned his agenda to field a winner.