Losing Brings out the Worst…in Fans!

Lose a few games and the worst comes out in fans.  We are in week 3 of the 2007 season, a season in which realistically was not going to be a very good one.  I predicted the team had a chance to go 10-6 and had the Miami Dolphins defense been what it was last year, that may have been a realistic possibility.  I am however, not a fool, and I surely am not surprised by the start…disappointed?  Yes, Upset? Yes, Surprised?  Not one bit.

The Miami Dolphins finished last year with 6 wins.  That hardly translates into a positive focus for this year.  The season ended with a resigning coach, a search for a new head coach, the hiring of a new coach, the implementation of a new system, the trade for a 37 year old quarterback, enough drama leading up to camp to fill a season as a companion to ABC’s “Lost”, and a draft that had fans screaming for the head of Cam Cameron and Randy Mueller.

The NFL is an ugly business and fans love to criticize the treatment of players such as Daunte Culpepper, who ironically will likely be the starter next Sunday in Miami, they love to criticize the trades and decisions of management, they love to scream for changes at quarterback.  They also rarely have a real clue as to what they are talking about.  This is after all the NFL and not a fantasy football league…albeit the Dolphins can sure play like it is.

Fire Cam Cameron:  A huge following subscribe to this line of thinking.  Mostly made up of fans who would rather have had someone else as the head coach.  These are the “I just don’t like you” fans.  This group will throw at you names like Cowher and Tomlin.  Cowher did not want to coach and Miami would have had to trade a couple of picks to Pittsburgh to get him.  Tomlin inherited a team that 2 years ago won the Super Bowl.  Cameron inherited a team who 3 years ago went 4-12, two years ago miraculously finished 9-7, and last year finished 6-10…yeah, I see a difference there.  Fire Cam Cameron?  As the fans with some degree of common sense will tell you, that is not going to happen for at least 3 years.  Complain all you want, but he is not going anywhere.

Aside from some clock management issues, a few personnel decisions, and some questionable draft picks, Cameron is slowing building an offense.  Miami scored only 13 points in week 1, they scored over 20 in week 2, and in week 3 managed 28.  However, it was the way they scored the points that improved.  This offense needs a lot of work, there is absolutely NO question about that and the fruition of that work will not likely be realized until year 2.  Do you want to know how good Cam Cameron could be?  Many fans will tell you that he was nothing without Gates, Tomlinson, Brees, Rivers, and the likes in SD…yet the team in the NFL with the best offense last year, can’t score anything this year…the players are the same, the coach is different, seems to me that maybe Tomlinson, Rivers, and Gates, are nothing without Cameron.  That is a testament to Camerons’ offensive play book.  Cam Cameron has a long way to go before he is the next anything…bust or genius.  The fans on this wagon, are just too lazy to walk anywhere, and this wagon just happened to be passing by to give them a ride.  A few wins, a few more improvements on offense, a few more points scored, and they will start jumping off.

Start Beck! Start Lemon! Green Sucks! – These are not your “I don’t like you fans” these are clueless fans.  It is week 3 and they have already thrown in the towel.  Sure mathematically the team can make the playoffs, everyone knows they likely will not, but in the NFL, you don’t quit until you have nothing to play for and then, you don’t quit.  You see what you have.  Calling for anyone but Green right now is a stupid idea driven by frustration and anger over losing.  Aside from one game, Dallas, Trent Green has played well, and the offense as a whole has played well enough to win.  The Dolphins are out of nothing technically, and until they are, you keep trying to win what you can.  You keep trying to improve, what you don’t do is change to a rookie quarterback to see if he is your future.  Brian Brohm will likely be the number 1 quarterback in next years draft, and guess what?  Miami will not take him.  They will NOT take him.  Beck is the future of this team and until the Dolphins are eliminated from the playoffs officially, they will not play Beck unless Green gets hurt.  Live with it.  Whether you like Green or not, agree with the compensation the Dolphins will give up for him, Trent Green is the starting quarterback of the Dolphins.  Hop off the wagon folks it isn’t going anywhere either.  If Green is an utter failure and actually loses the season for us…then thump your chest and be proud, I’m sure that you will be very quick to let everyone else know how right about him you were.

Emotion is a powerful thing, and unfortunately it makes good people say bad things.  For fans of the Miami Dolphins, losing brings out the worst.  It is easy to sit back and get mad, yell, scream, and want apologies and vindication, years of frustration have accumulated to form this frenzy.  An entire generation of fans can not remember the days of winning, and there are many out there who only know Marino as an historical figure who owns a bunch of records.  That line of thinking however, is weak minded, shallow, and nearsighted.  The passion of a team by a fan is strong, and disappointment adds only more fuel to that burning fire, but it also makes a fan stupid.

There are a lot of problems with our beloved Dolphins from the offense to the defense to the special teams.  There is no magical fix.  There is no magical QB that will come in and save the teams season, there is no magical coach out there who will turn this team around in one year, no magical trade that will bring the skid to a halt and turn it around.  It will take time, time under one coach, one system with players who believe in that system.  Something Miami has not had in quite awhile.

Cam Cameron could turn out to be everything the outspoken disgruntled fan says he will.  Trent Green could be another mistake in the Dolphins history of QB trade mistakes. The entire franchise may be as bad in 3 years as it is today.  However, there is not one fan, not one media critic, not one newspaper reporter, and not one blogger out there, that knows that for sure.  In the meantime, with each mounting loss, you will hear more of the same and it will continue to get ugly and at times it will get worse.  This team is still a few years away from reaching the start of what it can be.  Right now, it is an infant learning to walk.  Time is something none of us want to spend especially when it is spent waiting, but it is something that we as fans do not control…and bitching is not going to speed up that process.

Like it or not, this team is not very good, but someone should tell where that great team was that Cameron inherited?  Where is the winning team that has been out there for the last 5 years?  Wait, that’s right, there isn’t one.  So lets blame this whole thing on the new head coach, the new QB, and everything else.  It is of course so much easier to blame than it is to accept.