Miami Dolphins fans know how Patriots fans feel but we don’t care
By Brian Miller
There is no question Miami Dolphins fans can relate to how Patriots fans feel with Tom Brady leaving but don’t ask if we really care.
It sounds really bad but empathy is not something that Miami Dolphins fans will give out to Patriots fans now that Tom Brady has left the division even though we know what it feels like to lose someone near and dear to your football heart.
Crying in a dark corner is nothing new and Patriots fans finally get to feel a loss like they haven’t in 20 years. For that matter, many Patriots fans don’t know what losing something feels like. Mainly because we all know that most Patriots fans are really wagon jumpers from the Bills and Jets fan base. Let’s be honest, no one liked the Patriots before Bill Belichick started “pushing the limits of the NFL rules”.
Dolphins fans can still remember it all too well. First, for us older fans, it was a sad day when Dave Wannstedt took over the team and informed Dan Marino that he could stay with the team but would have to compete with Jay Fiedler for the starting job. Over the course of a week or two tension continued to build among the fans who had not venting social media platforms to agonize on. We waited for word of a trade that would send Marino to the Vikings.
The Vikings wanted him, they wanted him badly and given the team they had, Marino very well could have been their missing piece. A piece that could have taken Marino back to the Super Bowl. Instead, unlike Tom Brady, Marino opted to retire rather than wear another team’s jersey. Patriot fans get to watch that in 2020. So do the Dolphins fans!
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Still, watching your favorite player leave for another team is part of the modern NFL. Even the great ones are drawn by money and a change of scenery. Miami fans know that well too.
In 2008, Miami Dolphins fans got a taste of the reality you Patriots fans are feeling now. Jason Taylor was one of the most beloved players in team history. Still is today but in 2008, he was shoved out the door by Bill Parcells. Maybe it is fitting that a Parcells protege, Belichick, kicked the best player in Patriot history out the door, or at the very least opened it for him.
Taylor was traded to the Redskins after Parcells was turned off by the star defensive end. Taylor would spend one season in the nation’s capital before rejoining the Dolphins for another year in 2009. This time around the Dolphins welcomed him back but more because of the backlash Parcells had received. It wasn’t to last.
Following that season, the Dolphins once again didn’t bother trying to keep the future Hall of Fame end. Instead of a trade, however, we got to watch him leave in free agency and join the Jets. Imagine if Tom Brady had joined the Dolphins? Yes, it was as bad as it could get. He could have joined the Patriots and things would have been a little better. No one “hated” the Patriots back then, not like today.
Now, Patriots fans are sulking on social media and we Dolphins fans get to smile and soak it in but we also have to remember the history of our own franchise and know that we have been there. It’s a fair trade though.