Why we aren't playoff worthy.

[Dave Gray]

I finally found a way to put into words something that I've been thinking for a while when people talk about the Dolphins playoff chances.  I hear people say to me "If we'd only beaten Jacksonville".  Or Atlanta.  Or the Raiders. 

But it doesn't matter, because we're not good.

So, it sucks to be a turd when your team has won 6 in a row, but in my opinion we're winning 6 in row playing the same kind of football we did when we had lost 7 in a row.  And that's the difference.  It's not like we were playing poorly and now we're playing well.

I've never been so frustrated watching my team win than this year.  We are not looking great against terrible teams.  It's enough to win and that matters, but it's not impressive.

So, I ask this:
Do you think we're winning now as opposed to then because we're playing much better football?  Or is because we're playing the same football against worse teams?

And based on that answer, would you feel differently if we flipped our schedule, started off 0-6, and were 1-7 in the last eight games?

I feel like we are a .500 team playing .500 football and have been that all year and we're still that now.

[dolphins4life]

What's your point?  It's possible to win games, and even Super Bowls like that.

The Patriots made a habit of doing that during the Brady/Belichick years. 

The Dolphins ARE playoff worthy.

If not for the refs missing a blatant PI in the end zone against Oakland, they'd have the inside track.

[dolphins4life]

I finally found a way to put into words something that I've been thinking for a while when people talk about the Dolphins playoff chances.  I hear people say to me "If we'd only beaten Jacksonville".  Or Atlanta.  Or the Raiders. 

But it doesn't matter, because we're not good.

So, it sucks to be a turd when your team has won 6 in a row, but in my opinion we're winning 6 in row playing the same kind of football we did when we had lost 7 in a row.  And that's the difference.  It's not like we were playing poorly and now we're playing well.

I've never been so frustrated watching my team win than this year.  We are not looking great against terrible teams.  It's enough to win and that matters, but it's not impressive.

So, I ask this:
Do you think we're winning now as opposed to then because we're playing much better football?  Or is because we're playing the same football against worse teams?

And based on that answer, would you feel differently if we flipped our schedule, started off 0-6, and were 1-7 in the last eight games?

I feel like we are a .500 team playing .500 football and have been that all year and we're still that now.

To answer your question, it's likely because our opponents are playing worse and we are getting breaks.  This is part of football.   

[fyo]

I finally found a way to put into words something that I've been thinking for a while when people talk about the Dolphins playoff chances.  I hear people say to me "If we'd only beaten Jacksonville".  Or Atlanta.  Or the Raiders.  

But it doesn't matter, because we're not good.

So, it sucks to be a turd when your team has won 6 in a row, but in my opinion we're winning 6 in row playing the same kind of football we did when we had lost 7 in a row.  And that's the difference.  It's not like we were playing poorly and now we're playing well.

I've never been so frustrated watching my team win than this year.  We are not looking great against terrible teams.  It's enough to win and that matters, but it's not impressive.

So, I ask this:
Do you think we're winning now as opposed to then because we're playing much better football?  Or is because we're playing the same football against worse teams?

And based on that answer, would you feel differently if we flipped our schedule, started off 0-6, and were 1-7 in the last eight games?

I feel like we are a .500 team playing .500 football and have been that all year and we're still that now.

I feel we're a .500 team playing .500 football *now* (and getting a bit lucky, plus cushy schedule), but we were playing maybe .200 football during the bad part of the season.

So, yeah, I do think we've improved considerably, but that doesn't mean we're any good. I think there's a very good chance we drop 3 straight now, but then again I could see us continue to play .500 football and manage to win 2 of them.

[Tenshot13]

If we don't lose Tua and had to start bum Brissett, we win 1 or even 2 of those game.  We are then at the top of the playoff hunt, maybe even a wildcard spot.  We lost to a bad Jags team, sure....the Cardinals just got blown out by a terrible Lions team.  Shit happens, this year I don't see one dominant football team.  Just a few pretty good ones that shit the bed every few games.  We are just as playoff worthy as any other team in the NFL right now.

[ArtieChokePhin]

I think the guys may have bought in to Flores message or maybe Flores made some adjustments that helped rather than hurt.  Whatever the reason, it turned this team from awful to average.

It would weigh much heavier if draft position were an issue, but this year, it's not.

[Pappy13]

So, it sucks to be a turd when your team has won 6 in a row, but in my opinion we're winning 6 in row playing the same kind of football we did when we had lost 7 in a row.

This is 100% not true Dave. The Defense is playing lights out better in the last 6 games than they did when we were losing 7 in a row. The stats speak for themself because while you can say they were playing better teams during that 7 game losing stretch some of the teams were better, but many were not. Look at the scores below. In the 6 game winning streak they only allowed 10 points to Baltimore and Carolina who are not "bad" teams and conversely gave up 31 to the Raiders, 27 to the Colts and 30 to the Falcons during the losing streak. None of those teams is appreciably better than BAL or CAR. That's not to mention the 45 they gave up to the Bucs and the 61 they gave up to the Bills in 2 games.

In the 7 game losing stretch Miami never gave up less than 23 points and that was to the Jags. In the 6 game winning streak they held HOU to 9 and the Giants to 9 in addition to the 10 they gave up to BAL and CAR. Are the Jags better than HOU or the NYG? No, they are not. Are they better than BAL or CAR? Definitely not. If they would have held the Jags to 10 we would have won that game. If they would have held Atlanta and the Raiders to 20 points we would have won those games. If the defense was playing close to how it's playing now we would have won 3 of those 7 games they lost and Miami would be 10-4 with a shot to win the division.

If that's not enough to convince you then I went and researched how many stops each defense had each game. I considered a stop anytime your opponent had to punt or turned the ball over including on downs. You can see from below that Miami's offense is pretty consistent with right around 6 drives a game that end up in either a turnover or giving the ball back to the other team regardless of whether they win or lose. The one outlier was the first Buffalo game with 11 however if you will remember that's the game that Tua was injured and had to be replaced with Brisset, anytime you lose your starting QB, you can expect your offense to suffer and it did. The following weeks when Brisset prepared to start he did about the same that Tua has done all year.

However when you look at how Miami's defense has done they went up from less than 5 stops a game during the losing streak to over 7 stops a game during the win streak. That's a difference of almost 3 more stops a game. Again you could look at the schedule and say that's because of the opponent, but it's really not, Miami had 10 stops against both Carolina and Baltimore, 2 good teams. They only had 4 stops against Indy, 5 against Atlanta and 6 against Las Vegas arguably about the same or worse teams. They only got 6 stops against a HORRIBLE Jacksonville team, how did that happen? If the defense would have been playing better against those teams and gotten more stops Miami would have had a much better chance of winning those games.

As usual you are basing things based on what the offense does. When you look at what the defense has done in the 6 game winning streak compared to the 7 game losing streak, it's night and day. The defense has been giving the offense back the ball which has increased the offense's ability to put points on the board. While the offense really isn't any better than they were when they were losing they are getting more chances to score and the defense is giving up fewer points which means the offense has to score fewer points to win. All of that contributes to why they have won 6 in a row while previously losing 7 in a row.

Code:

Opponent	    Score	MIA  R 	Stops Mia 	Diff
New England	16	17	W	5	 4	-1
Buffalo	        35	0	L	11	6	-5
Las Vegas	        31	28	L	6	6	0
Indianapolis	27	17	L	6	4	-2
Tampa Bay	45	17	L	6	1	-5
Jacksonville	23	20	L	6	6	0
Atlanta	        30	28	L	5	5	0
Buffalo	        26	11	L	7	5	-2
Houston	         9	17	W	9	8	-1
Baltimore	        10	22	W	8	10	2
New York Jets	17	24	W	5	5	0
Carolina	        10	33	W	5	10	5
New York Giants	 9	20	W	6	7	1
New York Jets	24	31	W	6	8	2
New Orleans      3      20    W      7      10    3
Totals	        315  305	        98    95	-3
Avg	                22.5	21.8		7.0	6.8	
Avg Win	        12.3	23.0		6.4	7.8	
Avg Loss	        31.0	17.3		6.7	4.7	

[masterfins]

Compared to other teams in the AFC Playoff hunt I believe Miami is as good as or better than many of the teams.  So, yes I think they are playoff worthy.  I think it's unlikely that Miami would win a playoff game because I think they are below the top four teams.  The offensive line has shown some improvement, and the defense is playing much better.  The problem continues to be putting points on the board against decent teams.  Due to injuries and lack of talent the WR's and RB's are not playing at the level to be a winning playoff team.  If Miami can draft a true #1 receiver and a very good RB I believe they can be a regular playoff contender (also with some coaching changes on the offensive side of the ball).  I really believe they are in the best position going forward as they have been in 20 years.

[CF DolFan]

So, it sucks to be a turd when your team has won 6 in a row, but in my opinion we're winning 6 in row playing the same kind of football we did when we had lost 7 in a row.  And that's the difference.  It's not like we were playing poorly and now we're playing well.

I've never been so frustrated watching my team win than this year.  We are not looking great against terrible teams.  It's enough to win and that matters, but it's not impressive.

I think when you have a defensive minded team it's almost always like this. Close games won in the 4th quarter. Hopefully that changes with some additions to our offense.

[Pappy13]

Updated with stats from yesterday's game. If anyone doesn't see a pattern here I don't know what to tell you. Here's the thing, Miami's offense really wasn't that good yesterday, 7 drives ended in punts or turnovers compared to New Orleans that had 10 drives end in punts or turnovers. By the end of the game people felt sorry for the rookie QB, but Miami's offense didn't fare a whole lot better and they are going to have to do better against both Tennesee and New England to make the playoffs. New Orleans does have a good defense, but Tennessee and New England do as well.

Code:

Opponent	    Score	MIA  R 	Stops Mia 	Diff
New England	16	17	W	5	 4	-1
Buffalo	        35	0	L	11	6	-5
Las Vegas	        31	28	L	6	6	0
Indianapolis	27	17	L	6	4	-2
Tampa Bay	45	17	L	6	1	-5
Jacksonville	23	20	L	6	6	0
Atlanta	        30	28	L	5	5	0
Buffalo	        26	11	L	7	5	-2
Houston	         9	17	W	9	8	-1
Baltimore	        10	22	W	8	10	2
New York Jets	17	24	W	5	5	0
Carolina	        10	33	W	5	10	5
New York Giants	 9	20	W	6	7	1
New York Jets	24	31	W	6	8	2
New Orleans      3      20    W      7      10    3
Totals	        315  305	        98    95	-3
Avg	                22.5	21.8		7.0	6.8	
Avg Win	        12.3	23.0		6.4	7.8	
Avg Loss	        31.0	17.3		6.7	4.7	

[CF DolFan]

Updated with stats from yesterday's game. If anyone doesn't see a pattern here I don't know what to tell you. Here's the thing, Miami's offense really wasn't that good yesterday, 7 drives ended in punts or turnovers compared to New Orleans that had 10 drives end in punts or turnovers. By the end of the game people felt sorry for the rookie QB, but Miami's offense didn't fare a whole lot better and they are going to have to do better against both Tennesee and New England to make the playoffs. New Orleans does have a good defense, but Tennessee and New England do as well.

Not sure if you've been paying attention but Flores doesn't care. If we are up then we will play not to lose as we did yesterday. I can only assume it's because our o-line is so bad. It wasn't an accident that Waddle had most of his catches right up until we went up 2 tds. After that we pretty much shut it down to run out the clock. 

[Pappy13]

Not sure if you've been paying attention but Flores doesn't care. If we are up then we will play not to lose as we did yesterday. I can only assume it's because our o-line is so bad. It wasn't an accident that Waddle had most of his catches right up until we went up 2 tds. After that we pretty much shut it down to run out the clock.  

I won't deny that Miami goes into conservative mode much too early in games, but we didn't just go into conservative mode early in this game, they went into conservative mode from the onset. I can only assume this was because of the pick-6 to start the game and a good feeling that the defense would do it's job against a decimated Saints offense, but once you get into a conservative mindset, it's hard to get out of that. 30 runs in yesterday's game for 86 yards, a paltry 2.9 yards per carry isn't getting it done. Sure it eats away at the clock, but Tua is a pretty high percentage passer, completing passes and getting 1st downs runs the clock better than 3 runs and a punt does. Flores is going to have to open up the passing game a bit to open up the run game a bit in the next 2 games.

[CF DolFan]

30 runs in yesterday's game for 86 yards, a paltry 2.9 yards per carry isn't getting it done. Sure it eats away at the clock, but Tua is a pretty high percentage passer, completing passes and getting 1st downs runs the clock better than 3 runs and a punt does. Flores is going to have to open up the passing game a bit to open up the run game a bit in the next 2 games.

I don't disagree. I've known several coaches in my life who are fully content to win by 1 with defense and he fits in that mold.

[pondwater]

Hell, The Jaguars beat the mighty AFC juggernaut the Bills. Tua also has an as many yards per attempt as Josh Allen does. We have our issues, but this year is one of those years where shitty teams are beating good teams.

Jaguars over Bills
Lions over Cardinals
Jets over Bengals
Broncos over Cowboys
Texans over Titans

[Spider-Dan]

Tua also has an as many yards per attempt as Josh Allen does.

You're failing to account for the fact that Allen's 7.0 YPA is from strong and manly passes delivered from his laser rocket arm, while Tua's 7.1 YPA is from weak and ineffective passes delivered by his limp noodle arm.

/s