Take your pick. The Dolphins choked. Or they played brilliantly and courageously before yielding to a superior force.

Or both.

I tend slightly toward the first supposition after the New Orleans Saints bombed the Dolphins 46-34 after trailing by a semi-incredible 24-3 early on. Any team that loses after a 21-point lead cannot be a team of poise.

But don't discount the second guess. Drew Brees and his unbeaten crew from The City That Care Forgot are decidedly better than the Dolphins.

Maybe in a year or two, yeah, but it's Sunday evening that's the subject here, and Sunday evening was as much a heartbreaker for Dolfans in Land Shark Stadium as Saturday night had been for Hurricanes fans in Clemson's hysterical 40-37 overtime triumph over the University of Miami.

Except the Canes never had the Tigers on the mat the way the Dolphins had the Saints.

In the end, which is all that counts, it was all Saints.

BIG DISPARITY

They scored 43 points while the Dolphins were scoring 10. They seized momentum by the scruff of its neck and dragged the Dolphins out of just about any chance of playoff contention.

Brees brought them back to a 37-34 lead -- for the first time -- using ex-Cane Jeremy Shockey for a pass-catcher-battering-ram. Then, when Miami still had a ghost of a chance at the end, fire keep relighting in Saints' eyeballs, and footballs slid like axle grease through Dolphins receivers' hands.

It wasn't a matter of numbers, other than, of course, the points. It was the timing. When the Saints reached Red Zone Land in the fourth quarter, they were three for three (two touchdowns, one field goal). Saints win the hard ones when everything is against them. Dolphins can't.

Yet.

Someday they will. Some day the hands of Anthony Fasano, Ricky Williams and Ted Ginn Jr. will mean roof-raising victory instead of sickening defeat sliding off their fingers.

Someday Tony Sparano will be throwing his right arm high into the air after these kinds of games instead of staring into the mass of what started out as 66,689 spectators.

Some day was not Sunday.

NOT HIS DAY

Someday it will be Chad Henne with a better TD-interception ratio. Sunday he threw two, and each pick fell like boulders from skyscrapers on the Dolphins' angst-ridden offense, both returned for touchdowns.

Oh, the Dolphins had heroes even in this mess. Reggie Torbor. Tyrone Culver. And Henne and Williams and Ronnie Brown and Greg Camarillo and Yeremiah Bell and Davone Bess, too, even when everything was about to fall apart around them.

Or falling on them.

Like Shockey.

The man is a beast. Shockey is a mass of nicks and bruises and contusions and lacerations and still bounces off people -- and turf -- as though he were made of rubber. He caught passes of 16 and 14 yards on the drive that put the Saints out front to stay, 37-34. He could still have been catching them at dawn if that had been necessary.

Or Brees. The Brees the Dolphins could have had twice, once in the draft and again by trade. I dare you to call out a better QB. Peyton Manning? Brett Favre? Anybody?

Nobody but Brees could have engineered what Brees engineered against the Dolphins this point-packed evening.

I hate the word ``incredible'' the way it is flung around by hasty commentators when all it really is is ``unusual.''

I hate the word ``unbelievable'' for the same reason, for how many things on Earth today can accurately be described as unbelievable?

But Saturday and Sunday in Land Shark Stadium came awfully close to both.

Join the discussion

The Miami Herald is pleased to provide this opportunity to share information, experiences and observations about what's in the news. Some of the comments may be reprinted elsewhere in the site or in the newspaper. We encourage lively, open debate on the issues of the day, and ask that you refrain from profanity, hate speech, personal comments and remarks that are off point. In order to post comments, you must be a registered user of MiamiHerald.com. Your username will show along with the comments you post. Thank you for taking the time to offer your thoughts.

     Showing: Oldest first Newest first Most-recommended first Least-recommended first

@Nyx.AuthorDisplayName@ wrote on @Nyx.PostedAtTime@:

@Nyx.repliedToText@

@Nyx.replyAnswerText@

Reply to this Comment @Nyx.Recommender@ @Nyx.AbuseReporter@