ATLANTA -- Jeff Cross, former defensive end and the Dolphins' best sack man of the early 1990s, coined a pretty clever phrase back then. He used to refer to Miami's ``Make-Believe'' defense -- as in making believers of doubters.

Most of 20 years later (hard as that is to believe), we present to you the 2009 Make-Believe Dolphins.

This time, the phrase works doubly.

Most of the football nation outside of Dolfan loyalists seems to think last season's AFC East-winning, playoff-getting 11-5 record was all but make-believe -- as in something imaginary or somehow unreal. Certainly not something with any carryover weight.

And so these Dolphins -- beginning with Sunday afternoon's season opener in Atlanta -- are out to make believers of skeptics, not much less so than a year ago. This franchise's 44th season will culminate with a Super Bowl in the home stadium, but not a lot of people expect Miami to be in it.

There is excitement in the not-knowing, in the idea of a teetering team and season and how it could tip either way.

Tony Sparano, the Dolphins' best coach since the prime of Don Shula, on this opening game:

``I feel, well, I am nervous. I think you have to have that kind of feeling. It is a good nervous. Kind of like when you're expecting your child or something. You are excited to figure out what the possibilities are, what you are going to be. I love it. I can't wait to get going.''

Doubt is on this team like stink.

Nobody outside of the family believes.

The Las Vegas betting line on Miami victories is 7 ½: Sub-mediocrity, no playoffs. Sports Illustrated, in its NFL preview issue, had the Dolphins going 6-10.

It's almost as if last season never really happened at all and Miami is the same under-radar, eminently ignorable squad it was during the 2002-07 playoff drought.

Last year's league-record-tying 10-victory improvement from the previous season's 1-15 embarrassment is given so little heft that the team is forecast to be crushed this year under the NFL's toughest schedule.

Rarely in sports, any sport, has a team that accomplished so much and improved so dramatically been dismissed so routinely.

Strangely enough, Sparano encourages the concept of no carryover effect. He has fought against the notion his team should expect 11-5 again just because it happened last year.

``All I have asked this team to do is not to feel like we can pick up where we left off,'' he said. ``To the best of my knowledge, we left off with a [playoff] loss. I would rather not relive that.''

High hopes grow within the club, but outside the family, doubt is everywhere you look.

Quarterback Chad Pennington was superb last year, deservedly finishing second to Peyton Manning in league MVP voting, and yet in this week's ESPN The Magazine ranking of 35 current QBs, Pennington slots in 23rd.

The Sporting News named the 100 best players in the league this week and only linebacker Joey Porter (48th) represents Miami -- compared, for example, to five Falcons.

Miami's ``Wildcat'' offensive variation that hit the league like a fresh breeze last year was dismissed as ``a fad'' by none other than Sunday's opponent, Falcons quarterback Matt Ryan.

The Dolphins' perfect 4-0 exhibition record did little to chase the broad perception that Miami is a one-season wonder fixing to fall back to Earth.

The beauty of sports is that we never know until we know.

Miami could be headed for a hard fall or be the most unfairly maligned team in the league and playoff bound again.

What we can agree on is that Sunday should offer an undeniable gauge.

Miami is a four-point underdog, but Atlanta is one of those teams on the tough schedule that must be overcome if a successful season is to be had.

This is very much one of those swing games that the doubters have Miami losing, and that the brave optimists see as a victory.

The Dolphins must show enough run defense to limit Michael Turner, whose 220 yards rushing in the 2008 season opener were the second-most on Kickoff Weekend in league history.

And Miami must show itself with enough pass defense to contain Matt Ryan, Roddy White, Tony Gonzalez, et al.

On the other side of the ball, the Dolphins -- by air, ground or Wildcat -- must do enough to take advantage of a talented but young and evolving Falcons defense.

More than most any other team in the league, nobody is really sure how good Miami will be. The finding out starts now.

Maybe playoff hopes will be proven to be a cruel fantasy, or maybe all of the doubters will be proven wrong.

They'll be the Make-Believe Dolphins, one way or the other.

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