How the Dolphins can still make the playoffs. And the stark reality about this roster
Five takeaways from the Dolphins’ thoroughly dispiriting 30-17 loss to the Packers on Thursday night in Green Bay:
▪ From a playoff perspective, Miami’s margin for error is now gone.
The Dolphins hardly looked like a playoff team on Thursday. But there’s still a path to the postseason, if the Dolphins (5-7) do a lot of winning and get a lot of help.
Snatching a playoff spot from a loaded 8-4 Ravens team seems completely unrealistic; Baltimore holds the fifth seed (and the first of three AFC wild card spots) but can still overtake Pittsburgh (8-3) to win the AFC North.
But there remain avenues to surpass the Steelers (should they lose the AFC North) or the two teams that hold the final two AFC wild card berths at the moment — the Chargers (7-4) and Denver (7-5).
“I wouldn’t say the dream is dead for our team just yet,” Tua Tagovailoa said.
All scenarios would involve Miami winning at least four, and more likely, all five of its remaining games — home to the Jets, at Houston, home to San Francisco, at Cleveland and at the Jets.
Examining how Miami could jump each of those three teams:
1). Denver: If the teams finish tied, Miami would win the tiebreaker because it would be guaranteed to have a superior conference record.
Denver plays Cleveland on Monday night, then has a bye and then closes against the Colts, at the Chargers, at Cincinnati and home against Kansas City.
So if the Dolphins win out, and the Broncos lose, hypothetically, at the Chargers and either at Cincinnati or home against Kansas City, Miami would make the playoffs ahead of Denver — provided Indianapolis loses one of its final five games and doesn’t overtake Houston (7-5) to win the AFC South.
The Colts, like the Dolphins, also have seven losses and own the tiebreaker with Miami by virtue of their victory against the Dolphins. Indianapolis has a relatively easy schedule to close the season: at New England, at Denver, home to Tennessee, at the Giants, and home to Jacksonville. But expecting the Colts to win out seems improbable.
If the Dolphins win out, they would own a tiebreaker over the Bengals, who have seven losses but a worse conference record.
2). Chargers: Overtaking Los Angeles seems less likely than beating out Denver, partly because the Chargers have one fewer loss than the Broncos and partly because Miami isn’t guaranteed of winning a tiebreaker with Los Angeles.
Miami could win a tiebreaker with the Chargers, depending on which games Los Angeles loses.
The Chargers play at Atlanta, at Kansas City, home to Tampa Bay, home to Denver, at New England and then at Las Vegas.
3). Pittsburgh: Though Miami has four more losses than the Steelers, the notion of the Dolphins overtaking the Steelers for a wild card berth — while improbable — isn’t entirely out of the question because of the difficulty of Pittsburgh’s remaining schedule and because Miami would win a two-team tiebreaker with the Steelers.
Pittsburgh’s remaining schedule: at Cincinnati, home to Cleveland, at Philadelphia, at Baltimore, home to Kansas City and home to Cincinnati.
If the Steelers lose four of those six (and loses the AFC North to Baltimore) and Miami wins out, the Dolphins would overtake Pittsburgh for a wild card spot — presuming the Colts lose at least once.
If the Colts, Dolphins and Steelers all finish 10-7 in a battle for one wild card spot, Indianapolis would win the tiebreaker because the Colts beat both the Dolphins and Steelers.
“I told the guys I feel 10-7 gets us in,” Calais Campbell said afterward.
▪ Here’s what’s most discouraging about this era of Dolphins football:
Not only can’t they beat good teams, but more often than not, the scores aren’t especially close.
Last season, the Dolphins were outscored by 110 points against playoff teams; only Washington had a worse disparity last season. Miami went 1-6 against playoff teams, beating only Dallas at home on a last second field goal.
This season, the Dolphins are 0-4 against teams currently in playoff position (Green Bay, Seattle and Buffalo) and have been outscored by 58 points in those games, including two losses to the Bills.
What’s more, the Dolphins - in the Mike McDaniel era - are 1-15 in their last 16 games against teams with winning records.
The Dolphins’ schedule ended up much easier than expected, because the Jets, Jaguars, Browns and 49ers are worse than expected. To accomplish so little with such a forgiving schedule is inexcusable for a team built to win now.
▪ The criticism that the Dolphins A) are a soft team and B) can’t win in frigid conditions keeps being validated.
The Dolphins now have lost 11 consecutive games when the temperature is below 40. They’re 0-6 with Tagovailoa at quarterback in those games. It was 27 at kickoff on Thursday.
Even more disconcerting: The Packers dominated the line of scrimmage, again shining a light on the Dolphins’ flawed approach in constructing this roster.
“They’re not a physical team; that gets exposed in games like this,” NBC’s Jason Garrett correctly noted.
Miami could neither run nor stop the run in the first half.
While the Packers rushed for 102 yards on 6.4 per carry in the first half and 114 yards on 4.6 for the game, the Dolphins mustered just 14 yards on 7 carries in the first half and 14 for 39 (2.8 average) for the game. Take out the 13-yard run by De’Von Achane, and Miami had just one yard on six other first-half rushing attempts.
It didn’t help that Miami allowed five sacks and committed 10 penalties and couldn’t slow Jordan Love (129.2 passer rating) and missed 16 tackles in the first three quarters, which led to 82 extra yards by the Packers.
“We’re kind of winning the fight physicality wise,” Packers coach Matt LaFleur told NBC at halftime.
And when the Dolphins needed to impose their will physically early in the fourth quarter, they failed to convert on one run and two passes on three plays from the Packers’ 1 yard line.
“A lot of it has to do with how you’re built,” Garrett said. “If you’re all about speed, speed, speed, speed and not physical when you come up to environments like this and get into these goal line situations, it’s not going to go as well as you want it to.”
And that leads to the question about whether investing big money in two wide receivers, instead of one, is now a sensible approach to team building, or whether some of that money now would be better spent on bolstering the trenches.
This season, Tyreek Hill has a $31.9 million cap hit and Jaylen Waddle has a $9 million hit. That’s more than 16 percent of the cap. Next year, their combined cap hits will be $36 million.
That will be increasingly difficult to justify if the Dolphins can’t consistently get them the ball. Hill had just three first-half targets, went to the first half with three yards on one catch and finished with six catches for 83 yards.
Waddle had one first-half target for 16 yards and finished with four catches for 53 yards.
Hill entered the night 33rd in the league in receiving yards with 571, while Waddle was 36th at 548.
Ideally, you would like to have Hill and Waddle and have the cap resources to upgrade the interior of both lines. But that’s very difficult when you also have a quarterback (Tua Tagovailoa), cornerback (Jalen Ramsey) and edge rusher (Bradley Chubb) all with big cap hits.
It also hurts when your cheap, recent top draft picks (second-round cornerback Cam Smith, third-round linebacker Channing Tindall) are of little or no help. Smith, who has fallen behind undrafted rookie Storm Duck on the depth chart, dislocated his shoulder on Thursday. Tindall hasn’t played a defensive snap all season.
▪ Top-10 defenses keep flummoxing the Dolphins offense. But the bigger problem Thursday was Miami’s defense.
Playing without four starters (Chubb, Jaelan Phillips, Anthony Walker and Kendall Fuller), the Dolphins could stop neither the Packers running game nor Love. Green Bay produced 388 yards on 7.3 per play.
Offensively, the Dolphins are now 0-3 against teams ranked in the top 10 in scoring defense this season, with two losses to Buffalo and one to Green Bay.
Last year, Miami was 2-5 against top-10 scoring defenses.
So that’s 2-8 in games against top-10 defenses the past two years. Tagovailoa wasn’t the problem Thursday; he closed 37 for 46 for 365 yards and a 114.2 passer rating.
In fact, Tagovailoa has been very good in four of the 10 games: a 98.1 rating in the win against Dallas last year, a 103 rating in the win against Las Vegas last year and a 124.9 rating in the 30-27 loss at Buffalo on Nov. 3.
He was subpar in the Week 18 Buffalo game last year (62.7 rating), the Chiefs playoff loss in January (63.9 passer rating) and the Buffalo Week 2 game (56.7 rating) before he was concussed.
Since returning from the concussion, Tagovailoa’s play in Buffalo and Green Bay has been very encouraging. The tepid run game, porous run defense, proclivity for penalties and the special teams breakdowns were the primary reasons for Thursday’s loss - not Tagovailoa.
▪ The Dolphins apparently still aren’t ready for prime time.
In the McDaniel era, they’re now 3-9 in prime time, including 3-8 with Tagovailoa behind center. They’ve been outscored by 61 points in those 12 games.
The only wins: 16-10 against Pittsburgh on a Sunday night in 2022, 24-17 in New England in 2023 and the 23-15 win at the Rams on “Monday Night Football” earlier this month.
The offense has come up short in several of those 12 games, but defense has been the bigger problem, allowing 27 or more points in seven of those 12 games. This year, they permitted 31 points in the September prime time losses to Buffalo and Tennessee before yielding 30 on Thursday.
This story was originally published November 28, 2024 at 11:50 PM with the headline "How the Dolphins can still make the playoffs. And the stark reality about this roster."
