Foot-brawl! Ejections, fights mar otherwise punishing Dolphins performance vs. Bengals
The Miami Dolphins won.
The game.
And the fight, too.
Punches flew and very heated words traded early in the fourth quarter of the Dolphins’ 19-7 victory over the Cincinnati Bengals Sunday.
The brawl, sparked by a late hit on special teams by Cincinnati punt team cover man Mike Thomas on a defenseless Jakeem Grant, was massive and testy.
This was no baseball fight.
The emotions were real — just ask Brian Flores who raced across the field to jump into the fray.
Dolphins head of security Drew Brooks pulled his enraged boss out of the scrum before it got really serious.
“We’ve got to do a better job of keeping our poise,” Flores said. “That starts with me. I’ve got to do a better job of keeping my poise. But, look, I’m going to stick up for my players. They’re going to stick up for each other without getting penalties, without hurting the team, but we’ve got to do a better job of keeping our poise as a team.
“I’m just going to be honest, these are like my kids,” he continued. “The first time, yeah. The second time I got a little upset about it, but still I’ve got to do a better job. I have to. I can’t do anything to hurt the team. My emotions got the best of me there. But again, you see somebody you care about get hit like that twice … But I have to do a better job. I’ve got to keep my poise better. We have to do a better job of that as a team.”
As Flores mentioned, it wasn’t a one-time mistake by Thomas. He took free, illegal shots on Grant on back-to-back punt returns in the second half. The second one knocked the much smaller Grant down, where he stayed for a bit before getting up and remaining in the game.
While he wouldn’t get into details, Flores seemed to be shouting at Bengals safety Shawn Williams, who then struck DeVante Parker in the helmet. Parker responded in kind by throwing haymakers, earning both an ejection. Mack Hollins, who delivered a nasty blindside block, was tossed too.
As Parker and Hollins made their way to the locker room, they saluted the crowd. Grant stopped and thanked them for their support before they disappeared.
Grant, Parker and Hollins were not made available to reporters after the game.
Grant did weigh in on Twitter, however, writing: “I love this team...it’s special. So much HEART and DESIRE to be GREAT...8-4.”
Parker, by throwing a series of punches, might be subject to suspension in Week 14’s big showdown against the defending Super Bowl champion Kansas City Chiefs.
“That will be handled by the league,” Flores said. “We’ll see what that looks like. Again, that’s what we’re talking about as far as keeping your composure, keeping our composure. I would say we’ll see what it is, hopefully not. Hopefully not, but we’ll see.”
The melee overshadowed what should have been a feel-good day for the Dolphins, who improved to 8-4 for the first time since 2003.
The defense was on fire, fueled by Kyle Van Noy’s three sacks.
(The pass rush was so ferocious, it knocked starting Bengals quarterback Brandon Allen out of the game with a chest injury in the fourth quarter.)
Tight end Mike Gesicki played fantastic.
Miami’s third quarter was overwhelming.
And Tua Tagovailoa got his groove back.
Tagovailoa, who hadn’t appeared in a game since his fourth-quarter benching in Denver, played great, even with a sore left thumb. He completed 26 of 39 passes for a career-high 296 yards.
Gesicki was the big beneficiary of Tagovailoa’s improvement. He caught 9 passes for 88 yards and a touchdown Sunday.
After trailing 7-6 at the break, the Dolphins annihilated the Bengals in the third quarter, out-gaining Cincinnati 181 to minus-4. The Dolphins’ defense didn’t allow a first down the entire period.
“We were able to catch them in some personnels and calls they weren’t ready for,” Gesicki said. “That goes back to coaching. They did a great job of getting calls in quick. The offensive line did a good job of giving Tua time. Tua went out there and threw to the open guy.”
The only threat to the Dolphins on this day were the Dolphins.
They trailed at the break largely because of self-inflicted wounds.
Tagovailoa wasn’t great in the first half.
But nobody on the Dolphins was — except for Xavien Howard, until he got tossed for fighting in a much smaller altercation than the one that followed a couple hours later.
It took Miami awhile to get started, and self-defeating penalties (they were flagged six times in the first half) didn’t help. Jason Sanders kicked two first-half field goals, including one after some puzzling red-zone calls by Chan Gailey.
The Dolphins had first and goal at the 7, but ran the ball three straight times, with no success. And making matters worse, they spoiled a touchdown run by punter Matt Haack on a fake field goal with an illegal procedure penalty.
Howard later got ejected — a debatable officiating decision, to be sure, after he and Tyler Boyd exchanged little more than shoves — but not before he picked off Allen on a deep pass to Boyd. It was Howard’s league-leading eighth interception.
Cincinnati’s only touchdown came on a fluky screen pass that Boyd broke and took 72 yards to the end zone.
And once the Dolphins picked up the pace, they left the Bengals far behind.
“The thumb felt good,” Tagovailoa said. “I think – you know, on my behalf, I need to help our guys start a lot faster offensively. I think the guys knew what we wanted to do as far as our game plan, but I wasn’t really playing in-sync with how the guys were out there as well. I think things started to click starting towards the end of the first half. And then second half, we kind of knew what we wanted to do.”
This story was originally published December 6, 2020 at 4:32 PM.
