Adam Gase is not about ‘incompetence.’ So far he’s about something that might be worse

On a day the Miami Dolphins lose a wide receiver (Albert Wilson) for a “significant” amount of time with a hip injury and finish the game with only two receivers because another receiver headed to the locker room with a groin injury (Kenny Stills), the agent for a receiver who didn’t play (DeVante Parker) ripped the Dolphins and specifically coach Adam Gase for “incompetence.”

And I would say an agent of a player who is not producing criticizing the coach of a team that is not producing is so Dolphins.

Somebody here needs to be the adult and put Parker, who is healthy enough to practice every day, back on the active list. And somebody else has to recognize Parker has had limited opportunities because, well, the guy is too often hurt.

But more to the point: Look, Adam Gase is not incompetent.

That’s not the Dolphins’ problem. I’ve covered coaching incompetence in my time chronicling this franchise and Gase isn’t that.

But I’ll tell what he is so far:

Mediocre.

Middle of the road.

Not terrible.

Not great.

Just ... mediocre.

The Dolphins travel to Houston on Tuesday as part of their preparation for Thursday’s game against the Houston Texans. And part of the baggage Gase will carry with him is his coaching record the last two-and-half seasons.

It’s 20-19 in the regular season. It’s 20-20 if you consider that 2017 playoff loss at Pittsburgh.

You know what either one of those records say about the results Gase has gotten so far with this team? Mediocre.

Middle of the road.

The Dolphins head coach has had some great moments during his time with this franchise. And he’s had some disasters.

He dug that ‘16 team out of an apparent grave and engineered an 8-2 record over the final 10 games to get the Dolphins in the postseason.

And then, riding that wave of self-confidence and fan trust, Gase delivered a simply miserable year in ‘17 that had people jumping off his bandwagon. The Dolphins were 10-6 that first year and then offered up a corresponding 6-10 the next season.

16-16.

Mediocre.

Everything about these Dolphins has been more or less mediocre since Gase took over. And I’m actually being generous because there have been some whopper embarrassments in prime time blowout losses and even an assistant Gase hired sniffing blow in his office.

Gase was brought to Miami as an offensive-minded coach to solve the Dolphins’ long running inability to put a great quarterback under center. He was brought here to remind a generation of Dolphins fans who never saw Don Shula on the sideline and Dan Marino on the field what it’s like to dominate on offense.

Have we gotten that?

Gase came to South Florida with his 2013 experience as the offensive coordinator of a record-breaking Denver offense that had record-breaking quarterback Peyton Manning. And his solution for raising the Miami offense to similar heights has been to do nothing at quarterback.

Gase took Joe Philbin’s quarterback and empowered him. But he’s still getting more or less Joe Philbin results from the quarterback position.

And from the offense overall.

The Dolphins scored 22.7 points per game in Gase’s first year running the offense. That was 19th best in the NFL Last year they sunk to 28th in the league in scoring but, be fair, they lost their starting quarterback so the Dolphins get a break for scoring only 17.6 points per game.

But this year, amid promises of improved Tannehill play and numerous offseason additions meant to improve the offensive line and team speed, the Dolphins are back to where they were that first year.

The team now is averaging 21.6 points per game. That’s tied for 23rd in the NFL.

They’re tied with Cleveland.

Cleveland!

I’m going to extend a kindness here and tell you that’s mediocre. It’s not. It’s bottom third of the league, but let’s call it mediocre for the sake of, well, hope.

About that hope ... the Dolphins are clinging to the idea that backup quarterback Brock Osweiler (who through two games has actually played better than Tannehill) will keep the ship afloat at Houston on Thursday and then a healthy Tannehill will take over again after that.

Nobody actually knows if Tannehill can be back from his shoulder injury by then, but the team is hoping.

So what is that really saying? It’s saying the Dolphins hope one career mediocre QB will play through some issues and eventually give way to another career mediocre QB to save the season.

And even as injuries deplete Miami’s talent — much the same way it depletes everyone around the NFL — we’re supposed to believe the Dolphins the second half of the season will suddenly catch fire.

We’re supposed to believe a rally is afoot if we can just get through all this mediocrity.

Who believes this?

I came home from Sunday’s Dolphins loss and watched the Kansas City Chiefs play the Cincinnati Bengals. And the Chiefs demolished the Bengals.

And it wasn’t the fact that KC took Cincy apart that depresses but the talent that team puts on the field. And then coach Andy Reid does a million-and-one things with that mind-boggling talent, running options and fakes and craziness that dumbfounds defenses on almost every play.

That is what great offense looks like.

Patrick Mahomes Jr. is what a great young quarterback looks like.

I haven’t seen that kind of stuff in Miami since ... since ... the early 1990s, frankly.

What I have seen is the Dolphins, who once boasted in every press release they were among the winningest organizations in all of sports, sink to the virtual irrelevance of constant mediocrity.

If you think of the NFL as a Christmas play, the Dolphins have gone from being one of the stars, maybe as Joseph, to merely being a featured player toward the back of the stage. They’re riding a camel or something.

The Patriots, Steelers, even the Chiefs to a degree now, are traditional teams that have been able to sustain through the years, remain in front of the audience all the time, because they win consistently.

Us? Mediocrity.

And here’s the dangerous thing about mediocrity: It multiplies itself.

Teams like the Dolphins that somehow manage to reload every year and play well in spurts and not in others end up in the same spot year after year.

The coach and his staff stay around a long time because, although they’re not winning with any consistency, they’re not losing either. So nothing actually improves. The quarterback stays around a long time because he’s not bad and changing him might bring in a bad one. So nothing changes there, either.

That mediocre team never drafts high enough to get the best players. It has enough cap room to hold ground but never amazing camp room to buy a big winner.

That’s what the Dolphins have been doing for years before Gase arrived. That’s what they continue doing now with Gase.

This season Robert Quinn is the most expensive player on the Dolphins’ salary cap, costing $11.4 million. He has one sack.

Andre Branch is next with a $10 million cap charge. One sack.

Kenny Stills, who is having an MRI test on his groin Monday, is third at $9.75 million. He’s been very productive in scoring four touchdowns through seven games.

Kiko Alonso is fourth, costing the Dolphins $9.63 million and he is also playing very well.

So, even as we look at the production the Dolphins are getting from the very top of their cap structure, the team is so far getting as many wrong as right.

Isn’t that an illustration of mediocre?

I’ll give you an alternate illustration of mediocre that has been confirmed the past two-and-half seasons: Coach Adam Gase and the Miami Dolphins.

This story was originally published October 22, 2018 at 1:46 PM.