Cote: Ewers has done enough to ignite Dolphins Hope Machine ... for now | Opinion
It has been creaky, in disrepair, oft-broken -- in the shop much of the past 25 years. Is it sputtering to life now? Is the Miami Dolphins’ Hope Machine running again?
Has Quinn Ewers willed it alive? Is one promising Sunday in late December enough for ignition?
This is a pretty good definition of desperation. This is the Dolfans’ lot as the latest year nears its turn.
Tua Tagovailoa had the Hope Machine humming just a couple of years ago, remember? Two straight winning seasons? A selection to the Pro Bowl? We loved Tua for a minute. But love fades fast around here. Desperation will do that, too.
So the Dolphins looked good in their home final Sunday afternoon, beating a Tampa Bay team in a fight for the playoffs, 20-17. The defense was good, with two interceptions and a fumble recovery. Ewers was good, too. In fact, he became the first Dolphins rookie to throw two TD passes in a first half since 1983. Some guy named Dan Marino. OK, credit when and where it’s due. The kid had a great half. Looked the part.
Now what? Too soon. Enjoy the moment.
This was Ewers’ first career NFL win as a starter, and his first touchdown pass came on a 63-yard strike to fellow rookie Theo Wease, who’d been called up from the practice squad the day before.
So who gets to keep the cherished first-TD ball?
“I do,” said Ewers, smiling. “He gets the next one.”
No problem. It was great day for Dolphins rookies, with those two, and two others contributing an interception and a blocked field goal.
“He’s swaggy on the field, but how calm and poised he is,” said Waese of Ewers. “He doesn’t break character. Same person in the huddle as he is in the lockerroom.”
It felt good to feel good for Ewers. But the only trouble with putting too much stock in Sunday or Ewers’ role in it is that the broader reality takes over.
There is a thud, and you realize that Miami is 7-9, out of the playoffs again, and finishing up next week at New England, where Ewers will face the first top-notch defense in his three-game late season trial run.
And so we are gathered here today to bury another Dolphins home season, the latest to rest in pieces. And we are here to pay respects on this solemn occasion, or at least all the respect that is due an NFL franchise that has pretty much wasted this entire quarter-century awash in mediocrity and disappointment.
Owner Stephen Ross, caretaker of the mess for the past 17 of these seasons, has somehow managed to ambitiously create a multi-use wonderland of the Hard Rock Stadium facility without once putting an outstanding team on the football field.
As Miami ends the season next week, this marks the 25th consecutive season the Fins have failed to win a playoff game, the longest current such streak of sadness in the league. (Happy anniversary?)
Not that I’m keeping track, but this also marks 41 seasons since Miami’s last Super Bowl appearance and 52 years (!) since the Fins’ last Super Bowl championship in 1973.
When I started getting asked in the ‘90s if I thought I’d live to see Miami in another Super Bowl I took it as something to chuckle at. When I get asked these days pondering mortality, I take it seriously and have to mutter, “Probably not.”
Then again, Dolfans could wonder the question aloud aimed at their newborn in a crib and find the answer open to debate.
Dan Marino Boulevard has become a promenade of tears. Don Shula is spinning in his grave; that or enduring a lot of guff from old football colleagues up in heaven.
Somehow, the once-proud Miami Dolphins -- still the singular franchise of The Perfect Season -- have become one of the dregs of the league, albeit (as this year) seldom one bad enough to gain a really high draft pick to help excavate from the mire.
This season stands as a perfect example of the perpetual state of the Dolphins as Miami benched its six-year starting QB in Tagovailoa to roll dice on a barely drafted seventh-round rookie in Ewers.
I’m pretty much alone in saying and writing that the Fins quit too soon on Tua. Either way, the Dolphins have now all but publicly admitted they erred in drafting Tua fifth overall in 2020, one spot ahead of Justin Herbert.
That would be one in a long, serpentining parade of mistakes made by Miami since the club’s most recent playoff victory on Dec. 30, 2000. The team is on its 11th different head coach since then (including three interim guys). Mike McDaniel seems safe for another season, especially since the team, soon after a 1-6 start, showed longtime general manager Chris Grier, enough of a scapegoat to alleviate some heat off the head coach.
So we take hope where we seem to see it. Proof is not necessary. Dolfans can wait. They’ve been waiting for 25 years.
A popular sing-along song they play at Hard Rock Stadium (they did again Sunday) is the Journey classic, “Don’t Stop Believin’.”
That’s what the Dolphins are counting on. That you never stop believing. No matter what.
So the Dolphins looked good Sunday, and so did Ewers. That’s enough (for now).
Miami trailed 7-0 early before Ewers cashed that long scoring pass to Wease, then, after a Fins field goal Ewers hit tight end Greg Dulcich for an 11-yard score.
Miami’s 17-7 lead at the break was not impressive in that Tampa Bay and Baker Mayfield have stunk for two months, entering this game having lost three in a row and six of the past seven.
But the lead did impress because Tampa had everything to play for, in a fight with Carolina to win the sad NFC South and claim the conference’s final available playoff spot. Yet Miami, especially on defense, played like it had the stakes riding.
“We’re playing for each other,” said Ewers.
McDaniel was asked what he looks for in drafting a QB, even one in the last round.
“You don’t want a ceiling,” he said. “Does he have the things you need to be a starting quarterback? You take into consideration all the athletic skill sets. Can he handle the heat?”
Ewers checked all those boxes on Sunday.
The Dolphins won, the Kid QB looked close enough to the real deal, and that’s enough for now.
That’s enough for now when that’s all you have.
Remember: Don’t stop believin’, no matter how tempting the Dolphins can sometimes make that.
This story was originally published December 28, 2025 at 3:55 PM.
