My friends, football is a funny game. Case in point: the fortunes - or misfortunes - of those Miami Dolphins.
It seems like yesterday that Miami was riding high with Yale grad Mike McDaniel hailed as an offensive mastermind and Tua Tagovailoa viewed as the QB who would restore glory to the franchise that gave us icons like Shula, Marino, Csonka and, yes, Uwe von Schamann. Indeed, the future looked so bright that our darling FISHBOY, that Miami superfan, had to wear shades.
(Note: my guy still has to wear sunglasses, largely due to the pounding headaches that plague him as soon as the Fins kick off each weekend.)
Instead, here we sit with McDaniel’s club at 0-2 and flailing. Their only consistency: surrendering 33 points in each of their two defeats - to the Colts (33-8) and Patriots (33-27). Turns out Miami’s defense is as holy as the crowd at a Billy Graham crusade.
Offensively, the Dolphins haven’t fared much better with the oft-injured Tagovailoa off to a rough start. The data: three TD passes, three picks and a 22.3 QBR that ranks 31st among NFL quarterbacks, with just two players - first-year starters J.J. McCarthy (Minnesota) and Cam Ward (Tennessee) - faring worse. His career record vs. the Bills: 1-8.
The news likely gets no better this evening as the Dolphins travel to Buffalo (2-0) to face Josh Allen and the hard-charging Bison. You can catch the action at 8:15 pm ET on Amazon Prime as Bezos enjoys the rattle and hum of the cash register.
Miami’s record in Buffalo for the past decade has been uglier than my pinky toes as the Fins have lost nine straight in western New York. The last win: an OT victory engineered by QB Matt Moore and rookie head coach Adam Gase on Christmas Eve 2016. Gase, by the way, got the job over a host of candidates that included Miami’s 2015 interim head coach, a fella named Dan Campbell1.
The series was a different story in my youth as Miami dominated Buffalo in the 1970s to the tune of 20-0, routinely sending THE FRANKLINVILLE KID into tears as he tried to choke down his beef on weck. It remains the longest win streak by a team against another in NFL history.
The next decade started similarly with the Fins taking five of the first seven games against Buffalo, leading up to an October 9, 1983, matchup that remains one of the most memorable in the history of this rivalry.
Both teams entered the game with 3-2 records with the Bills led by quarterback Joe Ferguson, a tough character in his 11th - and penultimate - season with Buffalo. He would finish his career with a 3-22 record against Miami.
Yet, Ferguson's finest moment in his 18-year NFL career may have come against these same Dolphins on that October day in 1983. Playing in Miami’s Orange Bowl, his own personal house of horrors, Ferguson channeled his inner Johnny Unitas and threw for a franchise record 419 yards2 and five touchdowns in a 38-35 overtime victory. The man was dialed in.
THE FRANKVILLE KID vividly remembers watching the game with his dad and brother.
“It was amazing. Ferguson was on fire that day and Joe Danelo kicked the field goal to win it in OT. We were all going nuts and jumping up and down. We could never beat the Dolphins.”
Ferguson’s heroics spoiled the first NFL start for Miami’s Dan Marino though the youngster was brilliant with 322 yards passing and three TDs. He showed flashes of the brilliance that would define his career, including a 14-yard touchdown pass to Mark Clayton with about three minutes remaining that gave Miami a 35-28 lead.
After Buffalo tied it up, Marino twice led the Dolphins into position to win, but two missed field goals by the aforementioned von Schamann (52 and 43 yards) kept the Bills alive. Danelo drilled the winner with 62 seconds left and it was party time for BUFFALO JILL and her ilk.
The 741 combined passing yards between Ferguson and Marino still stands as the highest combined one-game total in the Bills-Dolphins rivalry. Dan, of course, was just getting started while Ferguson was nearing the end.
He spent one more year in Buffalo before embarking on an odyssey to a trio of football Siberias, mostly as a backup: Dee-troit (1985-87), Tampa (1988-89) and Indy (1990). He retired from the NFL after 18 seasons and more than 27,000 yards passing, still good for second in Bills history to Jim Kelly, though Allen should pass him sometime this season.
Still, Joe wasn’t quite done yet.
Indeed, in 1995, the 45-year-old Ferguson was summoned to the Canadian Football League’s San Antonio Texans by Kay Stephenson3, his old Buffalo coach. He dusted off his cleats and spent time as a backup before the team folded at season’s end.
This makes Ferguson part of an exclusive club: QBs who have played pro football at age 45 or older. As far as I can tell, there are only three guys besides Ferguson who make that cut: Tom Brady, George Blanda and one John Nesser, who handled the pigskin for the Columbus Panhandles in 1921. BROTHER BLUENIK can attest: Nesser could sling the rock.
Fast forward to today, and we are looking at a potential beatdown at Highmark Stadium. The Bills have won 13 of their last 14 meetings against Miami, they lead the league in total offense, and the Fins can’t stop anyone. Even the ever-loyal FISHBOY is swimming for the exits.
I wouldn’t be surprised to see Miami rise up and make this one competitive but, in the end, it’ll be way too much Josh Allen. Call it 34-22, Buffalo.
One last note: the record last week was 10-6, bumping the season mark to 19-13 (.594). Enjoy the game, folks!
Miami’s recent history with interim coaches has not gone well. Before choosing Gase over Campbell in 2016, they selected Joe Philbin to be their head coach in 2012, bypassing Todd Bowles, the 2011 interim coach. Meanwhile Bowles has won three straight NFC South titles with the Bucs and, with two impressive road wins to start the year, may be on his way to his fourth in a row.
The record stood for nearly two decades before Drew Bledsoe passed it with a 463-yard effort in a win at Minnesota in 2002.
A boy named Kay? Johnny Cash would’ve had a field day with the coach, eh?