What can be said after a performance like that? The Miami Dolphins came out and laid yet another egg, this time in prime-time against the Houston Texans. The fact that the Dolphins were trounced on a Thursday night should come as no surprise to anyone who has watched this team during the Adam Gase regime.
Since Gase became the head coach, the Dolphins have had three Thursday Night Football games. To call those losses “blowouts” would be an understatement. Coming into last Thursday’s game, the Dolphins had been outscored 62-7 in two Thursday night games. That discrepancy ballooned to 104-30 after yet another drubbing.
Deshaun Watson came into Thursday’s game as the most-hit and most-sacked quarterback in the league. He came into the game nursing a partially collapsed lung and a broken rib. By all rights, this should have been a game that instilled fear in the young quarterback. Instead, Watson looked like one of the best young quarterbacks in the league — which he is, when healthy.
Watson torched the Miami Dolphins secondary to the tune of 239 yards, five touchdowns, and a near-perfect quarterback rating of 156. His two favorite targets, Will Fuller and DeAndre Hopkins, combined for 11 catches on 13 targets, over 200 yards, and three touchdowns.
Miami’s defense was exposed in a big way Thursday. There were communication issues in the secondary. The linebackers couldn’t tackle to save their lives. The defensive line couldn’t get any pressure against one of the worst offensive lines in the league. It was an all-around horrendous performance by the defense. It’s a shame, because for as bad as the defense looked, the offense was actually more alive than I’ve seen them in weeks.
Brock Osweiler isn’t Ryan Tannehill. That’s not necessarily a bad thing, and it’s not something that’s holding this Miami Dolphins offense back in any significant way. Osweiler turned in a perfectly adequate performance Thursday, going 21 of 37 for 241 yards and an interception. Not great, but not the reason for the blowout. There were a couple of really good performances that were entirely wiped out by one of the worst defensive efforts I’ve seen in years. Let’s remember the top 3 performances from Thursday night’s loss, because no one else is going to.
