So....forgetting the draft, are we a better team than that one exiting the playoffs?

lol! You caught it before he could change it.

 

The Patriots, in Super Bowl wins, have been #1 in points allowed 2x, #2 in points allowed 1x, #5 in points allowed 1x, and #8 in points allowed 1x. So, four out of five Super Bowls, they were top 5 in points allowed.

Our team was severely depleted on both sides of the ball all year long. So, yes, it is impressive that we went 10-6 and made the playoffs, and yes, we are better by getting back those injured players.

 

Teams that are good generally have very good winning percentages in close games. Skill is actually a key determinant in whether you win close games or not. Check out the splits of almost any great QB and you'll see that.

For example, Brady won 65 out of 94 games that ended in a point differential of 0-7. That's 69.1% winning percentage. You don't want to make the argument that they could have lost more such close games than they won, even though that's true. Winning more close games than not is a sign of skill.

 

Huh. I was looking at a site called The Football Database since that's the first thing that came up. I should have went to ESPN or PFF.

Thanks though! I do believe you...I just remember it differently for whatever reason.

 

I misinterpreted what was said, but what you are referring to is a difference of 10 games out of 256 that goes into calculating strength of schedule.

Our SOS would have been .492 if what you are saying occurred, still less than every AFC playoff team other than the patriots. Again, I really dont give a **** about strength of schedule, strength of victory is a much better indicator of what i'm referring to.

We beat absolutely no one this year. Our best win was beating Pittsburgh at home when big ben was injured. That was a nice win, i guess, but what was our second best win? Buffalo? Arizona? My entire point is that we were closer to an aberration than a legit contending playoff team.

 

I love the Big Ben excuse. However, you won't allow that same excuse for a depleted Dolphins team. lol...

And, Ben played all but one series. And the Dolphins were up something like 17-7 when he did get hurt. Also, the Dolphins put up 30 points that game and held Bell to around 50 yards rushing. Was that because Ben was hurt?

 

Yet, you continue to ignore that we did it without Pouncey, Jones, Maxwell, and others. Missing four or five starters is a huge deal. You are expecting a team playing a bunch of second stringers to beat up on teams like they're all first stringers?

Seems a little ridiculous to me.

 

Tom Brady and the good teams also dont play as many close games with teams they are clearly better than. Again, on top of us beating just about no one good, the fact that we were in position in games that could go either way in that many different games against teams that are that bad is exactly my point.

 

Tom Brady also has almost a .500 win% when he has a rating lower than 80...because their defense is so good.

 

It's not an excuse, its context. There is a big difference between beating the steelers with and without big ben. But i even already said that was a nice win anyway, was just providing context that playing Landry jones is a little different than playing Big ben.

And ya, holding bell to 50 yards rushing probably had just a little bit to do with going against landry jones instead of Big ben.

 

we also had Tannehill healthy almost the entire year, as well as Landry, Stills, Suh, Kiko, Ajayi healthy the entire year. Maxwell missed 1 game through week 14 so im not sure why that would be an issue if what you are arguing is that was one of the reasons we didnt win by more against bad teams. Pouncey is injured every year anyway, but he played week 5-10 which included a bad loss to the Titans, a bye week, and aside from that Steelers game, 3 close games against more bad teams. And every team has injuries.

 

You're right it's generally true that the best teams (or the worst teams) play a smaller percentage of close games than teams that are average. The difference isn't that great though.. 5-10% more such games (out of total.. not 5-10% more from "average") is what I'm seeing based on ~10 QB's I just looked at.

Either way, the important point is that strength of victory takes a back seat to winning percentage, even when looking at close games because winning in close games is a sign of skill. So when I see our record in those games that could have gone either way, I'm seeing something positive in the development of our team, not negative.

 

If your defense injures the starting QB, then you beat that team with their starting QB. So IMO this example doesn't count. Jordan Phillips tripped up Big Ben. Besides, our defense injured a bunch of starting QB's during the season.. it's not like that was the only time.

 

Obviously winning percentage is most important, but the point that you guys continue to show you dont understand is that there is context for all this stuff. Winning close games against the rams, niners, browns, cardinals, jets, bills, chargers, etc. is not impressive. If the #1 team in college football plays the worst team in the country and kicks a field goal as time expires to win, does that impress you or concern you? Especially given that every good team we played this year aside from week 1 against the seahawks, who if we want to talk about injuries and give excuses to injuries were incredibly banged up themselves, kicked our *** and didnt even keep the game close.

Its obviously better to win those close games against bad teams than lose them, and it is a step in the right direction that we are a step above those bad teams and can win close games against them, but the fact that all of those games against terrible teams were that close and almost every single game against good teams resulted in us getting blown out, should tell you where we are in the context of the league. And that was my only point to being with. All I said was that being in the "playoff mix" is not impressive and we are nowhere near the truly elite teams in this league.

 

lol...Landry Jones had one pass attempt. Again, Ben missed like one or two plays. Did you think he missed the game or something?

 

You want context? Try looking at our record prior to Gase and tell me it's not impressive that after all these years of agonizing waiting we're finally "in the playoff mix".

It's impressive.

Of course we're not elite yet. What else is news?

 

jesus you guys really have a hard time understanding my point and get tripped up and make a big deal out of the smallest things. Even if we beat them with him healthy and playing the whole game, my entire point is that we were embarrassed by almost every quality team we played and didnt win by more than 7 points in any game we played against all of those bad teams except for the dumpster fire that was the jets.

 

Thing is.. small things matter. You let them go unchallenged and they become foundations for bigger arguments later on.

Besides, it's not like we're ignoring the "bigger things" here. Oh, and we DO understand your arguments. Disagreeing doesn't mean lack of understanding. I've seen lack of understanding.. in this thread.. before.

 

Since 3 points is the most common margin of victory in the NFL I'm not sure why you're using 7 points as some kind of a magic cutoff in regards to a good team. lol

 

Ben did play the entire game. Well, except for a couple of plays.

 

We were between 6-10 and 8-8 for the last 4 years. He didnt turn a 1-15 team into a playoff team. Not to hate on Gase because I think he is a great head coach and he does seem to get the most out of his players, but im not sure why you are acting like he is some miracle worker. Part of the reason it has been so "agonizing" for years is because we were so mediocre. Part of the agony was the apathy of just being so incredibly OK.

And being in "the playoff mix" is jibberish fueled by an arbitrary cut off point made by the NFL. Being around the 6 seed in a conference of 16 teams is alright, but its nothing to brag about. WE'RE #6!!!!! And aside from the 6-10 year, we have been "in the playoff mix" for the few years prior, we just **** the bed at the end of the season. We've been hovering around that #6 seed for years now.

 

Yeah 3 point margin is most common (~15.5%) followed by 7 points (~10%). About 45% of games end with 7 point margin or less. 55% is more than 7 point margin.

Regardless, even Brady's Patriots play 40% of their games with 0-7 point margin, which is (as I stated before) only about 5% different than average. The difference isn't that great.

 

Because the truly elite teams in the league generally kick those teams asses, they dont keep them around a 1 possession game.

For example, the pats beat houston 27-0, were beating us 31-0 or something absurd without brady by halftime before they took their foot off the pedal, beat cleveland by 20, cincy by 18, pittsburgh by 11, buffalo by 16, San Fran by 13, Rams by 16, Broncos by 13, Jets by 38, and Miami by 21.

Dallas beat Chicago by 14, Cincy by 14, Green bay by 14, Cleveland by 25, Baltimore by 10, and detroit by 21.

The dolphins not only played a very favorable schedule, but they didnt win decisively against all those really terrible teams they played. And that should tell you something.

 

Dude.. we can all agree SB is the goal and we haven't achieved that in way too long.

But making the playoffs IS a big deal, for me, for many fans and for the franchise, especially after a massive playoff drought. I don't care what reasons you want to give for trying to act like that's not good enough, it's a real sign of improvement and that's enough to feel good about the direction of this team.. for now at least (if we crap the bed this year all that positive jibe goes away of course).

But all that's opinion anyway.. if you want to be negative about making the playoffs, fine.

 

Again, in the NFL beating a team by 3 or 7 doesn't mean anything. It's the number of wins. If we beat every team we won against last year by 50 points each we would still only have been 10-6.

 

But when they play teams that they are clearly better than, they generally will prove they are significantly better than those teams.

I'm not saying to win every single game by more than 1 possession, but to play that many bad teams and not beat 1 of them aside from the jets by more than 7 points should tell you where this team is. And not only is it not beating them by more than 7 or decisively showing you are the better team, they were absurdly close to losing against many of those bad teams. Cleveland should have beaten us, the bills were kicking our *** for 3 quarters down here and our offense was anemic, San Fran was like 10 yards from tying the game and going for the win as time expired, and all of those games were at home. I wont include the Cardinals game because Tannehill got hurt. Against the bad rams team and the QB making his first career NFL start, we were down by 10 and did not score a single point until 4 minutes were left in the game. The chargers were driving down the field in control and about to win the game as time expired before Kiko made that great play.

Actual good teams dont play that closely to that many bad teams. I'm not saying its the end of the world to play a close game against some of those teams, but against all of them? To not win one of those games by more than 7 points against all of those bad teams when 55% of the games in this league are won by more than 7 points should tell you something about how good we actually were last year.

 

jesus christ you literally have no actual argument. Your argument is check the standings. And it is the same reason why having a conversation with you in regards to the YPC thing is meaningless. You have no ability to parse details. No **** a win is a win in the standings. But no one is arguing that the dolphins didnt actually get 10 wins. we are analyzing the 10 wins to debate how good the team actually is. Not all 10 win teams are equal football teams just because they finished the season with the same record in a limited sample size of 16 games where teams play different schedules.

 

Ive already said its awesome to make the playoffs. Im not arguing that its not awesome to make the playoffs after a long drought, i'm arguing that we really arent significantly improved or at the very least anywhere near a contender. My entire argument is that it is an arbitrary cut off point that the dolphins were able to make with the benefit of a very favorable schedule.

Is making the playoffs all that special to you when we clearly arent a "playoff" team and continue to get blown out on wild card weekend when we do make it?

 

You're arguing that they didn't actually get 10 wins because you're trying to say that it was because they had an easy SoS, or that they "should" have lost x amount of games but got lucky etc etc.

You're also trying to argue that teams who are "supposed" to be a playoff team should be beating teams by greater than 7 points.

Again, why 7? Why not 4 or 13? Why is 7 this magical cut off between "real" playoff teams and "fake" playoff teams?

 

Oh the irony! haha

 

Dude, you don't get it. First year first time coach, riddled with injuries at important positions like center, left tackle, quarterback, both safeties, and corner...installs a new offense, and you think it's no big deal that they went 10-6 and made the playoffs? Weren't we 1-4 to start the season???

Which former banned poster are you?

 

We lost two of the last nine games in 2017. Your ENTIRE POINT is that we were embarrassed by every quality team. Yet we won 7 of 9 with second stringers and a 1st time head coach....

We completely understand your point. Now try to understand ours- your point is wrong.

 

On a related note, I haven't posted here for a few months because I figured that there was nothing to talk about. Little did I know that there were still great arguments about absolutely nothing on multiple pages! How silly of me.

 

There were several full seasons in the Henne/Pennington era where we didn't lose more than once per season by more than 4 points. Every game we'd take the lead, ride out that 4 point margin and watch the other team kick a last minute field goal to seal the deal. That was the theme under Philbin and Sparano alike.

So anyone who says margin of victory means something is an absolute fool...just ask any player who's lost a game by 1. In the NFL, a win is a win and it's the only statistic that really matters.

 

Ya, because we played 7 below average-terrible teams and we didnt beat 1 of them decisively except for the Jets. Every other team was within 1 score. You can say a win is a win, and it is, but the fact that we got blown out by every good team we played and didnt win by more than 1 possession against all the terrible teams we played is an indicator of how good the team actually was. And the 2 good teams we played during that stretch kicked our ***. And enough of the injury excuse, every team goes through injuries. The patriots have lost several starters just about every year they won the super bowl.

 

Ya, and those teams with Henne were known not for being bad, but for being incredibly average. It was the major lament of many on here that we would always be picking in the middle of the draft and thus were stuck in mediocrity because of our inability to get a top pick and draft a QB. And no, rather than making a blanket statement that is easily provable wrong, I highly recommend that you go back and look at the scores of when Henne was our QB because what you said is flat out wrong.

Again, you cant seperate that a win is a win while also acknowledging that not all wins are created equally and that who you play and how you play against them is an indicator of how good the team actually is. No one is saying that margin of victory is more important than winning the game at all, but how much you beat teams by is indicative of the quality of the team. Saying otherwise is flat out stupid. You dont have to care about it and can just enjoy the ride as a fan, but are you really going to sit there and actually say that it makes no difference in how good you think a team is if they win every game by 1 as opposed to kicking the *** of every team they play?

 

Jesus christ. no, you dont get it. No one is saying it wasnt impressive what we did last year. Im saying that going 10-6 is giving you guys this impression of the team that doesnt match what this team actually is. You hold up this 10-6 record without looking into how we played and who we played against. We played no one, and when we did play good teams we were shown just how far away this team actually is.

Kind of similar to how baseball has pythagorean record that tells you how many games the team actually should have won given their run differential, our pythagorean record came out to about 7.5 wins according to FO. No one is arguing that we didnt win 10 games and that making the playoffs wasnt better than what we had done previously. I'm arguing that we were not anywhere close to being a truly elite team last year.

 

This is selective memory I think.

In 2008, 4 of 5 losses were by more than 4 points. We also lost the playoff game by more than 4 points.
In 2009, 7 of 9 losses were by more than 4 points.
In 2010, 6 of 9 losses were by more than 4 points.
In 2011 it was 5 of 10 losses..
In 2012 it was 6 of 9 losses..
In 2013 it was 4 of 8
In 2014 it was 5 of 8
In 2015 it was 9 of 10
In 2016 it was 5 of 6, and we lost the playoff game by more than 4 points.

Not unexpected though given NFL statistics on margin of victory.

 

I was using more than a 1 possession game, so i was going with 8, but we didnt win any games by 8 anyway, so it was 7 in the dolphins case. But i stated already i was referring to them winning by more than 1 possession, so no, it's not an arbitrary cut off point.

And no. You seem to have a really difficult time with reading comprehension and cant stick to one consistent argument ever, but i've literally said maybe 25 times at this point that obviously a win is a win and we got to 10 wins obviously. My argument is that our SOS had a huge impact on our ability to make the playoffs and get to 10 wins and that you guys are using 10 wins as blinders for what this team actually still is: average to maybe above average, but nowhere near elite. you can continue to say that a win is a win, but you have nothing to refute that our strength of victory was nowhere near what the other good teams in this league had, and that is an indicator that this team's record is better than their actual ability and that they took advantage of a lot of favorable games on their schedule. That is what they are supposed to do obviously, but im not judging what they did, I'm arguing what they actually are.

 

And btw, this team has so much more talent than that 2008 team, but that 2008 team did the exact same thing by taking advantage of an easy schedule to make the playoffs one year and were met by an inevitable regression the next year when they werent benefitting from a lot of easy games.