From the Opposite Corner: Dolphins vs. Bills, 4 Oct. 2009

ALL-WHITE!

Sweet. This should be our default uni, as it was for so many years. Ditch those damned aqua pants forever, unless we ever wear all-aqua again.

Feels SO GOOD to get a win.

I guess playing the Buffalo Bills was just what the Doctor ordered

I’ve mentioned this about Vernon Carey before and it becomes more of an issue now, protecting a young Quarterback in his first full NFL games; this time he gets thoroughly beaten in the team’s first series of the game, on 3rd down.

And who does he get beat by? Chris Kelsay; 18 sacks in 6 seasons…their FIFTH-BEST pass rusher.

Absolutely pathetic and thoroughly unacceptable. It’s going to ****** Chad Henne’s development and obscure the staff’s ability to judge his game performance if Carey can’t hold his own against opponents’ second-best (or worse) pass-rushers.

Speaking of Henne, he had a better game fundamentals-wise against the Bills.

He still needs a lot of work in the area of pocket awareness.

Standing in the pocket, he gets happy feet even when there’s no pressure, and he still tucks and runs way too much and too early in his progressions. And yet, with a guy coming right at him from the front, he stands there and doesn’t protect the ball.

He also needs to understand that he CAN throw the ball away outside the Tackles.

Nice game overall for the kid, though. And everything wrong with his game can be fixed, so you have to have a lot of hope for him.

He just needs to keep learning.

Ronnie Brown is a MONSTER when he’s running instinctively. Why is he so much slower now than when he came out, though?

Didn’t he clock a really good 40 time at the combine? So what gives with his not being able to outrun anyone in the open field? He’s only in his 5th season, so he shouldn’t have lost a step yet.

What a nice job by Brian Hartline on that TD @8:23/3rd, hauling in that ball and having the presence to get down in the end zone before sliding out of bounds on his butt.

A few rookie mistakes aside, Hartline is coming along nicely; one can only hope that Pat Turner can get on the field soon and start getting his rookie season behind him as well.

What was Dan Henning thinking on that end-around to Hartline, though?

Rookie Receiver, still mistake-prone, not a fast guy—yeah, let’s hand it off to him behind the LOS, with the bills coming hard on almost every play.

Henning actually makes me jealous of the four teams who fired their Offensive Coordinators before the season even started.

Except Buffalo.

The Phins’ Defense played better overall this game; the run D was especially staunch.

Channing Crowder in particular stepped it up after as lousy a set of games as he’s had in the pros; the Secondary, bolstered by Vontae’s pick-six and Will Allen’s two INTs, did a decent job overall against the Bills’ dangerous Receiver corps.

The rooks need to increase their awareness of where the ball is in the air; on three occasions Vontae Davis and Sean Smith lost the ball looking up and had completions made over them.

That’ll come too.

What an impact by Cameron Wake in his first pass-rushing action! Two sacks in the 1st half, another half-sack in the 2nd…he’s going to be a nice player if he keeps learning.

Trent Edwards is going to have nightmares about Wake and Jason Taylor tonight.

Bet he was glad when he heard that Joey Porter wasn’t playing; bet he wasn’t so glad as the game unfolded.

I noticed that the D improved markedly as Tyrone Culver and Reggie Torbor replaced Gibril Wilson and Akin Ayodele, respectively.

Finally.

But before that, Wilson whiffing miserably on a tackle makes you wonder why the hell it took this long to get his lame *** off the field. Here’s hoping we’ve seen the last of him on Defense.

As a parting gift, Gibril, please accept this Nabo’s Fairy Princess Award for all your weak **** in your time as a Miami Dolphins starter:




Enjoy. You bum.

Back to the Offensive Line; Jake Long is doing somewhat better than in the first couple of games, but he really needs to work on staying with blocks longer. On two blocks that I saw he stopped playing before the play was over; one resulted in a sack of Henne, and the other kept Ricky Williams from gaining big on a sweep left.

And Ricky, man…quietly, steadily, he is making tough runs and gaining more than his share of yards; even breaking a long one occasionally, showing he still has some of the explosion that made him so dangerous in the past.

Contributing in the passing game, too.

Not bad for a guy with “small hands,” huh? :wink:

And now…random thoughts:

·Guess my Bernie Kosar UM jersey was double-lucky this weekend; it gets the call next week again.

·Anyone notice if Vernon Carey is starting to physically resemble John St. Clair?

·St. Clair is busy in Cleveland, getting Brady Quinn and Derek Anderson killed and all…but you could swear he’s got a double in Miami.

·Enough already with Gibril Wilson, willya Sparano?!

·Wilson should be dragged out onto the field before practice on Monday and shot like a lame horse.

·On the other hand: VONTAE!!!

·Nice pick and a heady jump by the rook on that route to make the INT…but why was he shushing his own fans in the end zone? Or was that the Bills’ fan section?

·Two minutes into the 2nd half the stadium was still about ¾ empty; how long does it take to pee and get some arroz con pollo? Apparently, in Miami, more than 17 minutes.

·On that throw by Henne to Anthony Fasano in the end zone @7:31/3rd: if Henne holds it one more second and Fasano goes to the corner, it’s a touchdown. As it was, Henne threw it into double-coverage.

·Nice to see Fasano bounce back and get involved in the game again after some dismal performances.

·Ben Roethlisberger has such a disproportionately huge head that he looks like a character out of The Flintstones. Kid you not.

·Thank you, New Orleans. :wink:

·Damn you, Mark Clayton. You horse’s ***.

·I’m sorry, Matthew Stafford. Dislocated kneecap sounds bad enough, but it’s bare millimeters from a torn patellar tendon; hope it doesn’t turn out to be that bad once the MRIs are in.

·Mark Sanchez finally looked every bit the rookie today against New Orleans. Thank goodness…I was getting tired of envying the damned Jets.

·I’m sure that Sanchez has many good games ahead of him, though. I just hope that most of them aren’t against us.

·When Peyton Manning hangs up his jersey for the last time, I believe he will do so as the greatest Quarterback to play the game. What an amazing player he is, what astounding things he does behind Center; simply put, what a joy to watch.

·And can you say enough about Reggie Wayne? The lone vet among a bunch of rooks, and all he does is step up like a champ and raise the level of his game.

·Where’s Jamar Fletcher playing these days?

·Hakeem Nicks, boy…what a gamer. Doesn’t look like a rookie at all out there on that 54-yard catch-and-run.

·Brandon Marshall made a spectacular catch today against the Cowboys, and then proceeded to make a jaw-dropping run after the catch to put Denver ahead for good.

·But Sam Hurd…what a dolt; makes a terrific clutch catch at the end of the game, but needing to get out of bounds he gets tackled inbounds instead.

·Hey! Maybe what Chris Chambers needed all long was to wear those pink gloves!

·Not a joke: the San Diego Chargers are on their way to wasting Phil Rivers’ career the same way that Miami wasted Dan Marino’s—without a decent Defense to help him out.

·And it is borderline tragic that LaDanian Tomlinson seems to have hit a Shaun Alexander–like career wall before being able to help Rivers win one.

·When is the NFL going to go to laser field-markers? For Sears’ sake, man—we’ve been using them to hang pictures in our homes for 20 years…they can’t devise one that shoots across the field at the 1st-down marker?

·They could even have a different color laser for the line of scrimmage, making offsides calls and illegal forward passes a no-brainer for the Refs.

·Join the TWENTIETH century, Roger Goodell, you ineffectual, Roger Moore look-alike schmuck.

·While we’re on tools: Best. New tool. Ever: the Craftsman Auto-Hammer.

·That B.C.A. pink sure did look good on the cheerleaders, though.

·Mmm…cheerleaders.

 

I know; I regret writing that...I'm jones-ing big-time now!