The Dolphins Have Fired Joe Philbin So I Guess That Whole "Dolphins Will Win The AFC East" Thing From Harvard Was Very Wrong
July
(Source) — The method that I came up with uses Pro Football Reference’s Approximate Value statistic, the site’s best measure of trying to tease out individual talent. Then, using ESPN’s NFL depth charts, I aggregated each team’s per game approximate value of what I considered to be the ‘core’ makeup of an NFL team: QB, RB, 2 WR, TE, Top 2 OL, the Top-4 ‘Front Seven’ defensive players, and the Top-2 players from the secondary.
After week 4
Me right now
Hey, Hardvard nerds, how do you like them apples? The team poised to take over the AFC East and finally end New England’s reign of terror is about to be coachless heading into week 5. Philbin still hasn’t done his Monday media meet so there’s a chance they just did the ol’ “Everyone who is a Miami Dolphins employee get on the plane… nope, not you, Joe” at Heathrow and he’s stuck at the airport looking at the bottom of a pint glass.
That’s my favorite part of every offseason. Bad teams get excited about things like the combine and the draft, but me? I get excited about the reports, predictions, and studies that tell me which team will finally knock the Patriots off their pedestal. This year, and most recent years (I think dating back to 2013 when ESPN the Mag predicted the Pats finish like 9-7 and the Dolphins win), it has been Miami that was coming for the crown. There was even a little Bills talk this season. Before then, it was Rex and the Jets. Every talking head always has their hot new team and every year it ends the same: the Patriots have 12+ wins and the flavor of the offseason team has a shitty quarterback and a coach on the hot seat.
You can set your clock to it, it happens that regularly. But, here we are. The Dolphins have a tight end coach as an interim head coach, the Patriots are undefeated and show no signs of stopping until San Francisco. Yet this offseason will be the same: Pundits will predict the fall of an empire, Belichick and Brady will behead everyone on their quest to yet another Super Bowl. Rinse, lather, repeat.