Kelly: Dolphins’ ‘front-loaded adversity’ was painful, but not crippling | Opinion

What’s the worst start to an NFL season a team can possibly envision?

How about losing its Pro Bowl quarterback (Tua Tagovailoa) and Pro Bowl tailback (Raheem Mostert), a duo that accounted for 50 touchdowns last season, for a month apiece?

But at least they weren’t lost for the entire season.

Then having three defensive starters - pass rusher Jaelan Phillips (knee), safeties Jevon Holland (broken left hand) and Jordan Poyer (shin injury) - suffer significant injuries?

That was the opening chapter of the Miami Dolphins’ 2024 season, a stretch that head coach Mike McDaniel succinctly labels “front-loaded adversity.”

“Ironically, this season for the Miami Dolphins is no different than the two previous in my mind,” McDaniel said in a head-scratching comment Monday, as the team returned from its super early bye week. “How do I say something like that? Well, you win, you lose, you have stats that are favorable, you have stats that aren’t. But you have to find adverse situations to grow through as a team.”

If that’s true, these Dolphins should have gone through a massive growth spurt because of all the drama a month and a half has produced.

How did we get here?

It started with a few overzealous police officers trying to arrest Tyreek Hill and a few of his teammates hours before the regular- season kickoff, a distraction I would argue the team was blindsided by.

The Dolphins paced themselves during training camp and the exhibition season to ensure the team’s top players would be healthy for when games mattered, then started out slow in the season opener before delivering a fourth-quarter 20-17 win over a Jacksonville Jaguars team the world now realizes isn’t very good.

But in that victory Miami took a massive loss as Mostert, the 10-year veteran who set a franchise record by scoring 21 touchdowns last season, sufstained a troublesome chest injury and got shut down for a month.

Week 2 featured an AFC East showdown with the Buffalo Bills, at home, in front of a nationally televised audience. It was clearly a duel the Dolphins weren’t prepared for because the offense committed three turnovers, were plagued by penalties, and that’s before Tagovailoa sustained a concussion that sidelined him for the next four games.

The next week Tagovailoa’s replacement, Skylar Thompson, the third-year quarterback who beat out Mike White for the backup role, struggles against the Seattle Seahawks in one of the most hostile environments a team can play in.

Thompson breaks his ribs in his fourth NFL start, which resulted in a 24-3 loss. His injury leads to Miami turning the offense over to Tyler “Snoop” Huntley, a veteran backup quarterback who Miami claimed off the Baltimore Ravens practice squad the previous week.

Huntley participated in all of six practices before making his first start against a then winless Tennessee Titans team, which bullied Miami to a 31-12 win by dominating the trenches.

The Dolphins’ offense’s performance made it abundantly clear Huntley hadn’t mastered enough of Miami’s complicated playbook to be effective. The Dolphins again played an undisciplined brand of football that led to the team’s third straight loss.

After the game McDaniel vows to simplify the offense, hold tough conversations, and another week of practice delivers a cleaner game (372 yards) from the offense. The return of Mostert, who contributed 98 all-purpose yards in his first game back from the chest injury, doesn’t hurt either since he was one of the catalysts behind Miami’s 15-10 win against the New England Patriots.

The victory puts the Dolphins at 2-3 before last week’s bye.

And here we are at the season’s restart, beginning preparation for an Indianapolis Colts team with what most Dolphins players, coaches and fans believe will be the last game without Tagovailoa, who is eligible to return from injured reserve during the Week 8 home game against the Arizona Cardinals.

If the Dolphins can leave Indianapolis with a victory the team will be at .500 with 11 games ahead of them, and could benefit from a rested and motivated quarterback ready to silence the premature retirement talks.

That means the season still has life.

Miami faces the Colts (3-3), Arizona Cardinals (2-4), Los Angeles Rams (1-4), Las Vegas Raiders (2-4), New England Patriots (1-5), San Francisco 49ers (3-3), Cleveland Browns (1-5) and play the New York Jets (1-5) twice the rest of the way.

What’s my point? If injuries don’t ravage this roster more than it already has the Dolphins could be looking at a 10- or 11-win season if things fall right.

This season might not end in New Orleans playing in the Super Bowl like many hoped, but there’s still a playoff berth to fight for.

There’s still the potential of securing the franchise’s first playoff win since 2000.

There’s still life in this season, and hope for this aging rebuild.

So let’s have some perspective about how difficult this “front-loaded adversity” has been and give the 2024 Dolphins a legit chance to rebound, proving that they are a resilient team, one capable of shaking off a poor start the way the 2021 Dolphins did when they won eight of the season’s final nine games after starting 1-7, which was a stretch that featured sevens straight losses for that Brian Flores team.

What’s the common thread between both of those Dolphins squads?

“Literally, Tua went on IR both seasons in the second week,” said right tackle Austin Jackson, a starter on that 2021 team.. “That’s really the biggest parallel [that’s] glaring.”

And that’s the main reason this isn’t time to panic. and point fingers of blame. Let’s begin judging 2024 when Tagovailoa returns, and Mostert’s healthy enough to be the lead back, and take it from there.