The NFL has released its 2026 schedule, and to give you an idea of how bad they expect the Miami Dolphins to be, the League and its media partners have scheduled the team for exactly zero primetime games. Neither have they scheduled the team for any of the nine international games nor five holiday day games. The Dolphins will only play on Sunday afternoons between 1 and 4PM, where discriminating viewers can choose to look away.

In addition, the NFL has told Dolphins ownership that their stadium is no longer eligible for future Super Bowls because changes to the area since 2020 do not leave adequate "room for hospitality events around the stadium." Which sounds to me like a polite way of saying they don't want people to have to spend any more time than is strictly necessary participating in NFL football in Miami.

As a longtime Dolphins watcher, let me say: I strongly agree with them.

I have a whole category of posts here on my website under the heading "dolphins quarterbacks suck," but even by 21st-century Dolphins standards, the 2026 squad looks uninspiring. Quinn Ewers, Mark Gronowski, Cam Miller, and Malik Willis: If you recognize two of them, you watch far too much football, and I encourage you to seek professional help. Based on what I've seen so far, I suspect that only Ewers will be memorable, and only then as the answer to the trivia question "Who was the quarterback at Texas before Arch Manning?"

I think it's right kind of the NFL to spare its viewers from the nail-biting contest to find out which of them gets to be the one the Dolphins bench for whomever the team selects in next year's draft. Will I be hate-watching the 2026 Dolphins only to see if Arch replaces Quinn again? Signs point to yes.

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The headline in today's The Athletic begins: "Ted Ginn, Jr, ex-NFL receiver and UFL coach...". Ted Ginn Jr? Now that's a name I've not heard in a long time. A long time.

Ginn, for those of you who haven't wasted the past few decades following the rotting corpse of a once great football team called the Miami Dolphins, was the 9th overall pick in the 2007 draft. He played his college football for Ohio State, where he set a record for scoring on punt returns. I presume that's why GM Randy Mueller (who had been installed as something of a figurehead GM during Nick Saban's head coaching tenure only to find himself in over his head when Saban abruptly skipped town) drafted Ginn as high as he did. Ginn had great foot speed but hands of stone. He was an immediate bust.

I happened to be in the stands when Ginn finally scored his first NFL punt return touchdown following the Eagles' opening drive in week 11. The Dolphins were to that point winless on the season, and I had already soured on Ginn. My brother, an Eagles fan, knew it. So when Ginn scored, he immediately taunted me with "Who's your fav-rit play-er? Ted Gin Jun-ior!" He would repeat that whenever Ginn's name came up in NFL broadcasts in the following years.

Admittedly, the 2007 coach and roster Mueller assembled didn't do Ginn any favors. (Can you name any of the three quarterbacks who started for the Dolphins in 2007? There will be a quiz later.) But after just three years in Miami, he was traded to the 49ers. Thereafter, he spent equally short terms with the Panthers, Cardinals, Panthers (again), Saints, and Bears. That's actually a pretty good career by NFL standards, and he wouldn't be widely considered as a bust if he hadn't been drafted so high by a team that needed so much help.

Anyway, all that is what I think of when I read the rest of that headline: "...arrested on DWI charge in Texas." I have to say that it's nice to know that some things don't change. Nearly twenty years later, Ted Ginn, Jr. continues to disappoint.

Pop quiz, hot shot! The Miami Dolphins 2007 quarterbacks: Trent Green (5 starts), Cleo Lemon (7 starts), John Beck (4 starts). Lemon was the only QB on the roster when Ginn was drafted. Later-career Trent Green was signed in June on a one-year deal to shore up a terrible roster. John Beck was the rookie QB taken after Ginn with the 40th overall pick, after JaMarcus Russell, Brady Quinn, and Kevin Kolb. There's a reason 2007 is considered one of the all time worst QB classes.

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I had hoped to wake up yesterday to find Stephen Ross had fired the head coach of his Miami Dolphins today. Ross likes to fire coaches on Mondays.

Ross bought majority ownership in the Dolphins in 2009, and even he doesn't like his own choices to lead the team. He fired Tony Sparano with three games remaining in the season (after a 26-10 loss to the Eagles) on December 12, 2011. He fired Joe Philbin with twelve games remaining on the season (after a 27-14 loss to the Jets) on Monday, October 5, 2015. He fired Adam Gase the day after the season ended (with a 42-17 loss to Buffalo) on Monday, December 31, 2018. He fired Brian Flores the day after the season ended (with a 33-24 win over New England) on Monday, January 10, 2022.

Side note: Sparano's mid-season replacement was Todd Bowles, who has gone on to have some success with the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. Philbin's mid-season replacement was Dan Campbell, who has gone on to have some success the Detroit Lions. I have to wonder who on the current staff, given a chance to be interim head coach, would go on to win elsewhere once they finally get out of Miami?

Side side note: I still think current head coach Mike McDaniel will make someone else a great offensive coordinator, and I wish him well in his future endeavors. He's just amply demonstrated that his skills are not a good fit for a head coach position, especially with the personnel he's been given in Miami.

Back to the matter at hand, the Dolphins disappointed me again. Despite being beaten Sunday 31-6 by Browns, who had managed only one win and never more than 17 points in previous games, the now 1-6 Dolphins did not announce a coach firing today. In fact, the first line of today's ESPN article reads "Dolphins quarterback Tua Tagovailoa will remain the team's starter, coach Mike McDaniel confirmed Monday, despite the worst statistical two-game stretch of his career." This despite the fact that the Dolphins are currently projected to have the second overall pick in the 2026 NFL Draft. Sadly, that's the point.

You may have noticed that the only coach Ross has fired after a win was Brian Flores. That was no accident. After Flores was fired, he accused Ross of trying to bribe him to lose games, an accusation the NFL upheld (among other proven charges including that Ross had tried to tamper with other teams to steal their quarterbacks and coaches). As punishment the Dolphins were forced to forfeit draft picks in 2023 and 2024.

So Ross has learned his lesson and will now just leave a bad coach in place to secure the pick. Too bad for us fans. If history is any guide, Ross will ruin that, too.

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While watching the University of Georgia football team struggle in the first half of Saturday's season opener, it crossed my mind that maybe they were playing poorly because I had forgotten to wear my usual red gameday underwear. I immediately dismissed the thought because it is crazy.

There is nothing I, as a distant observer, might do on my sofa that could possibly affect the outcome of a football game in progress being played hundreds of miles away. There's even less my underwear could do about it. If it could, that would mean that there are intangible, undetectable threads connecting my very being to the game like the strings on a marionette. That's the stuff of superstition and religion. Like I said, crazy.

Of course, it's a seductive kind of crazy. It's easy to think that the world revolves around me, that I'm an integral piece of the cosmos, that my behavior and desires are strong enough to change the outcome of distant events. There are certainly narcissistic people — well known people, powerful people, *presidential* people — who think this. Those people are crazy.

Even if the energy that makes up the sentient being that calls itself Walter Stephens is indeed intertwined with the background radiation of the cosmos in significant ways (and that's a pretty big "if"), it's ridiculous to think that my energy is more relevant to the outcome of a football than the physical/mental energy expended by the 22 people playing it. My wants and desires will never be stronger than a motivated linebacker who has sacrificed significant portions of his life on the way to his goal of being able to charge through offensive linemen so that he can hug quarterbacks. That guy's crazier than I could ever be.

So, just because A) I'm not wearing red underwear, and B) the Bulldogs are playing poorly, those two things don't have to have a causal relationship just because I want them to. It's that sort of magical thinking that gets people in trouble. If you're one of those people, well, you know what you are.

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I haven't mentioned the Miami Dolphins in over two months and for good reason. They're bad. They're even bad at being bad. Their best achievement in 2019 was having Dan Marino named as one of the 10 greatest quarterbacks of the past century. Too bad Marino retired 20 years ago. The team hasn't had a consistently decent quarterback since.

To solve that problem, the team started the 2019 season with the intention of losing more than anyone has ever lost before to secure the first pick in the 2020 draft. They ultimately finished fifth in the race to be worst, meaning they won't get the best available quarterback. They might not even get the second, third, or fourth.

The best option, according to just about everyone, is Joe Burrow, whose LSU team mastered the art of having offensive linemen get away without being called for holding. He is followed in some order by Justin Herbert, Jacob Eason, and Jake Fromm. Two of them are/were Georgia Bulldogs, so I'd be fine cheering for them as Dolphins. On the other hand, Herbert is slow to make decisions, but is a nearly seven-foot-tall giant. Given that NFL scouts are size queens and Herbert is the one I like least, I figure he's the one most likely to be the Dolphins' eventual pick.

If there's any good news for the Dolphins, it's that their original target QB, Tua Tagovailoa, has fallen from his early projections and should still be available at five. (Maybe even at twenty.) Why? Because he's fragile. Would the team that famously passed on Drew Brees' wounded wing draft a player who's the real-life equivalent of a mid-80s G.I.Joe figure with a busted rubber band? We'll see.

Meanwhile, the Dolphins' last quarterback project, Ryan Tannehill, refuses to lose with his new team. Two games into the playoffs, two wins. That's two more than Ryan won in seven years with the Dolphins. Given that the Dolphins are still paying Tannehill against his last contract, they deserve at least some credit for those wins, right?

It remains possible, maybe even likely, that last year's starting QB, Ryan Fitzpatrick will return under center in 2020. In 2019, playing for his 8th team, Fitzpatrick became the oldest player (37) to lead his team in rushing yards (243) and rushing touchdowns (4) in a season, which implies that the Dolphins running game might be a bigger problem than whoever they've got under center. (Tannehill, for example, is now winning largely thanks to the legs of Derrick Henry.) I won't be surprised if the team decides to try losing another year's worth of games to address that problem in 2021.

Go 'Fins!

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No sooner do the Dolphins trade one Ryan than they pick up another.

Quarterback Ryan Fitzgerald has been signed as the Dolphins' starting signal caller. The Dolphins will be Fitzpatrick's 8th team in his 14-year career. He'll set a record if he completes a single pass for the 'Fins in 2019. Long-term marginal competence has to count for something, and that something appears to be about $5 million, the price of Fitzpatrick's new contract. The team paid Jay Cutler twice that in 2017. He won 6 games. I guess they're expecting Fitz to manage only 3.

This will be Fitpatrick's third tour of duty in the AFC East. He's already passed through the locker rooms of both the Bills and the Jets. All totaled, he's managed a career 6-5 record against his new team. The only team in the division that hasn't hired him is the New England Patriots. He has a 2-9 record against them.

It's probably worth noting that during Fitzpatrick's entire career, the Bills, Jets, and Dolphins have had at least 13 starting quarterbacks — each — while the Patriots have had essentially one. (Technically, they've had 4. Tom Brady missed all of 2008 with a knee injury and served a 4 game suspension in 2016 because he likes saggy balls. But there was never any doubt who the team's starting quarterback was.)

Will Fitz bring his Fitzmagic to Miami in 2019? My Magic 8-ball says no. So does Vegas. Even before dumping Tannehill, sports books were down on the 'Fins. Last week, if you bet a dollar on them to win the Super Bowl, you could pocket $300. That's three times longer odds than are being given to any other team. Comparatively, the never-going-anywhere Detroit Lions are 100-1. Those were Friday's odds that the Dolphins could win their division. I'm sure the addition of Fitzpatrick isn't bringing them any closer.

Ye gods. It's going to be a long season.

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One year ago, I wrote, "Sadly, it looks like another rebuilding year is in the cards for the 'Fins." I shouldn't have acted so surprised. Ever since a real estate baron bought the team in 2008, the rebuilding never stops in Miami.

It was pretty clear that 2019 was going to be a rebuilding year when Coach Gase was fired (with cause). And then Yesterday, the Dolphins traded starting quarterback Ryan Tannehill to the Titans. Ryan was a first-round pick (8th overall) in 2012. After 6 years — though only 4½ on the field thanks to some very questionable medical decisions concerning his oft-injured knee — he's now worth something less. (The Dolphins essentially gave away Tannehill plus $5 million for a 2020 4th round pick. That feels about right. He should have been a 4th round pick in 2012.)

With Tannehill gone, there are zero quarterbacks on the roster who have played a single snap in the NFL. That's a step up from 2017, when Jay Cutler filled in.

The question now is whether the Dolphins hire a cheap free agent to fill the void or will some rookie from the draft get the call? Neither of those seem like great options. I can't say as I'm very excited about the prospect of Jacksonville wash-out Black Bortles taking snaps, and there's no phenom like Andrew Luck coming out of college this year. 'Suck for [Drew] Lock' doesn't have the same ring.

Maybe I can find something else to do on Sundays this fall.

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It didn't take long for the 2017 UGA football season to go off the rails. Eight minutes and thirty seconds, to be precise.

There between the goalposts you'll see UGA's 2017 season being helped off the field.

That's when sophomore starting quarterback Jacob Eason went down with what has been called a "knee sprain" on a late hit out of bounds. As I write this, the true extent of the injury is unknown, but judging by how quickly Eason disappeared from the sideline never to return, this thing is serious.

Eason wasn't exactly tearing up the field in the brief time he did play. He completed one of three passes for four yards. His two misses were overthrows of open receivers. Like the rest of the team, he seemed too "tight" to start the game, a recurring problem for the team during Smart's increasingly dissatisfying tenure.

Everyone loosened up when true freshman (and the latest in a line of "No, Seriously, He's The Next Great Thingâ„ " at quarterback) Jake Fromm replaced Eason, and the Bulldogs went on to win in convincing fashion. Chubb and Michel looked game ready, and everyone was happy. Until the fourth quarter, when Bryce Ramsey, in true Bryce Ramsey fashion, threw two interceptions on two consecutive drives on the only two passes he attempted in the game! All 10 of Appalachian State's points came indirectly from Ramsey turnovers. Sigh. I hope next week's opponent — Notre Dame — wasn't watching.

Jake Fromm, you better find a way to make a uniform out of bubble wrap. Something tells me you're going to need it.

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The Miami Dolphins are guaranteed a winning season for the first time since 2008. It's an unusual sensation. I'd forgotten what it felt like to cheer for a winning NFL team.

If the Dolphins win on Christmas Eve in Buffalo and on New Year's Day versus the New England Patriots, they'll definitely make the postseason. There are scenarios in which they could lose one or both of those games and and still have a shot at playing for the league title. Given the Dolphins' history of poor performance in the snow and against teams much, much better than they are, I'm not holding my breath.

(It doesn't help that starting quarterback Ryan Tannehill busted his ACL in week 14 and may or may not return before September 2017. Great timing, that.)

However, don't let my pessimism about the future fool you into thinking that I'm not excited about the present. I am, indeed, very happy that the Dolphins won't finish the season as losers, something I predicted before the season started.

That's the best thing about being a pessimist. It's always a pleasant surprise when you're wrong.

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Word on the street (ok, word via NFL.com) is that Jared Goff will be starting at quarterback for the LA Rams when the Miami Dolphins come to town this weekend.

I think that's probably a bad idea.

For those of you who haven't been paying attention, Goff was the first overall pick in the 2016 draft. That means the Rams thought he wasn't just the best quarterback available, but the best player available this year. The Rams have taken an old-school approach to rearing the young quarterback and let him ride the bench while he learns the ropes. Most teams these days throw their new quarterback prospects out on the field immediately to see if they sink or swim (*cough* Miami Dolphins *cough*). But not the Rams. At least not until now.

The reason I say this might not be the right week to start the Jared Goff experiment is because the Dolphins aren't the sort to play nice with opposition quarterbacks. No team in 2016 has spent more on their defensive linemen than the Dolphins (by a margin of nearly $4 million!). In the past 10 weeks, the Dolphins have broken Super Bowl-winning quarterbacks Russell Wilson and Ben Roethlisberger, accomplished journeyman Ryan Fitzpatrick, and Tom Brady stand-in Jimmy Garoppolo. Is that the sort of meat grinder you want to put an unproven $20 million man in? I wouldn't.

So why this week? Maybe coach Jeff Fisher thinks that his previous starter, Case Keenum, is too important to risk feeding to the Dolphins' D-line. Maybe Fisher is frustrated with Goff and wants to punish him. Whatever the case, good luck, Jared Goff. You're going to need it.

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