The Miami Dolphins Missing Ingredients

It’s conference championship Sunday in the NFL, and the Miami Dolphins are on the outside looking in for the 32nd consecutive year after not even making it to the postseason party.

It might not require a ton for the Dolphins to get back to the playoffs for a third time in four years in 2025, but that’s not the ultimate goal, which is getting to and winning to the Super Bowl.

That obviously entails winning a conference championship game, so it’s worth pondering exactly what’s missing as we prepare to watch the Washington Commanders, Philadelphia Eagles, Buffalo Bills and Kansas City Chiefs all try to earn a spot in Super Bowl LIX in New Orleans.

So what do those four teams have that the Dolphins don’t? What have they done that the Dolphins haven’t?

Let’s break it down, in no particular order.

This isn’t necessarily about being Lamar Jackson and being to bust a 60-yard touchdown run at any time, but the ability to scramble for a first down is huge in helping extend drive, and this is where the Dolphins simply don’t have that element with Tua Tagovailoa — and will have to compensate elsewhere because they’re not likely to have it. But it is a factor. During the regular season, Jalen Hurts rushed for 62 first downs, compared to 57 for Josh Allen, 55 for Jayden Daniels, 22 for Patrick Mahomes, and only five for Tua.

When it comes to picking up first down, Hurts and Allen provide the Eagles and Bills with a huge advantage with their ability to simply run the quarterback sneak because of power (Hurts) or size. Washington has a big running back in Brian Robinson to accomplish that goal, while the Chiefs really don’t have a power back per se, the closest thing being fullback Carson Steele. The Dolphins have a bunch of smaller, quicker back, but they are lacking that power back.

Of course, it helps to have an offensive line that can move defenders off the spot, and the Dolphins clearly are lacking in that department, though putting all of the offense’s shortcomings on that group is both lazy and unfair. Among the top four teams, the Eagles are the gold standard when it comes to the offensive line, and the Bills aren’t far behind. The Chiefs have three bona fide studs on the offensive line in left tackle Joe Thuney, center Creed Humphrey and right guard Trey Smith, who’s a pending free agent who likely is in line for a big pay raise. Washington’s offensive line ranks in the top 10 in both the Pro Football Focus O-line rankings and ESPN’s run blocking and pass blocking win rate. The Dolphins are no higher than 26 anywhere. To show this can be overcome, though, the Cincinnati Bengals were 32nd in pass block win rate and 30th in run block win rate, per ESPN, and the only reason they missed the playoffs was because they lost four games while scoring 33 or more points.

It’s probably not a coincidence that the final four teams all ranked in the top 10 in third-down conversion percentage in 2024, and this is an area where the Dolphins faltered. They landed at 25th in the NFL after being seventh in 2023. Obviously, the absence of Tagovailoa for six-plus games didn’t help there, but the offense still struggled with him in that department. Tagovailoa finished 16th in the NFL in third-down passer rating this season among those with at least 90 pass attempts at 86.4. Mahomes, Daniels and Allen were fourth, sixth and eighth, respectively, while Hurts was 12th.

The final four teams all did a good job at protecting the ball compared to taking it away, especially the three elite teams — Buffalo, Philadelphia and Kansas City. But Washington, which was a modest plus-1 in turnover differential in the regualar season, was able to upset Detroit in the playoffs in large part because of their five takeaways. The Dolphins, meanwhile, were minus-5. For those wondering, the Dolphins were minus-3 in turnover differential in the Tua starts and minus-2 in the non-Tua starts. The biggest difference for the Dolphins in 2024 was the takeaways on defense dropping for 27 to 16 (because the giveaways on offense actually dropped, from 25 to 22).

When we look at the final four and how the Dolphins can reach that level, we almost should eliminate Washington from the discussion because the Commanders’ success is due in large part to the phenomenal performance of Daniels as a rookie and the five takeaways against Detroit. Even with the Eagles, one factor that has to be included is the NFC not being as good a conference as the AFC.

For the Dolphins to be able to compete and ultimately beat teams like Buffalo and Kansas City — and we certainly could add Baltimore — they’ll need a improvement from a combination of factors, including but not limited to offensive line play, clutch quarterbacking, forcing turnovers on defense and the ability to pick up the tough yards.

Yeah, it’s not going to be an easy task.