MIAMI GARDENS — The Miami Dolphins are a team with an abundance of uncertainty toward the future as the closing moments of the 2025 season draw near.
The general manager, Chris Grier, was fired midway through the season and interim Champ Kelly has held it together in the meantime.
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Coach Mike McDaniel has been at the epicenter of hot-seat conversations from the start of the season. Those cooled down after he survived the late October cut that sent Grier packing, which then turned into a four-game winning streak to stave off elimination from playoff contention as long as possible after a 1-6 start.
Was that, the way McDaniel rallied his team, and Sunday’s surprising 20-17 win against the Tampa Bay Buccaneers enough to save him on Black Monday, the NFL’s infamous day after the regular season concludes and head coaching vacancies are largely determined?
And then there are the players. As quarterback Tua Tagovailoa, once given the keys to the franchise with a four-year, $212.4 million extension, has already been benched, what can rookie Quinn Ewers do for himself and his future? The same question applies to many others, both veteran and inexperienced, as they leave their final fingerprints on 2025.
For this week, it’s all about simply putting together the best football the team can in a finale against the New England Patriots (13-3), who will be vying for the No. 1 seed in the AFC.
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“Your lasting impression is your strongest impression in the National Football League, whether that’s for our team or everyone else watching our film,” McDaniel said Monday. “So I’ll take that seriously, and I’m very confident that our team will, too.
“You have a platform to define who you want to be. Whether people define you as that, in the immediate, is irrelevant. If you want to be a team that plays football the right way and has the ability to perform, regardless of circumstance, you have a tremendous opportunity against an opponent that you are one score away from beating that has had the best record in football for a good amount of the year.”
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Ewers, with two starts under his belt showing he can handle the spotlight and one good enough for a win, can make his final case for how the franchise should view him going into next season.
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As the end of Tagovailoa era with the Dolphins appears to be a given, Ewers’ three-game sample to end the season can influence whoever will be making offseason decisions on whether the team needs a sure-fire starter at the position or a fringe-level quarterback on an economical contract who would merely compete with Ewers in 2026?
McDaniel said Monday he knew Ewers’ 63-yard touchdown to undrafted rookie wide receiver Theo Wease Jr. was essentially a no-look pass with how he manipulated a Bucs defensive back with his eyes.
Ewers had established an idea from earlier series that Tampa’s Cover-0 or Cover-1 looks pre-snap could transform into two-high safety coverages upon the snap.
“That’s just Quinn doing something he’s adept at in the heat of the moment, because the moment’s not too big for him. So he took his eyes straight at the corner,” McDaniel said.
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Ewers capitalized on his training camp and preseason chemistry established with Wease and also has done the same with tight end Greg Dulcich, who led the team with five catches Sunday which went for 58 yards and a touchdown.
“Quinn would be the authority on throwing to Greg seeing how they started on scout team together this season,” McDaniel said.
“Consistency and, realistically, he has an idea of how Greg is going to react to certain looks based on that rapport, to a degree. It’s just leaning into that trust.”
Ewers, Wease, Dulcich, second-year running back Jaylen Wright, defensive tackles Jordan Phillips and Zeek Biggers and cornerback Jason Marshall Jr., who had his first career interception against Tampa Bay, are among young players with their stock up following the season’s penultimate game.
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The Dolphins, after starting 1-6, are 6-3 since ahead of visiting Gillette Stadium for this Sunday’s finale.