MIAMI GARDENS – As the Miami Dolphins walked onto the field into the locker room at Hard Rock Stadium, their stares into the abyss showed that it was all out of their hands.

Tua Tagovailoas The highly anticipated return resulted in a 28-27 loss to the Arizona Cardinals that can only be described as what happens when you take your foot off the gas and play not to lose.

Although the Dolphins' offense scored points on 62% of their drives, including three touchdowns, it wasn't enough. 8/10 times 27 points should lead to a win, but when the other teams have an above-average offense with a star quarterback like Kyler Murray, you're never satisfied.

All in all, it was objectively a great game that came down to the wire. An exciting watch for anyone who isn't a Dolphins fan.

It's actually kind of hilarious that on the last Cardinals drive Mark Schlereth said, “One of these teams is about to have their hearts broken,” and boy, was he right.

It feels like one of those games where something slips out of the team's hands, and that happens to all teams at some point. When you're in the hole, as the Dolphins were and are, there's no room for error or complacency.

This blame game feels like a Uno reversal card because the fault has been shifted to the other side of the ball.

Quarterback can't also play defense

Tua Tagovailoa not only got through the Cardinals' game unscathed, but also got the offense back on track. Tyreek Hill was unlocked, and the offense had much more room to maneuver as the defense had to revert to a two-knight safety strategy to contain explosive plays.

The offense was fluid under Tagovailoa's leadership. The timing of shifts, scripts and routes was synchronized at the highest level. While Tagovailoa's performance didn't exactly scream a great game, he had the offense going and was rarely stopped all afternoon.

If this is all true, then how did they lose? Three words. Defense and play calling.

Let's start with defense.

In the first six games, the Dolphins defense was their rock and they held the Dolphins in every game. One of the league's best defenses in the second half seemed to have forgotten who it was.

The Cardinals scored 20 points in the second half and used the final five minutes of the game to score the game-winning field goal.

Kyler Murray returned to his star form and continued to find the gap in the defense. Funnily enough, the holes in the defense were who they were up against Marvin Harrison Jr. And Trey McBride. Most of these cases were David Long Jr. And Cam Smithboth are exposed.

Games have their ups and downs, but when it came to the final drive of the game, the Dolphins defense had scored three goals that could have given them a shot at victory.

First, stop the Cardinals altogether. Second, hold them to a field goal and give the offense enough time to get a two-minute drive and win the game. Third, let the Cardinals score a touchdown when all else fails to give the offense a chance to respond with a touchdown of their own.

They didn't do any of that.

In the end, the Cardinals played slowly against the Dolphins in the final five minutes of the game. They slowly but surely used up all the remaining time, forcing the Dolphins to use all their timeouts, converting in the third period, where everyone in the stadium knew it was going to be a run game, even though it was a run from the quarterback and kicked a game-winning chip shot field goal with no time remaining.

It can be said that the offense should have scored the possession beforehand, but the defense had to do anything but let the opposing team run out and score with no time left.

I can't blame the offense other than a few critical drops and a rocket attack that resulted in a safety. I'm looking at Jaylen Waddle, Jonnu Smith and Aaron Brewer.

You play to win the game

I can't conclude this without pointing out an aspect of the game that is usually overlooked, namely underestimating an opponent.

It's the NFL, and everyone will tell you that you treat every opponent the same. While that's true in most cases, it happened in the middle of the game and McDaniel took his foot off the accelerator.

The Dolphins' last drive looked clear to me, and that took as much time as possible. Given that they had two first downs on the drive, they must have forgotten that they only had a two-point lead in the fourth quarter.

This drive is where you pull out your best plays and give Tagovailoa as much opportunity as possible to put some points on the board and force the Cardinals into a touchdown to win the game.

There are too many times when the Dolphins run the ball in obvious situations and get negative results from it, especially late in games with a narrow lead.

Get there, open it up, and complement the running game on first downs with short completions to keep the defense on its toes. No gain on the first, a short completion that's pointless on the second, and then Tagovailoa has to throw the ball away on third down because of a total blitz.

Punt.

I understand wanting to rely on your defense, especially because they've been really good despite injuries, but they underestimated how good Kyler Murray and the Cardinals' offense was and got burned.

There is blame here, but if I blame anyone, then it moves on Anthony Weaver and the defense. They were on fire the entire second half and couldn't keep the Cardinals under control with the game on the line while letting them run out the remaining time.

At the end of the day, the defense has to hold up its end of the bargain, and flat out it hasn't, and now the Dolphins are 2-5 and looking at 2-6 as they head home to play big brother on Sunday , the Buffalo Bills.

It looks like the end of the 2024 season is near.

Let us know in the comments who you think is most to blame for the loss to the Arizona Cardinals.