Sun Sentinel Palm Beach Edition
Dolphins, Jets rivalry heats up
Hyde: Gase leaving for New York is fuel to the competitive fire.
So the Quarterback Whisperer will now be the New York
Jets coach, and there’s no need to whisper the initial reaction. It can be said loud and clear: The Dolphins’ offseason just took a step for the better if Gase remains the coach he was here.
The Jets just assigned themselves to remaining the morbid J-E-T-S, if Gase doesn’t grow up in various and serious ways.
The Jets young quarterback, Sam Darnold, won’t get as much help as being forecast, if what happened with the Dolphins repeats itself in New York.
What this move primarily does is put a flame under a Jets-Dolphins rivalry that needs full fire, right? It’s grown stale and inconsequential, two AFC East leftovers bowing to mighty New England.
So this move is good in that regard. Enmity is fun. Football is personal. The Jets and Dolphins never should be pals, and Gase will guarantee they won’t be. He’ll probably try some small-minded play like the time he called for an onside kick against his former Denver team in 2017 while leading 35-9.
Or maybe, just maybe, Gase spends some serious time in self-examination of
what went wrong here. Maybe he grows up in his second stint as a head coach. Maybe he won’t repeat mistakes from releasing talented players to making bad assistant hires (the New York tabloids might re-hash the cocainesniffing, escort-riding offensive line coach) to becoming a serial excusemaker at the end.
Coaches sometimes take developmental steps forward with their second job. Bill Belichick did. Pete Carroll did. And … well, no, not Hue Jackson. Not Doug Marrone. Not Rex Ryan, Eric Mangini, Jeff Fisher or even Jon Gruden, if his initial, second impression is lasting.
But offensive coaches are the flavor of the day in the NFL, and if fired Texas Tech coach Kliff Klingsbury can get hired by the Arizona Cardinals, Gase looks like an inspired choice by comparison.
Gase, to be sure, is a good man. He’s talented, too. Just ask him. His arrogance actually is an endearing quality. It also disappeared each of the past two years as he got beaten down by losing, pulled down that eternal ball cap further on his head and, quite possibly, wanted out of town by the end to get a fresh start.
His Dolphins did beat the Jets in five of their six games, meaning the Jets ownership saw Gase at his best. They can add to their hopes by subtracting from their problems, too. But solving their bigger problems? This will be interesting to watch, considering what Gase showed in three years with the Dolphins. And didn’t show. He entered South Florida as an anointed quarterback guru and offensive mastermind who had the backing of Peyton Manning and a reputation of getting the best from a limited Tim Tebow and harnessing the gun-slinging of Jay Cutler.
Yet the reputed offensive mastermind never had an offense rank higher than 24th with the Dolphins. The avowed Quarterback Whisperer saw his primary quarterback, the one he said he took the job for, Ryan Tannehill, remain the same average-at-best guy he was before Gase arrived.
He never could identify quarterbacks — or just thought he could coach up anyone. He brought in Cutler for the 2017 season after Tannehill was injured. Chalk that up as another learning mistake as he moves to New York.
It wasn’t all mediocre stuff, of course. Gase showed smarts and boldness his first year by moving away from his passoriented attack to a power running game that helped the Dolphins to the playoffs. If the Jets get that versatile and creative coach, they got the guy the Dolphins hoped to have.
But Gase switched back the next year from what worked to what he was comfortable coaching. He also grabbed more personnel power and, for some reason, was given it.
So when players grew upset with the changed offense — and several of them did — Gase traded one of them, running back Jay Ajayi, to Philadelphia. He helped the Eagles to a Super Bowl.
By Gase’s third year with the Dolphins, his third season with Tannehill, his third season to mold and mesh and hire a staff just as he wanted, this team was decidedly worse. His offense ranked 31st in the league and his hand-picked defensive coordinator’s defense ranked 29th.
It wasn’t all Gase’s fault, of course. The front office didn’t give him enough players. It always starts there in pro sports. The coach gets too many questions. Give Gase that.
But for a guy who sets the team’s culture and is the voice of a franchise, all you heard by the end was a mouthful of excuses. Their season was a disappointment, he said, because of injuries. They were 1-7 on the road, he said, because they always met teams at the wrong time.
And he went around to selected media by year’s end saying it wasn’t really that bad a season considering no one picked them to win many games. That’s an interesting way to look at things. We’re bad — but who’s surprised?
So now he’s off to New York with a fresh team and fresh start. Maybe he’ll take full advantage of that. Or maybe what you saw with the Dolphins is what the Jets will get.
The one certainty here is a rivalry that’s been a
Grade B movie for years just got a lead character to add some spice.