A St. Fitzpatrick’s Day Miracle!

There’s no question now that the full tank job is on as the Dolphins sign vet QB

Ryan Fitzpatrick isn’t just Fitz-magic, as he says. He’s Fitz-perfect! He’s Fitz-like-a-glove! He’s exactly the kind of quarterback the Miami Dolphins’ wellplanned, well-documented and well-this-is-really-happening-now plans to tank this upcoming season demand.

The design is so thought out the Dolphins waited until St. Fitz-Patrick’s Day to sign him. Talk about kissing the Blarney Stone. Or, more accurately, tying your roster to a blarney stone to better sink to the bottom of the NFL.

Can you say Imperfect Season? We all know the Dolphins had to find a veteran quarterback to keep this locker room in shape and this season from downshifting internally from just a wonderfully losing locker room into an absolute clown show.

Their two quarterbacks on the roster, Jake Rudock and Luke Falk, had thrown a combined five NFL passes. All by the relatively experienced Rudock.

Fitzpatrick, 36, has thrown 4,285 passes. That includes 148 interceptions, which can be expected to increase mightily this year considering talent has been notably subtracted from last year’s 29th-ranked offense.

But Fitzpatrick fits just what they need, too. A veteran. A pro. A class act. A guy who’s been around the NFL block, considering the Dolphins become his eighth team. That now includes every AFC East team but the New England Patriots — you know, the only one that wins this millennium.

Most importantly, Fitzpatrick is a good man with a good sense of a humor as evidenced by his allweather beard and entertaining outfits (the open-shirt, jewelry-strewn, chest-hair-showing post-gamer in Tampa last year ranks as tops).

It doesn’t take his Harvard education or nearperfect score on the famed Wonderlic draft test to know what he’s stepping into, too. The game the Dolphins played here was finding a credible NFL starting quarterback without paying him a credible NFL starting quarterback salary.

If they paid too much, it would threaten their compensatory third-round pick for losing Ja’Wuan James due to the NFL’s doublesecret formula. That tells you how much they didn’t really want a decent quarterback. They considered that third-round pick as more valuable.

Here was their problem: You can’t sign a credible starting quarterback for the reported two years, $11 million they signed Fitzpatrick on Sunday.

Tyrod Taylor turned down a similar offer to sign as the Los Angeles’ Chargers’ backup. Ditto Teddy Bridgewater, who signed back on as New Orleans’ backup.

So Fitzpatrick is a backup who will start for the Dolphins. That’s the storyline here. That’s the storyline, it seems, at many positions for the Dolphins this season.

That narrative only changes if the Dolphins somehow move up in the draft for a quarterback.

And, well, there still is some mystery why the Dolphins scouts stayed after Kyler Murray’s pro day in Oklahoma last week to privately work him out.

Is a draft-day surprise coming? Will the Dolphins deal for a quarterback this year?

Or, as everything points, will they roll the dice that the randomness of sports won’t give them three or four wins next season and knock them out of the top draft position?

Or Alabama quarterback Tua Tagovailoa gets hurt?

Or something else so foreseen happens that you can only shrug and agree that it could only happen to the Dolphins?

There was some question just where the Dolphins were heading, but after Sunday it’s all systems go for a full tank job next season. Line up what’s happened in the past few days.

The Dolphins dumped anyone with age or expensive salary to clear up the salary cap for next season. (Well, OK, not everyone, as Robert Quinn’s still around.) Right now, they’re $70 million under the cap this season. Next year, it stands at about $115 million.

They also didn’t sign anyone notable in free agency’s gold rush this past week (team owner Steve Ross’s checkbook must be twitching).

They then paid Tennessee $5 million toward Ryan Tannehill’s $7 million salary to dump him for a fourthround pick next year and, more importantly, get a

$25 million charge off the books for next season.

Now they’ve signed Fitzpatrick. The only issue here is he comes face-totrademark with Dolphins safety Minkah Fitzpatrick (no relation) for the “Fitzmagic” tag.

Again, it’s all Fitz-perfect! And, yes, I love typing that line so much I might trademark it heading into this season. Hats. T-shirts. And jerseys to wear to each Dolphins loss. Fitz-perfect! Fitz-perfect! Fitz-perfect!

Bottom-line: The Dolphins couldn’t have done much better than to sign Fitzpatrick to give the gloss of credibility to this coming season. Meaning, they couldn’t have done much worse. And, to show everyone they’re in on the job, they made it a

St. Fitz-Patrick’s Day Miracle.

Dave Hyde