It was bound to happen at some point. Odds were that it would have been last Sunday instead of this week but the New England Patriots were going to lose a regular season game at some point. Not to the Miami Dolphins though, right? Going into Sunday’s game at Foxborough the Patriots were riding a 21 game winning streak with the Dolphins carrying a 1-20 record during that time span.No one this side of Joey Porter gave Miami a chance to win this game as they have been the NFL’s roll-models of futility in recent history. However, Porter said on Wednesday that beating New England without Tom Brady “shouldn’t be that hard” then his team went out on the field Sunday and proved him right.
Chad Pennington was adequate going 17-20 for 226 with no turnovers but the story of the day was Miami running back Ronnie Brown who nearly accounted for all of Miami’s points by basically running the same play. Lining up at the quarterback position Brown ran for a franchise record four touchdowns and threw for another from a formation made popular by the Arkansas Razorbacks and Darren McFadden.
“I don’t know why in the world we couldn’t stop that play. They just came in and beat our butts,” Patriots safety Rodney Harrison said.
Miami tallied a total of 461 net yards against New England’s defense and the Patriots offense, left inept by injuries, just didn’t have the firepower to keep up. Joey Porter and the Miami defense didn’t let up either. Porter sacked Matt Cassel three times and also forced him into an interception and a fumble.
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