The Miami Dolphins (4-4) committed 11 penalties for 107 yards Sunday night at home against the Oakland Raiders and thus fell short 27-24 at home on NBC’s Sunday Night Football weekly prime time match up.
“There might have been 21 penalties between both of us. It seemed like theirs almost came on one drive where there was back-to-back penalties. Ours were coming at really poor times where we had some good plays and (they) get called back. Hard to recover from it,” said Dolphins head coach Adam Gase post game.
The loss is easily summed up by missed opportunities for the Dolphins. Stalled drives that had great offensive potential but very little discipline when it came to offensive play. And at the most critical times, promising drives were killed because of penalties or costly turnovers.
Penalties kill drive 1 offensively for the #Dolphins Promising offensive plays were made.
— Brandon Odoi (@Brandon_Odoi) November 6, 2017
Particularly frustrating is the timing of such a poor showing with undisciplined play, matched with an amazing night for Jay Cutler, the struggling quarterback who’s banged up (rib injury) and still managed a 34 for 42 night passing for 311 yards and three touchdowns with no interceptions.
What made Cutler elite tonight was his footwork, he bought lots of time in the pocket and kept his eyes down field for big throws.
“ He was patient. We didn’t hit him as much as I would like to have seen. Part of that is he had some throws available and he was taking them,” said Raiders head coach Jack Del Rio of Cutler.
The Dolphins now have to rebound and look to next week because they have a third consecutive national spotlight game, this time on Monday night on the road against the Carolina Panthers. Last week they lost 40-0 on the road at Baltimore on NFL Network.
“We’ve got to eliminate the penalties. It’s hard to win. The fumble, that’s at a terrible time. We talked about it all week as far as not turning the ball over against this group, because we couldn’t afford to. We just knew the success rate that (Raiders Head Coach) Jack (Del Rio) has had when his team wins the turnover battle. We did it at a very poor time. We probably could’ve had some points there. We’ve just got to make sure that we don’t do that,” said Gase.
BRIGHT SPOT
In the wake of the trade of starting running back Jay Ajayi, the Dolphins started Damien Williams, the fourth year veteran out of Oklahoma. He was solid, rushing for only 14 yards but combined with Kenyan Drake, they put up a solid 86 yard night. With Cutler on fire, it didn’t matter that the run game wasn’t. But that’s where Williams proved interesting, he had six receptions for 47 yards and a dynamic touchdown where he shook off several tackles and dove into the end zone with incredible will.
“I’m just showing you who I am every day. I don’t quit. I don’t go out of bounds for nobody. It is an effort play. They gave up, I didn’t,” Williams said in the locker room after the game.
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