Time's up for Tony Sparano. We may be stuck with him the rest of this season, especially with Mike Nolan, the most obvious possible replacement, not looking any better than his boss, but any lingering belief that Sparano might be an NFL head coach has been extinguished.

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I'm sure lots of Phinsiders are [re]watching the game today, and I'm sure lots of you will post much closer analyses of what happened, but I thought I'd jot down the things I noticed, anyway.  I'll read them, even if nobody else does. :)

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On the NFL channel on Sirius a little while ago, the host (dunno which one, they all sound alike to me) set up a segment on the Dolphins by saying everything is terrible in Miami: the owner is terrible, the FO is terrible, the coaches are terrible, the offense is terrible.  Those are his words, almost verbatim.

He then brought Armando on to discuss the details.  Did Armando correct any of that nonsense?  No.  Did he even attempt to provide a more balanced view?  No.  The setup told him what the host wanted him to do, and he obeyed.  He crapped on everything about the Dolphins.  Everything.

After the conversation we've had recently about the lousy coverage the Dolphins get from the national media, Armando's performance really hit a sore spot.  If your own local media isn't prepared to correct the national media's errors, why ask the national media to get better?

Thanks for nothing, Armando.  You've demonstrated once again that while you are a gifted self-promoter, you're a lousy excuse for a reporter.

Pardon the screed, Phinsiders.  Had to get that off my chest.

As it turns out, I'm going to be in New York next Friday, Saturday, and Sunday.  Anybody got any suggested locales for a Dolphins fan to catch some of the draft? 

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A lot of people have been saying we shouldn't use our first round pick on a running back; running back is a mid-round position.  So, with that in mind, who's impressing you among the mid-round running backs?

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Of all the disheartening things we've heard and read about our team this season, this is the most disheartening of all:

"This isn’t the north, where you want to just take it 4 yards and a cloud of dust," Ross added. "I think I look for a different brand. Seeing the Dolphins, how fans want to see them, how we win, we’re going downfield, the days of Dan Marino, the days we all want to go back to."

That's a man who wants to sell tickets, ads, and merchandise, not a man who wants to win championships.  It's so wrong-headed, I hardly know where to start.

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There are only 2 things that are clear to me about the future of this franchise, at the moment:

1. Dan Henning has to go.  I actually predicted somewhere around here that this team could take a step back this year because of all the churn, especially along the offensive line.  But what I'm seeing on offense isn't a step back; it's a disorganized retreat.
   
2. Mike Nolan has to stay.  While the offense has been coming apart like a used Kleenex, Nolan has been welding the defense together into one of the best units in football. The man clearly knows what he's doing, and he's an excellent fit for our personnel (which is nice, since we spent the last 3 years assembling it).

Everything else?  I'm fuzzy about that, but here's some sketchy thoughts. 

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What if they held a draft and nobody came?

So the big question on the minds of all Dolphins fans is: what will Miami do with the first pick in the draft?  We have lots of needs, and there are lots of option.  Let's peruse them.  Some of us favor Jake Long, at LT.  Others say Long is better suited to RT, and both the draft and FA are deep at the OT position.  Good points.  Some people favor Chris Long, at DE or OLB.  Others say either position is not one where we have our greatest needs, and Long might be a tweener, regardless.  Some people favor Matt Ryan, at QB.  Others say taking a QB at #1 would be too expensive, especially given that we just drafted a QB last season, and Ryan doesn't seem to be a #1 QB.  

Glenn Dorsey is pretty much out of the running now, given his health problems.  There's McFadden, universally regarded the biggest talent in the draft, but RB is the one position we're actually pretty deep at.

The upshot is: there's nobody in this draft who's worth a #1 pick, this year, to these Miami Dolphins.  If we could, we'd trade down out of the top spot, snag one of the Longs or maybe Sedrick Ellis or even Ryan, and not have to pay them so much more than they're worth to us.  The problem is -- as, ahem, I predicted back in Nov. -- nobody particularly wants to trade up to our spot.  So there's nobody we particularly want at #1, and there's nobody to trade down with.

So how about this: when the commish announces the Dolphins are on the clock on draft day, Jeff Ireland goes to the podium and says, "Pass."

That's right.  With the #1 pick, the Miami Dolphins select nobody.  Let the Rams pay somebody out the ass, if they want to.  If not, they can pass, and let the Falcons inherit the problem.  Honestly, it wouldn't bother me one bit if that's what we did on draft day.  The NFL would go apey, of course, but maybe seeing somebody do something so drastic on draft day would cause them to restructure the way the draft works.

Or, if passing is just too much for you, how about this: a couple weeks before the draft, we buttonhole some kid we'd like to take in a later round and say, "Looky here.  We'll draft you #1 if you'll commit right now to a reasonable contract and guarantee you'll show up for training camp on day one."

I think I still prefer just passing, but that's partly just because I'd like to watch the ensuing train wreck.  What do you think?

Just heard on ESPN's "NFL Live" that Wayne Huizenga is saying he "still intends" to sell the team.  I didn't even know it had been firmly established -- much less publicly admitted by Wayne -- that he ever intended to sell the team; now he tells ESPN he "still intends" to sell. Maybe those tears on Sunday were from the dollar signs in his eyes causing some irritation.

What does this mean?  How does it affect the GM/HC rumors?