Loss to Dolphins could end Pats' playoff hopes

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The New England Patriots are a more-than-respectable -- especially considering all of the injuries they've had -- 6-4, but, if the playoffs were starting this weekend, they would be on the outside looking in. The Jets, Titans, Steelers and Broncos all would qualify as division leaders, and the wild-card teams would be the Colts and Ravens, who, like the Patriots, are 6-4, but have better conference records. Indianapolis also has a head-to-head win over New England, which is only 4-4 against AFC teams, and just 2-2 against division opponents. Also ahead of the Patriots in the wild-card standings is Miami, which also is 6-4 but trounced the Pats in Foxboro in September, 38-13. That one-sided win snapped a highly embarrassing stretch for the Dolphins in which they'd lost 20 of their previous 21 games. The Pats, on the other hand, went into that game having won 21 consecutive regular-season games, and 23 of 24 overall.The Patriots, first-place finishers in the AFC East for the last five years, haven't missed the playoffs since 2002. But they'll be in grave danger of being left out of the postseason picture this year if they lose Sunday in Miami.The Dolphins haven't been to the playoffs since 2001. But despite their struggles in recent years, the Fish have fared well against New England, winning four of their last eight games against the Pats, and two of the last four played in Miami. While there's no question that the Dolphins have improved significantly this season since Bill Parcells was hired as team president and brought in Tony Sparano as head coach, Pats coach Bill Belichick, as is his wont, grossly overstates how good this Miami team really is."They are a great football team right now," Belichick said earlier this week. Great? Don Shula's 1972 Dolphins were a great football team. His Miami team that won a second straight Super Bowl the following year was a great team. The 1984 team for which Dan Marino threw 48 touchdowns but lost in Super Bowl XIX to Joe Montana and the 49ers certainly could be considered a great team. The 2008 Dolphins are hardly a "great" team, as such a devoted student of NFL history as Belichick must know.He also went on to call Miami's 17-15 victory Sunday over the Raiders an "impressive win." Having to kick a last-minute field goal to beat the 2-8 Raiders in your own stadium hardly qualifies as an "impressive win." What was impressive was how Miami, in its mauling of the Patriots in Week Three, totally baffled and befuddled Belichick's defense by unveiling the Wildcat formation -- a variation of the ancient Single Wing, in which the ball was snapped directly to multi-talented running back Ronnie Brown. "It's a formation they run maybe five to eight times a game," Belichick said. "They change it up every week, add a couple of new looks off it. Every time the ball is in Ronnie Brown's hands it is dangerous." That, at least, is not a typically Belichickian overstatement. It is dead-on accurate. Brown was spectacular in the first game against New England, especially operating out of the Wildcat.In six plays using that "everything old is new again" alignment, Brown ran four times and scored on three, including a 62-yard scamper. Twice, he handed off to running back Ricky Williams for a total of 24 yards. Most shocking to the Patriots, Brown even threw once -- a 19-yard, left-handed toss to tight end Anthony Fasano that resulted in another touchdown.If Brown and the Dolphins are similarly successful on Sunday, the Patriots' postseason hopes will be dead in the water. A loss would effectively leave New England two games behind the Dolphins in the playoff chase because Miami would have the edge in a standings tiebreaker by virtue of having swept the Patriots. And the Pats still have to face division-leaders Pittsburgh and Arizona -- fortunately, both games are in Foxboro -- and also, for the second time this season, play back-to-back games on the West Coast. Although -- once again, fortunately -- they're against Seattle and Oakland. Sparano and the Dolphins know what the stakes are this weekend. "My message to the players," Sparano said earlier this week, "is that if you walk through this door on Wednesday and your heart's not racing a million miles an hour, then you don't have a pulse. This is why we do what we do. We put ourselves in a position to have a big game here at home at the end of November." This is a very big game. If the Patriots lose it, they're not likely to be playing any big games in January.(Contact Jim Donaldson at jdonalds@projo.com.)(Distributed by Scripps Howard News Service, www.scrippsnews.com.)