MIAMI – Against all odds, the Miami Dolphins are one win away from qualifying for the playoffs.
Something that seemed a long way off last year, after losing the first three games by a total of 117 points combined in what was, a historically bad start.
Miami had the worst plant in the world NFL, He hired players who had no team and made them play on Sunday. And with that in mind, they managed to win three of the last five games and dream of a better future.
Being a playoff candidate so soon?
Unthinkable, considering the myriad of questions this team had.
But among so many questions, there is a clear certainty, and is that the Dolphins, after much searching, finally found the head coach listed in Brian Flores.
Flores is one of five siblings from a family of Honduran immigrant children. His parents, Raúl and Maria, moved to the United States in the 1970s to provide their children with a potentially better future.
Without a lot of money, but with iron values, that was exactly what they got.
Flowers fell in love with American football at age 12 under the tutelage of her uncle, played for Boston University College, and got her first chance in the NFL as a scouting assistant with the New England Patriots in 2004.
Integrity, work and clear communication are its three main values.
And these characteristics made him climb the ladder in New England, where he ended up being in charge of defensive calls when Matt Patricia he was named head coach of the Detroit Lions.
His Patriots fans always talk about Flowers “the person,” rather than the coach, and that the respect they have for him is absolute.
After 12 interviews, he finally got the opportunity he missed so much in Miami as head coach.
The Dolphins have the only duo of general manager and head coach African Americans in the entire NFL, but origins aside, the capabilities of both speak for themselves.
The head coach is supposed to do his best to win on Sundays, and the general manager tries to make the best team possible, but to think that they both don’t work in unison would be to miss the truth.
Which brings us to this present in Miami, where Flowers tries to balance winning in the present, with thinking the best for the future of the Dolphins.
After the team started with a 3-3 record and was in the middle of a winning streak, Flowers decided to sit down with veteran quarterback Ryan Fitzpatrick, to give way to rookie Tua Tagovailoa.
Tagovailoa has alternated good with bad, although the team has continued to win, thanks in large part to a great defense and some very good special teams.
Already on two occasions since then, Flores has sat in Tagovailoa when he was playing poorly to replace Fitzpatrick again.
The most recent occasion, this past Saturday when Fitzpatrick led the Dolphins to a crucial win in the face of their playoff aspirations.
As you can imagine, the criticism came en masse. While some are crying out for Fitzpatrick to be the incumbent –flowers has already ratified Tagovailoa–, others allege that such constant changes only drain confidence in their new quarterback.
But while the noise is heard from outside, inside, Fitzpatrick and Tagovailoa, despite the two wanting to play, hug and encourage each other constantly thinking for the good of the team.
“It works because Flowers is a great communicator,” Fitzpatrick emphasized when referring to the constant changes.
They say that when you have two marshals, you essentially don’t have one. And while that dynamic is very unusual, I applaud the fact that Flowers turns a deaf ear to criticism for going against the norm, while keeping the locker room afloat, his team in restraint, and the future in good hands.
A very difficult thing to do, which for now seems to work.
In fact, I dare say that if the Dolphins qualify for the playoffs, Brian Flors will be named Coach of the Year, although he has a big competitor in Kevin Stefanski, of the Cleveland Browns.
Beyond the fact that the situation of marshals takes all the spotlight, there is no denying that he has maximized the talent of his players, and that he has turned a defensive without so many glittering names, into an elite unit.
Adjustments in the meantime, which were not seen in Miami for a long time, are now commonplace.
And for a novice quarterback, there’s nothing better than learning when his team doesn’t depend on him to win games.
Flowers is building these Dolphins his way, and next year he will have multiple first- and second-round picks in the draft again.
That is why, in the midst of so many unanswered questions, there is an inescapable reality: Brian Flowers is a great head coach.