Not quite the year of the Dolphins...

...but still a successful year nonetheless.

Granted, I wasn't here to witness the downfall of last year, nor most of the return to respectability this year, but I was catching the tail end of something special. Maybe it was too much to hope that we'd go all the way this year, after having went 1-15 last year, and having not made the playoffs since 2001, AND the fact that we haven't played in an AFC championship game since 1992.

But the fact that we DID go 11-5 this year is Cinderella story enough. Huge turnaround. Loads of respect. Had this been any other season, where we were touted highly to be the "Super Bowl or Bust" team (a la the JETS) then we, like the affore mentioned suckers, would have been a bust. And Miamians all around would curse the team, and prepare themselves to hop off the flaming bandwagon until the party got roaring again. (Yeah, I have to admit, that Miami-fans, of ALL sports, are the worse at supporting the teams when they suck. There's no Bostonian/Chicagoan pride here. Uh-uh. You lose. You suck. We'll holla at ya when there're more W's posted.)

But this year, no one suspected a season this good. One might've thought a mediocre turn around, but I doubt anyone thought playoffs, much less a winning record. So though we lost today, it's not a loss to weep over. We can still hold our heads high. We enjoyed the ball since we were lucky to have been invited. Now we'll just feast on smashed pumpkins, pick up our glass slipper, and tuck it away until next year to give us the motivation to get to the big dance.