The five-hour flight from San Francisco to South Florida allowed Joe Philbin and his coach staff an opportunity to both review the tape of Sunday’s loss to the 49ers but also start doing some homework in preparation for this week’s game against Jacksonville. Defensive coordinator Kevin Coyle met with the media early Monday afternoon and touched on some interesting subjects:
1. Colin Kaepernick’s 50-yard TD run that wrapped up the game came as a surprise to Coyle.
The 49ers faced a third-and-5 at midfield, and Kaepernick had just gotten blasted by outside linebacker Jason Trusnik on a 2-yard run the play before. Looking down from the press box, Coyle sensed that Kaepernick was hurting and didn’t think the Niners would call his number again. They did, and a hole opened up between Trusnik and defensive end Jared Odrick on the left end that he turned into a 50-yard touchdown run.
When asked about the play and whether Trusnik or Odrick was at fault, Coyle replied neither: “It wasn’t one or two guys on that run.
“They featured a style of perimeter run that they had not shown prior to our game; they ran it a little bit earlier in the game with limited success, and then they came back to it on their final drive.
“The play before was very similar, where he kept the ball and ducked back underneath and took a pretty good hit. Anticipating where we were in the game, after him getting hit pretty good there, I thought they were just going to run the ball and be content with trying to punt, and play defense at the end of the game.
“They came back with the same play and we just had some breakdowns along the way. I wish we’d had a little better force position; I could have helped them with that, but I thought they were going to run the ball up inside.”
2. Coyle can’t get over the inability _ he prefers to call it bad luck _ of the defense to force turnovers.
After breaking a three-game turnover drought with a Reshad Jones interception last week, the Dolphin defense had a real chance to come up with another on the first drive of the game when Koa Misi and Cam Wake forced a Kaepernick fumble, only to have 49ers tackle Anthony Davis beat Karlos Dansby to the loose ball.
Asked about the drought, Coyle replied, “That’s a good word for it.
“It’s hard to figure, but Cam hits the ball, the ball bounces and Karlos is diving for it as their offensive lineman (Davis) is, and they recover it and we don’t. Not for anybody’s lack of effort; everybody’s doing a great job rushing the quarterback.
“Koa Misi actually hits the quarterback first, and as he bounces off him Cam comes in and jars the ball loose. It seems it’s happened a number of times from that standpoint. We’ve created 17 fumbles and only gotten three of them. It’s not because guys aren’t hustling and flying to the ball. It’s hard to pinpoint the reason because it seems we’re right there and we haven’t come up with them. But we’re going to keep working at it.”
3. Philbin is encouraged but not buying the “moral victory” approach after tough losses to the Patriots and 49ers.
The Dolphins just played two of the best teams in the NFL and hung with both for more than 55 minutes. There’s something to be said for that _ after all, those same 49ers buried the Jets 34-0 and whipped Buffalo 45-3 _ but Philbin wasn’t taking any satisfaction from the close calls, and insisted his players weren’t either.
“I thought the energy, the mindset going into the football game was right,” he said. “I think our performance for a majority of the game would tell you that that was the case _ that the guys were ready to play the game. I think the tape shows that too, but, again, at the end of the day, we didn’t make enough plays in the fourth quarter to win the game.
“There’s got to be some dissatisfaction for us to even make steps to go forward and get better. So I hope they’re not satisfied. (I) hope they’re a little bit disappointed both in the outcome and so there’s going to be a little bit of that. I think our attitude overall is very good.”
If the Dolphins carry that attitude into the next two games, they should come away with victories over Jacksonville and Buffalo, both at home. They’re still in search of a meaningful win over a good team; they’ll get one more shot at that when they finish the season at New England two weeks from Sunday.
