The Miami Dolphins took care of business on Sunday, defeating the Detroit Lions, 31-27, at Ford Field to improve to 5-3 on the season.
Miami has now split their matchups with NFC North opponents this year, as they lost their Week 6 battle against the Minnesota Vikings. They will face the Chicago Bears in Week 9 and the Green Bay Packers in Week 16.
Dealing with a number of injuries, the Dolphins will need to make sure they’re on their game and performing as they did in this contest.
Here are the winners and losers from Miami’s win over Detroit:
WINNER: QB Tua Tagovailoa
Tagovailoa finished the game with a 138.7 passer rating while completing 80.6% of his attempts for 382 yards and three touchdowns without throwing an interception. Miami is undefeated in games that Tagovailoa has finished this year, and if he stays healthy, he should be an easy pick for his first Pro Bowl.
LOSER: Coaching
Once again, the Dolphins were penalized heavily for unforced mistakes. In total, Miami had 16 flags thrown on them with only seven accepted for 55 yards. This is unacceptable, especially considering how many of them were offsides calls. This puts the team in poor situations, making it worse with injuries that they’ve had.
WINNER: WR Tyreek Hill
Hill has been worth every penny and draft pick that the Dolphins gave him and the Kansas City Chiefs for his services. On Sunday, he recorded 12 catches for 188 yards, keeping up his record-breaking pace. This season, Hill has four games over 160 receiving yards, while the rest of the NFL has five combined. He’s just two off of the Dolphins’ all-time record set by Mark Duper, who had more than 160 yards six times in 146 games with Miami.
LOSER: WR Erik Ezukanma
The Dolphins needed to activate another wide receiver for this game with River Cracraft out with a neck injury, and instead of making fourth-round pick Erik Ezukanma available, they opted to elevate undrafted rookie Braylon Sanders from the practice squad.
Sanders played 14 total snaps, all on offense, bringing in both of his targets for 17 yards. However, he did fumble on his first career reception.
The fact that Ezukanma can’t get on the field over an undrafted rookie says a lot about what Miami thinks of him at this point.
