The Good, Bad and Ugly From Dolphins' Week 5 Loss vs. Panthers

The Miami Dolphins lost to the struggling Carolina Panthers on Sunday, dropping their record to 1-4 and putting further strain on a team already teetering on the brink of collapse. 

It was not a good game to say the least, but like we do every week, we’ll try to find some “good,” while also making sure to properly cover the “bad” and the “ugly.” Suffice to say, the latter two categories will take the spotlight this week. 

The Good: Tua, Waller, Waddle, Achane 

The offense hit a bit of a lull in the second half, and we covered why in our film review, but these players had a nice game for the most part. 

The running game was brutal (19 total yards), but Achane’s touchdown catch to put the Dolphins up 10-0 was arguably the team’s best play of the day. Achane is still a playmaker, even if the running game is stagnant. 

As for the passing-game trio, Tua Tagovailoa’s numbers were quite good. He completed 75 percent of his passes and threw three touchdowns. He also had several big-time throws, including one down the seam to Darren Waller and another to the tight end for a touchdown. 

Waller caught all five of his targets for 78 yards and the touchdown. When he was on the field, the Dolphins used a lot more heavy personnel, which was fairly successful. 

Lastly, Jaylen Waddle posted his first 100-yard game since Week 12 of last season. He’s clearly good enough to anchor Miami’s passing attack now that Tyreek Hill is out with his knee injury. 

The passing game was hardly perfect Sunday, but most of those issues were systemic problems we knew the Dolphins had. 

Yes, Tua faltered on the final drive, but he played well overall on Sunday, so he deserves to land in this section, especially considering the performance of others. 

The Bad: The Defense 

In an upset, the defense doesn’t land in the ugly column this week. That has nothing to do with its play but is instead an indication that Miami’s issues run deeper than one side of the ball. 

Everyone will point to the Dolphins’ run defense, and that’s totally fair. Allowing Rico Dowdle to run for 203 yards is completely unacceptable. The Dolphins’ interior defensive line got pushed off the ball, and the back seven couldn’t tackle. 

That’s a bad combination against a team that really needs to run the ball to move down the field on offense. 

The Dolphins allowed 6.16 yards after contact, their highest of the season, and the worst mark for the Dolphins since a 2016 contest against the Pittsburgh Steelers.

It’s important not to let the pass defense off the hook either, because Bryce Young is not exactly a world beater. After his interception on the Panthers’ second drive, Young completed 17 of 26 passes for 165 yards and two touchdowns. 

Obviously, there’s a sample size consideration to be made, but when Young was on time, he had open receivers to throw the ball to. And when he needed to create, players like Tet McMillan, Xavier Legette, and Jimmy Horn beat Miami’s cornerbacks.

This was easily the worst game Rasul Douglas and Jack Jones played since arriving in South Florida, and it’s an underrated reason the Dolphins lost.  

The Ugly: Miami’s Offseason Changes 

This type of loss makes it difficult not to examine the team from a broader perspective. How did a team that made the playoffs two straight seasons and almost won the AFC East go from that to dropping a 17-point lead to this version of the Panthers? 

Ultimately, it’s a failure to adapt and evolve on both sides of the ball. 

On defense, it took the Dolphins until this offseason to start focusing on getting tougher up the middle. That led them to draft two defensive tackles with their first three picks, invest at linebacker, and overhaul the safety room. 

The jury is still out on the rookies, but the returns aren’t great. Jordyn Brooks has been OK this season, but Dodson was struggling before his injury, and KJ Britt wasn’t much better upon entering the game. At safety, Minkah Fitzpatrick made some nice plays, but Ifeatu Melifonwu and Ashtyn Davis missed a bunch of tackles at the second level. 

On offense, the team finally cared about guard this offseason. Well, James Daniels is hurt (not anyone’s fault, but still bad), and Jonah Savaiinaea is a disaster in pass protection and inconsistent in the running game. 

They finally signed a big receiver in Nick Westbrook-Ikhine, someone known for winning on vertical concepts, and they don’t let him run any. The Dolphins invested in a bigger back, Ollie Gordon II, but he’s a rookie and can’t create a ton for himself.

The structure of the offense remains largely unchanged. If the Dolphins can’t hit quick, middle-of-the-field routes, everything falls apart. The quarterback still can’t create outside of structure or consistently access all parts of the field with his arm. 

Don’t even get me started on the lack of investment in a true tight end, not a glorified receiver. Although the only button Miami pushed this offseason that seems to provide any type of changeup on offense is Darren Waller, who is a glorified receiver, but hey, at least he’s tall! 

All of that has led to a defense that struggles to stop the run and has had to build most of its secondary out of late-summer free agent additions, while the offense has yet to find a counter to the same coverages defenses have been using since 2022. 

The Dolphins pushed back on evolution in 2024 and tried to double down. Now, its 2025 pivot is looking like too little, too late — a last-gasp attempt to fix systemic issues that should’ve been addressed years ago.