There were actually five of the 14 games this year where the Dolphins played in a way that's associated with 6 or fewer wins on a season, and in fact the way they played in the Tampa Bay game was associated with less than one win.Turn around?
Dolphins started off strong, lost a few along the way and are now back on a roll.
The only unexpected losses were to the Bills and Buccaneers.
Saints, Ravens, Patriots and Panthers were all games that could have gone either way. Nothing shocking here, most pre-season predictions probably had the Dolphins losing most of those games. Aside from the Saints, the Dolphins were competitive in all of their losses.
The Dolphins are on track to a 10 - 6 season and a wildcard spot which is where most realistic homers would have put them at the beginning of the season.
There's more than the scoreboard to go on in determining "competitiveness."