The 96-2000 team was is frustrating. You can excuse 1996 because Jimmy tore down the entire roster (needed to be done, anyway). 1997 was promising and 1998 looked even better, but it all fell apart in 1999. A lot of it had to do with how Jimmy tried to mold the team into a run-first offense with a quick defense, and he did succeed to a point (especially with the defense), but at that point, Marino was so far in decline that teams knew he wasn't a deep ball threat. It also didn't help that Marino didn't have very many reliable receivers to throw to. OJ McDuffie was perhaps the best of an average corps of receivers. Kareem Abdul-Jabbar was a good RB, but he didn't have nearly a good a line as Emmitt Smith had in front of him, and his stats reflected this. Tim Ruddy was his best and most consistent lineman and everyone else was average at best. Richmond Webb was in decline like Marino was, so it just wasn't going to work.
To be fair, Jimmy was always swinging for the fences on offense. The most notable example was John Avery, who no one was going to confuse with Dave Meggett. Avery seemed to have the propensity to either just drop the ball or get tripped up by a stiff breeze. With that team, for every last second FG win over the Broncos, there were at least one or two just "why bother playing" losses to teams like the Broncos in the 1998 playoffs. And the less said about the 99 playoff loss to the Jaguars, the better...
To be fair, Jimmy was always swinging for the fences on offense. The most notable example was John Avery, who no one was going to confuse with Dave Meggett. Avery seemed to have the propensity to either just drop the ball or get tripped up by a stiff breeze. With that team, for every last second FG win over the Broncos, there were at least one or two just "why bother playing" losses to teams like the Broncos in the 1998 playoffs. And the less said about the 99 playoff loss to the Jaguars, the better...
carousel and got off 
