You'll remember that back in July we ran a contest here for Dolphins/Patriots Monday Night Football tickets. The tickets were graciously donated by one of our community members - "Jupiterfins." The winner of the contest was "Whippets2" - whose real name is Bob. Bob had entered the contest and explained how he was a heart transplant recipient. Of all of the worthy entries, Bob was voted the winner of the tickets.
You can read Bob's entry here.
Today I got an e-mail from Bob, expressing his gratitude for the tickets. And coming off of two tough losses these past two weeks, Bob's words are really refreshing. They remind us all why we love this game - and this team.
Below is the e-mail I received from Bob. Enjoy!
Matty,
You often hear people talk about some epiphany of life experience they have had and how it moved them and you say to yourself what the heck are they talking about. Well I now know. It is that soul shaking moment of truth. That moment in your life that you cannot seem to comprehend the magnitude it is affecting you till you are in it. That is what I experienced, and Jupiterfins provided to me on Monday Night. I literally, at 53, sat in that chair with over an hour till kickoff, looked around the stadium, and a feeling came over me like nothing else I have ever experienced; tears started rolling down my face and I literally had to look down cause I started to shake in my seat. Thank God my roommate from college was in the back getting us something to drink.
I figured it out on the plane ride home as that moment was a check off of a bucket list item and a movement towards the finality of my life. It was a completion of something that I said I wanted to do before I got my new heart and here I was actually doing it. I cannot express the gratitude to Jupiterfins, you and everyone on the site for allowing me the pleasure to go to the game.
Ok - now for the game.
I think people thought I was a nut, but I bet the next day they were going that was what that guy was yelling in the stands. I called for the head of the special teams guy a hundred times. I cringed at every kickoff, every punt, and that as before the crap started happening. So with that said no more talk about Special Teams but I do have a few other thoughts.
1. Chad Henne - Chad is great in the pocket and throws beautiful passes right to his receivers, if there is NO RUSH. If he feels pressure, his feet start moving as fast as a someone running from a burning building and that is when he gets in trouble. Chad does not trust his receivers or his reads. He does not throw until the receiver is out of his break and he has to see that break so he has to lock on to his target. As Dan says pick a guy and let if fly and what I think he means by that is trust them throw to the spot they will be there Chad doesn't and it was so obvious that was the case on the pick to Bess.
2. OC - My god, could this guy be any worse? How many dink and dunk passes can you possible call. Not one pass to stretch the D. NOT ONE. Now that may have been Chad but still you can let the D crowd the line and in the end the dink could not work cause there were too many in area of the throws. Are you kidding me you run Wildcat on 3rd and 6.....6......right there Sparano should have said you need to go home.
3. DC - Two weeks in a row, you know they have one guy to go to. Jets Keller, Patriots Welker. And you don't do anything about it. Your solution was Benny Sapp. No double, no bump and run on him you just let Welker run free. Oh wait you did that cause you were going to put pressure on Brady that's right with a huge rush and blitz package, Oh wait no you chose to rush 2 and 3 and let him sit back there and not double Welker, the last two games NOLAN GETS AN F. Let go back to the first series where we were all over Brady and it was 3 and out. I said oh man we are going to be on tonight. That package that was in there was working every time it was in, too bad it wasn't in enough. What has happened to our run D, its horrible, how about a few run blitzes oh wait how about just a BIitz. I could go on but will stop there.
4. Fans - I understand that we got blown out and that it was my only experience and I was staying at the stadium till they kicked me out, but you get up on a Monday night game and vacate the stadium with 2 min gone in the third Quarter. I was like WOW. That was what they call MASS EXODUS. But I understand, I was thoroughly embarrassed myself. On a side note, can Patriot fans be any more annoying? Talk about a bunch of classless clowns.
We are young, we have most of the pieces, we lack coaching, intuition, administrative integrity (stupid penalties like false starts and stuff like that, things that can be controlled), creativity ( there is nothing special anymore; it's so generic on both sides of the ball). It seems like we have handcuffed our coaching staff, everything is so generic.
Matty and Jupiterfins, thank you both for allowing me the thrill of a lifetime. I will never forget it.