What Big Week 1 Losses Have Meant for the Dolphins

Heading into the Monday night matchup, the Miami Dolphins were on the wrong end of the most lopsided score of Week 1 of the 2025 NFL regular season.

The 33-8 loss against the Indianapolis Colts at Lucas Oil Stadium wasn't the worst in a Dolphins opener, though, not even coming close to the 59-10 debacle against the Baltimore Ravens to kick off the rebuilding/resetting/tanking season of 2019.

It was, however, the fifth time in franchise history the Dolphins lost their opener by at least 20 points and overall the third-most lopsided Week 1 loss for the team.

Besides the 2019 game, the Dolphins were handed a 34-7 defeat by the Chicago Bears to kick off the 1988 season.

The other opening-day losses by 20 points or more came in 1986 against the San Diego Chargers (50-28) and in 2012 against the Houston Texans (30-10) in Ryan Tannehill's Dolphins debut.

For those wondering, the Dolphins have four wins by 20 or more in openers — in 1995 against the New York Jets (52-14), in 2000 against the Seattle Seahawks (23-0), in 2002 against the Detroit Lions (49-21) and in 2005 against the Denver Broncos (34-10).

But since it was a loss the Dolphins had this season, let's focus on what that might mean for the rest of the season based on team precedent as well as recent NFL history.

THE DOLPHINS AFTER WEEK 1 BLOWOUT LOSSES

The immediate bad news in terms of precedents for the Dolphins is that they've never made the playoffs after starting with a loss of 20 or more points.

They never even finished with a winning record.

The closest they came was in 1986 when the went on to finish 8-8 after that loss against the Chargers. They went 7-9 after losing against Houston in 2012, 6-10 against losing the Bears in 1988, and finally 5-11 after the 49-point loss against the Ravens in 2019, though that entire season almost deserves an asterisk.

WHAT RECENT NFL HISTORY TELLS US

The Dolphins not only had the worst opening-day loss this year (pending the Monday night result between the Chicago Bears and Minnesota Vikings), they were the only team to lose by at least 20 points.

Examining the data over the past 10 years, the averages of games decided by 20 points or more in Week 1 is 2.7, so this was an aberration.

But what happened to those 27 teams that lost their opener by 20 or more from 2015-24?

Not surprisingly, that kind of loss often is a harbinger of things to come and 23 of them wound up not making the playoffs that season, with 10 of them failing to win more than five games.

But not all hope is lost.

From 2020-24, 12 teams lost their opener by 20 or more and four of them ended up making the playoffs — the 2020 Cleveland Browns, 2021 Tennessee Titans and Green Bay Packers, and the 2023 Pittsburgh Steelers.

The 2023 Cincinnati Bengals didn't make the playoffs after losing their opener 24-3 against the Cleveland Browns, but they did finish with a winning record (9-8).

More incredibly, those 2021 Titans and Packers wound up earning the No. 1 seed in the AFC and NFC playoffs after losing their opener by 25 and 35 points, respectively — Tennessee was routed at home by the Arizona Cardinals 38-13, the Packers were humbled on the road by the New Orleans Saints 38-3.

Of course, it's only fair to point out that Tennessee and Green Bay were coming off division titles before their bad opening losses, whereas the Dolphins missed the playoffs last season.

Still, we'd imagine the feeling in Green Bay and Tennessee after that forgettable 2021 opening weekend for Packers and Titans fans might have been similar to what Dolphins fans are going through after the team's embarrassing loss at Indianapolis on Sunday.

Nobody is suggesting the Dolphins are going to duplicate what the Packers and Titans did four years ago, but maybe the thought here is to not give up on the season because of one bad outing.

THE DOLPHINS AFTER WEEK 1 BLOWOUT LOSSES

WHAT RECENT NFL HISTORY TELLS US

More Miami Dolphins Coverage: