It isn't much consolation, anyway, trying to play spoiler at the end of a season already spoiled. It is a sad, better-than-nothing consolation you were after, the last and lowest kind available. It would have provided not nearly enough to fill the emptiness still there.
So the New York Jets beat the Dolphins here Monday night 13-10, denying the home team and Dolfans the chance to deny their rivals a playoff spot, but it didn't matter much in a Miami season that has stopped mattering and, in the end, if anything, the result was just fitting, that's all.
The Dolphins and their fans would lay a decent claim to leading the NFL in disappointment this season, so why should Miami being denied a gift on Christmas night surprise anybody?
How could the final home game of a season such as this end any other way than with Dolphins fans trudging chin-down from the park to wonder (again) what went wrong?
What fell short?
It was too little offense (again), a 10th time in 15 games Miami did not top 17 points.
It was the Dolphins simply not being good enough (again), as the season record sank to 6-9 in a fifth straight season out of the playoffs.
This is not to suggest there is no God or Santa Claus, by the way. It is to suggest that neither God nor Santa seemed to like Miami very much this year, evidently. Or lately, for that matter.
There wasn't going to be any successful dressing up of this game in festive terms, no matter the calendar, no matter the cheerleaders in their Santa suits.
It was largely a meaningless game, nearly as pointless as the 0-0 score deep into the third quarter, except, ultimately, as a potential visceral victory for Dolfans over hated Jets fans who would lead the global economy if obnoxiousness were currency. Instead, it was a sixth consecutive prime-time victory by the Jets over Miami.
Of course, the result mattered to the Jets, the victory greasing their path to the playoffs. But the Jets are not our concern here.
For the Dolphins, win or lose, the soundtrack for this evening was closer to what Elvis Presley was briefly heard singing across Dolphin Stadium loudspeakers between the first and second quarters:
Blue season, it has been, and one that even a victory Monday would not have made all that much brighter.
All a victory would have done is set up the next sad consolation: possibly still finishing .500, a nonaccomplishment that, in the franchise's better days, would have been its own ignominy.
The night had the visual look of an August exhibition, from the steady sheet of rain that emptied all of those thousands of orange seats, to Cleo Lemon beginning the second half at quarterback.
A pregame electrical malfunction that doused the banks of end-zone lights lent a more literal feeling of gloom.
A festival of punts arose from domineering defenses repeatedly stymieing offenses that moved the ball like two teams of men attempting to push a boulder uphill.
The loss perfectly represented a season when none of the wishes came true.
Those Super Bowl predictions by major publications lied.
So, because of injury, did the promise of Daunte Culpepper's arrival.
The hope inspired by Nick Saban's arrival as coach?
That's on hold, in that mediocre space between satisfaction and disappointment where you find a not-quite-two-year record of 15-16.
No franchise in the NFL celebrates its history as fervently as the Dolphins, keeping alive a receding past in the recent absence of anything more current worth cheering.
Sad to note we got another reminder on Christmas night: The team with the storied past has no present.
Dan Marino's and Don Shula's statues greet stadium visitors, frozen reminders of halcyon days. On Monday, Marino and fellow former stars Dick Anderson, Mark Duper and Nat Moore were honorary captains, and Richmond Webb, the stalwart former tackle, was inducted onto the team's Honor Roll.
Also, Monday happened to be the 35th anniversary of ''The Longest Game,'' Miami's epic 1971 playoff victory at Kansas City.
More old glory. Always, old glory.
When is this club going to give its fans something new to cheer?
Five years out of the playoff is an NFL eternity. Now the team completes a season 1-5 against teams from its own division, all three of whom are younger overall.
''We gave this season away,'' superb defender Jason Taylor said in the buildup to this game.
``We threw it away.''
It was mindful of hearing founding club owner Joe Robbie, many years ago, lamenting that his franchise was ``wasting the Marino years.''
Now the same thing is happening with the Taylor and Zach Thomas years.
Maybe it will be different next season, of course. Maybe, maybe, maybe.
Blue Christmas.
Blue season.
Catch Greg Cote's Random Evidence of a Cluttered Blog daily at MiamiHerald.com.
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