It’s been a wild week for NYC Dolphins fans. Last Sunday we were as high as we could be, wiping the Jets out and dancing in their home stadium. Then 24 hours later our city had been so badly damaged that it’s going to be years before we can fully recover. And then of course there was the Colts loss as icing on the cake. But we are New Yorkers and we are not going to let this mess us up! So many of our members and friends have had their places damaged or destroyed, people are without work and power.
Dolfans NYC has been committed to raising money for charity from day one and I can’t think of a better time than now to give. Last night I set up a fundraiser to try to raise money for the Greater New York Red Cross. I put a $1000 target goal, but hoped to eventually raise even more. In less than 24 hours we have already raised more than half of that and donations keep coming in. It just shows you how awesome this community, and the larger Dolphins community is.
So check out this video I recorded at Third & Long during the Colts game on Sunday. We talk to some of the members of our club that have been impacted by the storm. These guys are the lucky ones but still have had some terrible stuff happen since the storm hit. And after you watch the movie check out our fundraiser page and make a donation. You can get some cool prizes including Dolfans NYC shirts which we are making available for the first time outside of Third & Long.
So keep the donations coming. You guys are inspiring. I hope you are all safe out there. Go Dolphins!
The DolfansNYC tailgate and takeover was the most successful thing we have ever done as a club. We bought 200 tickets, rolled up to the stadium in two packed busses and were pretty much the only fans left at the end of the game. It was amazing. There had to have been more than 300 fans at the tailgate and we sold out of EVERY Dolfans NYC t-shirt and raised a bunch of money for charity. We plan on donating $1500 to the Miami Dolphins Foundation when Michelle and I head down to Miami for the Titans game in two weeks. Really great experience.
If you somehow missed the news we had a few special guests at the tailgate… Dolphins owner Stephen Ross showed up with minority owner Fergie of the Black Eyed Peas, CEO Mike Dee, Phins great Nat Moore, MiamiDolphins.com Andy Kent and a ton of cheerleaders. It was so cool of them to do that and a pretty good PR move. Some Jets fan hit Mr. Ross with a cheeseburger knocking his glasses off. Luckily they fell right at my feet and as soon as Ross got his glasses back on he just ignored the whole thing and kept posing for pictures and signing autographs. One of our members asked him why he came down and he said “I could have stayed in my box all game but I had to check out the tailgate. This is the biggest Dolphins fan club in the United States!” Very cool.
After the tailgate we filled the stands. We may have been in the endzone in the nosebleeds but I assure you our presence was felt. Mike Dee tweeted after the game “Great to head home w/a win. Complete team effort w/ an assist from DolfansNYC, who kept the Fins chants going all game long!” Reggie Bush didn’t mention us by name but he Tweeted “Loved the Dolphins fans showing up today! We heard you guys loud and clear and so did the rest of the stadium! Thanks for your support.” Not to brag or anything (okay maybe a little) I was leading the chants from the endzone. By the end of the game all the Jets fans were gone and the Dolphins fans left seemed to flood into our sections and we chanted “LET’S GO DOLPHINS” so loudly you could hear it on TV. It was one of the best experiences of my life. What a great day.
I want to thank everybody who came out, and especially want to thank my partner Michelle who did all the dirty work on this one. I am pretty good at doing the promoting and doing the screaming but Michelle is the best party planner you could imagine and put all 199 tickets we bought on her credit card. We have worked on this for months, but she busted her ass all week on the details while I was off hanging out with my girlfriend in California. So thanks Michelle, thanks to Sailor Jerry rum for sponsoring the tailgate, thanks to Third & Long for hosting a breakfast before we got on the buses, thanks to everyone who joined us at the game and thanks to the Miami Dolphins organization for not just recognizing us but supporting us.
Week one was a huge success for Dolfans NYC but not so much a success for the Miami Dolphins. We had a packed house at Third and Long(sadly we had to send a few fans next door until we could sneak more people in) and we raised some money for the Miami Dolphins Foundation with another raffle. A lot of the regulars won the prizes so I was happy about that. If you didn’t win you will have more chances. We plan on doing a bunch of raffles this year. We won’t be doing one this Sunday but we will have a new batch of t-shirts for sale.
The Dolphins on the other hand did not play so well. They teased us with great defense and better than expected offense for about 25 minutes. They couldn’t get in the endzone but they looked good against a VERY good team. And then they fell apart. They had four turnovers in four possessions and got scored on three times in the last three minutes of the half making a 3-3 game a 24-3 game by the time they went into the locker room. Aside from a special teams touchdown they couldn’t get in the endzone in the second half and lost 30-10.
It took me two days to get over the game but in the end I came out feeling pretty okay about it. Yes, it was painful to watch but if you think about it there were a lot of positive signs. The Dolphins run defense was dominant and the secondary did okay. Andre Johnson is one of the best players in the NFL and the Texans have a very good offense. They scored 24 points off of turn overs and ended up scoring only 30 points. That’s impressive.
The offense couldn’t score in the red zone and gave up four turnovers which you don’t want to see. But it’s not very often that a team gives up four turnovers in four drives. Tannehill looked pretty good aside from throwing passes into the defensive line and I think that stuff is correctable. Some of the missed passes that looked like over throws or under throws were mostly to Armstrong and Hartline, two players that have only been practicing with Tannehill for a week. Their timing will get better and Hartline looked very healthy. The right side of the o-line struggled and we clearly need better receivers, but the run game looks awesome, the o-line should get better as the year goes on and when Hartline and Armstrong play with Tannehill for a bit longer the passing game could improve significantly.
The Dolphins are not going to be a good team this year and we know it. But there were a lot of good signs against the Texans that were over shadowed by a few minutes in the second quarter. If Tannehill turns out to be a pretty good QB in this league this year won’t even matter. But that being said I think the Dolphins are going to be a lot better at the end of the year than they are now. And for the record I think they beat the Raiders on Sunday. Go Dolphins.
Check out the slideshow of pictures from Third & Long below. If you want to save a photo double click on it and it will take you to Flickr.
Well this is it boys and girls… The end of another disappointing Dolphins season… but at least this year there are things to hope for. The team has played great of late and it looks like we have a pretty good running back in Reggie Bush. He is out for the Jets game but the future looks bright. If we can manage to get a QB and a new coach there is no telling what 2012 will bring for the Dolphins. To start it off right we can help knock the Jets out of the play offs this weekend. No better way to start the year for a Dolphins fan in NYC. And if we lose to the Jets and the Redskins win it will go a long way to getting us a pretty good quarterback.
Anyway this week I know a lot of you will be tempted to stay in bed and crawl to your couch after a night of heavy drinking on NYE. With the game on TV it might make it hard for some folks to get to the bar. That’s why we are giving you a reason to leave your house for one more Sunday! We are going to say goodbye to the 2011 Dolphins in style!
We are going to have some sort of breakfast food waiting for you when you get to the bar. At the very least there will be bagels and Bloody Mary drink specials and we could have more stuff like eggs and bacon and delicious things to help you get rid of your damn hang over.
We are also going to be doing our last raffle of the year! We want to raise a little bit more money for charity so we are going to be getting rid of all the rest of the stuff that we have been holding on to. Last night I went to Jay Fiedler’s 40th birthday party and he signed a couple items for me for the raffle. We also have a few Nat Moore autographs left over from the Nat More meet up. We also have some assorted things like a Jim Mandich t-shirt and some actual game day Dolphins socks! We might even have some Garo Yepremian signed stuff too. I have been told by one of Garo’s business partners that it’s in the mail but I am not sure if it’s gonna come in time.
No matter what we should have a great time on New Years Day and get to say goodbye to everyone for a while. But don’t worry, you won’t have to wait all off season to see everyone because we have some special events we are working on including a 1972 Dolphins reunion in North Jersey and of course our yearly draft party. Things are looking up! Go Dolphins!
Although it seems ages ago after that tragedy that befell us on Thanksgiving Day, last Sunday was fantastic. Our boys in Aqua trounced the Buffalo Jills in the most brutal fashion. Our defense came up huge pounding away on the Bills who limped off the field down by multiple scores after just the first half. It was a beautiful thing.
Third and Long was not exactly packed as you might expect when your team loses seven straight games to open a season but the die hards are there every week and by the end of the first quarter the bar was bumping. This was the most fun I have had watching a Dolphins game since I had second row seats to watch the Phins beat the Jets at the Meadowlands to lock up the AFC Championship in 2008. It was a great day.
I took a few pictures that are not exactly the most flattering shots of our bunch. Earlier in the year we tend to have a lot more cute girls out. But hey a win is a win and shots all around. Go Dolphins!
If you want to save a picture double click the slide show below and it will open up in a new window!
As many of our regular members found out, a Miami Dolphins camera crew visited the home of DolfansNYC, Third and Long, during our Nat Moore event to interview Michelle, Igor and a few die-hards, and find out more about our unique club.
The feature appeared in Episode 8 of “Inside the Fins,” which aired on a local Dolphins affiliate in South Florida, and is now available on MiamiDolphins.com. Check out the video on here (scroll to the 15:30 mark for our segment) for an inside look at DolfansNYC.
I am a bit late posting these photos, basically because last week killed me inside and I have spent the last six days pretending that football is not a thing. Unfortunately, it still is a thing and I get to go down to Third & Long tomorrow and hang out with everyone and have an amazing time until the Dolphins embarrass us again.
Then again, I remember thinking we were going to get killed by the Chargers a few years ago and we Wild Catted the hell out of them. I was watching the game at a Dolphins bar in CT called Woody’s and that place was a big part of the inspiration for us starting Dolfans NYC. Unfortunately this year I don’t think we have any secret weapons and with Daniel Thomas and Vontae Davis out we could be in a lot of trouble…
Anyway, despite losing last week. we raised over $300 for charity through our raffle and t-shirt sales. Tomorrow we won’t be doing a raffle at Third & Long but we will have Dolfans NYC t-shirts. So yeah, check out the photos below and let’s all pray to Don Shula that the Dolphins somehow get their shit together tomorrow and win at least one game before the bye week.
As many of you may know, Inside the NFL‘s cameras were at Third and Long, the home of DolfansNYC, filming during Sunday’s game against the Houston Texans. Susannah Collins visited several New York bars that catered to out-of-town sports fans, and interviewed a few members of DolfansNYC for the segment. It aired on TV last night and will re-air in the coming days, so check your local listings to find it on Showtime. Check out the video below or on the Showtime Sports website.
