The Miami Dolphins’ week began with star receiver Tyreek Hill in handcuffs, the victim of police abuse of power after a traffic stop. You thought things couldn’t possibly get worse.

Then Thursday night happened.

In an almost unimaginably familiar double-nightmare, the Dolphins lost, 31-10, at home to the rival Buffalo Bills (again), and also lost quarterback Tua Tagovailoa to a concussion (again).

In the micro view a hundred things go into winning or losing any one NFL football game, and Miami did most of them wrong Thursday. But from a macro vantage three major hurdles will define whether this Miami Dolphins season may be looked back on as a success.

The Fins faced that first telling hurdle Thursday night in prime time, and tripped on it. Badly. Embarrassingly.

Miami needed to beat its arch-nemesis, the bleepin’ Bills, for a change. Instead it was a Buffalo stampede as the Fins were run asunder at home.

And the beat goes on ...

Buffalo has won four straight AFC East division titles largely over the backs of the Dolphins, and it seems little has changed. The Bills are still walking the Fins like a dog on a leash. Buffalo has now beaten Miami in five straight games, 12 of the past 13, and 14 of the past 16.

As bad, Tagovailoa left the game in the third quarter with what was ruled a concussion after a hard hit — and after throwing three interceptions.

Might Tua be sidelined for several weeks as he was in 2022?

Anybody got Ryan Tannehill’s phone number?

A lopsided home loss to the Bills coupled with a recurrence of Tagovailoa’s old concussion problem, wow.

The three things Miami must do to make this season a success — with one leading to the next:

1. Find a way to beat the doggone Bills.

2. Win the AFC East to avoid a road playoff game in wintry cold.

3. Win in the postseason, at least one game, for the first time in 24 years, the NFL’s worst such drought.

It was Miami’s regular season-ending home loss to the Bills last year that blew the division title and sent the Dolphins off to sub-freezing Kansas City to lose in playoffs.

Wait. Need to add one more imperative:

4. Keep Tua healthy.

Thursday was supposed to signal a change at last. Instead the Dolphins played like a team expecting to lose and inventing ways to do it, even before Tua went down and out.

The game book-ended an emotional, crazy five days in the history of Miami sports’ flagship team.

The week began with the star receiver Hill a victim of excessive police force during a traffic stop on Sunday, dropped face-down on the pavement and handcuffed behind his back but later catching an 80-yard TD pass to lead a comeback win over Jacksonville.

I thought the week might end with Hill’s team rising and winning Thursday, not despite that shocking cop controversy that has dominated headlines, but perhaps in part because of it. The Bills had other ideas.

Hill called what happened Sunday “shell-shocking” but said football would be therapeutic for him.

“It’s how I get away from a lot of stuff,” he said. “This is how I separate myself from past traumas in my life. I’m not gonna mix the two.”

The Dolphins were trying to get away from a lot of stuff too Thursday with a victory against the one team they must learn to beat. The losing skid to the Bills and the fallout from the police incident with Hill dominated the buildup to the game.

“That’s going to be what’s written out there until we do something about that,” Tagovailoa had said of the can’t-beat-the-Bills narrative. “Until we do beat them, and we beat them consistently, none of that’s going to change. And we have an opportunity to do that this year. We have an opportunity to do that Thursday.”

Opportunity lost — largely because of Tagovailoa’s three interceptions leading to 17 Bills points.

And the beat goes on.

Tua’s first pick happened because his pass caromed up for grabs off the shoulder pads of rookie receiver Grant DuBose. The Bills turned the turnover in a 17-yard scoring pass.

Miami tied it 7-7 on Tagovailoa’s 5-yard touchdown pass to De’Von Achane.

Then came pick No. 2, with Robbie Chosen either running a wrong route or Tua grossly overthrowing him. The Bills cashed it for a 43-yard field goal.

Buffalo needed no turnovers for James Cook’s 1-yard and 49-yard TD runs to make it 24-7.

The Fins’ 34-yard field goal for a 24-10 deficit just before the half was not enough to quell the scattered booing.

Pick No. 3 was the worst, with Tua meaning to throw the ball away out of bounds but tossing it weakly enough for Ja’Marcus Ingram to catch and sprint 31 yards into the end zone to make it 31-10.

Tagovailoa was on his knees, literally but too figuratively, as Ingram crossed the goal line.

Even the best QBs can be forgiven an occasional nightmare game of this sort. But this QB did it against a nemesis rival, weeks after signing a hugely rich contract extension, so he invited the doubts about him to reappear — along with the concerns about his history of concussions.

The Dolphins played in their popular aqua throwback jerseys, with end zones painted in old-timey orange. None of the glory-days mojo helped.

I know. Beating Buffalo would have been only one game. But this felt bigger than that, it was bigger, symbolically, at least.

“We know the stakes of it,” coach Mike McDaniel had said. “Bottom line is, you get in this business for stakes like that.”

Trouble is, those stakes are through Miami’s heart when it comes to Bills.

Dolphins safety Jordan Poyer, prior a seven-year Bill, had admitted on arrival this offseason that the Bills always thought Miami a team that might fold under pressure or quit when down. Thursday was supposed to end all of that. It did not.

New England owned the AFC East with 17 titles in 18 years through 2019. Then Tom Brady left. There was new hope. Miami hoped to step up, take over. But Buffalo has now won four straight division crowns.

Thursday was supposed to signal the beginning of change.

But the beat goes on.

The Dolphins recently produced T-shirts that read, MIAMI DIFFERENT. McDaniel wore one this week.

The slogan means to signify that things are different this year, with this team.

“If you’re trying to do something that maybe the organization maybe hasn’t achieved in 24 years,” he explained by example, meaning a playoff win. “If you’re trying to stand out in the world. I think [we’re] leaning into that, creating our own standard for what we think our football should look like.”

Miami Different is not a bad slogan.

Would be even better, though, if the Bills hadn’t just made it seem like Miami Same-Old, Same-Old.

©2024 Miami Herald. Visit at miamiherald.com. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.