Culpepper haunts Dolphins

Daunte Culpepper rushed for three touchdowns and threw two more as the Oakland Raiders defeated the Miami Dolphins 35-17. Culpepper certainly didn't resemble the supposedly injured QB the Dolphins discarded during the preseason. On a couple of his TD runs, he outran the Dolphin defenders pursuing him. While his passing wasn't great, he outperformed his replacement, Trent Green, who completed just 14 of 25 passes with two interceptions for a 55.1 QB rating.

The Dolphins wasted the second good performance by Ronnie Brown this season. Brown carried the ball 15 times for 134 yards and caught another 73 yards worth of passes. However, the defense let the Raiders run wild, piling up 299 rushing yards on 49 attempts. That's 6 yards per run!

The season is now a quarter of the way through. The Dolphins have yet to win a game, and what was thought to be the strength of the team -- the defense -- has looked awful so far. The offense is inconsistent, but everyone expected that. If the defense had lived up to its billing, the Dolphins would be 2-2 right now instead of 0-4.