1. Star Trek occasionally threw in a parallel-universe script in which everything was flipped - the good Capt. Kirk had a bad Capt. Kirk, the bad Vulcans were the good Vulcans, etc ... Maybe that's the the proper way to introduce what a respect analystics site's numbers ask:

Are the Dolphins the second-best team in football?

Actually, the Advanced Football Analytics states that with its weekly team efficiency rankings. The Dolphins are behind only Denver using its numbers-crunching analysis, as you can see here. The top five teams: Denver, Miami, Indianapolis, Green Bay and Cincinnati.

The Dolphins are good and talented - everyone can agree. But second in the NFL? They ranked second last week, too, when I talked to Brian Burke, who began the site in 2006 and is respected in football. He does analytical work for a few teams. Last year's top two teams by his formula: Denver and Seattle, the Super Bowl teams.

So why are the Dolphins so high?

"If you had to pick one number, and that’s all you could know about a team, it’d be yards per (pass) attempt,'' Burke said. "That’s where the Dolphins stand out on their defense."

The Dolphins' defense ranks first in the league with a 6.1 yards per pass attempt.

Also, the Dolphins offensive and defense shines in the running game. Advanced Football Analytics uses a success-rate to judge running games. A successful running play's success is judged only as "yes" or "no" depending on the following criteria:

First down: At least five yards.

Second down: Half of the remaining yardage to the first down.

Third down: If it gets a first down.

The Dolphins have a fourth-best success rate against the rush on defense (62.7 percent). They have the best success rate on offense (53.2 percent).

So ... that leaves the passing game. And there's where the Dolphins don't stack up. THey rank fourth-worst at 6.6 yards per attempt.

"My system likes the Dolphins because teams can’t move the ball on them,'' Burke said. "They’re going to cause a lot of problems for a lot of people And their passing efficiency on offense is pretty low - they've had some struggles on offense. They're not going to necessarily be average, but maybe they don't need to be."

Burke said the Dolphins' strengths of defense and running the ball is, "kind of a Rex Ryan format of a team. Teams like Baltimore and Pittsburgh built teams around that format for a decade."

The issue with the Dolphins, Burke says, is a schedule that grows tougher for the next month with San Diego, Buffalo, Detroit and Denver.

Some other teams in the Advanced Football Analystics rankings:

Detroit (6-2) is 11th.

New England (6-2) is 15th.

San Diego (5-3) is 19th.

Of course, count Burke among those surprised by the Dolphins sitting second.

"Very surprised,'' he said. "I don't take these particular rankings as gospel. But they're an early warning system that can detect teams that are overlooked or over-rated. I doubt (the Dophins) are the No. 2 team in the league, but the numbers are telling us this is a team to keep an eye on."

2. The Heat got the opening-night script they needed in their first game without LeBron James, as I wrote in my column. It's not Broadway anymore. But it's basketblall, and it was fun basketball on the first night. Chris Bosh with 26 points and 15 rebounds? Dwyane Wade with 21 points? Norris Cole won't always give 23 points, as he did Wednesday, and James Ennis won't always have a game-shaking dunk, as he also did. But for this night everything was fine in the Heat's 107-95 win against Washington.

3. The Dolphins have got some good mileage out of the read-option offense with Ryan Tannehill. But it's nothing to build on. Just ask some of the top analysts. CBS' Steve Mariucci quoted colleague Warren Sapp's line that the, "fastest-evolving organism is the NFL." In other words, defenses will quickly catch up to it.

"The telltale sign is you don't even see it as big in college,'' Phil Simms said. "If colleges (defensively) are adapting to it, what do you think the NFL will do?"

Simms then compared i to (ouch) the Dolphins using the Wildcat in 2008 and not being effective with it once defenses caught up.

4. San Francisco had the seventh-highest payroll at $154 million in winning the World Series. Just in case, you wondered how far the Marlins' $48 million payroll looked.

5. How is North Carolina a 14-point underdog to Miami?