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O.J. McDuffie tip-toes down the sideline and gets to the Colts' nine-yard line.

LONG SHOTS: One QB's dream will end today
BY ARMANDO SALGUERO
asalguero@herald.com

MIAMI DOLPHINS

The careers of the Raiders' Rich Gannon and Dolphins' Jay Fiedler have had many ups and downs. Today, they take center stage in Oakland.
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SEE ALSO
Who has the edge? (01/06/01)
EDWIN POPE: L. Smith earns Csonka's praise (01/06/01)
Wheatley is the one who got away (01/06/01)
Dolphins: Raiders' bye no advantage (01/06/01)

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Dolphins playoff coverage
Miami.com Special Report: Road to the Super Bowl
Enemy Camp: BayArea.com Raiders coverage

OAKLAND -- This is where the fairy tale ends. Before this afternoon's sun sets over the frigid East Bay, cruel reality will descend on somebody's unhappy quarterback like an angry pass-rusher run amok.

The dream season will end for either Rich Gannon or Jay Fiedler because both cannot walk away from Network Associates Coliseum escorted by victory.

One of these unlikely successors to the legacy left by Marino and Stabler is going to live up to that heritage today.

The other will spend the offseason living with this defeat and the doubt it will seed.

``It'll be a great challenge for me personally, but it's 11 guys on offense,'' Fiedler said this week, deflecting the notion that Miami's success or failure would be decided by his play. ``It's not just Jay Fiedler going out there and beating the Raiders. They still have to stop [running back] Lamar Smith. I know they're going to commit a lot of people to doing that, but they still have to stop him.

``We also have receivers that have to win for me and offensive linemen that have to block for me. It's not just Jay Fiedler . . . ''

But it is, sort of.

The Raiders looked at last week's Miami victory over Indianapolis and saw the Dolphins offense leaning heavily on its running game to overcome a limping passing game.

The Raiders also saw in Fiedler an inconsistent quarterback who threw three first-half interceptions and was booed by the hometown fans.

So which element do you believe the Raiders will be most concerned with today?

``You have to stop the run,'' Raiders defensive tackle Darrell Russell said. ``They have a guy who ran for over 200 yards last week. Of course, he's what we're focused on.''

Despite forked-tongue quotes from Raiders coach Jon Gruden suggesting the opposite, the Raiders will mobilize to stop Smith while daring Fiedler to beat cornerbacks Charles Woodson and Eric Allen.

When Fiedler came to the Dolphins early last year, few believed he would bring the Dolphins this deep into the playoffs. But Fiedler believes his newfound maturity has prepared him for this moment.

``Sixteen starts in the NFL later, it's made a big difference for me,'' Fiedler said. ``I've been out there, I've been through some wars. I have the experience of going out there and leading the team to wins. It's a long way from where I was last year.''

Gannon is also light years from his humble beginnings. Although he is 35 -- ripe enough that he operated a wing-T offense when he played at the University of Delaware -- Gannon is making his first career playoff start today.

``It's not that big of a deal,'' Gannon said of the milestone. ``I've played in the playoffs and been in some very big games before. I don't think it should be as much of an issue as people want to make of it. It's nice to be at this point in your career and be on a team that's playing well and having success. It certainly beats the alternative.''

The alternative for Gannon looks eerily like the one Fiedler faced before the Dolphins signed him as a free agent: A career as a lifelong backup.

Two seasons ago, after he dispatched Jeff George, Gruden saw something in Gannon that Kansas City, Minnesota, Washington and New England missed. The Chiefs, Vikings and Redskins looked at Gannon and saw a backup.

The Patriots, in their infinite wisdom, saw a defensive back.

Gruden saw a starting quarterback who would throw 52 TD passes the past two seasons.

``He knows his job inside and out,'' Gruden said. ``He works hard, he expects everybody else to do the same, and he never stops trying to get better.''

The Dolphins intend to make Gannon work harder than he has all season. They are focusing on Oakland's running game because the Raiders rank No. 1 in the NFL. So Gannon becomes the wild card.

While the Dolphins fully intend to choke the Raiders on the ground, Gannon will be challenged to move his team by passing. Or running it himself, which he did quite well this season, leading all starting quarterbacks with 529 rushing yards.

``I've taken good care of my body and my legs,'' Gannon said. ``The guys who have mobility and can move around a little bit can create some positive plays. My philosophy is that I'm not back there to run the football, but there are times when protections break down and you have to pull it down and make a play. I feel I can still do that.''

Gannon's ability to scramble presents the Miami defense with a dilemma.

``I don't know how you defense him,'' Oakland receiver Andre Rison said. ``If you sit back and wait, he picks you apart. If you get a good pass rush, he's going to run for the first down every time.''

Fiedler was as much a threat to scramble as Gannon earlier this season, but a torn rotator cuff in his left (nonthrowing) shoulder three weeks ago has limited that threat. The injury is so severe, agent Brian Levy says, if Fiedler were a fan he would be unable to lift his arm to do the wave.

But Miami's starting quarterback refuses to make his injury an excuse for his scrambling restraint or the inconsistent play he has suffered the past three weeks.

``Any time you face some adversity like an injury and overcome it, it makes you stronger,'' Fiedler said. ``It makes you a stronger person, a stronger player, a stronger teammate. This team has been through a lot of adversity throughout the year and so have I. We're both stronger because of it.''

Today will determine exactly how strong

Wheatley is the one who got away
Runner may return to haunt the Dolphins
BY JASON COLE
jcole@herald.com

OAKLAND -- In their greatest years, the Oakland Raiders were the team of the unwanted.

Players such as Lyle Alzado and John Matuszak, often hyped on steroids and whatever else they came up with, came to the Raiders from other teams. They had been cut elsewhere and reclaimed by owner Al Davis, set free to terrorize the rest of the league with their rage.

This season, the Raiders, who play host to the Dolphins at 4 p.m. today at Network Associates Coliseum in the second round of the AFC playoffs, have recaptured some of that spirit.

It's just bottled in a decidedly different person -- running back Tyrone Wheatley, the soft-spoken leader of the NFL's best rushing attack. Wheatley is a 1,000-yard rusher for the first time in the six years since he was a first-round draft pick of the New York Giants.

But Wheatley has arrived in Oakland after being traded to the Dolphins in 1999 for a seventh-round pick and then released by Miami only three days into training camp that year.

Angry? Insulted?

No, not really.

``I had a great time [in Miami],'' Wheatley said. ``I worked out, and [former coach] Jimmy [Johnson] was truthful. I would rather a man tell me to my face what is going on rather than to nitpick and do this and do that and then all of a sudden at the last minute say, `Well, it's not going to work.' He was straight up front, saying there were a lot of guys there. And he's going to go with two younger backs.''

Those younger backs were J.J. Johnson, who proved to be injury-prone, and Cecil Collins, who proved to be incident-prone.

But Wheatley, who ran for 1,046 yards, nine touchdowns and averaged an impressive 4.5 yards per carry, takes no joy in the fact the Dolphins eventually had to find somebody else [Lamar Smith] who basically does the same thing that Wheatley is doing now.

``I'm the same no matter where I go, no matter what I do,'' Wheatley said. ``Basically, like they say, `What you see is what you get.' I came here with the same attitude that I had when I was in New York, same attitude I had when I was in Miami. Here, the only difference is, they allow you to play.

``They allow your attitude to flourish. They allow whatever it is inside of you that makes you you. It's a puzzle, and they're going to make it match. It's weird. I just sit back sometimes and just look at us, man.''

OK, but what is the puzzle inside of Wheatley?

Mostly, Wheatley is a combination of exceptional physical talent and exceptional intelligence. He can discuss a number of issues, from politics to music, in great detail.

There was the time in 1998 when The New York Times did a story about Wheatley, with the reporter and photographer going to Wheatley's home in New Jersey.

The photographer was Dith Pran, a Cambodian refugee who was written about extensively in the book (and later a movie) The Killing Fields by former New York Times reporter Sydney Schamberg.

Wheatley knew all about Pran. That night, Wheatley took his little brother out to rent a copy of the movie.

That's not necessarily what most football players are like. Wheatley developed an image as a guy who was too smart for football. Not necessarily an intolerable rebel, but a guy who didn't fall into line the way most coaches want.

Wheatley got into disagreements with Giants assistant coaches. He frustrated both former Giants coach Dan Reeves and current coach Jim Fassel to the point he was put on the inactive list.

``I'll be the first one to say that a lot of it just didn't come from them,'' Wheatley said. ``You know, a majority of it came from me. Here I am a young guy who is doing everything he is trying to do. I'm looking at older guys, saying, `I'll do this with this older guy. I'll do this.' I'm trying to do everything in the right way possible.

``But it was always something that would come up. You're not doing this or this has to be done or this has to be changed . . . So every day it was something new and I would get frustrated and frustrated and frustrated. Basically, I got sick and tired of being sick and tired.''

It got to the point Wheatley tried to get cut.

``I got a crazy notion in my head that if I acted up [bad] enough, they'll get rid of me,'' he said.

Wheatley eventually took the advice of an assistant coach who saw through the act, keeping his mouth shut and eventually moving on. It's more in line with his character.

``He's a really good person, a very likable guy,'' said Dolphins running backs coach Joel Collier, who visited with Wheatley last season after the Dolphins won at Oakland in the regular season. ``He did everything we asked him to do. He worked out, he paid attention.''

Wheatley did everything except one thing. He didn't hold onto the football.

On the first day of training camp, Wheatley fumbled on his first carry of the infamous ``middle'' drill, a run-only drill which is football at its most basic. The offensive and defensive lines simply crash into each other and the running back does what he can.

The 6-0, 235-pound Wheatley didn't do much. He fumbled a second time on opening day. He started running outside instead of pounding into the middle, missing the point of the drill. The third day of camp was an intrasquad scrimmage. Wheatley ran tentatively.

``Man, the dude did nothing when he was here,'' one Dolphins player said. ``I give him credit, he's playing well now. He's running hard. But when we put the pads on here, he ran soft and he ran high. You expect to get punished by guys like that.''

Not all the Dolphins agreed, saying it was more of a problem with the numbers game. Wheatley just didn't get enough chances.

``Tyrone's a guy who's going to get better with more carries,'' defensive end Trace Armstrong said. ``He has power and great speed once he gets through the line of scrimmage. I don't know if he ever got the ball here enough to be able to show it . . . He has an extra gear that a lot of backs don't have. You'll see him a lot of times break two or three tackles at the line and then pick up 20 or 25 when he gets out into the secondary. That makes him unusual.''

Said Dolphins coach Dave Wannstedt: ``It was just a lack of opportunity. As far as toughness, that he showed us, and work ethic. I know we were all impressed with what he had done to that point.''

But not impressed enough to keep Wheatley around. For most athletes, going from first-round pick to trade bait to being cut would leave at least a small emotional scar.

Again, not for Wheatley.

Said Wheatley: ``It was a crazy situation. There were a lot of running backs out there. What was it, nine guys at tailback? The coaches had to make a decision quick. It was strange, but I don't hate anybody for it.''

HOME GAMES
Indianapolis, NY Jets, Buffalo, New England, Denver, Oakland, Atlanta, Carolina

AWAY GAMES
Indianapolis, NY Jets, Buffalo, New England, Tennessee, Seattle, San Francisco, St. Louis

Lamar Smith waits for his blocks and rumbles 17 yards for the game winning touchdown.