MIAMI — Itt isn’t about this season. That is what Miami Dolphins fans — impatient like any fans and maybe more so than most considering the franchise’s long championship drought — should force themselves to remember right now.

The club’s 44th year unfurled Monday night here with the first preseason game, an NFL dress rehearsal, but to suggest what has just started won’t be ending in the Super Bowl Miami is hosting hardly qualifies as outlandish pessimism.
The Dolphins remain a young team for the most part, and the schedule is brutal — the toughest in the league. These things alone force the realistic focus to the building of something for beyond this season.
That is why the most important knowledge Miami can gain from this August isn’t something it might need immediately, but something it must know for the future, and must know for sure.
Is Chad Henne the man?
Is Miami’s present young backup quarterback, in his second season, the franchise QB who can be trusted to be the best this club has had since that Dan Marino guy?
These are the questions that need to advance from unknowable to something approaching certainty, the sooner the better.
There are more immediate concerns, sure, in the wake of Monday’s 12-9 victory over the Jacksonville Jaguars in the glorified scrimmage in which reserves played most. One pressing issue is Miami’s defensive backfield.
The quarterback-of-the-future question, though, is the one more far-reaching, the one that looms over this franchise.
The Dolphins need to think beyond Chad Pennington, who is 33, and whose below-average NFL arm strength has no miracle cure.
That doesn’t mean right away. Don’t get me wrong. Pennington had a marvelous season last year, and finished second to Peyton Manning in the league MVP voting — deservedly. This is not a guy you even think about replacing right now.
What if, though?
What if Pennington were injured? Or his performance was off? Or what if Miami, against that brutal schedule, got off to so poor a start this season that the shift to the future became accelerated?
It would help to know soon whether Henne is the guy to accept that handoff or whether the search for The Next Big Thing, for the Dolphins’ elusive Holy Grail, continues.
We learned little of Henne’s true potential last preseason, and even less in the regular season as Pennington enjoyed an unlikely-to-be-repeated career year.
Monday came more baby steps, hints of knowledge, small signs.
Henne completed 7 of 11 passes for 94 yards, with a 33-yard touchdown to (of all people) converted tight end Ernest Wilford, along with one interception.
His pick was off a deflection. And Henne would have had a pair of TD passes if Ricky Williams hadn’t let one slip off his hands in the end zone. By baseball rules Henne would have been Miami’s winning quarterback in relief Monday. He seemed poised, even being tested by a brief though heavy downpour.
“Henne I think had pretty good control of the huddle for the most part,” said coach Tony Sparano afterward. “Made a couple of nice throws in the middle of the field. Made one bad decision; that’s why he needs the snaps.”
We know what Pennington can do. We have had a career of proof. We know his limitations.
Likewise we pretty much know that rookie quarterback Pat White, also with a less-than-cannon arm, is a niche QB tailored to the gimmicky Wildcat offensive variation — not the quarterback of the future.
Henne is the one we don’t know about.
That’s why we should see as much of him as we saw Monday night or even more throughout this preseason.
Don Shula unleashed Marino on the world by midseason of his rookie year; then again, No. 13 was special. It would be ludicrous or at least unfair to suggest Henne could be another Marino.
But it is time to begin learning if he can be a reasonable facsimile, one the Dolphins feel comfortable handing the future to.
We got a glimpse Monday night how the home-game atmosphere will be amped up with star power this year. Heard Jimmy Buffett’s feelgood vibe. Heard T-Pain’s street version of the Dolphin fight song. Saw rapper Flo Rida waving to the crowd.
Fans want a winner, though. Not a song and a dance but a first Super Bowl triumph since 1973. And an outstanding quarterback remains a team’s quickest, surest way to that grand prize.
Henne has the arm strength to be that guy. Is the rest of his game worth the investment? Worth the keys to the franchise?
This is the year to find out and August is the month to begin.
It’s time to start being sure whether Henne is the rightful heir to the air.