With all due respect to the New England Patriots, Buffalo Bills, and even the Miami Dolphins' former AFC East playmates, the Indianapolis Colts, no team gets a Dolphins' fan's blood boiling more than the New York Jets.
It's a rivaly that goes back to the salad days of the AFL, when Joe Namath led the Jets on an upward climb that led to their only Super Bowl win in 1969, and the Dolphins were a struggling expansion franchise.
Monday night marks the 88th meeting between the teams, with the Jets holding a 46-40-1 overall edge, including a 13-5 mark against Miami this decade.
There have been many memorable games between the two teams, starting in the 1970s, when Namath went against the Dolphins and their vaunted "53 defense."
Miami won most of those battles, on the way to a 14-6 record against New York in the 1970s, and the Dolphins won their only two Super Bowls following the 1972 and 1973 seasons.
The battle reached its apex in 1982, when the teams met three times in the strike-shortened season, with the final meeting deciding the AFC Championship.
The Dolphins won the first two games, 45-28 and 20-19, and then, in a game that was later dubbed "The Mud Bowl," Dolphins linebacker A.J. Duhe intercepted three Richard Todd passes, returning one 35 yards to seal a 14-0 victory.
In 1985, future Hall-of-Famer Dan Marino hit Mark Duper with a 50-yard touchdown pass with less than a minute to play to give the Dolphins a come-from-behind 21-17 win. Duper, who had missed seven weeks with a broken leg, set a team record in that game with 217 yards receiving.
Then came 1986. In the first game of the Jets-Dolphins rivalry I ever saw, Marino threw a career-high six TD passes and staked the Dolphins to a 45-38 lead late at the Meadowlands.
But with Miami trying to run out the clock -- and needing one first down to do it -- running back Woody Bennett fumbled, and the Jets recovered.
Cue Ken O'Brien to Wesley Walker, as the pair connected for the tying TD with no time left to force overtime.
Then, after winning the all-important coin toss, O'Brien found Walker again -- for Walker's fourth TD and a 51-45 win that remains the highest-scoring game in the series.
O'Brien threw for 479 yards in the victory; Marino passed for 448.
That game propelled the Jets to a nine-game winning streak, and at 10-1 they ventured to the Orange Bowl for a Monday night date with the Dolphins.
What resulted was an improbable blowout, as Marino completed 29-of-36 passes for 288 yards and four TDs, and Lorenzo Hampton gained 150 yards on 19 carries and scored two TDs in a 45-3 victory.
The Jets lost their last five games, but backed into the playoffs at 10-6 that season.
On Dec. 7, 1987, the already intense rivalry became even nastier when Jets defensive tackle Marty Lyons' illegal chop block on future Hall-of-Fame Dolphins center Dwight Stephenson ended Stephenson's career in a 37-28 Jets' victory.
Dolphins coach Don Shula was so upset about the hit that he reportedly chased Lyons out of the locker room with a profanity-laced tirade when the defensive tackle tried to apologize to Stephenson.
The next year, Marino threw for a career best 521 yards, but he also tossed five interceptions -- three to rookie Jets corner Erik McMillan, who returned one 55 yards for a TD in another Jets win.
In 1991, the teams met in the regular season finale at Joe Robbie Stadium with a playoff berth on the line.
Marino passed to Ferrell Edmunds for a 1-yard TD and a 20-17 lead with just 44 seconds left.
But the Dolphins went into a prevent defense, which allowed O'Brien to move the Jets into field goal range, and Raul Allegre booted a 44-yard field goal to tie the game.
Once again, the Jets won the toss and received the ball in overtime, and Allegre put them in the playoffs with a 30-yard kick.
Marino didn't get his revenge until three years later, with the "Clock Play," when he led the Dolphins back from a 24-6 halftime deficit to beat the Jets in 1994.
After throwing two TD passes to Mark Ingram to cut New York's lead to 24-21, Marino drove the Fins to the Jets' 5-yard line with 30 seconds left.
Once there, it looked like Marino was going to spike the ball to set up the next play.
But as we all know, he faked the spike, and hit Ingram for the winning TD pass over rookie Aaron Glenn. The Dolphins won 28-24, and went on to capture the AFC East that season.
The next memorable meeting came in 2000, when the Dolphins took a seemingly insurmountable 30-7 lead into the fourth quarter.
Jets fans still remember the NFL Films microphone picking up this exchange between Dolphins quarterback Jay Fielder and defensive end Jason Taylor:
Fiedler: "They ain't coming back on us!"
Taylor: "Hell no! You kidding? C'mon now."
Of course, the Jets rallied for 23 fourth quarter points to tie the game.
And, when it seemed like Miami had regained control after Fiedler hit Leslie Sheppard for a TD and a 37-30 lead, the Jets battled back again.
Vinny Testaverde threw to a 3-yard TD pass to Jumbo Elliot on a tackle-eligible play that tied the game with 42 seconds left. It was Testaverde's fourth TD pass of the quarter.
In overtime, Fiedler threw his third interception, leading to John Hall's 40-yard field goal that won the game, 40-37.
When Monday Night Football celebrated its 500th telecast in 2002, fans picked this as the greatest game in the history of the series.
It has forever come to be known as "The Monday Night Miracle."
The years following that game were down ones for both franchises, as the Dolphins only made the playoffs once and the Jets three times, winning just one postseason game between them.
Then came last year, and the Brett Favre experiment, which actually began in Miami.
On opening day, Favre threw two TD passes, including a Hail Mary at the end of the first half that Chansi Stuckey somehow caught, to beat the Dolphins 20-14 in Dolphin Stadium.
That started the Jets on an 8-3 surge that made them seem playoff-bound.
We all know what happened next.
Favre hurt his elbow, and the Jets struggled, losing three of their next four to fall to second in the AFC East.
The Dolphin entered the Meadowlands on the final weekend of the regular season needing a win to clinch the division and a playoff berth.
Favre threw three interceptions, while jettisoned Jet Chad Pennington completed 22-of-30 passes for 200 yards and two TDs in a 24-17 win.
The Dolphins went to the playoffs, while the Jets stayed home.
Just another chapter in what has historically been one of the best rivalries in the NFL, a rivalry that will feature new heroes Monday night, as young QBs Mark Sanchez and Chad Henne face off for the first of what could be many times.
Let's hope it lives up to the long, memorable history established between these two franchises.
(Photo: Yahoo Images)
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