Jay Fiedler went 7-for-11 for 55 yards Saturday, but he hasn't distinguished himself yet this summer. AP

TAMPA -- With every passing week, the discouraging truth becomes a little more evident, a little harder to overlook. The Miami Dolphins are soon going to have to declare a victor in their two-man quarterback competition, but that doesn't necessarily mean either guy looks like a winner about now.

The Dolphins entered Saturday night's preseason encounter against Tampa Bay pining for clarity and itching for resolution at the game's most pivotal position. But it's hard to make the case that they got either, as quarterbacks Jay Fiedler and A.J. Feeley continued to wage their neck-and-neck war of mediocrity.

The good news, and there's been precious little of that in Miami's recent past, is that the Dolphins' awful August is almost over. The bad news is that Miami's 17-10 loss to the Bucs provided only a modest amount of cause to believe things will get better before they get worse.

To be sure, Feeley made some progress and managed to hang 10 points on the board in his nearly two-quarter stint, which was 10 more than Fiedler produced in his first-quarter action. Feeley had his moments and showed a bit more command of the offense than he has previously this preseason. And the bottom line was that Miami finally received a touchdown drive from one of their top two quarterbacks.

But the man the Dolphins acquired this offseason to unseat Fiedler also appeared not ready for prime time at other moments, not the least of which was when he misplaced his helmet when his turn to play came in the second quarter. A TV timeout spared Feeley further embarrassment, but it was hardly a display of game awareness that inspired confidence.

"I had a hard time finding my helmet,'' said Feeley, chagrined in the visiting locker room. "You don't like something like that prohibiting you from getting in the game. It was kind of a frustrating deal. We couldn't find my helmet anywhere. But fortunately they came through with one of those long TV timeouts.''

The hard, cold numbers said Fiedler finished a respectable 7-of-11 for 55 yards against the Bucs, with no touchdowns, no sacks, no interceptions and a 75.9 passer rating on his two drives. Feeley led the Dolphins to a field goal and a touchdown in his three possessions of work, totaling out at 8-of-14 for 83 yards, no scoring passes, no interceptions, no sacks and a 74.4 rating.

But things really weren't that pretty, especially for Feeley. Twice he made ill-advised passes into heavy coverage that were almost picked off. Another time he got an 11-yard completion on a ball that was juggled by Miami's No. 1 receiver Chris Chambers before it was fortuitously hauled in by the Dolphins' Derrius Thompson.

"We made improvement and we're going to stress the positives,'' said Dolphins head coach Dave Wannstedt, trying to convince us that the glass is half full in terms of Miami's offense. "I was comfortable with how both guys played tonight. I thought they both threw the ball pretty well. And I thought with the new additions on offense [namely receiver Marty Booker, who came over from Chicago in the Adewale Ogunleye trade], I see it coming together a little bit better than last week.''

But that really only speaks to how low the Dolphins offense has sunk in the wake of Ricky Williams' retirement. Through the first two games this preseason, you almost expected to see Miami's offense cordoned off with yellow police tape, like any other disaster site. Before Saturday night, neither Fiedler or Feeley had led the Dolphins on a touchdown drive, and that included the first two preseason games and Miami's scrimmage against Houston.

That ignominious streak didn't end until Feeley sneaked it over on fourth down from a yard out late in the third quarter against the Bucs, and even then, the score was a little tarnished by the fact that replays seemed to indicate that Feeley never quite broke the plane of the goal with the ball.

No matter, Feeley bounced off the pile and spiked the ball with authority, at least exorcising some of the frustration that has surrounded all things Dolphin this year.

"It's important for all of us to put points on the board, to get the touchdown,'' said Feeley, the former Eagles third-team passer who came over from Philadelphia in exchange for a 2005 second-round pick. "We've been missing that in the last two preseason games, so it was very important for myself, for Jay, and the offense as a whole.''

Asked about the ferocity of his post-touchdown spike, Feeley turned a tad defensive. Or maybe he was just embarrassed that it took the Dolphins almost the entire month to score a touchdown worth celebrating.

"It was my first time, my first touchdown running since being in the league,'' he said. "It was an exciting time. I think it was good for all of us. I was fired up, our offense was fired up, and to punch it in after being stopped the first two times in goal line, it was kind of the exclamation point for the offense.''

We'll give him his punctuation mark, but let's not lose sight of the fact that Miami totaled a paltry 209 yards of offense against Tampa Bay, with 170 of those in the passing game. Without Williams, the Dolphins are still floundering for a running game, gaining just 39 yards on 21 rushes. Whether you're talking in the air or on the ground, nobody's under the illusion that that's going to cut it in two weeks, when the bullets really start flying in the AFC East.

"I think at times we had a little something going,'' said Chambers, who had a team-high four catches for 56 yards. "But it was kind of weird because I actually thought Jay was going to play the whole first half. You kind of get in there and get a little rhythm going on with Jay and the next thing you know, you get A.J. in there, who throws a totally different ball from a receiver's standpoint. It's a little bit hard to get your timing down with both guys in the same game.''

Some Dolphins observers believe Wannstedt is still leaning toward Fiedler as his opening-day starter, because he gives the head coach more of a comfort level in his command of the Dolphins offense. The only problem is that while Wannstedt knows exactly what he gets when he goes with Fiedler, that hasn't been enough to elevate the Dolphins past a certain point in Wannstedt's first four seasons in Miami.

With Feeley, the Dolphins have a better athlete with a bigger arm at quarterback. But they also have an inexperienced hand who is prone to make mistakes. And this year's Miami team, with all the waves of adversity it already has endured, cannot afford many mistakes and still win.

Which way will Wannstedt go? Will he play it safe and stick with Fiedler, or roll the dice on Feeley's boom-bust quotient?

"In a perfect world, yeah, you want to have the No. 1 offense working together every day,'' said Fiedler, asked if he'd like to learn Wannstedt's decision before Miami's preseason finale at New Orleans next Friday. "The more time you get together, the easier it is to jell and feel comfortable with each other. But we have to deal with whatever decision is going to be made, whenever it's going to be made.''

More and more, that looks like the last possible minute. Chances are Wannstedt isn't tipping his hand just yet about his choice because he's still not completely sold on either option. Saturday night didn't make his decision any easier. It just made it that much later in the game.

Don Banks covers pro football for SI.com.