Six races into seven-time Formula 1 world champion Lewis Hamilton's first season with Ferrari, it's already safe to say that his move resembles Aaron Rodgers' late-career NFL move to the New York Jets, rather than Tom Brady's late-career move to the Tampa Bay Buccaneers.
And the reality of it is that everybody not living in fantasyland saw this coming from a mile away.
When Hamilton signed with Ferrari before the start of the 2024 season for 2025, it shocked the Formula 1 world, and that's an understatement. For years, there had been rumors about the Briton eventually making the move to the Scuderia, but those rumors never amounted to anything.
So the fact that the media's favorite go-to, slow-news-day rumor actually came true led to dreams of a record-breaking eighth world championship and a return to the top for a red team that haven't tasted championship glory since 2008.
Was there ever a chance of that happening?
Nobody wanted to answer that question, because everyone knew the answer to that question wasn't "yes".
In race number one of the season in Melbourne, there were already signs of frustration from Hamilton toward a team that have become known for regularly botching race strategy calls and costing their drivers several positions. On what could have been a podium debut in the rain, he only managed to come home 10th.
There have been other feisty exchanges between Hamilton and race engineer Riccardo Adami this season, but perhaps none of them top Sunday's during the Miami Grand Prix.
Hamilton had been ordered around teammate Charles Leclerc for seventh place, but unable to make up any significant ground, he was told by the team to give back the position.
When given an update on the position of Williams' Carlos Sainz Jr., Hamilton sarcastically responded to Adami, asking "you want me to let him pass as well?"
It's particularly notable because Hamilton is the driver whom Sainz replaced at Ferrari, and it became clear early on in the 2024 season that they had made a massive mistake.
Sainz is in the prime of his career, and his development-focused attitude helped Ferrari actually come close to their first title in 16 years last year. They were able to make a late charge past Red Bull and ultimately had to settle for second behind McLaren.
During his entire four-year stint at Ferrari, Sainz was one of the most underrated drivers on the grid, and apparently Ferrari had him pretty underrated on their lists as well, kicking him aside to make way for a driver well past his prime.
Hamilton, now 40 years old, has been well past his prime for a few seasons now.
He had the first two winless seasons of his career in 2022 and 2023, and after setting a new career-low in the point standings in 2022, he dropped even lower in 2024. Mercedes teammate George Russell was firmly the better of the two drivers during their three-year stint together.
Some have pinned Hamilton's struggles on the ground effect era which began in 2022, one year after Hamilton saw a potential eighth world title escape his grasp on the final lap of the season finale.
Perhaps that is true. But as others pointed out, that means that if he doesn't hit the ground running when the new 2026 regulations are put into place, then all Ferrari really did was sign a driver for his past achievements. After all, he is set to turn 41 before the 2026 season, the final year of his current contract, begins.
And that's already looking like the case. Hamilton has already conceded that it's going to be a long year, once again illustrating a lack of development potential on the driver side to actually make a difference. This is a team fighting among themselves in no-man's land, occasionally even being beaten by inferior cars.
Hamilton finds himself behind Leclerc in the standings, and Ferrari as a whole have been outscored by three drivers, including Max Verstappen in a Red Bull that has arguably been slower than the Ferrari this year. They are just one point ahead of Russell, and Hamilton trails the driver who replaced him at Mercedes, 18-year-old rookie Kimi Antonelli.
And again, absolutely everybody not living in 2015 saw this coming from a mile away. But nobody wanted to admit it, because apparently the storyline was far too dreamy.
Quite frankly, Hamilton's sprint race win in China might very well go down as the most random highlight of his Formula 1 career. He surprisingly never won a sprint race during the four years the format was used while he was at Mercedes, and the win came on a weekend when McLaren were head and shoulders above everyone else, which has often been the case in 2025.
And at this rate, it might well be his only highlight at Ferrari. Things are not looking up. Yet at the same time, they're looking exactly like they looked in February 2024. Now the reality that everyone saw convenient to ignore has arrived, and the future of this pairing looks bleak.