FOXBORO — When the Dolphins roll out for their first offensive series against the Patriots Monday night in Miami, some of the schemes could look a little familiar to the folks in New England.

That’s because Dolphins offensive coordinator Brian Daboll has spent the abbreviated offseason installing a system that has some similarities to what the Patriots have done. Miami quarterback Chad Henne told Miami area reporters that the new system is “similar to what I was used to at Michigan. It’s a New England offense — New England with a little Jets in it. It’s a good offense for a quarterback.”

No surprise there: Daboll made his bones as an assistant under Bill Belichick in New England, serving as the Patriots’ defensive coaching assistant from 2000 to 2001, and then the wide receivers’ coach from 2002 until 2006 before he followed Eric Mangini to New York. (Daboll departed New England after the 2006 season, becoming the Jets’ quarterbacks coach in 2007 and 2008. Later, he served as Mangini’s offensive coordinator with the Browns in 2009 and 2010.)

In his short time with the Dolphins, the 36-year-old Daboll has delivered a jolt of energy to the Miami offense, opening up the playbook and using aggressive schemes. Henne, with new running back Reggie Bush in the backfield, has professed to feeling more comfortable in Daboll’s offense while there’s a rejuvenated relationship with wide receiver Brandon Marshall.

It all sparks optimism among Dolphins’ fans that they could improve upon last year’s numbers, where Miami finished in the bottom half of the league in most major offensive categories. They were 30th in scoring, 21st in total offense, 21st in rushing offense and 16th in passing offense.

“He has brought a lot of energy to our offense, and to this team, and I think that’s obviously it is something new and refreshing to this team,” Bush said of Daboll. “I’m not sure what they had in the past, but it just seems like guys have responded to it. They love it, they love his energy. They love how upbeat he is.”

“He’s done a great job. I mean, couldn’t ask for more and he’s done a super job,” said Miami coach Tony Sparano. “You can see that Brian’s time with coach Belichick and the Patriots there has served him well. Of course, he was on the defensive side of the ball for a little while there so that helps any young coordinator coming into our league, having some experience on the other side of the ball and seeing it from the end. So Brian has done a great job and has a lot of enthusiasm and rubs off on our players.”

Despite his success — and his Patriots’ pedigree — you get the feeling Daboll isn’t (or wasn’t) necessarily the most well liked guy in Foxboro. He rubbed some people in the organization the wrong way because he followed Mangini to New York. And when Daboll was initially hired by Miami, former Patriots fullback Heath Evans took a shot at the move, telling ESPN 760, “The Dolphins probably just got worse. … When he was in New England, he was never a guy that I would have considered the brains of the operation.”

And at the NFL scouting combine this past offseason, former Patriots’ GM Scott Pioli was asked by Miami reporters what his memories of Daboll were when they were together in New England. “I remember that [Daboll] was a part of a great deal of success there,” Pioli said succinctly and frostily.

One Patriot with good things to say about Daboll this week was New England quarterback Tom Brady.

“He was a very good coach for us, a good friend,” Brady said. “We spent a lot of time riding on the buses together. … One of the things that separated him was that he took it personally out there when the receivers were going against the secondary of the other team.”

Perhaps Daboll’s finest hour came last season when, as the offensive coordinator with the Browns, he helped put together the game plan for Cleveland's upset win against New England, a 34-14 beatdown of the Patriots that was the ugliest regular-season loss of the year for New England.

Sparano said one of the first weeks Daboll was on the job, the two sat down and watched film of that game, as well as plenty of old film on the Patriots in hopes of picking his brain about how to survive in the AFC East.

“That was old news, but I mean, I picked his brain. We watched the film together; we went through it,” Sparano said of the November contest. “I kind of wanted to go through the division games and Brian’s played in this division for a while, whether it be with the Patriots or the Jets. That was a good way for us to kind of sit down, have some dinner and watch some film and get through some things.”