SAN FRANCISCO – Although the Miami Dolphins doubled their victory total, there were no real winners. The NFL’s two worst teams played a game every bit as wretched as their records.

Randy McMichael caught a 15-yard touchdown pass with 10:35 to play, and the 49ers fumbled five times in the fourth quarter of the Dolphins’ 24-17 victory Sunday, leaving San Francisco as the league’s only one-win team.

It was the game of the weak, the battle of the bads – a meeting of two once-proud franchises brought to historic lows by injuries, infighting, poor management and insufficient talent.

The fans who booed both teams off the field at halftime saw a game that was just as painful and awkward as these clubs’ precipitous declines this season.

San Francisco’s surreal inability to hold on to the ball was the most eye-catching part, but there also were 16 punts and a seemingly endless series of gaffes and stumbles. Miami (2-9) snapped its three-game losing streak with just 200 total yards.

Capped by Derrick Pope’s 1-yard fumble return for the clinching touchdown with 3:10 left, the Dolphins scored 17 points off San Francisco’s fumbles in the fourth quarter to get the first victories for interim coach Jim Bates and starting quarterback A.J. Feeley.

Hopefully, Bates, the Dolphins’ defensive coordinator until Dave Wannstedt’s resignation two weeks ago, will remember only his unit’s strong performance, including eight sacks, and not the ineptitude of just about everything and everybody else.

Tim Rattay passed for 181 yards and fumbled three times for the 49ers (1-10), who lost their sixth straight and surged past Miami for the inside track on the top pick in next April’s draft. They’ve also got an excellent shot at the worst record in franchise history: the Niners went 2-14 in 1978 and 1979.

The Dolphins spent the entire week in San Francisco following last Sunday’s loss at Seattle, staying in a hotel and working out at a nearby college in a second training camp of sorts. It seemed to work for the defense, which held San Francisco to 228 yards – 69 on a desperate last-minute drive culminating in Maurice Hicks’ score with 37 seconds left.

Fittingly for these teams, the game turned on turnovers. San Francisco linebacker Derek Smith returned a fumble 46 yards for a touchdown early in the fourth quarter for a 10-7 lead, but Miami’s Patrick Surtain recovered Hicks’ fumble moments later.

Miami reached the 1, then lost 14 yards – and McMichael still slipped between two defenders in the end zone for his fourth TD catch of the season.

Rattay fumbled on consecutive plays on the 49ers’ next drive, losing the second one to set up a 50-yard field goal by Olindo Mare, who missed a 30-yarder earlier.

Rattay then fumbled while getting hit in the end zone, and Pope scored untouched with 3:10 left.

One play after dislocating his finger in the first quarter, Feeley threw a 25-yard touchdown pass to Chris Chambers – but that catch accounted for much of the Dolphins’ 81 first-half yards.

Even San Francisco’s biggest defensive play was strange and disjointed. Travis Minor fumbled while running into the pile at midfield, but nobody seemed to realize it except Smith, who extricated the ball and ran for a score that was upheld on a replay challenge.

AP-ES-11-28-04 1942EST