Here we are, finally at the end of a season that has been equal parts brilliant and excruciating. The Baltimore Ravens sucked all the wind out of the sails of a team that is still easily a Top 4 unit in the NFL. So will they start their playoff run against another Top 4 team or against one of the teams striving past mediocre? To figure this out, they have a Sunday Night Football game against one of those Top 4: the Buffalo Bills, who I previewed in Week 4.
| Projected Record | 11-6 (ACTUAL: 10-6) |
| Offensive DVOA* (2023) | 4th |
| Defensive DVOA (2023) | 12th |
| Players Added from Last Matchup: Bills | Poona Ford IDL, Jordan Poyer S |
| Players Added from Last Matchup: Dolphins | River Cracraft WR, Jalen Ramsey CB, DeShon Elliott S |
| Last Result | Bills 48-20 |
Injury Report
PLAYERS ON IR: Damien Harris RB, Nyheim Hines RB, Justin Shorter WR, Zach Davidson TE, Tommy Doyle T, Jordan Phillips IDL, Matt Milano LB, Tre White CB
New Thing 1: Who Wants It More?
The Dolphins and Bills have been bumped to the top of the NFL fight card this week because the division is at stake. For the Dolphins, the playoff ticket is already punched, and they’ll make it for the second year in a row for the first time since 2001. The division title would be their first since 2008. For the Bills, the playoff ticket is not punched yet, and by kickoff, they will know if a loss means that they are out. If the Steelers beat the resting Ravens and the Jaguars beat the Titans in a fight for their playoff lives, the Bills will need to win to make the postseason. On this point, there can be no question who needs the game more if the bar is survival. But on the topic of legitimacy, the stakes are less clear: for McDermott, a playoff exit would be a massive embarrassment and might mark a potential endpoint to a Super Bowl window barring some major restructuring. He is in the unique place of proving himself once again as a coach: overshadowed by his superstar QB, undercut by the departure of longtime collaborator Leslie Frazier, and burdened by stories of strange HR concerns and 9/11 hijacker sympathizing, McDermott is unlikely to be fired this year but faces an uncertain future with a loss. Josh Allen and the Bills roster has no need to preserve legitimacy. 2023 has been another year of excellence for the high-flying roster, and Josh Allen looks no worse for the wear outside of his customarily absurd amount of turnovers. The defense survived injuries to the two most important players (and a huge lack of production from some key contributors, listed below), and found their way forward in taking the ball away. The Bills have arrived and have not yet left the station. The Dolphins, meanwhile, are a national media yo-yo, going from disgusting carnival oddity one week to The Best Team Not Being Talked About the next. Back in the now-nostalgic late 2010s, the Bills enjoyed the same treatment, and proved their mettle in the playoffs. Part of doing so was annihilating a surging Miami in a 2020 meltdown, banishing them from the playoffs and lighting up the league for the next two years after. Miami, now in the opposite position, can make a similarly impressive announcement. That is a covetous position, to be sure: Miami has so much to play for. How much does Buffalo want their season to continue? Does Miami have another gear for the moments that will command them respect for years to come, as all good teams do?
New Thing 2: Miami at Home
Much has been made of the Dolphins record at home, but it is surprisingly less important now for the Dolphins offense. Miami has 5.2 yards per carry in the run game at home to 4.9 on the road. They have 8.7 yards per passing attempt at home to 8.1 on the road. Tua’s 17:5 TD-INT ratio at home to 12:8 on the run is notable, to be sure, but can be explained easily by the more difficult secondary matchups the Dolphins faced on the road this year. For the defense, it is obscenely important to be at home. The Dolphins have allowed 3.3 yards per carry at home to 4.3 on the road. 6.6 yards per passing attempt to 7.7 on the road. They allowed 31 rushing 1st downs on the ground at home to 67, an 8:8 TD-INT ratio at home to 17:5 on the road, a completion percentage difference of 12 percentage points, and ultimately (and most importantly) a 77.9 QB rating at home to 109.2 on the road. The Dolphins defense is a sieve on the road and a brick wall at home. Will that matter to the Bills? The numbers say that it absolutely will: Allen has an 18:7 TD-INT ratio at home to a 9:9 on the road. The Bills have 7.9 YPA in the pass game at home to 6.7 on the road. That averages out to a QB rating similar to Miami’s own defensive trend: Allen has 102.4 at home to 80.2 on the road. Defensively, the Bills match the Dolphins offense as a pretty consistent unit regardless of the playing field. One difference: the Bills have 31 sacks at home as opposed to 22 on the road. So for Dolphins fans, both the hope and the canary in the coal mine for a blowout rests of the shoulders of Josh Allen: if Allen explodes out of the gate in the 1st quarter, Dolphins fans will be in for a long afternoon. If he struggles, it will fit a historical trend.
New Thing 3: The Josh Allen Running Experience
Josh Allen is running again! While that may be the obvious narrative, there is a new and rather conservative notion to his running that bears watching, as it has changed in some key ways. First, Allen has the fewest runs of 10 yards in his career, exactly half of the amount that he had in 2022. His yards per attempt, as a result, is nowhere near the last two years: the 4.7 yards per attempt are not close to the 6.1 and 6.3 of the last two years, both on substantially more carries. But even as his running has become substantially less jaw-dropping, his efficiency rivals any season of his past career and is in fact historic. Both Allen and Jalen Hurts are tied right now for the most rushing TDs by a QB, topping Cam Newton’s 2011 record of 14 (a record that had stood at that point for 35 years) with 15 each. Allen has 6 fumbles in 2023, the fewest of his career by far (last season, he had an insane 13). Despite far fewer runs, Allen will come right up against his career high for 1st downs made rushing. Allen is choosing his spots and being safer, utilizing the QB sneak at a more frequent rate a la the Eagles, and the Bills have seen him put together a healthy and effective season. Had the Bills been better, Allen would be a surefire MVP, in large part due to his effective rushing.
New Thing 4: Coaching Chaos and A Safe Coaches Box for Headsets
Ken Dorsey was fired after one of the NFL’s funniest collapses against the Broncos earlier this year, replaced by hotshot QB coach Joe Brady. What has that meant for the offense? For one, it has meant the perplexing disappearance of Stefon Diggs. In Jay Skurski’s Bills Mailbag, a reader mentions that Diggs has not broken 50 receiving yards in four games and has not broken 100 in ten games. Why can’t Joe Brady find touches for one of the best receivers in football? Brady is an odd coordinator, most famous for his work as Joe Burrow’s passing game coordinator at LSU designing a wickedly cool offense (that we would eventually learn probably had more to do with Burrow, Justin Jefferson, and Ja’Marr Chase playing in it) that took college football by storm. Once at the NFL ranks, Brady struggled mightily with the lack of talent and QB in Carolina before sitting under Dorsey for 2022 until his firing in 2023. The Brady offense does not look much different, with Allen still throwing his patented digs and crossers at a high rate. The only noticeable shift to the eye test is a much bigger emphasis on running the football, one that likely has a lot more to do with Sean McDermott’s micromanaging habits than a philosophical difference between Brady and Dorsey. Brady has one advantage over Dorsey: he has yet to allow the Josh Allen offense to dip below 20 points, and that means a whole lot in the grand scheme of things. It also coincides with a stellar win loss record: Dorsey’s time with the Bills saw them at 5-5 and they’ve gone 5-1 since including the most recent 4 game winning streak. He has not eliminated the turnover issues: Josh Allen had interceptions the last two weeks, and has thrown one in 11 of his last 12 games (he avoided one in just the Cowboys game, when he also threw for less than 100 yards). Buffalo is tied for 8th in giveaways with 25, while also ranking 10th in yards given away to penalties (842). Buffalo has yet to settle down, even with the coaching changes.
New Thing 5: The Emergence of Khalil Shakir and the Run Game Make The Bills Safer
The Buffalo Bills can finally run the ball without Josh Allen, and have a true threat outside of Stefon Diggs. This is in large part thanks to the emergence of James Cook. Despite only ranking 37th in yards after contact per carry, Cook is second in 10+ yard carries behind Christian McCaffrey, topping 1000 yards and nearly doubling last year’s total. Cook has seen a huge uptick in carries, topping 16 in every game since Dorsey’s firing outside of the Kansas City game. With Allen scoring TDs, Cook has only been asked to play between the 20s, scoring just twice this year. Cook has 10.5 yards per reception at that, with 430 on the year and 4 TDs that way. Latavius Murray has been the powerhouse, scoring 4 TDs, and Ty Johnson has been the RB for a number of angry runs to a 4.4 YPC average. The Bills are 7th in total rushing, one of their best seasons in recent memory. Part of playing it safe is having a dependable slot receiver in the mold of a Jarvis Landry, and the Bills have also found that in the form of Khalil Shakir. Shakir, who I did not even mention in the last preview, has a whopping 15.3 yards per catch on an ADOT* of just 8.7 yards. That means he averages 6.9 yards after each catch, and his shiftiness shines on tape. In a year of drop issues, Shakir has dropped just one pass. He’s an underrated talent on a team with big names, and his 33 catches on 39 targets underscore just how useful he can be.
New Thing 6: Emergences on All Levels of the Defense
At the beginning of the year, any preview of the Bills defense started with the top tier talent: Von Miller, Matt Milano, and Tre’Davius White. The latter two ended up on injured reserve in the weeks following the Miami game while Von Miller has been reduced to a healthy scratch on gamedays following legal trouble and poor production. The Bills haven’t quite been an impenetrable fortress on defense (12th in DVOA), but the replacements, both by a single player and in aggregate, are playing well. On the edge, A.J. Epenesa has continued to be a force as the year went on, punctuated by his insane 6 pressure game against Jacksonville. DaQuan Jones has also returned to the lineup to compliment Ed Oliver (Jones had 7 pressures against Miami in Week 4), and the Bills have focused on interior pressure this year as opposed to their customary edge rushing and blitzing. Miller’s absence has barely been felt, and the Bills have as many sacks as the Dolphins (53). While he may not snatch as many possessions from the opposing offense as Milano, Tyrel Dodson made the move from part-time to full-time, and has helped anchor coverage from the LB spot. He’s only been thrown at 29 times and is averaging 8.5 yards per catch, both indicators that he can cover. Terrel Bernard was the first person the Bills turned to once Milano went out and, despite slightly fading as the year went on, he’s still intercepted 3 passes and logged 20 pressures. Finally, a midseason trade for Rasul Douglas paid huge dividends. The perennially-solid former Packers corner has picked off 4 passes for the Bills, allowing a QB rating* of just 40 in his coverage area. A good high school recruit could come into the league and throw for a QB rating of 40. While the Bills have had nightmare penalty problems, he’s also calmed the secondary down with just 2. Last week against the Patriots, his 2 INTs (1 taken back for a TD) were the difference between a close game and one easily iced. Dodson, Jones, Epenesa, and some of the other key defensive pieces mentioned in the former preview are all free agents next year, and each is doing their part to make the final season in Buffalo memorable.
New Thing 7: Health, Health, Health
You saw the injury report at the top of the page, it’s dire. Miami has true questions surrounding Waddle and Mostert, specifically, and early reports suggest neither will play (Waddle himself gave reporters more optimism). Mike McDaniel has insisted that this is “just another game” and if we’re being honest, the totally pragmatic approach is to hold injured players for an actual elimination game next weekend. Momentum certainly feels real, and that’s probably enough to push for this game. The Dolphins do have another week of Jevon Holland and Terron Armstead, theoretically a step further from their injuries, and will get back Robert Hunt after a long stretch with the hamstring. But each one of those lengthy “Full” practice designations tells a story: De’Von Achane has turf toe, drastically limiting his speed. Tyreek Hill’s ankle has been a nuisance since prior to the Titans game (oh yeah, and his house burned down?) On those fronts, the Bills have far less to report. This would be a different game, too, with Bradley Chubb and Jaelan Phillips to rush Allen.
Game Prediction
I won’t sugarcoat it, it’s really not looking good. Let me just drop in Josh Allen’s passing stats against the Dolphins in his career, which were posted on Twitter a few times: in 11 games, he’s 9-2, with 3,004 yards, 31 TDs, 5 INTs, a 110.8 QB rating, has been sacked just 16 times, and has 7.9 yards per attempt (which would be good for 5th this year). Projected out, the Josh Allen vs. The Dolphins season would be 4642 yards and 48 TDs (tied for 5th all time with Dan Marino). Year over year, Josh Allen punks the Dolphins. Why would anyone expect anything different? Year over year, the Bills defense looks like it’s running while Miami is briskly jogging. They simply seem to have another gear. In the last blowout, the Dolphins didn’t seem to be close to the intended receiver on a single play. How can it be different?
You’ll know that Miami has a chance if Josh Allen isn’t completing passes with ease. That is plain and simple the only way Miami can compete. Allen has spent much of this year out of rhythm, and the teams that have accomplished that with him managed to get home with pass rush and disrupted the deep routes. This is a huge task for the secondary’s communication, and Jevon Holland has to be ten times better. DeShon Elliott’s availability for this game should help as well. On Miami’s side, their chances will hinge on the run game. Robert Hunt’s return means that the second-level blocking should instantly improve. If Robert Hunt is starting at LG, then Miami will be signaling a clear commitment to domination in the run game. Big plays by Achane, a re-discovery of form by Jeff Wilson, and an angry OL can set up the play action shots. If Waddle and Hill were on the field together, I would like Miami’s chances in that case: Douglas, while a great replacement for White, is not a speedster.
But we can’t have nice things, and the nicest version of Miami feels more like a September dream now than the expectation for Sunday. As such, I will pick with my waking self and prepare for a Wild Card game in Kansas City that may be hilariously sloppy. I’ve never been so hopeful to be wrong!
Score Prediction: Bills 34-20
Season Record (Taylor’s Picks): 12-4
* = See Glossary
