All right, welcome back to the Buffalo Bread podcast. We are in the Week 18. It has all come to this. We are recording here on Saturday, or Sunday actually, Sunday morning, early Sunday morning. We had a bit of a technical issue with our previous recording, so we're coming back at you. And the good news is that gives us the most up-to-date information to share with Bill's mafia heading into this evening in about 14 hours match up between the Buffalo Bills and the Miami Dolphins.
Dan's here with me as always to talk about what the heck happened last weekend and what are we so terrified about today? Dan, what's going on? Good morning, JJ. I am terrified tonight that what will happen is what we have seen from the Bills over the last two weeks where they have played either injury-depleted squads in the case of New England or substandard squads in the case of LA. And they will not rise to the occasion against a team that they should manage rather handily.
Now this is no shade to Miami. Miami is a talented team, but I think we can both acknowledge based off the injury report they're going to be depleted on the defensive side of the ball, and they're also going to be depleted on the offensive side of the ball as well, with news breaking last night that while Waddle and Moster are questionable, both are unlikely to play in this game.
The Bills JJ have a track record of absolutely dominating competition that we feel should be really competitive against them. The first game against Miami has a great case in point, the Dallas game a couple of weeks ago again another one. And then I guess the term would be playing down to the competition when they face a team that on paper they should handle pretty readily, but for whatever reason don't.
This is an interesting mix of those two concepts because this is right now the number two-seeded team in the AFC and the Miami Dolphins and the team leading the AFC East. They've got a great record, but also this is a roster that is depleted as well. If the Bills go into this, I think with the wrong mindset, we could see a game that's much more akin to the New England and the LA game as opposed to that Dallas game. Well, I think you're absolutely right.
And we saw the Bills go into Arrowhead and defeat the Chiefs. It was close, but they beat them. They beat, you know, that's a Super Bowl champ from last year. And then turn around and or prior to the buy go to Philly and in a driving rainstorm have the game decided basically by just a 59 yard field goal that was probably the most unlikely to make ever to send it to overtime.
So yeah, I think that, you know, that's what we've seen as Bills fans all year is they get up for massive competition and they play down to teams they should absolutely roll. This Dolphin squad is the exact opposite. They still to this date only have one winning, you know, one winning game against a team above 500 and that's the Cowboys and that one was very close. And so, you know, they've they've lost. I think they're one in four against playoff caliber teams this this season. One they are.
It was an incredible stat that I want to I want to give credit where credits do. I think I heard it on Extra Point Taken on the ringer podcast network. The Miami Dolphins are currently one in four against teams with a winning record when they played that team, which is the lowest winning percentage and win total in the modern NFL era for any team that is qualified for the playoffs.
In addition, that's also the fewest games any playoff qualifying team has played against teams with a winning record at the time they face them as well. So JJ, I understand advanced metrics, you know, have something to say about strength of schedule and opposing opponent DVOA and all the stuff. But the reality is, is that the Miami Dolphins have had a very easy light schedule this season. They haven't been tested a lot. And in those moments, they've have been tested against good teams.
Their their point margin, their point differential is minus 49 against teams with a winning record when they play them. It's stunning and staggering for a team that also put up 70 points and a win earlier on in the season. It really is a polar opposite team, depending on whether or not they're at home and whether or not they're playing a team with a winning record. It's crazy. And this week, they are playing at home, which is something that should give, you know, that's part of that.
When we opened the pod talking about being scared of this match up this game and the stakes at hand. At this point, we also have the, you know, we have the ability to now to know that the others won and the Houston Texans and the Indianapolis Colts did not tie. So two of the three things that, you know, had that had to happen to knock the bills out of the playoffs, should they lose have happened to this juncture.
The only the only kind of switch left to flip is tomorrow or today, the 425, I believe the Jaguars will be taking on the Titans and whom they've already beat once before, likely Trevor Lawrence is back in for this game. And if the Jaguars win, they take the AFC South and that is the final switch so that would make a bills loss, a loss and, you know, goodbye, you're on your couch or booking your trips to Cabo for the off season.
So that's kind of punching up even more things that we need to pay attention to that today in this, this route to Miami. And like you were saying, Miami is kind of this polarizing team against inferior competition versus, you know, superior competition and then also home and away. They are home. They do have a lot of injury situations that they're stacked up against it kind of slow down that high flying offense. But they do, you know, they also have high stakes.
If Miami wins, there are two seed and they're hosting at least two playoff games if they make it that far. If they lose, they're automatically locked in as the sixth seed behind Cleveland and will be traveling to number three Kansas City Arrowhead, the first round of the playoffs.
And so, you know, if I'm Miami knowing how poorly I play on the road versus how well I play at home, I am not wanting to let the Buffalo Bills take the AFCs from me and that two seed making the path to a Super Bowl so much, so much harder.
It definitely and on the flip side of that coin, if you're a Bills fan, if the Jags, if both if the the Bills can do no worse than the seventh seed, which means if they find their way into the playoffs today with a Jags loss, but also lose today in Miami, they're just headed back to Miami next week to play this team again. And we know what the the metrics are on beating a team three times in the same season. It is almost impossible to do.
So if the Bills get the win today and they end up finishing as the two seed, I think two things happen. One, we would welcome a home game in Buffalo against the seventh seed, which right now is projecting to be Pittsburgh, I want to say, right? Yeah, I think it's Pittsburgh, especially now with TJ Watt looking like he's got some sort of groin injury as well, and maybe maybe out for that first round against Pittsburgh.
And but you avoid that dreaded rematch with the division, divisional opponent to much later on down the road. So you know, JJ overall, I think, I think the Bills want to win out. That's still the easiest course. I know my trauma is a Bills fan is saying, well, hopefully the Jags lose. So at least we are, we are guaranteed a playoff spot by the time we head into that game. So there's a little less at stake.
But still, I think the priority for the Bills has to be winning today, clinching that fourth straight AFC East championship, and then heading into next week, knowing you're going to be at home against a tough opponent in Pittsburgh, but knowing that you really can kind of control home field and maybe even could be squeaking out an extra home game, depending on what happens with Baltimore and their matchup against the lowest remaining seed in the divisional round as well.
So if you are the Bills, you want to take advantage of this injury to pleaded dolphins roster, you want to take advantage of a team offensively that has been down, I would say over the past couple of weeks. But JJ, I feel like an order for them to do that. The bills got a few a couple of things primarily on offense. I think you and I can both agree that since the buy, this Buffalo Bills defense has been surprisingly strong.
The book on them, especially after that Eagles game was that they were vulnerable in the spine of the defense because the age of their safeties and the relative inexperience of their linebacking core with Matt Milano being out. And despite the fact that Terrell Bernard, who is a Pro Bowl snub, by the way, despite the fact that Terrell Bernard had been playing absolutely out of his mind and we see it every week, teams were exploiting the middle of the field on this Buffalo Bills defense.
Flash forward after that Philly game. And this Buffalo's Bills defense has played absolutely lights out at every level of the field. Hide took a couple of games off due to injury, came back in the New England game and look great. We are also getting to quad Jones back. It feels like just the right time as he returned in that New England game as well. So this Buffalo Bills defense feels like it's getting healthy at the right time. And I'll jump in on just one note. Yeah, go ahead.
Stomp on your take. After rewatching the Patriots game to kind of see what that happened on offense, I also watched some of the defensive snaps. Dequan Jones did not look like a person playing with a still repairing toward pack. He was playing with all of his pass rush moves. He was doing full extension. He was handling the point of attack and double teams, all the things you expect to see in it.
Certainly there was noticeably something missing from his get off and his like juice that he had before the injury. But the things that would make me that I was looking out for to see if somebody, you know, like I think I remember seeing JJ Watt come back for the playoffs with one of his runs after a torn pack. I think it was still with Houston. And you could tell he was favoring one side. He was only using moves to one side away from the injury. That wasn't it for Dequan Jones.
He looked like he might have been working through some football shape issues. But in terms of like actually being able to use his full range of upper body stuff, he looked good. Sorry. Oh, no, no, he did. And I was going to say he also played 50% of the snap share that position as well, which coming back from an extended injury, injury stay was great. Was great to see.
And it was clear that the bills were ramping him up for this Miami game where they're absolutely going to need him, even with most are out. Devon H.N. is still going to still going to be a factor in this run game. And with Miami having been limited, have so many other weapons on the outside, their lack of depth in the wide receiver room is likely going to play a factor here too.
So I can see Miami relying heavily on that vaunted run game in which they are still number one in the EPA and the league per rush attempt. So so it's definitely going to be a test for this bill's defense. But it feels like the bills are getting healthy JJ at a time where the dolphins are in an injury deficit right now. So where do you want to start?
Because I think we can tie in some of our observations from New England game into this pregame for the Buffalo Bills, particularly on the offensive side of the ball, where I know you and I both have some strong feelings on what we feel like we need to see against Miami based on the bills previous outings. You want to start defense versus Miami offense or vice versa here.
No, let's let's start with the bills offense, because I think that we can both agree the strength of this team right now is that is the defense and how they've been playing. So let's start. That's crazy, isn't it? I know how much they've lost this season. Like it is far as personnel. That's unbelievable. Which like if you're out there and you're one of those, you know, fire McDermott people, which was me at one point this season, right? I think it was. Yeah, absolutely.
Well, because it you know, it was like the Tyler Dunn piece came out and there was like so much going around that he just like was not that he did not have that team. But then like moments, I think that galvanized them because after that, that, you know, hit job in the media, there was a there was a noticeable difference from this defense coming out, you know, with the kind of fire they were playing with. And so I think that maybe the locker room answered the claims that he didn't have them.
Right. And so they agree. And that I think is that's something to note about the season. But yeah, let's let's start with the bills offense, because I think that we can finish with strength and talk about the bills defense versus this Miami depleted offense. So on offense, these Buffalo bills, what we've seen is that they've had a rejuven under Joe Brady since the Philly game. We've seen they have this amazing kind of rejuvenated rushing attack.
Their metrics all all track that they're, you know, yards before contact yards per rush, they're they're doing really good work in the in the run game. And that's nice. They've also re, you know, reestablished Josh Allen as a weapon in the rushing attack. And so those those things have changed for the better under Joe Brady. Joe Brady is also excelled at getting the ball out to tight ends and running backs out of the backfield.
Where we've seen some slips is that, you know, their Stefan Diggs is all but disappeared from this offense since the since the buy. And Gabe Davis, I think we talked from, you know, previous pods about how he just disappeared for three games. He showed up for one had a really excellent, excellent game and then disappeared again.
And so it's it's getting the ball outside the hashes to wide receivers and connecting on a lot of our standard wide receiver, you know, passing concepts that Josh Allen has excelled in in the years in years past has just not been there. He's you know, been dirt in some balls, he's been overthrowing the connections have not looked good.
And it's not it's the the weird thing about it is that this stage in a season, especially at this stage in many of these players careers with the bills, it shouldn't look like he struggles to have chemistry with these targets, right? Like, after especially after seeing the start of the season, when things were clicking with this offense a lot better with a lot of those those concepts, they hit a lull in the middle of the season, it just hasn't come back yet.
And so we haven't seen a huge Josh Allen game, you know, Josh Allen player of the week against these dolphins in week four. That was, you know, for touch, he had more touchdowns than any incompletions in that game, I think it was 21 of 24 for four TDs 300 plus yards. It's just that kind of thing where we're, you know, we haven't seen a Josh Allen takeover game.
And I'm hoping that this dolphin squad is the get right for Josh because he's he's really dominated them in the in the years past in the regular season. So yeah, those are kind of my observations generally about the state of the offense.
The Bills are still one of three or four teams, the entire 32 team league that have their their preferred five starting offensive linemen for every game this season, which I think that, you know, to see the offense flailing any year where I mean, Josh Allen has been dinged up here and there. But other than that, we've seen mostly healthy across the board on offense. Weapons have been in.
And so it's really a question of what is happening and can they can they do something against it's a team they know very well to really kind of get things sparked heading into the playoffs and win this one and then continue on with rolling. Yeah, it really feels like that Bill's fandom doesn't have the the juice or the energy for another let's blame the coordinator round of criticisms here when it comes to the bills passing game.
So everyone I think is looking to sort of spread the blame out in a variety of different areas digs is hurt or he's taking himself if you listen to Josh Norman taking himself off of certain drives. There is the Josh is just injured or he's missing guys. But I think it's a it's a combination of just about everything. So one of the things JJ you and I talked about was wanting to see how Brady would adjust when teams were starting to take away some of these check down concepts to James Cook.
We saw that a little bit in the LA game and then we saw it really in the New England game where team where those teams were sending a free rusher on whatever side James Cook was coming off of.
So I was doing one of two things it was disrupting cook getting out of the backfield on those passing downs but it was also closing out the passing lane between Allen and Cook forcing Allen to hold on to the ball a little bit longer move around in the pocket move around outside the pocket and look for a different target.
But I haven't seen Brady do though with a lot of these route trees and route concepts in the passing game is exploit the middle of the field with anybody other than concaid and other than cook. And this was a criticism that we had of Dorsey's play calling last year and then early on this season as well where you saw you see if you look at the NFL next gen stat passing charts you see Josh when throwing to wide receivers almost exclusively looking outside the hashes and outside the numbers.
But when you play a team like New England and when you play a team like LA where there is a vulnerability in the middle of the field due to injuries or lack of talent and the linebacking core. And this wasn't the case with New England but they were down Jabral Peppers in that game. Yes they still had Kyle Duggar but when you've got safety play that you can exploit as well in that Philly game Josh lived in the middle of the field both with his legs and with his arm.
And then since we have come back from the buy it's been a lot of what we had seen before which is if we're going to target digs or we're going to target Davis it's going to be outside the hash marks. There is an opportunity with how banged up this dolphins defense is for the bills to get back to good by using the middle of the field again it is where the primary weakness of this dolphins offense is. And it's not that teams are condensing the middle of the field and trying to take it away.
It's just that for whatever reason that's not where Josh's first read is going or that's not where his alternate reads are going. And it's not where a lot of these route trees are ending up to when you pull Davis's route chart and you pull digs as route chart they're almost exclusively running outside of the hashes.
Now granted you don't want all of these routes that Kincaid could be running the check down stuff with Cook and then digs and Davis clouding the middle of the field but there is still an opportunity to use some of your A grade weapons like digs and I would put Shakir in that realm as well in the middle of the field a little bit more creatively. I would love to see a CD lamb type of approach to the use of digs in this game and see him line up in the slot.
So if Ramsey is going to follow you're going to take one of the best outside defenders of Miami and you're going to immediately put him on the inside guarding guarding Stefan digs and if he's not you're almost guaranteed a mismatch with digs in the slot where you can get a quick route release and hopefully exploit the middle of the field.
There should be a big Dalton Kincaid game as well because we know we saw Kincaid with that sort of breakout 51 yard bomb from Josh last game and I think this could be a game where Kincaid presents a lot of mismatches for what is a relatively undersized linebacker unit for the Miami Dolphins as well. There's a lot JJ that is there for the taking for the bills but based on the New England game based on the LA game they're just not taking it.
It's so interesting because Brady came in and he was smashing the easy button with a lot of concepts check down concepts running bad concepts that Dorsey simply was not folding it in a consistent basis.
There is stuff that exists in the passing game where he can do the same thing to before whatever reason it's not clicking either the route trees are inconsistently there or Josh isn't looking enough there but this is a game where you've got to hope that all those things get corrected because Miami despite the fact that Zaven Howard is not going to play they're still pretty tough and defending outside the numbers so you've got to exploit that middle
part of the field especially with these light boxes that Fangio likes to play. Well I was just going to add that Fangio you know basically what we know about Fangio's defense when he's coached for other teams is true with the Dolphins this year.
Their defense started rocky and has increased substantially week over week as players get more comfortable in the scheme understand the concepts and understand what he's asking them to do and what the leverages are and where they need to apply pressure and where they need to bail technique and where they need to jam and now that they're playing a little bit better they have Jalen Ramsey back over the past five weeks this Dolphins defense has
been a top ten unit in almost every metric and you know the bills even though they're injury depleted need to take that seriously and I'm with you I think that what we've seen from Joe Brady is yes he's used concepts that were like begging you know Dorsey to use throughout the course of the year because Dorsey's plan was always our offense is the offense we need our players to execute because we have elite talent and when our players
execute with our elite talent there is an answer for every defense and we will beat you and that was when that was true it was extra true but when it was false he never had a counter point he never had anything to maneuver to it Stefan Diggs was a step late or not getting separation in the game the whole the whole passing offense might be cooked you know Dorsey was was planning it with Brady he schemes ways to beat teams but again we're struggling
to find an alternative when that first option is shut down and so I think that that's a vulnerability and to your point about you know the route trees that we see from Diggs Davis even Shakir for that matter not really passing the center line of the field I think that what we're seeing there is that Brady is using those threats as threats only not as weapons and that I think is a point it's a great way to put it that's a that's a component
of his offense is using clear out routes and you know Gabe Davis got a game ball for blocking and running routes to pull defenders out of boxes and things like that and that's why in but you that's only useful if those if the threat of those routes is actually ever delivered on it's the same thing as play action passes it's effective you know it's effective to some extent 100% of the time but if you want it to be truly effective for
game breaking plays and this is part of the reason I think we've seen the Buffalo Bills kind of go down quite a bit in offense when it comes to explosives they haven't done a you know 20 plus yard passes 10 plus yard runs in a bit and they've struggled to catch them in games because those you know threat routes that they have you know the wide receivers running Josh is not connecting on them for whatever reason those routes are not getting
open for whatever reason and so teams are able to give a little bit more cushion give a little bit more separation and try to squeeze down on the things that the bills are doing well underneath which is seems to be stymying the offense and they're not able to you know cause the the defense is to loosen up very much and I agree with you I think that the dolphins you know outside the numbers they're pretty good in coverage as I mentioned before
there are top 10 defense in most metrics since you know the past five weeks even if they've struggled here and there and they they gave up a massive clunker to to the Ravens that still tracks so that says that they're a little bit better than top 10 you know they might be top five in some of those metrics and so there's some opportunities across the middle field I think that even if Jerome Baker for the Miami Dolphins is coming back off of his
IR you know that he's questionable right now is their inside linebacker their best inside linebacker still not like an elite coverage linebacker and so I think there's going to be some opportunities for cook there and really you know some things to get done the other thing to take note of from that Ravens game the the dolphins were playing their starting defense partly because of the injuries but also just because of their the way they approach
it this is not the same as the bill's defense the bill's defense will come at you in waves and there there are reliable depth players behind the starting level that can get you through a game the dolphins don't have that the part of the reason they gave up 56 points is that because once their frontline defenders going went down and once their kind of interior defensive line Zach Sealer Christian Wilkins Raquan Davis once those guys get gassed
they literally don't have defensive linemen past the second level they have a manual Agba Dashaun hand as interior big guys and then everybody else on their on their depth chart is marked as an insider outside linebacker and I know that that counts Melvin Ingram that counts Bradley Chubb that counts you know Jalen Phillips those are linebackers but we know they played down in the dirt but what that tells me then is that they don't have
the kind of beef for a team like the Ravens who's gonna lean on you and run as much as you know some of the other you know as much as say that the Patriots that gave the bills a lot of problems and so I think that if you can establish a physical game against this defense and kind of beat them up they won't they won't bring it we saw until you know Lamar Jackson was pulled from the game with the the Ravens there were snaps where he had
five to eight seconds in a completely clean pocket to throw the ball partially because at that point in the game some of those defensive tackles and defensive linemen had been you know up 100% of the snaps and we're just didn't have anything left and so I think that if the bills can have long sustained drives that's another area of weakness is not only just the injuries but the fact that they don't have reliable depth and so you get a much
less capable squad once you tire out the starters and that's I think been an underrated story JJ of this Miami Dolphins team on both sides of the ball this season the roster construction really has lent itself to a lack of depth and a lot of key positions that this offense in the way McDaniel calls it there are a priority and I look specifically at the tight end and wide receiver room with that and then on the defensive side of the ball as well an overall
lack of depth I think everywhere except you could argue maybe that defensive back room but a linebacker in D line you're absolutely right traditional middle linebacker I mean this is a Miami team that that doesn't have a lot of depth which is surprising because you still have a QB who is on a rookie contract and not getting paid yet you know it's interesting you brought up the metrics on the Miami Dolphins defense this is a team that heading into that
Baltimore game was sixth in weighted DVO a which takes into account more recent performance and kind of bunks early season performance so you're absolutely right that after this eight week mark two things tend to happen traditionally teams in the in the fan geo scheme they start to get better in the second half of the season but then they also got Jalen Ramsey back at that time as well and it was this great confluence of things while
this Miami Dolphin team was also going into a soft kind of garbage part of its schedule as well it's had a lot of opportunities to get right granted not against great competition game in and game out but now you look where they're at not just with the injuries but with where this scheme can be exploited and I think there's a lot working towards the bill's advantage here and we have to remember too that that JJ Josh Allen has played three games against
a fan geo style defense defense that has been led by Vic Fangio himself one earlier on this season and then two in prior years and he has scorched Vic Fangio called defenses Fangio doesn't seem to have JJ a lot of answers for what Josh can do with his legs or with his ability to extend plays and asking these DB's to hold up in coverage for long swatches of time isn't something that this style of defense is geared to do so it'll be interesting to
see to me if Fangio decides to call an audible he blitzes at one of the lowest rates in the league I think Miami is only blitzed on 21% of its pass rushes this year I wonder if they're going to dial that up a little bit JJ and here's why the book on Josh Allen has typically been that you cannot blitz him because if you blitz him he'll destroy the blitz like he did in that week five game against Miami where he was absolutely stellar against the blitz that being said though
we've seen from the Jacksonville game really on a lot more teams apply a lot more pressure to Josh in the form of delayed blitzes and in the form of simulated pressure you know it's interesting because Josh JJ I didn't believe this until I saw the stats on pro football reference Josh is a top 10 QB as far as blitz rate this season which means teams are blitzing him at a far higher rate than they had the previous two seasons last season he was 17th in blitz rate and then the season before
that he was 15 so teams have kicked it up a notch and JJ that tells me that they're seeing something either with this Buffalo Bill's pass protection or Josh's decision-making ability or potentially the lack of performance from some of these wide receivers and pass catchers particularly after the buy they're seeing something that says if I blitz Josh and get his timing off this Bill's this Bill's offense doesn't have the chance doesn't have the ability to quickly adjust or if Josh
extends the play I'm not as worried about the weapons down the field anymore as I maybe was in previous years you know JJ it's interesting we said that the bills needed to fix the drop problem that their pass catchers had last year but this is still a team that ranks number four in the league and drops with 29 overall for the entire season 12 of those 29 JJ have come since the buy so in the last month of the season so these Buffalo Bill's pass catchers aren't executing on a lot of these
broken down plays like they used to and Josh isn't playing as well against the blitz anymore either with some of his delay decision-making and inaccuracy if there is a way for the dolphins I think to not to not wait for the game to come to them it's going to be in the form of Fangio to meet changing it up and blitzing Josh more which is definitely not at his comfort zone but is something I think that
we're going to have to keep an eye out for as an added wrinkle with everything on the line for the afc east in this game well I agree with you I think that that's one that's been talked about kind of across the you know the talk space this week leading up is that he may need to do that with how depleted they are the other piece that he may need to do that he doesn't like to do is to have Jalen Ramsey trail Stefan Diggs and we know about you know Josh Allen and Jalen Ramsey's
beef and the way that he likes to test that guy after all the comments when Josh was coming out of the draft and then we have the added complexity of Eli Apple who is the opposite side CB who's filling in with Zamey Howard out and the beef that he has with Stefan Diggs after all of his talk you know post Cincinnati Bengals playoff game in Orchard Park where the the Bengals destroyed the bills and so Eli Apple was absolutely completely decompensate during the Ravens game
they took him to the to the house you know on multiple snaps one snap that he was roasted for repeatedly was where Lamar Jackson dropped back as if he was a lefty and then switched his feet and through and for some reason Eli Apple bit on that and thought that there was no way that he was going to throw to that side of the field and so like you know which is just kind of are you a professional football player are you a professional of any kind like he's not gonna throw a left
hand it are you kidding and so you know that's the kind of thing that it'll be interesting to see how they approach coverage to you know try to get that execution as you mentioned Dan from the from the wide receivers is you know what's Fangio going to do to try to keep that you know drops up execution down for this bills you know bills team who's definitely gonna try to get that going I think against this you know the Dolphins with how Josh has performed he likes to push the
ball it should be like 70 degrees with between two and five miles per hour of winds this evening and so it should be perfect night for football cloudy but not really expected to have have rain and if it is maybe a sprinkle nothing too serious so yeah I mean there won't be any excuses I think is my point there won't be any excuses for Joe Brady Josh Allen stuff on digs etc to not make something happen against this defense and I'm worried if we see a slow start and a failure to
get going in the scripted portion of these plays I'm severely worried about even if the bills make it into the playoffs with a win how they fare against teams that have a chance to prepare for them and you know are able to shut that down because you know it's good it's a big test there's gonna be a true test for Joe Brady versus a Fangio defense and it's going to be an interesting relief to see basically an equivalent offense offense from a talent perspective based on injury you know injury
luck and how they face the dolphins under Dorsey versus how Brady handles them and I know the second one's always harder because you give them a chance to see your personnel and see your opportunities but I do think it's going to tell a story of what kind of capabilities Joe Brady has as an offensive game planner and as an offensive schemer in what he brings to the table in this game because you can't you know there's some cheats available for him in the form of inferior talent on the field
for the dolphins and so the real question is can you unlock some things or can you expose some
things that Fangio is trying to scheme to correct? Yeah well said well said and I think that puts a very beautiful little bow on our analysis of that side of the ball JJ how about we flip over now and talk about this this surging Bill's defense against what'll also be an injury depleted Miami Dolphins offense so as it stands right now I believe Miami is set to play only one of its offensive line starters in the game Tyree Kill is in but has been in a walking boot all week
Jaylen Waddle likely to be out or he most are likely to be out for this game and folks need to remember that the dolphins can do no worse than sixth right now they are in the playoffs no matter what so while I'm sure they would like the two seed and lay home field advantage my my sense is there's also something in the back of their mind that says we are already in we don't want to risk what could be a very deep playoff run by putting guys out there when they're not ready to play
so Waddle most are most of the offensive line likely out for this game JJ it's going to be Tyree Kill on the outside and then probably Cedric Wilson or somebody like that Braxton Berrios is the the number two outside wide receiver here and then it's going to be a steady steady diet of I think Devon HN and and Jeff Wilson Jr coming out of that backfield so JJ what do you see are some of the keys for this now all of a sudden almost healthy Buffalo Bills defense
as they go into a depleted yet still dangerous Miami offensive setup yeah so I think that the um you know it feels like you know it feels feels like the point of the pod loses its potency when my answer is almost always win the trenches right like it's hard but that's football like there's no way to answer this question I have totally noticed that about us like it's like I'm always on the offensive tuck the middle of the field James Cook involved and you're like throw
to the trenches right yeah I'm like win the trenches win the 22 episodes and it's been the same thing basically for how the bills need to win yeah exactly so you know I think that that's that's that's the thing for me is like and to expand on that it's not just when the trenches because like I said that's that can be applied to every single football game that's the strategy to win every game on offense and defensive lines is to win the the physicality of the game
and impose your will on the opposition and so I think that's the answer but more specifically scheme wise I think it's you need to set the the edges of that defensive line with Rousseau Epineza Floyd um maybe I don't know if von Miller's going to be back in this one I hope he's going to be inactive because Kingsley Jonathan looked really nice against the the Patriots I think you know give him a young a young you know upstart um who's on a cheap contract and so it sort of
feels okay for him to take snaps from a super expensive contract and von Miller um in terms that you're not like kind of double paying and so give them a chance but have them set the pocket wide and maintain the edges until they know it's not a pass or not not a run because that's where Devon A-chain has Devon A-chain has been really you know hurting other teams he's not a between the tackles runner um they have done some things with zone that he's found some small seams because
he's also kind of a small guy um that in his quicks right so he's found some seams in the middle of that line but most of his money is being made outside the tackles and so if you're able to have somebody like like I think that Greg Rousseau is probably a top five or six dn in this league when it comes to setting the edge mostly because of his length it's really hard to leverage that guy and not give him an option to get outside and then shut something down or at least squeeze a running
back further towards the sideline or back inside towards his linebackers and so I think that setting the edge um the side opposite Rousseau is going to be critical to shutting down this run game in terms of shutting down the pass I think it's it's the same thing the bills the bills have held Tyree kill under 60 yards every time they faced him in the Sean McDermot era they know how to bracket him it's the same thing that they did against CD Lam um often it's is that it's not a true
double or triple team but it's rather you're just kind of flip you're you're floating your zone to be a little bit thicker with bodies towards that player side of the field and you're always capping with a say safety on his side of the field and so it whether it's one high or two high safeties you're always shading to keep things over the top and that's I think going to apply even more in this matchup with Jalen Waddle likely not to play they're not going to be afraid of some of those
other players getting deep on them because they they have done an excellent job the past few weeks of marrying the rush with the coverage and making sure that they have an answer in shutting down the pocket in less than three seconds as a you know to kind of close off half the field we've seen the the bills suffer this so many times where there's you know Gabe Davis running wide open in the end zone but the rush has has an answer for that which is they bring overbearing pressure to one side to
the same side that Gabe Davis is running open and uncovered they have pressure coming from there so Josh is flushed to the opposite side of the field which kind of takes that throw off the table especially if he has pressure he can't flip his flip his hips and set his feet and get you know one of those cross cross body cross field throws throws out that's the kind of thing that the bills can do here too is you you set your coverage is super strong and then you have an option or a
lever a stunt a delayed blitz with Bernard to really flush to a to a to a place where he's uncomfortable and make a throw back across his body those are the things that I can see also I think that you know you mentioned to her Bernard having a great year and as a as a pro bowl snub it seems criminal I mean he's the first player in like 35 years or something to have six sacks three interceptions two fumbles two fumble recoveries you know like he has had an outstanding
first year as a starter and I think that there's a lag right like and we've talked about the pro bowl before it doesn't really matter it's kind of pointless you know Jalen Ramsey missed seven games this season somehow a pro bowler but Russell Douglas leads the entire league in takeaways the past six weeks and he is not um Josh Allen has like 17 more touchdowns or 13 more touchdowns than Patrick Mahomes but Mahomes is for some reason the pro bowl quarterback doesn't matter
I'm excited to see when the all-pro comes out because I think that's a more that that matters more and it's more it's it's a more honest and reasonable assessment of players capabilities and so all that being said back to the kind of defensive scheme I like I don't think that they should shadow Russell Douglas over Tyree kill I think that he's their best coverage player but I think they can play the defense as the defense they can like I said flip their zones towards Tyreek
but not worry about you know having an individual assigned to him because I think there's some opportunities there that if they start to cap um off uh the route tree that Hill is about able to hit that will have opportunities from Russell Douglas to take on some of those secondary receiving threats and potentially take away some balls yeah absolutely I think I agree with you I don't want to see any one defender on the bill's defense assigned to Tyreek Hill because it is
good as Russell Douglas has been I don't know that there's anybody on the bill's defense that is capable of managing that assignment for four quarters but I also too think that that does not play to the strengths of this defensive scheme we saw them in week five play a lot of cover six a lot of cloud coverage over Tyree kill and we've seen them do that as you mentioned with CD lamb and other number one wide receivers on opposing teams the issue for the bills this season hasn't been
shutting down number one wide receivers has been shutting down the number two option which based on DVOA heading into this week the Buffalo Bills ranked 29th in the league at doing that now that's not necessarily a criticism of Christian Benford who recently has really come on and settled in to that number two uh CB slot um very admirably but it's more to the effect of the bills assigned so many resources defensively to shutting down a number one wide receiver they're often leaving
their number two guy um on an island for a long time that number two guy was dane Jackson because with the tray white out and before the arrival of rizul Douglas Benford was the number one lockdown CB for this team so a lot of those numbers are inflated with by dane Jackson stats and we've had that conversation about Jackson's limitations and coverage but Benford has really elevated play opposite of Douglas and I think that gives that should give Sean McDermott even more confidence
enrolling out some of these cloud coverages over to rekill and then you can rely on Christian Benford to manage his own to run uh Teran Johnson to manage his own in the slot against some of these lesser is going to sound like a cruel cruel word but the reality is is there is a drop off between Tyree kill Jalen Waddle and the rest of these wide receivers on this Miami offense so I think Benford and Johnson managing those counterparts for of Tyree kill that talent drop off I think is a lot
more doable you just can't let he'll beat you in this game and you got to force Miami to figure out another way to do that while they are so depleted and listen I say this every time too got to get pressure on to a if he gets the ball out and less than in in 2.3 seconds he is deadly when he is on time and he is the third best graded QB in the league according to PFF when he gets to throw from a clean pocket when he is throwing from a pressured pocket or a collapsing pocket his QBR
drops from 80 to 20 so you know you want to get to a under pressure and you know Stephen Ruiz who is one of my maybe favorite guys who breaks down QB analytics he often jokes and calls to us progressions performative because the reality is is to a nose where he wants to go with the ball he's not throwing to a guy he's throwing to a window where because of the speed on this offense he is 90% sure a guy is going to end up showing up and that has worked a great effect for them this
year but when you can disrupt that timing on those routries and you can get to to enforce them to hang on to the ball when that timing doesn't exist he cannot process with nearly that level of speed post snap post snap he is one of the weaker QBs still in the league when he doesn't have those first two predetermined routes that he can throw to so if you're the bills and you take those away and you get pressure on him it seems like a simple recipe and maybe we're oversimplifying it with how
easy we're making it seem but if you get pressure and you disrupt those throwing windows play the windows not necessarily the man which is what this McDermott defense is so good at doing you should have a really good day hopefully defensively against what is a depleted Miami offense they're still going to break one I could see Hill still going for like a 30 yard or I could see HN you know breaking off a long run because that's what this team is built on they're built on the explosives
but if you can force them otherwise to matriculate down the field with where they're at right now schematically and personnel wise I think I think the advantage goes to the bill's defense which is now something to say a lot against the Miami offense well and I think too that the Buffalo Bill's defense has been doing something in the past few weeks or even probably half the season in great measure and that's population to the football you have to have that in this situation
and good things happen when you get a lot of bodies around that Terrell I'm sorry Christian Benford strip out bumble against the the Patriots tight end you know in the first quarter that was that was purely just an effort play because that player was wrapped up and he showed up populated the football had nothing else to do other than yeah maybe I'll try for a fumble and got it right and so um that's the kind of thing that I hope that we can see with the bill's defense on this in this
matchup as well um and count you know counterpoint kind of flipping back to the other matchup this Miami defense is not as good at tackling they're one of the poorer tackling defenses in the league and so when players have challenged them you know and they have good yards after contact that Miami defense has not been good at that so the bills need to be excellent at it they need to to be good and tackling sure and tackling um not miss tackles because that's like you said what
you know how how Miami makes a take is by breaking open explosive plays causing people problems and it kind of long and late downs um and so hopefully that's you know something that bills can take care of and like you said pressure um and like I said population of the football and I'm really excited to see what happens with the interior pressure for the bills at Oliver has been playing out of his mind the past four or five weeks and I hope that that continues on on a long playoff run because
he is he's definitely making the bills look smart for for that extension um he's gonna end this year I think the 14th or 17th highest paid interior defensive tackle but he's gonna probably end statistically in the top five um in the league and so it's it's good money right that's a good value um and so seeing interior pressure like you said you know when we kind of started off the Miami Dolphins don't they think they have one or two I think they have two of their preferred five starters
on offensive line and the biggest you know void of talent is in the interior the center Lee and Meikernberg had his first start of his entire life as a center against the bills and I think it showed up right like we got there was pressure on two or early in the in the middle of that pocket um and he's improved over the course of the year of course but then he was out for injury and is just now coming back and so they're going to have you know a backup center they're gonna have a backup guard
their other guard Robert Hunt who is a preferred starter is playing but again coming off of an injury so this will be his first game back is likely to play and so there's vulnerabilities there and you know and and you know they do have two of their five preferred starters on the tackles but one of those is Terran Armstead who is they got to wheel his corpse out and like rejuvenate him every time to just to play like he's 38 years old he's had a long storied successful career he's
been an amazing tackle in this league but the thought that he can you know shut down a japanese for 30 snaps is like less likely right like he has some issues of mobility he's got knees shoulders ankles you know all things going on he's kind of dragging these injuries behind him every week um and so yeah I think the pressure uh disrupting the windows making sure that two of moved to a second read because I agree with you he's not a second reaction thrower he is uh you
know read it probably pre-snap no exactly where he wants to hit hit that that connection point hits the connection point or doesn't rarely makes a mistake or throws an interception um and if the bills can kind of close down those connection points with good film study and knowing where he would like to hit them with the ball um I think this could be a long day for the Miami offense I'm excited for that I want to see the bill's defense show up and show out and I've been of
the opinion kind of talking in the broadsco with other you know friends and bills chats things like that Dan that if the bills head into this game and the jaguars have won and it's a win or you are out uh scenario I think that's when we see the best game from the bills I think that if they have it same same as the dolphins having it in the back of their mind that the worst they can be as a six I don't actually love the bills playing this game within the back of their mind oh if we
blues were still in right like I prefer to see a a desperate team because I think that's the only way you match the energy of Miami at home after being embarrassed also has the stakes on the line of a two or a six seed and home field advantage in the playoffs and then also has the stakes that like I think that this is the part that is you know maybe not talked about as much the bills are their boogeyman the shaman term is like 11 and two against the the dolphins in in his
tenure and josh allen has completely roasted them and in his games he's had offensive player the week five times in like you know less than 12 times seeing them so I think that the bills have the ex will need a little bit extra juice because even an injury depleted even a you know we still have the six seed dolphins team is going to have some motivation from the fact that this is this is the team that we probably set out in the beginning of the year to say we're going to
take the division from these Buffalo bills because they have you know victimized us so many times so hard for so many years there's some I think there's some added motivation there that the bills can't necessarily match because they're the bully in the situation it's you know the revenge aspect of it I think is more in the dolphins favor than it is for the bills and it's the kind of thing too where it's like you know the dolphins you know replace the the ravens logo with a bill
logo and then take out some of the aggression they have from being embarrassed on national TV last week in this match up against the bills and so those are my kind of you know thoughts about how it's going to go and how it could go with extra motivation added juice for this team and and things we'd like to see. Speaking of things we'd like to see JJ how about we see what we think our
score predictions for this are going to be what do you say? All right let's do it. All right predictions sure to go wrong I got this game 24 21 bills I know a lot of folks are expecting a high flying high scoring game but it's tough for me to think that the bills have just been sitting on this uber dynamic super effective passing game under Brady since the buy I mean since the buy JJ Josh Allen's completion percentage is under 60 60 percent it's 58.3 and I know he's had nine total
touchdowns since the buy but six are rushing only three are passing he's averaging under a passing touchdown each game since the buy in this Joe Brady offense I would love to think that the bills are going to put another 40 burger on the on this Dolphins defense and Josh is going to throw for five TDs but I think what is more reasonable is that the bills figure some stuff out Gabe Davis has a solid game stuff on digs has a solid game and overall you feel good about where this offense
can go heading into the postseason so I'm going to go 24 21 bills great no I like that prediction I similarly think it's going to be a very close game I think that we might see the bills first 31 just because of all the injuries on the you know the dolphins defense is very depleted the bills might look better than they actually should against this team in this situation and so I'm going to go 31 27 bills and I think that it's a 27 to 24 game with the dolphins leading in the last two minutes
which you know everybody have your cardiologist cardiologist on speed dial because like I said you know 31 27 bills and I think that the dolphins are 27 to 24 in the fourth quarter with two minutes or less to go and this is an opportunity for Josh Allen to show his stuff and shine and show up you know in a way that only Josh Allen can with the game winning drive for a touchdown so that 31 27 bills god I hope you know they pull this one out because it would be sweet to be in at playoffs
where the only team higher seated than you is the outstanding Baltimore Ravens and you don't necessarily need to worry about them until an AFC championship I totally agree all right JJ how about some props I got one on offense one on defense first on offense Josh Allen over under two and a half passing touchdowns in this game so he has not gone over two passing touchdowns since that Philly game so as we established has not had a multiple passing TD game since the buy
so is this the game where Josh Allen remembers that he owns the Miami Dolphins and goes over yeah I'm gonna smash the over on that one I think he gets he gets more than two my score prediction of 31 total points would indicate that he needs to do some stuff so yeah I think the bills you know bills find some passing juice against this this team and he goes over two and a half yep you yeah yeah I agree I think it's gonna be over I think he'll throw three and I think those will be the
only three touchdowns the bills have in this particular game nice all right and then you want to do yours yeah I'll do my offensive my offensive one is Dalton concaid over 100 yards receiving ooh I'm gonna take the under okay only because again I just I don't know I don't know what Brady wants to do in this passing game I don't know who he wants to prioritize I don't know what level of the field he's picking to exploit he's been so good in the run game
of identifying where teams are weak and just relentlessly twisting on that weakness I haven't seen that in the passing game yet so I hope I'm on the Hopium pipe for 100 because that would mean that he sees the same weaknesses in the middle of this Miami defense that we do but again I haven't seen enough proof of concept in a small sample size to say that that he'll do that so I'm gonna take under I think in Cape probably as a decent game but I'm not gonna say over 100 yards
okay yeah that's fine um you got a defensive prop what is it yeah wait what's your overunder on that oh um I'm over you're over oh I'm all the way over I think that I yeah no I want to see I want to see Dalton concaid like I want to see him like slam some of the the doors on these uh you know rookie receiving records and things like that and rookie tight end for the bill stuff that he owned to firmly stamp his his way into the league as a you know outstanding offensive weapon
for this team yeah for sure all right uh here's the next one I got for you Leonard Floyd who'd cash in on a two million dollar contract incentive needs one and a half sacks this game uh Leonard Floyd over under one and a half sacks will he get it oh my gosh I'm gonna say over because that's a heck of a motivator and I think that you could see it's funny because like I don't I don't care I want what it takes to motivate you to to sacks Leonard Floyd go get it my friend that's what I'm
saying I'm going I'm going over over that as well he deserves it he's had such a great season for this team um absolutely all right I've got one yeah my one defensive uh prop rasul duglass over under 1.5 turnovers wow so he's done that twice is a yes he's done it twice in six weeks he's done it twice so so we're saying that almost half of his games is above bill bill you will turn over multiple turnover games um man I'm so tempted to hit the over but I'm I'm gonna say under I'm
gonna say under I just I get their injury depleted and I be on I may be on an island with this I just have too much respect for Tua and the way that team plays I think Tua is a good quarterback yeah but I also don't think he's a sloppy quarterback either so I so I get he's got 12 turnovers this season but but that's a lot here's here yeah here's my devil's advocate on that though this is a for it all type of game and they don't have many options so I think that's it creates a kind of
perfect storm for somebody like rasul duglass who does such good study of knowing where the ball is going to be and when it's going to be there that if if they're especially if the you know dolphins are trailing for any portion of this game um there's going to be some snaps where I think Tua is going to against his better judgment try to make something out of nothing and that's a that's a ripe ripe for the pickings for rasul duglass so I'm hitting the over all right all
right you've talked me into it I'll take the over to though I don't feel good about it I don't feel good about it at all but JJ I'll tell you what I do feel good about this pod uh made the technology gods be on our side as we go to post this thing here before the game for all of you listening at home like share and subscribe wherever you get your podcast google apple spotify and as always go bills go bills yeah