Drive Time: Dolphins Browns Week 17 Preview

and Buffalo. I knew going into that the Christmas Games, I knew the Steelers were pretenders.

are gonna win the North. The Bills have are already basically clinched into the two seed. It's those teams and everybody else, man, So we got to find a way to break that next year. But I mean that tells you how the AFC playoffs are gonna go. Hopefully Buffalo has to go through both teams, and I think they probably will if Baltimore gets the three seed, and then they they both win their wild card games, and then Baltimore goes into Buffalo.

are not. Anyway, That's the whole point. We have a must win game here coming up on Sunday, and we have to get some help. I think we will get

that help, and I put it on Blue Sky. I think that the Dolphins and Jets game is going to have a very likelihood of being flexed into Saturday based upon how I feel the results will go Sunday, and they usually break that out Sunday night after the games are after the Sunday Night Football game raps and with Commanders and Falcons on Sunday Night Football, I imagine, and that's going to be a pretty early declaration because the way I see it, I don't think the Lions and Vikings

game is going to be for the division in the one seed because I think the Vikings are going to lose to the Packers this week.

Saturday against the Jets in the finale. But first you have to win this one week seventeen at the Cleveland Browns Huntington Bay Bank Field. I had no idea what was called that back when I was in like high school and junior high and I would do this season predictions and write the Dolphins schedule on my peachy folders, whatever the hell I.

chance some ten to fifteen mile prior win projections. It feels like we've avoided rain for a couple of years. Now you might break that run this week. Let's get to know the Browns here real quick, and O man, you think the Dolphins have had it bad? This team in To say the last few years for the Browns has been tumultuous would be the understatement of the year. And think about that statement. Think about that statement on its own. When you consider the three hundred and sixty

five days ago. This was a team that was in the midst of a winning streak that would produce an eleven and six campaign and basically put all the other wild card contenders beneath them. And had the Browns not done that, Miami would have been on the road in Houston in the wildcard round last year. It's a winnable game, a lot more winnable than the freaking twenty five to

blow zero degrees. The Chiefs game was you know what I'm saying, and they go back to the post's they get wiped by the Houston Texans.

They win a playoff game against the Pittsburgh Steelers for the first time in like twenty years, and it makes us, besides the Lions recently, the longest playoff wins rout team in the NFL. Damn near beat the Chiefs in the Divisional round that year, but then Baker plays a full season with a shoulder injury. They go eight to nine

and move off of him, looking for greener pastures. They go seven to ten in the Jacoby Brissett slash Deshaun Watson era or first year, I should say then last year Deshaun gets the opening day start and produces one of the lowest QB epas we've ever seen in the NFL, gets himself hurt. Flacko arrives mid season and leads them to a four game winning streak and into the postseason. To Shawn returns this year and it's right on par with twenty twenty three. Maybe there is a god. He

gets hurt. Jamis Winstig nites them for a bit, but shows you all the signs of a quarterback who once had a thirty thirty five thousand season my favorite stat of all time. Thirty touchdowns, thirty picks, five thousand passing yards, highs and lows. And now they're on their third quarterback Dorian Thompson Robinson and have floated the idea of Bailey Zappi would be next should dtr not be available. Man

rough couple of weeks here for the Cleveland Browns. It's a super talented defense with likely the two time Defensive Player of the Year award winner and Miles Garrett. I think he wins it again this year. A true number one cornerback, good linebacker play if he's going to be available.

Jeremiah Wusu Kormoa and an offensive line that has big name but injury issues, a star running back that came back from agrusive injury only to get injured again, and a wide receiver cord that's pretty damn good, but led by a player they acquired in season in Jerry Judy. Truly one of the more fascinating teams in recent memory.

Let's go ahead and stick with the president and get to know the Cleveland Browns offense and if it isn't our third consecutive Shannahan Tree offense, which is also true for the fourth time in the last five games going back to the Packer game. Now that said it is an offshoot, but it wasn't what they were always doing. The Browns have actually pivoted back to it this year after going away from it to accommodate.

But since he went down, they have pivoted back somewhat more to the under center play action outside zone game. But the overarching issue is they went from this awesome pre game or pre Deshaun Watson run game to even down the stretch last year with Joe Flacco having it back to Watson's offense, where the run game went away again, and now they're back to the original Stefanski attack. The run game has not returned with him and that offense

coming back. It is now the twenty seventh ranked rushing attack, and we know this is an attack that uses They utilize a lot of multiple tight ends, multiple back sets, but that's where the pivot came into. Eleven personnel was ran seventy two percent this year and twelve personnel was seventeen percent. They do dabble in some four wide one running back, no tight end, which is weird because that's their best player on offense to me is David Nijoku.

It's only three percent, but they do run that sometimes, but there's no thirteen personnel, there's no two backs that It's been a tough year, as it would for anyone playing that many quarterbacks. For the Browns, they're thirtieth in yards per play, thirty first in points last and EPA per play success rate and third down conversions over expected. So for Miami, you have to look at this matchup as a chance to suffocate them, possibly shut them out.

That's how bad they've been offensively. Now, how do you attack it? To be perfectly frank with you, guys, I don't really have a passage here. Greg Olsen, the great play by play man who should be on Fox is number one booth.

And I think we saw the glimpses of hope and return to some of those vertical passing concepts that paired with the horizontal stretch, an outside zone game with Jerome Ford and when they had Nick Chubb going where Winston was able to get that going to a certain degree. So one in seven with Watson, Winston comes in and they beat Baltimore. They get blown out by the Chargers

and Saints. They get that super fun TNF snow win against the Steelers that I thought was gonna be a big game for the Dolphins because look at Steelers now. I thought they could just lose all those games down the stretch. And they beat the Bengals barely or not barely. They beat him pretty soundly. But it was the one game the Steelers won to keep themselves ahead of us

in the playoff race. They get that heartbreaking for Dolphins fans lost to the Broncos where Jamis had four touchdowns and three picks, two of those back six for touchdowns. Then things flat lined against the Steelers last week and they make the switch to dtr who has thrown no touchdowns and five career picks or five picks this season. I really don't know what else to tell you, guys, I have to give three things against this offense, Like

that's how the show works. I don't really have any I think if you show up and hold them to single digits, like they benched Winston because of his iont rate. Right, well, he has a four point one percent interception rate and that's really bad. Like Kirk Cousins leads the NFL and picks, but his iont rate is three point five. Anthony Richardson has the highest ion t rate in the NFL at

four point five. But Dorian Thompson Robinson who does not qualify because it pass attempts, how about a seven point one interception rate? Bucko, This is not an NFL quarterback Lea's not right now. And if they don't, if they don't go with him, it sounds like it'll be a Bailey Zappi, which is he an NFL quarterback? No, So, after a brutal year of bad scheduling luck, it looks like we, like, seriously, we get Kyler at maybe his peak of his career. The Rams got everyone back for

that game against US. The Packers were well out of their funk by that point, the Texans coming off there by even though they still look like they kind of stink. Hell, even the Jets have played better football since their bye week, and we get them twice post by week. I'm just asking for one damn layup all year. Since this has been a year of no cup game games for the Dolphins, especially when all the cupcakes you did have where during the stretch of games or two was down. This seems

like your first layup spot of the season. Big three versus the Browns offense Number one, Keep changing the picture. These are going to be a little bit shorter than what we normally do because I really don't think it has to be that complex this week. This is a group that has struggled, a group that has is playing an inexperienced quarterback that has really just based on what we do. I think I trust the guy calling defense

to really make their young quarterbacks head swim. There was a great snapshot ahead of the Cater pick last week where the Dolphins show a Cover one and run it. Then later in the game on the Cater pick, they show the exact same look but rotate into zone coverage, which gets Cater with eyes to the quarterback on that

glance route. One beat of hesitation allows our our pick stunt to arrive with Kalaias Campbell putting this shot across the bow of Brock Purdy and then Cater picks it off game over, so he was able to confuse Rock Purdy. And that's a stuff against Thompson Robinson that should be a walk in the park. Or if we see Jamis or even if we see Bailey Zappy, I don't care.

It's the same across the board. The Browns turn the ball over a lot, and I think that we can do that in this game, especially if it rains.

back the other way. That takes us to our second key, rate here. Number two, you gotta have answers for Ray Joe Day and Elijah Moore. With David Dajokus status in question, I don't think he's gonna play in the game on Sunday. Nick Chubbs down, it is Jerry Judy, it is Elijah Moore, and then a massive drop off in target share. Judy has one hundred and fourteen targets Najoku set ninety seven more ninety two, and then Amari Cooper, who's been with the Buffalo Bills for the last nine weeks, has the

fourth most targets on the Cleveland Browns. But Judy's had a revival here in Cleveland, seventy two grabs for one thousand and seventy two yards, four touchdowns. He's back to the crisp route running. We saw the Alabama and it seems like maybe he's got his head on straight this time. And I think you have to make him your focal point, whether whether you go Ramsey shadow or give consistent attention. You know, some see one special, some cover one special.

Part of what they ran against the Niners where you basically run cover one and instead of having your safety play a buzzing role, he goes and double somebody, which I think is a quite frankly, my preferred option a special on Judy with Storm and that safety, because I assume Kendall Fuller will not go.

to begin with after the Amari Cooper trade. I mean, Judy is a game breaker outside more plays a lot more on the slot inside. That's a matchup I think Cateror has can handle as well. It's but that big nickel we've shown as well. I think from a scheme and personnel standpoint, we stand to have some pretty good matchups here against this Browns offense, Judy can beat you deep, and that's the best way for Miami to lose this game, in my opinion, turning it over on offense and letting

Judy get behind the defense. But luckily we've done a pretty good job of limiting those this year. And the quarterback has not seen throwing the ball down the field at all.

against the Cleveland offense. We'll do the defensive Browns, which is actually a good unit against the Dolphins offense.

But Jerome Ford is like Jerry Judy in the sense that he has some gidea up to his game. My number one goal is to prevent the explosives from those two guys. Jerome Ford has six explosive runs this season. He has a sixty six yard touchdown run. We can't allow those. He averages five and a half yards per carry. Best kind of his game, it's the three runs that don't get much. Then he springs the fourth run, just not quite as frequently as Barry Sanders did. Right, and

on your wins, you create long down distances. That's when you get into your bag of coverages. You institute your rush games for a quarterback that struggles to see it and a line that has a lot of changes that can cause some communication issues.

the pivot. Jack Conklin was one of the game's best right tackles in football for a while well, and then the left tackles in for Jeddrick Wills, it's Germaine of Fetti, the backup. The smallest guy on the line is three hundred and ten pounds and that's Conklin. They're big guys that want to push you around, and that's where I think Jordan Brooks's ability to impact the rush lanes as a blitzer, how they use chopping, various roles and overloads

and sim pressures. By the way, Chop Robinson is a superstar, right, we all agree.

to ninety three to complement each other. And don't forget Benito Jones, who to me has played his way into garnering a long term role within this defense to bring it back to the size and what I assume will be a concerted effort to run the ball off the edge. I've been so impressed by Quinton Bell's run defense could be a nice workload for him to fight through that size.

They have the polers, the tight ends, the split flow action to just go out and win some rundowns and create some second down longs for Chop Probinson, Dependazier's back and go rush the quarterback for posterity. Their past block efficiency scores are bad.

Conklin ninety five point eight. I should note he's fifth and run block win rate, and further, he's off total knee reconstruction from week one injury last year, and each week he looks more and more.

You guys are familiar with fire zones. Yeah, it's essentially a five man rush with a three to three second and third level matching kind of like in soccer that doesn't show a post player off the snap, or they can rotate their coverage to get different guys into the post. It can look like man, it can be man match, but it's likely a zone at its heart that brings a rusher and replaces that rusher with a dropper. So kind of like when you see Benito Jones peeling back

into the hook zone, that's a fire zone. So they can dress it up with six or seven or even eight on the line of scrimmage. They can sim it. They can still bring more than you can block, so it's imperative for tu to be sharp at the line of scrimmage pre snap. By the numbers, there are ninth and blitz rate at twenty nine percent and that comes the twenty eight percent pressure rate, third in the NFL.

You won't see it by the three and twelve record or by the game you watch against the Broncos a few weeks back, but they can cause some issues on this side of the football.

the field. But really that's every game, right because Smith and Waddle two of the most efficient players in the league in terms of their targets what they do with them, and that's where the Dolphins have been successful.

a long time. There's like five guys in this league that can neutralize Miles Garrett, and Toront Armstead's one of those guys. So I'm glad he's playing the Big Three versus Brown's defense. Number One, you have to decipher the exotic looks, not the erotic looks like we heard on a podcast a couple weeks ago. Here, you don't correct your guest, but that was funny if you know what I'm talking about. If not, we're gonna let you guys

figure it out. Number one, decipher the exotic looks. So we covered the process and structure of the defense to continue it. They play cover one thirty four percent of the time, which is the second highest rate in the league. So if you want to take your deep shots, this could be a shot a chance for that, and I think we saw a lot of that last week. Personally, it used to be punishable by long touchdown if you dared played man coverage against the Dolphins, but this year

has not been as effective. Tua's passer rating is down from fourth against man coverage to sixteenth this year, and the biggest difference is targeting. Tyreek Waddle actually beats man coverage at a better rate this year. He has a higher yards per target and a higher passer rating against man coverage, but Reek's yard per target against man coverage is down from ten point one last year to five point two.

coverage structure to round that out. They run Cover three thirty percent of the time, so you're basically two thirds of the time to side from between Cover one and Cover three, which is the smoothest disguise you can possibly operate from right. It's kind of the same responsibilities. It's

just a little bit of a variation. We do plenty of that show one bail into three, and we saw the Jets do a lot of that against TUA and just went to work pounding out the intermedia and short perimeter throws against that coverage.

So this feels like a spot where you again could find the deep ball, but we've been tailing that all year and we haven't had that deep ball opportunities too often, especially if you catch them in a bad coverage like

the Broncos is a couple of weeks back. They ran that inverted two look, which is your safety's come down, and played the short the curl flat or the cloud whatever you call the cover two underneath area and the cornerbacks flip back and rotate into your deep halves, and they got burned up top on a third and eleven from inside the five yard line. That just ran Marvin Mims right down the scene from the slot and he ran right past their defense for a ninety seven yard

touch on or whatever that was. I just don't think it's in Jim Schwartz's DNA to have the game come to him. He's aggressive, and I see no reason to expect that to change this week. And if we get Wattle, that makes it pretty big difference, because well, yeah, he's one of the most efficient receivers in the league again, Like, how about this? Did you know Waddle has been targeted eight times on third and long this year and he's converted six of them for first downs.

that he does is still in there. This's a guy that, when he was properly featured, had fourteen hundred yards, Like he's an elite player.

shut down Nick Bosa last week. He climbed and defeated Fred Warner time and time again in the running game. This is a Hall of Fame talent we're talking about here against another guy who's for sure already you know, basically got his measurements for the gold jacket coming up. That's Marquee football while we love it, but also keep an eye on Dalvin Tomlinson and Michael Hall inside. They're both wicked pass rushers with a good combo of first

step quickness and power. Especially Tomlinson. Man, he's one of those freaks of nature that's three hundred and twenty five pounds, but he moves like a gymnast, like I bet he can do the splits. Hall is like that too, but at three hundred pounds. Because they're so adept at that.

Schwartz loves to peel them into the hook zone on those fire zones undercut stuff, and then they have to incorporate Jeremiah Wusa Koramoa, who's the modern day linebacker athlete in terms of how he moves both vertically and down hill.

in pass pro. And if I had to guess, I'm gonna guess that they're gonna try to put Brewer against a nose tackle head up at a zero technique like a Tomlinson and try to have him deal with power to try to create isolations on the perimeter for Toront Armstead and Miles Garrett or Shelby Harris off the other side. But he's also missed some games as well, or recently,

I should say. I think it was a great sign to see Isaiah Win step in and play as well as he did, and quite frankly the entire offensive line. That was a physical game from the Boys, and if they do that, they're going to be tough to beat. But it'll be imperative for two to decide for quickly what he sees for the guys up front, to get surge in the running game and communicate their protection assignments

against the many looks of Jim Schwartz. They haven't played the Niners, they haven't played the Rams, Packers or Texans, but they did put the Bengals twice, which is somewhat a comparable scheme here, somewhat not necessarily, and I think the Burrow plays similar to to US. I want to see what they did against Joe Burrow to see what they might do against Tua. They blitzed him twenty one percent of the time in the first meeting and then seventeen percent in the second meeting, So maybe it's fewer

blitzers and what we're used to. We shall see. This is the most fun matchup of the game. Let's go ahead and take a break right there, come back and do segment three, Keys two and three versus the Browns defense. Big picture, what's at stake, range of outcomes, keys to victory, all of that. Next Draft Time podcast, your host Travis Wingfield, brought to you by AutoNation. I hope all of your Christmas is We're Mary. All of the holidays however you celebrate,

We're fantastic. Plenty of family time, football, presence, food, all the fun stuff that we love this time of year, like December, the entire month of December when you have young ones.

Mariners had legendary slugger. Jay Buhner is the spokesperson for Northwest Motorsports where they have trucks, trucks and more trucks. And he'd always say stop buying Northwest Motor Sports and tell him the Bone Sentchuck because his nickname was the Bone.

Key number two against the Cleveland Browns defense is to be privy of the stars Miles Garrett and Denzel Ward, picking it back up from the first paragraph and key number one. Ward is one of the few cornerbacks in the league who can draw consistent shadow roles within the game plan. He is very, very good, smart player with elite change of direction skills, ball skills, knows how to play with physicality and win to back off. He can press, he can mirror. He's the reason they play as much

man coverage as they do now. Martin Emerson and Cam Mitchell Nope, Danny DeVito Meme, Nope. I don't like that they've had tougher years at the other two cornerback spots. Ward allows a fifty percent catch rate and just an eighty two passer rating against when he's in coverage. He is a true lockdown number one cornerback, and with all that man coverage and the way they mix up the front, I think some of your best matchups are tight ends

and backs on safeties and linebackers. Especially if Coromoa cannot go, his replacement has been Jordan Hicks. He runs the green dot now and then elevating in his position is Mohammu Diabate. I don't know if I got that right, but I hope I did. I apologize filling in at the other spot. They love to bring in Grant Delpit into the rush equation, and when they do that, it can indicate man coverage roles, or you can get a matchup where he wheels out and has to cover Devon eight Chan, which I like

that matchup against their safety as well. If there is no Wattle, I think it's a big opportunity to target those two guys John Neu Smith and Devon eight Chan. But to the larger point, Ward and Garrett are game changers, and I think sometimes you have to ask your guys to go up against their best and beat their best, and we have that. Toront Armstead hasn't been that way for Tyreek Kill this year, but that's what you pay him that money for, is to beat the top cornerbacks

in the league. Delpit can be had man. He's a penalty machine. He's over aggressive. After what we saw in the Houston game. If they do go Ward on Hill, I'm not taking those contested opportunities ever against an elite cornerback because it resulted in three picks last time we tried that against man coverage. Now Waddle on any of the cornerbacks, I love that a matchup, so I'd even look to have Malik Washington in an expanded role that way. Key number three is just protect the football. That could

be the entire segment right there. Just protect the football. I say it's going to be a shorter version here, and I think when it comes down to this, if the Dolphins can play a smart, clean game where they limit mistakes, penalties and protect the football, I think they can go to Cleveland in a must win spot and wipe the floor with them. The turnover numbers on the Browns this year are wild. They have a league high twenty picks they've thrown. They've gotten the second fewest picks,

taking away four of their own. They're thirty first and turnovers and twenty eighth enforcing them.

Dolphins in twenty twenty. Ideally the Colts lose this week, but I'm not sure the Giants would take a win even if you gave it to them, because they're in line for the number one pick now. Dable seems to have had a full blown meltdown last week, so maybe they have like one more in them, and hopefully it's this week. And if Richardson decides to throw thirty percent, like it's always possible. But I like the idea of

beat the Jets. Broncos lose to the Chiefs and that's all we need if that happens, I actually like our chances in Week eighteen, But then you add mac Jones having to beat the Colts. I like that a lot less. Or if the Chargers lose to the Patriots, which spoiler I'm gonna pick that, I actually think that will happen. I then losing to the Raiders in Week eighteen don't like that either. So go Giants, go Bengals, and then go Chiefs. In Week eighteen, you get those three results.

You beat Cleveland the Jets, you get a trip to Orchard Park first week of the playoffs. Since overmatches that sounds hey, like Allen has two hand injuries.

six points against the Bengals. The Bengals, a team that has arguably the best quarterback in the league right now scoring thirty points a game, and is still seven to eight because they can't stop anybody on defense almost impossible to do, and the Browns couldn't score on that Weavers in his bag right now. I think DTR and possibly without a young quarterback's best friend David Njoku. Yeah, this is going to be an ugly showing for the Cleveland offense.

So I'll say we win a twenty three to three game. I could see it being like thirty ten, but I think it'll rain. I think it could be a little bit sloppy. Twenty three to three. Dolphins win keys to victory, win that turnover battle.