More of my college football dalliance later in the column, but let’s look at four NFL things now. First, in Orchard Park.
The Bills are who we thought they were. Or at least who I thought they were. Every week, there’s a different most impressive team in the league. After two weeks, we thought it was Dallas. After three, Miami. After four? Maybe San Francisco. Maybe Buffalo. It’s close.
The Bills’ 48-20 win was notable for a few reasons. Miami had lost nine of the last 10 games in this series; since the Bills got good again with Josh Allen, Buffalo owned Miami. So this meeting was about division supremacy. A win would give the Dolphins a two-game AFC East lead over Buffalo, with tough road games against Cincinnati, Philadelphia, Kansas City and Miami remaining for the Bills. The league advantaged the Dolphins in the scheduling too. With their two meetings on Oct. 1 and Jan. 7, Miami could have to travel to play in Buffalo in full winter weather. Putting Miami at Buffalo in the first game this year meant playing on a bright 70-degree afternoon with a soft 5-mph breeze. Perfect football weather. Everything was setting up for the Dolphins.
Well, the crowd wasn’t.
“The crowd, man,” Sean McDermott said from his office a half-hour after the game. “They were deafening. In all my years in this league, I’m not sure I’ve heard … No, this crowd was as loud as I’ve heard any crowd in an NFL stadium. And that mattered today. I tip my cap to Bills Mafia.”
Leading into the game, it was hard to keep the outside noise out of the building. “They put 70 points on another team last week,” McDermott said. “We saw that, and we saw the tape. They were so impressive. But we really tried to keep it as ‘Next game.’ Respectfully, we treat every game like that. But we watched the 70 points on film, and they didn’t even have [Jaylen] Waddle. So we’re just emphasizing, one play at a time, one series.”
Miami began in track-meet style, going 77 and 70 yards for touchdowns in the first 17 minutes. But Buffalo defensive front seven started winning consistently—Ed Oliver, Daquan Jones and Greg Rousseau in particular—and Miami had four straight three-and-outs. That seemed so counter-intuitive after four quarters last week and the first one Sunday. Another factor was Miami left tackle Terron Armstead leaving with a knee injury in the second quarter. And when Tua Tagovailoa had time, he missed receivers more than he had in his starry September.
Josh Allen was superb in three ways: no turnovers, no major collisions in the open field, and the first perfect passer rating in his career. In 11 career games against Miami, he has 36 TD throws and five interceptions. It helped Sunday to have an inspired game from Stefon Diggs. His 55-yard catch-and-run for a TD, after being interfered with, then being in the grasp of corner Kader Kohou and breaking free, was the most impressive play by a receiver in week four.
“I think the Buffalo Bills proved why they are the team that our whole division is trying to beat,” Mike McDaniel said. That’s what this game was about: one team trying to wrest a division away from the once and future kings of it, the other team battering the challenger. Reality was a bitter pill for Miami Sunday. For Buffalo, as impressive as Allen and Diggs were, McDermott had to be thrilled with a defense that held Miami to six points in the last 42 minutes. “On defense, our guys really took over,” he said.
Sunday’s upshot: The window’s closing on all that talk about the Bills’ championship window closing.
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The Eberflus Era could be short-lived. Blowing a 21-point lead at home to a winless team is bad. Losing 14 games in a row is worse. But the team just seems to careening into chaos. Case in point: the Chase Claypool situation. Lackadaisical in week one and unhappy with the coaching in week four, Claypool was made inactive for Sunday’s loss to Denver. Afterward, Eberflus (3-18 as Bears coach) was asked if Claypool was told to stay away from the team Sunday, and the coach said it was “a choice,” implying it was up to Claypool whether to show up or not. A half-hour later, a Bears PR person told the press that Claypool was told to stay away Sunday. I won’t be surprised to see Claypool released (what a waste of the 33rd pick in the 2023 draft, which is what it cost to get Claypool from Pittsburgh last season) this week. But it’s just another bad look for a team on fire, a team that’s going to start over again at the end of the season. In Chicago, what else is new?
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Khalil Mack’s career day. Six sacks in a game has been exceeded only once—by Derrick Thomas, who had seven in a game 33 years ago. Mack had been sackless in the first three Chargers’ game. But he said he took advantage of a first-time starting quarterback, Aidan O’Connell of the Raiders, and the momentum of the moment. Amazing to think that Mack had three sacks in the first five plays of the third quarter, with all coming in a 43-minute span. “Everything was going right for me—not many chips, I felt great, I felt I could bend the edge with my foot and feel totally healthy,” Mack said. This was a career high in sacks for him, but Mack told me he thought his five-sack day against Denver eight years ago was better. In that game, he made three sacks of Brock Osweiler in the last 12 minutes of a close game.
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Dot-dot-dot. Incredibly impressed with Sam Howell, the Washington offense and the poise the Commanders showed in the painful 34-31 loss at Philadelphia. In the last two seasons at Lincoln Financial Field, the Commanders have split the two games and outscored the Eagles 63-55… Bills play Jags in London Sunday, and there could be some Josh Allen-on-Josh Allen crime. The Bills QB was superb Sunday, and the Jags’ pass-rusher had three sacks of Desmond Ridder … Andy Reid and Tom Landry each have 250 regular-season wins now. Knowing Reid’s love of football history, that’s got to send him into orbit … Best you can say about the 140th pick last April, Dorian Thompson-Robinson, is he looked like a rookie in his first start Sunday for Cleveland. The 135th pick, Aidan O’Connell, made a few more plays in his Raider debut … Ezekiel Elliott’s return to Dallas was grim (six carries, 16 yards), which exemplified his team’s day.
Read more in Peter King’s full Football Morning in America column.
