22. Miami Dolphins
Once again, the Miami Dolphins come up with an intriguing victory. With incentives on the line and future jobs up for grabs, we saw a couple of former Broncos come up big for the Dolphins in their win against the Buccaneers on Sunday.
Bradley Chubb notched two sacks against Baker Mayfield, one of them a strip-sack that ended up getting recovered by the Dolphins. Greg Dulcich led the Dolphins with five receptions on the day, and scored his first touchdown since 2022.
The Dolphins’ defense absolutely had Baker Mayfield in a blender all afternoon and forced three turnovers off the Bucs’ quarterback. That Dolphins’ defense is going to be an interesting factor here in Week 18 as Miami is going to take its show on the road one more time for a matchup against the Patriots, with New England playing for the #1 seed in the AFC.
Can they play the role of spoiler?
21. New Orleans Saints
I don’t care who the opponents have been. The New Orleans Saints are a fun team right now. They have a lot of young players on offense playing extremely well, but none more so than quarterback Tyler Shough. I’m going to continue to sing his praises.
Of course, going into the NFL Draft process, there was a healthy skepticism with Shough because of the fact that he transferred to about 12 different colleges and was one of the oldest rookies coming in this class. The Saints seemingly felt like he was only worth a Day 2 dart throw, so their investment in him wasn’t like they “had to have him” in the moment.
But Kellen Moore has done an excellent job setting up Shough and those young playmakers for the Saints to have success. He made some incredible throws in the Saints’ victory over the Titans, a game that put a couple of talented young QBs on display. The entire offseason is taking on a different tone for the Saints with Shough’s rapid ascent.