Inside The Bills

Turnovers were gifts for Miami

The Bills have had trouble protecting the football for most of the season, and that unfortunately continued at Miami. What makes the giveaways from Sunday’s game so tough to take is the fact that Miami is one of the worst teams in the league at forcing turnovers.

Miami came into the game with the second-fewest takeaways in the league with 12. Only Indianapolis had fewer this season (10) going into Week 16 action. The Dolphins also had the second-fewest fumble recoveries in the league with just three. On Sunday they doubled that total.

The results of Sunday’s turnover battle allowed Miami to go from a minus-12 on the season in takeaway-giveaway differential to a minus-8 leapfrogging Buffalo, which slipped from a minus-10 to a minus-14.

Those turnovers resulted in 17 points for Miami. It was the second consecutive week that Buffalo’s opponent scored 17 points off turnovers.

Miami depending on backups

The Dolphins are missing starters WR Davone Bess, LB Koa Misi and CB Nolan Carroll. And Miami is depending on some players they haven’t routinely turned to.

LB Jason Trusnik is in for Misi and probably the most consistent of the backups.

WR Marlon Moore is in for Bess and has all of six catches this season. And CB Dmitri Patterson is starting for Carroll. Patterson was just signed off waivers Tuesday.

Dolphins inactives

Here are the Dolphins inactives for today’s game against the Bills.

QB Pat Devlin
WR Davone Bess
CB Nolan Carroll
LB Koa Misi
OT Patrick Brown
TE Kyle Miller
DT Kheeston Randall

Miami to copycat Seattle?

After the Seahwaks victimize the Bills with their expertly run read option running game the Bills, knowing its a copycat league are aware they may see it again Sunday.

However, Dolphins QB Ryan Tannehill indicated this week that’s it’s not their bread and butter on offense.

“Yeah, we ran it a little bit last week,” said Tannehill. “It’s not something that we major in by any stretch of the imagination, but it’s something we have just as a changeup.

“I don’t know how it’s going to go. I feel like since we showed it a little last week and then they saw it several times against the Seahawks, I feel like they’re going to have a plan for that. I wouldn’t say we’re going to major in that at all, but it’s always a possibility to run a few times.”

Tannehill isn’t quite the athlete that Russell Wilson is, but knowing Miami struggled to run the ball in the first meeting and seeing Seattle roll up 270 rushing yards on the Bills last week, it likely crossed Joe Philbin’s mind to perhaps make more use of it this week.

Miami injury status report

Here’s the injury status report for the Dolphins entering Sunday’s game between Miami and Buffalo.

OUT
WR Davone Bess – back
K Dan Carpenter – groin
LB Koa Misi – ankle

QUESTIONABLE
CB Nolan Carroll – knee
WR Brian Hartline – back
TE Jeron Mastrud – hamstring
DT Randy Starks – not injury related

PROBABLE
WR Armon Binns – ankle
S Chris Clemons – neck, ribs
LB Karlos Dansby – biceps
DE Derrick Shelby – groin
S Jimmy Wilson – hip

WR Bess out for Miami, Hartline questionable

The Dolphins will be down an important receiver on Sunday as slot receiver Davone Bess is out with a back injury.

Bess did not practice at all this week and will not dress for the Dolphins game against the Bills. He is second in receptions and receiving yards for Miami this season.

Meanwhile leading receiver Brian Hartline is questionable for Sunday’s game with a back injury as well. Hartline was limited in practice Friday after he failed to practice Thursday.

If Hartline can’t play Sunday it would leave Miami’s receiving corps extremely inexperienced, with Marlon Moore, Armon Binns and Rishaw Matthews as the only healthy wideouts. Binns just signed with the Dolphins a few weeks ago and Matthews and Moore have just six receptions each for Miami this season.

Bills full injury status report

Here is the Bills full injury status report for Sunday’s game at Miami.

OUT
DE Mark Anderson – knee
LB Chris White – hamstring
WR Marcus Easley – hamstring

QUESTIONABLE
C Eric Wood – knee

PROBABLE
G Andy Levitre – knee
TE Scott Chandler – foot
DT Kyle Williams – ankle
LB Nick Barnett – knee
CB Justin Rogers – foot
DT Marcell Dareus – knee/wrist
TE Lee Smith – back
RB C.J. Spiller – shoulder
CB Aaron Williams – knee
DE Mario Williams – wrist

Anderson, White out for Sunday

DE Mark Anderson was active for last week’s game, but didn’t play as he was an emergency fill-in only if necessary. This week he won’t even be active.

Head coach Chan Gailey declared Anderson out for Sunday’s game in Miami.

“Mark Anderson tried to do some things, but couldn’t. He just couldn’t keep progressing so he’s going to be out for the game,” said Gailey.

Anderson was limited in practice all week as he never got around to practicing fully at any point. He has not played coming off a pair of knee procedures since Week 5. Gailey said he is not ready now to assess whether he has a chance to play in the season finale against the Jets next week.

Special teams LB Chris White is also out for Sunday’s game. White is dealing with a hamstring injury that kept him from practicing all week.

A. Williams steps closer to full workload

CB Aaron Williams returned to action last week against Seattle for the first time since suffering knee injury in Week 9. He played 36 snaps, but the coaching staff is still hesitant to play him for 50 or 60 snaps on defense after just one game back.

“No, I don’t think he would go do that,” said head coach Chan Gailey of Williams’ workload. ”He might have to (play that much) out of necessity, but we would rather not.”

With Leodis McKelvin now on injured reserve, Buffalo has just Stephon Gilmore, Justin Rogers and Williams as the only cornerbacks left from the beginning of the season still on the roster and healthy. Ron Brooks came aboard midseason with Crezdon Butler and T.J. Heath called up from the practice squad not long after.

Bills ‘D’ mixed it up

Buffalo’s defense is often criticized for being too “vanilla,” but that wasn’t the case Thursday night.

“They did a good job of defending the run, mixing coverages up,” said Dolphins QB Ryan Tannehill. ”We were trying to guess some coverages and get some play calls that would mix it up, and it seemed like we never really hit on one that we were trying to get. So, they did a good job of mixing things up and it made it difficult for us to get the ball moving.

“They did a little bit of everything. They played corner-safeties, they brought a safety in the box. I wouldn’t say it was daring us to throw, but they wanted to defend the run. They did a good job of coming down late and making tackles close to the line of scrimmage.”

“It was not a good offensive performance,” said Dolphins head coach Joe Philbin. ”We were 0-for-7, I believe, at one point on third down. We had no rhythm; we had nothing going on. We weren’t throwing the ball well, we weren’t running it well. They did a great job on defense and we didn’t execute well on offense.”

“It was pretty simple,” said Reggie Bush. “Couldn’t run the ball. We didn’t have much success running or throwing the ball, so when you can’t do either one, it’s a recipe for disaster.”

Miami finished with 184 total net yards in the game.

Dolphins inactives

Here are the Dolphins inactives for tonight’s game with the Bills.

QB Pat Devlin
WR Jabar Gaffney
TE Jeron Mastrud
TE Michael Egnew
OL Will Yeatman
DT Tony McDaniel

They only have six inactives because they have just 52 players on their roster.

Spiller a hometown hero

Here’s the piece that aired on tonight’s NFL Network pre-game show for tonight’s Bills-Dolphins Thursday night game on C.J. Spiller, and how he’s followed in the footsteps of his late uncle.

Spiller’s uncle was slain at age 19 and was a high school football star, to whom C.J. is often compared. The piece also covers how proud Spiller’s hometown (Lake Butler, Florida) is of the Bills back.

Another chance for big plays?

Last week the Bills faced a New England defense that had given up more 20-plus yard pass play than any other team in the league. Buffalo had five pass plays of 20 yards or more against the Patriots in last week’s 37-31 loss. Miami’s defense isn’t much better in defending big pass plays.

The Dolphins have given up 37 pass plays of 20 yards or more, which ranks 28th in the NFL (5th most). Miami gave up two pass plays of more than 20 yards to the Titans last week, including a 26-yard pass for a touchdown. The week before the Colts rolled up nine pass plays of 20 yards or more against the Dolphins.

Buffalo is 18th in the league in pass plays of 20 yards or more this season with 26 on the season.

A while since Miami has run for 100

After rushing for over 100 yards in two of their first three games this season, the Dolphins haven’t done it since.

Miami hasn’t hit the century mark rushing as a team in six games. Bills head coach Chan Gailey is naturally hoping that continues, knowing it puts added pressure on a rookie quarterback to make plays.

“It puts pressure on any QB, not just rookies, but maybe more so rookies. Asking them to go win the game is very difficult,” said Gailey. ”He’s done a good job of taking care of the football and managing the offense and putting the ball in the end zone. If they lose the running game which we’re hoping to stop a little bit, it’ll put more pressure on him and that’s what we want.”

Of course the Dolphins are looking at Buffalo’s run defense numbers and thinking they can get their run game back on track.

Don’t look for complex game plan

NFL game plans are relatively complex each and every week, but with very limited time to prepare for a Thursday night game both Chan Gailey and Dolphins head coach Joe Philbin have admitted that their approach both offensively and defensively will be pretty basic.

“You have to stay somewhat basic in this ball game for that very reason,” Gailey told Buffalobills.com. ”You don’t have the time to spend. You don’t have the film study time, the practice reps. You don’t have the ability to look at something time after time to get it down.”

Gailey said due to limited practice time the team probably went through one-third the amount of reps they execute in a typical practice week.

Dolphins head coach Joe Philbin said at the beginning of the week he told his coordinators that whatever they have that needs to be repped repeatedly in practice to ensure it’s executed properly in the game should be tossed out because there won’t be time to rep it sufficiently.

Several Bills probable

There are several Bills players listed as probable for Thursday night’s game against the Dolphins. Here’s the rundown.

Probable
DT Kyle Williams – ankle
DT Spencer Johnson – ankle
DT Marcell Dareus – shoulder/hamstring
G Andy Levitre – knee
C Eric Wood – knee
CB Justin Rogers – knee
CB Leodis McKelvin – groin
WR Brad Smith – hamstring
RB C.J. Spiller – shoulder
OT Chris Hairston – knee
DE Mario Williams – wrist/knee
S Da’Norris Searcy – hand
WR Marcus Easley – shoulder

Kelsay out for Dolphins game

Bills DE Chris Kelsay will miss his second straight game with a neck injury Thursday night along with three other Bills players.

Kelsay along with Mark Anderson, Aaron Williams and Fred Jackson will not play against the Dolphins in tomorrow night’s primetime division tilt. Kyle Moore is expected to start in his place Thursday night as he did last week at New England.

The veteran defensive end did not practice all week. Head coach Chan Gailey called him 50-50 for the game at best earlier in the week.

Dolphins injury update

Here’s the status of the Miami Dolphins’ players on this week’s injury report for Thursday night’s game against Buffalo.

Bush and Spiller are buds

Miami RB Reggie Bush and C.J. Spiller apparently cross paths quite a bit in the offseason and the two have struck up a friendship.

“I’m friends with him just from working out together back in L.A.,” said Bush. ”We worked out together and we have some mutual friends.”

“He’s a great running break. He’s quick. He’s elusive. He runs hard,” said Bush of Spiller. ”He’s a guy that definitely needs a lot of touches. He’s a guy that can break the game open at any given time and he’s doing a great job. and, every time we get a chance to play, I talk to him and just tell him to just to stay positive, stay focused, keep working hard and it’s going to come.”

Bush outshined Spiller in last year’s second meeting between the two teams. Spiller totaled 167 yards from scrimmage and a pair of touchdowns. Bush meanwhile rolled up 203 rushing yards and a touchdown in what wound up being a 30-23 win for Miami. 

“Just that we had a successful run day and we were able to jump on them early and kind of stay on them throughout the game and we were able to finish the game the way that you like to finish the game as an offensive player with the ball in our hands and kind of dominating in the run attack,” said Bush, who averaged 8.1 per carry that day. ”Obviously, that was a good day for us, but that’s in the past.”

Dareus limited with additional ailment

Marcell Dareus was one of a host of Bills players that was limited in practice Tuesday, but along with his shoulder ailment, he’s also dealing with another injury.

A hamstring problem was also added to the list of injuries the defensive tackle is dealing with. It’s not expected to keep him out of Thursday night’s game. Here is Buffalo’s updated Tuesday injury report

Did not practice
DE Mark Anderson – knee
CB Aaron Williams – knee
DE Chris Kelsay – neck
RB Fred Jackson – concussion

Limited in practice
DT Kyle Williams - ankle
DT Spencer Johnson – ankle
DT Marcell Dareus – shoulder, hamstring
G Andy Levitre – knee
C Eric Wood – knee
CB Justin Rogers – knee
CB Leodis McKelvin – groin
WR Brad Smith – hamstring

Full practice
RB C.J. Spiller – shoulder
OT Chris Hairston – knee
DE Mario Williams – wrist, knee
S Da’Norris Searcy – hand