Week 9 Game Ball: Cameron Wake

Because their offensive counterparts continued their season-long inability to sustain drives, the Dolphins defensive players were forced to contend with the likes of A.J. Green, Gio Bernard and Jermaine Gresham for 93 total plays, which, to put in perspective, is roughly 30 more than the average number of plays for an NFL offense.

Miami's starters were visibly fatigued late in the game, but overcame the adversity to continue making impact plays down the stretch. No single player did more than Cameron Wake, who had three sacks, four total pressures and recorded the dramatic walk-off safety in overtime.

He also forced and recovered a tone-setting first quarter fumble on his first sack of the day, but, in a sequence that was indicative of what was to come the rest of the night, the offense squandered the big play by ineptly failing to record a first down and then missing a field goal.

The defense continued to battle and despite allowing the Bengals to convert an inexplicable number of third-and-longs, kept the scoreboard close and eventually posted the game-winning safety. Wake, who suffered a leg injury in Week 3 that has limited him for the past five games, appears to have returned to his normal, extremely dominant self.

Hopefully, more performances like these provide good results on the field as the team seemingly comes apart off it.

Anyway, here are a couple GIFs for your viewing pleasure. First, Wake's first quarter strip-sack:

And the game-ending safety, where Wake is isolated on an overmatched right guard:

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All player data is courtesy of Pro Football Focus and all contract info is courtesy of OverTheCap.com.