The Browns didn’t play on Sunday, but the action around the rest of the AFC still pushed the team down, at least temporarily. Cleveland entered Sunday holding the No. 7 seed in the AFC, good for the final Wild Card spot in the conference.
Cleveland now wakes up on Monday looking up at the postseason. The Browns sit at No. 8 now, getting leapfrogged by the Miami Dolphins. Miami squeaked out a victory in Arizona over the Cardinals when ex-Browns kicker Zane Gonzalez came up short on a 49-yard field goal attempt that would have tied the game.
The Dolphins have won four in a row to improve their record to 5-3, tying the Browns. But the Dolphins win the tiebreaker for having a better strength of schedule to this point.
The Las Vegas Raiders also jumped the Browns in the standings. Las Vegas beat the Los Angeles Chargers a week after besting the Browns to also improve to 5-3. They surged up and also passed the Indianapolis Colts, who fell at home against Baltimore and also fell below the Browns in the playoff chase.
There’s still a lot of football to be played, but the tightly packed playoff race shows how little margin for error there is for Kevin Stefanski and the Browns over the second half of the season.
