Frantic Finishes: A Wild Day In The NFL

I want to start this piece by recognizing that I called this week's NFL slate "weak." And, on paper, it was. But, as they say, "games aren't played on paper." This was one of the best NFL Sundays I can remember, despite the lack of marquee matchups. That said, let's rank the NFL's frantic finishes!

Dolphins score 28 points in 4th quarter to complete comeback

There's just no way around it: what the Miami Dolphins did on Sunday was the story of the day. Not only did they erase a 21-point fourth quarter deficit, but they did it in incredibly dramatic fashion. In the offseason, Tyreek Hill bragged that defenses were "scared sh*tless" about facing him and Jaylen Waddle. If they weren't before, they should be now.

Miami trailed 35-14 entering the fourth quarter. In that frame, they ran 21 plays for 266 yards and four touchdowns. And they did that while holding Lamar Jackson and the Ravens offense to three points. It was the most dominant quarter of the NFL season, and likely won't be matched this season.

Jets score two TDs in final two minutes to stun Browns

In a normal NFL week, this would have been considered the most frantic finish. But this was no ordinary NFL Sunday.

The Dolphins put together a dominant final 15 minutes, but the Jets had quite the final 115 seconds. The Cleveland Browns scored a touchdown just after the two-minute warning to stretch the lead to 13 points. They missed the extra point, but so what? They went up by two touchdowns with less than two minutes to go.

Everyone in Twitter land thought the game was over.

Apparently the Browns thought the game was over, too, because they stopped playing defense. First, they decided to let Corey Davis score for some reason.

Then, they thought "hey, no one actually recovers onside kicks, right?"

Then, rookie Garrett Wilson found an open seam right in the middle of the field for the game-winner.

The Browns still had time to get in range for a game-winning field goal, just like last week, but the Jets defense didn't quit like the Browns.

Cade York was the hero for Cleveland last week with a game-winning field goal last week to beat the Panthers. But that missed extra point following the Browns final touchdown looms large. Lucky for him, the Browns did so much else wrong, it's being mostly looked over. But not here at OutKick. We see you, Cade.

Cardinals tie it at the buzzer, win on defensive score in OT

IF THIS WERE ANY OTHER WEEK ... OK, you get it. This comeback was ridiculous in its own right. The Arizona Cardinals looked to be down-and-out and Kyler Murray appeared to be more interested in getting home to his XBox than winning a football game.

Then, suddenly, a switch flipped. It's like Kyler Murray realized he could score double-XP in real-life. Maybe he thinks that's how the fourth quarter works? Either way, the Cards trailed 20-0 in the third quarter when Murray finally got them on the board.

But the Raiders marched down and kicked a field goal, and then turned Arizona over on downs, and the game still appeared to be over. With 12 minutes to go, the Cards trailed by 16 points. They would score a touchdown on that drive, but they still needed the two-point conversion. And NO ONE could get open for the Cards, so game over right? Wrong.

Fine, but they still needed ANOTHER touchdown and ANOTHER two-pointer just to TIE. No problem for the wizard, Kyler Murray.

Not only did they still need to convert the conversion, but a penalty backed them up to the seven-yard line. They can't score from there, right???

Unreal. Despite all the momentum and an exhausted Raiders defense, the Cards were forced to punt in overtime. OK, now the Raiders are going to get serious and win this game, as they should have done all along. RIGHT!?

Pure insanity, no other way to say it. Three NFL teams had a better than 97% chance to win their games, and all three lost.

Three incredible NFL comebacks all on the same Sunday.

And, we nearly had a fourth. The Los Angeles Rams led 31-10 over the Atlanta Falcons and allowed them to climb back to 31-25. But Marcus Mariota threw an interception to essentially seal it for the Rams. It almost feels like a good thing that it didn't happen. I don't know if NFL fans could have taken another one.

Yeah, Kliff. We all do.