Unlikely Star Helps Bills Win : AFC: Linebacker David White’s interception keys a 23-20 victory over the Dolphins.

Buffalo linebacker David White gave the Miami Dolphins a lesson in economics Sunday: The guys who play for minimum salaries can be just as valuable as the ones with seven-figure contracts.

White, who sat out last season after being cut by New England, made a key interception in the Bills’ 23-20 victory that left Miami’s millionaires in danger of missing the playoffs.

For Buffalo (10-5), AFC Super Bowl representative from 1990 to 1993, the victory capped a comeback from a 7-9 season. It gave the Bills the AFC East title and no worse than one home game in the first round of the playoffs.

“It was a great day and we can enjoy a few sublime moments,” Coach Marv Levy said. “But there are other tasks ahead.”

Miami (8-7) now needs help to make the playoffs in a year it was shooting for the Super Bowl by paying $18 million in signing bonuses for free agents. It may need to make them to secure the job of Don Shula, the winningest coach in NFL history.

As usual, this game between two bitter rivals was marked by minor skirmishes and one major one, a fight between Buffalo’s Carwell Gardner and Miami’s Bryan Cox late in the game.

But Levy, who missed three games this year to undergo prostate cancer surgery, said, “We don’t enjoy rubbing salt in other peoples’ wounds. We feel good. We don’t enjoy that they’re feeling bad.”

White, originally signed and cut by Buffalo in 1993, was feeling particularly good.

“I just hoped I’d just get an opportunity to play somewhere,” said White. “I’m just glad the Bills gave me another chance.”

White’s big play came midway through the fourth quarter when he leaped in front of Irving Fryar to pull down the interception.

He returned it nine yards to the Miami 11. Four plays later, Steve Christie kicked a 25-yard, game-wining field goal with 6:11 left.

The interception was Dan Marino’s lone mistake. He was 17 for 27 for 244 yards and came back after sitting out one play because of a dislocated finger on his left hand.

It wasn’t only low-priced Bills who did the work. Thurman Thomas earned his salary, leading Buffalo with 148 yards in 35 carries.

Also, Steve Tasker had six rushes for 50 yards on reverses and caught three passes for 19 yards.

Buffalo blew a 13-3 lead with turnovers that led to 10 Dolphins points in the third quarter. A Jim Kelly fumble led to a field goal, and then Calvin Jackson intercepted a pass tipped by Marco Coleman and returned it 23 yards to the Buffalo 25 to set up a Marino-to-Eric Green touchdown pass play.