yeah, its definitely a different beast. No off-games at all and bad builds and bad tactics will get exposed and exploited. My take is that first and foremost, you had better be able to stop the run, especially in the Eastern conference. This might be Miami's achilles heel.
Definitely can't rely on the same tactics to win. Holly's had to do quite a few adjustments to the AIs as well as a few personnel moves. Bay Area went so far as to pick up a new QB.