thurst44

Yeah, I guess, but there's healthy skepticism, and then there's this guy will definitely be gone by next year. It's just the relentless negativity about everybody on this team the week before the season opens, every year, even after finally ending the drought. And I'm not accusing you of this, because I don't think you are relentlessly negative. I'm just tired and should take a break from this board til Sunday, but this is a great source for team news as the roster changes. By now, we should have all watched enough seasons of this to know that it's not always as bad as it seems or as good as it seems at pre-season, and that teams can surprise us.

Yes, because teams NEVER rest recovering players in meaningless games. I'm sorry it just seems a bit tacky to run down one of our own players before he's even played. Again, maybe let's let them play an actual in-season game before we run down our new players.

Wow, dismissing Murphy before he ever plays a game?

Because pre-season ordains exactly what is going to happen in the regular season, as with last year's world champion Browns and 2008's juggernaut Lions. Also, teams never rebound from bad play. Seriously, it amazes me that no one remembers how gloomy we were after that three-game stretch where all aspects of the Bills fell apart or what we were saying (hint: the exact same things) last year at this time.

Fair enough as that's the sort of imprecision and absolutism I advise student writers to avoid . I'd guess about 60% make the team the first year, but that's a total semi-educated guest. I meant that most of them never make any significant impact. If we would be able to choose a recent 1st rounder who has shown flashes or, say, a player who already has a touchdown in the NFL (K. Clay), it would probably be a much more attractive pick.

Most 7th rounders don't make the team

Oh, for crying out loud, it's a 7th round pick in 2020...that's practically negative value.

I'd like to think that Beane's been around long enough to know that pre-season is a terrible indicator of how you are going to play during the season.

Zay didn't particularly do anything wrong this pre-season, and still has too much promise (seriously, guys, it's his second season). However, it was a bit telling that he was out there yesterday -- but he did make his one catch.

Steady sounds right. He was my early pick for surprise cut, but he's probably safe in a numbers game. McD's reaction to Coleman's Hard Knocks seemed a bit telling and he didn't do much to overcome it (and didn't cost them much), so I suspect he's a goner.

Ray-Ray

I actually agree with most of this, but have to take a little issue with the "empirically" toughest schedule part. The road/home balance is indeed impossible to argue. However, tough schedules are otherwise impossible to gauge. If we're inclined to expect the worst, we think teams who were good will stay good, teams who underperformed will rebound, and every team on-the-rise will rise, even the friggin' Browns this year, apparently. It's just one of those things fans say EVERY year, turns out to be untrue most years, then fans say it again as if it hadn't been unproven the year before. That being said, you may be right this time ;). Let's look at last year. We beat the Jets, but they are just the Jets, so that proves nothing (then the Jets start strong for the rest of the first half). Then we lose to the Panthers, and they looked terrible week 1, so maybe we are who we thought we are, and now we play two heralded undefeated teams who we have no chance against, including the defending NFC Champions. We win both games, so that's impressive. As it turns out, the Broncos would not win another game for a couple months and the Falcons went on their own slide. Ok, so we have the mediocre Bengals next, but on the road (ok, that plays out as expected -- but no one would then expect that moribund team would later knock off a hot playoff contender to let us end our playoff drought). We don't know the true nature of the schedule until it plays out.

Any unit at its worst looks really bad and I suspect we have all said the same at past times (this one feels more pronounced with the insane way Wood and Incognito got hurt and went bonkers respectively). And look up high first rounder Ereck Flowers and watch some of his games. There have been worse offensive lines, especially in pre-season, in other games. That being said, no, we can't win much if they play like last Sunday. Also, wasn't the reason Tyrod was practically ran out of town his propensity for 3 & outs? I loved Tyrod, but it's funny how now people seem a bit misty for him. But, yeah, o-lines are hard to solve. Of first round linemen, there are more Luke Joeckels than Joe Thomases, and we're pining after Joeckel right now. On other thing that could make a difference: our best lineman didn't play last week. Admittedly, most of our problems stemmed from the interior. Sigh, we'll see how they do next weekend. We're also forgetting, Allen is pretty elusive -- obviously not Tyrod elusive (he's up in the Cam-osphere in that regard) -- but it's why I'm for him to start. Despite Sunday's debacle, he's still the QB who can do the most damage with his legs.

Kelvin Benjamin has been making some great catches. As no-name as the rest of the wide receivers are, there's going to be a heck of a battle to make the team, and Jones has shown moments of being better (although Coleman may have underwhelmed and hard knocked his chances while barely here). I actually like the tight end unit (even Clay). In the first game, the offense looked a lot more well-oiled than the third. The o-line...yeah, again, got nothing -- except that fortunes change sharply and suddenly in this league. Last year the defense kept us in a lot of games and this one portends to be even better once the live bullets fly, especially if Edmunds keeps progressing, Tre doesn't regress, and they can generate some sort of pass rush in the real games. I do think I sort of remember you being generally "positive" before last season, but most weren't...it was pretty much the same hue and cry, perhaps not as centralized because Game 3 wasn't such a trainwreck. I'm not saying this team might not be "Top 7" bad...there's a definite chance of that. It's just not the given a lot of people here and in the national press are implying.

Yes, the offensive line is terrible, and even I'm not going to try to sugar-coat that one ;). However, last year the o-line would look otherworldly a few weeks, then like amateur turnstiles for the next few weeks. Hopefully, they can find a rhythm or overcome it. While we tend to get fixated on our own problems, there are some terrible o-lines on other teams as well. I'm in the NYC area and the Jets and Giants both have major issues there (Giants may have fixed theirs, but only one way to see).

If I had to guess, we'll start 2-6 and finish 6-2 or 5-3 or maybe even 7-1...not great, not worst...but who knows. I'm not ruling out 1-15, but this team has a lot of potential and the only hopeless seeming part is offensive line.

What criteria are you using? Would you have said the same thing last year at this time (check the comments)? How exactly are the Bears, unit-by-unit, better than the Bills? I can't help but suspect that it's the whole reverse of the George Carlin concept ("our stuff is s&*(, their s&*( is stuff"). I think you're missing my point: we really don't know who's better or worse. Why does it bother me? We do this every bleeping year and so many on this board are dismissive if you say one thing positive, or that we may not be one of the worst teams in football, yet we're over .500 for the last four years. Last year, we have the same wailing and gnashing of teeth, yet went to the playoffs...and still this year it's lather, rinse, repeat, repeat, repeat...I'm just suggesting maybe we won't be one of the worst, like I have most years -- and other than the time we started 0-8, I've been right with this very low-risk bet.

In the Pre-Season, since we're wigging out about that and ascribing attributes to our team based on it: Falcons, Eagles, and Cowboys are all winless and have looked terrible while doing it. If I were to predict, I'd say the Browns, Dolphins, Jets, 49ers (Garoppollo-haze likely to revert a bit to mean), Bears, Broncos, Redskins and Seahawks could all be pretty bad (or could surprise). Then there's always wild-card disasters. Cowboys could really go south fast, especially if anything happened to Zeke. Texans strike me as very overrated for a team who couldn't buy a win last year and were under .500 even when Watson was putting up unworldly rookie numbers. Ravens pre-season rings false to me, and would not be surprised if we're the upset special of Week 1. Mahomes has been crowned an all-star before even throwing one touchdown in the league, and the Chiefs lucked into the playoffs even more than we did. Jags should take the next step to perennial SB contenders, but often upcoming teams implode (look at last year's Raiders). Titans have the framework of a wreck. Finally, the Rams are so packed with new players that it almost seems like a Hubris the football gods will smack down.

The Jets offensive line is terrible too. I've seen them ranked below us frequently and they have given up their share of sacks in the pre-season. Does the whole AFC East even have a good o-line between them?

One line that makes me wonder a bit: "Levi Wallace offers the most on defense but hasn't played many special teams this summer" Aside from grammar issues, the basic premise may be true, but it leaves out the fact that Wallace was on the coverage teams this past Sunday and had at least two impressive plays -- and that's just what my inexpert eye noticed.

Go back and look at the comments at this point the last few years because we were mostly saying how bad we were going to be, yet we are over .500 in that stretch. Nothing is ever that definitive.

Let's see how they do in a real game. Also, last week Allen DID look good behind a disastrous line. My argument has been that we don't really know what we have, but at this point it's becoming clearer. By the way, why do people always accentuate the loss by adding Glenn, who did not play the majority of last year, while Dawkins played well in his rookie season. Dawkins had a rough game last week and did not play this week. The Bills o-line did not look great last pre-season either, so who knows. I'm not overly hopeful, but it's pre-season. Allen seems like someone who might actually benefit from the adversity. I could be wrong. I downright hated the pick at first. In any case, he didn't win the battle outright, so I can see an argument for each of the three, and hope the line gets it together (or they find a unit one way or another that works). Not sure what they can do about it now, but the future still looks bright despite a really sucky outing. This year...well, who knows? Who would have guessed they would go 4-2 with only losses coming to the Patriots after that historically bad 3-game stretch? Teams can turn it around quickly.

While the o-line was atrocious the last two games, I'm not sure how you could watch this game and not be even more inclined to want to get someone like Mack? We were getting zero pressure on the QB leading to our best aspect (the secondary) being picked apart. Also, we can fix two parts at once :). And, yes, I know you were just saying "forget Mack" as an expression, but Hap above makes a good point: it's unlikely anyone is parting with someone at this point. The best bet may be taking a shot on someone off the scrap heap (Joeckel or somebody), trying different combos (the mythic Teller, who i'd loved to have seen more of) or hoping that there is vast improvement in the next two weeks. Many teams have looked terrible in the pre-season...the Eagles lost 5-0 to the Browns for their third loss. It's not impossible that they play better in two weeks.

Funny, well, I always feel a bit sad for the eternal pessimist fans, always miserable, never appreciating the moment. Srsly, don't feel bad for "us"...we'll be ok (and maybe i should let go of caring whether fans are pointlessly negative and over-the-top too). Frankly, the "letdown" is just part of being a fan. As it stands, we're a game above .500 over the past four years, so on gameday, optimists and pessimists are about equally right. For seasons, pessimists are generally going to win as a majority of teams don't make the playoffs each year, and 31/32 don't win the Super Bowl.

He didn't do anything as last year's starter to throw him off the roster He's hardly competing for a spot. Shady's not done much; are you angling to throw him off the roster? He's not lived up to his contract, but he's been a solid, consistent player over the past 3 years, and if the O-Line is as bad as it looks, they'll be happy to have a veteran starter tight end outlet.