BringBackFlutie

...I see what you did here.

@Logic

I tend to agree with most of your post- especially about the getting in rhythm early piece, and I've thought that as well. We NEED more short passes to start- and not on obvious passing downs. Pass to set up the run-type plays. And I do think we call bombs too early. Josh is not in rhythm yet. But as for the above quoted portion...oh dear. Terrifying.

There's so much more to the deep ball than go routes, and there's so much more than dropping dimes over the shoulder on said routes. When a WR flashes on Allen, rather than run a straight go route, he hits them fine. There are other routes that could be called deep. Even still, when the WR is one-on-one with his man, and can get a step on him on the go route, it doesn't mean that he's wide open, and it doesn't mean that it should take a perfect pass to hit him. The WR (and chemistry with said WR) has a lot to do with it. Only look as far back as Tyrod Taylor with Sammy Watkins/Percy Harvin, and without. When he didn't have either, I didn't see him complete one deep throw. When he had them, he had the highest percentage completion and highest rate of deep balls in the league. Also, if Allen can set his feet, he actually has shown an ability to drop it over the top, but he needs some time to gain the consistency and a little more feel for the rush. This is not all to hate on Daboll or defend Allen, by the way, but to say that Allen must make the deep throws on specific plays is a bit too simplistic to me. I think there are multiple things that Allen, his WRs, and Daboll can do to get the ball deep and make the defense pay. Allen's ability to hit a go route in stride is 1/3 of that equation, but nobody is working on the other 2/3 to try to win right now, and give Allen more time to work on his portion. Lastly, on the topic of Josh Allen and go routes- I've got a holiday bonus for you, since shipping across the country is rather pricey: The interesting thing, is that the book on Allen has been written since last year, and everyone that can, has blitzed the hell out of him since then. It looks like he's not fixing that weakness, as defenses keep blitzing. Now...watch the games. Last year, he was weak against the blitz because he didn't know his reads, and blitzing him frequently caused him to bail the pocket (sometimes even when you didn't blitz) and make bad throws. At the beginning of this year, he stopped bailing the pocket so much, stayed in, and tried to force the ball, with sloppy footwork, into tight windows- not knowing who was the open guy behind the blitz- and throwing picks. Now, he's staying in the pocket, reading where to get the ball (in this case, the go route), and missing the WR on a throw with the same sloppy footwork. As I previously mentioned, Allen has shown an ability to drop a ball over the top, here and there, when he executes good form and sets his feet. However, his form is often sloppy, as he short-steps or throws off his back foot when the pocket starts to close in front of him. I'm not sure if he needs to trust the room in front of him, or if he needs to sidestep, or take a smidge less time to make the throw, but the footwork needs to be cleaned up to complete those throws. That would be the NEXT thing to fix, in, apparently, a multi-part solution to beating the blitz. It's hard to see, in these blitz-heavy games, that he's fixed so many of those parts already, but that's because he hasn't fixed enough of them to beat the blitz yet. By the same token, we CAN see that he's fixed a lot of those parts when he's not being blitzed. He rarely bails the pocket and scans the field. He reads the right throws and changes plays according to alignments and knows how to beat different concepts, and, when not against the blitz, has cleaned up his footwork a lot. We get this pattern where it looks like he's grown, but he hasn't, but he has, on a game to game basis. However, actually, all of the growth is there, but isn't always apparent when you factor in that game's variables, and his next goal as a QB is painfully identified. ...So as you said, non-linear. Case in point. ??

You make an interesting point, and it certainly seems that way, but I thought one of the things about Daboll is that he tailors the offense to the opponent, and that's why we don't necessarily have an identity. That's probably true, but it fails for a few reasons that I'm going to guess at. This leads me to your other point about maybe Daboll just shouldn't call the plays, since he's obviously not great at tailoring his plays to the defense in-game. I do think his game-plan, overall, is originally tailored to the opposing defense, but not adjusted. To further your point, I think it's that the game-plan itself is composed of plays that don't really fit his personnel. If Josh Allen isn't good at throwing the deep ball, or it's windy, just install all the OTHER cover 0 beaters out there. Lastly, my point is, that there seems to be a fundamental issue with his planning- his inability to take personnel into account causes him to call games from a play/scheme perspective, rather than a match-up perspective. This offense is very much predicated on match-ups, and, other than Josh throwing incomplete to Brown at the end, I didn't see the propensity to exploit match-ups, and this offense simply doesn't work without it. That may lead back to the point of in-game adjusting. If Singletary's lined up on a safety every play, keep throwing it to him, even if it doesn't work for a play. If he's just killing them in the run game, regardless of men in the box, because they're susceptible to his running style, keep finding ways to get him the ball. If Knox is lined up on a smaller CB, get him a quick slant and let him run over DBs, while the LBers are all blitzing. But it's like none of these things are recognized, and it's just a one-dimensional view of "they line up in this package, or show blitz on this down, we run this play to beat it." You have to combine that with an understanding of how your personnel match up with their players and how your personnel execute the plays you're choosing in the first place. To be fair, though, I'm sure a lot of the exploiting match-ups issue is on Allen pre-snap.

Right so we all lament the missed deep throw on that one, which would've ended in, at least, a field goal, but there are SO MANY other ways to exploit those deep routes that are HIGHER percentage. I don't know if that's comforting or frustrating, though. On one hand, it's not like this game of pinning our hopes on Allen making one very specific, very low percentage throw (which will smooth out, but never be perfect, over time). On the other hand, that's an easy thing to read that he and Beasley should be getting by now, ESPECIALLY if the plan A strategy for that game was to get over the top. There's just so much that broke down on offense that didn't need to, DESPITE the missed over-the-shoulder throws (we're now down to what, 2 overthrows and 2 drops, if you consider this one miscommunication?). It's maddening. It's not that I don't think it'll be fixed, either. It's just that I want it to get fixed soon, and at this point I think Josh Allen's head is spinning with everything he's absorbed this year.

Nah, I think it was the first one, which may have been Knox and not Beasley. This one.

And yet, if the BILLS were even the least bit offensive, we wouldn't have this thread.

That's what I'm saying! A lot of wide open guys all over the place, and their QBs just putting it in the area, and the receiver adjusting to it. Seems like most of our plays, if the ball isn't placed perfectly, the receiver's not catching it, because there's not a whole lot of separation. In some cases, the separation is happening at the end of the route, and Josh is overthrowing the WR, instead of overthrowing the coverage. On other plays, there ARE those wide open guys, and Josh is still throwing like they're going to break downfield and still catch it in perfect stride. It seems like both a scheme and QB/WR communication issue. There are so many elements to this, and I don't think it's just "Josh needs to learn how to loft the ball to hit the receivers in stride." They need to make a concerted effort to get WRs downfield in single coverage and work on the nuances of timing, depth of release, touch, when to overthrow coverage (NOT THE WR) vs throw to an area.

Yeah. This is obvious to me. However, I'm torn between fixing it to win now, or continuing it to teach our young QB. I suppose there's an argument for, "continue to teach our young QB while making things a bit easier on him, and thus winning more games," but the idea of throwing a Tom Brady-level offense at him every week until he gets it is somehow tantalizing to me.

Watching his combine throws, I noticed the opposite. He hit a lot of his deep balls. What he tends to need, though, is enough time for the guy to get 65 yards downfield so he can max out his arm strength and get a ton of loft under it. His biggest problem is just adjusting. That will come with time with different receivers, but it helps immensely to have WRs who can track the deep ball, as well as using deep patterns other than go routes (with which he seems to do fine). Watch the other QBs in the league who regularly complete these passes- the WR has 5-10 yards of separation and the ball is often a bit under or overthrown, but there's room to adjust, or the WR runs a deep breaking route where the QB is able to simply throw it in the vicinity and the WR runs to it with a free release. So, three things- more deep breaking routes, less fading on the go routes with Josh learning to under throw a bit, and, last but not least- WRs who can track the deep ball.

No I was thinking this exact thing last night. On the Brown and Knox throws it looked like they could've gotten up under it if they weren't fading to one side or the other. On the Beasley throw, he or Josh or both of them have to realize that Beasley had a clean break to the outside, and if Josh throws it anywhere in that vicinity, Beasley has a ton of room to make the catch easily (I call these KC Chiefs plays). Instead, Josh throws it over top, which is a much lower percentage, and Beasley is no where near it. Noticing these things just made it more frustrating to me, because then it seems it's not just a QB problem, but an overall problem with him and his receivers, understanding angles, depth of coverage, when to throw, when to look for it, etc.

I'm ready! Who do I talk to?

Hm. Really? Is it his half-asleep, DGAF face he plays with? Interesting. I guess I'd get it, though. Well, @Teddy KGB did list Tyrod Taylor already. So. I guess there's that? Also, Edelman is a sniveling, squinty-eyed, leprechaun-looking little ****, and I hate him.

AND get like a 20% turn out and look like idiots.

Oh God....I just made a potentially horrible realization. Is Daboll so bad at calling the right play because he never learned how, because he always had all the signals to know what's coming??? Ohhhh no.

That's an interesting point. I'd have continued going to those deeper throws, regardless, then. If I recall, there were two deep sideline throws that were also dropped. One to Beasley, and one to Knox. That'd be a 2/5 ratio, and I'm pretty sure 40% on those throws is pretty much average. So, I would've come back to it even more, if Baltimore was leaving it open all day. It's just SO hard to run an offense based on those plays, though. So hard. There's got to be more to beating that defense than fly routes. To be honest, I think there are other ways to beat it. Josh and Brown and Foster and Beasley needed to do better reading the coverages and tendencies in that game. You don't need to throw a fly route in Cover 0. You can pump fake an out and hit the post (much easier throw). As a matter of fact, that would've worked to create separation on the last throw of the game. You can also hit pop passes and seam routes to the side the LB blitzes. I don't understand that none of this was working.

I think it's the offense. Turnovers generally come from pressure. Teams don't feel pressure against us because: 1) Our offense doesn't scare anyone. The other team doesn't need to take chances because it's not like we're going to make them pay for 3 and outs, and our defensive secondary is SO dangerous that they're not going to throw into its teeth. That's suicide. We'd lead the league in picks if they did. 2) Our offense doesn't win the field position battle. There's less pressure to make plays when you're not consistently in situations where you have to drive the whole field.

I think it's going to boil down to Allen making a few more throws and being a bit better in calling his protections. The offensive personnel just isn't good enough to bail him out otherwise, right now. In the future, I don't think it's going to change, drastically, if we hope to keep and pay starters on an elite defense. I mean, we'll add some more pieces, of course, but we're not going to have KC's skill players running around out there. And (to which I'll further allude later in this post) I'm not sure we want a bunch of great skill players to make the offense go. We want our best player on offense to be the QB. A few notes about the OC, though: -While he can't call protections for Josh, he has to find a way to call blitz-beating plays. The Patriots have done it for years, regardless of Brady's abilities to adjust at the LOS. They run rub routes, quick slants, and screens, with good timing. Either we don't have the people to get that done, or Daboll isn't calling them enough or at the right time. It baffles me, though, that he comes from a coaching tree that specializes in neutralizing blitzes, and we can't beat it. Are you telling me that Allen is failing to execute every play that beats the blitz? I dunno. Maybe. -Too often I've heard the "execution" argument on both sides of the ball over the years. Each time I've heard that, we've changed the coordinator, and suddenly things start working. We heard that about Edwards and Wannstedt- "the players aren't winning their one on ones on the line." Enter Pettine, then Schwartz, and suddenly the same line is leading the league in sacks. We heard that about how "there are plays to be made, but the players have to execute" with Turk Schoenert and Nate Hackett. Enter Chan Gailey, then Greg Roman, and suddenly the same players are scoring points. I will obviously admit that in the latter cases, the change in performance also came with a change in quarterback, but it's not like the guys that subbed in were even average- they just weren't complete dumpster fires of QBs. Regardless, I'm always a little wary of the idea that these plays are being left all over the field because execution isn't perfect. ...All that being said, this argument is about the here and now- as in, "our offense isn't scoring points. Who's to blame?" In that case, the OC isn't without blame. HOWEVER, for the long term, I'd rather have an offense that isn't tailored all around our young players. I'd RATHER it were up to the players to make the right reads and execute. That's because Josh Allen seems like a smart guy, and if he continues to learn and grow in an offense that requires him to master the prototypical QB position, we'll have a much brighter future, than if Daboll simply schemed away his weaknesses.

But isn't the whole point of our defensive identity that we can play base or nickel and have LBers that dont provide a drop off in pass coverage? Like, aren't we one of the only teams that can do that? I thought we were built specifically to stop the Patriots' multiple tight end run sets without getting gashed by said tight ends in the passing game.

They'll be fine? I sure hope so. But you're probably right. This will almost definitely be on the offense to win. With 10 days, McD and Frazier will have something for Bmore on D.

I agree. If you have the numbers that factor in ranks of O and D of both teams, yard line, type of play, and players getting the ball, etc. that will probably refine things to the point that you know whether to go for it or not, regardless of immediately previous results. The odds of winning could STILL be better than kicking, and you'd want to continue to go for it anyway. Because had you not, and you kicked instead, there are chances that that didn't work out on the positive side either.

Thank you for reiterating what I don't have the energy to.

...sigh. k.

I'm not sure if he's right or not, but I'll tell you this: almost every one of those routes run by Baltimore were wide open primary reads...that we've seen tyrod taylor execute in various games. On certain nights, he looked really good throwing those passes for Roman, too (obviously with less success). It's amazing to me that people think this is a new offense. Those were textbook Greg Roman routes- step for step. Maybe it's happened in other games, but I haven't seen LJ come off of his first read except to run, yet. He's having a lot of success right now. I'm curious to see if it continues.