BarleyNY

Okay but every play would have to be like that to get an average of 1.2. And that didn’t happen. 2.6 looks correct for an average.

Dunno. But 1.2 seconds can’t be correct. It would be the worst pass blocking on record (by a fair bit). We know we don’t have that and we don’t typically see someone totally unblocked.

82nd of 101

This I may have something to do with it, but I think he’s confused by what he’s seeing. Defenses are scheming to take away last season’s bread and butter throws. These are not crazy exotic defenses. Teams are just more often using coverage schemes that take away the intermediate throws he killed them with last season. Other stuff is open though (as Warner showed). Allen will need to hit deep throws and take some short ones when nothing else is there. Also we are going to have to run the ball more. That he’s feeling extra pressure due to his new, huge contract could certainly be true. But there’s some other stuff at play here. Daboll has been using spread formations and the shotgun to simplify reads and keep Allen’s eyes up and on the defense. That’s why we don’t see much in the way of real play action where Allen’s eyes initially would be looking back at the RB. So what do they do? The team isn’t built to run a Shanahan style offense which leans on running, traditional play action and a lot of 2 TE and/or 2 RB sets. I’m not sure how Allen would do in it either. What we’re running is a lot like the offense NE ran with Brady. Allen is going to have to make quick decisions and get the ball out fast to be successful. Presnap reads will be huge. Then he can hit defenses on the longer stuff when they cheat up. Or he will have to be patient and kill them with the short stuff.

Pressure stats Pocket time for Allen both last season and this season is 2.6 seconds. So that’s not it.

Thanks for the post. I noticed that teams were taking away the intermediate routes that Allen feasted on last season, but I wasn’t sure how. NFL GamePass doesn’t have All22 up so no help there. Teams going back to more cover 2 makes sense - and I’ve seen this discussed in regards to how defenses are playing Rodgers. It looks like teams are going to dare us to run the ball, go to short routes and throw more to the TEs. I’m not sure we have the personnel for that, but we are going to find out.

Edmunds is the kind of player that can be debated endlessly by fans. He is a high pick that makes splash plays, but he also makes too many mistakes and misses assignments too often. Both sides have plenty of fuel at hand for their side. This is his fourth season. Despite his relatively young age discussions about potential and growth are no longer meaningful IMO. The player he is now is who he is and it’s who he is going to be until his physical skills decline. In that light it boils down to one thing only: his contract going forward. If he expects the mega deal in line with his draft position then we have to let him go. He is not worth that. If he’s on board with a respectable contract that reflects who he is as a player then I’m good with keeping him. The reality of that situation is that he’s really going to have to want to be here enough that he gives up a lot of money to do so. I mean, did anyone see the deal that Joe Schobert got a little over a year ago? Ridiculous. Imagine what Edmunds will get in two years. Some team will make the mistake of giving him a Mega deal based on the theoretical potential of him continuing to make splash plays while cleaning up his mistakes. That’s how I see it plying out. He plays out his fifth year option, gets a decent offer from the Bills, tests free agency and signs a huge contract elsewhere. Bills get a 3rd round comp pick. Of course I thought that’s how it would play out with Milano (who is a better LB than Edmunds), but he took less to stay. So it can happen.

No offsets for 5th year options. They are fully guaranteed. LINK to legal verbiage.

That’s unreal. That’s some Hue Jackson level game management right there.

As others have already said, sky high expectations are not being met. That’s certainly true of Allen, the OL and the coaching. It’s weird to be holding my breath after a 35-0 win, but it’s been an odd start to the season. Allen hasn’t played anywhere close to last season, but he’s been the best QB on the field in both games so far. Still, it looks like teams are trying to take away those 10-15 yard throws that were such a huge part of his success last season and I haven’t seen adjustments to counter that. That has to happen or we are in trouble when we play better teams. Next up is the WFT that has an outstanding DL but not much at QB so I like our odds there as we don’t have to have it all figured out to get a win.

He is a free agent after this year so I think it’s much more likely than not that this season is his last as a Bill. They have not extended him and they invested a first and two second round picks in three DEs. Seems like the writing is on the wall.

It is disappointing for sure

Poor decision making by the Giants. Under 5 min left in the 3rd, up 5 and Judge as them kick the PAT. Predictably they lost by 1. That franchise has really fallen. Gettleman’s drafting and other decisions, including failing to put a decent OL in front of a young QB, have been questionable to say the least.

Lotta good and great fan bases out there. Bills are one of them. Some cool stories here, but they aren’t different from ones you hear from many other fan bases.

I was surprised that they didn’t try more RPO and RO. They could’ve incorporated that easily with the 11 and 10 personnel they were using. Dunno. Maybe they were protecting Allen by avoiding exposing him to a lot of early season hits. Seems like weak reasoning if that was it, but I don’t know why else they wouldn’t have avoided running those plays. As for shallow zones over the middle, I’d refer you to the thread about how the Steelers confused Allen. Seems like they made a point of taking that away. Really good analysis linked in the OP of that thread.

This is a lot better - and needed - of a thread than I would have thought. Thanks for starting it. It’s probably cathartic to vent honestly. I knew the Steelers were a possible loss. I put our win probability at about 60% going in. A game we should win at home, but definitley not a gimmie. Now we travel to Miami to play a team I think we beat 2 out of 3 times there. But my worry is that 1 time out of 3. That’s compounded by the necessity of winning so we don’t go 0-2. Even with wins against the WFT and the Texicans, a 2-2 record with KC and the Oiltans on the horizon is not great. The schedule is not a tough one after that. Bucs aside it’s actually pretty easy overall. But I am looking for more than gliding into the playoffs on wins against bad to mediocre teams. I really need to see some of what I saw last season. I guess my fear is that not only did we not take a step forward, but maybe we took a small one back. That would be disappointing. Looking back to form and soundly stomping the Phins would start to easy my concerns. (/vent)

One more aspect that I didn’t address is that I don’t think we had the horses for it to be effective against Pittsburgh. Moss was inactive so it was up to Singletary, who is decent but not a difference maker. The OL talent is definitely geared toward pass blocking over run blocking. What the Bills did could’ve won them the game if they had executed better. They just didn’t. I have reasons to think that more runs and play action passes would not have helped much - running not our forte, longer time to throw, taking Josh’s eyes off the defense after the snap - but again, changing things up might’ve been worth a try. It certainly is a good option to have if we can run they kind of offense effectively. Also it leads me to some other questions, like: How effective can Allen be in a more run heavy, play action offense? Why wasn’t the running game invested in more?

I tend to avoid it right after games whether we win or lose. Overreacting seems to happen either way and I am not interested in those takes.

Red hot take

Yes. And it looks like I pulled the wrong scale. You are correct. Here is the proper one for the NFL: The Player Grading Scale: 100-90 Elite 89-85 Pro Bowler 84-70 Starter 69-60 Backup 59-0 Replaceable Oliver graded out at 72.1 overall which puts him 24th of 122. 78.8 run def, 54.6 pass rush. Yes, it’s early. Small sample size.

Edit: Found the right grading scale. It’s below. He graded at the top of “replacement level” in the game. Again this is in 30 snaps.

Graded out at 57.7 overall. 57.1 pass rush, 57.5 run def and 60.0 coverage on 30 total snaps.

In theory, sure. I haven’t rewatched the game yet (barf) so I might get a better feel after that, but I don’t think it would’ve been enough even if it did work. And it here is no guarantee that it would have. One of the disadvantages of play action is that it takes longer to get a pass off. That could’ve just as easily backfired since Allen already didn’t have much time. The main issues were that the Steelers were handily winning the LOS battle and Allen wasn’t consistently hitting his passes. Oh, and there was definitely some questionable coaching. Don’t get me wrong, in retrospect it wouldn’t have hurt for them to have tried your suggestions. After all, what they did didn’t work, but it would be way down the list of why they lost IMO.

Week 1: Rams Week 2: Browns

Not that I am against running the ball more, but it is doubtful that it would have changed the outcome of the game. The ypc was high because Pittsburgh was not focusing on stopping it. They would’ve adjusted if we had run more.