BarleyNY

Well, you’re not wrong. I understand why they overpaid a few of their FAs early on. They needed to get things turned around and no one was coming here without a premium. I get the Morse contract in that context, but there have been some awful ones given too - like Star’s $50M/5 and Kroft’s 3/$19M for example - that are indefensible.

The PFF guys said the best comp for JOK was that he was like a “faster Milano” and then he said “and I like Milano”. I was surprised JOK made it past the Bills too. Maybe if they wouldn’t have resigned Milano they would’ve taken him.

Cap hits can be manipulated to a degree, but every dollar paid gets accounted for eventually. And some ways of doing so can bite a team.

According to Spotrac they already did White’s, but they aren’t showing Dawkins’ as done. Sometimes those sites are behind getting info, so it is very possible that it already happened with Dawkins.

I mentioned Dawkins who is the best candidate for a restructuring. Poyer only had one more season on his deal so that would require an extension even if it’s a fake/voidable one. I don’t think Diggs is a guy I’d approach for a restructure as I think he’d require a bump to do anything. We easily could move a little of Williams’ cap hit down the road, but not much. There really aren’t a lot of great candidates.

Close

That’s great, but he’s gotta go find some cap space. We are pretty tapped out otherwise. The Bills are sitting on $3.7M in space now per Spotrac. Rookies will drop that to $2.5M. Then after cut downs when full rosters and practice squad players have to be included, that number would go to $0 or less. Plus then there is space for replacements for IRed players that has to be cleared. I think a restructure of Dawkins gets us through this season with no additional spending of note, but anything else is going to require clearing some space.

Kuiper was never a film guy. It was all connections and getting info from team. Now maybe that’s changed. Or you’re thinking of Mike Mayock who always did his own study. Not that Mayock looks good doing an actual GM job. Yeesh

Thanks. Just saw. I’m surprised.

That’s a nice face-saving thing to say for Edmunds, but realistically if he was all that was hoped for the option would already have been picked up. The reality is that they paid the guy that plays next to him and doled out contracts knowing what his option looked like. If the cupboard is too bare to pay him, then that was a decision that was made to prioritize other players. It wad not something that crept up on them. I do think that the Bills would like to keep him, but at a market rate. That’s tough to do with the team that drafted a player who has underperformed his 16th overall draft status. The right move is to decline the option and let his play dictate what comes next. If he balls out then try to extend him this season. If not then let him test the FA market like Milano did and see if it makes sense for both sides to get a deal done. Mistake IMO. But let’s see how it plays out.

Kuiper graded the draft like an lazy college English prof. 3 As, 3 Cs and everyone else gets a B. Hilarious he’s still stealing money from ESPN. He used to be the only guy dialed in to front offices and did a great job of monetizing that info. But now he’s just living off of that very old legacy. He brings nothing to the table anymore.

Chart shows a compilation of draft grades. We all know that there’s limited value in immediate draft grades, but they’re something to discuss now that we are entering the post draft NFL void. Flame away

I don’t think the Bills can afford to do much of anything at this point due to their cap situation. They sure could use some upgrades though because beyond Tre all they have are 2 or 3 serviceable players. It looks like they think that will do the job with their scheme. That wouldn’t have been my plan, but it looks like it’s theirs and we’re going to see how it works out. I’d think the Bills would have run that card up if Newsome somehow made it to 30. I know the Browns were very surprised he made it to 26. They were very much hoping one of the top 4 CBs would make it to them, but weren’t expecting it. I was a little surprised the Bills didn’t make a move up for him or even another player. 30 was a bad spot to be picking in this draft.

Damn that’s a good point. That’s a lot of DL. Last season the Bills opened with 9 DL on the 53 man roster: Defensive line (9) Ed Oliver, Vernon Butler, Harrison Phillips, Quinton Jefferson, Jerry Hughes, Trent Murphy, Mario Addison, A.J. Epenesa, Darryl Johnson Link Even if we keep 10 this year that gets eaten up quickly. Here’s my first 9: Hughes, Addison, Epenesa, Rousseau, Basham, Star, Oliver, Phillips and Butler. Then maybe they go with one more of the rest? Time for Beane to work the phones for some late round picks for some of them.

Yup. That is what I was driving at.

While I agree with the OP that the Browns have taken huge strides this offseason and have probably passed the Bills on a talent level, Hap makes an excellent point - and it’s one that I harp on regularly: SHOW ME. You gotta prove it. How it looks on paper is not how it always shows in real life.

Actually it has to be executed by tomorrow, 5/3. Not sure if it’s by 4 pm or midnight Eastern time. I can’t find the time anywhere.

I thought the same thing. Kuechly is the FLOOR for his expectations?! That is all correct

Honestly, that’s a pretty fair assessment. Star will be here this season and there’s a good chance that he will be here next due to the structure of his reworked contract. New money in it is really not that bad, but this season’s salary is fully guaranteed and $2M of next season’s is as well. The frustration many feel is due to the massive initial contract he got (that we are still seeing cap hits from) and his below average performance since he’s been here. The two ways I see that this could play out are: 1) he’s good enough this season that he’s here in 2022 or 2) he’s poor enough that the Bills suck it up move on after this season.

The Browns were in year 1 of their makeover last season. Their injury situation was ridiculous. In the Steelers playoff game an offensive lineman that had joined the team THAT DAY played meaningful snaps. In addition to getting healthy the Browns have improved their team tremendously this offseason in both free agency and the draft. Every level of the defense was addressed with the back seven getting a near full makeover. Do not expect to see anything close to the same defense as last season. A lot of Bills fans are not giving Mayfield the credit he is due. For the first time in the NFL he gets to stay in the same offense for a second straight season. He learned the current system on the fly last season because of the elimination of most of the offseason. He looked terrible for half a season, then after the bye he rated as the second best QB the rest of the way.

The big places I thought the Bills could’ve improved to help them gain ground on the Chiefs were: - CB: This is more about losing ground. I hate how shallow we are there. We only have three I’d want to see on the field. Tre is a stud, Wallace is solid and Johnson is adequate. Notably of the three only Tre is signed beyond this season. One injury and I think we have real issues. - Speed X WR: The real value of Brown was that he could take the top off the defense. We didn’t have that kind of player last season when he got hurt and we did little to address it this offseason. Sanders can be a good backup to Beasley, but he doesn’t have speed anymore. And I’m not depending on a sixth round pick who was projected to the slot to be our outside speed receiver this year. - High end RB: A RB who could stress defenses as a runner with home run ability and as a receiver would be huge for this team. We really did almost nothing here. Brieda will be okay but he’s not going to be an upgrade. Beyond those major needs I’d also have liked to see a center and 1 tech selected. I don’t like Morse’s concussion risk and don’t love having to shuffle the IOL if he goes down again. It really feels like a “when” rather than an “if” with another concussion. As for 1 tech, I thought Star was below average to poor two seasons ago and he’s had a year off. I don’t trust him to rebound this year and I don’t want to see Oliver at 1 tech again. The Bills were very lucky from an injury standpoint last season. I hope that happens again, but we can’t count on that. I’d have liked better depth in the places I mentioned. That’s a worry. The other theme above that’s concerning is that we did nothing to address our team speed. It’s an arms race with teams like the Chiefs and Browns. The Bills did nothing to gain ground on the Chiefs and they lost some serious ground to the Browns.

Yeah. Really no other reason to delay.

https://www.google.com/amp/s/profootballtalk.nbcsports.com/2021/04/30/fifth-year-option-tracker-for-2018-nfl-first-round-picks/amp/ Here the update on fifth year tenders for 2018 first round picks as of two days ago. Allen and Edmunds are the two highest picks with no decision. Obviously we are picking up Allen’s. I have been of the opinion that we are not picking up Edmunds and the delay in announcing Allen’s is that the FO is avoiding the obvious question about Edmunds. Lots to talk about after the draft so there won’t be the blitz in the press there would have been with nothing but mock drafts to otherwise talk about.

I seriously want to hear why someone would think they are similar. I don’t see any similarities at all.

So if I’m up to date on the facts: - Rodgers is mad at the Packers for a variety of reasons including drafting his replacement instead of getting him more offensive help and stupidly electing to kick a FG in the NFCCG which effectively ended their chances to win that game and advance to the SB. - He told the team months ago that he would not play for them again and kept that behind closed doors. - The Packers told him they’d trade him but have yet to engage in trade talks with any suitors. - Rodgers went public with his ultimatum just before the draft If I have that all correct, then the Pack looks like a total cluster F. They have had time to try to make Rodgers happy in GB or to decide to move on and trade him for value. Either seems defensible, but instead they’ve lied to him about trading him and have created a situation where they might not have him or any of the massive compensation they could’ve gotten for him. As for Rodgers, he’s 37. He’s at the end of his career and it looks like he either wants to play for a team that can win it all (and that he trusts) or he’d rather retire. That’s reasonable for a 37 year old elite QB. I really don’t want him in the AFC and I doubt he gets traded to another NFC team so I’m rooting for him to retire and host Jeopardy! or go to the booth or something.