BarleyNY

He was the only real option due to his contract and availability. The Bills were stuck - and that was their own doing - but by mid-season he was the only viable option to try to improve the WR corps. But, yes, due to injury and/or declining skills it wound up being a bad trade.

They are in general. But they have a salary floor to meet and they aren’t stupid. They’re looking at getting a new stadium so they’re going to try to make the fans happy with some popular moves. They may even make a push to try to get a championship - or at least get close to one - while they’re trying to get their new stadium.

This and PR. Gotta make it look like the league is clean for the fans.

They don’t get their salary or per game roster bonuses, but it does not impact their signing bonus. They could have voided it but chose not to. The reason Beane gave was the DT market didn’t have much left so O-gun minus 6 games was a better option than anyone else left.

Yep. Out for 6 games and shells of their PED enhanced selves on the field after that.

Prior to the draft Elam was the player I least wanted the Bills to draft and said so in the thread for that. It was a terrible decision to go into the draft with such a glaring need and a terrible decision to draft him. But, yes, cutting your losses is always the smart move once you are in a bad situation.

You’re right about all of that. It’s just a lot to see people gushing about it when the Bills do it and laugh at other teams when they do it. I don’t mean to imply you did that. Just plenty of it on the board.

How many people here think Chicago’s GM did an awesome job getting that 5th for him?

Kupp is primarily a slot WR. Palmer was brought in to be the floor at X. That’s Keon’s competition. Kupp isn’t a fit because we just paid Shakir and have a glut there.

I think it’ll have to be the draft. With the post 6/1 designation nothing much seems to happen on 6/2 anymore.

Lol. Good point

He would be employed in some capacity in the NFL, but the Bills would’ve cleaned house long ago if Allen and Mayfield went top 3 in that draft.

Yep. Never, ever, ever draft a CB who has to grab WRs at the top of their routes. Never. Getting grabby running side by side on go routes? Fine. You can work with that. But grabbing at the top of routes just means you can’t stick with the WR when they make a move. That never works in the NFL.

Bosa is going to have to do a lot of heavy lifting on the pass rush for this to be a noticeable upgrade. That would make life a lot easier on Oliver, Roussea & Co. This group plus some draft help should not be bad, but it’s not where I’d want it to be in a scheme that relies on pressure from the front 4. In a more blitz heave defense I’d be a lot happier with it. Hopefully we nail some draft picks on the DL next month and things click.

But when Cook had a heavier workload in 2023 he broke down by the end of the season. Thats why the Bills reduced his snaps to 45-50%. Barkley and Henry play 90%+ of snaps in close games. One of those 3 RBs is not like the others. Again, I’d like to keep Cook, but he warrants a contract around $10M AAV - not $15M.

It’s not a valid excuse because Beane put himself into that position. He should have addressed CB prior to the draft. It didn’t have to be an All Pro addition, just a competent CB. He chose not to do that. That mistake was an advertisement to everyone that he had to take a CB in round 1. My prediction was not only that he’d do that, but that he’d trade up in the round to do it, which happened. KC knew what was going to happen, so they jumped up to get McDuffie before we could slide up a couple spots to get him ourselves.

1st and 4th. We traded a fourth to move up to draft him.

One hopes

O-Gun is a solid addition. Good rotational DT

Obviously significant injury risk, but his ceiling is high. I can’t hate on this. Gotta take some risks. Might as well do it on someone who can be a difference maker.

I just rewatched the all-22 of the playoff game against the Ravens. Oliver was a freaking beast in that game. He’s no Aaron Donald, but he’s our best DL. He just needs some real help. If he was on the Iggles he’d be tearing it up.

Crap. That’s correct. Missed it because he had 4 years left on his last contract and I thought it was filled in with the new one. Well, that’s going to make an enormous difference so never mind on the numbers above.

Let’s see. Palmer will replace the cap hit from #51, which is $844k. Bernard will likely have his $3.406M salary replaced by $1.125M vet min. Palmer likely will also have a $1.125M salary. So only cap hits from their signing and w/o bonuses to add to that. That puts them at a gain of $312k of space minus the bonuses. So it will be a net loss of space, but I’m unsure if it’ll be more than the $3M we’d have otherwise. Really depends on structure. Even if they can squeeze it, it’ll be razor thin so they’ll want to create a little space to have ready for their next signing. Also I’m not sure if all of the cap adjustments (performance bonuses, insurance, etc.) are through yet. If not, that will change things a bit too. Edit: OTC doesn’t have a line item for adjustments (which is frustrating) but Spotrac does and has zeros. So they’re still not out to the public yet. Teams have had them though.

OTC has a calculator that allows you to play around with restructures, etc. to get an idea of what’s possible. Obviously we have to wait and see what the Bills are willing to do there though.