GunnerBill

His OC has struggled too. It is almost always the case with Shanny disciples. They know the playbook. They know the scheme. They don't understand the scheme the way Kyle Shanahan does. It is why for years McVay struggled to beat him head to head. Shanny knew how to stop his own offense and McVay didn't know the scheme as well as him to be able to adjust. McVay became a better coach in 2020 when he started to add his own wrinkles to the playbook. Can Slowick get to that point?

That "re-sign Bates and sign Saffold" offseason was depressing. I hated it at the time and predictably it failed.

And Grable. Who trust me is the best of the bunch.

Not might on the Bills TD. That was baltent OPI and the biggest missed call of the night. 2nd was the facemask on Johnson. 3rd was the non-review of the drop inside 2 minutes (not on the on field refs). I also thought on Gray's first TD that the Chiefs had an illegal formation with not enough guys on the line, but it was tight.

He has been aggressive since 2020. Particularly on 4th downs. And the numbers support that

If that is true McD's gut must align with analytics very consistently. Because over 5 years he is top 5 of going with the numbers.

The Bills would definitely sign him at that price. He will get more than that. I think they will sign him anyway, but it will be at a higher rate than that. I'm still on the fence about signing Shakir. But I think the Bills love him.

I think he will ask for Surtain money. I don't think he is as good as Surtain.

Torrence has 2 years left. He isn't a FA until after 2026.

There is a fair gap between those two though isn't there? Surtain is $24m AAV. Agree though for earning potential he should want to be outside and with Watson out they are gonna need to use him there I think.

They did end up moving McDuffie more outside 2nd half. But agree he hasn't been at his best this year.

I just think the difference in plans represents the difference in the offenses that we were facing. In 2021 he was averaging 305 ypg and 3.5 TDpg and the Bills said you will get your yards we are going to make you work hard for every yard and buckle down in the redzone and he threw for 272 and 2 TDs. This year he is averaging 245 ypr and just over 1TD pg and the Bills said okay we are gonna come and challenge you because you might struggle moving the ball if we do that and if you make a few explosives on us, fine, we trust our offense to keep up and he threw 3 touchdowns, but struggled moving the ball and only had 196 yards and the Bills offense more than kept up. They were both really good plans against the version of the Chiefs they were facing. Now we gotta get the plan right if we see them again and pray our key guys are healthy.

There were three throws on KC's final touchdown drive that were real needle thread passes. I think it was to Gray, Hopkins and Watson and on all three of them the window to put the ball was very small and Mahomes found the gap. Makes me wonder a bit if the recent interceptions have made him slightly gun shy earlier in the game from taking on those tight window throws. Because it only seemed to happen when they were in "gotta have it" mode.

I think it is joint with the famous "no blitz" game by Leslie Frazier in the 2021 regular season when we beat them 38-20. Two extremely different plans but both very effective for the different type of Chiefs teams they were deployed against.

Definitely played better as this year has gone on. I remain convinced he came back overweight and wasn't at his ideal playing weight for week 1.

They called some play action shots down the field on early downs that Josh came off to throw short because there was no separation downfield. The Bills had more shot plays called yesterday than any other game all season. They were definitely looking to attack the Chiefs downfield.

Agree. I doubt Milano starts any of the next 3. I think they ramp him up and hope he is ready to start those final 3 regular season games and ready for the post season.

Yep. When I watched the XP miss yesterday back that is absolutely not on the kicker. Funky snap and hold. I do think he missed it though. Whether Bass made that kick reminds me of that gold and white / blue and black dress image that went around a few years ago where some see the same image one colour and some see it the other. We all saw the same thing it looked like he missed to some or he made to others.

Yesterday was a fun game because you saw a development in strategy between the two teams. They both tried to break tendency on defense. The Chiefs played more zone defense than they normally do against the Bills and the Bills played more man defense than they normally do against the Chiefs. It was a fascinating chess match which stopped either QB playing their best overall game BUT was sprinkled with high end throws by both of them in certain moments. Maybe it was the lack of genuine season jeopardy in it, maybe it was the strategy nerd in me, maybe it was the sense of balance between O and D, but I REALLY enjoyed that game. Though despite the lack of jeopardy I still roared the Allen TD run and the Bernard pick.

And how Brady called aggressive shots against the blitz. He called plays that attacked down the field when they wanted to bring extra guys better that we have ever done before in these matchups where our response to the blitz has been more just to survive. Eff that. They wanna throw extra guys at us, make them pay on the backend.

The Jets could lose out. They are genuinely the best new comedy on television.

And McDermott is unbeaten off a bye. San Fran are the type of unconventional offense that require a bit more gameplanning and so giving our staff extra time for them in particular is a favourable scheduling break IMO. I did the playoff predictor before this weekend, had them winning the Seattle game and still missing out at 10-7. I think they face an uphill task now.

I did as well, but as others have said I thought Fairbairn missed against us earlier in the year and it looked similar. I can't remember a year where we have had two of these contentious in / not in calls. Weird. He does, but as others have said I thought that looked off even before Bass made contact. Looked like a funky snap, hold operation.

Irrefutable proof? No. Does it lend credence to that theory? Definitely. Bernard and Benford are big for this defense because they are match up pieces. The Bills have three guys of that ilk on this current defense - Taron Johnson being the third. And in that game in January the first two were injured and Taron was playing hurt. We need to get to the playoffs with those three, Ed and Groot healthy and firing. If they do there is enough there on this D while our O keep scoring 30.

The Chiefs played a ton of zone actually. Way more than they usually do. I'll look at whether they had McDuffie follow Cooper side to side but I think after the 2nd catch he just wasn't out there that much.