GunnerBill

No he can't. His numbers when split wide are terrible.

I think safety is the weakest position group, but less impactful than receiver. And I'm less keen on Johnson. He is just an admission that Samuel hasn't worked for me and I have never actually rated him that highly. I'd rather stand pat than give up assets for him. It's got to be a proper outside boundary receiver for me to be interested. Not an inside / outside flex guy with dubious hands.

Yea they were in my view the best hope of a duo that could at least hold their end up.

I agree Poyer's time's up. But he is better than Hamlin and Rapp even now.

The linebackers we had out there on Sunday aren't even that fast. It wasn't about size and/or speed - it was about ability. As for are our DBs slow - Hamlin ended up as the one in pursuit and yes he is slow.

I took it as now. And I went receiver because I think that is the most realistic option. They are generally the pieces you see a non-competitive team heading for a rebuild shed first. I wouldn't hate safety as an option because we just don't have NFL starting level players on the roster at that spot, but who is giving away a clear upgrade starting level safety? I can't immediately thing of guys who are on likely bottom feeding teams that could come available. I think safety is as big a need as anything else in the offseason though. Hopefully Bishop comes on some and we are only looking for one starting level guy. I never liked how they handled the spot in the offseason.

I wouldn't give up a 1st or a 2nd for it. But the Browns next 5 up to the deadline are Washington, Philly, Cincy, Baltimore and the Chargers. If they are 1-8 or 2-7 and in sell mode and would take a mid round pick for Cooper then I'd do it as long as the Bills look like being a playoff team at that point (which so long as Josh's healthy they should). If the Bills are a .500 type football team at that point then I'm more in the "ride this year out, keep the pick, build through the draft" territory.

The ability to threaten outside the numbers. Baltimore told the announcers in pre-game meetings they didn't think the Bills could do that and daring them to was the gameplan. They were right.

Yea I agree with that. There just weren't a ton of "normal pass plays" from the Ravens. We never got them into enough pure dropback passing scenarios. And that is what you have to do to beat them.

The people moaning about the Dline are underestimating the cleverness of the Ravens plan. They designed their offense specifically to neutralise the Bills DLine. Could they have played better? Could one of them have made a play? Sure. But the Ravens plan was to take them out of the game and make the Bills 2nd level the critical point of failure. Ty Dunne knows seriously F**k all about Xs and Os.

What we are missing so far is some plays.

He also got burned on some plays. And I don't know what you expect them to do when they are down to backups? Williams, Spector and Lewis were good against Miami and Jax for the most part. But turns out three backups can't hold their own against the starters of one of the best teams in the league. I mean, no *****. That us why they are backups. Or when Milano, Bernard and Taron are back they will be able to play the second level combo they intended on playing.

I turned a Bills game off early for the first time since the Gailey era last night. It was 3.45am, I was knackered and the game had gone. So I missed the final 9 minutes or so but I saw all the scoring. I said in the GDT it was a perfect storm of: injuries, coaching naivety and known personnel issues. That is my take on the game so let me break it down. Injuries I have to give the Baltimore coaching staff a ton of credit, they were excellent. It is one of the best run teams in the NFL (so are the Bills) they know what they are doing and they are buttoned up and professional. If John Harbaugh can win another Superbowl before he retires he would cement himself as a HoF coach. Criminally underrated IMO. Their gameplan on offense was to go right after the second level of the Bills defense. In the first half they targeted the Bills secondary once (they play where Agholor prevented an INT). Everything else was designed to expose the Bills second level. Their run game was all about getting their big bodies to the second level and challenging the Bills linebackers to get off blocks. Their pass game was all about getting the linebackers moving laterally and exposing their lack of speed on the edge and then the odd play action shot behind them when they had drawn them out of the middle of the field. They didn't get away from it. They didn't do anything crazy. They just kept going after the second level. Excellent job Todd Monken. I think for the first time last night against a team with the talent of Henry and Jackson and the speed of Hill you saw just how much is missing from the Bills defense at the moment. Spector, Williams, Lewis, Hamlin and Rapp. That is five guys at the heart of your defense who this time last year were backups. There were coaching missteps (more below) but they were just out-talented in that match up. Coaching naivety Joe Brady and Bobby Babich have rightly got a fair amount of credit for their starts as the Bills coordinators. But they struggled last night. I'll start on defense. Obviously the Ravens hit the big run first play from scrimmage. That can happen. They executed well against the weakness I identified above and you have to give them credit. Instead, Babich panicked. We spent the next two drives entirely in 4-3 base with Nicholas Morrow playing as a strong side linebacker. I said it about him in pre-season - he is not an NFL talent at this point. I don't mean to be cruel. For an undrafted player he has had a good career, this is his eighth year in the league. That is commendable. But he was brutal for the Eagles last year and he was brutal last night. Not Athletic enough, not a good enough anticipator and just generally a weak spot. Watching Justice Hill zoom by him while he looked like wading in treacle was sad. Leslie Frazier used to be much criticised here for staying in nickel against the physical run teams like Tennessee and Baltimore but he would always hold by the philosophy that going from nickel to base meant taking off the field a player who is better than the one you are bringing in. I get it the gap between Lewis and Morrow isn't the gab between Taron and Klein. And Lewis did NOT play well last night missing two critical tackles that led to 1st downs. But at least he had the basic athleticism to have a shot. Staying in base for those drives really killed any chance we had of settling in on defense. Second half Babich and McDermott came out with a different plan which was stop asking Williams and Spector to play linebacker and just send them to crash the line every play. It was a chips all in type of aggressive move and we got them off the field twice cheaply. Unfortunately what it always risks is when the Ravens did break that first line there was going to be a lot of yards there for them and after the turnover (coming onto it) the dam broke. At that stage I think Babich was sunk and what happened from there was not on him. His talent was more the issue than he was, but his naivety and panic cost us first half IMO. Onto offense. First thing to say is the lack of motions and shifts tonight seemed to give Josh fewer easy button throws. Some of that was no doubt the sound in the stadium and the Bills just wanting to be a bit more basic and stress their fundamentals, some of was likely "we know what the Ravens are in so the benefit is less" but at the same time it meant we didn't create those little schemed leverage opportunities we have for short completions and YAC in recent weeks. Secondly I think what we are seeing with the Samuel in the backfield stuff is a lot of whiteboard plays. They look great when you draw them up, because you imagine there is a confusion on defense. But teams are not buying it. They know for the most part what the Bills are trying to do with it and it felt forced last night that he was trying to go to it. I do think it is hurt by the lack of threat the Bills have outside (more to come) because teams don't feel forced to stay in 2 high shells so if Samuel is in the backfield, fine, just make sure that is a DB responsibility rather than a linebacker one and if you need to commit a safety closer to the line to get that done, so be it! I think they got away from James Cook too soon as well because they were trying to force the cute stuff with Samuel in the backfield. And the trick play... ugh. The play call obviously didn't work and went disastrously wrong swinging the entire momentum of the game. But even had it worked I don't like it there. For the first time all game the Bills seemed to have the Ravens D backpedalling, Cook had just had three runs for 13 yards, it is 2nd and 7 at the Ravens 44. You are probably in 4 down territory as it is FG no man's land in any event. Either run him again and try and get to third and short or throw one of your quick hitters see of Shakir or Kincaid can get you into 3rd and short or break one for a first down. Going for a trick ply there seemed unnecessary, it was naive and the Ravens were ready for it. Your best players are Allen and Cook. Taking it out of their hands to put in Curtis Samuel's was dumb. Personnel issues I'll start with the easy one - Tyler Bass is a problem. The game was probably gone already when he missed that FG but it was the final nail in the coffin. If he makes it and the Bills get a stop, who knows. Once he missed the Ravens were pretty much home and hosed. I know why they don't want to make the move but the time is coming where they have to. Wide receiver is also a problem. Shakir isn't going to make magic every time you throw him the ball. Sometimes he will get just what's there for him as he did mostly last night. That is fine, unless him getting more than what is there is the entire basis for your offense as it feels like it has been to an extent. Keon had a couple of nice backshoulder catches and that was good to see. But it's a tough way to win in the NFL and you see with his drop the margin of error you are working within. He is still obviously a work in progress but I remain where I was on the start with him. He may develop into a better version of Gabe Davis. That is still no more than a #2 receiver. The Bills just do not threaten outside. Collinsworth said about 6 minutes into the game that Roquan Smith had told him their game plan was keep a lid on the middle of the field and force the Bills to win outside. And they just can't. I thought we might get here next week, we got here a week early. But I say it until I'm blue in the face eventually in this league in high leverage situations you are going to have to win outside or at least threaten to win outside. Or else it allows the defense to dictate to you. The Bills have the Quarterback to do it. They don't have the receiving talent to do it. Running Ty Johnson out as a receiver split wide on 3rd and 11 tells you what you need to know about how Brady feels about his receivers ability to win in those situations. People rightly ask why couldn't we expose the Ravens weak pass defense (by the numbers through the first three weeks) well my answer to that is it wasn't a Joe Brady problem. Or a Josh Allen problem. It's a Brandon Beane problem. Let's see where we are at the deadline record wise. But I suspect he will have to try and make a deal for someone. Hollins, MVS, Samuel and Coleman isn't going to be good enough outside when you need to show you can win there. The Ravens were dead right with their game plan. Make the Bills win outside. They proved last night that when a good team dares them to do that they are in trouble. Finally safety. The weakest spot on the team. We knew it going into the year. But two guys in Rapp and Edwards who have spent their recent past as backups plus Hamlin and Lewis who we have seen enough of in Buffalo to KNOW they are backup level players was never going to stand up to scrutiny. Sure, they were unlucky with the Bishop injury. He is still getting up to speed as a result. But at the moment they don't have a starting level NFL player there and the first game where they had to bring a guy down into the box more hey presto it shows up big time. Predictable.

He was slightly better against the Jags but they had quit before the kick off. Agree bad in the other two and bad tonight after a bad pre-season. Not going well.

Get Josh outta there.

Douglas has has a ***** game too. Let him walk after the season. That is an easy call.

That is on Hamlin. Ran right into the back of Spector. It's 3.45am chaps. This is a wrap. I'm going to bed.

Missed it by a mile. Was never in at any point.

This having him in the backfield stuff isn't working.

Gotta kick it here. If it was 4th and short I was going.

We need to play with tempo now. We are 3 scores down.

The one score streak is about to come to an end. Perfect storm of injuries, coaching naivety and the personnel issues which were apparent before the season.

Cam has to make that tackle

Ugh. I hate that playcall. So needless.

Atta boy Keon. Fantastic throw.