GunnerBill

But the best rusher we have is Ed

I'd go free agency actually for safety. It would be my one swing at a proper FA this year. I love the idea of Curl. He is pretty much perfect for this system. Only thing that slightly gives me pause is he is more the Poyer replacement than the Hyde replacement and Poyer is under contract one more year. But Curl has played both so I'd still be inclined to go that and then in 12 months time if you think actually he should be more of your box guy you move him into Poyer's role and find a centre fielder in the draft or FA. Remember their first couple of years here they played mainly the other way around, Hyde played more in the box and Po played more of the centre field role. It was 2019 on that they really settled into the current pattern.

I'd keep Poyer another year. He is no longer "All Pro Po" but he is still an above average safety in this league and except for the first couple of weeks where I think you can give him a pass for needing to knock some rust off he has had a solid year. Not his best year as a Bill or anything but a year that if we got it from a free agent in his place in 2024 we'd say "he was fine." At $7.4m for 2024 and $2m dead cap if we cut him am I getting a better player than Jordan Poyer for $5.4m? Possible, but not super likely. Hyde is a FA. I'd let him walk, replace him this year, let the new guy learn the system with Poyer then move on from Po next year. If we had missed the playoffs and we were gonna blow some stuff up I'd be more inclined to rip the band aid off. But having made it we are now very much in the transition more gradually space for me.

He isn't going to boom the bleep out of it. That isn't who he is. He doesn't have a massive leg. But he is an experienced punter who understands the value of hang time, has experience with this crew - in terms of Reid and Tyler - important both for punting and holding, and has played in playoff games. Given where we are he was the best, most sensible, option. If he can get his punts off, not have a block and not leave any crazy short fields that is the best outcome. The risks associated with every other option floated are greater IMO.

I agree. Not Matt Haack's biggest fan but it was by far the best option for where they are. The worry with him when he was here was blocks to remind people. He had to one opening day vs the Steelers which led to a touchdown and a couple more that were nearly things. He has a strange long wind up. As long as he avoids that Sunday I'll take it.

Yep. Spags has killed us with his pressure package almost every time we have played them right back to the last game here in the covid year. The two exceptions to that were in 2021. In the regular season when Daboll used Allen's legs a lot early in that game and really backed the Chiefs off and made them play conservative and in the playoffs when our offense was really rolling and they got to Josh a couple of times but overall our OL won the battle.

I'm fine with either / or. My worry is both.

So you'd take our best DL off the field? How does that help? The problem with expecting the middle of the Dline to collapse the pocket consistently in this game is that Guard - Centre - Guard the Chiefs OL is as good as anyones. Their weakness is at tackle.

I take the point on Poyer / Rapp but they haven't done one or the other exclusively. Rapp has played some traditional dime too, although granted he has played more free safety with Poyer in the box recently - especially against teams where they want the dime to have that coverage ability. Personally I don't really want Dorian Williams anywhere near the field in this game. Way too many mental mistakes. Lined up in the wrong place twice on Monday, bites on any misdirection you show him, not got natural feel in coverage. He flies about and he has speed and athleticism but I feel like he'd be a rabbit to the Fox of Reid and Mahomes on Sunday. They'd toy with him.

I think that is what they thought happened, they thought the ball had bounced out. But by rule if he fumbled it and was in contact while he is out of bounds by rule that still counts as a "fumble out of bounds" even though the ball never went out.

Because we don't have the linebackers we normally have so we almost need that to be more of a core part of our base. Tbh it is a bit about how do we get our best XI healthy defenders on the field more often than not?

If the video was inconclusive (I agree it was) then they were right to stay with the call on the field. If it touched Friermuth while he is out of bounds then by rule it is a fumble out of bounds. I don't think it did hit his helmet FWIW but I don't think the replay proved it one way or the other.

If healthy.

1. Maybe Taylor Rapp (if healthy himself)? In some sort of dime / hybrid linebacker / big nickel role? 2. Yep, and again our athleticism at the second level if our starters end up being Klein, Dodson and Lewis concerns me there too. Might have to really ask the ends to be disciplined and that takes away from your pass rush. What would you rather have? Pick your poison. 3. Agee. I think we are going to need another exceptional performance from Josh and his supporting cast, which - other than the Knox drop right after half time - showed out pretty well for him vs Pitt.

I believe you are a Bills fan. You are just a really emotional one (call it PTSD if you like) who lets your emotional response dictate your assessment of the team sometimes. That isn't meant as a criticism, because you can have an honest and decent conversation about it. Filthy Beast is a Dolphins fan and is here and on twitter trolling. This is at least his 3rd incarnation on this site. He is not a Bills fan. I am concerned while our defense is this beaten up. Because my logic is the Chiefs defense is gonna be tough to play. It has been all year. I think they have let up 30 or more once in 2 seasons. They are legit on defense. But that wouldn't worry me if we had all our defensive pieces (and I'm not even meaning Tre and Matt here) because I think we'd be capable of holding them. You need to give me one of Bernard (not happening) or Taron (feels 50/50 at best) for Sunday. If we have one of those guys up I just favour the Bills. If they are both down I worry Kelce will destroy us in the middle of the field and it won't matter that Mahomes has no good receivers because they will give Kelce 15 or 16 targets and move the ball.

I think it is the opposite actually. It is sarcastically pointing out to all the people who say McD is trash because he hasn't won a Superbowl that it is difficult to be consistently competitive even if you are a Superbowl winning coach.

I think DeBoer is a good football coach but man this is a jump. In 2019 he was the OC at Indiana. Now he is the Head Coach of the Crimson Tide. Two seasons at Fresno, two seasons at Washington. His record is solid but he hasn't built those programmes with a lot of guys he has recruited. I have no doubt he can coach on Saturdays. but the difference when you are in one of these prestige jobs is that being a great coach on Saturday is only part of the job. The reason Saban and even to lesser extents the likes of Urban and Dabo and Kirby have been successful is because they have built a culture and built a programme. Harbaugh too. He was building that thing for nine years. There were plenty of missteps along the way, but they were building. Every now and again you get a here today, gone tomorrow National Champion. I'd put LSU's miracle season in that category. But generally that isn't how it works. These programmes are built meticulously, top to bottom with a culture established then good recruiting, then a standard of winning and ultimately the big success. I am NOT saying DeBoer can't do it by the way. I am just saying it is a total unknown. We know he can coach. Can he do the rest? Will be intriguing to find out. I think it was the right time for Saban to step down btw. I said in the other thread I consider he, Belichick and Carroll to be the three dominant coaches of the 21st century so far and they all fell within 48 hours. Bill the best NFL coach, Saban the best college coach, Pete the only man this century to win a championship in both college and the pros. But just one National Championship in the last 6 years for Saban and the landscape changing with NIL, transfer portal, conference re-alignment, playoff expansion.... it is only going to get more challenging. A 52 year old Nick Saban would have relished that. A 72 year old Nick Saban, less so. I understand his decision to step away totally.

Yep and the reason Burrow can't quite break into that rivalry in the same way is he doesn't have a team with the same divisional dominance. Buffalo and Kansas City both have the best QB and the best coach (now the Hoodie has gone) in their divisions and I'd say by a distance. Whereas Burrow does not have the best Head Coach in his division (indeed I'd argue Taylor is the worst Head coach in the AFC North) and the gap Burrow to Lamar is not as big as Mahomes to Herbert or Allen to Tua. I know Burrow was hurt this year so possibly not fair to point out that Cincy didn't win the division, but we shouldn't forget that the last two years when the Bengals did win the division the Ravens were actually in first place and then Lamar got hurt and they fell away. And that divisional dominance matters because it guarantees yearly match ups under the current scheduling model. I haven't crunched the numbers on this by the way but I actually think the Buffalo / KC rivalry which is obviously heightened now they have these two all timers at QB is probably one of the most common out of division match ups in the entire NFL going back 15/20 years. Since 2008 I can only think of three seasons (Rex's last season in 2016, Josh's rookie year in 2018 and I think 2019) where the Bills and Chiefs haven't met at least once and this will be the third time they have met twice.

Something I know from my own coaching experiences in soccer is anyone can coach when the bus is rolling. When results are good and confidence is high coaching is pretty easy. Where you find out who can really coach and who can really lead is when the bus is stalling and people are jumping off. It has come to mind the past couple of days with Siriani and McDermott. After that Philly game if I had said to you "one of these coaches will be fired in January" the entire world would have had their money on McDermott. But Siriani's team had some bumps and he was powerless to respond and in the end it was like a boulder rolling down a hill picking up speed as it went. McDermott somehow managed to bring his team back together, unify, refocus and make a run.

I was actually saying he is not really a defensive guru despite his coaching background being on that side of the ball. I think Tomlin is just a solid football coach but he is an example of a guy I think is more suited to Head Coach than coordinator.

Not just wrong but very wrong. Jordan Love is for real.

He is the one to watch. If we had a full week I'd be confident he would play. A short week makes me more nervy. I just think with him and Bernard out the level of athleticism in the middle our D takes a major hit. Williams can fly around but he is still a bit too rash and raw, and then Klein, Cam Lewis, Neal, even Dodson if healthy.... you lose a bit of burst at that level.

I was holding back in case you won.

They couldn't activate him yesterday. They needed Klein up (as was evidenced) and Isabella up given Davis was down.

Clear flag.