GunnerBill

Tom Peliserro on Eisen yesterday said he'd be surprised if Johnson interviews for more than 1 or 2 jobs this round. He isn't going to take 3 or 4 interviews like years past where he has interviewed for jobs he isn't sure he wanted then ended up withdrawing, sometimes when teams were basically about to hire him - see Washington last year. I think that is smart. Continually leaving teams at the altar is not good for your reputation. Ben Johnson doesn't need his "name out there" at this point. He is the hottest thing in a headset.... he should only interview for jobs he is convinced he would take if offered. I somewhat doubt that includes the New York Jets. On Joe Douglas's recommendation though. Douglas very much led that search and Saleh was his guy.

It's a good piece, and the overall conclusion that the trick to being great against man might just be having true high end man beating receivers is right in my view. However, on the opposite end you have to have really talented DBs to be successful playing a lot of man coverage. The Jags for instance tried to play man vs Buffalo in week 3 when the Bills were very much still bedding in Keon Coleman and Amari Cooper was still running downfield while Deshaun Watson got sacked.... they were shredded. Why? Because Tyson Campbell was out and the rest of their DBs just aren't good enough to play man coverage even against a mediocre set of Bills receivers. Similarly over the years the Dolphins have tried to play a ton of man against the Bills, and Josh has been excellent against them. Even since they have had Jalen Ramsey, Allen has just looked at the defense, worked out man or zone and if it's man don't throw at Ramsey, throw somewhere else and the others won't be able to carry their assignments. The Chiefs, missing their #1 outside corner Jaylen Watson, took a different tack in week 11 and as a team that normally tries to play the Bills in a lot of man coverage they switched to primarily playing zone. That was likely in part to protect Nazeeh Johnson who was starting opposite Trent McDuffie outside and Chamarri Conner who has replaced McDuffie in the slot since Watson's injury. It didn't work. The Bills targeted Johnson 12 times and had 9 completions for 103 yards and Conner 6 times for 5 completions and 55 yards. But if you are Steve Spagnuolo you probably say to yourself "if they got cooked that bad in zone maybe it was a good thing I didn't play more man." So while there is definitely a question for the Bills as we look toward the post season in respect of "can their receivers win consistently enough vs man coverage?" (and I think that especially applies outside the numbers) there is a question for the teams we are going to face as well as to whether they trust their DBs enough to play us in man, and if they do, does it work?

I mean the Eagles got there beating the 49ers 4th string QB. The only one of the five teams I think you can say have proven their pedigree is the Chiefs... but they, arguably, look the most vulnerable of the five right here today, despite the record. Which isn't me writing them off btw. I still think it is going to takena very good team to knock your guys off in January.

Bad bet.

No tied necessarily but definitely influenced by the owner. The story on Jones is Mara was VERY committted to him. And even this week Jones went straight to ownership for his release. Father - Son relationship is how I've seen it described. Schoen and Daboll should have been stronger though. There is no question on that.

Or any relocation costs!!

And hopefully he'll have a full offseason where he is healthy. Missing the whole of camp as a rookie DB in this system in particular is tough to overcome.

He could do a lot worse.

From his college film, he is plenty physical enough. We haven't seen that yet when he has been on the field for the Bills but I think that is because of the second issue - his head is spinning and he is out of position and not able to just run and hit as a result. The bigger worry for me is how long the mental adjustment has taken. He missed camp, so I'll give him a bit of a pass, but some players struggle to get it mentally and that is keeping him on the bench more than anything else.

Spielmen was a pretty good GM in Minnesota. It was probably time for a change in the end, he'd been there 10 years, but I think they generally had solid rosters during that period.

To be clear I don't think your way of looking at it is unreasonable. But you stsrted fron a premise that "only Bills fans could look at it different" and it was ridiculous to have a different view. That isn't true. The Bills body of work this decade is extremely impressive. Comfortably the 2nd best team in football over the 4 and a half years. Does that count for more than winning a Superbowl? No. But does it count for more than teams who have the same problem we do - can't get past the Chiefs? I think that bit is debatable.

So I was talking about since 2020 rather than the Josh's entire career. My opinion is the Bills have been the best team not to win a Superbowl in that period.

Yea. That weak conference produced one Superbowl Champion in thr 4 years we are talking about. The other 3 years the Superbowl Champion was the team neither the Bills nor the 9ers can beat in the playoffs. In fact the 9ers can't beat them at all. What is "my thing" is the full body of work. That is what I set out. I don't hide from where they have out perfomed us. But the reality is both teams have the same problem. In crunch time they can't beat the Kansas City Chiefs.

But what would you give up for him?

Arguably. Those Green Bay teams were pretty flawed and the Bills beat them very easily in the regular season so I think it is arguable that only that Lions win last year really was a against a high quality team. Yes, they have two conference championship. Depends how you quantify it. In this decade: Wins: Bills 57 (2nd); 49ers 46 (6th) Points: Bills 2,210 (1st); 49ers 1,994 (7th) Points against: Bills 1,475 (1st); 49ers 1,552 (2nd) Division titles: Bills 4; 49ers 2 Playoff wins: Bills 5; 49ers 6 Conference championships: Bills 0, 49ers 2 Superbowls: Bills 0; 49ers 0 Demonstrably false. Cowboys ranks in that time: Wins: 45 (9th) Points: 2,088 (2nd) Points against: 1,781 (15th) Division titles: 2 Playoff wins: 1 Conference Championships: 0 Superbowls: 0

This is undeniably true IMO. EDIT: worth saying Shanahan's 9ers are 0-5 vs the Chiefs. Regular and post season. McDermott's Bills are 5-4.

All this reminds me is some of you guys are like... really old.

The first half of last season McDermott was not doing either job very well. He seemed to find his stride more second half of the year after the infamous hit piece. I don't know if somehow it refocussed him or something but he defenitely stepped off the stupid blitzing defensively and found a groove with his playcalling. When he fired Dorsey I also thought he should have given up playcalling. He didn't and it came right but I was adament after the season that he couldn't try and do both jobs again. I was pretty optimistic about it going in, but it did not work. I'm much happier with him back 100% in the Head Coach's chair.

Yep. I'm certain about them. https://x.com/fball_insights/status/1859007980752212301?t=qKma9VgzOOt6_h5ardeNVA&s=19 As for Spags, he is excellent. But you have to be excellent to make that kind of D work. There are very few coordinators who can make it work and even then go back to 2021 and he was under pressure for his job. Chiefs fans wanted rid of him, they finished 27th in total defense and it was then that Brett Veach decided he needed to change tact and move resources onto the defensive side. The 2022 draft they spent 2 firsts, a second, a third and a fourth on defense. They are one of the best defenses in the NFL right now, but they should be. When everyone is healthy there are two starters on that D who were drafted after round 3 - Jaylen Watson at corner (6th round) and Drue Tranquill who was a 4th rounder the Chiefs signed as a free agent from the Chargers. But as you say it is stylistic preference. I do not like heavy blitzing defenses. Never have, never will. I am conscious of that bias.

The Bills most played coverage is cover 3 at 28%. They have played cover 2 zone 19% (which is 7th highest in the NFL seeing as you are interested). They have played 16% cover 4 and 14% cover 1 man. They are actually one of the more flexible coverage teams, and that helps their disguise on the back end. They have the 3rd lowest blitz percentage at 18.1% and despite that they are middle of the pack (16th) in percentage of opposing QB drop backs that result in pressure. I'm the opposite to you, I hate heavy blitzing defenses, but I think Babich has done pretty well as a first time coordinator. He hasn't been perfect, he has made some mistakes (going to bigger personnel after the Henry run in Baltimore just to watch them nickel and dime is down the field with Justice Hill for two drives for example) but I think for the most part he has stayed patient, adjusted well and managed to maintain so of the really clever coverage design that has been a staple of McDermott's Bills teams despite a ton of turnover in the secondary.

It would need one of the 8 win Vikings, the 7 win Packers (who would have the h2h) and the 7 win Commanders (cake walk schedule including 2 games v the hapless Cowboys) to collapse down the stretch.

If they lose both games I doubt even winning out does it. Arizona will take the west.

They tried to get something done last spring and I understand they were a distance apart on money which is why they just did a bit of a restructure to free up cap room. Douglas has only had one, moderate, pay day by the standards of an NFL player. He will want to maximise the dollars on this deal

Athletic reporting he will likely be benched or possibly even cut once the playoffs are mathematically out of reach. The Jets will have a different Quarterback by the time they come here at the end of the season. And yet you can make the same argument about the Head Coach and he was fired.

The 9ers line hasn't actually been that great this year.