HappyDays

What's the number one predictor of targets in your view? Because he literally told the Commanders he didn't want the job.

I'll revise that to top 4. Reid Shanahan McVay Johnson That's probably the order I'd have them. Agreed that Johnson needs to prove more which puts him behind the other 3 but his first two seasons in Detroit have been amazing. He actually got more out of Jared Goff than even Sean McVay did.

What possesses you to think that? They have an elite OL, the best slot WR in the NFL, and a top 3 offensive coach. If you love the Lions offense I have one idea that could get us there, but that discussion will have to wait until next offseason.

Last year's Chiefs offense is probably the best point of reference we have. Mahomes finished 7th in passing YPG but just 19th in passing YPA. Considering that offense still featured Travis Kelce and of course Andy Reid calling plays I don't think we can reasonably predict better from the Bills passing offense this year. A reasonable average prediction would probably be something like 9th and 21st respectively. Of course there is a path to better. In previous discussions I have laid out these 4 best case scenarios: 1) Joe Brady turns out to be a top 5 offensive coach. 2) Kincaid develops into a top 5 pass catching TE. 3) Coleman hits the ground running and is immediately a starting caliber X WR. 4) Claypool turns back into the player he was in his first two seasons. I think there is a path for each of these scenarios to come to fruition but none of them are likely. How our passing offense performs will depend on which if any of these scenarios come to fruition.

Yes, with HoF talent on the field with him. That's my point. To overcome abysmal defensive performances we need way more offensive talent. It is so frustrating that as soon as the Chiefs lost their edge in offensive talent, they immediately got an elite defense to make up for it. Wouldn't that be nice.

My take has been that the offense needs better talent to perform better, and the defense needs better coaching. I understand not everyone agrees with that. But since the coaching isn't going to change I think over investing in the offense is the only way we'll ever get a championship. Mahomes has had 1-2 HoF talents on the field with him, and 1 HoF talent on the sidelines, throughout his entire career. I'm not so unfair that I expect us to give that caliber of help to Allen. But yeah if we're already just giving up the idea that the defense can perform at even an average level in the playoffs, we'll need the offensive talent so Allen can make up for it. If the idea is that Allen has to prop up both a poor defense and a lack of high end talent on offense all the way to a Super Bowl win, that's patently ridiculous and you know it.

Sure the offense was not good enough in that game. I can concede that point. It doesn't change the conversation at all. Based on how the defense performed it wouldn't have mattered either way. Ditto for the Bengals game. There is not a single playoff game in the Josh Allen era where you can say the defense did their job but the offense didn't, but there are several where you can say the opposite. But also your whole argument here is proving my point... The offense has not been good enough to make up for bad defensive performances. We need a major influx of talent on that side of the ball so that we can regularly put up 30+ points in the playoffs.

Okay fine. We can also add on missed FGs to make the defense look worse and the offense look better. No matter how you want to lay it out, the offense very clearly has been well above average and the defense has been well below average in the playoffs. It's really not debatable. But my whole point is that well above average isn't good enough. We need the offense to be totally dominant in the playoffs to the point that it doesn't even matter what the defense does, and even that caliber of offense might not be enough to get us past the divisional round as we learned in the 2022 playoffs. Like we basically need a perfect offense just to give us a coin flip chance of making it to the Super Bowl. Not really a realistic expectation but I wish we would at least try to build the offense to that level.

Personally I would throw out the Ravens game entirely, for both sides of the ball. That was not a real game of football. FWIW removing that game would put our offensive PPG at 28.0, and our defensive PPG at 27.2. Also FWIW in two of the three other games you listed (Chiefs and Texans) our offense scored more points than the Chiefs did when they won the AFCCG this year. If that's what we're considering as bad playoff games for the offense, that kind of proves the point we're making. The Bengals game is the only one where I would say the offense was outright bad and gave the team no chance to win. So yes it is a crazy take to try and paint the offensive and defensive performances in the playoffs as remotely equivalent in any way. The offense is regularly putting up more points than their opponent typically allows, while the defense is regularly giving up more points than their opponent typically scores.

My favorite stat from this game is that Allen's passer rating decreased slightly after he threw the 1 yard TD pass to Tommy Doyle. It went from 158.3 to 157.6 because the lower YPA mattered more to the passer rating formula than the extra TD pass.

Right. So when I say we probably need our offense to be ranked #1 to get further in the playoffs, this is what I'm referring to. Top 10 isn't good enough. Even top 5 production hasn't been good enough like you point out. We need an offense that can overcome historically bad defensive production.

The offense was not adequate in that playoff game as evidenced by the fact that they scored less points than their opponent. I think every single person in this discussion secretly agrees with each other. Everyone knows the Bills will have a good offense but not a blow you away offense. We can quibble a bit on the exact expected rankings and stats, but really I don't think anyone on here disagrees with that general statement. So what it really boils down to is whether that caliber of offense is championship caliber and I think past playoff experience under this regime would indicate heavily that it is not. For me the most likely source of optimism isn't that every single pass catcher on offense is going to exceed their career production to the point that we become a blow you away offense; it's that Bobby Babich will be the DC in more than just name and will turn out to be an elite defensive coach. On that point I actually am willing to wait and see. I just wish we had chosen the path of most likely success, which would have been over-investing in the offense and trying to just steamroll teams all the way to the Super Bowl. Even if that kind of turnaround didn't happen in a single offseason, I would have been happy with just a sign that the regime was making it their new philosophy. Instead they invested basically the bare minimum on offense and appear to be rolling along with the same philosophy that has failed them time and time again. We just have to hope this time they happen to be right.

It's not really a complaint, just a matter of fact. We need an offense that can score at will, including in the playoffs. I actually think this is where the disconnect lies between both sides in this discussion. Nobody thinks the offense is going to suck. Josh Allen means we are basically guaranteed a top 10 offense. It's just that top 10 is not equivalent to championship caliber. If you adjust your perspective to that, you'll understand why so many of us are unsatisfied with the offensive investments. I agree it is dramatic. But when your defense is consistently giving up historically bad production in the playoffs, you need a historically productive offense to overcome that, no?

Based on our defensive performance every single playoff run every single year. What team have you been watching? We'll probably need a top 1 offense to compete for a championship, honestly. Top 10 isn't acceptable. That's the bare minimum expectation with Allen.

A championship?

Top 10 isn't good enough, that's the issue.

Adding Aiyuk or Adams would immediately transform our pass catchers to a top 8ish group IMO. Having a legit #1 outside WR on the roster changes everything. Shakir and Samuel would have much more favorable matchups. MVS and Claypool would be fighting it out for the 6th spot instead of both likely seeing a significant amount of targets. Coleman could be eased in. Hollins could mainly just focus on special teams. I hope Beane at least tries. He tried to give Arik Armstead the same money that Jacksonville gave him. Use that money and give Allen the caliber of weapons that he deserves.

I supported both the trade back and drafting Coleman. Exactly what happened was literally my dream scenario. Still I do not think WR was sufficiently addressed this offseason. In fact that's two years in a row that the Bills took my draft crush with their first pick. Still I wish they had done more. For me the individual moves are secondary to the larger philosophy. My personal player preferences are just opinions. The idea that the Bills need to overinvest in pass catchers is, to me, a cold hard fact. I would have rather taken Worthy followed by Franklin than just Coleman alone, even though I liked Coleman better than both of those players, because the first scenario would have represented what I KNOW to be a necessary change in the teambuilding philosophy. Instead I fear this regime has learned nothing and is stubbornly continuing to prioritize the wrong positions.

If nothing else you can tell he really wants it. His natural physical traits combined with his work ethic and attitude make me optimistic he will be ready sooner rather than later. His cuts in this clip already look noticeably better than the limited clips we saw out of OTAs.

Right so in that context what Mahomes did was even stupider if we take your theory of ideal QB play in that situation. The Chiefs needed just a FG to win the game. Inarguably the best case scenario was picking up a 1st and then kicking a FG as time expired. Whereas with us we needed a TD to have any kind of chance of winning the game in regulation. But Mahomes didn't try to perfectly thread the needle. He tried to score a TD on a play that his coaches clearly designed to be a TD. You're the only person I've seen try to claim otherwise. The hold redirected JuJu's route?? You know that's not how routes work, right? A hold doesn't "redirect" a WR from a horizontal route to a vertical route. You're just making crap up because you're starting with the supposition that "smarter" QBs don't try to throw TDs in those situations. Mahomes is a smarter QB, therefore he must have been doing something else on that play. Yeah man because sometimes Mahomes throws bad passes. His tackles get beat off the snap, he's about to get crushed, and his mechanics are way off. He threw it in the direction of his first read 1v1 to try and score a TD and the pass was off the mark. I don't know what else to tell you.

Are you for real man? Like actually? JuJu is running basically a slot fade into the endzone. What are you even talking about? You think the plan was for him to catch the ball exactly past the sticks and then just tumble to the ground? Is this really the narrative you have to come up with to try and prove that smarter QBs than Allen don't take shots at the endzone in situations like this? This is nuts man. Dude if I had a nickel for every time Mahomes aggressively wagged his finger in the direction of an incomplete pass, I'd be Travis Kelce's girlfriend.

No I don't think Mahomes thought he saw a holding that not everybody even agrees was a good call and decided to throw the ball in that direction to maybe draw a flag to run the clock down. Because that's utterly ridiculous. The kind of bizarre narrative a person only comes up with when they've backed themselves into a corner in a debate. Here's the actual play: Mahomes is looking at JuJu the whole time, pre-snap even. Very clearly that is the first read. As soon as he confirms the nearest safety's leverage he's just taking a 1v1 shot to his guy running towards the endzone. This is a TD shot, clear as day. Not a galaxy brain 4D chess draw a holdng flag shot. That's nonsense and you know it. Occam's razor - great QBs go for the endzone when they can. They don't turn down open TD windows to chase perfect game clock scenarios. Like I said, there are plenty of criticisms to make of that final drive. Choosing to try and score a TD over trying to perfectly thread the game clock needle is not one of them. Me, I am still baffled as to how Dawkins ended up 1v1 vs Chris Jones on a TD shot play... Just terrible situational game management in a critical moment, same as usual under this regime.

That's really your interpretation? This is weak. Everyone else saw Mahomes try to throw a TD to take the lead in the Super Bowl. But no, he tried to draw attention to a defensive holding that happened as/after he was gearing up to throw the ball. Sure. Whatever works better for your side of the debate. The correct interpretation is that any QB worth his salt is going for the TD in that situation. Not pre-determining that his defense is going to fail. I'm sorry but that is total nonsense. I have plenty of criticisms of that final series. Trying to score a TD one minute too early isn't one of them.

So in your opinion, in the 2023 Super Bowl, Mahomes made a mistake when he threw a 3rd and 8 pass to JuJu Smith-Schuster in the endzone with 1:54 remaining? Surely there was somebody open underneath to keep the clock running so they could just kick a walk off field goal. Right?