HappyDays

Not a great looking injury report, but I expected the team to be extra cautious with a Monday game leading into a two day rest disadvantage against the Chiefs. I would guess they are prioritizing rest for the injured players over one extra day of practice. Tomorrow we will get a real sense of who has a realistic chance of playing on Sunday...

PFF's fundamental flaw is they don't properly weigh the plays according to importance. With Oliver they consistently give him very high pass rush grades but very low run stop grades. Against the Steelers his pass rush grade was 90.9 which is top of the top elite, while his run stop grade was 33.9 which is bottom of the bottom terrible. His total grade ended up being 65.3 which is decent starter level... But Oliver is a pass rusher. That's where his value lies. Mixing run stops with pass rushes is not really a proper evaluation of his value as a player. And that's before getting into the numerous other issues inherent to PFF's grading system.

Bills 28 Chiefs 23 I think our inability to kick FGs may make things more difficult than they need to be but it may also force our hand with 4th down attempts. Ultimately I think our offense will do just enough to out pace them and I am predicting we convert TDs while the Chiefs are converting FGs. This is the weakest Chiefs team we are likely to get in the Mahomes era. This has to be the year we finally beat them in the playoffs. It just has to be.

It's somewhat of a myth on here that short passes are automatically available. That is not always the case. Allen failing to take profits was absolutely not the issue against the Steelers. I've watched the all-22. He was processing the field and reading the defense as well as he has all season. People on here think Cook/Kincaid/Shakir are just automatically getting open underneath... Trust me, those reads are often times covered up perfectly. Against zone defense I would say the underneath options tend to be there. But defenses are playing a lot of man against us lately because they know they can get away with it... And if you watch the tape you will often times see those supposedly always open underneath options getting zero separation. If we had a true "take the top off the defense" option we would probably see more favorable looks. But with the personnel that we have it is going to be tough sledding moving the ball down the field consistently. Luckily we have one of the toughest QBs in NFL history.

It is but we keep hitting these offensive lulls in the middle of games that allow inferior opponents to stay in the game or get back into the game. It has happened in every game since we blew out the Jets.

Well yeah, we only have one WR on the roster that can play outside at an above average level. And that WR is not quite as elite as he been in the past (although looking closer to that level over the past two games). This conversation was done to death in the offseason and now we are left with the reality that it is hard to be a consistently elite passing offense without that #2. Allen makes some drives happen all on his own, but some drives are going to stall out because of our pass catchers. Kincaid has shown himself to be the most capable of all our options behind Diggs so we will really have to rely on him down the stretch. We will need Shakir and/or Harty to make an explosive play or two over the course of a game. We are trying to overcome a fundamental flaw in our roster construction so everyone else has to rise to the occasion to make up for it.

This is a surprise for sure, but interestingly Dak's contract expires after 2024 (2025 & 2026 are on the books as void years). So my guess is Jerry Jones has decided to give McCarthy and Dak one more year, and then blow it all up if/when they fail again next year. The head coach and QB are now tied at the hip. For the record I don't think Dak played well against the Packers but it would have been impossible for him to win that game anyways given how poorly his defense played. And ultimately a disaster performance like that falls on the head coach above all else.

Before the Steelers game I had heard he had a calf & achilles strain which is typically a 1-3 game absence depending on how severe. But haven't gotten any updates on him. Harty in recent weeks has shown off some of the speed we thought we were getting when we signed him. I agree I think he could be a bigger factor down the stretch than anticipated. It may have just taken him time to recover from his turf toe and now he's closer to 100%. Obviously he broke that punt return against the Dolphins, but he also almost broke his catch for a long TD against the Steelers. We need players that can create plays like that.

The Chiefs won't be trotting out the awful secondary that Davis took advantage of in that game... They might have the best CB duo in the league and they're all coached extremely well. I think this will need to be another Kincaid/Shakir game, with a big helping of Allen's legs. And that would be true whether Davis was playing or not.

I haven't heard of any changes on anything I was told yesterday. Still just a minor tear in his meniscus which some players are able to play on but not all. It is normal for the Bills to rest injured players on Wednesday regardless of their game status.

I recognize that Davis is a better WR than Harty or Sherfield, but at the same time there are too many negative plays that occur on throws in his direction. Without him we lose some of our vertical passing but we also lose some of our worst tendencies as an offense. So on the whole I lean towards his absence being a good thing, not that I will ever celebrate a player being injured especially a Bills player.

Just got an update on Gabe - He has a grade 2 PCL tear. I was told he will not play this week. He may be able to tough it out for the AFCCG but even then he would not be 100%. @Einstein looks like you'll get your wish.

I think Taron being limited is a good sign... I think that means he is fairly far along in the concussion protocol.

I saw a stat that KC's defense ranks 5th in DVOA at home, but just 17th on the road. So there is definitely something to this.

Yes. Get Josh to the line ASAP and let him make his calls. We have homefield advantage for the first time ever against this version of the Chiefs. Use it well.

I think they just want a baseline. A punter/holder cannot be the reason you lose a game. Haack will almost certainly not be as good as Martin has been in recent weeks but we know what we're getting.

Allen, Brady, and Kromer need to have a plan ready for their blitzes. That is the key. For my money Spagnuolo calls the best blitz packages in the league. The first game against the Chiefs was by far the worst game of the season for the OL and I think primarily it was just an issue of getting the protection calls right. Chris Jones is elite but the rest of their DL is not so good that they should totally dominate us like they did last time... Everybody just needs to have a plan. Allen be ready to replace the blitz with the throw, pass catchers make sight adjustments, Brady have a few blitz killers in the bag, OL use homefield advantage to communicate pre-snap and be 100% ready. If our pass protection executes twice as well as it did last time I am confident we will win.

Sam Martin will likely not be available this weekend. Haack is probably the best option to get us through a game.

I don't know that Shakir can really be a high volume target machine. This season he has been excellent catching the ball and racking up YAC, both very important traits. But he is not a consistent down to down separator. I think his small size and more specifically his short arms will make it difficult for him to ever be a primary target. He is shifty but not truly elite in that area like Beasley was in his prime. And his measureables just naturally give him less ways to win against physical coverage... That being said his measurables also make him a slippery SOB and he has quickly learned to use that to his advantage with the ball in his hands. I am happy with him in his current role as an infrequently targeted pass catcher with an extremely high catch percentage and a knack for creating explosive plays. It should be Diggs, then Kincaid, then Shakir, and everyone else can fight over the remaining scraps. Ideally next year it's a 1st round (or splash free agent) WR sitting in the pecking order before Kincaid or Shakir.

Bernard? That's possible, my source wasn't sure, he was speculating high ankle based on what he'd head.

Matt Haack is the only option that comes to mind.

Couple updates: -Sam Martin has a grade 2 hamstring strain. He was shot up at halftime of the Steelers game just to be able to execute his punts in the 2nd half, but that is a temporary solution before the swelling sets in. Unlikely he will be available on Sunday. -Spector may have what's called a "transverse process fracture" in his back (someone more medically educated than me can maybe explain what this is) which is just a pain management issue.

Here's the update I got on a few of the injuries suffered yesterday: -Spector is totally fine, will have no issues. -Benford has a small tear in his meniscus but may be able to play through it. TBD -Bernard I got less clarity on. My source believes it is a high ankle sprain, but not 100% sure since they were still testing it as of when my source got the information. TBD on if he can definitely return this year or what the return time would look like but thankfully it appears he avoided a truly serious injury. I have no update on Taron Johnson, or the players that were out against the Steelers. I'll pass along any further updates if I receive them.

We will likely never face a worse Chiefs offense in the Mahomes era than the one we face next week. If we can't beat them now, we never will. This is a huge game for McDermott's future here IMO. I think a loss means he is definitively on the hot seat next year. If not now, when?

He has quickly become the most dependable player on the offense, and the only player that consistently gets YAC. The TD he scored today has been totally missing from the offense in the Josh Allen era. And I'd like to think he'll keep getting better.