HappyDays

I think Ridley lost track of the ball there

Jags wasted TO earlier is looming large... Pederson has badly mismanaged this game.

Steelers have had excellent turnover luck in this game. Typical. Still waiting for the first Josh Allen dropped INT of the year.

Word for word this could describe Mahomes and the Chiefs this year. But the narrative around the two QBs is for some reason entirely different. Mahomes and Allen are obviously not perfect this year, but they are the only reason their passing offenses are performing at a top 10 level over the course of the season. Them putting on their Superman cape from time to time is in fact the difference. Average OL play and a below average group of pass catchers is not conducive to elite passing offense, I don't care who your QB is. I'm surprised after the year Mahomes has had that this debate hasn't been closed once and for all. I think if Allen had the exact game that Mahomes had against us in week 14, there would be a lot of people on here saying that we would have won that game if Allen had played better. They would have pointed to the handful of missed throws Mahomes had and said "if your defense holds a top offense to 20 points, your QB has to find a way to get the win." But Bills fans don't watch other QBs with the same critical eye that they watch Allen. Every missed pass or bad read is treated like the end of the world on here, rather than the regular occurrence that it is for every single QB in every single game. I still see people blame Allen for the Eagles loss which is straight up unbelievable. I see people say things like "if Allen doesn't play like he did against the Dolphins this year (with his 158.3 pass rating), the Bills can't beat good teams" - and they say this is as a criticism of Allen. I see people say that if Allen doesn't play perfect for four straight games we have no chance at a Super Bowl, even though that has never been the case for any other Super Bowl winning QB. So the expectations for QB play have gotten obscenely out of control on here. Every time I watch any other great QB play a game I see plenty of missed passes or jitteriness in the pocket. It is in fact completely normal. Allen misses 4 passes instead of 2 in a game and all of a sudden he doesn't care about his mechanics anymore, he's gone Hollywood, etc. It can't just be the normal ups and downs of a QB's season. It has to be the end of the world. Also Gunner to your point on Cincy - I think talking about total investments made is a bit of a red herring. What matters is what's on the field. Cincy prioritized defense in the draft after giving Burrow an elite WR tandem. The Bills on the contrary have prioritized defensive line above all else every single year that McDermott has been here. They missed several opportunities to acquire top WR talent in the draft over the years. They failed to do what was necessary to pay for Hopkins this past offseason. At the end of the day the weapons they've surrounded Allen with this year have not been good enough, arguably worse even than what we had last year because Diggs is not performing like the true #1 he was last year. That's why our passing offense is where it is right now.

This shows that Allen is the best QB in the NFL against what PFF defines as perfect coverage.

He's sprinting away from two pass rushers with another LB bearing down on him... He isn't scanning the field at that point. I know Allen has done superhuman things but let's be fair about what he is physically doing on this play and not act like we're playing Madden. Diggs immediately goes into scramble drill mode and takes his route deep. Allen locks onto him because he's running out of time... The truth is a true alpha #1 WR turns that throw either into a crazy catch or a DPI and nothing in between. But Diggs hasn't been that guy lately. The throw highlighted in that picture was effectively a throw away. Diggs ran a post corner but was unable to separate and finish his route against 1v1 coverage so Allen just threw it over him to avoid a sack. At no point was that pass coming close to being a completion. If you watch that play on the all-22, the play to make was Shakir replacing the blitz on a quick slant from the right slot. I don't know Allen's reads on this play. If he is supposed to lock onto Diggs in 1v1 man coverage no matter what then the play failing is on Diggs for failing to separate. If Allen is supposed to replace the blitz with the throw then it's on him for not reading the blitz pre-snap and getting his eyes over to Shakir.

Hopefully someone takes him before our pick and takes the temptation away from McDermott and Beane. I remember feeling anxious as Christian Gonzalez slid last year and let out a sigh of relief when the Pats took him. It forced us to make a pick that clearly helped the team more now and in the future.

Fair to say that luck is involved in winning a Super Bowl. But with better coaching and/or roster management we would have at least come close to a Super Bowl win in three years of elite QB play. One blowout loss in the AFCCG is not close. I will consider the floor of success this year to be a close loss in the AFCCG without a dumb coaching error at the end that causes the loss. Getting to that point just once in four years is not a matter of luck.

Dude that's crazy. If you remove all the plays Mahomes made with his right arm he's the worst player in NFL history.

Tough game to predict because the dynamics will depend on the Steelers and Jaguars. I'm going to predict the score as if it's win and in, lose and snooze, for us... Bills 34 Dolphins 20 Assuming we need this win to get in the playoffs I just see us playing at our absolute best. The Dolphins don't really need this game. I think they will be cautious with their injured players, especially after losing Chubb for the season in garbage time against the Ravens. One team shows up needing the win, the other team shows up licking their wounds and already assured to limp into the playoffs no matter what. I know which team I'm betting on... 20 points is basically where the Dolphins offense has maxed out against good teams this year so that score feels right. As for the Bills, Allen simply has the Dolphins number. I'm not going to predict a total bloodbath like the last time we faced them because our passing offense still is not entirely trustworthy but I think we'll move the ball and put up points. Bold prediction: Bernard scores on a scoop and score off of a Tua fumble to seal the win in the 4th quarter.

Interesting you say that because in my all-22 watch of the offense Kincaid was a big part of the gameplan. In fact I would call this game his true breakout game even though the numbers don't really show it. He did a little bit of everything. He ran with proper leverage to draw coverage away when called for. He ran a couple quick stop routes for 1st downs. He made himself available to Allen on a scramble drill in a critical 2nd and long situation from inside our own 10. He was seemingly the primary target on 3 deep passes (one completed, one was the INT where he had two steps on his defender, one the protection broke down before Allen could get a pass off but he was the wide the hell open downfield). It's really impressive tape and I think it was Brady's first concerted effort to get him involved downfield. More of that to come, I am sure of it.

This makes it all the more frustrating that until Kincaid we hadn't drafted a single pass catcher on day one or two under this regime. The first pass catcher with high level traits that we've drafted and he immediately breaks a franchise record. Please Brandon, keep drafting pass catchers early. Unless they're a complete bust they will immediately produce with Josh Allen throwing them the ball.

I'll admit I'm worried that Diggs' problem right now is mental, not physical. I fear that he has lost a bit of his edge, and any backslide in that department creates a big difference on the field. He has expended a lot of emotional energy over the years to no avail and I wonder if he is now feeling a bit checked out and hollow. Maybe he is banged up a little. But there is also something just plain missing from his play and his demeanor on the field lately... He is making an effort but he isn't playing with his hair on fire like I'm used to seeing. He looks nonchalant when passes in his direction are off target. He has been unwilling to try and disrupt interceptions like the one against the Chargers. He stayed on the sidelines for the entire first drive of the 2nd half but didn't appear to have any physical issues on the field. He and Allen clearly do not have the same relationship they had in 2020 and 2021, there is tension there. I don't know. Something is up and I'm not convinced it is just because of injury.

To win a Super Bowl, a QB eventually has to be able to make something happen even when other things around him are not working. It's bound to happen somewhere along the way in the playoffs. I've never once seen that ability from Tua. He could probably win a Super Bowl on the 49ers but that's a once in a generation superstar offense. Lately Tua has had trouble putting up more than 20 points despite having Tyreek Hill, Jaylen Waddle, and a very strong RB duo. It isn't gonna get any better than that. He's also shown to be a fragile player. I think they will pay him because they'll feel like they have no choice but IMO Tua is the definition of QB purgatory.

Ideally they would do both. We can't rely on a 1st round caliber WR to even make it to our pick given the importance of the position. Even if we get one, we can't rely on one picked in the 20s to have a major role next year. People expected Kincaid to have a major role this year and instead he has just been a solid role player. And we NEED a WR capable of having a major role next year. It's not optional. Unfortunately Beane has backed himself into a corner. Hopkins was the play because he was an immediate improvement that would have been affordable if we had made an effort. Now we have less cap flexibility and we're coming up on an offseason where guys like Pittman and Higgins are going to get massive contracts. Looking at the FA list I don't expect there to be a good middle class of WRs. There's the $15M+ WRs, and there's the Sherfield/Harty level "upside" projects. This offseason's version of Hopkins would probably be Mike Evans but I expect him to re-sign in TB. I don't know what the solution is. OBJ? Hollywood Brown? I just know I don't want to go into the draft with the same gaping hole at outside WR that we had entering last year's draft. If Beane really wanted to go nuts he could cut Hyde, Poyer, White, and Von and use the resulting cap space to make a real splash signing like Pittman. But that's not his M.O.

Joe spends the first 15 minutes or so of his all-22 review breaking down the offense. It's a good listen. He came away more encouraged than he felt after the live viewing. Specifically he felt a lot more encouraged about Allen's performance. He charted 16 failed drop backs out of 34 total. He assigned blame to Allen for 4 of them (3 misfires, 1 poor decision), the OL for 5 of them, and the pass catchers for 7 of them. Like me he felt that Allen's interception was more on Sherfield and that Allen read the play correctly. It's probably too late to fix the offense unfortunately. Our WRs are not suddenly going to improve. Maybe Torrence can play better but I think it's past the point in his rookie season where he's suddenly going to learn how to win against an inside move. One encouraging thing is almost of all the negative drop backs came in the 1st half, really just the 1st quarter. So it was more a slow start than an all around awful performance. Joe thought that Brady did a great job coordinating the offense and giving plenty of opportunities for plays to be made, the players just didn't execute frequently enough.

@Maine-iac finally found someone that posted the video: It is just bad timing that Austin spins away from the post at the exact moment Allen is throwing the pass. Watch Sherfield's route. He lazily rounds it out and slows down right after his break. Terrible.

This made me realize something that I had felt but wasn't consciously thinking about. Every week over the past month or so the defense is playing with its hair on fire. They might not always perform great but they are rallying to the ball, celebrating after big plays, and just generally look they are playing like their lives are on the line week after week. When they let the opposing offense make a play they don't let it shake them, they're just on to the next play. Everybody looks like they know what their teammates around them are doing and have enough trust in their teammates to simply execute their role on the play. The offense in contrast always looks a bit lethargic to me. It looks like a group of co-workers that have a pleasant enough relationship but aren't going to war for each other. When they have a bad play it often snowballs into a string of bad plays. The players openly show frustration on the field. There is often times a complete lack of cohesion. Allen and his pass catchers aren't always on the same page. The OL miscommunicates and allows free rushers. I think there is really something to this.

Flat out incorrect. I've watched the all-22 and there was only one play where Allen failed to make the right read to an open receiver. Not one play failed because he didn't throw the ball to a check down. Several plays featured immediate losses off the line from McGovern or Torrence and there was nothing he could do.

You'll have to take my word for it, CJ doesn't make stuff up. He is reporting something he was told by an inside source. FWIW Kyle Trimble of Banged Up Bills retweeted it so he also believes the report is reputable.

It has been theorized by many that Allen has been struggling with some kind of shoulder injury this season. Apparent confirmation here: FWIW CJ Caggiano is a reputable insider, I've followed him for a while. Every year he has schedule leaks that turn out to be correct, and he has given a couple injury updates that turned out to be correct as well. Take the info how you will, but if true it could possibly explain some of the recent mechanical issues Allen has had on some of his throws.

https://www.spotrac.com/nfl/buffalo-bills/von-miller-7717/ Spotrac shows a post June 1 designation release saves us $6.8m against the cap next year, the cap hit going from $23.8m to $17m. Then in 2025 a dead cap hit of $15.4m. I'd like to think after a full offseason Von will be recovered from his ACL, but he'll be 35 in March so we have to accept that it's possible he will never be the same player again. Tough decision. I think the ideal scenario is get him to agree to a pay cut under threat of release and give him a shot to prove himself next year.

I wonder if they would consider approaching Von about a pay cut? Given his play this year, his age, and his recent legal troubles, he does not have a lot of leverage in that scenario. If he doesn't want to take the pay cut let him go.

Yes you still need talent on defense of course. But that team's Super Bowl aspirations are built on their four headed monster at the skill positions.