HappyDays

You're the worse team and the one making all the mistakes...

I'll state the obvious - Allen has earned the benefit of the doubt. He has taken plenty of decent or better pass catchers over his career and made them productive and efficient. So when the occasional Gabe Davis comes along and every pass in his direction is an adventure I tend to lay the blame on the pass catcher, which is why I was completely unsurprised by Davis being a disappointment in Jacksonville. That isn't to say Allen is perfect and never to blame on any throw. But when you're talking about season-long percentages, you can't just excuse certain trends away as random variance. There is usually a reason behind the data. There is no intuitive reason why Kincaid should have a significantly lower catch % than Knox and his significantly higher ADOT. If you want to ascribe that to Allen just randomly being less accurate when throwing to Kincaid, that's your opinion. Mine is that Knox has done better than Kincaid at being exactly where Allen expects him to be. Maybe it's just chemistry. All I know is Kincaid's catch percentage needs to be better and that falls on him more than anybody.

Not a good sign when you're having to convert multiple 4th downs including a fake punt just to remain somewhat in the game. That is what Denver had to do to us and I suspect the final score of this one will look similar.

This is quickly turning into a "thanks for showing up" game for Washington. Philly has way too much talent to deal with for a team that was just drafting #2 overall.

Haha just ridiculous

They have an unreliable kicker. Converting the first 4th and 5 was probably more likely than converting whatever distance that FG would have been. A 34 yard attempt changes the analytics.

He's become the Isaiah McKenzie of the locker room except he actually takes his job seriously too.

What impresses me about Daniels is he seems unflappable.

Yeah so the hope is that the speed and physicality of the NFL has been too much for such an inexperienced player, and that once he acclimates all of those gifts that made him such a good prospect will show up again. I'm not writing him off yet. But next year is big.

He's a latecomer to the position. Only one season of high school football and one year of being a division 1 starter. So there could theoretically be a high ceiling still there to be realized. It just really frustrates me because he was my draft crush last year specifically for his cerebral traits. At Utah he seemed to have a great feel for making himself available to his QB. I had visions of him being our version of Kelce, using his instincts to find space and then his physical traits to create plays after the catch. I didn't see him as a long term developmental player, I thought despite being a relative latecomer he had day one traits. So I've somewhat lost faith that he'll ever be that guy. Some players have a natural feel for the position that can't be taught. The player I saw at Utah had that feel... I don't know what went wrong.

So the weird thing is that Knox's ADOT is 8.8, Kincaid's ADOT is 7.5, yet their catch percentages are 66.7% and 58.7% respectively. You would expect the opposite correlation. But Allen doesn't seem to have any trouble delivering the ball downfield when Knox is the target. This tells me Kincaid too frequently is not where Allen expects him to be. And I don't think it's a coincidence that Brady has mostly relegated Kincaid to quick short passes. The biggest gap between Kincaid and Kelce is not physical, it's mental. I want him to spend this entire offseason just watching film and hopefully that will help develop some instincts for finding windows and creating leverage. That skill is what makes Kelce the GOAT.

I have a different take on this play. First play on this clip: I think Kincaid needs to flatten this route. Allen throws the ball after Kincaid makes his cut and is seemingly going to finish his route on the 39. Instead he drifts upfield and ends at the 41. This makes it impossible for Allen to know where he's going. If you watch it in slow motion you can see him appear to be flattening his route but suddenly he starts drifting upfield as soon as the ball leaves Allen's hands. This creates an awkward catch attempt where he slips trying to come back to where the ball was delivered. Not an awful throw, not an awful drop. Bad leverage caused by a lack of attention to detail. This is what I've seen from Kincaid too frequently this year and it's a big reason why he has a low catch percentage.

I'm really not though. Kelce is/was a #1. Kupp was a #1. I'm not saying it has to be a full time outside WR. I'm saying it has to be a player that is worthy of getting majority target share in any offense. Shakir isn't that. Great complementary player though.

The OP said he's a "legit #1 WR." That isn't close to true. We don't have a legit #1 WR. I once said you need one to win a Super Bowl. We're two wins away from proving me wrong.

Come on man. Shakir would be the #1 WR for maybe one offense in the entire league, the Patriots.

This is from Joe Buscaglia's review of the Ravens game:. More man coverage this week, please. Elite QBs tear up our zone defense annually in the playoffs. KC's receivers are pretty average overall. Don't be afraid to man them up and don't be afraid to blitz Mahomes. The book on stopping their offense has changed.

Bills 24 Chiefs 23 This game will flip the script of our previous playoff matchups and become a defensive struggle. Chiefs kick a FG to get within 1 point and kick off with 5 minutes remaining. We then methodically run out the clock with a few clutch plays from Allen and finally slay the dragon.

Censor? I hardly know her

See I never bought the mismatch thing. Everyone just looked at the stats of their run offense compared to our run defense and surmised there was an insurmountable gap there. Me, I believe run defense is about WILL from the players and INTENT from the coaches. I'm now fully convinced that Oliver and DQ were dogging it a bit early in the season, saving themselves for more important games. Their will showed up in this one. You saw it on tape and Henry's stat line proves it. I'm also convinced the coaching staff had the wrong game plan in week 4 - against Baltimore you have to shut down the run first and live with their production through the air. Otherwise you're on your heels the whole game. In this game the intent of the coaching staff was made clear on the very first play - 4-3 base defense and Henry was stuffed for a 1 yard gain. There was never a mismatch. The players and coaches just didn't have the right formula in week 4. Thankfully they corrected it when it mattered.

This really was the most Chiefs like win of the season for us. The more I think about it, it's uncanny. Chiefs always let their opponent make a game of it. They never put their opponent away early. Their opponent might outplay them but their opponent makes big mistakes and they don't. The end of the game in particular was as Chiefs as it gets. 4th and 2 from the goal line with a chance to go up by 8, the Chiefs would kick that FG every time and put all the pressure on their opponent to execute and go win the game. Because they know their opponent very likely can't hold up under the pressure, and if they can then Mahomes will just drive down for a game winning FG. They leave themselves multiple avenues for victory and trust that one of them will come through. This game was frustrating but also maybe the most impressive win of the McDermott era because it showed a championship ability that I've never seen from this team before. We beat Baltimore exactly like KC did in week 1, except this time the would-be game tying drive was quashed by a finger rather than a toe.

They drafted Hayden Hurst a few picks BEFORE they took Lamar Jackson. Any stories they've told after the fact to indicate that they were all in on him are not true. They decided a TE prospect was worth the risk of losing out on him entirely. The truth is nobody, including Baltimore, properly valued him.

FWIW so is WR production. In 2022 the top 10 WRs averaged 1,422 yards. In 2023 it was 1,451. This year it was 1,296. Passing production in general has gone down, as has scoring. Defenses have caught up to the high flying big play offenses, so offenses have responded by becoming more about ball control which is reducing the overall number of plays run. Keeping this discussion point on topic, a player like Kincaid should theoretically thrive in the new style. He was drafted to be a ball control type of player. Instead he's low efficiency and low production.

Yeah Ryan Van Demark did a steady job in that game but it's no coincidence we had our worst rushing efficiency of the season against KC. We just imposed our will against the two best run defenses in the league. I don't expect us to let up this weekend.