Logic

This entire thread by Michael F Florio (who, I should note, is not the same person as ProFootballTalk's Mike Florio) is excellent. It's worth reading the entire thing, which is too long to post all of here.

Outstanding post. I have not seen it stated the way you did, and the comparison you made to "total football" is spot on. The crazy thing is that, while at first blush it may seem like exaggeration or hyperbole, an examination of the numbers themselves relative to the production of other historically great teams reveals that its not. The Bills may realistically finish the season without a 1,000 yard receiver and without a 1,000 yard rusher. Considering their historic offensive production, that is WILD! Great post. And here's hoping we somehow, some way get to keep Joe Brady beyond this season.

I hope you're right. What has me concerned is that the MVP voting panel is largely made up of media members and journalists. So if you're saying "the media" are the ones making this a talking point, well...lots of those doing the talking will also be doing the voting.

I'd love to agree with you, but I don't think I do. If Lamar Jackson, say, scores five touchdowns while making a couple spectacular runs, you can't tell me that that -- being the final impression left by either quarterback during this season -- won't sway some votes.

I'm pre-emptively annoyed at Lamar getting another chance to compile stats on a standalone game against a bad opponent, while Josh Allen sits in week 18, and then NFL analysts, talking heads, fans, and MVP voters not taking into consideration WHY it is that Josh is sitting and Lamar is still playing. Ugh.

Fair enough. The defense DID look much better. The offense also played a clean and mostly impressive game. I guess that, if I could further clarify my comments, it would be to say that this game looked like what Bills games have often looked like to me this season (thoug less so recently). They returned to the form they had shown throughout most of the year. Specifically: - The defense lets the opposing offense march down field a few times with relatively little resistance in the first half, but then stiffens up in the second half after learning what the opposing offense is trying to do, and mostly shuts them down from there on out. - The offense looks decent to good in the first half -- stagnating at times, but then re-committing to the running game and getting things going -- but then explodes in the second half and looks unstoppable. - The defense bails out some drives in which they allow the opposing offense to move the ball easily by coming up with a turnover in a big moment. I'll grant that the defense looked quite toothless against the Rams and Lions -- and even against the Pats at times -- so I could see where this apparent trend would be concerning. Taking into account the entirety of the season, though, I'd call those games the exceptions rather than the rules. In this game against the Jets, it felt like the Bills got back to who they have been for most of this season: The defense that gives up yards but takes the ball away, the offense that has a pretty good first half but a great second half, the running game, the Josh Allen rollout magician plays, etc. I suppose that's more so what I meant by the game feeling "ho hum" to me. The Bills team -- after a few concerning weeks -- showed us that they're still the team we were all so excited about for most of the season. But yes, to your point: That return to form was very welcome and much needed, and is a valid reason to feel encouraged this Monday morning.

I've been thinking way too much about the MVP race. I CARE way too much about the MVP race. I'm not one of those "I don't give a damn if Josh wins or not, it's all about the Lombardi" guys. I want to see Josh named MVP because he deserves it, because it would validate him undeniably as an all-time great, and because it would burnish his eventual case for the Hall of Fame. That said... Two things bother me (which have probably already been more clearly stated by others): 1. The criteria suddenly seems to have changed. For about a decade now, the MVP award has generally been given to the best performing quarterback from one of the top two seeds in either conference. Last year was a great example, with Lamar winning largely because the Ravens were the top seed. His statistics were very ordinary and certainly didn't scream "MVP". NOW all of the sudden, out of nowhere, people are disregarding this precedent and suggesting that the QB of the three-seeded team (with two more losses on its resume) should win solely because of superior statistics, when "superior statistics" hasn't been enough to overcome the "wins" criteria of previous years. Given the way in which the goalposts have been moved on Josh Allen again and again throughout his career, it is hard not to take this a little personally and to wonder if this same "shift" would be happening if it was any other player leading the MVP voting. 2. People consider raw statistics way too much without weighing the context that surrounds them. Specifically, Josh Allen has played 100 less snaps than Lamar Jackson. He's also going to sit next week while Lamar racks up more stats against a bad Browns team. I'm already pre-emptively annoyed at all of the "This seals MVP for Lamar!" stuff I'm gonna hear next week as Lamar plays and Josh sits. But WHY is Lamar playing while Josh sits? That should matter to the outcome of the MVP race. Further, the context of the players Josh Allen has surrounding him and the expectations this Bills team had (or didn't have), vs the players Lamar has surrounding him and the expectations his Ravens team had. That's it for me. Those are, as best I can sum them up, the two things that make me feel like Josh Allen deserves to win it over Lamar Jackson this year. If I look sheerly at their play this season and at the numbers themselves, there is no particularly valid argument that Lamar ISN'T a valid and deserving MVP candidate. But deciding, out of nowhere, to change the rules for deciding the award, to suddenly ignore context, surrounding talent, expectations, win totals, precedent, etc...It feels unfair, and it feels lazy and sloppy, and I don't like it. TL;DR: The sudden change in MVP criteria sucks. Josh for MVP.

It's weird, but watching the game yesterday, the win felt kind of "ho-hum" to me. Just sort of like "yeah. That's what we were supposed to do, onto next week". I can think of no better summation of this season and how talented this team is than the fact that a 40-14 thrashing of a division rival registers as "ho-hum" to me. What a Bills team this is.

MVP is voted prior to the playoffs.

And yet...he was out there catching touchdowns while six foot nine basketball legend Keon Coleman was sidelined with a thumb boo-boo. 💀💀💀

Can you imagine being a Jets fan the past couple years? Watching Tom Brady retire only to immediately be followed by Josh Allen. Gonna be about 35 straight years of an elite QB in your division, dominating you year in and year out. You draft what you think is the best QB in that 2018 draft in Sam Darnold, then watch him flame out. Then you draft Zach Wilson in the first and watch HIM flame out. Then you bring in Super Bowl winner and multi time MVP Aaron Rodgers to play QB?! All that fanfare, all of those prognostications of winning the division from the media, all those nationally televised games. Opening night on Monday Night Football, the building rocking, Rodgers running out on the field with the American flag. How pumped must they have been? "THIS IS OUR YEAR!". Four snaps later, it's over. But okay okay, we'll get 'em in 2024! And then Rodgers plays poorly, the head coach is fired six games in, reports of building-wide dysfunction are posted every other week, bad ownership, toxic culture, 41 year old egomaniac QB who doesn't seem to be worth the headaches he brings along with him... And now here they are a few days after Christmas, staring down the barrel of the longest active playoff drought in major American sports, with no certain future at GM, HC, or QB, and with Woody Johnson tapping THE 33RD TEAM, of all things, to head up his search for the new GM. Wow. Truly painful to think about.

Worthy is like the love child of Lee Evans, Roscoe Parrish, and an actual cheetah. Your post is gonna look real silly when he goes for 1,300 and 10 next season while also breaking the sound barrier on a week 4 sluggo route.

Go all out this weekend, beat the Jets, let Josh lock up his first MVP award. Rest key players in the final week of the season. Let Josh start the game and exit after a series to keep his consecutive starts streak in tact.

Everyone has already made some pretty good lists. Rather than be repetitive, I'll do the All Drought Era Bills: QB: Ryan Fitzpatrick RB: Fred Jackson, Travis Henry FB: Sam Gash WR: Stevie Johnson, Lee Evans TE: Scott Chandler OT: Jason Peters, Cordy Glenn G: Ruben Brown, Andy Levitre C : Eric Wood DE: Aaron Schobel, Mario Williams DT - Pat Williams, Kyle Williams OLB: Takeo Spikes MLB: London Fletcher CB: Antoine Winfield, Nate Clements FS: Jairus Byrd SS: Lawyer Milloy P: Brian Moorman K: Rian Lindell KR: Terrence McGee PR: Roscoe Parrish Head Coach: No

I mean that's certainly what I suspect, too... But do you know FOR SURE that it's a schtick? Has he admitted it or dropped the facade anywhere at any point?

The one I'm really curious about is the Packers fan that used to come around here. He was overly "aw shucks" and Wisconsin Nice. So much so that I truly couldn't tell if he was putting on an act or if that's just who he was as a person. He also mostly wasn't here during Bills-Packers weeks, but just randomly here in general. Would pop in to say nice things about the Bills, and then disappear again. Was it schtick? We may never know.

All time favorite. Perfectly captures the bittersweet nostalgic longing for the Christmases of my childhood. Beautiful song.

My Pats hatred actually DID need to be rekindled. Thanks for this! Really gonna add to my enjoyment of beating these guys twice in three weeks.

To answer the "what year to buy" question: This year's version is of course the only version that's going to have up-to-date rosters. And even then, they'll only be TRULY up-to-date if you download roster updates online, which would require an online subscription. If you don't care about having current rosters and don't plan to play online, then you can save yourself a whole bunch of money by buying an older version. A quick Amazon search reveals that Madden 24 (which has Josh Allen on the cover) goes for $29.99, while Madden 23 can be had for under $10. For the purposes you're describing, any of the last few years' versions should do the trick, so it's just a question of how much you want to spend and whether you care about updated rosters.

I went over to JetNation forums expecting to see outrage and calls for Woody to sell the team. While there's certainly some of that, I'm surprised by how many people there were doubting the article, casting aspersions on Diani Russini and Mike Silver, and in some case saying it seemed outright made up. I understand that when so much of your identity is wrapped up in a team, it can be hard to accept such a huge death knell for its success: That you have awful ownership and team culture. So the most logical defense mechanism is to just say it's all lies and fake news and go on thinking you're a year away from success. All I can say is that where there is smoke, there is usually fire. The articles about the Bills being a toxic dumpster fire and having awful culture that proliferated prior to McBeane wound up being right on the money. Admitting it, rooting it out, and rebuilding from scratch was the only antidote. Maybe Bills fans were just as quick to dismiss those articles when they came out as Jets fans are to dismiss this one now. The general thrust of the Russini article rings true to me, though, even if all of the specific details are not 100% accurate.

I respectfully disagree. I think the quote is right on the money. That doesn't mean that Joe Douglas or Robert Saleh or any of their other "football people" over the years should be absolved of any mistakes they made in team building. But the buck 100% stops with Woody Johnson. He IS a meddlesome, impulsive owner. I will repeat over and over again the idea that Marv Levy espoused in his autobiography: In order to be a consistently winning franchise in the NFL, you have to be good from the top down. And "the top" means ownership. If you have bad ownership -- whether meddlesome, impulsive, cheap, impatient, whatever -- you're never going to consistently field a good franchise in this league. The Jets have an ownership problem. The quote seems right on the money.

I do agree that sometimes there are quarterbacks that seem to lack a certain "it factor". Kirk Cousins is the best example. If you look at purely his statistical production in the prime of his career, it's very good, even elite at times. And yet, his teams rarely made much noise outside the regular season, and almost no one was looking at Kirk Cousins and saying "boy am I scared to play THAT guy". Buy why? Why is that? I don't really have an answer. There was just...SOMETHING...that was missing. I don't know what. It was like empty statistical production. Is it heart? Will? Grit? The invisible, intangible, oft cited but impossible to define "it factor"? I don't know. I'm not sure I'm ready to put Herbert in that category just yet, but I see where you're coming from. I'd like to see what he looks like in year two of a Jim Harbaugh offense, after they add some legitimate receiving weapons for him. He's a really talented guy. Does he have the "win or die trying" gene like Allen and Mahomes? Not sure yet. Jury's still out.

Players from losing teams almost never get offensive player of the week awards. It's the same principle as MVP voting.

The Eagles, Steelers, and Chargers aren't so bad as to make me discount that level of defensive improvement. I'll grant you the Giants, but the rest are viable NFL offenses.

For those saying the Ravens defense stinks. Well...it DID stink. It's been getting A LOT better lately: