Ayjent

I hear you loud and clear: QBs - Allen, Peterman, Anderson, Barkley (All McD & Beane) WRs - Benjamin, Jones, Holmes, Pryor, etc. (All McD & Beane) TEs - Clay (holdover), Croom (McD & Beane) RBs - McCoy (holdover), Ivory, Murphy, DiMarco (McD & Beane) OL - Mills, Groy, & Miller (holdovers), Dawkins, Bodine, Ducasse, Teller (McD & Beane) Guys that they let walk or Traded: QBs - Taylor WRs - Woods, Watkins, Goodwin TEs - O'Leary RBs - Gillislee OL - Glenn I'm not so mad about letting guys go, really, but you've got to have a good plan to replace those guys or identify guys that can do things to make your offense as effective. Woods is the one that hurts the most - a willing blocker, a good route runner, solid hands, and leader So they churned the hell out of the Offense and have have one bonafide legitimate starter for building the future (Dawkins). They have a huge question mark at QB that they better hope to hell turns out to be awesome. The 2nd round WR is underwhelming and may be an NFL talent, but is one that can be easily replaced by a street FA or journeyman FA. Defense has been decent job, but good luck with that offense.

I'm no fan of these guys other than McD's ability to get some overachieving results at times. Even then there are more stinkers than shockers....ummm...(insert the butt end of the joke here). However, I really think that they do get until next year and it makes sense to wait to see how they unfold their plan and if for no other reason, to see if Josh Allen is showing marked improvement. However, this has been really ugly and I think exploded in their faces way more than they let on and many people are rationalizing this as part of the plan. Keep telling yourself that, but they thought they were going to be somewhat better than last year and that Peterman would bring them some value if he could show out to be as capable of a QB as Taylor (parlaying it into another trade or valuable back up). They thought Zay would show improvement and that Benjamin would be healthy - a good 1 and 2 WR, and they thought they were set at RB and TE. They knew the OL would be a bit of an issue, but something that they could overcome. This is why they should be in more trouble than a lot of people think. Yes the cap situation and draft picks are going to be there to try to address issues, but if they fail to hit at a high percentage in the offseason - they are done midseason and don't make it out of the third year. Problem is that they may have created the same problem they just dug themselves out of, because I'm sensing that next year may change plans to a success or bust plan and not a building for the long term plan. Frankly, I've seen no sign that they know what they are doing on the Offensive side of the ball either in picking up personnel or playing to the strengths of their personnel. The best play they get out of Allen is when they use him as a RB frequently and that is just not sustainable nor anything different than the guy they just got rid of in the offseason.

All very good points. I think point 7 is really the biggest problem with the handling, regardless of McCarron trade. None of the 3 they had in camp were ideal day 1 starters with their experience and the talent surrounding them. There was a ton of overconfidence in their own abilities on display by the staff and FO to think what they put together would have even the slightest chance to be good. They are playing the rebuilding card now, but who makes the playoffs the year prior with the plan to start rebuilding afterwards focusing on the D when you have a hell of a time paying a good D to stay together and have no O to provide any compliment? Demolition of a roster is the easy part, let’s see how good they are. Every misstep will be magnified given how much they tore it down.

So what part of the organization is responsible for that and how do you fix it? Because it seems that this rationalization is generally shifting the blame from one obvious circumstance (failure to draft a good player at QB that is having success elsewhere) to another mysterious one (unstated failure of this organization to be stable for any young QB).

I think it is really fair to question whether they may have lost some vets because today looked like a team disinterested and disheartened when down 14-3, especially on D. The vets see what we see - a team that was ill prepared at the most important position. They, like many of us had hope in Allen and when he goes down and it becomes clear you are playing with Peterman or an older journeyman that hasn’t played in over a year. They were in late season, out of playoff contention form. We’ll see if they rebound next week and I assume they’ll give a better effort for a divisional home game, but if they don’t you could see things get weird and ugly over the next few weeks and all bets are off for McBean if players start openly questioning the process. That will make all of that cap space even more useless than it will already be (filling your team with high priced free agents was the mess they inherited right? So let’s do it again with guys not as good at evaluating pro personnel).

If you watched EJ in college he wasn't really anything to get excited about and was not a project - he was well coached, played many college games, and was exactly who he was in college - a guy that was wildly inconsistent with many different things that could drive a coach crazy (e.g., footwork, accuracy, not keeping his eyes down the field/not seeing things fast enough) but had been addressed year after year. He wasn't raw - he just wasn't very good. That's why he really never got better with experience - he was as ready as he was going to be when they started him. It was no surprise to me that people would get excited about his promise in a couple of games and then he would never deliver with consistency. It was a bad pick and bad scouting - they had so many opportunities in the drafts before and after to address the position with better prospects, and failed to. To me that is the Nix/Whaley legacy - they got talent on the team, but had no idea what they were doing with the QB position. This regime looks like they are about equal in QB talent evaluation, but early results suggest that they may even be worse, although they are certainly more focused on the position. Nix/Whaley loved drafting WRs, but none really materialized into top shelf talent. Now I think Allen is a rawer prospect than EJ, but he is also in a much worse situation with the lack of talent around him. But I also think this "raw" title is only appropriate for guys who haven't been playing QB for long or came from systems that were drastically different than pro Offenses - I don't think either really apply to Allen, and he has really not shown many flashes at all of putting things together. He is having a tough time making simple reads and throws, and his pocket presence leaves something to be desired. Not saying he can't improve, but he has a long way to go and the odds aren't exactly in his favor.

The premise is the same - he was available as a FA when the Bills were shopping for a QB and knew that they would be moving on from Tyrod. Bridgewater was a way more promising option than McCarron , because the biggest issue with Bridgewater was his injury not his play. You take the more talented option with more experience, even if the injury concern is there - where money is about equal. I'm really surprised that he was so cheap to begin with, and it would have been a perfect situation for both the Bills and Bridgewater because the Bills were getting rid of their starter and wanted to draft a franchise QB and keep Peterman, who would both not have enough experience to warrant them as the only QBs on the roster. McCarron was not a good option, and I never understood anyone getting excited about that signing - not really much in-game experience and not much to talk about when he did play. Maybe the Bills had their sights on Anderson for a long time, but this love affair with former Carolina personnel is a little overboard. They need to be able to assess pro personnel better than just relying who they knew from Carolina - that well will dry up and it's not like it's that great to begin with.

He was a free agent this summer, the Bills decided on McCarron rather than Bridgewater and the contracts weren't that different.

I thinks it’s a combination of the talent and coaching. I think they are substandard in both on Offense and pretty good in places with talent and have average coaching that can be pretty good at times on D. This is the standard issue uneven team that has plagued the Bills for years, they rarely have both units at a caliber that compliments consistent winning. I think the Bills were more talented last year and I don’t think Daboll is worse than Dennison, but their OL coach has not changed and neither have the results up front, they’ve gotten worse because of talent (talent this regime has had two years to address). So the coaching does matter, but these are run of the mill coaches that have their scheme and don’t coach to their personnel’s strengths. That is the hallmark of good coaching.

Shaw, Good post. What I'm most curious about is what the GM and Coaching staff realistically thought that they would be able to do with the personnel they had and through the decisions they made. I've heard people give their opinions on this board and take statements and come up with between the lines reasoning, e.g., they know they are rebuilding, they didn't expect to improve this year and are taking their medicine. While I don't know if that is the case this year, I do know that Beane and McDermott expressly addressed that stuff last year by telling us their larger plan, stay competitive while remaking the team. I wasn't a big fan of the moves they made last year before the season, but the results were way better than most of us expected. I honestly think they thought they were going to improve more this year, building off of last years success while churning the roster more to their liking. I think they underestimated the value of the QB position and the talent level they had at that position. The guys they chose to go forward with this year proves that. The same can be said of the WR and OL. I think they saw a stable situation for a young pair of QBs coming off of a playoff appearance and thought that they wouldn't be any worse than last year. I look at it this way, do you really ever want to get worse from one year to the next? Especially in year 2 of your tenure? You usually want an upward or even trend not a downward one. I don't know if we'll ever truly know what they expected, but I'm guessing the Pegulas do.

Free Agent signings from other teams usually mean you are getting the guys that the former team didn't think was worth the money of keeping around. Not always but a good percentage of the time. Moreover, in terms of spending money wisely, Free Agents are the worst bang for the buck and a significant part of the mess Beane/McDermott inherited with the cap. If you think they are going to avoid some of the same issues with potential dead cap issues, then you should set your expectations that they aren't going to be signing the best of bunch of FAs. Coveted guys want big guaranteed money. So the cap thing to me is really a bit of a red herring - it helps you have flexibility to spend money, but its not like the issues they just found their way out from under will be avoidable, it will just be their personnel and cap decisions that they are saddled with and not someone else's. The better way to spend money is to keep the young talent you drafted and covet, not much to worry about for at least a couple of years there, unless you think Benjamin is a keeper. They need to stock up in the draft and I really didn't understand the plan this year - draft your QB, but neglect the Offense around him, especially a failure to make sure you have a stable, proven option at QB (they still have that opportunity but have been curiously silent in trying to shore that up).

The other guy is much worse and I don't think there is anything to debate there. Honestly, they could find another guy that currently unsigned or on a practice squad to be a better No. 2 option in case Allen is struggling too much or gets injured. No one should want to see Peterman taking regular season snaps in a meaningful game. I don't think that they will pull the plug on Allen if he is struggling, because that isn't exactly a confidence builder. I see some traits that I'm not sure are that easy to coach out of some one. The main thing that bothers me about Allen is his pocket presence, including how long he holds the ball. His pocket presence is skittish and I've yet to see a QB prospect go from skittish to smooth in the pocket - the only guy that looked somewhat skittish and made good that I can think of is Rodgers, but he was nowhere near Allen's level of skittishness). That is really a natural feel thing because it is an instictive trait on what to do when danger arises to a large degree - sure you can work on getting the ball out with rhythm and getting better at reading defenses to overcome it, but defenses will sometimes confuse and then that's when these traits show up again. I was a little disappointed in the way he was so flustered and struggled to bounce back from what happened earlier, he didn't show much composure in forgetting the past and doing the best he could from that point on. However, the entire Offense looked that way so I won't put that all on Allen, but he does get the most touches on the ball and the offensive action goes through him so he has the biggest impact on the Offense.

Beat me to it. Same thought.

I don't blame him for retiring or his reason's for doing so, but this is a ton of rationalization for a really ill-timed, poorly executed retirement. Why he retired is perfectly fine. The how is the problem. Finish the game out, tell coach you need to play the other guy and say I'm here if you need me until the game is over. Then after the game approach the team with some respect and let them know your decision and sorry for letting them down and taking a roster spot from someone who could have been committed to the team the entire year. It's not a regular job, and people make a lot of money doing it, but it is also a job that requires everybody looking out for each other for health and success. That's why its a big deal and why his teammates and coaches have every right to be pissed at how, not why.

The deep ball takes time and the OL isn't good enough to consistently give him time. Allen can sometimes make time with his mobility and sometimes runs right into pressure. As far as receivers go, the best route runner they have is supposed to be Zay Jones - but from what I've seen I don't see a creative receiver when it comes to moves to get open. The scheme may be bad, but I don't get the all 22 to really see the way the plays develop beyond the limited TV angles. I know receivers always have the advantage of knowing where they are going and some of the craftiest receivers set defenders up by doing something a couple of times to get the defender to anticipate and completely undress them, but those are great one on one players. Play design is more dependable, but again it requires the players being on the same page and the protection holding up. I think those things as of right now are not even close to as consistent as they need to be and you can point to the players at every position for that, not just one. Zay Jones was supposed to be - a reliable receiver that could run all types of routes, make catches with coverage, and have great hands. I haven't seen much of those attributes, but it would be good to. The negatives on him were that he didn't do well with tight coverage off the line and he didn't get a lot of YAC. I think a little chemistry between them would be ideal and could really change the trajectory of Jones' career and help the development of the team. As bad as they made the roster, these are the coaching and player development things that can right a wrong to some degree - that's what I'm looking for as the season goes along. Allen needs to have the chemistry built somewhere otherwise it's going to be a tougher year than it should be. I think he's trying to target Benjamin, but I just don't think Benjamin plays as well as he is capable of - I don't know if that is effort, conditioning, or belief that this team is crap and he isn't going to waste an injury on it - whatever it is, it would be nice to see him step up. We saw him come out against Carolina and dominate because he wanted it pretty bad - that's the type of attitude he's got to bring to every play and every game

Go ahead and watch the game again, if you can stand to. When you do you will most likely have a much different opinion than PFF and Joe B. Does Allen have something to do with the sacks? Absolutely, but not all of them and early on the OL looked terrible. The fact that they played better after getting their doors blown off early probably helps even out the grading. But first half - the OL looked just as bad as advertised.

A guy who had just over 50 pass attempts in college and looked like a College journeyman back up QB. Perfect!!! Beane: "We'll show you Bills fans that we can in fact do worse than Peterman." Why not just put Logan Thomas back at QB and forget working out a guy that couldn't even start in college for Western Kentucky.

I have to say that those short quick passes were bread and butter for Gailey with Fitz, and he and Stevie had good chemistry. Fitz was a limited down the field passer when he was here in Gailey's offense so teams played tight and made Fitz try to beat them down the field. However, challenging Allen to beat you deep may be a bad idea. It would be a good idea to implement some of that quick passing into the Offense, butI'm not sure the Bills have anyone that is a good or even average route runner at the WR position. Benjamin has shown he isn't going to fight for 50/50 passes, and he isn't going to get much separation either (not that it was his MO before he got here) so he is not really a dependable option. But maybe they should at least attempt having those types of routes for Benjamin and let the big guy muscle for the ball. Problem is throwing high over the middle so your big guy can get it is really dangerous if it gets deflected or goes through his hands.

I thought his timing on the throws to the backs were nice for the most part, hitting them in stride so that they can maximize yardage and not require them to divert their attention to catch the ball longer than necessary. That shows a lot of improvement from the college tape. If he learns how to be a quick read and release passer he could be very good, but that’s going to be a hard task with the cast around him. Maybe he develops chemistry with a receiver he can rely on and that starts this year. It would be nice if it were Jones, but that is something I’m going to be watching for. Not having McCoy is going to sting unless someone steps up, and we could very well see some bad games ahead from Allen, how he responds and learns is really the thing to watch.

Trade Dawkins for a second round pick, and use that second to trade for a damaged goods, low effort receiver. Don’t worry we’ll draft for that hole at T in an upcoming draft in the 7th round or overpay in FA - just be patient. Sign a street free agent T for a couple million and then cut him to create more dead cap - I gotta fever and the only prescription is that we gotta have more dead cap dammit! (Think “more cowbell” skit) Promote Juan Castillo to both DC and OL coach (believe it or not he has been a DC before - that didn’t go well btw) and clap profusely.

They had some fight to them after things got out of hand early, but they are very mistake prone and have penalties that are just crushing blows on the few good offensive plays they put together. Speaking of the refs... Officiating left something to be desired IMO. They should’ve blown the whistle immediately with Jones losing his helmet. that was just a nasty, nasty hit even with a helmet on. They gave the Bills a first down on a personal foul that gave them a new set of downs down in Chargers territory , but didn’t move the ball. I don’t know how it was missed, but I think the Bills were just thankful to have the drive extended. Maybe I am missing something, but that was my recollection, and I could be wrong. The personal foul on Hughes was garbage too. Not as bad as the Clay Matthews roughing the passer call yesterday, but in the same ball park. Is it just a matter of time before you can’t touch the QB in the throwing motion, like a punter? One has to wonder if the McDermott play calling and V. Davis retirement are related incidents - you could definitely see something where the coach lays into the team and says were making a couple of changes to who is play calling and starting. Whether Beane and McDermott know what they’re sowing is a different question that has been discussed at length on this board since the offseason? I’m skeptical, because I see obvious things that they did to themselves personnel and coaching wise that doesn’t give the two young guys they went with at QB the support that would help them succeed. Ultimately you want to see how well they perform where they can succeed not where only very few could? And you want to see it ASAP so that you can assess it and not be left with questions down the road because of negative factors. The INTs bothered me a little, because one just wasn’t a very good pass, the other was understandable with a guy trying to bring him down. But those are expected from a guy trying to make something happen. He had some really open guys that were completions but didn’t exactly throw accurate balls that could have been much bigger plays. But again he made the right throw and not even the great ones through dimes on every completion. The biggest concern to me is him holding the ball - that’s a trait that is hard to break unless it is a product of no one being open or not being comfortable with the first read throw. Still promising, and you can see the areas he needs to improve on...making those steps and improving with consistency will be the key. No guarantees with him, but you see the talent that made him a first rounder. I wasn’t a fan of the pick, but I am remaining optimistic because his development may be the definition of success or failure for this year and this regime.

No. I've only been here since they shut down BBMB although I did check out these forums from time to time before then because they had some good discussions. Generally, the discussions here are better and not as sanitized as the other board. I think people on forums are generally pretty intelligent because they aren't rapid fire, x character or less thoughts trying to get people to react and respond (although that does occur here too). Some people presume others are stupid or mean something that they don't because they take or don't take a particular position - that drives me crazy, and it drives me crazy that people who are fans of the same team with a lot of the same interests as far as the topics being discussed go after each other with such venom sometimes. It's like a bunch of people with Internet road rage. I'll admit that I've been negative about this team for a while, because they've done some pretty questionable things that seem pretty obvious to me. However, it's much easier to observe a chess game and point out bad moves than it is to play a chess game and make good moves - so I get that what seems obvious from a distant perspective may be a difficult call when you are close to action and all the other factors you may have to consider (at least that's the way I try to see it), but I know that a grand 3-5 yr plan isn't usually the reality of how a team is built and operates because there are too many variables changing at all times.

And this isn't vapid complaining? I'm a fan of this team and I always want them to win, even when they do stupid things, but it doesn't mean that they get a pass from me because I am a fan. I'll be the first one explaining why someone on the Bills is better than anyone else in the league and how the Bills are doing things right - these things just need to happen sometime for me to do so. The Bills do questionable things and the results speak for themselves - this regime is no different, they just do different questionable things than the last regime. I'm patient, but the writing is on the wall, we'll see how adaptive they are to their mistakes (and believe me they've made plenty in this "process") and where they go from here, but for people to rationalize the current state of the Bills as part of a larger plan that was expected is a bit naive.

I wonder if they will be anchors or buoys - looking like anchors with 2/3 right now, but still some time for it all to shake out. All is well is Allen turns out to be a stud, but going to be an uphill climb for him with the cast around him. Especially, considering the relative cost in draft capital compared to how they could have handled the position and OL in front of him. - Allen was the most expensive option for the Bills. The overall cost for the Bills moving up from 21 to 7 was (Cordy Glenn, No. 21 pick, and two second round picks (No. 53 and No. 56)). They could have kept Cordy Glenn, had one pretty nice 2nd round pickto address improving the line, and had Mahomes or Watson to sit behind Tyrod for a year with a better line (all hindsight I understand, but that is a much better situation for a QB to succeed and was certainly within the realm of possibility). Yeah, maybe you don't have Tre White and Tre Edmunds, but they created those holes they need to fill too. I wasn't a big fan of them moving up for Allen and drafting him at all, but he's shown to be better than I thought he would be so far. His accuracy yesterday on wide open throws and time he takes in the pocket are concerning, but there were some good things to like as well - he definitely pushed the ball down the field and isn't shy about going for the big play.

And so could anyone in Buffalo if the Bills actually thought that those things were important and were good at talent evaluation - they let WRs go to FA (Woods, Goodwin), traded them (Watkins), and picked up poor replacements (Matthews, Benjamin, and Jones) - BTW I was fine with Goodwin and Watkins moves (Watkins isn't as good as advertised and they sold as high as they could - which was pretty good haul). The vets the brought in were both coming off significant injuries, and the rookie they drafted with a high pick is Cra-Zay - they didn't address interior line that was aging at the time of the 2017 draft, and then retired (albeit unexpectedly in Wood's case and somewhat predictably in Incognito's case) after the 2017 season - in 2017 they hired an OL line coach that has a pretty uninspiring track record before the OC, and then hired a poor choice at OC, after the season they fired the OC and kept the OL coach (where many of the issues with the Offense came from). - In 2018 they hired an OC with a very bad resume as an OC in the NFL, only having success as a TE coach and co-OC for the two most established teams - New England and Alabama (neither have missed a beat without him) - and who knows how much control he actually has, because he certainly had to accept the OL coach as part of his staff. - they had two Tackles that could have anchored the line in 2018, they traded one of them for a draft pick right before the draft -they didn't address the interior line until the 5th round of the draft this past draft and signed bottom of the barrel free agents -they traded away an established starter at QB to learn behind for a third round pick, and signed a guy that had 4 starts in his NFL career, then traded him for a 5th round pick leaving only Allen and a 2nd year guy who had two starts that were underwhelming. So could their have been a better situation for a young QB in Buffalo? Yes. Instead they made many moves to make that situation worse. But they have money next year, right? I can't wait for them to stop playing it coy and show us how smart they are with FA and draft picks - I know they are just playing 'possum.