Shaw66

I don't think Bishop is underperforming if he isn't starting early this season, or even the end of the season. I agree that he needs to be starting in season two. And, yes, the fact that McDermott makes solid veterans work well in the defensive backfield does make the Bishop pick interesting. It means that McDermott and Beane expect something special from him. It's interesting to compare Bishop to Bernard - that piece in the Athletic was interesting. It essentially said the Bills took Bernard much higher than he was projected to go, but they took him because they had very high expectations for him. We didn't see enough last season to declare him a great player, but what we saw was pretty special play. I'd guess that McBeane would say they have those kind of expectations for Bishop. Bernard sat for season, but then he was expected to be ready, and I'd think the same is true for Bishop. The sooner the better, but definitely by year two. In the case of both Bishop and Bernard, the guy coming out of college was touted as being a true standout in terms of the mental game. They understand and can execute everything. It may take a year to get up to speed, but then we should see impact. And look at O'Cyrus Torrence. Same expectations - be a player by year two, and sooner if possible. Be a clear positive for the team sometime between now (last year at this time, Torrence already was beginning to show how soon he'd be ready) and a year from now (Bernard took a year to get up to where he needed to be).

I agree with this and your earlier post. What McDermott does is take quality safeties and defensive backs and teaches them to operate in a system that creates an effective defense. It isn't necessary for McDermott to get the top talent in the league to play those positions; what's necessary is for his players to work hard and execute the system that he has taught them. He can do that with any solid starting safety in the league, and that's what he has to work with now.

It's not too complicated, but I've said often, and I think others agree, that there is a problem with his system in the playoffs. His approach to developing a football team is to have guys who can do everything. In the case of offensive linemen, it's pass protect, power run block, and block the edges and downfield. Receivers, too, and running backs. And defenders - DBs who play the run tough, Dlinemen who can stop the run AND rush the passer. So it takes a while for players to be able to play that way. The problem with that approach, I think, is that you don't have players who are really, really good at one thing. You don't have a Chris Jones, for example. You don't have a Tyreek Hill. Instead, you have guys who are pretty good at everything, and when then have to play against the studs in the playoffs, they don't match up well. Belichick made it work that way - a bunch of no names who did their jobs. We're waiting for McDermott to show he can win that way.

I agree with all you said (of course, I did, because you were agreeing with me!), but this part that I quoted is important and people forget it. Pressure on Mahomes is important, and the Bills have known it. That's why they got Von Miller. Unfortunately, he went down and wasn't available when the Bills needed him in the playoffs - for essentially two seasons.

Well, it's the same narrative as a year ago. Last year, it was "Dorsey was learning the ropes as a rookie coordinator, blah, blah, blah." Turned out, Dorsey didn't seem to have learned much at all. So, this year it's Brady. I actually buy a lot of what you say about how things went for him 2023. 2024 is when we find out what he has. I'm confident, but we won't know until November or beyond.

Yeah, I agree. And perhaps the most amazing thing is that anyone with a brain can see that Allen still has upside. How crazy is that? Allen almost certainly won't win six Super Bowls (although anything is possible), but if he takes another step or two and stays healthy, he will legitimately be in the G.O.A.T. discussion.

That's right. In Elway's case, he had Reeves as HC for several years, then Wade Phillips, and then he won two Super Bowls with Shanahan. I don't think that means that what's necessary is a head coaching change as much as it means getting the right kind of offensive coaching, which could mean the coordinator. Tom Brady, for example, had a defensive head coach and the right offensive coordinator. In Denver, the offensive coordinators under Reeves included Mike Shanahan, who was there for 85-87 and 91. They didn't get along, and Reeves fired him. Also Chan Gailey for a year. Finally, the Broncos figured out the wrong guy was fired, and they made Shanahan the head coach and won two Super Bowls. So, I agree the Bills need the right coach for Allen to take the final steps to all-round greatness, but that doesn't mean McDermott has to go. It means he has to get the right OC. However, sooner or later, if he keeps getting the wrong OC, then McD will have to go.

I think there's truth here from both the unnamed exec and Alphadawg: I've been saying this for along time about Allen - he isn't an elite game manager. He isn't great at pre- and post-snap reads. He makes some poor decisions with the ball. I think it's all true, but it's all relative. As the exec says, he has "immense talent," and that talent overcomes a lot of mistakes. A guy with average NFL talent who makes decisions like Allen is on the bench, but Allen is so incredibly talented that he is an excellent QB despite the mistakes. I've said for years, and I'll say it here: Allen is Elway. Elway compared to Montana makes the point. There was no comparison in terms of talent, but Montana was masterful as a field general. Then Elway mastered the mental game, and he was brilliant. I think Allen is further along than Elway, and I actually think he is a better thrower (and better runner) than Elway, but Allen still needs to develop his decision making. Mahomes is ahead of him in that category, and Mahomes is a good enough thrower that his mental game makes him superior. But I think Allen is coming for him. All of this discussion about Allen is, I believe, beside the point. Allen is either great right now or awfully close. The Bills can win with him exactly as he is, if the defense will step up in the big play department.

I can't rank them. In no particular order: 64 championship game. Cowboys Monday night. Taron Johnson. The Perfect Game. Nyheim Hines. XXV. Those are my top six.

Yeah, I think you state it correctly. It's not that third down percentage is meaningless. However, as you say, turnovers are much more important. And third down percentage really is a minor stat. The more important stat about downs is first downs. What matters is how many first downs you get, regardless of what down you get them on. And in first downs, the Bills were very good but not standout. They were third in the league, but there was very little difference among the top five. That's why you find the top teams have a good third down percentage. Coaches don't sit around trying to figure out how to improve their third down percentage; they sit around trying to figure out how to make their offense better. People do this a lot - they find some random stat and make a big deal about it. Third down percentage is nice, but it isn't all that important. Having a great third down percentage doesn't give you a great offense. It's the other way around: a good offense gets you a good third down percentage.

Thanks, I'll see if I can find something. That sounds like an interesting stat. Bills were 19th last season. Not pretty. But we sort of knew that, because they were playing hurt all season.

What's the difference? The difference is you don't know what you're talking about. Last season, the Bills punted 49 times. The Jets led the league with 99. A team that punted five times a game more than the Bills would have had 134 punts, so your example is patently absurd. But even if you're going to talk about a reasonable number, like a team punting ONE more time a game than the Bills, which would mean a little better than the median, and put Allen at one half turnover a game more than the median, the difference is that in half the games, the Bills are giving up about 40 yards in field position. That's like the defense giving up more than 10% more yards for the game. I found the number a couple of weeks ago: On average, a turnover means your team is giving up four points. Two extra first downs a game doesn't get you four points, not even close. Field position is one of the most fundamental keys to success in football, and the lower the total points scored, the more important it becomes. The NFL is in an era where scoring is declining, and that makes turnovers more important. However, I'm interested in your last statement. How do you know that Allen has been more efficient over the past four seasons than any other player over any four-year period? That's an interesting stat. How's efficiency measured?

It's because stats like this don't correlate with winning. As much as we hate to admit it, when Josh turns the ball over, it hurts his team a lot. What's amazing to me is the difference between the regular season and the playoffs. I get carried away in these discussions, because I'm sure that Josh's regular-season turnovers hurt the team. However, it's hard to complain too much about it, because the Bills make the playoffs every season, and in the playoffs, Josh has 21 career playoff TD passes and 4 INTs. That number alone seems to prove what many people have said here for a long time: If you're looking for an explanation of why the Bills haven't won it all, don't look at the offense. It's the other side of the ball that has let the Bills down.

That's an amazing stat, and the team's 4th down percentage is pretty healthy, too. I'm not a total stats geek, so I won't - don't even know how to - do the work to figure this out, but I don't think your conclusion why the INTs is almost irrelevant. I think if one does the statistical analysis, they'd find that third-down conversion isn't as important as a turnover. A turnover instantly reduces your chance of scoring to near zero and, because of the significant change in field position, a turnover also increases the chances of the opponent scoring as compared to following a punt. A third-down conversion doesn't increase the Bills' chances of scoring by nearly as much as a turnover improves the other team's chances. Turnovers cause big changes in the probability of winning, and third down conversions do not correlate to winning in the same way. That's why pretty much all coaches and commentators talk about the giveaway-takeaway differential and virtually no one tracks third-down conversion differential. .

I remember that talk, too, and I remember thinking at the time that those guys' job was to say something (1) true and (2) positive, and that was all they could come up with. I think they took Manuel on a wing and a prayer, and they knew it.

I agree. I caused a stir talking about wideouts a month ago, but I haven't changed my mind. I think the level of the talent in the WR room and their collective contracts (and the fact that the Bills didn't willing to pay either Diggs or Davis) probably tells us something about Beane's philosophy on this subject. Still, we can be sure that Beane and McDermott have had one or more serious conversations about (1) the kind of impact Aiyuk would have on the Bills offense and (2) how much the Bills would be willing to give up to get him.

Well, I look at and listen to some rankings. I find I'm most interested in those confidential polls of GMs, because I think collectively the GMs know the subject better than anyone else. I also listen to the anecdotal evidence from other players. I think PFF is a joke, but I still feel good when they rank a Bills player high! Posters here? In my professional experience, I came to realize that there are some people who are just really smart, and if they put their minds to it, they can form really good opinions about subjects where they aren't experts. There aren't many people like that, but there are a few. And there are some people here like that, people who even though they haven't worked in the NFL for 20 years, or coached D-I for 20 years, still somehow are right about things most of the time. The rest of us? We just have opinions that seem correct to us, but in reality, we aren't right often enough to be experts. Having said that, I'll also say this. I read somewhere that if you take a big glass jar, a jar that holds maybe two gallons or five gallons, fill it with gumballs, and then ask a thousand people to guess how many gumballs are in the jar, you'll get a guess or two or three that are very accurate, and you'll get some guesses that ridiculously off, and you'll get a lot of guesses in between the accurate ones and the hopelessly wrong ones. However, it turns that if you take the average of all of the guesses, that average comes out close to the right number pretty consistently. It means that the collective knowledge of human beings is quite good, even though the knowledge of any one individual is spotty. Therefore, I'd guess that the collective knowledge of all of us posting here is pretty much on the money. Therefore, there are some things we can be sure of: The Dolphins suck. Keon is slow. Diggs used to be great, but now he's a jerk. It's always worth taking a peak at Rachel Bush images. Ralph was cheap. It was a forward pass. The Dolphins suck.

I love his hands. Every ball sticks. Rollover on the ground and catch. Really? There is more to the position than that, but I keep liking what I see.

That version of McCoy had his best year receiving ever, and one of his best years rushing. Shady would have liked the 2024 offensive line. And he had Tyrod Taylor as his quarterback. I'd take McCoy.

Yeah. It's all just another way of saying, "If you have Josh Allen, then reasonable talent and reasonable coaching will make you a contender." Coaching will be the difference this season. On way or the other.

The fact is, he's more or less correct, in the sense that teams didn't feel the need to be all over the Bills receivers. Defenders seemed to be able to stay close to the Bills' receivers without having to get to close. As defenses prepare each week, the emphasis always is what it is that the defense has to stop - the think that can just eat them up. At the beginning of the season we all would have said that's Diggs, but by the end of the season, Diggs could be stopped without making him the primary focus. The focus shifted to Kincaid or to Cook, and either case, those guys weren't striking fear in anyone's heart. It makes sense that defenses weren't interfering with the Bills. It's been obvious for a while now that for the Bills passing game to be a serious threat, it's going to be about route design, play calling and execution. That's primarily Brady. They have a roomful of receivers who are route runners and after the catch guys, with the possibility that either MVS or Claypool emerges as a real threat. The route runners will run their routes; if the routes stress the defense, and if Allen makes good decisions, it'll be a good passing offense and then, maybe we'll see more PI and holding.

Hey, I didn't want to let this go by without commenting on it. I particularly appreciate the list of commentators who have podcasts worth listening to. I knew they must be out there, but I never know who they are. I'm gratified to know that they're saying what I've been thinking - there are plenty of questions, but it's a fundamentally good team. I started getting excited about this year's team a few weeks ago. I think this will be another edition of McDermott's we do everything well philosophy. They're going to run, they're going to pass, and when you key on one, they're going to do the other. They're going to rush the passer and they're going to take the ball away. It's going to be fun.

I remember liking Hyde in Green Bay and was happy when the Bills got him. Not so much Poyer. My recollection is that some fans had little to say about Hyde but liked Poyer. Either way, they were two late-round picks whose team did not renew their contracts. Rapp and Edwards are the same (both higher picks than either Hyde or Poyer), and Bishop sounds like he has real potential. I think, absent injury, we're going to be seeing some high-end safety play come November. And although I don't have high hopes, there's even a chance that Hamlin will raise his game.

Yeah, I too worry about Rapp. I have the same hopes for Bishop.

I agree. You get it. Every place I look at the roster, pretty much every place, I think, "Well, this could be good. Or not." One reason I wrote about 2017 was that I think that was the kind of team, personnel-wise, that McDermott wants to have: loaded with good football players who are long on want-to. It's a team full of wrestlers, guys who will do whatever it takes, every minute. I've always thought McDermott hit the ground running because he had Kyle Williams. He could hold Kyle up to the entire team and let them all see what an outstanding football player looks like: a guy who comes to work every day and does whatever it takes. Every day. For Williams, it never was about him; it was always about the team. I think that's what McDermott has in this roster. And I don't think McDermott feels like he's on some kind of hot seat. I think he has the guys he wants, and he KNOWS he can win with these guys. His players are not the challenge this season - his ability to muster and direct the football acumen of his coaches is the challenge, and that's what McDermott wants. Mike Tomlin said he always hated practicing against McDermott at William and Mary, because McDermott brought everything he had, every day, every practice, every rep. This season, we're going to get everything McDermott has because he now has a team full of players who are going to give him everything they have. And, as the months have gone by, increasingly I think that in McDermott-world, the team got BETTER the day they traded Diggs. I think McDermott may have said to Beane (or it went without saying), "Get rid of Diggs and get me some more of my kind of players." The thing about Diggs is this: When all is said and done, he's just another prima donna "look at me" wideout. It's true, he has an incredible work ethic, and he works at his craft in a way that sets an example for the rest of his team. But every day, in subtle little ways, it's always about Diggs. I think Beane and McDermott understood that when they got him, but they thought they could maximize the "team" part of his psyche and control the "me" part. What I think about Diggs, and what I think McBeane discovered about him, is that Diggs has an intense desire to fight, and that's what makes him the dog you want on your team. The problem with Diggs is that his desire to fight is so intense that sooner or later he turns that desire in little ways on his teammates and/or his coaches. He can't help it - at some point, the only way he can satisfy the "me" in him is to fight with his team. I think that's what happened in Minnesota, and I think it's what happened in Buffalo. I think that Houston will get the "team" Diggs for a year or two, just like the Vikings and the Bills did. Good for them. So, I think that the day Beane dumped Diggs, McDermott's world got brighter and the team got better. Just look at what happened to the wide receiver room. Distraction number 1 was traded. Distraction 1A left in free agency. (Not that Davis was a problem like Diggs, but he was a problem nevertheless, a problem because he never could meet expectations.) What is the one distinctive feature about the wide receiver room now? There is not an ounce of "me" in that room. If there ever was any "me" in Samuel, in Claypool, in MVS, in Hollins, in Hamler, the league has beaten it out of them. Shakir showed up with no "me." None of this is to say, however, that the team is going to be great. As I said at the start, thing about this team is that in almost every positional grouping, my reaction is that I can see how each grouping can be good, but I don't know if they will be good. If McDermott succeeds and they're all good, then you have a lot of good players playing football with Superman at quarterback. I like the Bills' chances.