Richard Noggin

I've found that planning ahead is how people lose survivor pools. Your job is to survive THIS week. Most of these pools don't last long past the midpoint of the season. There are enough matchups to exploit each week. No reason to go out on a limb right out of the gate. (Of course the payoff is nice, being able to select those teams later, BUT when will Denver or Baltimore have a better matchup than week one?)

I'm thinking in my suicide pool that the Ravens over the Jets is a solid pick. I think Lamar will go after each game like he's always done. I'm also thinking that many people will pick the Broncos over the Seahawks, for a multitude of reasons. Any thoughts?

Dane is clearly CB2 on this team when Tre White is healthy. Neither Benford nor Elam are challenging him for snaps at this time. However, Tre White is NOT yet game healthy, so the platooning of Elam and Benford is impactful on a game-to-game basis. They have different physical traits and different skillsets and fluencies. Ideally, by season's end, both rookie corners have gained enough seasoning to be relied upon no matter the play call or matchup. We know our coaches are ELITE developers of secondary talent. It will be fascinating to see how the CB snap counts unfold in 2022/23.

I did intend to timestamp the video. Alas, I failed. I appreciate being taken to task in an objective way as you're doing here. Honestly, though, Edmunds does NOT, to my eye, sell-out on Poyer's pre-snap read the way he could/should have. His eyes were still a bit elsewhere momentarily. Obviously his keys were telling him something a bit different. I was yelling about it as it unfolded in real time. Of course it's not ALL his fault by any means. But he was maybe the only guy who could have disrupted the play, and it seems obvious Poyer realized that right before the snap.

I TRIED with the timestamp! Such things are difficult for an idiot like me, unfortunately.

Feeling compelled to call attention to a player who many are overlooking (often for good reasons): DaQuan Jones #92. He could actually be everything we were told Star was supposed to be. #92 flashed a bunch for me.

In the spirit of objective diligence, and not to hijack a thread, blame for this LA 4th down conversion seems to start with a certain maligned MLB, given Poyer's very explicit pre-snap alert that falls on deaf ears (or feet)... (At the last moment, Poyer recognizes the pre-snap look and tries to alert Edmunds to the imminent WR screen to his left, but the MLB does NOT shift left or even take his first step(s) in that direction, thereby causing him to be just a step too late to make the play. It seems clear to me, but I'm sure many will disagree. And that's...okay.)

Is this board satire? If so, bravo.

What the ***** did I just read

The back shoulder 3rd down conversion to Diggs with Ramsey playing press was my personal favorite.

You sleep after a Bills win? Weirdo. Anyways, shoutout to DaQuan Jones! Looked stout and even brought a little heat against the pass. Def caused Stafford's first INT.

Missed a huge opportunity to sing "Blue Light" instead of just "Blue"...it would have rhymed perfectly AND been more accurate for people who intentionally drink more than a dozen beers before kickoff, which is no small segment of fans. Blue Light happens to be only 20 calories and like 1.5 carbs less per can, so turns out you better be hitting double digits to make the sacrifice even remotely worthwhile. I am just finding this out now. Useful info, that.

Easy to be funny at the START of 2022. But how many of you were funny at the END of [insert any year 2000-2010]?

Lotta sales and money managers...which tracks for the pressure and visibility of the gig. But do we really want the refs to be competitive A-types? It's the old conundrum of whether we should trust those in positions of authority because we've all seen people who seek such authority.

Daboll seemed to be stubbornly loyal to his weekly game-plans. Luckily, he devised a lot of good plans to attack opposing defenses. The problems arose when for whatever reason those plans didn't work. I can remember too many games where Daboll failed to help his offensive linemen, especially, win their matchups due to repetitive or predictable play-calling. That week one Pittsburgh game last year, just dropping back repeatedly and letting some gifted Pitt specimens tee off on a middling group of protectors. Daryl Williams and Cody Ford and Ike Boettger need a little help against the likes of Watt, Heyward, Ingram, etc. I've always envied more intuitive play callers, who have a more consistent system and set of packages and plays they rely on. Have a plan, but feel the game more. Respond to what IS happening on the field, rather than what you predicted SHOULD happen on the field. Marry the run and the pass more fundamentally so that plays look the same and defenders have less idea what's coming.

Diggs has fewer plays designed to get HIM open quickly as a product of bunches and picks and motions and et cetera. Diggs plays a more traditional X role more often than Kupp does. Right on the line, out wide, releasing and running routes. Working against presses and brackets and doubles and buzzes and et cetera. Kupp gets a lot of defensive attention, no doubt, but there's more scheming designed to disrupt that attention and get him the ball nonetheless. Methinks the Bills have sought to play it slightly more "straight-up" so that extra attention paid to Diggs opens up other favorable matchups. Or, conversely, a lack of extra coverage attention means Diggs sees the ball, a lot. In theory.

Maybe they're downplayed because of what BuffBart is sharing anecdotally here: meniscus tears CAN be fairly minor. They can also be fairly significant. I'm pretty sure I had an undiagnosed tear a handful of years back; no health insurance at the time, and the pain was mostly manageable except when I went DOWN stairs. I was still able to run and do some training that didn't involve squats or lunges or the sort. Sharp pain lasted 4-6 weeks. Who really knows how many weekend warrior soft tissue injuries come and go in the shadows of the American healthcare system...

Are they building it downtown after all?!

Yeah, I'm seeing that now and derp. One of the broadcasters mistakenly mentions him in a Youtube vid of the play I just checked out...we MUST always better vet our sources.

Looking critically at the last couple decades of Patriots seasons shows us a tendency to be at their worst in the first parts of the season, but to improve and to find some semblance of a winning identity by season's end. So it's reasonable to expect early struggles and bad losses before they sort some things out and plateau as an "in the hunt" fringe team. Or maybe they'll just absolutely implode!

Do we really see that play as Josh's poor footing being the problem? He definitely spun the tire, or "slipped," but the left side of his line got absolutely stoned where they stood; his LT in particular got hit by a car in the crosswalk. Morse won HIS rep and Allen should have tunneled behind him. But the bad footing occurred behind the LG/LT, so burrowing behind Morse just wasn't at all what Allen was thinking? DaQuan Jones gave up NO ground to Feliciano, and of course Simmons attacked the inside shoulder of Dawkins with such effect that I'm not sure Allen's footing (given his predetermined "route") really matters or wasn't at least impacted BY the line play.

We've been hurt so bad so often, in such public, crushing, nicknamed ways (as recently as earlier this very year). It CANNOT get worse than our lifetimes of letdowns. Therefore, it's all upside. No risk, all reward. I'm stunned by how well I dealt with last year's end. (Denial ain't just a river in Egypt.) **eyelid twitches**

While I agree that Thurman is not widely celebrated as an elite physical specimen, I will disagree that "he didn't play at that (4.47 40) speed." Go back and watch the first half of his career at least...dude was deceptively fast. I wonder if Thomas was underrated in college in the eyes of many due to his junior year ACL injury (is my memory correct: did he elect NOT to have it surgically repaired?) in an era where that was considered potentially career-threatening, as well as being the guy who kept the prodigious talents of Barry Sanders on the sideline. I think maybe also he visibly lost a half step by the end of the SB runs? Noteworthy that hIs Y/A dropped more than a full yard (and stayed that way for years) after the 3rd Superbowl season.

"Talent" doesn't need extra time to be assessed. "Talent" is innate. Skills and traits, and therefore efficacy/success can be improved, but that doesn't necessarily have anything to do with talent. On one hand, we can see talent defined narrowly and assessed quickly. Thus, we'd already know how Josh Allen rates against Bruce Smith, strictly with respect to "talent." Except that...more talented people have more potential for improvement (the whole "high ceiling" thing). So asking for more time to see if Allen surpasses Bruce isn't really wrong at all. And also, wtf do we mean by "talent" anyway? Obviously RAS is a big part of it, but there are many other traits and gifts and abilities that are more complicated to quantify. And the whole notion of a player's potential, or ceiling, versus floor, or bust-ability, adds layers of subjectivity and projection.

Nevermind the ABSOLUTE NECESSITY of objective journalism to a functioning democracy. Or for that matter, a populace able to discern fact from fiction, and priority from frivolity. Nonetheless, I like the reporting I read from The Athletic.