TigerJ

While I wouldn't completely rule out signing/claiming a late cut from another team, I will not be terribly surprised if the receivers Buffalo ends up with in September are all on the roster now. I'm not as pessimistic about their potential as some.

Going down the lineup of UDFAs: Mat Boesen - It's tough to imagine a 238 lb DE who takes just about 5 seconds to cover 40 yards making an NFL roster. Ike Boettger-Injury probably cost him getting drafted. He's got good feet and comes from "Offensive Linemen University" (Iowa) so you have to like his chances to make some noise. Buffalo does have a developmental guy already that they may like in Conor McDermott, so Boettger will really have to turn some heads. I don't think the Bills are going to keep two developmental guys on the roster. Gerhard de Beer - You gotta love the story, but he's fighting the same obstacles as Boettger, plus one more - he's about as raw as they come. He's got intriguing athleticism though. Ryan Carter - His size is against him in the competition to make the roster. I think there are other candidates who have an advantage over Carter for depth positions. Keith Ford - Decent size and speed. Not the most creative runner in the world, but usually gets positive yardage. He might have a shot if McDermott decides he's got too much age in his incumbent RB depth. Robert Foster - With excellent size, speed and famiarity with Brian Daboll and his offensive schem, it's easy to see why he might have a path to a roster spot. It's hardly a given, however. Benjamin, Jones, and Kerley probably are locks to make the roster. Holmes is an incumbent, though I think he could be vulnerable. I also think Reilly and Streater proved last year they could be serious competitors for a roster spot, and Malchi Dupre has been making some noise so far in OTAs. Plus, McDermott has familiarity with Kaelin Clay. Then you've got the rookies from the most recent draft class. That's a pretter fair amount of competition even though they're arent established NFL players for the most part. Mike Love - Has good measurables for DE. I imagine Buffalo will carry 4 or 5 on the active roster in September. Jerry Hughes, Trent Murphy and Shaq Lawson have 3 roster spots nailed down. That means Love is in competition with Eddie Yarbrough, Marquavius Lewis and Owa Odighizuwa for one or two spots. Among that group of 4, Love and Odighizuwa have the best measurables. Lewis has some promoters, though his 40 time is underwhelming, and Yarbrough showed some effectiveness last year. Love could have a chance with a good showing in training camp, but it's not an easy road by any means. Tyler Davis - has prohibitive odds against unseating Steven Hauschka as kicker. Corey Thompson - has enough speed, and similar size to Matt Millano, who is a lock to make the roster. You have to figure he has a chance. Linebackers who are locks to make the roster are Edmunds, Milano, Alexander. There will likely be 6 or 7 who make the final roster. So, Thompson has the following as competition for one of possibly four remaining roster spots: Humber - a veteran who started games for McDermott, Deon Lacey - who has excellent measurables but came from a small school, Tanner Valejo - who was a rookie draft pick last season, Julian Stanford - who has elite speed but is another small school dude, and Xavier Woodson-Luster - who is seriously undersized at 219 lbs. That's 6 candidates for 3 or 4 spots. Those are probably the best odds for any UDFA this year. Cam Phillips - isn't a smurf but he doesn't have great size either. Plus, he's by far the slowest receiver on the roster, and that's including Kelvin Benjamin. He knows how to use his hands to be an effective possession receiver, but it's still hard to imagine he con overcome the speed handicap, because there are other receivers on the roster that can use their hands and are effective possession receivers. Phillips is not a special teams candidate, so he'd have to make the roster as a receiver only. I don't see it happening. Levi Wallace - is a good storyand played well for Alabama, but he has several weaknesses as a cornerback starting with his lack of speed and physicality. The Bills will carry perrhaps 5 CBs. Locks are Tre White, Vontae Davis, and rookie Taron Johnson. So, you've got Borders, Gaines, Pitts competing with UDFAs Wallace and Carter for probably 2 spots. I think Borders and Gaines have the inside track on making the team, but it's not set in stone. So, ranking the top 5 threats to make the roster, I think it is Thompson at #1, Robert Foster at #2, Mike Love at #3, Keith Ford at #4, and Ike Boettger at #5.

I thinkk it's a bit too early to get into detailed discussions on any single game the Bills are going to play. They look like they improved their defense. Questions about the offense are going to remain for a while. We'll see how it all adds up.

I agree. Tyrod's game is not geared toward championship level football. He will give Cleveland better quaterbacking than they've had in a while if he starts rather than Mayfield, but I don't think his ceiling would have allowed Buffalo to ever have much better results than they had last season.McDermott and Beane are looking for better. Wheather or not they find it or have found it is certainly open to question, but Tyrod was never going to give it to them.

That's what doesn't work on my computer. The old means of listening on line did work. I don't know why that is.

I can't listen live anymore on my PC. I hear the broadcast for a fraction of a second, then it shuts down. I've been relying on buffalobills.com for recordings of One Buffalo Live.

You could well be right, Buffalo, analytics or not.

Your reaction is why I say it's a loaded question. As I said, the definition of racism kind of grates against my sense of fair play, but it's not my definition. As I said, it is defined sociologically (what people group you belong to and what people group you're doing it to), not psychologically. I don't know what Websters would say in defining it, but if you were to ask an African-American, I think he'd agree with me.

I agree. Buffalo drafted Josh Allen on the basis of his physical attributes, his intelligence, his attitude, and what he has done given his relatively weak background in terms of high school and college experience. They took a chance on him, knowing he's furthest from being a finished product compaired with all his first round QB peers from the recent draft. We all know he could bust. I think McBeane knows he could bust, but the reason they took a chance was because his physical attibutes are off the charts, and because his attitude and intelligence are outstanding. They are willing to gamble that success will come as he moves up the learning curve. I'm OK with their gamble.

Based on my last post, this is easy. The answer is still no. If Peace Frog were black himself, he cannot commit a racist act by definition, and certainly one can not commit a racist act toward another person of the same race. It is thought to be generally acceptable to poke fun ant one's own ethnicity. For example, if you're Polish, you can tell all the Polish jokes you want and nobody would normally be offended, if they know you're Polish.

Now there's a loaded question! The answer is no. That brings up the whole issue of what racism is. Was Peace Frog's motive in posting it racist? I don't know what he was thinking, so it is not fair for me to judge. Sometimes, however, malice is not required for racism to be present. We are all to some extent products of our environment. Sometimes, our environment may tend to cause us to view others who are different from ourselves through a stereotyping perspective. Was Peace Frog doing that? I don't know. I'm not even sure whether I was doing that in what I thought was a harmless quip about a second language. I don't think I was trying to be hurtful, but I could see where someone might take it that way. Racism, by definition of those who have been victimized, can normally only be committed by someone in a position of power by association with a people group that possesses a majority position or wealth. In this case, Blacks cannot be racist because relative to white America, blacks are in a minority and don't on average have as much economic power. Can Blacks be predjudiced? Absolutely, just like caucasians. Can they act on that predjudice and hurt, even kill white people? Absolutely! And there are many cases of that having happened, but racism is defined sociologically, and not just on a basis of individual motive and action. As a white person, that understanding kind of grates against my sense of fair play, as it might yours, but that is how it works.

Well, I'm sure my take is an oversimplification and there are many more factors that have led to the social situation we have today where there is so much more poverty in black America than white America, as well as more single parent families etc. What it comes down to is there must be social factors that account for those realities, and history (including slavery and racial oppression) are among them, or you must believe that the African-American community is at fault because of who they are. In other words, as a race they must be inferior. I believe that while there are individual differences within every race, it is social factors that led to what we have today, and not something inherent in black Americans.

Well, to this point they are suggesting he is healthy. His trainers are cognizant of his rapid growth and are being careful not to put too much strain on vulnerable joints. He also sounds like a well rounded and intelligent young man. He's in to music, art and robotics, and plays a mean game of chess. His mom is 6'3" and if his father is well above average, his size may not be due to any metabolic disorder. I would assume they have tested for such things.

This is true. I think Reid started Mahomes in week 17 because he had decided that Alex Smith was not going to be a Chief in 2018. Ususally, however, a switch will happen either because of injury or because your starter is proving to be hopelessly ineffective, in which case the team is probably not waiting until week 17 to pull the trigger.

I don't have a lot of expectations, positive or negative. I think there may be some long pass attempts, more than might be typical of a new QB. I also expect tthere is going to be a learning curve, but I really don't know how McDermott and Daboll are going to handle him or how quickly he can navigate that learning curve.

I went to seminary in Kentucky and shared a dorm with a bunch of guys mostly from the south. Somebody left some food out, and a fellow from South Alabama was horrified that we hadn't put in the refridgerator. "Don't y'all know it'll rurn? he said. It took even the other guys from the south a while to figure out he meant "ruin" when he said "rurn." Everybody kidded him mercilessly about that.

Unless you happen to be a completely dominant team, there is always an extent to which you will depend on what other teams are doing. That was a little more obvious in Buffalo's case with the dependence on Cincinnati's last second win. Buffalo still had to have its share of clutch performances. I see no shame in benefitting from something that happens elsewhere in the league.

Absolutely agree, but many blacks who have made it in a predominantly white world often had to overcome a lot more than many white persons who enjoyed similar success. The perception of racial superiority would be almost funny if it weren't so tragic. We could go back to Nazi Germany and the myth of the Aryan race. I recently saw some research into the genetics of ethnicity and ironically the research shows that caucasians are genetically mixed - so-called modern man and neanderthal. If you want to find those who are most genetically pure "modern" human beings, you have to go to Africans and their descendants. They do not have the Neanderthal genetics that white folks like me have.

The problems of black America certainly go all the way back to slavery. In Africa, blacks had a family structure. It may have been a bit different from white family structure, but it enabled values and customs to be passed on from generation to generation. Under slavery, black families could be ripped appart on the whim of slave owners. When slaves were freed, black families no longer had a stable family structure. Black males did not know how to be fathers and family providers because slavery had denied them the opportunity to learn. Couple that with the lack of opportunity because white folk wanted to reserve opportunity for themselves and their children, and it became a recipe to keep blacks in poverty for generation after generation: no opportunity, and no means of passing on a culture which would allow the ability to make social advances over time. A small percentage of blacks have been able to break free, and have created their own opportunities for advancement, and have created a family structure and a culture from scratch, but too many have not. The failure to do so should not be a reason for blaming black America because there is no evidence to suggests white folk would have done any better had positions been reversed. Society still has an obligation to try and lend a helping hand to black America. This is not easy, however. White America has in many cases tried to create opportunity for blacks. Unfortunately, there is no easy or quick way to try and help an entire ethnic group to create family structure from scratch, especially since we live in a time where family structure across all cultures is under attack and has disintigrated in many cases. Sometimes new structure have arisen, sometimes not, but it's tough to offer what we no longer have. I apologize. I did not mean to offend with my second language post, but it is true, language in some of the subcultures in our society is sufficiently different that it makes making oneself understood in the "establishment culture" rather difficult, almost as if it is a second language.

I did like McKelvin, and he developed into a fine cornerback. While I did post the "second language" remark in fun, I do surmise that most likely McKelvin's way of speaking probably has cultural roots. Doing a bit of research, he hails form Waycross, Georgia, in the sourtheast part of the state. The population is about 14,000 with about 54% being black. The median family income in Waycross is about 60% of the median family income in the state of Georgia. That means there is a good chance at least that McKelvin grew up in poverty and a black culture. He is to be commended for having arisen out of poverty, but his way of speaking probably does have a lot to do with his social circumstances growing up.

When I saw the post about McGee's tackling, I immediately thought of Winfield. It didn't matter that he was undersized. When he wrapped you up, you went down.

Give the guy a break. It's tough when English is your second language.

Well, there was a reason he wasn't drafted. The other thing is that LSU typically does not have a strong passing offense. They have churned out some great NFL receivers. OBJ and Jarvis Landry are a couple of recent examples. Thus they do get some talented athletes. It may be that some, like Dupre were not motivated that highly in college beccause the offense was not that productive through the air. When you sign undrafted free agents, you're going to either get a guy who is either not as physically talented, who found a way to be productive, a guy who was talented but had injury issues in college (Robert Foster?), a guy who is new to the sport of football (Gerhard de Beer), or a guy like Dupre, who seems to have some natural talent but appears to have somewhat unmotivated in college. With any undrafted free agent, there is a high degree of chance that he does nothing and washes out of the league unnoticed, but when you sign him you do it because you think there is also a chance he will take to your coaching and start to do the things that will enable him to become a productive player. I think it is pretty clear Sean McDermott has created a strong locker room culture, and that may help a player like Dupre.

Interestingly, when he was drafted, he was not seen as a sure thing at CB. He couldn't backpedal like a normal CB, and had to learn after he was drafted. Fortunately, he picked it up quickly and had a nice, if too short career in Buffalo.

Sean McDermott, when he announce that Jones had knee surgery. Implied that the surgery took place now to give him a chance to participate later, but would not commit to a timetable for recovery beyond making it clear he would be a non-participant through the spring.