Maine-iac

I think we've proven over and over again we can get production out of the RB position without using a day one pick. Overall better coaching will get better production. Also you don't have to use a ton of early picks to draft decent WR's. You just have to have a decent front office and scouting. No one I can think of is surprised Kupp is an excellent WR and he went in the 3rd round. Sometimes also things just don't work out. I thought/hoped Zay would be great.

People want to see Mahomes in Buffalo? Get Andy Reid to coach here and you will see Mahomes like production at the QB spot. Bring in the guy who sank Peyton Manning followed by a journeyman TE coach with a career 17ppg scoring record and you get what you get.

Brandon Tate FTW!!!! ..... even better can we bring back Kaelin Clay for the 1 millionth time.

Hasn't the book on Pettine always been to run the ball at him? He's made any number of great QB's look bad but teams have found room to run. With all that said a team that is a little over a season removed from leading the league in rushing for a second season seems absolutely incapable of getting it going against anyone.

They took a big jump when they had a big dump and got rid of Fisher. McVay is the reason that offense completely turned around and they brought in Wade Phillips who can take almost any group and make it awesome on defense. The difference is that they finally have great coaching on both sides of the ball. The significant investment in WR's didn't hurt either. Woods, Cupp, and Cooks (Watkins last year) also didn't hurt either. I'm even leaving out Reynolds who was great in the senior bowl but lost in their depth chart. We haven't made the investment in our offense anywhere near that level. I would imagine this year is already a lost cause but if they make a large investment in the offense next year and this years picks (Allen and Edmunds) pan out then we could take a nice big step forward next year. I would at this point think we almost have to or McDermott will not last.

I think people just don't understand winning. Throwing for 300 yards a game does not equal winning. I absolutely am not saying I don't want a decent passing game and goodness knows that the part of Taylor i could never defend was that he just wasn't an adequate level of clutch. He did a lot of things well or at least well enough but when the chips were down he couldn't get over the hump. It wasn't the number of yards he threw for. The same test will someday be the measure for Allen and it will have nothing to do with how many yards he throws for. As far as just wins and losses the lack of help is just as too blame as Taylor. At least half his loses had huge defensive or special teams failures and since he joined the Browns both games should have been won by the kicker and were not. Again the knock on Taylor is not taking the game into his own hands and making a few extra plays and I can't argue that but he does usually put teams in a position to win.

I purposely didn't mention Taylor. Sample size? In three seasons with THIS team he carried a winning record. Give him a decent defense and we would have gone to the playoffs three straight years. The argument made over and over again for passing yards was that it would make any game winnable and a bad defense less of a big deal. While I'm all for more passing yards and I like Allen it was crap when they were saying it two seasons ago and it's crap now. If your offense can move the ball and score points it doesn't matter how and having a good defense is always the best way to start winning games. If Allen had the exact same stats as Taylor but could throw that one clutch pass a game or 2 or 3 more TD's a year in those tight games he'd be a success and it would have nothing to do with getting a ton of yards.

McDermott calls the defense 17 to 10 Vikings. Frazier calls it all game 30 to 13.

I don't think 240 passing yards in a game where you were behind 28-6 at the half really epitomizes a mic drop moment. Edwards and Losman both won their first starts for what it's worth. Hell Manuel even had a lead going into the 4th on the Pats in his first start. Passing yards might be the most meaningless stat out there.

Joe B has Milano as the second ranked player on his season grades (only 2 games I know). The way some people complain about that kid you'd think he was the rookie LB getting abused. I really think with our rookie DT playing decent the defense really needs better playcalling and to keep the DB's healthy and they could be much better. I'm not writing Daboll off. He squeezed 20 points out of that group of players in a half (essentially). Who knows by the end of the season. What I wouldn't give for a big time receiver. Maybe Zay can finally heat up and become the guy we thought we drafted.

What we are forgetting that it could also be the new scheme. Woods might be getting abused if he was here also. The line looked and played much better in 15 and 16 and then without much change all of a sudden couldn't run block or pass block in 2017? I mean if he doesn't fit the scheme then it is entirely possible that he isn't going to look very good. That said it doesn't change the fact that he played as well or better than Woods was playing when he took over for him when he got injured.

Did the throw to Holmes in the end zone bounce off his hands? Looked like a decent throw all things considered. Then it looks like Holmes dropped another one 2 or 3 throws later. The interception while he was getting pulled down was just dumb but that's what rookies do a few times. He'll fix that. All in all it looks like he can move the ball. He's more of a muscle car forcing it's way through the wind than a Ferrari slicing through it but I think he can get the job done.

Zay's problem hasn't been so much getting open as it is his scary bad hands. The guy looks like he can barely make routine catches and sometimes he doesn't. He caught so many passes in college it seems almost unthinkable that he drops the ball so much. He almost dropped it again today on that long ball.

I want a QB that can put points on the board. I'll give them time to cut down on mistakes and turnovers but they need to be able to move the ball and put TD's on the board. Allen seems capable of doing that. We had 2 turnovers and the defense was non existent the 1st half and we still scored 21 points. For the offense that's a start. The second half defense may have been a start also but you have to play defense for 4 qtrs every week.

Allen completed a 57-yard pass to wide receiver Zay Jones late in the second quarter. According to NFL Next Gen Stats, the pass had 64.0 of air distance from the spot of the throw to the spot of the catch. That is tied for the second-longest air distance on a completed pass since 2016, when NFL Next Gen Stats began tracking.

Hey we won the second half! If we didn't spot them a 28 point lead we might have had something.

Nice ............. I'm happy with this second half of play. Still plenty of mistakes but there's some life in this team.

....... if 310 yards and 2 tds is a dumpster for a 2nd year QB.

No I agree but at least it happened is what I'm saying. Hopefully we can look like an NFL defense for 4 qtrs next week.

I am fine with Allen looking like a rookie and taking some sacks but I hope he cleans up the picks. Hey we found our defense! Second half of this game actually looked like an NFL team with a rookie QB instead of a dumpster fire.

Cleveland 0/2 on extra points. Remember Carpenter?

UGH ......................

Another drive, another penalty on the O-line. At least this one doesn't hurt anything that much.

Defense giving up big chunks of passing yards again.