DabillsDaBillsDaBills

Cards 27 Bills 17 The Bills tend to start out sloppy in week 1 under McD. I think that trend continues this year

64 million in dead cap Milano already out most of the season I'm thinking 9 wins

Darn, I was just going to bring this up. It'll be easier to scapegoat Babich when he's the one calling plays.

I can't say McD is the ONLY reason we haven't won a SB, but I do think he's the primary reason. In the last 4 years, with a top-5 roster (at worst), we've had 2 playoff losses where the team looked unprepared for the moment (first Chiefs game, Bengals game). We've had an epic coaching meltdown (13 seconds) and we've had 5 games where our DEF looked pathetic (Chiefsx3, Bengals, and Colts). For a defensive minded head coach that's just not acceptable.

McD is the one that took the offense off the field for the 4th down to go for the most telegraphed fake punt in history with Damar 'make a wish' Hamlin. Going for it was the right decision, but going for it with a fake punt was lunacy. McD doesn't get nearly enough criticism for that choice on here. The DEF got stops on the 3rd and 2nd to last possessions. We could have forced a 3 and out on the Chiefs last possession to get the offense the ball back, but they did not.

Playoffs are a small sample size and unfortunately our excellent regular season DEF gets TORCHED by KC in the playoffs. Is it simply bad luck? Does McD get too tight and that trickles down to the players? Is our team at a disadvantage in the 'let them play' style in playoff games where refs are too scared to call penalties? In our last 4 playoff losses our opponents have been called for 8 total penalties.

We've been the top scoring offense and a great red zone offense over the past 3 years. Being bad at passing ONLY (not running) inside the 3 is random happenstance caused by a small sample size. Sharp's tweet had 7 plays over the last 3 years

YOU LIKE THAT? Personally I enjoyed RG3 as an analyst. He was articulate, intelligent, and charismatic. Could be insufferable at times, but for the most part was less annoying than others in the biz

Since 2020 we've been 12th, 1st, 9th, and 4th in red zone TD percentage. Sharp is singling out PASSING plays inside the 3 yard line because we are randomly very bad at it. It's such a narrow stat that a few bad possessions really skew the data. Completely meaningless IMO

Sam Martin had a couple of awful punts (and a couple of really good ones). I want consistency from punters and he is not it

For anyone wondering.... please read the 'assault allegations' on Jim Brown's wikipedia page. TLDR: arrested 7+ times for assault - mainly against women. Never found guilty of anything major...BUT neither was OJ.

You did make some good points here, but I wanted to throw out a few more stats. In 2022 with Dorsey as OC Josh averaged 7.75 carries per game and was our leading rusher in 9 out of 16 regular season games. None of those were really desperate must win games considering our worst record at any point in the season was 6-3. In 2023 in the Dorsey games that decreased to 4.8 carries per game and Josh was only our leading rusher in 2 out of 10 games (4 carries for 14 yards vs Jags and 8 carries for 44 yards vs Bengals). Even in the Daboll years it felt like we had a 'in case of emergency break glass' button and call some designed Josh runs if the offense was struggling. That safety valve was turned off for Dorsey in 2023 and I have to imagine that was a McBeane decision. I think McD had a coming to Jesus moment when he fired Dorsey and realized that shackling the OC/Josh was a bad decision and gave Brady the green-light to run Josh as much as he wanted. As you pointed out once Brady was OC we were in must-win mode, but I'd call the Broncos game under Dorsey a must-win as well and Josh only had 4 carries that game. 4 carries for Josh is fewer than any game under Brady

Personally, I do think McD meddled with the offense. Josh Allen had 4.8 rushes per game under Dorsey and 9.0 rushes per game under Brady last season. Do you think Dorsey made a unilateral decision to have Josh run less? Or do you think Dorsey was listening when McD and Beane spent the entire offseason talking about Josh running less and sliding more?

Why would we only look at the 6 week slide period and ignore the 3 best offensive performances under Dorsey? Do weeks 2-4 not count? If you're arbitrarily excluding data from your stats to make an argument, its not much of an argument Complete regular season stats: 26.2 average PPG with Dorsey. 23.0 median 27.0 average PPG with Brady. 21.0 median

I'm interested to see what type of career Dorsey has. I don't think he was a very good OC for the Bills, but I think he is over-hated by most fans here. He was handcuffed in 2 different ways by McBeane 1) The mandate for Josh Allen to not run as much 2) Complementary football (IE the #1 priority was clock control instead of scoring) I don't think the offense looked very different under Brady (and the stats bear that out). The Brady offense against Chiefs, Chargers, Patriots, and Dolphins were every bit as inconsistent as the Dorsey offense looked during our 6 game mid-season swoon. The 5 game win streak to end the regular season had more to do with the DEF, and some luck, then it did the offense. Thankfully the DEF forced 15 turnovers in Brady's 7 games (compared to 4 turnovers in Dorsey's final 6 games). That gave our OFF so many more possessions and took some pressure off as well. Luckily we eeked out some wins due to Toney lining up offside, playing the Chargers with a backup QB and interim coach, Patriots with 4 turnovers in 10 plays, and we had a punt return for TD against the Dolphins. The offense was fairly bad in all 4 of those games.

What games did Bass win for us last season? He kicked a late FG to take the lead twice. 39 yard FG vs Chiefs (regular season) 29 yard FG vs Chargers Every single kicker in the league (and many not in the league) would've made those kicks. Bass cost us the Eagles and Patriots games in the regular season. He cost us at least a chance in the KC playoff game

Since 2020 the Bills are 2nd in regular season wins 1st in points scored (per game) 1st in points allowed

Did you look at wins with the same criteria as well? For example the Giants game this year saw our offense score TWO go-ahead TDs in the 4th Q. While our DEF allowed a lead-losing FG drive in the 4th Q. I'm cherry picking here to illustrate how deceiving it can be to only look at the 4th Q.

I'm actually interested in how you would count some of these games. Does the 2023 loss to the Jets count as a game our DEF choked because they allowed 2 scoring drives in the 4th Q? Josh and the offense did score a game tying FG on a drive that started with <2 minutes left. Pretty easily Josh's worst game of the season, but a game in which the DEF gave up the lead late and the OFF scored on a 'clutch' drive to tie it late. What about the 2021 loss to the Titans? Strictly speaking the offense failed to score to take the lead late in the 4th Q. However, our DEF did not force a stop after the 1st Q and allowed 6 straight scoring drives. 2022 loss to the Vikings or 2021 loss to the Bucs? Both sides of the ball had clutch and anti-clutch moments in the 4th/OT. FWIW if we're looking at clear cut examples of 1 side of the ball choking the game I'd have this list DEF blew it: 2020: Cardinals 2021: Chiefs (playoffs) 2023: Patriots, Eagles OFF blew it: 2021: Jaguars, Patriots (extreme weather) 2022: Dolphins (extreme weather) The rest of our close losses have joint responsibility in the 4th Q or involve 1 side of the ball playing great for 3+ quarters but not being able to close the game out. Offense has the '21 loss to Titans and '23 (playoffs) loss to Chiefs. Defense has the '23 loss to Broncos

KC defense scored a TD that game and forced 2 punts. That's a better defensive performance than the Bills in any of the 3 playoff games vs KC

I wouldn't call a half season suspension a slap on the wrist. It's certainly a lot more than Von Miller received for similar allegations.

If Allen and Mahomes swapped teams, everything else remaining the same, Allen would be the one with multiple SBs and MVPs while Mahomes had nothing.

I hope he has a bounce back year, but I'm still wondering how on EARTH Von Miller and McDermott thought he was ready to play by week 5 last season. Does he not practice at all? Did he look good in practice against guys putting in 60% real game effort? Hate to be the bearer of bad news Von, but forcing yourself back way too early actively hurt your teammates. We would've been better off stashing him on IR and using the roster spot on someone else.

10-11 regular season record in games that Allen didn't start (every game in 2017 and weeks 1, 7, 8, 9, 10 in 2018). 2018 had starts by Peterman, Derek Anderson, and Matt Barkley. 0-1 in the playoffs w/o Allen. For the record we did win a game that Peterman started - the snow game against the Colts! The PeterMan got knocked out in the 2nd half and replaced by Joe Webb. Ironically I think 2017 and 2018 are McD's best seasons as a coach. Those are the only years he had the team outperform its talent level.

The DEF got torched that game. We were the first team in NFL history to allow 450+ yards with 0 forced turnovers and still win a game (regular or postseason). Luckily for us Rivers missed an open WR on 4th and goal, and their kicker doinked a 33 yarder off the upright.