Kelly the Dog

Yeah. He’s been out three weeks with a shoulder injury. Really sucks for him after last year preseason was cancelled. And now he’s hurt. Glad the NFL changed the rule. He may never see the field. But injuries happen. If he’s the #3 RB in a real game would be interesting to see him a few plays.

When I watched the Breida play I thought he just assumed he would beat the defender to the end zone. He miscalculated and stepped out, which was a mistake. But guys like him often just assume they will run by people which they usually do. I think a lot of people will be pleasantly surprised by how Daboll uses Breida, the same way he uses McKittrick. Breida is super fast.

It’s funny, but if Knox caught the easy ones he drops and didn’t catch the equal number of balls he really shouldn’t catch, fans would have a completely different opinion of him.

I think, if they keep Addison and Hughes, that those two and Epenesa and Rousseau will all play approximately 50% of passing downs. Rousseau has looked surprisingly good at setting edge on run plays too. The few he has been in on. AJ is an unknown on run plays in his new body/weight although he is responsible and decent against run. personally I would trade/release Addison but McDermott loves him. It’s possible but I wouldn’t bet on it. That said, other positions may be a bigger factor in roster spots than the internal competition at them. Like keeping 6 or 7 WR because of Stevenson may be a bigger factor in the number of DEs we keep that who they would like to keep. I don’t think we need 7 DE. But Rousseau, Basham and AJ along with Hughes IMO are locks. Addison, Obada and Bam all warrant serious consideration. I don’t see how we keep them all.

All true. But the Bills are in a unique situation. They have a stacked roster. In previous years you would choose Fitz because he always has the chance of elevating the players around him in his gambling style. That’s the opposite of what we need even though Josh is a gambler himself. if Josh goes down for a couple games our best bet IMO is exactly how Trubisky played against the Bears. Making the right reads and throws and letting playmakers make plays. Not a riverboat gambler like Fitz. Bad teams need Fitzy not good teams.

They actually made a change to that. We can put him on the roster exemption list and keep him there all year and no one can sign him away from us. But… unlike the last two years… he is not forbidden to play if on roster exemption. We can activate him at any time I think and put him on active roster. Then of course he becomes like a regular player and there are no more protections. I wouldn’t doubt they do this if one of Motor, Moss or Breida gets hurt for a game or two.

It’s impossible for us fans to know how much influence these veteran players have on the younger guys. McDermott (and I believe Beane) really like Addison as a mentor and teammate and veteran for these younger guys. But do you really need two of them? Hughes is a tremendous guy to follow and learn from. Hughes is the biggest hustler on the team. He’s vocal. He’s smart. He knows both the speed game and technician game. Eric Washington the DL coach is also a ex player the young kids can respect. i totally get McDermotts vision for players, cogs, teammates, veterans, process guys, role models, etc. Not sure on DL you need two. Hughes is better role model than Addison. He tries harder than ANYONE on the entire team. For a decade.

If you are Daboll your life goal is to be a head coach somewhere. There is no amount of money any owner can pay that would prevent you from that. Granted, a guy like Daboll may not take any job like other guys (would and should). He can afford to be a little picky. Knowing he has Josh and the roster Beane assembled he pretty much knows his stock won’t go down. But 90% chance IMO he’s gone after this year. The offense is going to dominate. Josh is very likely (because of Josh not Daboll) to look even better. Daboll will rightfully get an offer he will take.

There are certain guys, like Taiwan Jones if they want to keep him, or Breida if they want to keep him, they can say to we want you on our 53 but we need to keep Stevenson or Kumerow or whomever, and we promise we will sign you right back. They may not want to do that if they can be signed to another teams 53 (which I think guarantees their contract), but if they like their standing and team, which Breida seems to, they could easily agree.

EJ hadn’t played 50 games in the NFL. No one thought EJ was a great prospect. Not a chance his talent was a #2 overall. EJ was a decent prospect, probably 2nd round talent, that few ever become franchise guys. Trubisky was a far better prospect than EJ. Not really close. There is an enormous difference between Trubisky and Peterman, who shouldn’t even be in the league.

That’s a good point. But… Even if true may still be best guy to run this Bills team. I was a Tyrod fan. I’m a huge Fitzy fan. But they are both clearly flawed as starters. I would easily have argued that Fitzy was the best #2 in the league last year. Tyrod, if not a good starter, is a very good backup. But IMO if Josh went down for a couple games, Trubisky may be a better option than Fitzy. if the Bills were worse, Fitz is the better option. Because he can win games by himself. But if you’re good, you don’t want a guy as erratic as that. You want an efficient guy who can do what you’ve been doing.

Good point. BUT… GMs like Beane, who is a great one, have to make decisions on stuff they don’t know. Like you just suggested. So on this message board, we often play GM, and pontificate or predict how things may turn out. GMs have to make hard decisions without knowing what will happen either. To me it’s okay to hypothesize about how well a guy might be. We’ve only seen about a half of a preseason game with Trubisky on the Bills so of course there is no way of knowing. But he’s played 50 games in the nfl. He’s not an unknown.

I don’t really agree. He had a crap roster in Chicago on offense in his four years. To me 29-21 on that team was pretty good not pretty bad. Their defense was good but skill players and coaching awful. Fitzy is a unique player. Maybe all time. If I had a crappy team Fitz can elevate them. If I have a good team, like the Bills do, I’m not sure a wildcard maniac like Fitz, who I love, is a better option than Trubisky.

There is no way Trubisky will agree to be locked up. Regardless of price. He wants one year of rehabilitation and then sign with a team he has a chance to start with. The best we can hope for is him signing another one year deal after this one. But I doubt he would.

I actually think that Dabol is designing a role and place for Breida. Similar to how he uses McKittrick 4-6 times a game. You saw the difference on the one play Breida made to the goal line. His speed is ridiculous. Like we saw with Stevenson. You can’t coach that. They have given Breida a bunch of normal RB carries from common sets. That’s not what he’s good at and no surprise he doesn’t look any different than Motor or Moss last year. But in regular season I imagine that Breida gets 4-5 designed plays a game, like McKenzie gets, which will be tough for defenses to prepare for. I think Breida is going to make some huge plays for us and never put up fantasy stats.

He’s played a lot. 29-21 as starter on Bears is actually fairly impressive. Yeah Bledsoe was pretty shot when he was here. Had one half of good season with two good WR. Then sucked. Tyrod was better.

I really think that part of Trubisky’s thinking to sign with Bills was that Dabol will like him, see him every day, get a HC job somewhere next year, and strongly suggest his new (lousy) team sign him either as starter or backup. I think that’s smart.

Yeah. It’s really close. I saw some Bear games but not a ton. I didn’t think he was the problem though. So much, right or wrong, is expectation. If Trubisky was second pick of second round people would think he was pretty good. Well then 98% of all threads on here are “who cares?” 😀

Not sure it’s weird. It’s more a testament to how bad our choices were for decades. And how great it is to be thinking about a backup QB and not a starter.

You have the years he played on the Bears. Not great but winning record. Playoffs. With. Crappy receivers and coaching. He wasn’t good but he got way more blame than he deserved. I don’t think he’s great. But with all the weapons we have he’s a very good option.

Yeah Fitz may be a better option as back up. Very close. Fitzy on the Bills, although he played well at times, is not the Fitzy now, who is a great backup. It’s close. I like Fitzy. So I may choose him. But if, say, in a hypothetical, this year, if you needed a QB to play two games because Josh was hurt, would you rather have Fitzy or Trubisky. I think it’s a tough call. Normally I may say Fitz. But because the Bills are so deep, you may want the less erratic guy. You may want Matt.

And almost Kelly? To me, the only competition is Tyrod. And Tyrod obviously had his limitations. A lot of fans and posters here think that Trubisky is the best back up in the league. Unless you consider Tyrod a starter (and I like Tyrod more than most), that would assume Trubisky is a better option than Taylor. To me it’s very close. Neither are great. Neither might not be consistently good. But I think if I had to choose, right now, for who I’d rather lead the team if Josh went down, I may say Trubisky. Which would make him the best Bills QB since Drew Bledsoe. And maybe even Kelly. I think Trubisky would be as good as Bledsoe was at that time in his career. And I don’t really think Trubisky is very good. As a starter, right now, no way. As a backup, hell yes.

I hate having and especially drafting guys like him. They are smart and they can succeed if not be stellar in college, in pro practice, and even in preseason. It’s almost predictable. But they cannot succeed on a regular basis in the NFL regular season because their arms prohibit it. And coaches, even good ones, get enamored with their play in these 3/4 speed settings. I don’t want them on my team because they may or even likely look good in practice/preseason.

The pass to Stevenson was gorgeous and timely, but he didn’t throw one pass that showed he has NFL requisite arm strength. He also looked rather slow in everything.

Fromm is the Nathan Peterman of Matt Barkleys. Doesn’t have NFL tools. Liked what I saw from Webb as QB3 on PS. Very impressed by Rousseau. We need veteran OT depth bad. TEs all looked decent. As did most LBs. Speedy needs to stay but hard to find a spot for him. Nice S depth too. Motor added a cylinder. Haack is going to help. Spencer raw but great prospect.