Florida Bills Fanatic

This could be a prelude to adding some more young DB's in the draft and making sure that they have enough resources to teach and develop them. Mc D and Beane don't do things like this without something specific in mind.

CB Rasul Douglas or RB James Connor

The entire scenario is utterly ridiculous. The Panthers aren't going to give away their best player for almost nothing, nor are the Bills in the position to commit that much cap space.

We don't see the things that go on in practice and meeting rooms. When we see a guy go to the bench in a game, we assume that it is because of a single and most recent misdeed. Most likely, the benching is the culmination of multiple issues (the straw that finally broke the camel's back so to speak). Players on a good team aren't going to support a player that is a continuous screw-up. If a coach lets bad play slide, he'll lose the entire team. Most players want to play on a winning team. As long as Beane, McD, and Allen are in Buffalo, they will be a reason for players wanting to play there.

Mock drafts are always a crap shoot. They are never totally right nor are they completely wrong. When a GM has a roster as good as the Bills, they don't artificially restrict themselves to just one side of the ball. But given the starting assumption on free agency, I understand the this exercise. Beane will likely address CB, DL, IOL, QB, and WR. The only real immediate need is at CB and just like in this mock draft, I believe two will be selected. Beane will have some flexibility to pick values off the board and avoid reaching for a specific position. Having 9 picks will give the Bills the ability to move up in the middle and later rounds to grab some players that may slip down for some reason. Teams that are consistently competitive don't allow an entire position group to get old at the same time nor do they create a large concentration of cap expense in a group. Once Beane put out the roster fires that he inherited, he has worked to establish a balance. I don't expect him to throw out that approach this season.

You may very well be right but I expect someone on the DL either within the first three rounds of the draft or as a FA signing. I also believe that the Bills are confident in Doyle and he will be the swing tackle as long as Dawkins continues to play well. Some season down the road Brown will be the LT and Doyle will be the RT. The Bills will probably be looking at a guard or center or both this year. Beane's free agent moves usually provide a strong indication of his draft direction.

This has been a subject of local sports talk radio since the story broke. It is believed that there is more than one witness from more than one incident involving Ross. If any of this is true, the NFL is in a really bad position. With their financial involvement in the sports betting industry, they could be looking at lawsuits seeking recovery of funds lost on bets involving Miami games. The feds could get involved under racketeering statutes with people looking at jail time. This could also become the final straw that leads Congress to eliminate the monopoly exemptions for the league. When you look at Miami in conjunction with the claims of Jackson in Cleveland and the mess in Washington, the NFL has some serious work to do to clean up the league. It will be interesting to see whether the league actually holds these owners to the rules contained in their ownership agreements.

There are also independent scouting services that sell their evaluations to various customers, including NFL teams. I believe teams use these sources to sense check some of their own internal player evaluations and to identify players that they may not have acquired scouting information about. With the availability of this information, it becomes increasingly harder for players to go under the radar. Teams also study and do their own draft simulations based on the needs of the other teams, assessments of college players, and educated guesses of who will be available when they draft. With so much information readily available, I'm not surprised that Beane doesn't seem overly concerned. As one of the other posters correctly pointed out, the Giants are picking in the early part of each round and the Bills are generally 20 picks after that. Either team trading up or back could create a potential clash of interests but it seems remote.

According to a friend of mine that works in the NFL, the Bills have always had excellent scouting. What they didn't always have, were good decision makers to make the right player decisions. A new owner, new GM, and new head coach changed all of that.

There won't be a high cost WR FA acquisition for the Bills. I expect Beane to draft a speed guy to stretch opposing defenses and be an occasional jet sweep guy. There are multiple players like this available in the draft. In general, this draft is deep at the WR position. At the risk of triggering yet another Andy Isabella thread, I believe he will be available this off season. I'm not sure that Lil' Dirty will not be back next season. There is probably a lot of posturing going on related to a future contract. We'll know for sure prior to the draft. Until then, it's fun to speculate.

Wallace will get a decent contract somewhere but I doubt the Bills will be into him for $9M. As far as drafting a first round corner, this may be the time. The new guy could replace Wallace and eventually become the CB1. I can picture Beane wanting to time out the end of the next rookie corner's first contract to coincide with the eventual end of White's time as a highly paid corner in Buffalo. As sad as that sounds, corners have a shelf life and good teams move on before they are overpaying for diminished skills. Much of this will depend on having the right player available at pick 25.

As much as many of us would wish all of this to be that simple, it really isn't. There are several good candidates for all of these jobs. I have been partial to Bowles, Flores, and Morris. If this ends up in litigation, the process will be under as much scrutiny as the result. It is important to have a very structured and uniform interview and selection process. The selection criteria must be clear and as measurable as possible. Some teams are probably very good at this and some are probably very bad. The bad ones are probably a direct reflection of the owner. As others have pointed out, Bienemy may just not interview well or maybe he just doesn't have the attributes to be a head coach and lead an organization. We have no way of knowing but when so many different teams interview the guy and pass, there is something amiss.

You may be correct. He's still under contract and I'm not sure the Pack will trade him (at least for a realistic price). If they do decide to send him on his way, it won't be to an NFC team.

I think he decided to stay in Tampa

There are various provisions in ownership agreements in the NFL that give the league leverage to force the sale of a team through legal action. Reference Jerry Richardson and the Panthers. Fortunately that mess didn't evolve into a drawn out legal battle.

I always like to read the breathless prognostics from the "Sky is Falling Crowd". With relentless certainty they lecture us that JA and the rest of the team will regress into some bottomless statistical pit. This hasn't happened yet and in the absence of serious injuries, will not likely happen in the near term. I think we have all seen enough of JA to know what kind of player that he is. Even Belicheat acknowledged that he is a special player after their last game. When you look around the league, the teams that regress usually have significant injury problems across their rosters, including star players. Other regressing teams hit the wall because cap problems forced them to release or trade too many good players. And still others falter because they held onto too many older players and they all dropped off the performance cliff at the same time. I trust Beane and McD to manage the cap and to maintain the roster by continuing additions of good talent through the draft. May the Bills have a clunker of a season in 2022?....maybe but it is more likely to be caused by injury problems as opposed to some loss of skills or performance by their key players. So for the fans that so self assuredly predict the regression of JA and the demise of the Bills in 2022, I suggest letting the off season play out so that we can truly assess the state of the Bills going into the regular season. To do anything else is merely mindless speculation.

WR talent appears to be pretty deep in this draft. I wouldn't be surprised to see Beane wait on a WR and go CB or DL. In the last couple of years, the free agent signings have provided a pretty clear road map for Beane's draft plans. Have any of us really been surprised by any of his first picks in the draft? When you look at the roster and project who will be retained going into the draft, the Bills don't have any glaring holes except punter. There are some areas that can be improved but no catastrophic absence of talent. This gives Beane the flexibility to look at the best players at the best value regardless of position. He can also gamble on a great prospect coming off an injury. GunnerBill may very well have it correct. It all depends on whether 24 other teams let Williams fall that far in the draft.

When I look at draft picks and their second contracts, I look for guys that were real difference makers on their teams. If they were not real difference makers but good players, they should get reasonable market based offers. If desperate teams are willing to overpay, then I believe they should be allowed to walk. The overpaid players reduce the ability of the new team to field a competitive team over the long term. Under the cap structure, teams can really only have maybe five or six premium contracts, so a good GM will have to decide whether a guy is worth one of those premium deals. Usually; QB, one WR, left tackle, one CB, one pass rusher, and one other player hit a premium deal. When I look at the Bills; Allen, Diggs, Dawkins, and White will be receiving premium level pay going into 2022. Looking at the rest of the team, it is hard for me to see anyone in line for a huge new contract. Much to the dismay of many, I think Edmunds will be getting a hefty contract, because of how he fits into the scheme that McD runs. The scheme requires freakish athletic capability that isn't widely available. Oliver is the only other guy that could be in the mix for a big payday but not a huge break the bank kind of deal. I believe our development of draft picks is pretty consistent with other teams around the league. I actually think Beane hits things reasonably well in the draft. When good teams are drafting late in the rounds, the players being picked are not elite players that automatically walk into high impact starting positions.

Cowboys already had a very good group of receivers before drafting Lamb. He was a luxury that they really did not need. Their o-line had gotten old and injury ridden and could have used an infusion of talent. Some of Zeke's best runs this year were to merely get back to the line of scrimmage. As always, Jerry went for the big splash and it didn't pay off. One of the earlier posts pointed out that great coaching prospects avoid working for Jerry and that may be very true. It may also be true that Jerry will only hire coaches that will tolerate his incompetent meddling in team operations. When you look at some of the consistently under performing teams, bad ownership is a common characteristic. Bills fans lived through it with Ralph's last few years. In addition to Dallas; Washington, Detroit, Chicago, Miami, Jets, and Jacksonville are living that nightmare now.

The Cheatriots looked old and slow. Their LB's in pass coverage were a joke. I expect them to replace at least five starters on their defense and upgrade the WR group. Their biggest dilemma will be at QB. Do they believe that a game manager with an average arm can compete with Allen, Mahomes, Herbert, and Burrow in the AFC? I believe that they already know the answer and will be forced to go with Jones until a better option is available. I do expect them to be secretly involved in trade activity surrounding veteran QB's that may become available. Behind the scenes, Belicheat may be more concerned about securing the record for the most career coaching wins than he is about winning another SB. I have to admit it's great to see all of the Patriot's fans with their panties in a knot. I hope there's about 25 years of misery in their future. Go Bills!

He is not a typical head coach. He appears to still be on top of his game. I believe he has excellent coaches on his staff that he has trained to do things his way. I also think he operates the team much like a CEO runs a large corporation. He operates from 10000 ft. and only gets his hands dirty when there is a problem. This probably allows him to avoid much of the physical wear and tear. I'm sure that he is trying to stay on until he breaks Shula's record. Personally, I think he will make it.

The owner and front office gave their new coach a crap roster, the Watson side show, and nothing at QB. They fire the guy of a team that had no chance to be competitive. Culley may have gotten the best end of this deal. He gets to collect the balance of his contract ( I believe it is about $17 M) and he doesn't have to deal with the morons in the Texans organization. Once again bad ownership leads to very bad results.

Actually, the actions of the owner (Ross) in Miami have probably hurt their ability to attract a great candidate pool. He has influenced the team to make questionable draft picks, turned over the coaching staff too often, and has been a general distraction to the people trying to run the team. He ranks with Snyder and Davis for being one of the worst owners in the league. Good candidates will try to avoid the chaos.

I'm guessing that Ken Dorsey would be the most likely replacement. If he isn't, the Bills will lose him too. The transition to Dorsey would be an easy one.

Since the league started scheduling team bye weeks following their international games, it isn't as bad for the teams. It isn't ideal but it isn't as horrible as it used to be. For fans, it is a great trip (in the UK) and a good time. Seeing pubs full of Bills fans and hanging out was a lot of fun. If they play in the UK again, I'll be there (Covid permitting).