glazeduck

Possible, yes and again -- I'd LOVE to see it. I just think the athletic TE is too big of a trend in the league right now for him to come to a team that has to do a whole bunch of cap karate to even get in the discussion, ya know? His agent's job is to get him top dollar, so he would have to really want to come to Buffalo, and I feel like we would've heard something about that by now.

Exactly. Jonnu Smith isn't negotiating with the Bills in a vacuum here (if he's negotiating with them at all). The market will dictate his price and terms of his contract, having the ability to craft a contract in a way that's beneficial to our cap situation and doing so with Smith onboard and excited about that proposition are 2 completely different things. This is Madden thinking and not the reality of how free agency works.

lol sorry for trying to bring some reality to the conversation. Perhaps I should've been more explicit (read: boring.) You can't sign everybody, teams have their priorities and I tend to believe that TE is low on this team's priority list. Lower, certainly, than CB, pass rush, DL, OL, WR, RB, KR/PR and probably backup QB. Yes contractual funny money sometimes exists in the NFL, but just because it *can* happen, doesn't mean Jonnu's up for that, won't get a better offer elsewhere, or we'll even try to do that (see priority comments above). I'll gladly be wrong, because I love Jonnu's game, but I don't see it here...

Both Henry and Smith are going to be out of our price range, unfortunately. I think Rudolph or trading for Njoku are probably our best bets, barring Feirmuth dropping to our 2nd rd pick...

CB might be an option for our first pick if we trade back, but I don't see a reasonable value at 30... Fairley, Horn and Surtain are the clear top 3 and all will likely be long gone by 30. From there there's a fairly wide gap and then another grouping of bigger CBs that would all fit our system well -- all or many likely available at the bottom of 2: Adebo (my preference), Newsome, Melifonwu, Keith Taylor, Stokes (his 40 will push him up draft boards but I don't love him for us anyway) and Shaun Wade. To the OP, there's a bunch of guys I like in the 3rd more than Samuel too: St. Juste, Mukuwamu, Joseph, Campbell.

That's fine. My point was more that there isn't any specific *stigma* around restructuring, often it works in the players' best interest and shows leadership. No reason why all of those couldn't be true for White.

Bingo. Not to mention the most dominant player in the league just restructured... If Mahomes can restructure, anyone can.

Purely my opinion on him, based largely on college scouting. He wasn't even a solid athlete coming out of college -- how many TEs in the NFL have been even "good" without being a decent athlete? His hands are *fine*, maybe even bordering on good, but he lacked the ability to separate, so he's more of a safety valve than a weapon. He's a fine blocker but I wouldn't argue an exceptional one. And this was all before Miocarditis... he's supposed to have improved in any of these areas? To use your word, I think he's an "ok" player, but "ok" players, are depth guys, nothing more.

I don't believe Sweeney is anything more than a depth guy. If he had something we would've seen it by now. Jonnu's going to get a lot more than $8. I doubt very much that we'll be a player for him. I like Brevin Jordan, I think he'd be a great fit with Knox too.

LOL I'll trade you my EJ Manuel signed football straight up if you want! 🤣 I believe in Tre, I believe in Frazier, I think they'll get it figured out -- last year was just far too crazy of a season to lean into too heavily either way.

I think he was limited by his injury more than we know, but time will tell. I guess I look at it like this: the coaches, front office and med. staff are closer to what's really going on than those of us watching from our couches. If they think he's the guy -- for whatever reason, then I don't have enough info to disagree with them. Taking your QB rating of 114+ a different way -- we were without our NT and our run defense clearly suffered because of it. Who's to say that the staff may have had Tre triggering downhill on run looks more aggressively to account for that? Just playing devil's advocate here, but regardless of what the reason was, we still almost made the super bowl. Tre's not perfect, but I think he'll have a bounce back season and is not the liability that some make him out to be. I hope I'm right.

Sure, long term it makes sense. But the focus needs to be on the next couple years. Tre is still as young as some of these rookies and now should know the defense inside and out. I'm all for making upgrades where we can, but switching out your defensive QB probably ain't it in my opinion.

Wholeheartedly agree here, but the biggest factor in improving the pass rush will almost certainly have to come through Oliver and Epanesa's development. Don't see this happening. I know a lot of people on here dislike Edmunds, but I think (just a gut feeling) -- for better or worse -- he's ours and will be for awhile.

That story could easily have been a fake leak to leverage Addison into doing just this. Would still love Autry, but DE space is getting tighter and I have a hunch we'll have quite a few near the top of our board for the draft as well...

This is how I view him too. Love the athleticism, but he's better standing up than as a true 43 DE. Possible that Leslie varies things up a bit and goes more multiple to accommodate, were we to land him, but there's some square peg/round hole discussion to be had here. It's a pipe dream, but the guy I want is Phillips.

I'd be all for this in a "bring him in and let him earn a spot" kind of way. Obviously intriguing upside, but between the injuries and the constant thought of "if he was going to pop, he'd have popped by now", that's about the most I'd go. He's the right type of player this offense could use, no question; just not sure if he's the specific player this offense needs...

I think Leatherwood's stock is plummeting, also don't think Levi O is a day-1 guy when all is said and done. Like Ojulari better than Phillips for Pitt, but that's more of a style/scheme thing than a philosophical thing. Speaking of Phillips, I know you didn't include trades, but MY GOD, if he drops into the mid 20s I hope Beane is burning up the lines trying to move up to get him. Other than that, with the side comment that it feels a little 'chalk', nicely done...

Agreed. Of all of the DL cannon fodder mentioned around here he was by far my favorite.

Jamin Davis and Earnest Jones are 2 under the radar LBs that I'm really intrigued by. Both great athletes, both performed VERY well in the SEC.

I'm not kidding when I say that his continual development over the next couple years might be the most important factor in whether or not we win a super bowl in this era. Interesting that he dropped so many LBs, given the initial commentary about him playing inside and out... Sounds like that might've been turd polishing and they dropped it pretty quickly...

Pitts

He barely played for Cinci, which would speak to his bad season. Count me in at the right price, he flashed when given opportunity in Seattle.

LOL I'm not sure would else you would trust for an educated opinion on that, if not your own doctors? High usage RBs wear down fast, OL very often do not, so while yes, Long has had injuries in his past, comparing them as apples to apples doesn't feel appropriate to me. 32 is starting to get on the older side for an OL, for sure. My "narrative" is (and I've said this before) -- for us to remain in a championship window, we're going to have to take some risks. A guy who was formerly a stud and by all accounts, seems to be now in great shape again, seems like a risk well worth taking. The only factual information I have to go off of is that he's apparently healthy and I would trust our medical staff to do their homework on him before he got signed, so where's the issue there? Yes, he's had injury troubles, hence the year off. I, not being a doctor, am in no position to comment on whether or not those injuries would disqualify him from being considered or be cause for concern for whether or not he'd be able to last an entire season, that's for the doctors to decide. That is not a lazy take, it's simply the process, I'm not sure what you want me to do about it. Formerly high-level player + position of need + ostensibly healthy again + likely discount = risk well worth taking in my book.

"Way too long"??? He played in 2019. He took a year off to get healthy. He's Howie Long's son/Chris Long's brother, sooooo... I'm guessing he doesn't need the money. These are both lazy takes. Obviously any team signing him is going to do their due diligence on his health, so yes, clearly that's a hurdle for him to clear, but -- to my original point -- if he clears those hurdles, he's a 3x pro-bowl player at a position of need who will likely come at a discount...

Ughhhhhh yes pleeeeeease...