Mikie2times

448 yards and two TD's for a TE as a first round pick in year 2 is what you wanted? Only 3 TE's have been drafted in the first round since 2020 and he's one of them. Premium pick, non premium position, non premium production.

Even if our expectations were tempered heading into the year, we have a team that is capable of competing for a Super Bowl. Reaching an AFC Championship game is incredibly difficult, and as a Bills fan, it’s a rare experience—one that doesn’t come around often. For most of us, it’s something we may only experience a handful of times in our lives. Each time it happens, it carries a deep meaning. We saw the Bills in the 90s enjoy incredible regular season success, but ultimately fall short when it mattered most, and the disappointment of that lasted as a fan. This year has been one of the most exciting and successful in the franchise's history, and while it's been a thrill, I can't deny that there would still be a sense of disappointment if we fall short of reaching the Super Bowl. The significance of the Super Bowl, especially after the heartbreak of the 90s, is hard to put into words. The nostalgia it would bring, the emotional weight of being back there. For me, personally, the thought of them making it to the Super Bowl would stir up all sorts of emotions from my past. So, while it's been an amazing season, it’s hard to say that not reaching the Super Bowl wouldn’t be a disappointment. But still, it's been a really fun year and if it doesn't happen you just transition into College Basketball, knitting, or bourbon.

HOF QB's don't miss the playoffs very often. Then Tua got hurt and Rogers was trash, which was never part of the initial forecasts. So it's interesting to me when people keep leveraging how nobody picked us to do a lot this year. WELP, just so turns out we probably have the MVP and every divisional rival we have was horrific. So if we knew we had the MVP and no competition what would be the baseline projection then? The pundits just missed the boat. This offense is the best we have had since the early 90's. It's been a fun year, but it's always about the Super Bowl. I don't know how a loss here would be anything short of incredibly disappointing. I mean christ, I have heard all year how the Chiefs suck. We have been building our roster against them for 5+ years.

I do three spins

I love this team. Been a fan for my entire life. I thought your posts were pretty balanced. I think McD is going to waste the potential for a Dynasty. He's got Tony Dungy vibes all over him. My opinion will change when I see enough justification to change it. So according to plenty on here I shouldn't be a fan. I hate the Bills. They will debate anything but the actual topic and make the response personal every time. That is the price you pay for not conforming. Nothing new to this forum or life in general.

It was a big win, but as I said, very similar to the Houston playoff game. We almost gave it away and that shouldn't of happened. Saying that it needed to be a masterpiece is just stretching these statements out to make it look unrealistic.

They did, that is the best example of sustaining it

The negative Nancie's like me exist purely off the homers. McD has the Bills in the top 10 in turnovers forced basically every year he has been here. He clearly makes it a focus. On offense, Josh has been really good protecting the ball. So you would expect us to maintain an advantage here. You hope it doesn't fizzle out with the competition increasing, which is possible, but nobody really knows. You would also like the defense to not rank 28th in the NFL in EPA when you don't include turnovers but this team just isn't perfect. We have this thing two games away at this point. We will not be perfect this year, hopefully we can get thru these next two + in the battle and come away with the trophy. Then next year focus on just being a better unit as a whole.

Like 10 million articles exist discussing the volatility and "luck" of turnovers. We have seen some teams over the years stay on the right side of this equation for a signifgantly long time. So I think it is possible to be more than just lucky here. Specifically with INT data, that tends to be more consistent. Fumbles are a real crap shoot. To say we haven't got "lucky" on offensive fumbles this year would just be inaccurate. We will regress here, no way that doesn't occur. https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/turnovers-involve-a-lot-of-luck-but-which-nfl-teams-are-lucky-and-good/

The Carolina Panthers when McD led that defense to a Super Bowl were +20 on the year. Just as much as I question McD's defense, one thing he does really well is emphasize takeaways. He might just be the best in the NFL at it. We have ranked top 10 basically every year he has been here in takeaways. Partner that with an offense that doesn't throw INT's (fumbles have a bit more variance). It stands to reason we will be very good in turnover margin moving forward. But in a game to game vs the very best can we still count on them? Maybe, maybe not. I would have said no to the Ravens game coming down to it but we ended up +3. We will need them. We have basically leveraged our inability to be successful traditionally with them. Without them this is one of the bottom 5 defenses in the NFL.

The Good Our first half defensive game plan was excellent DL played very physical ED showed up, probably his best meaningful playoff game Offensive line protected Allen We mounted a running game against the best run defense in football Answering the early score and controlling the ball Made no mistakes and forced 3 by them The Bad Offense went ultra conservative Baltimore did whatever they wanted in the middle of the field Baltimore did whatever they wanted in the 2nd half, we had no answers Prevent on the TD at the end Started to resemble the Houston playoff collapse before the dropped 2 pointer I mean, it's sort of telling when you have a 10 point half time lead, +3 in turnovers, and you still need to a dropped 2 point conversion at the end. It should have never been that close.

I prefer yards per play. Houston outplayed the Chiefs, I think that much was obvious. Eagles Rams was down to the wire. Then turnovers really impacted the other two games. Usually the YPP winner tends to win outright, even more so than with total yards. Not perfect, but better. Yards Per play 5.2 Houston vs 4.2 Chiefs 5.7 LA Rams vs 5.7 Eagles 7.7 Detroit vs 6.6 Washington 7.3 Baltimore vs 4.6 Buffalo

Totally disagree with this. This shows first downs, yards, and yards per play for yesterdays game along with our last 3 playoff losses. If you have any idea based on that which games we crucified McD for and the one we are now celebrating, more power to you. We played a great first half then went onto put out a mirror image of the Texans playoff loss in the 2nd half. Tight on offense with the defense falling apart. Massive win for us, but as I have said in previous threads, not really sure how you say, great Scott! it is all different now! We can play playoff defense!

They get credit, but they're high variance events. Do we win the turnover battle 3-0 if we played again? Likely not. Do we win if we don't win the turnover battle 3-0? Likely not. Does that matter? Not in this game, we won, move on. Could it matter in forecasting future performance, sure.

The point is can we play at a level without turnovers to win games like this? I would argue no, but maybe it doesn’t matter. This team is likely going to keep protecting the ball and we can usually get a couple to go our way. Sort of a McD calling card. The Carolina defense he had in the Super Bowl did eventually come up dry and they lost. If you want to live and die with turnovers it’s going to be a bumpy road usually. But here we are, only two games left, this team isn’t perfect, defense is a big issue, but it doesn’t really matter at this point. Just win baby.