Beck Water

I'm hoping it's a thing where they're noting the drops more than the routine catches, but Yeah. Guy needs to get hooked up with Dawson Knox eye coordination guy or something.

If Dodson has improved in reading coverage and reacting, he could do OK. He can for-real *thump* on tackling and reading the run.

Good. Show Kinkaid that this is the NFL, it's not going to be easy

The only thing that could console me for drafting Boogie Basham with Creed Humphrey on the board, would be to see Basham succeed. It's why I value reading blow-by-blow accounts like Astro's. He usually clarifies which group is in when.

So now I'm confused, did Hamlin get two picks or one, and if one, was it thrown by Barkley or Kyle Allen?

Edit: from other reports, this was actually a Barkley pass, and the play had been whistled dead But still

I'm hoping that one or more of the guys who cover practice will spell out the personnel in the OL that are getting pwn'd. Apparently Dawkins, McGovern, and Morse are in there, and Brown. Is it Bates, Torrence, or Edwards at RG? Is this the lineup that's consistently getting owned?

Interesting that this is going on with McDermott apparently away from practice for a "family matter"

Uh-oh

(Note: this was said during practice, and is a joke. But yeah, would that be funny.

I care, and am also interested to know if it's Bates or Morse in at Center, because if the DL is pushing the OL back into Allen today but that didn't happen previously, it would be good if there are other OLmen on the roster who are capable of anchoring

Agree - McDermott's defense is totally designed to be a symbiotic unit where the whole is much greater than the sum of the parts - and it can fail and give up big plays when one guy is out of position. It fascinates me, actually. I'm forgetting who did a great breakdown on the 1st NWE game in 2021. We played some base D with Dodson, and whoever broke it down pointed out how Poyer chose the wrong gap and gave up a big gain, because Dodson looked the wrong way towards one gap, but then covered the other. Interesting look at the intricacies of how these guys communicate with each other on the field. Fans in preseason go for "eye candy" and can get all enthused about players like Tank Carder or Kiko Alonso who are actually free-lancing out of position and going for the ball - which can make for a big play at times, but is not what NFL defense is all about. AJ Klein First, it would help if you would explain what you mean by "below average player". Are you talking "no longer a starter"? But most teams keep 5 or 6 LB. Are you thinking, relative to the 180 or so LB that are signed to NFL rosters for half or so of the games during a given season, he's in the bottom 90? Whatever your metric is, what is your basis for your opinion that he is a below average player? That's something we can discuss.

Good writeup as usual, Gunner, with interesting points, so Thank You for that. I'm curious about how you see point #3 about Spector's "ceiling wise he is the best STer"? It's a fact that Spector was actually a healthy scratch much of the year, and when he did play, between him and Bernard, Bernard still got more ST snaps. Is this just hypothetical, based on athleticism and size?

From your keyboard to God's ears!

C'mon Dawkins, you gonna let AJE beatcha?

It could change, but so far it seems as though a bunch of the stalwart guys for real-time updates aren't at practice today. While that's understandable (tickets are scarce and maybe they gotta work for a living sometime), it means updates may be slim.

More Butler interview: Basically, I think what that translates to is saying Elam does not (yet) excel as an off-ball CB in the zone defense the Bills primarily rely on. That ain't a good sign for a 1st round pick. Whereas he's saying Benford really gets it when it comes to playing zone. Anyone else see it differently?

Indeed, interesting if the 3-legged race is sliding to 2 legs. I still think AJ Klein is in the mix, they just are confident in what he can and can't do and want to look at the younger players. So far it seems to be a pattern that Torrence is with the 1s for the initial, pre-stretching warm up segment that's half-speed or something like that Then Bates takes over with the 1's after the calisthenics/stretching, but sometimes Torrence mixes back in. Will be interesting to see if Morse takes over at C again today or sits out.

Anybody home? We see Allen walking on two legs without visible gimping, that's a Good Thing Chris Brown coverage of pre-practice Butler interview: