Beck Water

(click to make it readable) So to your point.....Fangio's big claim to DC fame, I think, are the SF defenses from his stint with the 9'ers 2011-2014. He had the #32 ranked D his previous stint as DC, 2005 in Houston. And SF had some pretty serious D talent in those days, especially at LB and Safety. The 2018 Bears (most recent claim) had a LB corps of Mack, Trevethan, Roquan Smith and Leonard Floyd, along with Akiem Hicks at DE and a couple of very talented DB. I personally thought the Miami D over-achieved under Flores/Josh Boyer. And they've certainly tried to add talent with Jalen Ramsey and Terron Armstead. But it's notable they have been running a 4-3 D and Vic Fangio's notable defenses have all used a 3-4 alignment. The Bills certainly saw a drop in quality when a #4 4-3 D was taken over by a DC whose bread and butter was a 3-4 alignment, and we didn't have the personnel to slot neatly into his wants. So I don't think it's a sure bet that Fangio's D will be the best in the AFC E this year. As for putting him as the best defensive coordinator in the AFCE, I guess that might be true considering his competition as actual DC are no one (Bills), Jeff Ulbrich (Jets, 3 years as DC), and no one (NWE, with Steve Belichick calling the D) By the way, Spotrac (FWIW) says "Ramsey will undergo knee surgery to repair a torn meniscus and is expected to remain out until at least December of the 2023-2024 season."

I believe those 2 teams are allowed to start training camp a week earlier because of it

As far as Diggs drops vs Shakir - here's that "eyeball test". When you're leading the team in receptions and yards as Diggs does, sure, you hate to see a drop. But in context of 150+ targets, 8 drops is relatively insignificant (5.2%). But when you're a rookie trying to prove yourself and earn more playing time as Shakir is, and you've gotten 20 targets, dropping 2 of them (scored drops, not contested or difficult catches of which there were also some "he coulda got that one" examples) is a much bigger deal that deserves its scrutiny. I like Shakir, and want him to succeed, but the cold hard football facts are that WR spots on the 53 man roster are limited, and need to go to a guy who won't drop 10% of his targets if the team wants to go places. So if Shakir wants to be that guy, he needs to fix it. The injury concern with Harty looms large to me. When you have posters whose opinions are often as diametrically opposed as myself and @BADOLBILZ and they both unanimously hone in on same concern on a player, it's probably legit. He's fast, and we have a good training staff, but scar tissue and damage from repeated injuries is a Thing.

I guess to some people, the distinction is volitional - lies are deliberately deceptive, where as deception can be unintentional? IDK. As someone who spent education/career working with numbers, statistics require careful context to be meaningful. And, they can be cherry-picked to make a point - which can be a form of lie. On the other hand, the eye test requires context to be meaningful as well as methodical observation from which the observer tries to eliminate personal bias. Professional football scouts train for this. Fans don't. And when you don't, you fall into the natural pattern of human psychology where "one aweshit cancels 10 attaboys" - seeing one mistake or bad angle leads you to say "he can't catch" or "he's never taking the right angle" As far as the Bills defense, they did NOT collapse in the 2021 playoffs. They did a nice job on NWE. A defense will seldom be able to totally shut down a top, juggernaut offense like KC. What they need to do, is stop the offense 4-5 times for FG or punts. The Bills D did that (as KC did to us), until the 13 seconds end (I'm not sure what you'd call that, it was certainly play calls/mistakes/execution lapses but total collapse, no) In 2022, the defense didn't "collapse" in the Miami game. 42 rush yards and 220 pass yards is not a statistical collapse. In fact, they bailed the offense out of a 4 fumble (1 lost), 2 interception effort. Against the Bengals, as far as I can tell, it was a total team collapse in all 3 phases. That speaks to psychology, not defensive scheme. The statistics of that game don't lie, but they have to be put in context. And part of that context is, on top of the pre-existing injuries toward the end of the season (Micah Hyde, Von Miller, Damar Hamlin Out; Jordan Poyer, Ed Oliver playing hurt) we piled on more from Miami. Of our DL starters, DaQuan Jones was out, Jordan Phillips was playing through a shoulder injury in a brace and limited, Tim Settle was playing on a calf injury. Guys like Eli Ankou and Boogie Basham were seeing significant time - and they're 2nd string for a reason. At one point our safeties were Cam Lewis and Jaquan Johnson. It's very observable that it was not the same defensive players that had put up the statistically great season, and when it was, they were obviously injured (wearing linebacker braces etc) What I find someone odd is, seems to me the same people who dismiss statistics as deceptive and prefer to rely on the "eye test" of saying the defense collapsed, don't seem willing or able to note this very basic and readily observable fact of it not being the same players, or them being injured - or dismiss it as an "excuse", when looking at the poor defensive result in the Bengals game. Yet injured/different players should surely be part of an "eye test"

Honest question: why do you feel it's a competition?

It's being attacked as unreasonable because without objective metrics, perceptions can be highly falliable and misleading. Emotions and feelings, when it comes to cold hard football facts, even more so. Ever heard the saying "one awshit wipes out 10 attaboys"? That saying encapsulates the fact that our perceptions and memories of an error, easily overwhelm our perceptions of positive contributions. There's also the point that eyewitness testimony has become recognized as notoriously unreliable. Who is doing this? Do you have a linky? Doesn't seem to be a Joe B production.

I don't think Teller was a Type 1 error. Beane knew he had talent, but considered him a likely backup that season (Cleveland was no different - he didn't start until 8 games into the season, due to injury). He also fell victim to Beane's belief that backup OLmen MUST have positional flexibility, the more the better. Bottom line it was a mistake, but had more to do with positional priorities than with talent evaluation. There's also the point that Teller became an all-pro in a different blocking system, if I'm not mistaken (that brings up a whole different set of questions, but I don't feel like going there too early. Nit: I really hate to do this also because I like Teller, but he was a 2nd team all pro in 2020 and 2021, and a pro-bowler in 2021 and 2022. All worthy honors, but 2nd team not quite the honor that 1st team is. Teller's wiki doesn't clarify this point.

Spector was a healthy scratch for the Vikes game. So he wasn't an option when Edmunds went down. But I don't think they would have played him. Fun fact so was Kaiir Elam, so the starting CBs were Dane Jackson and Christian Benford. Starting safeties were Damar Hamlin and ....I kid you not, Cam Lewis (Jaquan Johnson was available and played ST)

Lavonte David decided he wanted to stay with the Bucs - he's been in that area a minute (12 years) makes sense. Bobby Wagner decided "you can go home again!" and got himself released from the Rams to go back to aweing the Seasnakes in practice. Doesn't sound as though either of them were very interested in changing teams.

Reluctantly, I agree.

He's not specifying who those reps are with. Could be Dodson at MLB with the 1s and Spector with the 2s?

I always thought Feliciano was kind of a bully. The guy who compensates for his lack of skill during the play, by acting tough afterwards. You see it differently? If you search "Dawkins" I think you'll find your feelings are mistaken

When Hackett was in Buffalo, the general feeling was he was a dingleberry to Doug Marrone - that Marrone was the OC in fact while he was the OC in name. If I remember correctly one rumor was that he had a bunch of creative plays drawn up that he wanted to run and Marrone put the kibbosh on it. But was that Hackett, or was that "St Doug" Marrone? Rumor was, with the Bills, Marrone was quite the control freak with his fingers over every aspect. PR, OC, OL....

I think that's what Ed Oliver, Greg Rousseau, etc are saying

Count me among the under-raters. There was a reason why the Bills let Marlowe move on in 2021 FA. There's also a reason why the Lions gave him a 2 yr contract but moved on after a year, And why the Falcons gave him a 1 yr contract in 2022 FA but were willing to trade him in November for a 7th. Marlow is 31. Hamlin is 25. If it's close, Youth Wins It's a very valid point that we don't know how Hamlin will react when it's for-real tackling, or whether he's able to be back to his pre-incident form. I could be totally off the wall but I'm not sure the competition is between Hamlin and Marlowe.

Can't argue with that.

By other reports, Murray laid the lumber on his next carry.

Awesome write up, thanks for sharing! Could you tell anything about what happened on the Josh throw to Kincaid that missed him short? Was it some kind of communication error or is Josh having some technique issues?

On the Bengals drive before the incident, I didn't think any of the Bills D was playing well. We can all tell Hamlin was in position to make the tackle when he got the hit that stopped his heart. Isn't it just amazing how Hamlin started 13 games and was 3rd on the Bills in combined tackles, 4th in solo tackles - while taking poor angles and being bad in coverage all year? And Wow - a Safety who takes poor angles and is bad in coverage, playing with another Safety who had multiple injuries or with a STer 3rd string safety, and yet somehow the defense was #2 in Points Against. Seems very odd - almost miraculous

So let's look at this from a football perspective. The Bills currently have 7 safeties on the roster: Dr Poyer (incumbent starter, age 32) Mr Hyde (incumbent starter, age 32) Damar Hamlin (age 25, primary backup last season, played after Hyde injury) Taylor Rapp (age 25, FA acquisition, former 2nd round pick, 4 years with Rams, won Superbowl with them) Dean Marlowe (age 31, 7 year vet, backup on Bills last season) Jared Mayden (age 25, 2020 UDFA, has bounced around SF, Eagles, Bills, Jets PS - was on Bills PS when Hyde was injured) Zayne Anderson (age 26, PS player signed from KC) I believe the Bills usually keep 4 safeties on the 53 man roster. Looking at it purely from the viewpoint of demonstrated talent level and counting Poyer and Hyde "in", Hamlin and Rapp would probably be the next two in terms of demonstrated playing ability. Dean Marlowe looked old and slow last season, I don't think he looks faster and younger this season. So if Hamlin plays at anything close to last year's level, it seems likely that he's still "next man up" along with Rapp. There's a possibility that Mayden or Anderson outplay Hamlin and Rapp, but I haven't heard any noise from them yet. There's also the possibility that Hamlin gets hit on a tackle a few times, suffers mental effects, and decides to pursue philanthropy full time. If the Bills cut Hamlin, it will be for football reasons that will be clear, and will be a 48 yr wonder - no more.

Well, Brown did start 14 regular season and 2 playoff games for the Bills last season after post-season back surgery. I think they're similar just in having had a back injury, which isn't that uncommon for OLman

https://www.audacy.com/wgr550/sports/bills/stefon-diggs-has-been-unguardable-at-training-camp?utm_campaign=sharebutton&utm_medium=social&utm_source=twitter.com&utm_term=WGRAM Sal C's take

I can't claim to know the intricacies of the Cowboys OL, but I thought Tyler Biadasz was their C and started every game but Week 18 I hope Dion gets it together. I have trouble assessing how he played last season because it's true that when an OLman is playing next to a guy who is struggling, he struggles. More true for IOL but still true at OT.