Beck Water

I went on twitter, and I went to sharp's site https://www.sharpfootballanalysis.com/content/ I want to look at methodology - does "drafted themselves" count UDFA, for example? I don't read this as applying at all to how much the players played, as rookies. I think what it means is that when McDermott arrived, he basically purged the building of players drafted and developed by previous regimes, and brought in FA he trusted as well as rookies. And a lot of those FA have held on to jobs for a long time - eg DB Hyde, Poyer vs. Hamlin, Jaquan Johnson; DL Star Lotulelei, Jerry Hughes, Mario Addison over Harrison Phillips, AJ Epenesa, Boogie Basham and Greg Rousseau It does mean that a number of players the Bills have drafted have NOT worked out for the Bills or have been traded elsewhere (I'm not including guys who reached FA and we didn't re-sign like Harrison Phillips and Tremaine Edmunds.) 2017 Zay Jones (2), Nathan Peterman (5), Tanner Vallejo (6) 2018 Wyatt Teller (5), Ray-Ray McCloud (6), Austin Proel (7) 2019 Cody Ford (2) , Vosean Joseph (5), Darryl Johnson (7), Tommy Sweeney (7) 2020 Zach Moss (3), Jake Fromm (5), Isaiah Hodgins (6) 2021 Marquez Stevenson (6), Rachad Wildgoose (6) 2022 Matt Araiza (6), Luke Tenuta (6) What's striking to me looking back at 6 years of McDermott drafts and 5 years of Beane, is how many of the top draft choices have worked out, and worked out well, as well as how many of the players we moved on from are starting for other teams (Teller, McCloud, Hodgins). Most of those players we moved on from are late-round players where the overall hit rate for every team is poor, and many of them stayed around for several years, but didn't beat out the guys ahead of them (McCloud, Sweeney, Hodgins) But equally striking to me is how many of the times we did use a 2nd or 3rd round pick on offense, it hasn't worked out - Zay Jones, Cody Ford, and Zach Moss all big whiffs. It's almost as though we have much better ability to identify and sign defensive talent.

I don't think people forget that. The bottom line is that the R side of our OL was a fiasco, and the best that can be said of Brown is that he has yet to prove he can pass protect as a RT. Why do you trust Beane and McD when they say positive things about him? At this time of year, That's Their Job. They said positive things about Cody Ford, too.

I would take that from what Beane said, that he’s a vertical threat who can track the ball From the Athletic article describing him as a “speed merchant” who can exploit coverage that fears letting him past to cut underneath, I think he’ll play in the slot but maybe less than one would think against zone

I would think that against man coverage, Waddle and Hill would laugh and say “Feed Me!”

No, just weird. I’ll give you full-deflection readings on the wierdometer Again, judging by what I read here, I don’t think that’s an unpopular opinion I don’t mean I personally agree with that opinion, I’m saying that I read stuff that amounts to that opinion on a regular basis.

Am I the only one here who doesn’t look at trading draft picks, then finding $19.45M to pay a 31 1/2 yr old WR who has played 19 out of 34 games in the last 2 years as an unmitigated Great Idea? In the 2020 offseason, when Nuk was traded, I was bereft that he wasn’t traded to us. I viewed Diggs as a talented player and Hopkins as All World But That was Then, This is Now

I don’t think they’ll be counting on Doyle to go into the season due to his ACL. So they’ll add one more. But it might be Bobby Hart 🤪 (I think that will qualify as an unpopular opinion)

That’s a really good question. If I were guessing, I would guess “no”, but that the team knew Frazier was working some things out. Some relevant factors: 1) As the coaches and FO evaluated the team, I think it became clear that they were more likely than not to lose Edmunds. They also knew they could lose Poyer. 2) Frazier has indicated a desire to get a HC gig and frustration at not getting looks this year 3) Based on the “last game highlights where you most need to improve” seems pretty clear OL, WR, and run game have to be top priorities and maybe the defense needs to take a back seat I expect this was all being worked out up to the week before the combine. If the defense takes a step back without Edmunds, Frazier might feel that will hurt his case for a HC gig Being fired wouldn’t help his case, but “I need to take a step away for a year” is nicely vague and can have many causes. it could protect him from responsibility for any drop in defensive performance with Edmunds moving on and maybe lower talent on DL if Miller isn’t ready early in the season or if he and Tre White aren’t back up to par. So in this scenario, the team would know that Frazier wasn’t a happy camper for the reasons above, but wouldn’t know what he was gonna do about it.

I don't think the Cardinals are gonna eat anything on his salary. If I'm doing the math correctly, they're going to eat $22.6M of amortized bonuses of various sorts accelerating onto this year's cap with a trade. They do have $21.4M cap space, but that would gobble down almost all of it.

D Hop last 2 years - 10 games and 9 games. Last year he averaged 79.7 ypg, which is just a bit better than his career average of 77.9 or his Zona average of 77 (but down a bit from 78.2 in HOU) The question comes down to the injury history etc. In 2021, he was bothered by a series of nagging injuries - ribs, hamstring, and then finally an MCL tear. Last season, he missed the first 6 games because he was suspended for PED use, then was injured again and did not play in the last 2 games due to a "grade 1 knee sprain" (grade 1 means no tearing) - whether he could have gone if the games meant something, we won't know. But, he'll also be 32, an age when the length of the football season takes its toll and injuries start to mount. If anyone is interested, Draft Sharks gives his injury history, and calculates his chance of an injury at 58% for next season, with the projection he'll miss 3 games. https://www.draftsharks.com/fantasy/injury-history/deandre-hopkins/6679 The new guy a lot of folks are enthusiastic about has recurring hammy problems, btw

He's not recalculating. He's just using a base system other than 10

Judging by what I read around here, that doesn't qualify as an "unpopular opinion"

Apologies if this was posted upthread, but Jason LaCanfora just SCORCHED the ideo of Aaron Rodgers trade to the Jets with Sal Capaccio: You're kinda young, aintcha?

That definitely sounds like a draft that would have me vomit my Tacos I feel that points of agreement between TBD folks should be celebrated.

I don't think so, no. There was an 18 yd completion to Davis, the strip sack/injury recovered by Ryan Bates, an incompletion to Diggs that fell short, then the throw to Davis. Not just 4th and 21, but 4th and 21 from our own 14 yd line with 33 seconds left in the game, and no timeouts left for the Bills. Completing a nice 21 yd pass to get us to our own 35 yd line would not have gotten us too much.

Sorry, what I meant was "What Dawinstein and Davefan 66 said. No, running out to by an Apple won't solve your problems" Didn't mean to suggest that you were one of the "go buy a mac" advice givers, just to suggest that I thought your advice was good.

Don't we already have an older experienced vet on the roster, to mentor the younger pass rushers?

Surely the Jets will sign him to play with the #2 QB in the league, after Rodgers and the Jets and GB stop talking and get to the written word. How'd that go with another experienced veteran, Tommy in Tampa, when you strolled up on the sidelines to give him the benefit of your views? If Cole wants to play in the league next season, Drive-Bys on Twitter are probably not his best strategy

I think they just don't talk about it at all.

My Ignore file is lonely without you! It can no longer resist you. In you go, INto the sack.

Harris’ contract numbers up. As reported, $1.77M - quite a change from his $7.7M reported "market value" on Spotrac. He got base salary just over vet minimum - $1.12M, with reportedly $400k of that guaranteed; signing bonus of $600k so total guarantee $1M of that $1.77M No publicized milestones or incentives. https://www.spotrac.com/nfl/buffalo-bills/damien-harris-29123/

That's 80% where I am - Fix the Oline! Please fix the Oline! And, draft an offensive skill player, a WR or TE, before the 4th or 5th round please! We really can't afford to bring in another highly-paid vet WR on the cap, so we need to succeed with draft-and-develop. I do agree with the TBN writer who said that keeping Dorsey as OC is the biggest risk the Bills are taking. He's got to 1) take a step with his play designs and play calling 2) he and Joe Brady have got to get into Josh Allen's psyche and keep him from succumbing to the lure of the Aggressive Deep Shot. We need an effective short game and a run game to keep teams honest.

Contract details for McKenzie out. Took a significant price cut over the $2.2M he would have made with the Bills Basically, getting a vet minimum salary for a 6 season veteran, but he's getting a signing bonus and some additional guaranteed money. Funny how contract details like that involving a drop in pay take a while to be released Colts can move on from him pretty much any time without sneezing given their $21M cap, but McKenzie takes home more than a practice squad player earns, and more than the ~$330k would have received from the Bills if they brought him into training camp and then cut him.

Agree about 50/50 with the Bengals vs. being waffle-stomped. I think there might be a point that the Bengals really pumped themselves up for the Bills game and gave it everything they got, then they struggled to get back to the same place and didn't have as much to give vs. the Chiefs, same as happened to the Chiefs last season. You're likely right that the Chiefs had the "PR pump up" card with all the trash talk about "Burrowhead" and the "0-3 vs. Burrow" talk. But when I saw Burrow on the sideline in the Bengals game, he didn't look like the same "stone cold killer in the face" we saw vs. the Bills. He had that thousand-yard glazed stare. They did put up a better fight than the Bills did, for sure. I think I disagree that the Bills were "mentally beaten" or "running on fumes" the entire second half of the season. "Mentally beaten" teams don't win 8 games in a row. I do feel they were struggling offensively. Things that they were doing earlier in the season were omitted from their game plan; things that came easily, didn't. I think that has to do with Josh's UCL injury being worse and hampering him more than was generally reported; he acknowledged at the end of the season that he couldn't throw with his preferred rotational throwing motion and had to revert to a lateral motion that he used prior to 2020 (and was less accurate with). And then they lost Von Miller and had Poyer's injuries piling up, so the defense wasn't able to pick up the slack.

I think the coaches have a role to play, and I think the game plan has a role to play, but I think the way the Bills played vs. the Bengals wasn't a function of the game plan. One can say if the team is flat, the coaches haven't done their job correctly to motivate and inspire the players. But ultimately, great players on great teams have to be interiorly motivated, too; it's not like they're robots where the coaches can wind them up and find the right buttons or give the perfect motivational speech. Sometimes there's a "right" motivational speech that helps and sometimes I think there isn't.