Beck Water
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Posts posted by Beck Water
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1 minute ago, ColoradoBills said:
Morris has a chance to develop. I mean there was a lot of this board calling Knox "a scrub" at the start of last season. 'member?
I think there's a reason that when Morris was obviously in pain, both McDermott and Beane hustled over to check on him.
I don't think it's because he's not in their plans.
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2 hours ago, wjag said:
Is practice over? I thought the rules of engagement for the press is no reporting while practice is going on...
One of them tweeted that they've now moved into the regular season rules where the press is only allowed at stretching/position drills and then in the locker room.
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I've seen a few specific reports about injuries, but nothing about practice in general.
Thought I'd start one
McKenzie, Howard, Mancz, Doyle, and Settle off to the side.
As already reported, Morris pulled up on a route and was stretched on the sideline before heading to the locker
Dawkins says "We're already past it. It's over with" about Araiza's release
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12 minutes ago, ndirish1978 said:
McAfee, whom you should trust in regards to his opinions about punters and kickers, says Kern is a no-brainer and the best punter available for the Bills and that he is very good at kicking in inclement weather.
(McAffe's reaction to the news that Kern was released)
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7 minutes ago, Billzgobowlin said:
We have plenty of cap room with restructuring Dawkins. I'm guessing Araiza's contract wasn't guaranteed either
It was not, and as it's an after-June 1 cut the Bills have moved part of his modest signing bonus to next year's cap. We are carrying $52k dead money for Araiza.
Since Kern has been cut, we do not have to pick up his previous salary.
Spotrac shows the Bills currently with $10.7M top-51 cap, -$6.96M overall cap. Since "overall cap" is what matters when the "top 51" rule expires, it's a little hard to guess, but if I take my shot at the 53 man roster then add a reasonable guess for practice squad, I come up wiith $4-4.6M cap space.
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38 minutes ago, PromoTheRobot said:
😂😂😂 This sounds promising.
That's often been true for Belicheck
Even between 2011-2018 when the Patriots played in the Conf Champ or Superbowl every year, 4 out of 8 years his record going into Game 5 was 2-2
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2 hours ago, BillsFanSD said:
We all need to keep in mind that we don't know what the Bills know.
I am extremely uncomfortable with Matt Araiza (or any player) being released based on what we know right now. We, the general public, don't even know what Araiza's side of the story even is. None of us can possibly have an informed opinion of whether it's credible, to what degree it conflicts with the version of events laid out in the complaint, whether he's changed his story over time, etc.
I can easily imagine a situation in which the Bills had excellent reasons for dumping Araiza. For example, suppose hypothetically that he told them back in July that he never touched Jane Doe and now last week he admits to having consensual sex with her -- I would absolutely be in favor of firing an employee who lied about something like that, or omitted that kind of major detail from his story. These kinds of issues often come down to who you're going to believe, and why take the word of somebody who has already been dishonest with me once? But again, this is just speculation and I have no idea if anything like this happened.
Unfortunately, I can also easily imagine a situation in which the Bills made an effort to get their facts straight, decided that there wasn't enough evidence to take any action against Araiza, and then got cowed into doing so by a Twitter mob. I would be disappointed if that's what the Bills did, but a) it's been known to happen and b) I have no idea if that's what actually happened.
I argued over the weekend for withholding judgement on Araiza until we had better information. I'm strongly inclined to give the Bills the same benefit of the doubt. They have a pretty good track record and their incentives were aligned correctly. I have no reason to think that they acted improperly, so I'll assume their decisions were reasonable until shown evidence to the contrary.
Quality post. I would like to note that Araiza has not, as far as I know, in fact admitted to having sex of any kind with Jane Doe. There is an allegation in the plaintiff's lawsuit that he admitted to having sex in a taped phone conversation. But that is an allegation in a lawsuit, based upon the plaintiff's recollection of the conversation, not the tape. It should not be taken as fact. I guess Araiza's lawyer rather implied he might have, by omission? Which is closer to Araiza admitting it. But still.
I am NOT uncomfortable with Araiza (or any player) being released based on what we know right now.
An employer is not a court of law. Their math for an employee is fundamentally a simple flowchart:
"Does this employee bring our business more benefit than detraction?"
Yes -> keep him
No -> off he goes.
I've been both the manager and the managee in this equation.
So we look hard-heartedly at this equation. The Bills are made aware of allegations that they acknowledge, would have taken him off their draft board. But he's drafted, he's performing remarkably, he's apparently a likeable guy and a good teammate. Players and coaches are human. No one wants to feel they could be one phone call of allegations away from the unemployment line; no manager wants to fire a strong contributor over allegations.
So I strongly disagree with Fairburn and others in the press who are beating the drum that the Bills should have kicked Araiza to the curb the moment they learned of the allegations.
But once the alleged misbehavior is out in the public eye and known in the locker room, that benefit/harm equation has to be revisited.
You have a locker room full of human beings. Many of them are husbands or have steady girlfriends. Many of them are "girl dads". Now they're reading that one of their brothers, is alleged to have "mickey'd" a girl and brought her to a room where she was gang raped for 1 1/2 hrs and left bruised and bleeding from her ***** and ripped piercings. That's hard to wrap your mind around. You could see how shaken McDermott, Keenum, and Barkley were
It can not help but be a distraction and a morale-buster in the locker room, even if Araiza continues to perform remarkably. Look how divided we are in our opinions in this thread. It will be this divisive in the locker room.
IMHO the minute the specific allegations came out in public with Araiza's name attached to them (with or without a lawsuit), the benefit/harm equation shifted drastically and the Bills had to cut him.
I personally think the Bills response was not the best. I think they could have milked the plaintiff's lawyer for information about his motivations and intentions and 'read the tealeaves' that this was NOT a situation that was going to go away or reach a quiet settlement (despite the plaintiff's lawyer taunting Araiza with that possibility, that's clearly not his desired end game). Then I think their best path would have been to cut Araiza, keep Haack, and explore trades/team cuts for a Haack upgrade. They could have done that "for skill" and given reasons that would raise no eyebrows - a similar situation of "young boomer vs canny directional artist and proven holder" is playing out in Tennessee.
That would be what we used to call the "least ripples" path
It is, of course, possible that the Bills did find some discrepancy between information they gathered independent of the investigation and what Araiza told them
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23 minutes ago, Rubes said:
Looks like a hammy to me. Possible he could be out for a couple of weeks, we'll see.
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35 minutes ago, Motorin' said:
This is actually really interesting, and a worthwhile watch.
Jamie Erdahl, asked for her opinion, takes it somewhere I didn't expect.
Her key point: if a player's name is on a police report before the draft, that information should be made common to 32 teams. It shouldn't be a case that [at least] 2 teams know something about it, while others [at least 11] don't "our investigators are better than yours, nyah nyah".
My head is kind of exploding trying to wrap my mind around this. Overall, I think it's the kind of thing that sounds good, but really would be a Swamp.
First of all, Erdahl says "for the last 10 years" which, for 21-24 yr old young men is clearly inappropriate; juvenile records are sealed, juveniles who are questioned or mentioned in police reports, that should not be available.
Second, "on a police report" can be there as a "person of interest" later dropped from consideration as a suspect, can mean questioned as a possible witness, can mean lots of things.
Do we really want to go someplace in our society where just being mentioned on a police report can impact someone's career chances? I think we're already in a bad place civilly where having bad credit, which can be caused by identity theft or credit reporting agency error, affects job prospects and housing choices and the person affected has little redress. I have a friend whose sibling has been repeatedly bypassed for jobs he was qualified for by education and experience, and interviewed well for, because his credit is a wreck. Why is his credit a wreck? He had a joint bank account with his elderly mother so he could help her pay taxes etc - and she fell into the hands of a predatory drug addict who moved in and financially abused her.
So I'm not comfortable with that "if your name is on a police report, Tell the World" idea.
On the other hand, we're talking about reports of possible "red flag" behavior that some teams will have more concern with than others, and that theoretically just serve as a basis for questions to be asked so that the team can make a judgement. So maybe there should be a list of "flagged information" where if one team gets information, it should be shared.
On the gripping hand, we're talking about the NFL draft, where "all's fair in love and pre-draft maneuvering" so tactics such as releasing dubious information right before the draft in the hopes of causing teams drafting ahead of you to back off a player and letting him falls to you, are a thing. So I can see clear potential for that information exchange to be misused.
It's still one of the more interesting (and solution based) suggestions I've heard coming out of this brouhaha
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1 hour ago, Forlorn hope said:
What's revealing to me with arazia, is if he is innocent, he would seemingly cooperate with police and tell the authorities who was at the party. Show the police his phone, texts, timelines etc.
If he was guilty, logic would entail the prisoners dilemma and one of these guys would turn on the other.
This is why I think something very shady is going on with SDSU, SDPD
Strongly recommend that you watch this, for your own benefit and the benefit of people you know and love.
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1 hour ago, Ed_Formerly_of_Roch said:
OK have to ask. Not going to try and read 276 pages to find it but believe one of the posters, actually think it was one of the moderators commented that he's a bit busy with his day job preparing for the NASA moon launch to comment too much on this thread.
Just read the launch was canceled for today, do wonder if Two Bills Drive participation is the root cause of the delay??
Anyone know who that was??
Search engine here ain't great, but it will do an adequate job finding unusual terms like "moon" in a thread.
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32 minutes ago, Shaw66 said:
Well, Beane seemed to think that most teams didn't know about this. From reading here, it sounds like there have been only two teams who said they knew before the draft, then the ball wasn't dropped. Two teams just had guys who made highlight-reel catches.
What will happen, I'm sure, is that the Bills will ask themselves what questions should have been asked, or what people should have been contacted, and those questions and people will become part of the process going forward.
Now let's be clear here. Beane said that "we're up into the double-digits (meaning 10 or more) and no one knew about this"
10 is not "most"
10 is not even "the majority"
Nor is it "only" 2 teams who said they knew; the AP reporter who broke that said that he contacted 5 teams, 2 knew there was "something" (didn't dig because they didn't plan to draft a punter), 3 didn't know.
I posted the probability elsewhere that what were the odds, if "only" 2 teams knew and Beane contacted 10 teams, he missed finding one that knew? That's 45% assuming it's random (it's probably not random; the AP reporter and Beane probably reached out first to teams where they have the best contacts)
I agree with your second paragraph: Beane will learn from this and their pre-draft process will change.
27 minutes ago, Warcodered said:Right what I'm saying is that, that moment made it clear that the expectation that Ariaza could just fall in line with the teams media response wasn't reasonable. In a situation like this it makes perfect sense for him to follow his legal representations advice on how best to defend himself not the team.
OK. But his legal representative has also said that he "hoped the team would not cut Araiza". His client's interest is not limited to how "best to defend himself". If he wants the team to not cut Araiza, he needs to refrain from actions that make it more likely - I don't think it's reasonable to believe that there's a significant difference to Araiza's defense if he makes the statement during the game, vs. after the game or even after talking to the team.
Personally from various things said, I would say Araiza's legal representative may possibly be a competent defense lawyer, but he's shown himself inept at handling a sexual assault/rape allegation that could reasonably be expected to come into the public arena. The June 3 and July 29th LA Times article that quoted the victim's lawyer made it clear he was gonna "go there" if criminal charges were not forthcoming PDQ.
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5 minutes ago, YoloinOhio said:
Well, 52. They have to sign a punter once they are done. But I suppose they can keep an extra guy until they do that.
They're probably going to put Stevenson and possibly Doyle on short-term in-season IR, so carrying one of them on the 53 then IR'ing him to sign a punter might be a Thing
3 minutes ago, Mark Vader said:Yeah, I would also add Tanner Owen.
Really? Say more...what did you see?
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This is another TE discussion from a Cover1 pod after the Denver game
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14 hours ago, Warcodered said:
That may have well crystalized why it was very much time to move on, from a team perspective they might want to control exactly how any message gets out, but that's not reasonable to expect for someone in this situation.
I believe it's an NFL rule that players are not supposed to tweet or make other social media posts during a game. Certainly personal phone use is prohibited on the sidelines.
I don't think it's unreasonable to expect a guy who is still on the team, but has been pulled aside for being personally involved in a huge distraction, to have the judgement to refrain from putting out a statement DURING THE ACTUAL GAME.
You could tell McDermott was pissed about that and it may have been part of an "OK, Enough" moment.
1 minute ago, Warcodered said:How in depth an investigation do you do on a 6th round pick though?
Fair question, and the answer may vary from team to team.
Probably for the two teams who picked up on something, the answer is "if he's on our board anywhere, we do this kind of background".
Maybe for other teams, the answer is "if we've got him rated 6th or 7th round, Not much"
I expect this experience is going to cause the Bills and several other teams to re-visit their procedures on this point.
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1 hour ago, PromoTheRobot said:
So the Bills beat media blame the team for "not knowing sooner" and how all this information was out there earlier. Yet those same reporters didn't know either.
It's the "job" of the Bills FO to do deep research on the backgrounds of all the players on their draft boards.
That's not in the job descriptions of local reporters.
50 minutes ago, Forlorn hope said:Fairburn and skurski etc think the buffalo bills have cia, nsa and fbi resources. Maybe even the kgb too...
To be fair, I don't think CIA, NSA and FBI resources were needed. Per comments released by the university, rumors of the gang rape in an off-campus house where football players lived, and that it involved Matt Araiza, were circulating through the athletic department and "99% of the football team" knew about it. There was a police investigation.
This is exactly the sort of thing area scouts and background investigators employed by teams are supposed to be able to find out. So there was probably a ball to catch, and it was dropped
I think some people here made a likely correct observation that the Bills may not have expected to be able to draft Araiza where they had him slotted (5th-7th round) and may not have resourced this - or their area scout may not have been the best at this.
To return to the topic, I think Fairburn's opinion piece in the Athletic is total crap. Skurski's piece strikes me as moderately factual. YMMV.
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7 minutes ago, Warriorspikes51 said:
Okay, I keep hearing most people talking about how Howard hasn't shown anything and many seem to want him cut or traded if there's any takers.
Am I alone in thinking he actually looked sneaky good?
He's shown good blocking. He's been lined up out wide and the few times he was thrown the ball he made plays including the TD.
in Carolina he had a red zone route where he absolutely exploded off the snap
I see him as being TE2 and a regular factor in red zone due to his size.
I would also keep Morris
Thoughts?Cover1 did a good video on this
Their conclusion is that who the Bills keep may depend upon exactly what they're looking for from the position
If they want the best blockers, they keep Howard and Sweeney
If they want the best receivers, they keep Morris and maybe Howard as a red-zone target
None of the three seem to be a complete all around TE
My take:
Howard has blocked well at times but he's also whiffed bad at times. He doesn't seem to have the power you'd expect from a big TE.
Sweeney has strength and power, and he blocks well when linemen approach him with power, but against starting front-7 in the league who have speed and use leverage well, he just gets moved aside. He can't be counted on as an in-line blocker which is why the Bils went to putting in a 6th OLman like Bates and then Doyle last season. As a receiver, he has sometimes been noticed for the wrong reason (not catching) but then he'll make a couple good receptions.
Morris can't block in-line, but he's a good ?angle blocker? in the style of an RB or WR. He's a reliable receiver
Bottom line none of them seem to be a complete TE, so it's gonna depend upon what traits Dorsey most values. I would like to see the Bills minding the cutout bin as well.
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12 minutes ago, BADOLBILZ said:
Keenum has 78 TD and 48 INT in his career for a 2.2% INT and an 86 QB rating
Barkley 11 TD 22 INT with 6.7% INT and 66 QB rating
These players are not comparable.
Thank you. I believe you're aware of the following, but to the OP you responded to what follows below needs saying:
The only reason Barkley vs Keenum is a question, is because Keenum had a rough outing in the first preseason game behind a jailbreak OL throwing to second and third string WR who were possibly not where they were supposed to be, when they were supposed to be there. Plus, it may have been a "progress check" where he realized he wasn't as fully versed in how to run the offense against totally different defensive looks, as he thought he was.
During the 2nd preseason game when playing behind the 1s or a mix of 1s and 2s, Keenum looked like what he is - a fully functional NFL QB who does not quite have the physical tools to start in the league.
He is the backup, and he knows he is the backup. He indirectly said that in his post-game presser, explaining how important the game is to the players who were "playing for a job" and explaining "he's been there". Note the tense, he's not there now, and he knows it.
Preseason stats are meaningless. If they meant something, Peterman would be proudly starting at QB for the Bills.
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17 hours ago, Bills2022 said:
The fact that no criminal charges have been brought after nearly a year likely means someone is protecting the University or the girl has some history of making claims after attending college parties. It could be both. These guys are sketchy, but her lawyer screams lawyer/PR guy that is trying to make her famous.
So unfortunately, I don't think that's necessarily true that "someone is protecting the university".
It may be true, or true to some extent.
It may also be true that this is a crime where it's going to be very difficult to prosecute and it's taking a while to put a package of evidence together
Look at where the police started: they had a bruised young woman with bloody clothes who came to them the day after the crime. They may look at her and listen to her story and fully believe she was the victim of a serious crime that they would like to see prosecuted to the full extent of the law. What do they have to work with?
She admits she has only hazy and incomplete memories of the crime, she doesn't clearly remember anything after meeting a guy outside and "flirting/introduced". She doesn't know if the bruises on her neck were hickies or strangulation marks. I'm not even clear they would have enough "probable cause" to search the house at that point. If they do have terabytes of data, they probably did search at some point and seize cell phones. Then they get to go through the cell phones in a legally admissable way. The labs that do that work are likely backlogged. It's a mess. It's going to take time.
15 hours ago, djp14150 said:The calls are inadmissible in criminal/ civil court. Califotnia is a two party stste.
if no warrant was issued for the recordings to occur and they get released by her attorney then she and her lawyer can get sued. The police can never release that recording or put it in the public record.
if they do and they did not have a warrant it was illegally obtained evidence and they will be subject to ethics/ legal violations
This has been covered multiple times up thread. It is not true in California.
https://www.lacriminaldefenseattorney.com/legal-dictionary/p/pretext-calls/
QuoteIn some states, law enforcement must obtain a court order before setting up a pretext call or are prohibited all together. In California, Penal Code Section 633 allows law enforcement officers to orchestrate and tape these calls as long as they are acting within the scope of their official duties.
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12 minutes ago, Shaw66 said:
Bills stuck with Josh when the news about his high school tweets broke the night before the draft.
Bills stuck with Beas when he went anti-vax.
Bills stuck with Araiza when they first heard the story in July. But when the story broke, it was clear they weren't going to get ahead of it and it was clear that Araiza wasnt as important as a QB or a slot receiver.
With respect, I think you've got it mixed.
An alleged gang rape leaving a young woman bruised and bloody, is hella more significant of an issue than some HS tweets or an anti-vax rant.
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16 minutes ago, StHustle said:
If true, Araiza should sue him for defamation.I think he may have other issues to mind. Just a hunch
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12 minutes ago, Kirby Jackson said:
There are probably another 200-300 that you’d get to before considering Moorman. There are probably another 50-75 that you’d get to before Schum. Sign someone that is good at punting in 2022.
They’ll kick the tires on all of these guys. Kern is certainly the favorite. He isn’t the long-term solution there but for a year or two he is still fine.
AP article on Kern.
https://apnews.com/article/tennessee-titans-nfl-sports-nashville-27ca802959919731ba12d4e1c2a6e44a
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3 hours ago, ColoradoBills said:
It seems to me these are their options.
1. They are working out guys who are not currently on any team.
2. They can put in a waiver claim on a cut punter they are high on.
3. If they don't get a waived punter, they can try out any remaining guys.
4. If they sign a guy who was waived and claimed, they can always cut him if they feel they have an upgrade.
I get the feeling a lot of punters are chewing at the bit to sign in Buffalo. It should work out OK.
One other option: Beane could work a trade before cutdown day, swapping a player the Bills would cut for a punter the trade partner would cut.
Neither team has to take their chances with waivers, both teams get something of value to them
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Just now, Kirby Jackson said:
The loser of Kern/Stonehouse
The loser of Chrisman/Huber
There are MULTIPLE other punters already on the street that outperformed Haack just last year: Ty Long, Jordan Berry, and Michael Palardy.
There are 5 upgrades off the top of my head. This isn’t difficult. We fall in love with AWFUL ideas because we are comfortable with them. That’s stupid. That’s really stupid for the Super Bowl Favorite. The Bills planned on upgrading from Haack. They can still do that pretty easily.
So Ty Long and Michael Palardy are two of the guys they worked out just today
Thanks for the other names, I'll look into 'em.
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Practice News Week of Aug 29th
in The Stadium Wall
Posted
Dr Kyle Trimble PT on Morris apparent injury