Beck Water

Recent history disagrees with your thinking. Bills are 2-3 vs Ravens under McDermott, including horrific loss in the 2018 season opener where Josh was thrown to the wolves; since Allen came into his own in 2020, 2-1 Bengals, we're 1-3 under McDermott; since 2020, we're 0-2

That seems plausible. Von Miller return from suspension also fills reps. My point was to @The Jokeman who suggested that Phillips and Jefferson were added to replace Smoot.

With whom?

So I don't know what the Bills thinking is, but Jordan Phillips is a 1TDT and Quinton Jefferson is kind of a "tweener", guy who can play both DE and DT. I'm not sure that either would be a good replacement for Smoot at DE.

Question: when has McDermott rotated players during the season?

He didn't rotate with Hamlin during the pre-season because of injury. Once the season started, the job was Hamlin's to lose. And he hasn't lost it. The Bills letting Edwards walk says to me that he's fallen off the depth chart for whatever reason, because otherwise why wouldn't they keep him in case of injury? If Joe Marino's info (via @HappyDays is correct, "bad attitude and low effort in practice" would be the reason for his fall.

Don't forget La'el Collins and Chase Claypool.

Don't you want your dime back to be strong in run support?

There actually are a lot of ligaments in the wrist that stabilize it and allow it to move side to side and up and down, not to mention thumb ligaments. Then move up a bit and there are all those ligaments that allow the fingers to flex. Now we move on to the tendons and all the little bones.... The thing is, unlike an ACL, the ligaments don't need to support the entire weight of the body, but they're still pretty critical to grip strength and motion of the hand.

He has to grip it, and hold it while DBs are trying to knock and rip it away, so the functional difference may not be that great Lawson is 30 years old, not 20. I don't think the "Carolina connection" has any basis in reality, but in this case since Lawson was drafted by the Bills and played for us 2016-2019 and 2022-2023, the coaches know him well. We'll see.

I'll take Samuel being involved any way he can get successfully involved. That's kind of an uncharacteristic, weird thing for McDermott to say, isn't it?

That is very well done.

I mean, Bill, maybe he did, but that kind of thing happens on almost every play, you could bet on it. And usually, it's not called unless it's really egregious. That happens to Dawkins. He gets penalized for being a Beast.

Well that was a sucky game. Texans got jobbed by the refs a couple times, but also Stroud.....well, he was supposed to be the Next Great Thing at QB. Shows how that can be derailed by crap pass protection and lack of open targets to throw to, though I thought he was pressing and looking too much downfield and wonder if the all-22 would show open targets underneath. Anyway, disappointed in the outcome of the game (wanted to see Rodgers lose) even though it's supposedly better for the Bills that the Jets win. Now I'm wondering if I misheard, but I was pretty sure I heard the announcers talking as though the Bills were the only team left on the Jets schedule that they had to worry about, which is very puzzling to me. When you're a 3-6 team, you probably need to worry about 4-4 teams like AZ, Colts, and Seahawks; Rams are only one win back on their entire division having had an early bye; and, I don't think we ought to count out the Dolphins. So I found that puzzling. Texans looked like they better figure something out quick on offense though.

Wow. Just…..Wow

I got nothin Also keon

OK, I guess his shin was down

I dunno that was pretty blatant I thought

Texans got hosed on that 4th down penalty. IMO.

Fitz with a crack about cayenne peppers

If I were a teammate of Rodgers, I’d get so tired of the way he rolls his eyes and looks to the heavens when his WR can’t haul in a catch.

Does he think that every team that plays the Bills doesn’t try to “bring down the player”? More than one defender has concluded, that’s easier said than done And yes, he’s correct, Allen does hang the ball out there like a loaf of bread. It’s not recent, s n a t c h has been part of the naughty words filter here for like a decade

Especially when he was "full" yesterday and "limited" today - wrong direction!

Right. And there's the important point that it's not just "practice makes perfect" it's "correct practice makes perfect". One question is: who is taking the leadership role in getting the DBs on point and in their correct role for each play? We know that Hyde held that leadership role. When Hyde went out, Poyer took it on with Hamlin. When Poyer moved into the box to replace Dodson and Rapp came in on passing downs last year, it was Hyde. So this season, is it Rapp, or is it Hamlin? My gut says, it's Hamlin, and McDermott doesn't trust Rapp in that role yet, let alone rookie Bishop. There's a "mic'd up" segment with Hamlin where it's pretty clear Hamlin is taking a bit of a leadership role pep-talking the DBs, which supports that. I think folks have a skewed view because Williams and Bernard were both 3rd round picks so folks expected them to take a bit longer to come up to speed vs. a 2nd round pick like Bishop (though there were those who felt they were wasted picks because they didn't contribute much their 1st year).

Jets, I think.