Beck Water

I would go with Eric Moulds. He put up numbers with Doug Flutie, Rob Johnson, and Drew Bledsoe throwing to him. I think with Allen he would be on fire.

That's because there's considerable uncertainty as to whether: 1) Rodgers will be able to return to play at QB by the start of the regular season? 2) If he does RTP, will he be playing at a comparable top level? It's been noted that it can take a year of lowered level of play before the player returns to form 3) If he does RTP and play at a top level, will he hold up all season?

I mean, you're not wrong....but we kind of laugh at them anyway, right?

"They've got to show me first" - exactly. Does the WR have the potential to be good? Sure. Can we say at this point that they're better? Hell to the noes - any more than we could say, before the season, that the Bills got better at MLB. Obviously Beane saw the potential with Bernard, but he had to prove he could do it on Sunday. Same with the crew of WR we have at this point.

Oh, No argument. The question was who did the Beane/McD Bills draft or sign in FA as a ST player, later clarified to "in the 2024 off season" Daequan Hardy is one answer, with a "possibly" to the FA signing of Mack Hollins My point was that there are a couple of Daequan-sized slot CB playing well in the league so while it's a long shot, it's theoretically possible and the Bills do have a need there with Neal's FA departure. It's not exactly stupid to draft a guy who might contribute on ST this season and whose college football position aligns with a roster hole he might develop to fill; teams draft late rounders with that profile all the time. As a 6th round pick, Christian Benford contributed on D right away, but that's very much more the exception than the rule on a good team, MOST 5th round and later picks have no business playing on O or D their rookie year and need some development. But yeah, he was 100% drafted for ST potential. As a 6th rounder, though, even with roster churn, it's a long shot to make the team. Last season we had no 6th rounder and 2 7th rounders, and neither made the final 53. 2022 6th rounders, one made the team one didn't and one was out of football for a year.

I dunno about college, but players pay for the jerseys they exchange. It's not free laundry to them. Your right to "all the feels" about how meaningless it is, other fans and players right to value memorabilia, frame their favorites and keep them in their family rooms etc.

Mike Hilton (Bengals nickel, developed by Steelers) is 5'9". Kader Kohou, who was made to look foolish by Diggs but actually made a list of top slot corners and did ok overall, is 5'10"

Oh. Well, nominally Daequan Hardy. In his post draft presser, Beane said something about thinking "why not look at a returner?" before taking him near the bottom of the 6th round, so I think it's fair to say that's primarily how the Bills see him. Though it's worth noting that he played Nickel, and our backup nickel (Siran Neal) is no longer with us, so I'm sure the Bills hope Hardy can grow into that role

Eh, back in 2020 and 2021 when he was 28, 29 yrs old, Matakevich saw snaps as a backup LB and he did OK. Pretty well in one game actually, though that may have been against a Dolphins team that was looking for the bus. Thing is, he had to play in Overdrive the whole game to make that work, and it was pretty clear last year if not before he could no longer do that.

In other words, Rodgers intelligence lacks regular, vigorous pruning and checking to keep it under control and in balance, so like Kudzu it is sprawling unchecked all over the place

It would be fair to say Tyler Matakevich was signed because ST coach Heath Farwell wanted him - though to be fair when he was younger he was a decent conventional LB Taiwan Jones was signed for his ST chops Andre Roberts was signed as a return specialist I'm probably missing a couple, but those are the primary that come to mind.

C'mon man, that wasn't a player-to-player exchange. Would you say that about a different jersey exchange between two athletes?

What part of this was insufficiently clear and how could I express myself in a clearer way?

I just don't think Beane would trade a player because of a tweet. The GM has all the goods - the GPS tracking his speed in practice and games, the specifics of what route he was supposed to run and how he ran it, how often he was open on-time against man. He gets info on what's going on in the locker room. Some of the stuff that's been rumored here - Diggs being chronically late, having a special parking spot, being an asshat to police officers, some stunt he pulled that hurt the team, that in 2022 he ranted at Allen about missing him in games to the point where the WR room was uncomfortable and Allen was fed up and stopped talking to him. I think Diggs may have forced himself out, I just think one small tweet weighs pretty small against everything else that may have gone on and against leaving a gaping hole while taking on $31M dead cap. And yes, I think the tweet was a shot at Josh. In the interview with Dunne if I recall correctly Beane pretty well said Diggs didn't want to be here any more. So yes, he got exactly what he wanted.

Oh, I hope not. Not that I don't think the man deserves his propers. He's done well when called upon. 78% catch % and some of those are routes, not pitches. I just hate a prediction of injuries, so I got to give you the "thumbs down" Sledge was used more in 2022, so I hope Brady has clever ideas about how to use him more *without* injuries. Yeah, I thought so. He hates that we've signed guys primarily for their ST chops, not that we have some "core STers" who are playing on rookie contracts or not much more, and who are developing players in the league, like Dorian Williams and Kingsley Jonathan, or who are budget backups the Bills developed, like Damar Hamlin and Quintin Morris, and have contributed when called upon. The thing is some of the players who get hate, like Siran Neal, actually have specific (albeit limited) roles as rarely-used defensive starters. Neal is our dime DB. He doesn't get a lot of snaps because the Bills have barely played dime. Gilliam is our fullback. He doesn't get a lot of snaps because the Bills have spent most of their time in (1,1) sets and rarely (2,1). So we really have only glimpses of how they play in their primary defensive or offensive role, but the glimpses we've gotten have been pretty effective, actually.

I dunno about "majority of his drops", but I know there were drops on short routes where the ball was a little off but the commentator or film breakdown reaction was "you gotta reel that one in"

I don't think the tweet had anything to do with the Bills making a deal. I think it was a snarky reaction to being informed of the deal. But, that's just my opinion I got nothing to back that up except a believe that Beane is a professional and wouldn't make a decision to throw a man overboard based on a snarky ambiguous tweet. So I think he pulled the trigger, Diggs was informed, and THEN he snarked out the tweet Concur.

He's griping about Mack Hollins. He outright says so in the OP As for core ST'ers (not counting kicker/punter): Of the guys who played the top-10 ST snaps, we still have 1. Reggie Gilliam 84.9% 4. Cam Lewis 74.9% 5. Q Morris 72.6% 6. Dorian Williams 60.7% 7. Taylor Rapp 44.4% 9. Kingsley Jonathan 41.4% Gone are #2 Tyler Matakevich, #3 Siran Neal, #8 Tyrel Dodson, and #10 Trent Sherfield. I don't think OP is really beefing about guys who are "core STers" in the sense of playing a lot of ST snaps. A number of those guys are on rookie contracts, like Dorian Williams, Baylon Spector, or Damar Hamlin. Or, very cheap vet minimum contracts like Kingsley Jonathan and Reggie Morris. OP is beefing about guys who are paid more than vet minimum or rookie scale and who primarily play ST, like Reggie Gilliam ($2.2M) or very slightly, Cam Lewis ($1.48M). And of course now, Mack Hollins ($2.48M) But ya know, an experienced backup by definition is not going to play at starter level at his offensive or defensive position. Lewis is a valuable backup to the Bills because he can come in the game and play boundary corner or nickel. Of course he's a drop off from Taron Johnson or Douglas/Benford, or else he wouldn't be the backup. And the backups have toi play ST, or who else is gonna do it? I'm not sure OP knows what his beef really is.

I'm all for it! Sign You Up!

I think you're asking a good question. There were reports that the Bills were shopping Diggs at some of the events preceding the league NY - Sr Bowl mebbe? There was a tweet from Diggs implying that he expected to be traded just before his salary guaranteed the 5th day of the league New Year in March Bills signed Samuel on March 14th. Bills traded Diggs on April 3rd One theory on the sequence of events is: 1) Bills shop Diggs in early Feb, but get no takers that they feel offer fair compensation for the cap hit they'd have to swallow and the roster hole 2) Bills decide to keep Diggs, draft/sign low tier FA to replace Davis, and make a modest splurge on Curtis Samuel as their slot/everyman WR vs going for an X 3) either something further happens with Diggs, the Texans make a "Zillow make me move" offer of what may be a high 2025 2nd rounder, or both I'd be lying if I said I felt good about the Bills WR rooml

I'll go further than that. Neal played a handful of defensive snaps in 6 regular season games. All 6 were wins, and none were against KC Neal played 3 snaps in the div. round playoff game vs. KC If the OP "2023 was this phenomenon on overdrive in the playoffs, as we had Baylon Spector playing some LB, Siran Neal trying to cover Travis Kelce, Trent Sherfield alligator arms etc etc." wants to blame our division loss on those 3 snaps Neal played, he's really got an uphill climb to make that case. Baylon Spector was inactive for the division round game vs. KC. He played 19 defensive snaps vs. Miami and 17 vs Pitts (both W's). C'mon OP, you can't really complain about a "phenomenon on overdrive in the playoffs" when 1) he played OK during a W 2) he was inactive during the loss Sherfield had 3 targets and caught 1 pass in the KC games, so I guess he could be made into a scapegoat, but then Stefon Diggs had 8 targets and caught 3 passes for 21 whole yards and 2.63 yds per target, so methinks that's laying the blame in the wrong bed raising a grand fuss about Sherfield. We do know Sherfield was playing as much as he did because Gabe Davis went out with a knee injury in Week 18, right? We can find out how good Siran Neal is or isn't as a gunner, twice this season when we play Miami

Not a STer?

Fair points, but the Hopkins and Diggs contract situations are substantively different. The Texans will take on a $16M dead cap for an unsigned player next year. The Titans will take on $9.8M dead cap for an unsigned player next year. They are both "mortgaging the future/kicking the can down the road" contracts. The Bills do have a substantive cap hit for Samuel next year, but Samuel is under contract. You failed to address the other point, that Samuel is a more consistent, higher producing WR than McKenzie, so one would expect to allocate more resources. What do you think is the going rate for a vet #3 receiver who has been consistently productive in the 50+ reception/yr, 600 yd/yr range? It's true he's not a "top tier outside WR". Who was available that you wanted the Bills to sign?

I've seen this number before (maybe from you?) and let it go, but at this point it seems worth correcting. The Bills are NOT putting $8M into the Crowder/McKenzie role in this cap-strapped year. As always when something like an "$8M average" contract is announced, we have to look at the fine print. Curtis Samuel's cap hit for the Bills this year is $3.4M: salary of $1.2M, amortized signing bonus of $1.725M. That doesn't seem excessive, given that he has actually proven on the football field that he can gain yards from the backfield and play outside, two things McKenzie could not. Except for the year he was injured, Samuel has been a pretty reliable 650 yd/season Comparison (both played from 2017-2023; Samuel's total is depressed by including an IR'd year.

Seriously? I'm in the US. Can't say I agree.