PoundingDog

Hoke, a DT on the Steelers for 11 years, talked extensively about the difficulty when playing 2 gap scheme against Cook - mainly his sudden change of direction in small space - like "I'm holding onto the O-Lineman seeing you in the left gap then next moment I don't see you at all." I remember Rex used to talk about Shady McCoy jumpcut you in a phone booth. Cook does that without a jump.

"Just woke up from my senior moment"

Glass half empty guys will tell you coaches trust Tre more. Glass half full guys will tell you Tre sux because when he's in there, the Bills D can't get off the field.

The Bengals do have a few extra days to go over Bills tapes and watch the Steelers game. So it is reasonable to guess that they may have plan A, B and C to stop our running game. It is an advantage to them -- if you have less talented, you need to scheme more and for that, the more time available the better. On the other hand, the Bengals are 0-10-1 coming off a Thursday night game, which includes the latest rendition of losing to the then winless Jets by 1 point on Oct 26. Let's hope that trend isn't broken this Sunday.

In this season, I throw all the general statistics out. Team has no business of losing lost. Team has business of winning won. Recency matters and I go by what they have done since Burrow back into the lineup.

Well, you can look at last week's game when a defense actually played well after the Cook TD. Then what? Probably nothing other than letting Allen do his thing, which nearlt pulled off at the end. The plan from McDermott's staff probably banked on stopping one of worse offense and it didn't quite work. Strategy wise, not unreasonable though.

Watched some Steelers extra points show with former Steelers D-Tackle Chris Hoke and a number of interviews. A few points worth noting from the Bills perspective. Hoke said openly he thought Cook is good, but seeing Cook live in action wowed him. He explain in great detail on how to defend Cook, especially on the edge runs that got the Steelers repeatedly. TJ Watt also said he can't remember a team repeat the play so many times and got them almost every time; of course Watt didn't give an answer like a former player Hoke would. The main point is Cook is the reason why that worked. Hoke pretty much said when one guy (defender) is staying blocked, Cook finds it, cut back, strenched run, to the edge, you name it. And when there is nothing, he buried his head forward for a 2 yard gain. The point above explained why Joe Brady is able to call the same play over and over again. Because we have a "near" superstar in Cook. I used the work near superstar because Cook is not someone who can make a hole on his own, something the great HoF guys are able to do from time to time. On the downside, it makes me concerned about our front office not able to identify Cook as a "must" have in the off-season compared to the other contract extensions we gave out before him. Rogers actually gave a very insightful interview after the game, mentioned something like good preparation but poor practice this past week, as well as his film sessions with the guys, insinulating some guy may be tardy or not paying attention. He used example of Jonnu Smith play today where he singalled in-breaker and Jonnu ran an out-breaker for that missed play. Hoke jumped on that point explaining why there are so few middle of the field passing plays - because Rodgers does not trust the receivers. The point right above reminded me of Bills passing game issue and Allen's trusted guys, practically Kincaid and Shakir (maybe Knox as well). It directly led me to think about the Coleman benching. Now Allen may run more unstructured "scramble drill" plays, but the majority has to be structured plays where they will go thru film sessions like Rodgers did providing checks with his receivers. If you (like a young player Coleman) believe you can just live off scramble drill plays, like the TD Coleman caught today, you' lll never be a trusted receiver a QB can rely on. This is what Allen misses the most from the boundary receiver position on this Bills team. Today it is an example how McDermott envisioned of being the preferred offense to him. You dominated in run, then everything plays off it. If you have a downfield threat, it would be perfect. However, a top receiver probably would not accept the limited role in this offense, like AJ Brown with the Eagles because they are not going to get Lamb's or Chase's money. There is reason Diggs left. The only option for a top receiver is from the draft. What McDermott should have but we don't have is a top level complementary defense that can buy opportunities for Allen and the offense - I'm NOT talking about offense like the Steelers. We'll see about that next week

My thought too. Pretty sure Heyward was yapping to the refs as well all game and Heyward didn't have a bad reputation in the league. But most of us think it is over blown, even some former Steelers like Chris Hoke who theorized that maybe Allen did it in a way not repectful to the "older statesman of the game."

according to Heyward after the game, Allen "intentionally" knee-ed on his stomach on an earlier play and he got no protection "like a quarterback." He went off on Allen every chance he got after that. Allen didn't back down of course. I thought Allen/Heyward exchange this game might be what turned the game around from emotional standpoint for the Bills.

For the game but Allen got into it. Especially go after Heyward.

epenesa?

Mahomes, Allen, and Jackson all have the ability to make plays outside of normal offensive structure. That was the new wave. But at some point, these guys are getting older and will have physical skills deterioating (gradually). So effectiveness may suffer unless they evolve. I see it in Mahomes, and I see it in Allen - some odf his sacks or push throws last seconds would be big plays 2, 3 years ago (yes even the sack he had today against the Steelers). Jackson is already hurting every year. Burrow is more a traditional QB that could play for a long time. But he has injury issue all his career. For Bills sake, I hope to see Allen having a better Roethlisberger career. That means he needs to constinue to work on his mechanics every year. He can go Manning's route if he decides to bury himself in everything football his life for awhile but I don't see it coming.

Could go unravel quick.

We lost to a Miami team without Hill, Philips etc. we lost to a backup qb Texans Have Josh called a player only meeting yet?

This is Pegula’s job to assess, not necessarily the football Xs and Os, but how operations, changes, ideas are within Bills organization. Some have mentioned a few defensive players not injured last couple years, we might have been able to get to where we have never been to. But several years in a row of the same reason points to a trend the organization needs to address. Terry should know the draft process and decision points. He should not pick players by reading scouting reports, but he can direct them to change the player rating criteria by adding and reducing some factors to influence the results.