Sierra Foothills

It's a given that McFrazier are DB Whisperers and that somehow the the whole of the secondary is greater than the sum of its parts. That said, someone has to be playing well in that secondary and propping up the others so it's either Dane Jackson and Levi Wallace were covering for the deficiencies of the safeties or visa versa. The long held belief is that Hyde and Poyer are enabling the Bills CB (sans T White) to play above their talents. The Bills secondary play cannot simply be attributed solely to smoke and mirrors.

What hasn't been mentioned yet is that Buscaglia suggests that the Bills should entertain re-signing Jerry Hughes to play at his customary RDE position. Buscaglia reasons that the present candidates... Greg Rousseau who has almost never lined up at RDE in college or pros, Shaq Lawson, AJ Epenesa, and Boogie Basham, don't inspire confidence. In Buscaglia's documented view, Von Miller is substantially more effective lining up at LDE, and therefore bringing Jerry Hughes back to play his familiar RDE position could be the cherry on top of a revamped Bills pass rush.

I disagree Bill. iMO McDermott was not emphatic enough and he was not unequivocal enough. That was more noticeable from the video... if you read the words they had a different effect than actually hearing them spoken. His mea culpa (thanks K-9!) was unsatisfying, like an insincere apology and that's why many fans and media felt it was insufficient. And more importantly what did the players and coaches feel about his comments? The leadership aspect is the most concerning thing about his post mortem (thanks K-9!). Part of it is McDermott's limitations as a speaker... he could have said more in fewer words and in less time. And the team would likely respond better to a more effective message than the passive finger pointing that was implied.

I just watched 10 minutes of his game video. I expected him to be solid at the point of attack and he was but I was surprised with his athleticism. He had zero problems with reach blocks and working at the second level. He was effective with seal blocks, in combination, basically polished in every aspect of O-line play. He plays like a guy who understands the theory and objective behind every play. That said the whole Iowa line looked so polished and professional so that made it a bit more difficult evaluating him. Looks like a damn fine player though.

Yeah I understand about the leverage and the wrestling background, biomechanics, etc. I'd still be concerned about his size especially in the context of NFL talent. It's not a perfect comparison but Jim Ritcher was a smallish center who excelled for the Bills for many years. He was legendarily strong in the weight room but going up against Jumpy Geathers in the Super Bowl was Exhibit A on why O-linemen need to be big guys.

In the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is king! Geez Haze, complaining again?

That's true but isn't it possible that Moss regains his mojo in the same way that Singletary did last year? In fact if given a fair chance to compete for playing time isn't it at least a 50/50 proposition that he does rebound?

The other somewhat bizarre thing about Linderbaum is that he maintains his consensus position as the top center in the draft and yet he measures only 6'2" 296 pounds with 31.125" long arms. Is the team that drafts him not supposed to be concerned about that? In fact isn't he a possibility to slide down the draft? And if he's there at 25 do the Bills consider him?

Three thoughts on the topic. 1) In this day of advanced statistics/metrics there is a unit of measure referred to as WAR (wins above replacement). This is the idea that you can measure how many more (or less) wins a given team would have if an "average" player was replaced by another player. I think if it was possible to compute this concept accurately that it would show that someone like Joe Thuney would be worth maybe one more win than a player like Ryan Bates. JMO. 2) I agree with those who say that even the greatest guards have less value than many would think. For example I think of Logan Mankins as one of the greatest guards I ever saw play. He was a 6 time All Pro, 7 time Pro Bowler and a member of the All Decade team. He'll likely end up in the Hall of Fame. And yet, despite the fact that he played for the Cheatriots*** for 10 years, he never won a Super Bowl. New England won Super Bowls in 2004, the year before he was drafted and in 2015, the year after he was released. They never won a Super Bowl with the greatest guard in team history, a future Hall of Famer. 3) It'd be one thing if you were guaranteed of drafting a Steve Hutchinson, Alan Faneca, Logan Mankins, Quentin Nelson, etc but there is no guarantee. You're just as likely to draft a Chance Warmack or Jonathan Cooper who btw were both considered "can't miss" players. No on drafting a guard in the first round unless it's at the end of the first round and all of the top players are off the board.

Last year at this time people were calling Singletary a disappointment. Then he had a bounce back year and now people are singing a different tune. Last year was Moss' 2nd year. It's way too early to make a pronouncement on his career. I liked Moss before he was drafted and was glad we drafted him. He has a nice physical style which I thought the team needed. He was a good pass blocker and showed good hands as a receiver. I think people need to dial down the criticism a bit because stranger things have happened than a 3rd rounder having a bounce back season. This is not to say that we couldn't use a dynamic playmaker at RB... just that people shouldn't get too high on their own abilities to predict a player's career curve.

Regarding McDermott, as the stakes are raised, the scrutiny increases. As the scrutiny increases it's inevitable that flaws become more apparent. That said, I feel McDermott is definitely a Top 5 coach and I'm glad he's our coach. Unfortunately the worst moment of his Bills' tenure was after the debacle in Kansas City. I thought he handled it poorly with the vague comments about "execution." It came off as blame shifting. McDermott should have simply said this: "I want to make it clear that I bear complete and total responsibility for the communication breakdowns at the end of regulation and in overtime. It doesn't matter exactly what happened and I'm not gonna get into exactly what happened. What I will say is that what happened is entirely my fault and I will take the steps necessary to ensure these mistakes never happen again."

Is it not a bit odd that the Bills have not spoken with Tyler Linderbaum? He's the consensus best C in this draft.

From the linked article: 1 Belichick 2 Reid 3 McVay 4 Harbaugh 5 McDermott 6 Tomlin 7 Shanahan 8 LaFleur 9 Vrabel 10 Reich 11 Carroll 12 Taylor 13 Stefanski 14 Staley My first thought is that it's awfully hard to split a team's success between the coach and the GM. They're either successful together or unsuccessful together. It's hard to think of an example of where you think "the coach is doing a great job but the GM sucks" or visa versa.

I had forgotten about that.

But Gilmore has never played weak-side linebacker... you're wrong! "This is a public service message from The Stadium Wall. When tempted to use the phrase 'fait accompli" consider using an IQ-challenged equivalent such as "foregone conclusion." In topics which attract an especially stupid group of participants "done deal" is the best option. Thank you. Does the coaching staff run all of their personnel decisons by you for final approval?

Right? Gets the big contract and immediately puts it in cruise control. Maybe Josh is the veteran they're lookin to unload to move up in the draft and create cap space? Darnold: "Oh my God is that a ghost?!?!?!??" Palmer: "Sam we've already gone over this... that's the Z receiver."

Even if he doesn't want to play football anymore? Do you also want him incarcerated in a labor camp? 🤪

Don't forget Phillip Gaines, EJ Gaines, and Kevin Johnson. OBD has been veteran CB retread central for some time. So in your estimation Dane Jackson is not good enough to be our 3rd CB.

Wow!!! He's gonna smash Randy Moss' record of 23 TDs in a season in week one!!!

No need to debate something we'll see soon enough.

Not only that, he scored 2 TDs in the 4th quarter versus the Chiefs. That projects to 136 TDs next year.

I've watched the highlight packages of Breece Hall that others have posted in this thread. A few observations: Highlight packages are not game film, they only show the good plays and not the bad so I'm always wary of that. That said Hall looks very good to me and I think that comparisons to Jonathan Taylor are fair. Look at their pre-draft profiles on NFL.com (below) Both stylistically and from the standpoint of measurables they are very similar players. Some people here are saying his game speed is slower than his timed speed. I saw a long strider who was consistently running away from people. It looks like he has good short area footwork and then quickly shifts to a long, smooth gate when he sees the opening. In other words I believe he's deceptively fast. Some people here say he has to work on his "route tree" and pass protection but there's no question that he has excellent hands and it seems he should have no difficulty becoming a receiving threat. Hall has 30 rushes of over 20 yards in the last two years, more than any other NCAA player. He is a quick strike home run hitter. Beane on numerous occasions going back to last year has expressed a desire to improve team speed and to acquire more players who can score from anywhere on the field. IMO Hall fits that profile. I believe that if Hall is available at 25 it means that other positions coveted by the Bills will be picked through and in that scenario there's a good chance the Bills will draft him. https://www.nfl.com/prospects/breece-hall/32004841-4c18-9796-85f0-25933f010ae8 https://www.nfl.com/prospects/jonathan-taylor/32005441-5943-1618-c081-5dd6b2d0b829

And in other news, grass is green.

... the Buffalo Philharmonic Orchestra?