PBF81

Your call. I'm sorry that my posts irritate you so much, really. Re: narratives, I think you've got it backwards. I don't do narratives, I challenge them. They're narratives because they're popular. I'm not very big on "everyone says ..." kinda stuff, simply because "everyone says." More stuff that's said league-wide every seaosn does not happen rather than happens, team and player(s) alike. Maybe wait until the end of the season to see whether or not they turn out to be true and therefore valid? If they don't, then feel free to hammer me all you want on them. I'd even encourage it and would probably get a good chuckle myeslf on them. Until then, I always back up what my takes are, whether you and others like it or not, which I can do nothing about. Besides, it's just discussion. If my posts irritate you so much, and I mean this sincerely, then why read 'em. It's borderline stalking otherwise. Gunnerbill arbitrarily "X's" every one of my posts that he seems to see. LOL I anticipate it when I see a notification from him. There are posters that I won't read, I don't have them on ignore, but I simply skip over them. I don't understand the seeming animus. I always try to answer posts directed at me, which some consider to be bad form, but IMO it would be bad form to ignore them. I deliberately go out of my way often to avoid getting into exchanges that I know are purely argumentative with no genuine exchange of ideas. I don't always succeed, but I do my best. We all want the same thing, or most of us anyway, which is a Championship. Although some have openly expressed simple contentment with winning seasons and playoff appearances without ever winning the big game, but that's fine. I don't take issue with it if that's what they're satisfied with. Cheers! Go BILLS!!!

That's an interesting thought! That correlation never crossed my mind. My first thought is why is Edmunds not an attacking, vicious, hitting, intuitive, tough defender when he was at VA Tech? It seems as if the consensus is that it was his role, which implies how it was assigned by the coaches. Seems to me good coaches could have changed his role and put him more in a position to succeed, to whatever extent they had envisioned. I'm firmly of the opinion that the reason why he hasn't been as good as people think he should have been, was because he was being asked to do the job of two LBs much of the time, largely because they've never been able to find another, a third, starting LB, after Lorax left. Prior to that time we had 3 starting LBs. I'm also not convinced that he's not suited to McD's new system, whatever that will be. One of the traits on Edmunds coming out of college was his versatility including "attack" implicitly. It would seem that he's gone because the team had to decide between Oliver and him financially. I'd have opted for Edmunds only due to the massive hole(s) it leaves us, but that's irrelevant. IMO he'll be much better where he is now and will excel there, ... also irrelevant. Here's the thing about McD's new D being "attacking," that I've been asking what that even means. Defenses entire definition is to attack, not pull back on the throttle like we've done in our biggest games. Either way, one needs the talent to pull it off, whatever the scheme/style. I'm not sure that we have that on D. We don't have any pass-rushers that are proven consistent in that role. Rousseau faded after the first four games, dramatically. It's almost not possible (never say never) to get the value (contract) we've put into Miller out of him at this point. Consider all of the best Ds historically, you know them. But to me it's a little bit like a catch-22, they were great because they had talent spread out all across the defense both starting and depth. The "style" only optimized that talent. To me a great DC would be able to change up his scheme to match his talent. Do we have that talent at say MLB? Completely unknown. Klein's obviously not it. Right now Bernard's the likely starter in the spot, but last year's rookie performance by him is hardly inspiring. I realize that the narrative on rookie draftee Williams has him potentially playing the position, but the reality there is that his draft previews all discount any notions that he's capable of taking on that role, he's more suited to back-up Milano at WLB, but we need starters, which is my theory as to why we only play 2 LBs. Will that change? Who knows, we'll find out soon though. We can talk about how he'll be what McD needs at MLB, but it's all talk until it happens, and given Beane's draft history, it's rare for him to land those types of players. I have no idea what their draft process is analytically speaking, but it's not working to that extent. We always have to sign free-agents for our top roles. Diggs, Miller, Poyer, Hyde, Morse. As to attacking, so we've just touched on the LBs, but how about the DL. What's changed since last season, effectively? Not much. Oliver got paid, but he's the same player. I anticipate that he'll improve as he enters his prime, but it's not guaranteed, and the opposite could happen as well, particularly in a new system, although that would seem to favor him. We brought in Poona Ford, great depth but he won't move the needle and it wouldn't surprise me if he gets cut. He hasn't exactly distinguished himself otherwise. It's quite likely that at 34 now coming off of that knee injury that Miller's finished as an above-average player much less as a premier player. We'll be lucky if he's an average starter later on this season. He may shatter paradigms, but what are the odds of that happening. Only one player last season at 34 finished with double-digit sacks and that was an anomaly. Of all the players that logged 4 or more sacks last season, only three, those three, were 34 or older. Hughes (9) and Brandon Graham (11) were both 34. Calais Campbell (5.5) was 36. Graham was the outlier, but he was also surrounded by talent that Miller won't have, in fact, Miller's supposed to be that talent that brings the others up, not the one that needs it around him to succeed. As to the secondary, the hope is that White returns to All-Pro form. Big questionmark there. Will he do that? Will he simply return to be a top CB but not in the top-10 say, or will he simply be an average or slightly better-than-average CB. We don't know. Anyway, we could go on ... Hyde's back Poyer's knee Allen's elbow Hamlin of course although he's a backup. One would think that regular rotation of players is part of that "attacking defense" that you cite, but we've been doing that under Frazier as well, so that part of it is not new. Will Oliver for example be expected to bump up his ~ 50% snap count to 60-70%? How would he be if so. Also, concerning me the most is that our coaching staff, again, now pretty much fully transplanted under McD from Carolina, has never achieved anything significant. Their trend is to underachieve in the biggest of games; Super Bowl 50, 2021 AFC CG. Otherwise lose in the D/WC rounds while typically underachieving. We will hope for the best, but saying something is one thing, actually getting it done is another. If anything, whether people want to hear it or not, we've been more sizzle than steak in the playoffs under McD with Allen performing the way he has, and that's what it's all about, how you perform against the best in the playoffs. Go Bills!!! Time for actual football.

Whatever, you guys really like to argue the point contrarily that McD has never taken responsibility for his team's miscues other than indirectly via statements that leave people believing that it was someone else's fault but his. Most other coaches wouldn't have escaped the scrutiny that he's been able to successfully avoid. Again, this season, as someone said, will finally be one that tells us what's going on. If the D slips tremendously, as I expect it to, then we have more info as to what's really going on. Time will tell, no need to argue or bicker. We'll very clearly know come January. And if we continue more on McD's ways of playoff ousters under his guidance as both DC and HC, then that will provide even more info. 12 seasons. 6 as DC, 6 as HC. 8 playoff appearances. 2 Wild Card Round losses, 4 Divisional Round losses, one horrific CC loss, and a Super Bowl loss to a team led by one of the worst QBs in that given season. Something's gotta change, and it's gotta change this season. If it doesn't the narrative momentum shift should be significant. Anything that I have to say doesn't matter whatsoever.

LOL, because yeah, firing the S's Coach was great corrective action. I can see how one would need to be Bill Polian to figure that out. LOL

Love the way you absolutely leapfrog the original argument. LOL In essence, the point that I made makes even more sense in that light. You guys seem so eager to be right and win an argument that you continue to shoot yourselves in the foot. See comment above. Yes, please, I'd absolutely love to reconvene as the season wears on. So far McD's proven nothing other than "building a culture." He can't win when it matters most and on top of that hinders his own team when it matters most. We'll see how things shake out. Then we'll see whether or not he throws someone else under the bus. Let's both bookmark this post and reconvene towards the end of the season.

I don't think it's the wrong example at all. Someone should have been fired after that, OR McD should have come clean that it was truly his fault instead of "accepting responsibility" while implying that it was someone else's, thereby hanging Frazier out to dry like he did. But to pick on the coach whose entire starting unit was unavailable to start in 20 of 32 starts between them, while still performing well with backups, to me is unconscionable. It also reinforces the point made. Your point completely ignores that and the original point that I made. It doesn't matter that McD gave him a shot, he's also given a bunch of coaches that haven't anteed up shots, but they were from Carolina with him and they weren't fired. And I mean really, what, it was Salgado's coaching that caused us to lose? LOL That's a ridiculous proposition. IMO McD doesn't have what it takes to get rid of coaches that aren't performing. This season he has most of his former staff at Carolina under him, he's successfully transition their coaching staff from 2011-2016 to Buffalo for the most part. Count me in among those that think that this is closer to not working out for him than it is for working out for him, but this season will certainly tell. At least it seems to be a growing mindset that should we underperform again that there won't be anywhere for him to assess blame besides himself. ... which will be refreshing if he can't perform up to standards and the talent that he has. By implication you see that the Safeties coach was more responsible than any other for our poor playoffs performance. I have no idea how that's rational. Otherwise, see my post above.

Winning does cure all, but in today's league you need to a great QB to be playoffs competitive. After the Allen era, other than for the fact that we've had only two great QBs during the Bills' modern NFL era, and Kelly transcends that even, unless we have one that makes us playoffs competitive, I'm not sure that I see ticket sales going very well given PSLs and prices. Keep in mind however that PSLs are "recyclable," meaning that the team can end up charging them more than once for STHs that relinquish their tix. Good luck on getting them again if we're only average or worse, but then presumably the single game tix will become more available then, ... not that those would necessarily be all that popular, just sayin'.

Agreed But IMO they're going to lose a whole lot more than the 10k seats that they'll lose. Also, once Allen's tenure ends, IMO good luck then. Green Stamps, ... LOL, I know you're not in your 30s.

LOL, seriously? How about firing Jim Salgado after our playoff losses this season, the Safeties coach, who did nothing wrong in his coaching tenure here, his only stint I think. ... other than not ever having coached in Carolina that is. Hell, he's arguably had the best unit on the team on McD's watch. And 13-seconds? LMAO What a wimp on that! Saying he takes responsibility with strong undertones that he wasn't really responsible. As someone else has pointed out several times, if Frasier was that big of an issue on defense, then why was he here for 6 seasons as the DC. So either McD's not competent in that, or he too threw Frasier under the bus. We'll never know because despite the "high character" veil, he doesn't practice it himself when discussing the team. We'll see what happens this season otherwise, but IMO the expectations are too lofty.

Well, OK, but that applies to all teams. No team gets to play only poor offensive teams. ... or poor defensive teams for that matter. Also to be fair, Atlanta's offense averaged 11th in scoring O in those six seasons. Otherwise, in the 12 games that he played against Carolina, his D allowed an average of 28.6 PPG against them. Their scoring averages in those seasons were 34.2 in 2011, 28.8, 25.9, 25.1, 25.5, and 29.3 in 2016. So McD parred at best, but underachieved in general. In half of those games NO scored over 30 points, 28 and 27 in two others. Against the Falcons in 12 games his D allowed an average of 22.1 PPG, but that includes two games where it allowed 0 and 3 points. In five of their 7 losses his D was directly responsible for those losses allowing 30, 31, 31, 33, and 48. Atlanta in those seasons averaged 25.1, 26.2, 22.1, 23.8, 21.2, and 33.8. In the 33.8 season McD's D allowed 33 and 408 yards, and 41 points and 571 yards. So considering that he really wasn't impressive.

Yeah, ya got me. I guess. STs are out for me, if for no other reason than the principle of PSLs. Full disclosure, I haven't been a STH in many years. I don't see the new prices going over very well however. Many here have already said that they're out based upon the forecasted prices in their previously released "survey." And frankly, now with Pegula's new emphasis on the "business side" of things, I don't see much relenting on those PSLs or prices.

Honestly, we just drafted Kincaid in round 1 and have two other "steals" from round 5 this and last year. Davis is the only WR that Beane's drafted that's still on the team. We paid much for Diggs and decently for Harty. Let's give some of our rookies a chance.

All I know is that I'm awaiting the new PSL & Ticket prices. I have a feeling that's going to generate some interesting sentiments here.

Regarding that bolded part, one would think that, but three more years of extensions says differently, A, and B, IMO he'll live off of the "he got us out of our playoff drought" narrative for at least a decade total, which means until his extension finishes and he's played in the new stadium at least once. Talk about a teflon coach. While IMO it's not a good sign, he's successfully now imported almost his entire coaching staff from when he was in Carolina, not merely on the D side either, but Washington, Holcomb, and Babich were all there with him directly under him on D. I don't see what all the hype was there as his results were both inconsistent and otherwise patently average on the whole at best. In the one season that he finished with the 6th ranked Scoring and 6th ranked Yardage Ds, but he also had the easiest schedule that any team has had from 2011 to last season, 12 seasons. Carolina only faced two teams with double-digit wins during the regular season, both were 10-6 and both were wild-cards that season. His defenses at Carolina, with the help of the aforementioned coaching assistants now transplanted here, averaged 13th in Yardage D with the Scoring D lagging that at 17th on average. His last season there was his second worst at Carolina, so there was no trend towards improvement and his last season was only second-worst to his first and rookie season as a DC. In four of his six seasons there his Scoring D ranked below-average at 18th, 21st, 26th, and 27th. And again, his 6th ranked Scoring D was against the easiest schedule of any NFL team that decade and the past two seasons included. Who knows what happened in 2013, his third season there with the 2nd ranked D both Scoring and Yardage, but in the playoffs it was more of the same that we've seen here with defensive underachievement and a divisional round loss in their first playoff game, and to a team led by Kaepernick on top of it by letting SF dominate them offensively. Carolina had 8 drives and scored on 5 of them. I'd like to be optimistic regarding the defensive side of things, but between that above and our defensive performances in the playoffs with only two exceptions against to teams lacking any significant offensive prowess, tell me that I shouldn't hold my breath. On the flip side, if Dorsey and Allen can put the offense together properly, I see absolutely no reason why it cannot be the highest scoring offense in Bills' history. I'm not sure what to think offensively at the moment. Unless our OL is what it seems that it should be and Kincaid does something better than average for a TE, and they actually use the RBs more, then we should be fine. Whether Dorsey does that remains to be seen.

Thanks. I plucked that from page 2. Talk about freak accidents. I wonder who the moron was that hit him.

He did it off-site tho, whatever that means. I'm curious what he did to suffer a season-ender offsite.

Agree Here's the thing tho, this got me rewatching that 3rd-and-22 play. If you're only going to rush 3, then you'd damn well better have more than two guys covering, or at least prepared to cover beyond the 1st-down line, which was our 30. The play starts with us showing 6 on the line, only three commit to rush, which is obvious after the ball's snapped. Tua sees this too. Seconds later after he releases the ball you can see that they've flooded the left side and we have 5 coverage guys on the line-of-scrimmage side of the 1st-down line. 4 of them are in the middle, 2 nowhere near any offensive player, 2 chasing whomever just passed them up the middle, and the other on the left side making sure that that Durham Smythe who blocked-and-released doesn't make a play. The latter seems to have been the only coverage guy that knew what he was doing. Otherwise there are 2 safeties playing zone left to cover Waddle and whomever else that is (Hill presumably) that's wide open on the left side just after the 1st-down line and also in for a 1st-down and a big play if Tua goes to him. So in short, we have 3 guys rushing the passer, apart from Miller not even our best pass-rushers; 8 guys in coverage, where one of those was is a mystery, four were over the middle covering one guy, two of them really covering no one presumably there in case Tua tried to scramble or hit Mostert out of the backfield late (highly unlikely) one covering Smythe, and two left in zone to take on both WRs that ended up going deep beyond the 1st-down marker. And Miller, who was completely taken out of the play by Smythe on a great block before Smythe released, Basham and Jones are the three guys you want in that situation and 3-man rush? Seriously? That's coaching. That's clearly on coaching, at least largely, unless the players were told something different and ignored it, which I would then still suggest is a coaching issue, just of a different nature. Granted, it was hot, brains were melting, etc. I get it, but on those singular big plays, arguably the biggest in the game, you've gotta pull your head outta your a$$. Some of this should be instinctive and in-your-sleep kinda stuff for these guys. I'm not a big Oliver fan, but those are the three that should have been pass-rushing that play. Rousseau for sure. I'd have even put Lawson or Epenesa in there before I'd have put Jones or Basham in there.

They also weren't anywhere near consistently good either. It should be interesting for sure. It seems that in comparison the DLs are similar, but that the LBs on the Panthers back then we're notably superior.

Except that McD isn't, he's become very effective at throwing others under the bus furtively.

MUCH weaker. IMO this is going to be a serious lesson in how the grass isn't always greener ... ... and Beane's management aside. A lot of things shouldn't be happening against a regular season #1 or #2 ranked Defenses in the playoffs.

Well yeah, of course, I'm not even sure we have that ability to do it effectively. And blitzing the MLB, a good OC on the other side, and seasoned QBs of which we play a lot this season, can pick that apart too. We'll see soon. LB unit seems so weak, weakest that I can recall.

It's one thing to say "attacking defense," it's another to have the personnel to run it effectively w/o undue risks. Do we have the pass-rushers to be able to do that w/o having to blitz regularly. Remains to be seen, but unless we get some consistent pass-rushers, it remains to be seen. No one should be thinking that Miller will return to what he was at 34 and coming off that injury, and who knows when. Rousseau was very inconsistent and came out strong in his first four games last season but then disappeared. Floyd comes in at 31 which should help. I'm not sure we have the talent to attack as such effectively.

LOL, okay, well, when you say that Allen shared no blame for any of our playoff losses, isn't that essentially saying that, McD aside. Short answer: yes. Anyway, who cares. Camp starts in a few days, all of this will be sorted out over the next month, and otherwise we're talking about some stupid poll where Burrow and Allen, two of the few premiere QBs in the league, are two spots apart in some ranking. If you want to analyze Allen's playoff performances, we can do that, but to suggest that his play in the playoffs has been either consistent or fault-free in losses is remiss. Among Allen, Mahomes, and Burrow, the least consistent in the playoffs has been Allen, by a wide margin over Mahomes although only marginally over Burrow, nonetheless. He can take steps to changing that this season and prove that last season's playoffs were all an anomaly. Right?

My take is that the difference between our team today and the same old from the 20-years drought is Allen. I think that says it all. And yes, I understand your mentality, it's alive and well here. The losses are all team losses and have nothing to do with Allen or McD, but when we win it's them that are responsible. Yeah, many of us fully get it. LOL

Yeah, thanks! Allow me to ask, whom do you blame? Because when I put the blame where it belongs, it seems to go over about as well as black person at a KKK rally. And how about Davis, who's outperformed Diggs in the playoffs? What's your take there? Yeah yeah, we all know, Davis wouldn't have done what he did if Diggs weren't on the team, so Diggs gets credit for Davis' catches. Or something different? I'm curious whether you're consistent. Otherwise, since my comments were general in nature, how about the other three playoff losses, was Allen anything to blame for those, the '20 season KC loss, the '19 season Texans loss, or the Bengals loss this past season? Or was he guilt-free there too? As to the topic of this thread, and in light of what you said, take away the two games of the '21 playoffs and to be more than fair, Allen's other 6 playoff games are mediocre tops! 6 games otherwise, 8 TDs (1-1/4 TD/game for the math challenged), 6 TOs, and only one game with a rating better than average for those 6 games and an 85.0 rating for the 6 games aggregately. He had more TDs in the two playoff games in '21 than he did in his other 6, demonstrating massive inconsistencey. That's poor and for reference purposes, this past season would have ranked 26th in the league and in Derek Carr, Justin Fields, Mac Jones, and Russell Wilson category. Just sayin' And I'm one of Allen's biggest apologists and defenders.