PBF81

We'll see to what extent that happens and whether or not it makes up for half of Allen's numbers on the receiving end. It'll be great if it's that simple. Shakir's the one we should have our eyes on. Samuel's a known quantity.

Well, the coverage will be tighter on them, so it remains to be seen how they respond when covered more tightly.

That's not playing to his strength however. That's fine, but are we really getting what Allen's capable of by forcing him into that game-managing role? Is that wise. As to our running game, on 3rd-downs it's pretty much Allen. Cook doesn't get the ball on 3rd-downs. Four times all of last season for Cook, once every four games on average. Allen had 43 3rd-down carries, Murray 20, averaging 2.0, and Harris 7. Allen had more than the rest of the team combined. Without Allen our running game is below average. Without Allen's rushing TD production we'd have ranked tied for DFL. As to those "two high defensive shells," do you see that happening with the current cadre of WRs that we have, namely a lot of deep coverage? Few do. Unless Shakir as a 5th round pick and no longer benefitting off of coverage directed to other WRs given that he's our best WR at the moment, steps up, that's not likely to be the case often. For as shrewd as everyone seems to think that McD is overall, with emphasis offensively here, without a reliable deep threat(s), our running game is going to be pressured more than it ever has.

Anything's possible. Carolina could win the Super Bowl, it's possible. You cavalierly laid it out as if it's quite likely. It's not, not with this coach and roster given what we've seen to date over seven seasons. Could it happen? Sure, but it'd be entirely anomalous. There's no logical basis for it happening. The only people thinking otherwise are a subset of active posters here. All I'm doing is discussing our strengths and weaknesses in light of expectations posed by some. The question is what's likely based upon the evidence that we have before us, which includes trends, patterns, current roster contrasted with past rosters and performance thereunder. It's a somewhat complex analysis, not a Twitter sized assessment. This has been pointed out scores of times here, but absolutely no one but Allen has consistently stepped up in the playoffs and even he's had his gaps. No one. I've repeatedly asked people challenging this to name the players, particularly on D, that have consistently stepped up during the playoffs. There are none. This is particularly true of McD's vaunted top defenses, which everyone that's so optimistic is relying upon for this success as laid out. In the playoffs our top-ranked D has played more like the 25th ranked D and among the worst defense in the playoffs generally speaking. We're statistically at the bottom of defensive playoff performance over the past four seasons in that regard. Holding teams led by Mac Jones and Rudolph Mason down in points, at home, in a rabid playoff environment shouldn't fall under the impressive category from a team perspective. It's expected. Back in the '90s we went to the home playoff games knowing that we were going to win. It wasn't even a thought that we'd lose. Levy took us to the AFC CG in his second season, with Kelly at QB, then to the AFC CG in five of his first seven seasons, and to the SB in four. ... with Kelly and defenses ranked 3rd, 5th, 6th, 14th, and 19th. Not 1st or 2nd even. But we had players step up come playoff time. You simply cannot go into the postseason without some of your players, even backups simply having as string of well-timed great games at least, posting impact play. The teams that advance have those players. Others here have said this repeatedly as well. The teams that win Super Bowls absolutely have them. We don't have them, and now at least everyone's realized it with Diggs, but it's no different elsewhere. And who on our roster right now is that player among skill positions? What, Shakir? Samuel? Cook? Kincaid? It's all on Allen. And now, seemingly, the narrative is that we're taking away his deep-game in favor of what he doesn't do best, namely the short game. We're essentially asking him to become a game-manager. That's ridiculous. So why on earth is all of a sudden the sixth or seventh time going to be the charm for the D, and particularly after we just lost key players in our secondary. There is no logical reason. It could happen, sure. Or with Allen out of his element. It's funny, when I used to point out that Diggs was inconsistent in the playoffs, and typically failed to step up in the playoffs while he was on the team, I was routinely slammed. It didn't matter, he was drawing coverage, etc. I was lectured. Now that he's gone that's the going narrative, that he sucked in the playoffs. LOL Honestly, ... Is it really that difficult to separate ourselves from our fan status to see reality. On top of that, despite Diggs having essentially provided far beyond what any WR to date has provided on McD's team, Bills Mafia slams and hammers him. OK, so it wasn't on the best of terms, but he played his heart out here. We'll see how this season plays out. As I always comment, there's absolutely nothing that's going to change because any of us say or don't say something here. We're stuck with the hand that's dealt us as fans. But it's frustrating to see the team being managed with underwhelming results come playoff time, and now Allen on the cusp of being shoe-horned into a role that is his weakness with his use more aligned with how Baltimore uses Jackson. Apparently all that talk when we drafted him of his big arm and strongest arm in the NFL isn't going to be put to use or matter much. That makes little sense and it shouldn't make any sense to anyone.

Great, let's see how Brady does. Again, the point is that I'm not sure we need Allen to do that when his skillset doesn't match that directly.

Why would we not? LOL Oh, no reasons. And no, you don't need the best roster in the league to win the Super Bowl. If by this, You just need to win 3-4 games in a row at the end of the season, you mean the postseason, yes, that's correct. And that's all, huh. LOL But in 7 seasons with our current head coach, we've strung two wins B2B in the postseason only once, and the first of those games we nearly lost to a notably inferior team with inferior talent and Reich as the head coach. After those two games our coach gave the game away. So yeah, that's all we need to do, but if it were that easy then we wouldn't be having this exchange. Right. I'll put it another way, with one of the most prolific WRs in the game and top defenses, we've failed to do that. Now with a new C/QB pairing, WRs absent a true #1 (pending the draft and then only a rookie) and possibly even a #2 given the takes on Davis, an all but completely new secondary, the expectations are similar? Well, OK. We all have our opinions. As I've expressed to another, I'm envious of people thinking like that. None of the circles that I keep offline are nearly as optimistic. Hell, some think I'm overly optimistic. LOL

LOL, it doesn't matter. Giving credit to Brady and the O for two of those six wins that came at the hands of both rare and unreliable defensive TDs is disingenuous. What, will Brady need a third of his games to have defensive TDs in them to win this season? That's the implication. Also, getting so lucky as to have played the Chargers without Herbert, Allen, and Bosa, ... LOL, imagine if we had to play without Allen, the excuses that would be flying left and right like chips from a woodchipper for our losses. There needs to be some consistency in these discussions. Constantly heralding the unlikely and rare as likelihoods isn't reasonable or honest.

You've mistaken me for someone else there. As to the rest of your post, all I'm doing is positing. Asking the tough questions. We'll see how it plays out. If we don't take a WR in round 1 that puts up like Rasheed Rice did last season, or Nacua, I'll be thoroughly impressed if we do more than narrowly win the division in week 18 or advance past the Wild-Card round. It's pretty unfathomable under any circumstances that we fail to make the playoffs barring Allen getting injured. What's funny and interesting here is that everyone's great and up-and-coming until they're not. Then all hell breaks loose. LOL I was responding to a poster that claimed that Allen ran more under Dorsey. Context

Thanks for a decent response!! It is a somewhat complex analysis to be sure, with a bunch of variables. Here's the thing, that's not Allen's strong suit. Wouldn't it seem logical to play to his strong suit in the interests of getting all that we can from him, instead of trying to turn him into a game-managing ball-control passer? That seems patently illogical. Last season, 9 of Allen's TD passes were 20+ yards. Without looking, and knowing stats from years of analyzing the NFL, I'd venture to say that easily that's more than any QB playing today and likely even way back. 15 of his 29 were 15 yards+. 19 were double-digit TDs. Let's contrast that with Mahomes, considered to be the best in the game today and since Brady. Mahomes had 3 of 27 over 20 and 5 in double-digits. It doesn't add up. Call it The Process or whatever, but things are not aligning with what they've said since they drafted Allen. They drafted him for his athletic ability and ability to make every throw and for his strong arm, right. But you're suggesting that they're now trying to turn him into something contrary to that. Call me crazy, but good coaches take their strength(s) and figure out how to shove them down the opponents' throats. Belichick didn't try to put a cap on Brady, neither is Reid trying to put a cap on Mahomes. But it seems that McD, via Brady now, is trying to do that with Allen. The types of receivers we have, whatever their design by McBeane, are what we have because that's how we've planned. Just as they say your as good as your record says you are, so too, your roster is as good as you've made it. In desperately looking to find some sort of plan or methodology here, all that anyone can offer is to blindly trust The Process, but seemingly not realizing that this Process isn't even identifiable for the most part and has otherwise never been articulated as to what it is. And now on the cusp of us going from one of the league's best passing teams to some version of the Ravens. Allen's better than Jackson, but not if he's not going to be used to his strengths. We seem to be taking a square peg and trying to force it into a round hole.

Longer than it should have been to be sure, particularly now that we've lapped ourselves with Allen spinning his wheels. You think that this team as it now is has a decent shot to win the Super Bowl this year? Hence my statements "as of today" or "currently" as I'm careful to state. Having said that, barring us taking a WR in round 1, give us your take on how to propel ourselves forward given what's been laid out. It's great that you think that the trio of Shakir/Samuel/Shorter isn't going to make much of a difference over last season, I actually envy you for being able to think that way, really. That's a minority opinion however.

This is where The Process has brought us.

At the end of the day, this team is missing nearly 2,000 yards and 15 passing TDs of production from Diggs & Davis on last year's team. That's about half of Allen's passing production. If it were that easy to replace that with a pair of 5th round WRs and a seven year vet that's averaged 500 yards & 3 TDs, then we wouldn't be talking about drafting a WR in rounds 1 & 2 or if possible, getting a high-priced veteran WR. We're looking more like the Ravens than ever.

The point is that we're not going to win enough games to win the division on defensive TDs and getting to play teams that have their the best players out due to injury.

I suppose, but our wins were not all impressive. Remember, we needed unlikely defensive TDs to beat Miami and NE. I'm in the minority on thinking that Brady's not going to be good. Also controversial, although for the life of me I don't know why, is the take that we should be doing everything that we can to build around and support Allen, particularly the passing game. (WRs/OL). Rather, we have a coach that insists on focusing on the D and running game whether that running game is provided by a RB or QB being indifferent. Remember, Cook doesn't run on 3rd-downs. Our current situation is very unsettling. BTW, Allen ran twice as much under Brady. His rushing attempts went from 4.7/game to 9.1.

Diggs should be productive not in the slot where Brady had him playing often. It's difficult to envision that wasn't a huge part of Diggs' discontent. If he returns to his usual productivity it will tell us a lot. The concern for Allen which I have yet to see anyone mention, apart from the fact that if he only averages what he did under Brady, he's headed for more of a 2019 passing season rather than his recent ones, is that he's not a high-percentage short passing QB. That's far from his forte. But those are the WRs he's now saddled with unless someone steps up to provide what Diggs has provided over the past four seasons. Shakir seems to be out best prospect for that right now which isn't exactly reassuring. It's all but a given that we need to draft a WR at 28th, and possibly at 60th too, or maybe a trade up in the 2nd as a safety valve. While Diggs may not have put up great numbers under Brady, he still drew coverage of some sort. As many that have covered this trade have pointed out, which should be obvious, we don't currently have a WR that's any opposing DC is concerned about in the matchup category. That's an issue. And all a mere three weeks prior to the Draft.

Agree generally, but let's not sidestep the implication that it's his (Beane's) MO that is responsible. That MO was at least partially resultant from his inability to produce any elite players via his drafts over six drafts, for which he went out and took those unnecessary risks because of that. Which is why we are where we are. It was a balancing act as you said, now he's bouncing around in the net below. It is what it is. Now some defend it by saying it's a normal progression when it isn't necessarily. Homers, nonetheless. BTW, I just looked at Allen's per game average under Brady. If that's anywhere near what he does on average this season, we may be in trouble. On top of that Allen has a new Center and we have only one WR on the team that's caught a pass from Allen this past season, and hardly a prolific one. It's a reach that that's a recipe for even staying the course much less improvement. Then there's the changes on D which we didn't Even bring up. We should learn a lot this season. Unfortunately it will very likely be in the hard lessons category.

Completely agree. Except for my way, right. LOL Tell it to those that disagree. But when any are slammed for wanting a Championship ... SMH.

Don't tell me, I'm not the one arguing it by implication. But that definitely appears to be the tack taken by so many implicitly. I'm a bigger fan than that. What needs to be given a rest is this sentiment that we haven't underachieved come playoff time or that KC is invincible. If the latter is the case, who cares who's coaching.

From what I can see, absolutely no one on this team has consistently stepped up during the playoffs besides Allen. Davis has been our best playoff performer, like him or not, regular season production being irrelevant, and the extent to which Davis was consistent also being questionable, he was our most consistent playoff performer, which isn't saying much.

What did I say? That's what I said.

Sorry, meant New England.

Yup, if everyone just lowered their expectations, yes, yes it would.

And yet ...

Yeah, sorry for being disappointed that we've underachieved during the McBeane era with one of the seemingly greatest QBs to play the game. I'll try to tone down my expectations to merely being ecstatic to have a team in Buffalo and "making the playoffs." My bad. I guess I'll have to hold out hope that our next QB is better than Allen so that we can do a little better come playoff time. This notion that the Chiefs are unbeatable is built for homers. The Pats beat them, the Bucs who hadn't done a thing with what, a 44-year old QB, and so did the Bengals. But hey, who's looking at the details. What a defeatest attitude by those blathering on about how we'll never beat KC as long as Mahomes is their QB and Reid their coach. Either way, call me crazy for expecting more.

Holy ignoring of reality for our team.