PBF81

TSW Best: We win the division again, there's plenty of see I told ya so's for everyone; the typical debates emerge after we are unceremoniously ousted in the divisional round, fun and the usual merriment for all. Worst: We don't win the division, don't make the playoffs; we have to hide all the matches; have a referral forum for suicide prevention counselors; hire numerous Crisis Intervention specialists, and have a good supply of Indicas.

Semantics there. That's what I mean by the the extent to which McD's success hinges upon Allen. Right now McD has been given quite a bit of credit for how good the team is. You and I have argued with you disagreeing when I've said that several of our coaches prior to McD during the drought years would have gotten what our offense has gotten here and more in some cases. That's the extent to which the perception of McD's success hinges upon Allen, not himself. As to holding Allen back, I've never used those words. The offense on McD's watch has never approached being all that it can be. Point being, I wouldn't put it in terms of "holding Allen back," rather not knowing how to get the most out of not only him, but the offensive roster in general as well. Make sense?

Think long term ... or at least medium term.

Mahomes and Allen have two different styles. But the difference between them is Reid vs. McD. Reid is arguably the best offensively oriented coach in the game today and a far better coach than McD is. McD has no handle on offense and must rely on those beneath him, whom he controls, and which are not proven to any notable level with no significant accolades or achievements in the NFL. It's common sense for the objective. Hopefully this will clear up this season for the stragglers and we can shed this entirely irrational fear of being bad with Allen at QB, and move on to someone that actually understands offense and doesn't have to try to build an empire out of loosely knit nonsense like complimentary football to overcome his terminal weaknesses. Them again, Pegula's the one that decides. Not Beane. Pegula doesn't seem to care about winning, only his wealth.

Agree that it wasn't the loss of Pioli. Again, some complexities, we don't always define things as the discussion moves along. LOL

There's some confusion here, possibly on my end. I was referring to generally as time went on. We had an email circle and one guy kept joking that BB's goal was to keep trading down his 1st round picks until he finally had the entire 2nd round in hand one year. Well see, but I think you may be disappointed. I just got done watching the presser from the Pats loss. McD must've mentioned "complimentary football" which he implied was balanced football with all phases, pass/run/defense all being relatively equal, at least a dozen times. (my paraphrase) But it was clear from his statements last season that he wanted or rushing game to be more involved. It's going to be an interesting season to be sure. I wouldn't wager a plug nickel on what they do on offense. I also don't understand why how when our rushing attempts went up significantly, that that's not significant as to pending this season. Well find out in two months.

Perhaps, but these are the more solid types of arguments in favor of him. It doesn't say much.

Yeah, and all that I put forth was average, he did come up big and didn't fold late in games as you implied. Even when they Offense/Brady won the game it's difficult to recall any games in which his D folded late. My avid diehard Pats fan friend would disagree.

Great question!

The core of that second era of Super Bowl wins was Brady and consistently ranked 1st thru 4th Scoring Offenses and Brady in peak form averaging 4,400 Yards, a compl.% of 64.7, 32 TDs to a mere 8 INTs, and a Rating of 100.6 during that 9-year stretch beginning after Pioli. BB's defenses ranked an average 8th in Scoring and 20th in Yardage during that same stretch. That was with 2 games per season each against teams with QB the likes of Tannehill, Cutler, Moore, Henne, Darnold, McCown, Smith, Fitzpatrick, Sanchez, Taylor, Orton, and Manuel. Hardly daunting. I'm well versed in this, one of my best friends was a Pats & Belichick fan, both. He and I used to argue over great lengths of time on it all. LOL As to Brady going to Tampa, it's my understanding that BB drove that, not Brady. BB thought that Brady was on the downside. Bet he's regretting that now. As to Gronk v. McCourty, Gronk & Brady were unstoppable. BB was generally good at drafting defensive players and OL-men. Yeah, difficult to tell all the nits, but one thing's for certain, at some point BB began running the entire show. That was obviously also a part of the rift between him and Kraft, who loved Brady too. At the end of the day BB was a coach that quite frankly, lucked into Brady for the aforementioned reasons above, was fortunate to have been in a division bereft of good QB play for the duration of the Brady era, and thereby artificially inflating his defensive aptitude, not to diminish that he was still great in that regard. Something rarely brought up by anyone is the difference in his playoff Defenses during that Pioli era vs. during the 10-year stretch after it, that second era of Super Bowl wins as you defined it. From '01 thru '08, BB's Ds averaged 18.2 PPG against. From '09 thru '18 it averaged 22.4 PPG against. In that first stretch of 17 playoff games, his Ds held opponents to 27 or fewer all but twice, and to 21 or fewer 13 of 17, and to 17 or fewer in 10 of 17. In that second stretch of 23 playoff games, his Ds held opponents to 27 or fewer in 14 of 23 games; to 21 or fewer in 11 of 23 games; and to 17 or fewer in just 6 of those 23 games. That's significant. During that first stretch, their offense averaged 24.7 PPG in the playoffs. During that second stretch post-Pioli, their offense averaged 30.4 PPG in the playoffs. It was clearly the offense carrying them in that second Super Bowl era.

Most of these topics have been covered many times over. Not to downplay your takes or argument, after a while it's a time thing. LOL And to answer your question briefly and directly, ... no. I don't find it negative. What I do find negative is false info, such as everything about Diggs which we know was a lie. Don't want to answer, fine, just don't lie about it. My original comment was meant to be about lockerroom issues.

I don't want to get into this again. We've done it in the past and you've already chimed in.

Again, we're getting into some complexities here and off on a tangent. I'll address them, but consider, the point was how sans Belichick, one's reasons aside, did zero notable w/o Brady. If that was the case with BB/Brady, and given the greater evidence of similar with McD/Allen, then to consider that it's similar for another defensive sided coach yet one without the pre-head-coach accolades and recognition on defense that BB had, really shouldn't be anything even approaching a reach. In fact, it should be a strong consideration. As well, I'm of the rooted opinion that McD tries to replicate BB. BB was a rock solid DC. But consider too, when he got to New England, he took a defense that ranked top-10 the year prior and dropped it by over 10 places in the rankings. His defensive rankings in NE were very good from 2003 - 2007, but then dipped slightly after that, and more than slightly in the early 'teen years. But consider his divisional opposition for 40% of his games. Us, the Fins, and Jets were pure crap during Brady's entire tenure. All three teams were a revolving door of coaches, QBs, without any team ever fielding an above-average QB during that stretch. That'll do wonders for defensive rankings. LOL But to your recollection of the '95 Browns, the Browns were 4-5 at the time that the move was announced, and even if they'd gone 4-3 in their last seven they've have failed to make the playoffs. Also, BB's only playoff win came against Bledsoe's Pats and of course Bledsoe's playoff horrificness, his other two playoff games were blowout losses. So let's not embellish any of that. Here's the thing, look at Testeverde's performance in Cleveland. It was average at best. In his three seasons there under Belichick he posted an 80.9 rating. The following season(s) in Baltimore he doubled his production from '95, his best season under BB. Over the next three seasons at the ages of 33-35 Testerverde played much better than he did in Cleveland under BB, and on two different teams, Baltimore for two seasons and the Jets. His career faded after that, aging out. BB has never produced a decent QB, ever. Brady was an accident and Brady did it on his own for the most part much like Allen has. That's why none of his OC's ever did anything notable or above-average, usually well below average, anywhere else. If you'll recall, BB was firmly behind Bledsoe much as McD was firmly behind Peterman. It was Mo Lewis, damn him for eternity, LOL, that forced BB's hand. Had Lewis' not put Bledsoe out for the season, Brady likely would have been yet another late-round QB drafted by the Pats that moved on unceremoniously after the 2022 season at the end of his initial 3-year contract. Here's where I want to spend some time, the bolded part above. Brady's early career stats were reasonably good but not great. For his first three years as a starter, he never had more than 6.9 yards per pass attempt. If you want 6.9 yards per attempt, you could get that from a lot of QBs. In the middle of the Brady years, he went down with a season-ending injury. Belichick went 11-5 with Matt Cassell as his starting QB. The reason why BB likely kept Brady on after that point is because Brady was far more efficient than Bledsoe and didn't make the blundering errors that did. His first season, despite what you said above, was better than Bledsoe's prior two in NE. That too vs. a soph QB that had never started vs. a highly regarded QB that had been in the league for nearly 10 years. Brady's 6.9 was better than Bledsoe's career average of 6.6 and considerably greater than his 6.2 2000 mark. Brady's rating was also 10 points higher than Bledsoe's under BB in NE and nearly the same better than Bledsoe's career rating. So it was really a no-brainer, obviously not a planned thing. That's where I look to see the extent to which coaching and management (GM) are better than their peers. Do they recognize the talent and have a replacement plan, or do they keep the higher-paid more highly regarded players in the game w/o recognizing likely better talent in depth. Relatedly, I remember watching Favre playing preseason in Atlanta and then Atlanta trading him to Green Bay. I remember telling everyone at that time that they traded the wrong QB, they should have traded George. So kind of like that. Belichick, like McD this past season, a part of my BB mimicking take, liked to be his own DC. His undoing was his taking over for Pioli and being his own GM, which was all but an abject disaster, AHEM, particularly on the offensive side, which is why he had to go for trades and non-drafted players like Moss, Dillon, and Welker. Sure, he also drafted Gronk, but consider, was that because he thought that Gronk could be anywhere near as good as he was? If that were the case, why did he draft McCourty in round 1 waiting until 15 picks later to grab Gronk as the second TE off the board? Clearly he was not of that opinion. McCourty was good, likely validating his 27th overall draft status, but not "Gronk good," nowhere close as few players are. I mean let's be honest, knowing what we know now, that 2010 Draft done over again, Gronk is easily a top-3, likely the first, player taken. But the point is that by meddling to that extent and wanting full control over the entire enchilada, BB worked against himself. Lastly, yes, BB went 11-5 with Cassel as his QB. That's pretty much BB's capstone argument in this context, to which I say, welcome to the rest of the division and siht QBs. Despite that, his was probably the best of the divisional bunch that season. But let's add some perspective, shall we. Miami also went 11-5, ... with Pennington at QB. Pennington had as his top WR Ted Ginn Jr. After that, Greg Camarillo and Davone Bess, JAGs. BB/Cassel had Moss and Welker. So is that really impressive? Teams win on/about 10 games every season based upon circumstances like easy schedules, as was the case here. We did it in 2017 for which McD gets way too much credit for, and again in 2019. The Pats and Fins split with each other, neither team beating a 10-win team otherwise. Both teams took two from us with us fronting Edwards. BB's not going to shake this stigma nor should he. At the same time, it's certainly reasonable to ask whether if for someone regarded by many as the GOAT coach this could have been the case, why not for other coaches. (rhetorical) Clearly there is no reason as to why not. Given that McD has underachieved in many ways considering that, it's likely the case here.

There are clearly some critical things that he's not been forthright with, re: those, yes.

The implication of the quote of yours that I responded to is that Beane hasn't provided McD with enough to properly get it done. Anyway, just being light. Don't get bent out of shape. You McD apologists are very emotional. At this point I can see McD going but not Beane.

The anti-Beane v. the anti-McD types in a celebrity death match. The obvious difference between that arrangement and Allen/McD is that Reid compliments Mahomes on the offensive side, while McD does nothing significant for Allen and has to rely on people that aren't even remotely in the same class as Reid or even close. As stated, Reid sees the forest for the trees and ensures that Mahomes is in a position to get the most of out both himself, as well as for them together to get the most out of their entire offense and offensive roster. We're far from that. In that regard we keep shooting from the hip hoping to get a bullseye.

Thanks! I'm not sure about answering adequately, but the question is asked for purposes of ascertaining the reasons for the irrational fear and apprehension that Pegula and certainly many fans have about trying to improve. For years I held the notion that Belichick was only as good as he was because of Brady and that without Brady he wouldn't have had the rep that he has much less the track record. His performance in what now, 11 seasons, without Brady, paints him among the worst, not the best. Horrific record sans Brady, only two playoff appearances, 1-2 in postseason play, etc. There's a reason why Charlie Weiss, Josh McDaniels, and Bill O'Brien never distinguished themselves in any significant way other than when they had Brady. They were mostly bad otherwise. If it were really coaching with Brady, that wouldn't have been the case. IMO 8 games is high, but I would say that for sure we've owned Miami since Allen's been here because of him. That's 2 games/season on average. I'll look at the rest in terms of whether we'd have won or lost with some of our drought era QBs over Allen. We'd have lost the KC game w/o him, the Philly game, the Tampa game, the Charger game to start. That's 6 games right there that were Allen, nothing else. So if McD had one of our drought era QBs, Taylor for example, he'd have been 6-11 last season. You really think that there's a risk that if we got an offensive expert as our HC that we'd be 6-11 or thereabouts? It's not much different in other seasons. Allen has carried this team. Furthermore, it's quite safe to say that McD would have few if any playoff wins under his belt w/o Allen who does everything come playoff time as none of McD's players show up with even a sniff of consistency. The irony is that Gabe was probably the one that did to the greatest extent, which again, isn't very much, but that KC game alone ... We don't beat the Skylar Thompson Fins, we don't beat the Colts, and if we don't beat the Colts we don't play the Ravens; It's highly questionable whether we beat the Steelers, none of the KC playoff games are even close, and the New England game is quite possibly close, with Mac Jones playing QB. So without Allen here, do we even make the playoffs much less win any of them? For sure McD's playoff track record would be garbage. That's what we're afraid of trying to upgrade? Without Allen here I see some of our worst drought era records and few if any winning seasons, certainly no 10+ win seasons.

Yeah, I know, you're always posting in good humor. I realize that. You know me. LOL I'm hoping so, just not within the next 12. On the football side tho, ... ..., allow me to ask, how many games per season on average do you think that we win because of Allen, simply because he's our QB? I've asked this of Gunner and others before but they won't answer the question. If they disagree, then they can answer it. LOL

What if .... nah, forget it. Seriously though, what are the odds of an Allen-led team every doing much below 9-8? I'd say pretty close to nil. What are the odds of someone that has a clue in offense, as opposed to McD who has absolutely none, and his choice of OCs having to operate under his grand ever-changing now complimentary football scheme, not being as good as that. Sometimes worrying about failure holds people back from succeeding. Happens all the time in the business world. I did not, spell-checker did. I bow my head in shame regardless. No Wings for me anytime soon, and when I'm allowed to have them again, only ranch for a year while I'm on probation. 😞

What if Allen's legs fall off midway on a big TD run this season? Same type of question. 🙄

That's funny, I thought that Brady's offense was as predictable as it could have been by season's end. ... oh, that's right, it wasn't Brady's offense at that point, it was still Dorsey's. Brady's offense was in the Dallas game in which Dallas came in flat and any QB in the league would have won that game, Philly, and of course Brady's inaugural Jets game. Dorsey should never have gotten the job to begin with. Neither should Brady have. You and I disagree on the extent to which McD, the head coach, controls the rest of the team, so that will be the difference in each of our angles. Common sense there. More will clear up over time however. A pattern has definitely come into view. I would have at least been interested to see how Dennison could do here now with Allen. He obviously predated Allen, but in Denver, with four different QBs in five years, including Manning at his DFL bottom-dwelling worst, and average talent otherwise at best, managed to produce average offenses with stiff QBs. (Simien, Manning in his last season who was horrific, Cutler, and Plummer) In four seasons in Houston he produced three top-10 offenses with Schaub at QB. Matt Schaub. That's notably better than what any of our OCs have done outside of their body of work with Allen. It's a pissing into the wind argument to suggest that he couldn't have gotten more out of this offense than our OCs to date. He was marginally better than Daboll in Daboll's first two seasons here. As to Daboll, you know, or should, that collegiate performance is all but irrelevant to NFL performance in terms of coaching. You are definitely more optimistic than I am, but we'll see how it shakes out. Bickering and arguing doesn't change a thing. LOL As to Brady, given that this was McD's 3rd choice, if he doesn't answer the mail, at some point the top dog needs to start being held accountable. That season should be this one. Brady had half a season to get his feet firmly planted and a full offseason to make whatever changes he wanted. They obviously really wanted Coleman, which IMO is again going to go down as a Watkins/Jones/Hardy type of blunder, so we'll see. As I've stated before, this is what they wanted apparently. So let's see if their vision works, or not. It's not as if we have a choice. LOL The fulcrum around which the pro v. anti McD debate takes place appears to be the extent to which McD's success hinges upon Allen. As you hinted with Brady above, we will find out more that it was truly Allen that carried the water in that arrangement once McD is no longer here and another head coach has done at least equally as well. Either way, for anyone to suggest that we've gotten the most out of this offense that could have been gotten, is incredibly weak. As to McD, he can't even get average out of his defenses come playoff time, which in and of itself should be enough to answer the Allen or McD question above.

Well you're one of 'em. I don't "hate" McD, but after 8 seasons of little more than overachievement in the regular season matched with underachievement, largely due to coaching blunders, otherwise most particularly his own personalized defenses, in the playoffs, I have no difficulty setting aside the positive to be able to clearly see the rest of the forest. Also, this notion that most other coaches would have an Allen-led team floundering quite likely is ill-reasoned out and childish as well since he does everything in the playoffs anyway.

The good guys.

Come on now. He had worse w/o Allen in 2017 on that merit alone. lt's also highly arguable that it was worse in '18 & '19 too. He's going to actually have to get more from the sum of the parts than the whole this season though for us to win the division. The question is going to be how does Josh perform under Brady. There are two general schools of thought there. The first is that how the team played under Brady last season isn't going to mimic how they play under him this season much at all. The second is that his offense will be more akin to what we saw last season under him. Those that take the former view seem to want to ascribe to Brady everything positive that happened to this team on his watch, even things like the play of the D implicitly. At the same time in response to the challenges accurately noting how our offense sputtered in the last several games of the season, they'll simultaneously argue that Brady was still running Dorsey's offense. LOL

Thanks. Was outside most of the day. Went to a ballgame. Was great.