dave mcbride

I just compared him with a random “name” running back, Joe Mixon. Over his career, Singletary has 13 fumbles on 817 touches, and he had 3 this year: https://www.pro-football-reference.com/players/S/SingDe00.htm Mixon, on the other hand, has 6 fumbles on 1,545 touches, and he had zero this year. In fact, he has had 3 seasons with zero fumbles: https://www.pro-football-reference.com/players/M/MixoJo00.htm

And the current Bills center is actually above average.

Honestly, a 7-3 record in Super Bowls is significantly more impressive than 7-0, much less 4-0. Getting to the SB ten times is incredible.

Remember the halftime show where scores of small children choreographed an impassioned rush to the stage while Jacko performed? If only the NFL knew then what we know now! I also remember being surrounded by filthy rich Cowboys fans, and at least one had a gold lame cowboy hat (we had really good seats through a stroke of luck). Should have been 59-24 -- Lett should have scored and James Lofton dropped the easiest of TD passes in last-minute garbage time.

Or Malcolm Butler in 2018.

More like a big lead and no need to throw it every play. He threw it 29 times and had a rating of 125.8. He had a legit great game. Total qb throwing yardage is a highly misleading stat. Focus on efficiency.

I was at the game. Sat right behind Ted Danson and Whoopi at the 40 yard line about 20 rows up.

You may recall that the game was played in an absolute monsoon:

That’s because teams get behind and have to throw the ball nearly every play. They were 4th in defensive ypa and 30th in number of passes thrown against (meaning only 2 more teams had a larger number of passes thrown against them). https://www.pro-football-reference.com/teams/kan/2022.htm Folks do realize that in college sacks are considered qb rushing plays, right?? Again, sacks count as qb rushing plays in college.

The thing is, the Patriots were not going to help the Bills. That wasn’t happening. But I am pretty sure that the Bills wanted McDuffie.

Terrible professional players judged RELATIVELY TO OTHER PROFESSIONAL PLAYERS and not randos off the street like you or me (i.e., like to like) get pro paychecks all the time. Everything should be judged on a curve, and there is a bell shaped talent distribution curve in every sport. There are always going to be bad players relative to the median player. Bad teams are filled with bad players. It’s why they’re bad. Johnson is one of them, but I do admire how he has survived.

Diggs has more than one good year left in him. He’s not that old and has a ridiculously huge route tree. He’s no one trick speed pony.

Oh, I fully get it. You’re just proving my point that he’s a bizarre low-talent unicorn who will literally play for anyone, anywhere, and at any time. That’s what he is, and it’s why he’s both interesting and unique. No need to valorize his “love for the game” (🙄🙄); merely look on in awe at a guy who has more than 20 professional football contracts in 15 years. That’s pretty crazy. Johnson was a D3 guy who only came onto people’s radars because Harbaugh was insanely successful at USD. He is low, low, low talent — which is (again) why his career is interesting. I feel like you’re invested in some sort of “climb every mountain” inspiration story when the simple fact of the matter is that he blows yet has bizarrely managed to hang on by being readily available to any team at any time in moments of injury-related desperation.

He was 0-5 with Tampa and had a collective passer rating of 60 (5 tds, 10 ints). No doubt, but he is the opposite of good. He’s a true unicorn and I feel deserving of a documentary. Again, 15 NFL teams. That is insane.

I don't think better at quarterbacking (he's bad!), but certainly better at surviving (think cockroach and nuclear attack) and better at answering the emergency call when QB 2 goes down for whatever team.

McDermott has always liked NFL family stuff (i.e., Edmunds), and Zay Jones has an NFL dad and played in the Panthers' backyard in college. Word at the time was that the Panthers liked him. And we moved just ahead of the Panthers to draft Dion Dawkins, and word was that the Panthers were enthusiastic about him. Beane knew he was leaving for Buffalo, and I've always wondered if he fed McDermott info. Obviously they used Bills scouting info - they had no other choice - but I have always thought that draft was McDermott's. Recall that interview with Whaley about Mahomes and Terry P's enthusiasm. Trading back for a good zone CB instead of grabbing Mahomes strongly suggests McDermott influence to me.

Taron Johnson is a very good player.

See above -- most of those yards came when the Jets fell behind 42-10. And I singled him out because -- to repeat -- he not only played for the Bills, he has played for FIFTEEN EFFING TEAMS! He's way worse than you seem to think, btw. A couple of garbage-time yardage accumulation situations in 2021 do not a good QB make.

He is legit bad! He always has been. I don't doubt that he may have locker room qualities, and the Niners were of course desperate. But guys like that don't last as long as him and -- more to the point -- they don't play for 15 teams! That has to be some sort of record.

No, that was Joe Webb in 2017.

Yes - 7 teams in 13 seasons and only 5 starts. Still has a long way to go to get to 15, though! Yes, that was Kroft.

He had a deceptively good game for the Jets last season - https://www.pro-football-reference.com/boxscores/202111040clt.htm. However, his three TD passes came after the Jets were losing 42-10 to the Colts. He also had decent numbers in a game for the Ravens too last season (same season!), but they lost 41-21 to the Bengals. Those two garbage-time productivity games got his lifetime rating up from the low-mid 60s to 70.6, which is still terrible.

There are literally hundreds of guys like him over the last decade and a half -- the Levi Browns and Jeff Tuels of the world. They last for a year or two and that's it. 15 teams in 15 years! And that's why he hung around, I guess. The numbers are terrible but I guess teams find a reason to believe.

I dunno, it's more about sports karma than the dollars and cents of it all. I'm not talking about his material well being. Anyway, he has been terrible wherever he's played. And yet he sucks. Don't get me wrong, though -- I'm genuinely impressed by how he's managed to keep hanging around.

Not sure all that many folks remember, but Josh Johnson -- a terrible QB who has somehow managed to last in the league for 15 years (albeit with stints in the United Football League, the Alliance of American Football League, and the XFL) despite a QB rating below the NFL equivalent of the Mendoza line -- did a stint with the Bills in 2015. He was signed mid-season when Tyrod Taylor got hurt and was the primary backup to EJ Manuel in the London game against Jax. We almost got a chance to see him perform given how awful Manuel was in the first half of that game. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Josh_Johnson_(quarterback) The most amazing thing about him is that he has played for 15 NFL teams! I mean, I thought Fitzpatrick had played for a lot of teams, but wow. This unintentionally hilarious article from two and half years ago has him about to hang it up after his 13th NFL team: https://www.sportscasting.com/after-13-nfl-teams-josh-johnsons-exhausting-football-career-may-be-over/. He has had over 20 contracts including the non-NFL pro-league contracts! (Jim Harbaugh was his coach at D3 University of San Diego too.) The non-NFL teams he played for: Sacramento Mountain Lions - United Football League (he played two games and then the league folded) San Diego Fleet - Alliance of American Football Los Angeles Wildcats - XFL It's both kinda sad and poetic that he now may well be done forever after embarrassing himself on the biggest of stages before getting concussed out of the game by legit bad man Ndamukong Suh. But he's the ultimate survivor, so I probably shouldn't write his obituary yet. Finally, I like the title of this entertaining Vice piece: "Josh Johnson, Emergency Quarterback": https://www.vice.com/en/article/9a4e7y/josh-johnson-emergency-quarterback And here is a picture of him as a Bill: