dave mcbride

I can’t see Johnston falling out of the top 12 (at worst).

There are no rules against it, but bear in mind that any team which does something like that is going to have to give him an even BETTER deal to get to a new deal. The thing is, the $11 million is fully guaranteed, and his agent isn’t going to take anything that isn’t as good as that on a per year basis. If the deal offered is worse on a per annum basis, the agent will rightfully tell the player to play the season out and bet on himself. He has been truly elite in some games over the past two years, and I believe that the pectoral injury he suffered really hampered his game down the stretch this year. When he was healthy, he was blowing up a lot of plays. The Bills don’t beat Detroit without him. Given that the money is guaranteed, you’re willing to have the Tim Settles and Mike Loves of the world over Oliver? Because that’s what it boils down too. You’re paying Oliver regardless.

No team, and I mean no team, is trading for a fully guaranteed $11 million contract. People should banish this idea from their minds.

So was their drive to open up the second half.

I think you're basically right, but there's also situational football and having an overall plan each game. Versus Cincy, having a more controlled offense would have probably resulted in more production. My biggest issues with the offense outside of talent (admittedly the number one issue) are the lack of a fully integrated run-pass identity in which the two approaches mesh together (like in a Shanahan system) and week-to-week situational variation. Daboll, coming out of NE, fully had his head around that even if not every week was a success. His approach to the passing game too had a recognizable identity -- featuring receivers with great separation / big window ability. It's why they prioritized Emmanuel Sanders, who was almost always among the league leaders in establishing the biggest throw windows for whichever QB he was playing for. Diggs is that guy too. Davis isn't. Beasley was a window god, and the Bills really missed him. Don't get me wrong, though - the Bills offense was quite productive overall and did a lot of good things. But it needs a lot of work both philosophically and with regard to personnel.

Maybe this is recency bias, but Allen seemed to have a couple of problems with slants in the second half of the season -- inaccuracy and batted balls. He missed Gabe Davis on a slant (behind him) a couple of games ago and it wasn't the first time. In the playoff game vs Miami, he threw behind Beasley on what I think was a slant and then forced the ball to him the next play (it was picked off). He also had a seemingly large number of passes batted down, and at least a couple were on slants to Diggs. In the Detroit game, he had Diggs open on a slant in the EZ but it was batted and picked off.

The Indy offense was very well coordinated with Rivers in 2020. The problem there was Wentz and later the fumbling machine named Matt Ryan.

Well, he had a good year with Wentz too -- they were 11-1 when he went down in 2017 and the offense was cooking.

… and Dorsey was consistently outschemed. Allen was bad too, but the circumstances created by the o-line debacle account for some of that. https://buffalonews.com/sports/bills/jim-kubiak-josh-allen-runs-out-of-the-magic-that-helped-cover-bills-deficienies/article_246b2c2c-9c37-11ed-a844-dba9b7f6ece2.html

No team, and I mean no team, is trading for Ed Oliver given the $11 million guaranteed.

The Kubler-Ross cycle of grief, NFL version: 1. Denial: "Those were some crap calls and this game would have a whole lot different if Daquon Jones played." 2. Anger: "Fire the coordinators. All of them." 3. Bargaining: "Come on, Brandon Beane -- give us some hope that you're going to do something big to fix everything in your end-of-season press conference!" 4. Depression: "The window is closing fast. 2020-2022 was our window and now the cap combined with years of mediocre drafting is going to hem us in. We'll struggle to win the AFC East next year." 5. Acceptance: "It's X days until the home opener!"

I think I am in this case. Terry's net worth is currently listed at $6.7 billion by Forbes and $8.19 billion by Bloomberg. I don't think many people really fathom how much money that it is. It's an obscene amount and so great that if he lost 80 percent of it tomorrow from either amount, he'd still have enough to live in the lap of luxury for another 30 lifetimes.

The Pegulas aren't in this to make money. They have enough of that to last several lifetimes. They do actually want to win it all.

I mean, what's he supposed to say? People are reading too much into this. He's not going to throw anyone under the bus. It's so not his way.

Again, wrong TD. It was the second one where he wrestled it from Minkah Fitzpatrick.

He's talking about the second vs. Minkah Fitzpatrick in the end zone.

I'm not giving up on him. He has made a lot of great receptions the past three seasons so it's clear he can do it. His issue is consistency. Zay Jones was a pass dropper too. Players do get better and can become more consistent.

Pitching UCL injuries have almost no relation to QBing UCL injuries. It's an entirely different throwing motion and QBs who have had UCL injuries historically have not required surgery. Allen will be fine. https://www.jshoulderelbow.org/article/S1058-2746(10)00246-6/pdf#:~:text=Conclusion-,UCL injuries of the elbow are uncommon injuries in professional,to return to competitive play. Sandy Koufax is the opposite of a comp.

Also: https://russellstreetreport.com/salarycap/nfl-salary-cap-faqs/#:~:text=If a player unexpectedly retires,the “Barry Sanders Rule”. 'If a player unexpectedly retires in his prime, while playing under a long term contract in which the team gave the player a signing bonus, the CBA allows the team to attempt to recoup some of that Signing Bonus. This has become known as the “Barry Sanders Rule”. If the team – usually after an arbitration hearing – is entitled to receive the return of a portion of the player’s Bonus, that amount is credited to the following year’s Salary Cap. To be clear, though, not every retirement causes the return of bonus money. In fact, teams often sign veteran players to contracts with a number of years that they know will not be fully reached. In such cases, the teams never seek the return of bonus money – and likely wouldn’t win in arbitration, anyway. The return of bonus money is only likely to occur when the player essentially retires unexpectedly and without legitimate reason (i.e. injury).' He is 27 and played almost every snap late this season -- i.e., "in his prime." The Bills could absolutely go after the pro-rated portion of the bonus if they wanted, and they'd be within their rights to do so. They'd win.

That is simply too much money to give up. No other profession he embarks upon will give him more than a tiny percentage of that. If he retires, he'll have to return or forego cash. He'll be around for at least another year. From Spotrac: Contract Notes: $36.7M guaranteed at signing (signing bonus + 2020 salary + 2021 salary + 2021 option bonus) 2022 salary injury guaranteed now $4.975M of 2022 salary fully guarantees 3/20/2021 Additional $4.975M of 2022 salary & $6.35M of 2023 salary fully guarantees 3/22/2022 Remaining $2.25M of 2023 salary fully guarantees on 3/18/2023 Injury guaranteed now) 2021 Option Bonus: $7.5M (must be exercised 3/17/21 - 3/21/21) 2022 Roster Bonus: $500,000 (3/20/2022) 2023 Roster Bonus: $1 million (3/19/2023) 2024 Roster Bonus: $1.5 million (5th league day of 2024) 2025 Roster Bonus: $1.5 million (5th league day of 2025) 2022-2025 Per Game Active Bonus: $14,705 ($250,000, 6 LTBE in 2023) Workout Bonus: $300,000 2022-2025 Pro Bowl: $250,000

He is NOT gonna quit because he'd be giving up tens of millions of dollars. He's not that stupid.

Good take. I'll add that White looked pretty bad on Sunday -- PI is becoming an innate reflex for him. He ran a 4.47 coming out of college, but I guarantee that he's at best a low 4.6 now. You can't play CB in the NFL at that speed and be any good. Safety, sure, but not CB. Whether or not he gets his speed back is one of the very biggest issues the Bills will be facing this offseason because they can't cut him given a dead cap hit of nearly $23 million.

Hindsight is 20/20, but the Bills took him over these 1st round d-linemen: Brian Burns (elite), Jeffrey Simmons (elite), and Montez Sweat (averages just over 7 sacks per year over a four-year stretch). He's probably a better player than Rashan Gary, who was also a first rounder, and certainly better than Jerry Tillery and L.J. Collier. Dexter Lawrence had a great year this year, but his first few were just OK. It's kind of a wash with those two because Oliver has certainly had some good moments. If a redraft were held today, the Bills would take either Simmons or Burns, but I also think that if there were an actual re-draft, Burns would go top five.

This. Who cares. Guys trash talk. Diggs certainly does.

Oliver was playing pretty darn well until the pectoral injury. After that, he fell off a cliff. It's hard to play DT with one good arm.