Cash

Okay I pretty much forgot about Dawkins, haha. Add him to the list. But I stand by my overall point. Most guys peak in their mid/late 20s. I don’t expect Spain, Morse, Feliciano, or Spencer Long to get significantly better at this point of their careers. Nsekhe can reasonably be expected to be getting worse. Williams is a bit of a special case because of injury & position, but even still it would be a big surprise if he ever has a better year than 2017. Ford, Bates, and maybe Dawkins are the only 3 that probably have their best football ahead of them. Not everyone automatically gets better every year, so it’s certainly possible Bates gets cut. But I think he’ll make the team unless a younger player beats him out.

Great post. Only thing I disagree with is TE being a draft need. We already have 2 (IMO) promising young TEs on the roster. McD has been very open about his belief of having veterans at every position. Never say never, but I’d be really surprised if Lee Smith got cut for a rookie, and now that Kroft took a pay cut, I don’t expect him to go anywhere either. So that basically means a rookie would need to beat out Sweeney. Certainly not impossible but not to the point that I’d call TE a need in the draft. I think gains at TE need to come from Knox and/or Sweeney getting better. Agreed. Also, Bates and Ford are the only two young OL on the roster (I don’t count Boettger). Both of them should be getting better with age right now, whereas most of our other OL are getting worse or at best staying flat. I think Bates likely stays unless a rookie beats him out. Lastly, I love this signing! Give me a WR in round 2 or 3, a RB in round 4 or 5, and this will be a tremendous offseason.

On the other hand, some teams (notably Jets, Vikings, and Eagles) signed basically no one despite having needs at WR. That could signal that they plan to draft 2 WRs in the first 3 rounds.

I’m very high on Alton Robinson after his combine performance.

I think it’s unlikely he’s cut unless they sign another vet or Daryl Johnston takes a big step and needs PT. You want 4 edge rushers to rotate on pass downs. I think Jefferson will be rushing from the interior in those formations, so if I’m right that leaves Hughes, Addison, Murphy, and Johnston. Johnston was getting exploited so badly at DE that he was benched after a couple games last year. If he doesn’t take a huge leap, you’re still 1 guy short. Im assuming they’ll draft a DE high, but even that only gets you to 4 DEs for passing downs not counting Johnston.

From what I’ve read, Jefferson will mostly be a 3-tech DT for us, at least on passing downs (which is most downs). We only have 3 DEs in pass sets I think - Hughes, Murphy, and Addison - and none of them are young. If we don’t sign another true DE, I wouldn’t be surprised to see one picked at #54.

Roughnecks isn’t bad. The rest are incredibly generic. Like, unlicensed 1987 video game generic.

Seems like a great hire!

Watching without sound. Can anyone explain what happened here? Edit: TO restored, all is well.

Yes. I would imagine that the vast majority of NFL-caliber players in general and QBs specifically don't peak midway through year 2. If this is as good as he'll ever get, then the pick was a bust. But I don't see why so many people seem to think that a player with his age & experience wouldn't get better going forward.

I missed that as well - thanks for posting! Billings is intriguing, as 1-tech DT is a position I think we could really use help at. I'm not really feeling any of the others, because either they're unrealistic (like Von Miller or Mike Evans), maybe realistic but would cost too much, or just aren't really upgrades (like Taylor Gabriel). AJ Green is the maybe exception there, but if I'm Beane, I wouldn't trade for him without getting his medical info first. With no guarantee he's more than a rental for this year, you need to be really confident that he's going to be healthy, and likely to stay healthy.

I'm obviously not a mod, but if the Bills do make any real trades, I vote for a standalone thread for each trade.

But Gordon isn't good this year - that's the problem.

Plus, the main issue with the play itself was that at least 3 blocks were whiffed - both receivers out in front plus the LT. I don't think any team has a play that will succeed if literally every block at the point of attack fails miserably...

I'm guessing it's about average? I don't pay attention to other teams' practice squads at all, but from memory, we cycled through a lot of guys under Nix and (especially) Whaley as well. Maybe we've just had 2 high-cycle guys in a row, or maybe that's just how the league is now.

He's also been surprisingly good on jump balls throughout his career. Plays bigger than his size - kind of like Steve Smith.

Sanders can still play, and would probably be a good veteran presence in the WR room. At his age, I would expect the price to be fairly low, and he wouldn’t preclude us from still drafting a WR high this year. I’d be in for a 5th or lower for sure. Probably would also be happy at a 4th.

Within the context of the Bills being 3-0 and at home? 1. Overall? Probably 3. It would be a little higher if Singletary or Tarim Johnson were healthy. Obviously there is a path to us winning, but I just have a bad feeling about this one.

I'm not necessarily against getting rid of the preseason, but doesn't this actually make the opposite point? Teller was so good in preseason that the Browns were willing to trade 2 picks for him and give him a shot at a starting job in Cleveland. The Browns might not have been willing to do that if he hadn't shown so well in preseason.

I'd say it's worth about 1/16th of the whole season.

Not an expert, but I actually think teams wouldn't really want that. Two reasons: 1.) Starting C is a high injury risk, so you have to pay serious attention to your backups. Starting LS is not, and most teams don't have much in the way of a backup LS. Having one guy fill both roles means that you now need a decent backup LS, which kind of defeats the purpose of combining the roles. 2.) Punters are always FG holders now because it lets the FG battery of LS/K/holder practice on their own, and none of those 3 are needed for most regular drills/practices. So if you make the LS and C the same guy, he has to split his time between practicing with the offense and with the kicker/punter. And you'll probably still need to practice kicks & punts while the offense is practicing, so you need your backup LS to fill in there. And again, if the backup is spending all the practice time with the K, why bother swapping in your starting C during the games? Seems counterproductive.

Definitely Steve Christie at this point.

Like I said in the Teller thread, it's very encouraging that we have players who aren't good enough to make the 53-man roster, but are good enough to have trade value.

Wade playing extensively would be the only thing worth watching tonight. ?

Nice! Best wishes to Teller, but I'm pretty sure he wasn't making the team anyway, and it's not a bad return for an unproven player. A 5th and a 6th next year for Teller and a 2021 7th. It's also very encouraging from a team talent standpoint that we actually have guys with trade value who aren't good enough to make the team. EDIT: Teams usually keep 8 or 9 O-linemen. These are locks: Dawkins Spain Morse Ford Nsekhe Feliciano Long That leaves 1 or 2 spots, and one of those pretty much has to be a guy who can play OT, which Teller doesn't. So I'd have been surprised but not shocked if he made the final cut.