Cash

I'll go on record and say that if we lose this Sunday AND Orton has a bad game, EJ starts the last 2 games.

Yeah, I loved him in preseason. Had one game in particular where he perfectly timed the snap count like 3 plays in a row, which really caught my eye. I kind of expected him to make the team over Manny Lawson.

Yeah, I really think it's only contract value. Frankly I hope we don't get any comp picks this year, because I'd rather we keep our guys. But if we do lose Hughes, it might be worth trying to limit FA signings to ineligible players (i.e., they got cut rather than contract expired) and get a 3rd or 4th rounder.

What a bizarre response. Why would my feelings be hurt? Do you think I'm Jim Haslett?

I like that analogy! I'd have rather gone for the KO and risked getting knocked out, but some people seem to think that losing a decision is better than losing by KO. I respectfully disagree.

I agree. I was having basically this same conversation with some non-Bills fans during the game yesterday. My prediction was that Whaley/Marrone are retained, Hackett maybe gets fired (50/50 he's retained), and the QB competition in 2015 is between Orton (who picks up his player option), EJ, and a mid-round draft pick. Of course, a lot depends on how the team actually finishes. If we lose out and finish 7-9, I think Marrone is likely gone, especially if the team seems to have quit on him. If we pull off an upset and finish 9-7, then I think it's most likely that everyone comes back, and we get a bunch of positive spin about how the team is headed in the right direction, it's our first winning season since 2004, the young guys need to develop, we caught some bad breaks, etc. (In the unlikely/miraculous scenario that we finish 10-6, everyone is definitely brought back with lots of back-patting, whether we make the playoffs or not.) The most likely scenario seems to be 8-8, and that's an interesting spot. Sadly, that would be the best record we've had since 2004, and a 2 game improvement over last year, so there is at least some reason for optimism there. I tend to think that the Pegulas won't rock the boat just for the sake of rocking the boat, and that if they're going to clean house (i.e., replace Brandon and/or Whaley), it won't be until after the 2015 season. I won't be shocked if I'm wrong, but I think 8-8 leads to the scenario I predicted above. If the team doesn't improve in 2015, then Marrone is gone, Whaley/Brandon probably stick around, and we probably draft a QB high.

Not much. He looked pretty bad this year before getting hurt. If they're willing to part with him, it probably means they don't think he's the answer.

You stay classy, London. Granted, he's probably right, but that's still a pretty harsh way to go about saying it.

I still agree with Marrone and the 4th down bot on the 4th and 6 call in the first quarter, but I think punting is a lot more defensible there, and won't argue this one. In fact, fivethirtyeight recently put forth some evidence that punting to Peyton Manning can be a good idea: http://fivethirtyeight.com/features/skeptical-football-sizing-up-the-inevitable-patriotspackers-super-bowl/ (Scroll to "How to beat Peyton Manning", although the charts might not make sense unless you read the first section as well.) I think you meant this one? http://nyt4thdownbot.com/play.html?gameid=12072014_BUF@DEN&playid=20141207007542

And I see where you're coming from, but to me, knowing this offense, I didn't see any way we could score twice in 4 minutes or so. Not that I thought it was very likely in 6 minutes or so, but the TD drive we eventually mounted was about the fastest I think this offense can actually manage. So I'm not looking at it in a vacuum at all. Put another way: I have no problem trusting the D to try to get a 3 and out, but I really feel like it was irrelevant. Knowing our offense, we didn't have time to score 2 TDs, even if the D got the quick 3 and out. And that's exactly how it played out. And that's my problem with the decision -- it went about as well as anyone could reasonably hope, and still resulted in us needing to recover an onsides kick with under a minute to go, then need to drive about 55 yards in about 50 seconds with no time outs. And that's after the 3 and out AND a 3.5 minute TD drive that included a 4th and 16 conversion. I don't think our offense can really do any better than that. I think we probably would've lost either way, but IMO, the better chance would've been to go for it the first time. Worst case, the game is over, which is what ultimately happened anyway. Best case, you execute that same 3.5 minute TD drive, score just before the 2 minute warning, then have the option of trying for the onsides or kicking deep. If you kick deep and get a 3 and out, you get the ball back at roughly your own 30 yard line with something like 1:45 to go and no time outs. That would still be a tall order for our offense, but a lot more manageable than what actually happened. (Which, again, was the best case scenario, not the most likely scenario.)

The 4th down bot didn't kill Marrone for that one, but mostly because our chances of winning were very low either way: http://nyt4thdownbot.com/play.html?gameid=12072014_BUF@DEN&playid=201412070073504 Personally, I think it was an indefensible move. The reasonable best-case scenario* is a quick 3-and-out followed by a punt, and that happened. Result: we got the ball back right where we started, but with about 2 minutes fewer on the clock. And guess what? We still needed to convert a 4th and 16 to advance the ball the next time! If we can pick up a 4th and 16, why can't we pick up a 4th and 2 from about the same spot? *Obviously a muffed punt recovered by the Bills, or roughing the kicker penalty, or CJ Anderson fumble would've been better scenarios, but those are very unlikely and not something a coach can really plan on.

Articles/opinions like these come up every few years. I find that they're mostly begging the question, i.e., assuming what they're trying to prove. "Running quarterbacks can't succeed" because they only define "running quarterbacks" as QBs who can't throw. Steve Young? Not a runner apparently. Neither was Elway, Tarkenton, Rich Gannon, Jeff Garcia, etc. Look at Aaron Rodgers' or Andrew Luck's running stats sometime, but neither one ever gets counted as a "running quarterback". Race seems to be a factor as well, but I think it's mostly just begging the question. Russell Wilson doesn't count anymore, because he "learned to play in the pocket". Nope, he plays the same style now that he did last year, and the same style the year before as a rookie. It's pretty much the same style as Ben Roethlisberger, except with read option runs added into the mix. There's also somewhat of a moving target in terms of what counts as success. Someone up above pulled out the old chestnut of "Elway only won once he stayed in the pocket", which is ridiculous. He went to 3 Super Bowls as a young scrambler type! That counts for nothing all of a sudden? Those Denver teams around him were garbage! Early-stage super-athlete Elway was awesome, and late-stage pocket-passer Elway was still really good. Similar to Randall Cunningham, who tore the NFL apart with his athleticism early, and tore it apart as a pocket passer late. What's my point? It bothers me when people beg the question. If your criterion for "running quarterback" includes an inability to pass from the pocket, what's the point? Bad passers don't succeed in the NFL? Wow, big revelation! Who are these straw men arguing that we need a great athlete QB who can't throw? I don't see anyone cutting Tom Brady to pick up Dennis Dixon. Those aren't typically the choices a team has. It's more like Jordan Palmer vs. Dennis Dixon. In that case, I'll take the guy who can at least do some damage with his legs, since neither one can do much damage with his arm. (As for my ideal QB? One who can kill you from the pocket, who also has escapability AND the ability to burn you with his legs when things break down. I.e., Aaron Rodgers.)

I think that actually is our offense. We run 4 verticals about 10 times a game, and most of the other plays I see broken down on all-22 have at least two fly patterns in them. I personally think it's a contributing factor to our red zone struggles - our whole offense is based on sending WRs deep to stretch the field vertically, and that can't be done in the red zone.

Interesting if true.

Brilliant and very well done! Unfortunately I wasn't able to make the Brawlers' home opener here in Boston, and won't be able to make their last home game either. I think they just have the 2. If this league still exists next year, I'll probably go check it out.

Technically, the 8.1 is not a "projected win total", but an "average simulated result". Out of the thousands (millions? Dunno what kind of computing power 538 has) of simulations run, our average win total works out to 8.1, but I'd guess around 20% of the simulations have us winning 10 games or more -- because that's our playoff %. Possibly higher, even, because I imagine we miss the playoffs at 10-6 in a decent number of simulations. So there's definitely a chance, and not that horrible a chance either. If we lose this Sunday, I think it's pretty much over -- I can't see us getting to 10 wins without sweeping the Jets, and there's almost no way we'd win a potential 9-7 playoff tiebreaker. If we can get back to the non-QB level of play from the first 2 games, and Orton can keep up about this level of play (or preferably cut down on his turnovers), I think we have a real shot at it. But if we keep playing like garbage until the last drive or two, we'll get smoked.

Glad it's back! Week 8 - Bills @ Jets - L Week 10 - KC @ Buff - W Week 11 - Bills @ Fish - W Week 12 - Jets @ Bills - W Week 13 - Browns @ Bills - W Week 14 - Bills @ Denver - L Week 15 - Packers @ Bills - L Week 16 - Bills @ Oakland - W Week 17 - Bills at NE* - L Which would put us at 9-7. I could live with that.

We actually disagree about the stunts, I think. Like I said the first time, the issue I've seen is one of confusion, not lack of athleticism. One of the all-22 breakdowns in recent weeks highlighted how Richardson would frequently try to help out another lineman whenever Richardson thought he had no one to block. Unfortunately, he frequently did have someone to block; it's just that that someone was coming in late on a stunt or delayed rush. That's not an athleticism or physical skill problem, it's a mental/diagnostic problem. If that can be fixed - whether by replacing the player(s), changing techniques and/or blocking schemes, or just through learning from experience - I think we'll be in a lot better shape. But whether it can be or not, I still don't think that putting extra TEs in the game helps the O-line. Extra TEs help the tackles a lot more than the guards. And I don't see them doing anything to help on the stunts and delayed rushes up the middle. If Richardson and Pears can't tell when to stay put and wait for a man to block, having extra blockers out wide won't do a thing to help. There is an argument for having multiple backs stay in to block, but I still feel that we're ultimately better off having better players on the field most of the time. And I have no doubt that our 5th-best WR is a better overall player than our FB or our 2nd-best TE. If everyone running the Bills is good at their job, then we seem to have a serious disconnect between FO and coaches. Because the FO has put a lot of resources into the WR and RB positions, and very little into the TE and FB positions. If playing extra TEs and a FB is truly necessary to help the O-line (I disagree, but maybe you're right), then it still goes back to the FO for not providing the coaches with a good enough O-line. Alternatively, it's possible (but we can't prove it) that the O-line, while inadequate overall, wouldn't look as bad if the coaches were implementing the offense differently. Hey Big Cat, since Kelly doesn't seem interested in fully answering your question, I'll take a stab at it. My guess is that with Orton, the Bills have played with: 4 WR/0 TE/1 RB - 3% of the time 3 WR/1 TE/1 RB - 40% 2 WR/2 TE/1 RB - 30% 1 WR/2 TE/2 RB - 15% 1 WR/3 TE/1 RB - 10% 0 WR/3 TE/2 RB - 2% Totally guessing off the top of my head, so probably way off. I would say that if Goodwin was healthy, the 4 WR should be played a decent bit more, but as is, I won't call for it to be used more. I think the 3 WR set should be the base offense, as it was last year, and be used maybe 60-70% of the time.

One of the main problems with our O-line seems to be confusion. I.e., we let a lot of free rushers in on stunts, delayed rushes, or Pettine-style blitzes where the pressure is disguised. It doesn't seem like the O-line is getting beat by 1-on-1 pass rush moves nearly as much as just not blocking the right guy(s). So I do wonder if spreading things out more might make it harder for opposing defenses to confuse our line? Theoretically, it should move a couple defenders away from the ball, and make their blitzes slower to develop.

I certainly hope so, but I'm not very optimistic. During our 2-0 start, one of the things I was hopeful about was that, even though our offense hadn't been playing very well, there was reason to expect that both the QB and O-line would play better with more experience. Four weeks later, the QB position is playing a bit better, though not exactly in the way I expected, but the O-line looks a lot worse. It's very concerning.

That's 3 times already that we've been flexed to Fox. Weird.

My guess is that most plays are neutral - maybe the range from C- to B or something? B+ or above would be positive, and D+ or lower would be negative? Just a guess. And if that's the case, it doesn't surprise me that most of the scores are pretty close to zero. Most guys on most plays are pretty much "doing their job" - not screwing up, but also not making a great play. I like his methodology in principle, but I agree that it could use some more explanation. It would be nice if he had a reference post he could link back to every week, where he maybe gave examples of what constitutes a positive or negative play, and roughly what kind of play earns what kind of grade. I do like that he keeps a running tally year-long. Whatever his system is, it at least approximates how guys actually played, and it's nice having a an aggregate score for the year.

One sign that this Bills regime may actually be "different" than past ones is that we had a few opportunities for a similar cut this year, and took none of them. Manny Lawson was kept as a backup. Kraig Urbik was kept as a backup. Erik Pears lost his RT job, and was kept at another job. Which, granted, he doesn't seem very good at, but I'd rather have him available at RG or RT than a street free agent. Plus, and it's hard to quantify this, but it makes sense that Henderson would benefit from playing next to a veteran who's experienced at RT - a good resource to lean on. None of the above players are great, although I still think Lawson is a pretty good SLB miscast as a DE. But they're a significant step up above the replacements that would be signed if they were cut.

The other issue (and this has been said in other threads as well) is that when we do throw deep, it tends to be go routes only. A few successful 15-20 yard square ins will back off the defense pretty well, but too often, our passing playbook seems to be drag routes, curls, go routes, and rollouts, and that's it. It's the intermediate stuff -- think 10-20 yards past the line of scrimmage -- where you really hurt a defense, and it's definitely lacking for us. How much of that is on Hackett and how much on EJ, I don't know. I will say that unlike the Trent Edwards era, we at least have more short throws to WRs or RBs on the move, rather than stationary targets.

Matt Moore is one of the better backups in the league, but I don't think it makes much sense to bench a guy early in his 3rd year. Give him the whole year, and if he's still no good, you can move on in the offseason. Personally, I was very anti-RT when he came out in the draft, and still don't think he'll amount to much, but I'll admit that he's been a lot better (or more mediocre?) than I thought he'd be. He does throw some nice passes when he's on - particularly in week 2 against us. I thought he overall played pretty well in that game, it's just that the rest of the team was getting beat badly. PS. Every time I see "Tannehill", I read it as "Talleywhacker". I miss crayonz.