finn

That's an understatement. If we lose Ricky Bates, we're down to Cody Ford and the assistant coaches, with an aging Stafford on the other side ready to pull up lame at any point.

No objection. Except, is Hunter a sexual predator? How about Bill Cosby? Woody Allen is also a creepy liberal. But then I think of Clarence Thomas, and I'm back listing creepy Republicans, sorry.

Especially after he offered not a word of complaint, that we know of. He took the loss as graciously as a person could. Not sure if that made them feel better or worse, but I bet it made them even more motivated to make it up to him. He played his guts out and teed it up for them.

The entire country was deprived when the Bills didn't advance. Josh Allen was playing at god level, and he may have ascended to an even higher plane. Even that dweeb critic, who said "Ok, he played great against the Pats, but no way does he repeat that" had to admit he not only continued but played even better. Mahomes, well, we know how that turned out. He was exhausted trying to play at Allen's level and couldn't sustain it.

I do think most people would agree that Watson should be able to play football, at least somewhere (I suggest Canada). But I wouldn't let him work in my daughter's school, even though I probably couldn't stop him legally. "Rules" work both ways.

Ok. But when do expressions of the public's moral outrage start rising to the level of the "societal sanctions" you deplore? For example, is a boycott of Browns games a societal sanction, or merely a decision of how people spend their money? If it's wrong for the NFL to ban Watson from playing, is it wrong for the Lady's Library Club to disinvite him from a speaking engagement? Both are societal sanctions, aren't they? My point is that it's not easy to locate what defines a morally just response to this sort of behavior (or "alleged behavior"). There are no rules. Our society just mooches along, figuring it out en masse in an imperfect, inconsistent, contradictory, messy devil's brew of reason, bias, and emotion. Much like our legal system, unfortunately.

Not sure I understand your meaning. You "believe there is something to the allegations" and remind us a court of law "decides on guilt or innocence." Of course it's up to a court of law to make a legal determination; who is saying otherwise? That's not the point. The legal system is deeply flawed and very often--maybe usually--it gets it wrong, especially in sexual assault cases. Brock Turner, Woody Allen, Brett Kavanaugh... the list is endless. Are you saying Browns fans shouldn't "believe" the 22 credible allegations from unrelated women--while giving yourself that option? Or that they shouldn't, what, buy tickets? Object? Arrest and charge him in the streets? What are you saying here?

Entirely guaranteed.

Seems like he would be a natural kick returner, but I don't see any stats on him after college. We certainly need a returner.

I for one am glad they didn't break mortgage the future to pay Watt last year. A real leader sitting on injured reserve vowing fiercely to be back for the playoffs, maybe.

Who said anything about drama? If the players resent McDermott, they might not express it beyond a raised eyebrow or a significant silence. That doesn't mean it's not damage that McDermott should attend to.

Yeah, but a botch of this magnitude can do a lot of damage, even to a coach who has done things right for five years. His "execution" comment throws the players under the bus, when it's obvious they did what he and Frazier asked them to do. The two of them blew it, not the players, and he really screwed up by exculpating himself at their expense. And, no, his "...and that's on me" bromide does not undo the damage. I wouldn't be surprised if this is festering to a degree among the players. I suspect it will clear up, but McDermott may have used up a lot of goodwill. He can't blow it again, or blow it and blame the players.

Didn't realize/notice that. Thanks.

I don't see how he's an upgrade over Obata. Why not re-sign him instead?

Yeah, but I'll take them if the alternative is nothing at all. I for one want to know there might be resentment simmering among the staff and players. Speculation is fine, too, as long as it's made clear it's just speculation. For example, I think it's plain, albeit not a "fact," that the coaches blew that game. It wasn't the players, who played their hearts out, but the coaches. And it's likely there's a connection between that failure and Heath Farwell leaving for a parallel position. After that, it's pure speculation. Did Farwell not get the message to pooch kick? Did he get it and disobey? Did he get it and botch the communication to Bass? I noticed, by the way, that while McDermott didn't throw anyone under the bus specifically, he pushed the blame away from himself with his his "communication" comment, along with the "I'm ultimately responsible" line. So, speculating: I suspect McDermott was justifiably furious at Farwell for botching the kickoff and basically fired him. And he's justifiably furious at Frazier for his utter incompetence in the ensuing 13 seconds of play. And he's probably furious at himself for all sorts of reasons (not taking strategic timeouts, not overruling Frazier, etc.). Anger is a toxic emotion. He also has to deal with his players' anger, also justifiable. You come all this way and the coaches blow it? My worry is that he's ignoring the anger, clapping his way through it, so to speak. To be fair, it's a very difficult situation to handle. I would vote for complete candor: put it all out there and talk through it. I don't think that's McDermott's way. But that's just speculation.

Farewell, Farwell. I wonder now if it wasn't a miscommunication on the part of Farwell but rather an act of insubordination. A mere misunderstanding is hardly grounds to fire someone, if that is in fact what happened. Maybe Farwell changed the call.

I can see the team's loyalty triggered, as in, "Hey, we all have screwed up, we got his back," that's one thing. But if they think, "If he had just got out of the way and let us do our job, we'd in the Super Bowl," then they might not be happy this offseason. I suspect it will be the former. Wow, what a screw up. Rush four when Mahomes can't hold the ball, guard the sidelines despite KC having three timeouts, prevent the TD when they need only a FG... That performance must have raised eyebrows throughout the league.

I feel sorry for him. He'll live with "13 seconds" for the rest of his life. It's like Scott Norwood, only missing from the 28 yard line instead of the 48. I wonder if the team has lost confidence in him.

Just like I'm screaming how stupid McDermott was to go on 4th down in the Titans game? I said I admire that call, even though it lost the game. And I'm not hung up on one call. I've praised and criticized other calls in this thread. If you want to jump on my posts, you need to read them more closely. I have better things to do than teach remedial reading.

It's not the volume of calls, it's the judgment in the clutch I'm talking about. I'm not saying he should never punt, but he's got to make the right call in the critical situations. He did it in the Titans game and on the first drive in the KC playoff game. He didn't do last year in the playoffs against KC, and he didn't do it again in the 3rd quarter against KC this year. Both times he hurt his team, maybe even fatally. He's got to improve.

By all means continue your personal attacks, if your goal is to degrade this board to the level of Chiefs Planet. I think some head coaches do go for fourth and a foot in this situation, with one of the best short-yardage QBs in the game at their disposal and against a team they lost to the previous year in part because of too-conservative decisions. It's the kind of call that distinguishes the great coaches from the average ones. For example, Andy Reid was widely praised for a gutsy a fourth and 1 with a backup QB in the playoff game against Cleveland last year. McDermott is coming along--I was heartened by his fourth-down call against the Titans this year--but he still has a way to go.

I'm venting, forgive me. I'm still frustrated that McDermott chose to punt in the KC game on fourth and very short on the Bills 36-yard line (or whatever it was). I give him credit for going on fourth down twice on the first drive, but this was a game in which the Bills had to score on pretty much every opportunity. If he can back up his faith in the defense, that's one thing, but it didn't stop the Chiefs on that next drive, or, famously, when it counted the most.

I'm skeptical on that last point. With the job offer from Daboll in New York, Dorsey had all the leverage. He could easily have insisted on autonomy to run the offence with McDermott's interference. In fact, it would have been dumb not to since McDermott is so obviously hostile to a throw-first offense. He wants to punt, play defense, and win by three points.

And how about jamming the receivers for a change? At least so they're not running at full speed out of their cuts for gods sake. The Chiefs could not have had a more favorable defense if they had planned it themselves.

To say nothing about not seeing Wyatt Teller's potential or realizing that Williams might be a one-year wonder, or not developing anyone, including Brown, who had an erratic first year, or Ford, or anyone else for that matter.