Crashing and burning and Bill

[GunnerBill]

The problem Big Cat was the defense played small in big moments all year. The Jags game is the classic one, obviously. The Bills team is built to win in that scenario they had the best paid D-line in football and that was the last game before Mario properly mailed it in before anyone throws that at me. He tried that day and was exceedingly frustrated all day long.

 

But the Giants game... where the defense gave up a lot early, the offense got them back in shooting distance only for the defense to miss a call, be in the wrong formation, have a blown assignment and let a running back take a swing pass half the field for a touchdown.

 

That happened all year. Time and again. It happened in big moments in Philly and in KC as well. The defense made the big plays when needed less than half of the time last year. The Titans game and arguably both Jets game it did but that was it. Now that is understandable if the team is spending all its cap $$ on offense and you are running scrubs out there.... but despite what you will say about injuries that wasn't the case. The Bills D played small with their top players out there plenty of times.

 

The defense let the team down and the defensive coaching and play calling sucked. All year round. Calls in late, missed calls, missed assignments it was horrid to watch. Undisciplined, unorganised, unmotivated and generally poorly coached.

 

Rex gets his chance this year to tweak the personnel and prove all us doubters wrong. But even if he does it doesn't change what happened in 2015. It was a bad defensive performance and an even worse coaching performance for the vast majority of the season. I hope that is a one off, but I have articulated my concerns on this board elsewhere about how the Rex Ryan D actually matches up against what most NFL offenses are running as base concepts now. I don't think it matches up great and I sadly am not expecting a major improvement in 2016.

 

I have never hoped to be wrong quite so much, believe me.

Edited April 1, 2016 by GunnerBill

[4merper4mer]

I really didnt think we were getting our act defensively at all till the latter part of the season.

You mean like when we played Kellen Moore?

The problem Big Cat was the defense played small in big moments all year. The Jags game is the classic one, obviously. The Bills team is built to win in that scenario they had the best paid D-line in football and that was the last game before Mario properly mailed it in before anyone throws that at me. He tried that day and was exceedingly frustrated all day long.

 

But the Giants game... where the defense gave up a lot early, the offense got them back in shooting distance only for the defense to miss a call, be in the wrong formation, have a blown assignment and let a running back take a swing pass half the field for a touchdown.

 

That happened all year. Time and again. It happened in big moments in Philly and in KC as well. The defense made the big plays when needed less than half of the time last year. The Titans game and arguably both Jets game it did but that was it. Now that is understandable if the team is spending all its cap $$ on offense and you are running scrubs out there.... but despite what you will say about injuries that wasn't the case. The Bills D played small with their top players out there plenty of times.

 

The defense let the team down and the defensive coaching and play calling sucked. All year round. Calls in late, missed calls, missed assignments it was horrid to watch. Undisciplined, unorganised, unmotivated and generally poorly coached.

 

Rex gets his chance this year to tweak the personnel and prove all us doubters wrong. But even if he does it doesn't change what happened in 2015. It was a bad defensive performance and an even worse coaching performance for the vast majority of the season. I hope that is a one off, but I have articulated my concerns on this board elsewhere about how the Rex Ryan D actually matches up against what most NFL offenses are running as base concepts now. I don't think it matches up great and I sadly am not expecting a major improvement in 2016.

 

I have never hoped to be wrong quite so much, believe me.

100% +++

[The Big Cat]

The problem Big Cat was the defense played small in big moments all year. The Jags game is the classic one, obviously. The Bills team is built to win in that scenario they had the best paid D-line in football and that was the last game before Mario properly mailed it in before anyone throws that at me. He tried that day and was exceedingly frustrated all day long.

 

But the Giants game... where the defense gave up a lot early, the offense got them back in shooting distance only for the defense to miss a call, be in the wrong formation, have a blown assignment and let a running back take a swing pass half the field for a touchdown.

 

That happened all year. Time and again. It happened in big moments in Philly and in KC as well. The defense made the big plays when needed less than half of the time last year. The Titans game and arguably both Jets game it did but that was it. Now that is understandable if the team is spending all its cap $$ on offense and you are running scrubs out there.... but despite what you will say about injuries that wasn't the case. The Bills D played small with their top players out there plenty of times.

 

The defense let the team down and the defensive coaching and play calling sucked. All year round. Calls in late, missed calls, missed assignments it was horrid to watch. Undisciplined, unorganised, unmotivated and generally poorly coached.

 

Rex gets his chance this year to tweak the personnel and prove all us doubters wrong. But even if he does it doesn't change what happened in 2015. It was a bad defensive performance and an even worse coaching performance for the vast majority of the season. I hope that is a one off, but I have articulated my concerns on this board elsewhere about how the Rex Ryan D actually matches up against what most NFL offenses are running as base concepts now. I don't think it matches up great and I sadly am not expecting a major improvement in 2016.

 

I have never hoped to be wrong quite so much, believe me.

 

The defense did not lose the Giants game, nor the Jags game. It's such a shameless stretch to suggest so. And you cite those games for when they let us down in the clutch. Which big moments were you referring to in the KC and Philly games? I ask because you insist it happened "time and again" and I simply don't recall that being the case. Please, note I'm not saying it didn't happen.

 

I think, however, that you're grossly overstating the frequency with which it happened while simultaneously (and conveniently) overlookin all the times that clutch plays by the defense late in--and throughout--games were critical to victories:

1. NYJ1--final, game deciding drive ended in a pick
2. HOU--final, game deciding drive ended in a pick
3. TEN----final, game deciding drive ended in a pick
4. NYJ2--final, game deciding drives ended in three picks
5. MIA2--while they played poorly it was a big play that turned the whole thing around
6. IND--shutout for the first 44 minutes

Again, none of this is to say that the defense was beyond critique in 2015. It's to curb the overstated critiques that have infested this board for the past five months. Plus, there needs to be some understanding of a standard here. What is the expectation? You cited a handful of lapses, some of which I acknowledge, but maintain would have be inconsequential with any help from the offense, whatsoever.The Philly game applies here too. But aside from the defense not playing inside a vacuum of itself, lapses and bad losses happen in the NFL. All the time. So what's the standard? What's the expectation?

 

You've also cited lapses I fully acknowledge and do not excuse. What I've offered above serves to simply shed a light on your dark--and only dark--characterization of how things unfolded in 2015.

[BADOLBILZ]

 

The defense did not lose the Giants game, nor the Jags game. It's such a shameless stretch to suggest so.

 

 

Shameless stretch? They LITERALLY blew both of those games with awful play at the end. That TD where Bradham and Rambo were shed like small children is one of the most lasting images of 2015. Just awful.

[The Big Cat]

 

 

Shameless stretch? They LITERALLY blew both of those games with awful play at the end. That TD where Bradham and Rambo were shed like small children is one of the most lasting images of 2015. Just awful.

 

Yes, it's a shameless stretch to say the the reason the Bills lost against NYG and JAX was because of the defense. It's absurd, in fact.

[BADOLBILZ]

 

Yes, it's a shameless stretch to say the the reason the Bills lost against NYG and JAX was because of the defense. It's absurd, in fact.

 

 

Shameless!

 

You doth protest too much.

 

You just can't wrap your head around being wrong and want to find some hidden truth....that doesn't exist....to explain why.

 

The plain truth is that they were poorly prepared, undisciplined and confused until late in the season......that is on Rex Ryan.

 

If there were issues acclimating players to the defense it should have been addressed more assertively during TC.......and they've all said as much.

 

I expect they will be much better next season even if they have lesser talented players at 3 or 4 positions on defense.

 

But as others have said........2015 was a skid mark that can't be scrubbed from RR's resume.

Edited April 1, 2016 by #BADOL

[GunnerBill]

I have not tried to claim we ONLY lost the Giants and Jacksonville games on defense. Just that in both games the crucial moments the defense failed to make plays.

You ask me what the expectation was and say the defense doesn't play in a vacuum.

Here was my expectation - I expected the 2015 Buffalo Bills to WIN on defense. Why? Because that is the way the team had been BUILT to win. All the pundits expected that, Doug Whaley expected that, Terry Pegula expected that and most importantly Rex Ryan expected that too. That was the way we were SUPPOSED to win. And before you tell me you can't win that way in the NFL anymore..... the Broncos just did and the Texans and the Chiefs turned their seasons around by doing just that.

The defense doesn't play in a vacuum. But the 2015 Bills were supposed to have a D that could carry the O occassionally. And the only games in which I honestly think that happened were the Titans and the second Jets game.

Don't pretend that this was supposed to be a perfectly rounded, balanced team where the defense and offense were ying and yang working in perfect harmony. Because if you are talking vacuums that is a vacuum divorced from reality.

It was supposed to be something else and the part we were relying on let us down far too often.

Edited April 1, 2016 by GunnerBill

[The Big Cat]

 

 

Shameless!

 

You doth protest too much.

 

You just can't wrap your head around being wrong and want to find some hidden truth....that doesn't exist....to explain why.

 

The plain truth is that they were poorly prepared, undisciplined and confused until late in the season......that is on Rex Ryan.

 

If there were issues acclimating players to the defense it should have been addressed more assertively during TC.......and they've all said as much.

 

I expect they will be much better next season even if they have lesser talented players at 3 or 4 positions on defense.

 

But as others have said........2015 was a skid mark that can't be scrubbed from RR's resume.

 

I'll never understand why posters like you insist on others admitting they are wrong.

 

What drives this impulse? And exactly what is it you think I'm wrong about?

 

I'm on record up and down this board since last January bemoaning the preparation of Rex Ryan teams.

 

The defense took a step back in 2015, on this we all agree.

 

But to say that the offense wasn't responsible for losses in 2016, that's a blatant misrepresentation of reality to serve the false narrative that the 2015 was a failure. Its only failure was relative to 2015. But that was bound to happen. The 2015 was going to take a step back, regardless because there was no way they could have sustained the health from 2014. And they didn't.

 

This is neither done, nor perfect. When it's finished to my satisfaction, I'll post to another thread. In the meantime:

 

This is a heat map to show how the offense performed relative to the averages of that opponent's 15 other games. The coloration is as follows: RED (0-85%) ORANGE (85-100%) LIGHT GREEN (100-115%) DARK GREEN (115%+)

 

 

In some cases, this doesn't tell the whole story--or at least not as well as the one does for defense because:

1. Our rushing attack was so good it throws off the "average" column
2. Numbers will automatically get a boost when we were playing from behind against softer defenses and/or accumulating meaningless stats (NE1/CIN/WAS)
3. Doesn't account for turnovers (JAX/NE1)
4. And defensive/ST touchdowns are removed from our scoring, but against opponents' averages.

I'm sure there are many other limitations, but the defensive one, I think, tells a pretty accurate story of the 2015 season (coloration is inverse for defense):

 

 

Again, I have to re-run some of these numbers, so it's not finished, but when we distill the averages, which still come pretty close to how things went, we get this:

 

 

The above is a side-by-side of averages. Whichever unit performed better in a win gets credit for the victory, whichever team performed worse in a loss gets the blame.

 

Again, not perfect, but a pretty fair at-a-glance for how 2015 shaped out.

I have not tried to claim we ONLY lost the Giants and Jacksonville games on defense. Just that in both games the crucial moments the defense failed to make plays.

 

You ask me what the expectation was and say the defense doesn't play in a vacuum.

 

Here was my expectation - I expected the 2015 Buffalo Bills to WIN on defense. Why? Because that is the way the team had been BUILT to win. All the pundits expected that, Doug Whaley expected that, Terry Pegula expected that and most importantly Rex Ryan expected that too. That was the way we were SUPPOSED to win. And before you tell me you can't win that way in the NFL anymore..... the Broncos just did and the Texans and the Chiefs turned their seasons around by doing just that.

 

The defense doesn't play in a vacuum. But the 2015 Bills were supposed to have a D that could carry the O occassionally. And the only games in which I honestly think that happened were the Titans and the second Jets game.

 

Don't pretend that this was supposed to be a perfectly rounded, balanced team where the defense and offense were ying and yang working in perfect harmony. Because if you are talking vacuums that is a vacuum divorced from reality.

 

It was supposed to be something else and the part we were relying on let us down far too often.

 

I'm not pretending anything. The defense in 2015 was expected to carry the offense. But falling short of expectations is not failure, especially when expectations were so high. It's a disappointment, to be sure, but--as we've done 40,000 laps on already--there were plenty of other factors--besides "Rex sux"---that led to the letdown in 2015.

Edited April 1, 2016 by The Big Cat

[FireChan]

Falling short of expectations is the definition of failure. What nonsense is this?

[CardinalScotts]

Unless TT makes a significant improvement, it really doesn't matter if the defense finishes 2nd or 20th.

your talking about a team with significant injuries that went 8-8......although I do believe Tyrod and Roman will put together a much better offense, IF they don't and they don't suffer the same type dismantling by injuries they are in the playoffs anyway.

[4merper4mer]

Falling short of expectations is the definition of failure. What nonsense is this?

 

 

Well if he's going to defend Rex and his defense he is going do have to ignore the meaning of words here and there.

 

Such as:

 

Sack

Pressure

Good

Bad

Coverage

Scheme

Complex

Discipline

Cause

Effect

 

There are a few more too.

 

Cuz Rex Sux.

[KD in CA]

But to say that the offense wasn't responsible for losses in 2015, that's a blatant misrepresentation of reality to serve the false narrative that the 2015 was a failure. Its only failure was relative to 2014. But that was bound to happen. The 2015 was going to take a step back, regardless because there was no way they could have sustained the health from 2014. And they didn't.

 

Good analysis. Thanks for putting some thought into it. I assume the years in this paragraph were just an error (fixed here). The point here is spot on.

[mannc]

your talking about a team with significant injuries that went 8-8......

Look, let's not forget that the Bills went 6-8 during the competitive portion of the season, including losses to two mediocre-poor teams in games they had to win toward the end of the season.

[The Big Cat]

 

Good analysis. Thanks for putting some thought into it. I assume the years in this paragraph were just an error (fixed here). The point here is spot on.

Ha, yes thanks for fixing the mistakes.

[John from Riverside]

I would like opinions on this

 

One thing this offense did NOT do was turn the ball over under Tyrod Taylor's watch.

 

If you have a offense that doesnt turn the ball over.....does it stand to reason that a improved defense would not translate into more wins?

[Jauronimo]

I would like opinions on this

 

One thing this offense did NOT do was turn the ball over under Tyrod Taylor's watch.

 

If you have a offense that doesnt turn the ball over.....does it stand to reason that a improved defense would not translate into more wins?

No. Defense is utterly irrelevant. 1st, 15th, 32nd, who cares? The outcome is the same unless your QB is top 5 and you're a preseason super bowl darling.

[26CornerBlitz]

No. Defense is utterly irrelevant. 1st, 15th, 32nd, who cares? The outcome is the same unless your QB is top 5 and you're a preseason super bowl darling.

 

That is exactly what the Super Bowl Champion Broncos believe.

[26CornerBlitz]

Lol. It's sarcasm in response to Big Cat.

 

No way! From Jauronimo? Not possible!

[The Big Cat]

 

No way! From Jauronimo? Not possible!

 

Well, if you think about it, two teams in the last 16 seasons have won the Super Bowl with a number one defense and subpar QB play. So, he makes a pretty good point.

[26CornerBlitz]

I think most people want a playoff birth and considering Denver just won the Super Bowl with below average QB play its not a stretch to say this team is in the playoffs and a legitimate threat in the AFC with the 2014 defense and not Rex's cluster !@#$ of a defense last year.

 

Fully pregnant!