BuffaloBillyG Posted June 13, 2021 Posted June 13, 2021 Teller looked great in the 11 games he played last year. But it was 11 games. Let's not clear his spot in Canton just yet. Thomas 4 seasons ago was still learning the position. And even still if you saw any WFT games he wasn't spectacular. He was force fed the ball because they had little else at the skill positions.
Doc Posted June 13, 2021 Posted June 13, 2021 (edited) 1 hour ago, BarleyNY said: I want to chime in on the scheme argument. I used to think that it was a valid reason to excuse Beane, but got set straight here by a long time member (whose name escapes me at the moment). He made the very valid point that every NFL team utilizes both power/gap and I/O zone schemes. Also Teller has done just as well when running plays in both as he is as strong as he is agile. Here is a breakdown of him playing against one of the best DTs in the league - Matthew Ioannidis: Beane doesn't trade players without the input of the coaches. Likely it was a Bobby Johnson/Daboll decision, OK'd by McD. Edited June 13, 2021 by Doc
strive_for_five_guy Posted June 13, 2021 Posted June 13, 2021 16 hours ago, Mister Defense said: Wrong. It is a very valid point; illogical to say otherwise, whether you agree with it or not. To say the Bills, clearly a player or two away from reaching the Super Bowl last year, would not have had a better chance with Teller, the number one ranked guard in the NFL by PFF, and Thomas, with almost 700 yards as a tight end, is ridiculous. To not think that the Bills two biggest weak areas, glaring holes, would not have been dramatically different, better, with, instead, the number one player at his position, and the number 14 player is shockingly illogical. Such poor analysis, when the facts of the matter seem very clear. The Bills have come a long way, but we should not be homers, should not ignore when they make mistakes. That won't make the team stronger, only honest, objective fact based analysis will. These were two big misses, letting two players go who seem to be on their way to top level careers at their positions-- positions that are still such obviously weak areas on the team, still obstacles to success--and, maybe, to beating the Chiefs. Kind of duh analysis, I think, a no brainer. Mistakes by Dabol, and, he makes them. A running game would not have just been nice last year, but as I said since September, would be essential in January. It was ,and the Bills didn't have a good one. Don’t dare suggest anyone is a homer here 😂
BarleyNY Posted June 13, 2021 Posted June 13, 2021 2 hours ago, Doc said: Beane doesn't trade players without the input of the coaches. Likely it was a Bobby Johnson/Daboll decision, OK'd by McD. I’m sure the coaches had input but doesn’t Beane have final say over the roster?
Doc Posted June 13, 2021 Posted June 13, 2021 1 minute ago, BarleyNY said: I’m sure the coaches had input but doesn’t Beane have final say over the roster? No, McD does. https://buffalonews.com/sports/bills/beane-to-control-bills-53-man-roster-but-mcdermott-will-have-final-say/article_95cf9d9e-e3a7-504c-90d9-be086e3af618.html 1
BarleyNY Posted June 13, 2021 Posted June 13, 2021 5 minutes ago, Doc said: No, McD does. https://buffalonews.com/sports/bills/beane-to-control-bills-53-man-roster-but-mcdermott-will-have-final-say/article_95cf9d9e-e3a7-504c-90d9-be086e3af618.html My bad, then the buck stops with him. 1
Doc Posted June 13, 2021 Posted June 13, 2021 20 minutes ago, BarleyNY said: My bad, then the buck stops with him. True, but to a degree. He's a defensive-minded coach and relies on his offensive-minded coaches to keep the good players.
DabillsDaBillsDaBills Posted June 13, 2021 Posted June 13, 2021 I find it funny in these hindsight posts that nobody brings up Gilmore and Woods. We let Gilmore walk for nothing and he's been all-pro multiple times with a defensive player of the year award. 1
BADOLBILZ Posted June 14, 2021 Posted June 14, 2021 12 hours ago, SoTier said: Logan Thomas was a fourth round pick by the Cardinals. He was active for 2 games as a rookie in 2014, and then didn't play in another NFL game until 2017 with the Bills at a time when the Bills didn't really have an NFL-caliber offense, both players and coaches. Daboll was a new hire in 2018 and was the only offensive hold-over among the offensive coaches going into 2019 IIRC. Josh Allen was a rookie QB who was more notable for his running and "hero ball" play rather than his his passing skills. Thomas then went on to Detroit where he didn't light up the league, either. Finally, in his seventh season as a pro, Thomas had a decent season with Washington. That's 1 decent season in a 7 year career with 4 different teams in which he started all of 23 games, 15 just last season. How, exactly, can anybody consider Thomas "a miss" by the Bills ... or the Cards or the Lions??? He was drafted as a QB not a TE so the "7 years" thing isn't particularly relevant to his TE history........which essentially started with the Bills as a pro(though he was on the Lions practice squad for 1 day after agreeing to convert to TE late in 2016). He played sparingly for a Bills offense for two years that was, at times, compared to the very worst in the history of the NFL. They simply mis-evaluated him. Same thing happened with their evaluation of 2018 Wyatt Teller. It was a challenging time to evaluate offensive talent because they had bankrupted an OL and WR corps that had been pretty talented prior to their arrival. They weren't up to that challenge in identifying the potential of either player in the chaos they had created on offense. Lesson is that bottoming out one side of the ball during a re-build can cause THESE kind of mistakes. Fortunately, you gotta' be making mistakes constantly to not be competitive in the NFL. They got a QB so they can afford to have a good deal of strikeouts and still be competitive. 1
Nelius Posted June 14, 2021 Posted June 14, 2021 This board is amazingly on point. I read the initial post and had like 3 things to contribute but it was all covered on the first page, so uh, big gulps eh. Most notably, if we got it wrong then Detroit whiffed mightily. It seems like he really put it all together just recently so I don't fault our team. I'm a big fan of Mr. Logan Thomas though, and honestly him, Fitz, McLaurin are strangely turning WFT into an NFC team that I can root for.
Billy Claude Posted June 14, 2021 Posted June 14, 2021 (edited) The mistakes were signing Tyler Kroft and, especially, Spencer Long who was absolutely horrible for the Jets in 2018. Giving Long a 3 year 12.6M contract (though only one year guaranteed) was not a good decision. The Jets fans were laughing about that signing. They also laughed about the Brian Winters signing. Once those signings were made there was no room for Thomas and Teller. Thomas was 28 years old at the time and choosing Kroft over him was understandable. Teller, on the other hand, had started 7 games for the Bills his rookie year and showed promise which was why the Bills were able to get a 5th and a 6th for him. They took Long because they needed a backup center but I think Long was so bad that by the end of the season someone else (Feliciano?) was taking the center snaps when Morse couldn't play. I am appreciative of the job Beane has done but lets not try to claim he did not make mistakes. His 2018 free agent class was bad (Trent Murphy, Star, Vontae Davis, ..). His 2019 free agent class was better (Morse, Brown, Beasley) but folks were pretty puzzled by the Kroft and Long signings at the time. Luckily he seems to be learning from his mistakes and getting better each year. Edited June 14, 2021 by Billy Claude 1
ProcessTruster Posted June 14, 2021 Posted June 14, 2021 On 6/12/2021 at 11:03 AM, Freddie's Dead said: Logan Thomas was a miss, but to be fair, he didn't do much in DET in 2019, yet somehow exploded last year on the WTF's. His last year here, we had Chucky Clay, Boy Toy (Jason Croom), and Khari Lee (there's a bar bet, up there with Tim Euhus and Tony Cline). Hard to fault McBeane if Logan couldn't beat out those guys for the starting spot. Good for Logan Thomas on his success last year, more power to him. Wyatt Teller is a head scratcher. Vlad "The Impaler" Ducasse and John Miller were the definition of mediocre to bad. Vlad clearly had compromising pictures of McBeane, because he wasn't good at guard. Teller looked good in limited action, but we shipped him to CLE, for draft picks that became Stefon "They call me Mr." Diggs, so Teller is indirectly responsible for us landing Diggs (as is Marcell Dareus, since we picked Teller with the pick we got from the Jagoffs). I'd say we got the better of that deal, so I'll let McBeane slide on that. Projecting football talent into the future is a black art. The Bills missed out on two players here, but Logan Thomas did not show it when he was here, and Teller wasn't here long enough to show it. yeah, but Josh Allen was a hit, when the experts thought there was no way. so McBeanes got it right at the most important position in the game. I'll take a couple misses in exchange for that hit. 2
DabillsDaBillsDaBills Posted June 14, 2021 Posted June 14, 2021 8 hours ago, Limeaid said: Lots of threads do and this has nothing to do with Logan Thomas. I suggest looking at one of those threads to rehash this. Could you point me to one of those threads about Gilmore or Woods? I used the search function and didn't see anything The thread title only mentions Logan Thomas, but the post mentions Wyatt Teller as well. I figured it was fair game to bring up players other than Thomas when the OP did so himself. I was sticking with the theme of former Buffalo Bills players that this front office let go and were (more) successful elsewhere. Not sure why you're playing the forum police? My post was at least semi-relevant
Max Fischer Posted June 14, 2021 Posted June 14, 2021 What ifs are annoying. There are a multitude of factors that contribute to the success or failure of a player. It's possible the Bills provided Logan everything he needed to succeed yet he didn't put it together. For all we know, it took a few more failures and his ideal situation for Logan to put it all together. I'm happy for him but there is no guarantee that if he played for the Bills last year he would have had the same success.
Doc Posted June 14, 2021 Posted June 14, 2021 17 hours ago, DabillsDaBillsDaBills said: I find it funny in these hindsight posts that nobody brings up Gilmore and Woods. We let Gilmore walk for nothing and he's been all-pro multiple times with a defensive player of the year award. Woods was a miss, Gilmore no.
Rochesterfan Posted June 14, 2021 Posted June 14, 2021 18 hours ago, DabillsDaBillsDaBills said: I find it funny in these hindsight posts that nobody brings up Gilmore and Woods. We let Gilmore walk for nothing and he's been all-pro multiple times with a defensive player of the year award. 1 hour ago, Doc said: Woods was a miss, Gilmore no. I think in both cases the Bills knew the players were good and were good/great while here. Gilmore wanted out and wanted to go to a team were he could achieve personal accolades and he did that in spades. Woods wanted to return to family on the west coast and McD granted that request. In my minds eye - how the Bills handled things and their return was terrible, but they were not players that the Bills got rid of before they blossomed - they were a couple of the best players the Bills had during a period that the Bills were bad and players wanted out and therefore would not sign extensions or were looking to be way overpaid to be here. I think they fall into a different category where the Bills recognized the talent, but could not retain nor convince the players to stay. There are a long line of guys that fall into that going back in the drought to Winfield/Clements, Pat Williams, etc. 2
Ethan in Cleveland Posted June 14, 2021 Author Posted June 14, 2021 20 hours ago, BarleyNY said: I’m sure the coaches had input but doesn’t Beane have final say over the roster? Nobody really knows who has the power. Beane came after McD. Im sure almost all decisions are done by consensus but who has the final final say is unknown.
Doc Posted June 14, 2021 Posted June 14, 2021 58 minutes ago, Rochesterfan said: I think in both cases the Bills knew the players were good and were good/great while here. Gilmore wanted out and wanted to go to a team were he could achieve personal accolades and he did that in spades. Woods wanted to return to family on the west coast and McD granted that request. In my minds eye - how the Bills handled things and their return was terrible, but they were not players that the Bills got rid of before they blossomed - they were a couple of the best players the Bills had during a period that the Bills were bad and players wanted out and therefore would not sign extensions or were looking to be way overpaid to be here. I think they fall into a different category where the Bills recognized the talent, but could not retain nor convince the players to stay. There are a long line of guys that fall into that going back in the drought to Winfield/Clements, Pat Williams, etc. Gilmore never even made a Pro Bowl while with the Bills. His attitude sucked also and they weren't going to pay him what he was looking for. If they had franchised him, it's doubtful they would have gotten someone to give up a decent pick and the $17M/year he was looking for. And they got a younger and just-as-good player for a lot cheaper. As for Woods, he was a 600 yard/season receiver with the Bills. The obviously was a product of the QB situation and he blossomed with the Rams. So while I can't fault them for letting him go, it was still a miss.
Straight Hucklebuck Posted June 14, 2021 Posted June 14, 2021 I don't worry about it at all. Logan Thomas is already 29 years old. He is a backup level Tight End. So, he makes no difference to this team. 1
BigAl2526 Posted June 15, 2021 Posted June 15, 2021 Sometimes I think it becomes a question of how long can you wait? When a guy hooks up with a new team the clock is reset, but now a kid like Thomas has had a little time to learn the nuances of his new position. I think it can be easier to have success with a new team, particularly for a guy making a position switch. I think there was a Canisius basketball player who tried to hook up with Buffalo as a tight end a few years ago. Things didn't go well for him, but he did show up later on and had a little playing time for another team later on. For a kid like Christian Wade, the challenge is a little tougher because he's competing against two clocks. One is ticking down the time that The Bills will be patient and let him hang on. The second clock is his own biological clock. If he doesn't impress the Bills enough to make the roster this year, what chance is there of landing with another team as a 31 year old rookie running back?
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