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So many reporters, analysts, and talking heads picking the Bills to win the Super Bowl. What changed?


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Posted

I've noticed over the past week or so that more and more local and national reporters, analysts, and talking heads are picking the Bills to win the Super Bowl. Many are also picking Josh Allen to win the MVP award.

Whereas earlier this offseason it was all "will Josh Allen regress?" and "can the Bills fix their pass rush?", now I'm just seeing a whole lot of "Bills win the Super Bowl" predictions. What changed? Was it the preseason performance against the Packers? The training camp reports of Allen and the offense being lights out? The perceived improvement of the pass rush? Are the Bills just the "trendy" pick all of the sudden?

I'm sure there's much more than I'm listing here, but here's just a small collection of what I'm talking about. I'm not sure how to feel about all this but here we are. What a time to be a Bills fan.
 

 

 


 


 


 

 

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Posted

"What changed?"

 

Did you miss the 2020 season or.....? 

 

Unless we're going back to 2019, nothing's changed. After you go 13-3 & make the AFC Championship game, you become a lot of people's pick for SB contender. So since then, nothing has changed.

Posted (edited)

Think it’s almost entirely pass rush  / development of Epinesa and Rousseau -related for two reasons:

 

1) Pass rush was the team’s primary weakness last year 

 

2) Pass rush was essential in winning the super bowl against the team they lost to the previous round  

 

All the reporters both local and national focused on it during their visits and apparently the new / improved guys have passed the eye test. Therefore with the last theoretical blocker clear to the big dance, why not? 

Edited by BillsGuyOutWest
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Posted
31 minutes ago, BigDingus said:

"What changed?"

 

Did you miss the 2020 season or.....? 

 


You mean the 2020 season that saw the Bills losing handily to the Chiefs in the AFCCG and then ended with a Chiefs-Bucs Super Bowl?

 

Yeah, I remember that. Exactly my point. I’m seeing more people picking the Bills than the Chiefs or the Bucs. The Chiefs beat the Bills twice last year and the Bucs return all 22 starters.

 

What changed?

 

 

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Posted

I think we're the trendy pick because reporters don't want to pick the obvious teams in Tampa and KC. So the big risk takers go all the way down to three, LOL!

 

However, here's a list of things that has changed.....

 

- This team was very new last season. So now, we have a second year together, both players and coaches, and a lot of young players too, to get much better. Both individually and together. I think this is pretty big.

- Emmanuel Sanders healthy and ready to go! He's a legit excellent #2 and another great weapon for Josh. Our four-wide package might be the best offense in the NFL right now.

- Cody Ford. Should the big guard finally find his game he could really help the run game and solidify the passing game.

- Josh Allen - He's definitely still maturing in all facets. That is, He's still getting better.

- The run game. Brian Daboll's whole offseason last season was to create a Star in Josh Allen. That took ALL his time last season. He worked only on pass blocking. He worked only on passing routes and passing plays. The run game fell to the way-side. Now, with a offseason to digest and a full spring and summer to work on everything together, the run game should be better.

- Our 23 year old RB is a man! And his coaches, both Leslie Frazier and Sean McDermott say it is time for him (and teammate Ed Oliver ) to make splash plays. I'm hoping the D is also more aggressive this year and that both players have more freedom to attack.

- Our coaches are maturing together. It wasn't that long ago that Sean McDermott was a rookie HC. He wasn't kidding then that there was a lot for him to learn. I also think he has (had?) a problem playing chefs HC and his former boss Andy Reid giving him far too much respect. It's time Sean beats him. This is also Brian Daboll's first successful attempt at  being an NFL OC and I'm certain he is learning in the playoffs. The whole team is learning about winning in the playoffs and what it is going to take. This is very real and what usually happens with young teams growing up.

- Lastly, we have really improved the DL over the last two years. AJ is in a way better position to help the Bills now going through his first real training camp. Efe Obada was signed and is going to help sooner or later. Great depth is a must for Super Bowl teams. This year, two more DEs were added and they both look good. Groot looks especially good and has what we need. Pure skill at pass rushing. All 8 of our DL is going to see equal time and it is a better 8 this year.

 

Did I miss anything?

 

Go Bills!

 

Written But not read....

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Posted
24 minutes ago, Rc2catch said:

It’s just pre jumping on the hype train, takes a little bit for someone to make that bold statement. Then others just piggyback off of it. 

 

Wholeheartedly agree. There was a jump from the early/mid off-season to the past couple weeks, in terms of pundits' predictions for the Bills. Honestly I think it's the "trendy" option, as offered by @Logic.

 

Regardless, we have a great shot at the title, and god I hope we're contenders year in year out. Long live Allen.

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Posted

Camp/preseason

 

Everyone who was on the fence got pushed off of it by the Bills' offseaosn performance.

 

Honestly, I don't like it, because the talking heads are wrong more often than not.

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Posted
6 minutes ago, Logic said:

ul
You mean the 2020 season that saw the Bills losing handily to the Chiefs in the AFCCG and then ended with a Chiefs-Bucs Super Bowl?

 

Yeah, I remember that. Exactly my point. I’m seeing more people picking the Bills than the Chiefs or the Bucs. The Chiefs beat the Bills twice last year and the Bucs return all 22 starters.

 

What changed?

 

 

No 2 seasons are the same, that's what changed.  So are the 22 same starter Bucs going to start as slowly as they did last year and have only the 4th best record in the NFC again?  Did you expect the 2011 NY Giants to repeat even though they were barely over 500 but got hot in the playoffs?   Your conclusion that we're going to see the same resuilts as 2020 is illogical.  

Posted (edited)
34 minutes ago, Logic said:


You mean the 2020 season that saw the Bills losing handily to the Chiefs in the AFCCG and then ended with a Chiefs-Bucs Super Bowl?

 

Yeah, I remember that. Exactly my point. I’m seeing more people picking the Bills than the Chiefs or the Bucs. The Chiefs beat the Bills twice last year and the Bucs return all 22 starters.

 

What changed?

 

 

 

It's a good question.

 

IMO they saw the Green Bay game and now think Josh isn't going to undergo major regression.

 

And they buy into the fact that our DL can rush the passer much better this year than they did last year. And since that was the main reason we had trouble with KC last year I think, they have some faith we might do better against them.

 

There is surely more to it than that, but I think those are the main two reasons, I think.

 

 

 

Edited by Thurman#1
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Posted

I live in oregon and we have superbowl picks up on the whiteboard in my office and 5 out of the 8 picks that are up so far are picking the Bills to go to the superbowl from the AFC, the national outlook has changed! what a time to be alive!

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Posted

One thing I don’t understand is I’ve also seen the Patriots and the Niners getting a lot of Super Bowl hype. I have no idea why. Niners are essentially the same team and jimmy isn’t getting any better. And the Pats have a rookie QB who is unproven. Sure he will be an improvement over Cam (it’s gotta be difficult to be any worse) but I can’t imagine him being Tom Brady right away

Posted
37 minutes ago, Gene1973 said:

You are seeing the lemming effect in action in terms of the talking heads...

 

Also Allen. If he takes another leap forward in development, I think many see that he will truly be on par with Mahomes. Add into that the stability of the franchise.


What stability?  The owners said they need a new stadium to be paid with public funds and made a veiled threat that Austin, Texas is interested in getting a team.  They backed off that but say they won’t renew the lease on the current stadium until a new stadium is decided on.  I know it’s just threats again but what if there isn’t enough public funding?
 

Now, if you’re talking about GM/Head Coach I understand.

Posted

I just think the coming of the season changed things.  Here's why:

 

I've complained, along with plenty of others, that the Bills don't get covered properly by the national media.   It's because Buffalo is a small market, and because the Bills have been so bad for so long, the average just believes the Bills are bad all the time.   

 

The press largely writes what their audience wants to hear.   Because so many of the ill-informed fans around the country think the Bills are bad, the press wasn't going to write a lot of positive stuff about the Bills in the off-season.  They're trying to write stuff the fans already believe, so they were writing "are the Bills for real" articles.   

 

Now that the season is here, the press has to write their preseason review articles, and the press isn't stupid.  They look at last season, the teams, how they've progressed or not, and it's pretty clear the Bills are a serious contender.  The fans will read the preseason review articles in any case (without regard to their anti-Bills bias), so the press is now telling the full story, so to speak.  

 

All I know is that it's like a dream, seeing all this stuff. 

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