What the Ravens loss (and many other bad losses) should teach us

[stosh64]

11 hours ago, Buffalo Bills Fan said:

Right. On forward McDermott always adjustments. Lots of football left to go. Everyone improves as they grow.  Same issues later on in season worried but not right now. Just wait to see how they respond to all this.

Agreed, what wasn't such a big game against the Jests a few weeks ago suddenly becomes a huge game.  Was last week a fluke and we are seriously a contender, or have we been exposed like some of those slump years and we start making excuses and looking forward to next year.

     Jests week suddenly became an all important game for the McBeane era Bills. 

[SlimShady'sSpaceForce]

2 hours ago, Ethan in Portland said:

I agree with the OP premise

 

But the Bills aren't 7 - 1. They are 5-3 with only one win over a hood opponent.  

 

What we don't know is if the loss to the Jags is the anomaly or if the losses to the Steelers and Titans is the norm.  

 

We won't know until they play better teams. 

yet one can argue 2 plays away from 7-1.  
 

If Josh didn’t slip TD & a W 

 

[zow2]

The Bills losses this year have been close games.  Close games usually come down to 1 huge play.  Pittsburgh, Tennessee and Jacksonville all made the big plays in the 2nd half to close it out.  

 

There will be more close games.  It would be nice to see Buffalo make the big play at the end to flip the game into a W.  

[auburnbillsbacker]

12 hours ago, Doc Brown said:

There's so much pretzel twisting going on trying to justify the Bills loss that at this pace Ford will be regarded as the best guard in the league by Saturday.

There is far more overreacting going on than pretzel twisting.  

[billsfan1959]

For what it is worth, I think the Miami defense has played better in the last two weeks than they have in almost a year. That is more of what I expected from them this year. I thought their offense would be bad, and it certainly has contributed somewhat to the demise of the defense by a drop in possession time and keeping them on the field so much. However, the last couple of weeks is what I thought they would be coming into the season.

[transplantbillsfan]

Agreed.  This is why I generally don't participate in those "predict the score" threads.  It's often like a blind man throwing at a dart board.  Yes, there are absolutely games certain teams should win--Buffalo should have beaten the Jags last week... the Ravens should have beaten the 'Phins last night--but that's why you play the games on Sunday... and that's the beauty of the NFL.

 

(And good god then you have those absolutely moronic threads like how much playing time Trubisky should get against Jacksonville )

 

It's truly any given Sunday and on any given Sunday any given team can win even if it's a superior team playing "one of the worst teams in the league."  There's a mental part of these games that's not played on paper where you get measurables and statistical outputs during the season.

 

That's why I was so disappointed last week.  I thought this team was one of the most mentally tough teams in the NFL.  Last weekend proved they still have a ways to go.

[corta765]

1 hour ago, prissythecat said:

wasn’t it “connect the dots” lol

Crap your own to me

[CincyBillsFan]

1 hour ago, ngbills said:

You have to look at the full picture. Are your wins all very close? Are your wins due to turnovers? Are your wins due to an imbalance - really good O or really good D? Is one player performing on another level? There are so many variables. If the Bills had looked near perfect and then randomly lose to the Jags then I think you cough it up to any given Sunday. But when you have legitimate flaws that have shown up on multiple game days then it is a deficiency that needs to be fixed or you are at risk of losing to any team. Right now the Bills look more like that. There have been games with good numbers. But a lot of that was due to both the schedule and defense helping the offense out a lot with great field position and keeping the other team off the field. But the O has really struggled even in those blow out games. The OL has struggled all season. The running game has not been established. The Allen / Diggs connection has not been there. It needs to be fixed vs just thinking its nothing and all teams lose. 

Looking at the full picture here's what I see:

 

*  Four of the five Bills wins have been blowouts with margins of victory huge by NFL standards (18, 22, 35 & 40 points).

 

*  Their 5th win ended up being by a comfortable 15 point margin against a team that has won back back to games since including a big upset over the Ravens.

 

*  Two of the Bill's losses were by 3 points with the Bill's offense having the ball in their opponents territory with a real chance to tie the game & force OT or win the game outright.

 

*  Their 3rd loss was by one score against a likely playoff team in Pittsburgh.  The difference in this game was a blocked punt TD by the Steelers. The Bills led this game at half by 10 points.

 

*  The Bills have not trailed at halftime in any game this season.  The Bills have out gained their opponents in every game this season.

 

 

 

 

[ngbills]

13 minutes ago, CincyBillsFan said:

Looking at the full picture here's what I see:

 

*  Four of the five Bills wins have been blowouts with margins of victory huge by NFL standards (18, 22, 35 & 40 points).

 

*  Their 5th win ended up being by a comfortable 15 point margin against a team that has won back back to games since including a big upset over the Ravens.

 

*  Two of the Bill's losses were by 3 points with the Bill's offense having the ball in their opponents territory with a real chance to tie the game & force OT or win the game outright.

 

*  Their 3rd loss was by one score against a likely playoff team in Pittsburgh.  The difference in this game was a blocked punt TD by the Steelers. The Bills led this game at half by 10 points.

 

*  The Bills have not trailed at halftime in any game this season.  The Bills have out gained their opponents in every game this season.

 

 

 

 

All good points. And most driven by the dominant defense. I think this is a great team and the loss to the Jags doesnt change that. But if the issues on O cant be resolved it just makes the road much tougher because you cant rely on the D being that dominant all the time and especially come playoff time. 

[CincyBillsFan]

Just now, ngbills said:

All good points. And most driven by the dominant defense. I think this is a great team and the loss to the Jags doesnt change that. But if the issues on O cant be resolved it just makes the road much tougher because you cant rely on the D being that dominant all the time and especially come playoff time. 

I don't understand you saying it was driven by the defense?  Sure they've played great but the Bills are producing huge yardage eclipsing 300 yards in every game so far. 

 

I think the issue is that even when moving the ball at will and rolling up yardage and points the Bills offense seems off.  This IMO is due to a below average O-line that introduces a sense of chaos on a lot of the pass plays and RB's that are not able to make teams pay for how they're defensing us.  That big TD run by Motor on the 2nd play of the Miami game should have been repeated multiple times. Instead, our run game is more apt to lose yardage then gain yardage on any given play.  And let's be honest we all fear 3rd and 1.

 

 

 

[BassToMouth]

It should teach you that the nfl is scripted.

[FilthyBeast]

Despite the Bills personal dominance of the Dolphins, their roster is not bad talent wise. Big issue for them has been coaching and the seemlessly never ending QB carousel the last few seasons. And last nights results wasn't a shocker either considering injuries and slow starts are finally catching up to the Ravens.

 

And as crazy as it sounds if Miami's defense keeps playing at the level it has in recent weeks it's not out of the question they find themselves right back in the playoff picture in the coming weeks given their remaining schedule, especially in an AFC that appears to be wide open beyond the current front runners in TEN.

[JohnNord]

13 hours ago, BillsFan619 said:

Good teams lose to bad teams. Very good teams have very bad losses.

 

The Ravens just lost to the Dolphins. The same Dolphins that lost to the Jags. The same Dolphins that lost seven in a row. The same Dolphins that still have Tua (who's nursing a broken finger).

 

I was just as shocked as you were. I thought we'd steamroll the Jags. It was a gut punch. It was very disappointing. They had no business being on the same field as us. Until they did.

 

Yes, we have problems. Yes, they need to be addressed and McD promised that they are being addressed (he's typically a man of his word and responds well to adversity). Yes, our margin for error just got smaller.

 

That said, we're not out of this thing because of one bad loss. History has shown us this. I remember one year where the Cowboys won one game. It was to their rivals, the no named football team, who ended up winning the Super Bowl that year. Heck, there were four bad losses by good teams last week (us included). The Ravens game is just simply the newest example.

 

Yes, if we pile up a few more bad losses against teams we should beat than it could be over (for this season). But right now, we're still in this thing and we're still contenders. The Steelers, while a tough loss, was a bad matchup. The Titans loss was a heartbreaker. The Jags is our first bad loss of the season. And guess what, every AFC contender that's at the top of their division has a bad loss now. The Titans do. The Ravens do. The Chargers do. And, our awesome Bills do.

 

I'm not even predicting what the Bills will do. They could lose a few more bad games and then many of you can comeback to this post and tell me that the post didn't age well. You have my permission to do so, btw. But that's not even the point of the post. The point is that every team has a REALLY, HORRIBLE, TERRIBLE BAD loss every once in awhile. We just had ours. That said, one bad loss doesn't have to define our team or their season. Everything is still in front of us and we're still contenders at this point.

 

As fans, let's not let one week define us. Let's cheer our hearts out as our Bills continue to fight for it all. Go Bills Mafia! Let's go Buffalo!

Gotta look at the overall sample size.  How many “bad losses” does McDermott have?  I can only think of a couple.  IMO that’s a good sign but it shows that nothing is a given victory in the NFL 

[Buffalo Bills Fan]

Ravens  really struggled with the  blitz 0 d. 

Edited November 12, 2021 by Buffalo Bills Fan

[SlimShady'sSpaceForce]

someone help an old guy out 

 

 

not that I paid much attention but 

 

I swear to god, I’ve heard 

 

Tua —Tonga Vailoa — on tv 

 

How does one pronounce  Tagovailoa’s

@Gugny @ExiledInIllinois

[ExiledInIllinois]

3 minutes ago, SlimShady'sSpaceForce said:

someone help an old guy out 

 

 

not that I paid much attention but 

 

I swear to god, I’ve heard 

 

Tua —Tonga Vailoa — on tv 

 

How does one pronounce  Tagovailoa’s

@Gugny @ExiledInIllinois

Ask @GoBills808... He's on Big Island. 

 

IIRC... It's "Tung-oh-vi-low-uh"

 

??

 

[GoBills808]

1 minute ago, ExiledInIllinois said:

Ask @GoBills808... He's on Big Island. 

 

IIRC... It's "Tung-oh-vi-low-uh"

 

??

 

Tah-go-vai-low-uh

[Gugny]

11 minutes ago, SlimShady'sSpaceForce said:

someone help an old guy out 

 

 

not that I paid much attention but 

 

I swear to god, I’ve heard 

 

Tua —Tonga Vailoa — on tv 

 

How does one pronounce  Tagovailoa’s

@Gugny @ExiledInIllinois

 

TOO-uh

 

[SlimShady'sSpaceForce]

6 minutes ago, GoBills808 said:

Tah-go-vai-low-uh

but was I hearing it wrong?

 

how do the announcers say it?

 

 

[Gugny]

10 minutes ago, GoBills808 said:

Tah-go-vai-low-uh

 

People in your country have weird names.