Rational Thoughts After Pats Loss

[SCBills]

It's all still right there for them..  Maybe not the 1 seed, but in this wild year, who knows.  

 

Win out and the division is ours.  

 

The compounded fear is that coming off an absolute gut punch that played to most of our fears:  conceding the division to NE after one year & having a home field that is absolutely not an advantage for us right now, we now face Tom Brady..  A game many of us are expecting to lose, and expecting to wake up Monday morning on the outside of the playoff picture looking in.  

 

Even then, win out, and we're in, and with some help from Indy or Miami.. maybe we even take the division..  but this season has been incredibly disappointing and seems to be setting up for another tense game against NE, in Foxboro with our season very much hanging in the balance. 

 

Edited December 7, 2021 by SCBills

[muppy]

#denverbill  ...I agree with all of this....m

Bills should have won in multiple ways.

A. Fumble = NE Score
B. Diggs losing track of a wind blow ball which hits him in the arms and he drops it.
C. Knox drop
D. Encroachment which was not called and flabbergasted even the TV announcer.
E. Missed FG forcing us, after the flabbergasting no call, to go on 4th down.
F. Allen missed some must have throws. Like the last one which was FAR off from any Bills receiver at the end there.


And Any one of these things don't happen we win. Even if NE doesn't touch the ball on that KR if we make Diggs catch and get the FGs we win.

Or if Allen puts a Catchable ball on the 4th down we win.

But this is a sign of a team who did not believe that they could win. Those mental mishaps are a lack of confidence IMO. A lack of coaching too. Coaching which should have handled those massive Egos early on and managed the lows that were there the last 4 weeks as well.

I'm not a throw the baby out with the bath water kind of guy. Daboll and Frazier definitely have some blame here. But the OL could not get our running game going at all. That was the plan and the OL could not deliver. Allen was forced to win it again for them and he simply can't with such inconsistent blocking.

One down the OL blocks lights out. The next 2 they are a sieve. Even just below average play, like last year Allen can do amazing things. But not like this on such a windy day. He needed better from them.

We need an upgrade at both interior OL and at RB. It is clear that neither Moss or Devin have a beast in them. We need a bigger RB threat to be able to play these kind of games.

[rayray808]

this post really helped me through the pain today

 

it was honest and precise

[corta765]

10 minutes ago, damj said:

We're not as good as we thought we were and have serious flaws. Last year the offense was on fire and it masked alot of these problems.

 

A thought I have had is this Bills team is like 2019/2020 mixed with some slightly worse luck, bit worse coaching decisions, and play that is closer to the mean then the defense or offense playing on fire as each side did those years. Also I was looking it up and Allen does not have a single 4th quarter comeback this year and he has 10 the three years prior. He has basically covered their a**es a bunch and this year it hasn't gone our way bringing up some unfortunate discussions and possible truths.

11 minutes ago, SCBills said:

The compounded fear is that coming off an absolute gut punch that played to most of our fears:  conceding the division to NE after one year & having a home field that is absolutely not an advantage for us right now

 

I commented this earlier in the week but it was never realistic to think NE would always be down or that another division opponent wouldn't rise (outside the Jets lol). Bills with Allen have at least 10 years here they will be in the mix but some years will be rockier then others. Don't get me wrong I wish we throttled NE and they were not the team they are but like you said here we are. Flip side is they will have more shots in upcoming games and years to prove otherwise. I am not sure whether the drought or the NE domination for so long has been worse for Bills fans psyche when it comes to playing them. Flipside is lets just say they take the division and we are a WC team, next year they get the tougher schedule, the pressure, etc.. It is forever easier to hunt then be hunted.

[PatsFanNH]

1 hour ago, Nextmanup said:

BB isn't Einstein for Christ's sake.

 

You offer the rationalizations of a loser.

 

It was obvious what to do and not to do last night.

 

McDermott played scared and defensively, b/c that is who he is by nature.

 

He did not play bold and aggressively, like Philadelphia did in their SB against NE a few years ago...which is why Philly won that game. 

 

They played to win, took chances, were aggressive....and it paid off.

 

I don't ever recall a Bills game being coached like that against NE.

 

 

Philly won that game because BB refused to play his top CB in Butler.  They had some really awful CB in that game (shudder)

[Big Blitz]

I agree op and last night was his worst game ever as a HC.  

 

Let me sum up this teams number 1 problem and if the season ends in failure it will be this:

 

 

When it's time to run the ball, they either refuse to, or most often, they just can't.  

 

Everything else about this team is championship caliber.  Even the average D line bc in the end the overall defense can get the job done. 

 

But Singletary, Moss, inferior IL play settling on "running it back" with those 5 completely blew up in their faces.  

 

 

The end.  

Edited December 7, 2021 by Big Blitz

[Pirate Angel]

It's much simpler, our offensive line is bad and a our rbs are bad. Every loss we have our oline has been handled. The moment we try and commit to a running game our backs turn the ball over. We have very good receivers and a very good qb, but her cant go through his progressions and set his feet.

[corta765]

1 minute ago, Pirate Angel said:

our offensive line is bad & our rbs are ba

 

I would say more our offensive line does not run block well. The offensive line passing is fine when healthy, not saying it is great but its good enough for what is needed. Upgrades will be needed next year obviously and I agree the RB situation is just a hodgepodge that can't figure itself out. The Zach Moss pick is looking like a real miss for what was expected vs his actual production. I think though whatever injury he had last year still is impacting him this year.

[Nextmanup]

10 minutes ago, Pirate Angel said:

It's much simpler, our offensive line is bad and a our rbs are bad. Every loss we have our oline has been handled. The moment we try and commit to a running game our backs turn the ball over. We have very good receivers and a very good qb, but her cant go through his progressions and set his feet.

A substantial improvement to our offensive line, especially in pass blocking, would immediately translate to much better QB play; for that reason, it should be the top priority of the off-season, and  I think it will be.

 

Josh goes into panic/nervous mode when he is harassed and doesn't have enough time in the pocket.  He struggles to find open receivers like this, just as he did last night.

 

It's a consistent problem for him.

 

 

[jkeerie]

2 hours ago, corta765 said:

 

This year has been kinda a sports evolution year for me for two reasons:

 

1. AFC Title. Once we made it there finally!, it reset my expectations and also kinda grounded me from living and dying on every play. 

 

2. Had my second child, my wife got COVID (recovered thankfully), and my mother in law got diagnosed with Stage 4 cancer. Football stopped mattering nearly as much for what really is important. I do not mean to put people down either saying that as if it is your thing to max that is awesome and good for you. But life for me hit a major refocus and losing my mind and ruining my week over a game played by millionaires lost its importance.

I am so sorry for all your troubles this year...but it really does change your perspective.  Our expectations for the Bills this year were indeed raised after making it to the AFC championship game last year and beating KC this year.  So...the way we've played since then is shattering those expectations and leaving us all at a loss to explain it.  Then you couple that with the rise of the evil empire again and it adds further negative emotions. 

 

In truth...I expected this from the Pats this year.  They weren't that bad last year, finishing 7 and 9.   They had a lot of players sit out due to covid and had horrid QB play from Newton.  So...they didn't have to "rebuild."  They had most of the pieces and added a few more with a boatload of cash in the offseason and a competent QB.  That's why it only took them one year.  The Bills on the other hand were building from scratch.  The cupboards were bare when McD and Beane took over.  So...the Bills have built a competitive team over the course of the last 4 years.  They've also been incredibly unlucky this year.  We've had to face the top teams with all their weaponry and we've lost key players heading into big contests.  There was only one team where we were clearly overmatched and that was the Colts.  The other games, the Bills mostly beat themselves either with players not playing up to par, or coaching not being up to par.

 

So...this year my rooting interests are three-fold.  1.  The Bills get to the playoffs.  2.  I do not want to see NE in the SB because I just can't stand the media falling all over themselves over Belichick.  (He is a great coach.  I don't disagree with that.  But he's not the only great coach.  As someone said earlier, the narrative is totally different if one or two plays go our way yesterday.  I actually do agree with McD.  The Bills caused their own demise yesterday.)  3.  I don't want KC to make it to three SBs in a row.  If they do and they get there next year as well...what we as Bills fans have clung to as our only real claim to greatness is negated. 

 

So...that is my Christmas list.  I'll watch games, I'll cheer and I'll keep the faith.  At the end of the day, though, the chips will fall where they may and hopefully the Bills braintrust will learn and keep building.

 

Congrats on your second child, Corta!  So happy that your wife recovered from Covid.  Prayers for your MIL in her battle with cancer.

[colin]

we won 10 games in 19, woudla been 11 but we sat guys in the last game.  we won 13 last year, most we are gonna win this season is 12, and that's with an extra game (and i don't think a single person on this board thinks we are gonna win 12 this season).  Our talent is better than 19, and i don't think you rationally say it is worse (in fact, it is kinda obviously better, less the tre white injury of course) than in 20.

 

all we have done this season is crush cans, snuck one over kc, and gone .500 at home including two total let downs on O, and a total team blow out.  mcD in every season before this year had at least one total run for the bus game (NO when we had tyrod, several in Josh's first season, a couple in 19, tenn kc in the play offs last year, indy this year).  so he's conservative in a way that doesn't prevent blow out knock down losses.

 

allen is easily the best thing on this team, and about 29 or 30 other nfl teams would step over their own mothers to get him.  he's the only reason we did well at all last year and this year.  I agree mcd is coaching poorly this season, but he's the HC and he's on contract, and the D is solid and his shortcomings aside, he's got us this far.  we absolutely need a better offensive coaching staff, and i wouldn't look past upgrading our D staff either.

 

we might not have an overall great roster (not as good as we thought) and it's clearly not balanced or tough, but my goodness our redzone o is just so shockingly our biggest issue that if mcd wants to keep his seat from heating up too much he is going to have to address the O coaching.  i don't think he has the eggs to fire daboll midseason, so it's likely in the offseason.

[corta765]

4 minutes ago, colin said:

we won 10 games in 19, woudla been 11 but we sat guys in the last game.  we won 13 last year, most we are gonna win this season is 12, and that's with an extra game (and i don't think a single person on this board thinks we are gonna win 12 this season).  Our talent is better than 19, and i don't think you rationally say it is worse (in fact, it is kinda obviously better, less the tre white injury of course) than in 20.

 

Agreed. The offense talent wise is certainly more dynamic even with the line play being weaker. The biggest fall is Singletary who year one was sublime but never reached those levels.

 

What really is wild is the Bills are a Josh Allen QB sneak conversion/TD & one good drive vs JAX from being 9-3 even with the Pats loss. The self inflicted pain, poor coaching from in game adjustments to game plan, and truthfully a little bad luck really has hurt this year. If you want to think positively lets say the Bills beat CAR/NYJ/ATL like they should, can you rely on Josh to have one baller game that he wins us TB or NE. I would say yes, but the realist in me sees some area of the lineup hurting his success which costs us that game given how our season has gone. 

[Orlando Buffalo]

We still are probably gonna make the playoffs and hopefully we get our execution down by then but I am surprised by two things yesterday, one is that McDermott at no point put extra Dlinemen in to force some throws and we did not try to bit any longer throws in the first half. We have a ton of DL and we have Josh, use it better.

[Evian]

The Bills have 5 losses. They were blown out 1x. The other 4 losses were close. This team could easily be 9-3 or 10-2. The problem is they ended two games inside the opponents 20 and did not finish.

 

They need a little confidence. Honestly, they can lose in Tampa as long as they win in New England and roll into the playoffs with 4 straight wins.

 

There is a ton of football left in a year where there is no great team. 

 

Don't count out the Bills yet. Things might just click.

 

 

[corta765]

30 minutes ago, Buffalo Timmy said:

We still are probably gonna make the playoffs and hopefully we get our execution down by then but I am surprised by two things yesterday, one is that McDermott at no point put extra Dlinemen in to force some throws and we did not try to bit any longer throws in the first half. We have a ton of DL and we have Josh, use it better.

 

The most disappointing thing for me this season is how vanilla our approaches have been on defense and offense. Like you said given the way the game was go 5-2 and throw the extra d man out there, especially in the wind load the box 9 low and dare Jones to try and throw in that crap. I read BB was going 6 O Lineman last night. Why didn't the Bills do that on a Jet sweep or something with Josh in the redzone on one of the final drives. Virtually no play action, one designed run, no jet sweep, etc.. As I said of the five seasons as coach this is without a doubt the worst job they have done.

[saundena]

I like McDermott- but I don't think he a Superbowl calibre coach.... yet.  We are too inconsistent, make too many costly errors and lack a killers instinct.  I think these are all flaws that start from the top down.  That said, McD is a young guy and supremely bright and I think he will grow and become better and better the more seasoned he gets.  Maybe in the offseason he shuffles his staff a little bit, or tweak's his "Process" (because after all we're not lovable losers any more).  Maybe he needs to be a little harder and let the team know that performances like Dawson Knox had last night won't be tolerated....  Whatever it is I think he'll do what needs to be done even if it's currently outside of his comfort zone. 

 

And so with that belief in mind, I'm hopeful that Terry's & Kim's approach will be to keep the band together for a while (a la Harbaugh, Tomlin, etc) rather that blowing the whole thing up again.  We have a top 5 franchise quarterback that probably hasn't even reached his potential; the hardest thing for any franchise to find.  So it doesn't make sense to blow the whole thing up.  Incremental improvements from McD in a variety of areas will help our team "tighten up" and I do believe there are some low hanging roster moves that will be addressed in the offseason which should help improve our team in 2022.  We definitely aren't the team that we were last year and we've certainly taken a step back; but I believe that all around we have a solid coaching staff and front office, one that is capable of righting the ship. 

 

Keep in mind that for all the years that the Patriots were so good, even they had down years.  10-6 seasons following 14-2 SB wins.  Their last SB win came on the heels of a 11-5 season...  

 

 

[DuckyBoys]

we stink at running and we stink even worse at stopping the run  McDermott can go out and talk about lack of execution but if his gameplan is to let the Pats come out heavy and show nothing else and not have any answer for three quarters.....

 

Roster is not great  Beane hit on Allen  Lot of question marks and obvious whiffs that we'll ride with too long since they are Beane moves. 

 

Basically if Josh plays lights out we can win but he has to play lights out and the team cant blow up around him.  Too many drops, miscues to overcome in that type of weather.

 

Much more frustrated with the defense overall  They faced a one dimensional attack and still could not get off the field

[Nextmanup]

4 minutes ago, DuckyBoys said:

we stink at running and we stink even worse at stopping the run  McDermott can go out and talk about lack of execution but if his gameplan is to let the Pats come out heavy and show nothing else and not have any answer for three quarters.....

 

Roster is not great  Beane hit on Allen  Lot of question marks and obvious whiffs that we'll ride with too long since they are Beane moves. 

 

Basically if Josh plays lights out we can win but he has to play lights out and the team cant blow up around him.  Too many drops, miscues to overcome in that type of weather.

 

Much more frustrated with the defense overall  They faced a one dimensional attack and still could not get off the field

Josh don'ts have to be "lights out" for our passing offense to work.

 

A few extra passes completed last night and we win the game, despite looking bad for large stretches of it.

We do need to stick with what works---that's passing.  That's what we are built for and that's how the Super Bowl will be won this year.  We can win it throwing like crazy or it will be won by someone else throwing like crazy.

 

If you think a run team is going to win, you're nuts.

 

 

[K-9]

I said in the summer heading into camp that a big challenge for this team would be playing under the weight of raised expectations and that it reminded me of the ‘89 Bills after their AFCC loss to the Bengals in ‘88. Seeing the same kind of inconsistency from this group as we saw in ‘89. Just feels so familiar. 

[billsfan_34]

7 hours ago, Success said:

McD is a good coach. It's easy to look at last night's game and say he got outcoached - and he did - but BB will always be the master.  McD really didn't have a bad strategy or gameplan.  BB's was better - and NE got the breaks that made all of the hindsight analysis more stark.

 

I.e. - if we score on that last drive, the talk today is more about how the Pats might have blown it by not being more aggressive and passing more. That's how it goes in hot take nation.

 

We weren't going to keep sweeping the Pats year after year. The important thing now is to get the split.

 

Bill knew he could run the ball in very bad weather, and he knew we could not. In my opinion it is that simple. Stevenson will be a thorn in our side for years to come as he enters into a feature back role much like Henry.

Edited December 8, 2021 by billsfan_34