It was a hard loss AND we closed the gap

[mannc]

1 minute ago, CincyBillsFan said:

Correct and in the off season Bean must do what KC did - go all in on Allen and surround him with the best possible talent.  KC is not obsessing over not having the leagues best defense. They want to have the leagues best offense. 

 

NEVER again in a big game do you take the ball out of Allen's hand for even one possession. That the Bills did it last night on 3 possessions was a huge mistake.  Scoring a TD on just one of those three possessions and last night ends differently. Score two TD's on those drives and the Bills win comfortably.

 

Going forward you fix minor holes in the offenses before fixing bigger holes in the D.  This might make McD uncomfortable but so what.  If you want to win championships this is what you must do.

 

 

Exactly...you build on your greatest strength.  Going into the offseason, you know that, with Josh Allen at QB, you are going to be able to get a huge return from a game-breaking receiver that you draft, unlike in 2014 when we gave up a a ton of assets to pair Sammy Watkins with EJ Manual. Fortunately, there are a lot of those types of players coming out of college these days.  We also need another TE, by the way.   

[CincyBillsFan]

1 minute ago, mannc said:

Exactly...you build on your greatest strength.  Going into the offseason, you know that, with Josh Allen at QB, you are going to be able to get a huge return from a game-breaking receiver that you draft, unlike in 2014 when we gave up a a ton of assets to pair Sammy Watkins with EJ Manual. Fortunately, there are a lot of those types of players coming out of college these days.  We also need another TE, by the way.   

Man as I recover from the shock and heartbreak of last nights loss it's like the future for the Bills is crystalizing right before my eyes.  In today's NFL you go all in on offense when you have the best QB in the league.  The fact is only 3 or 4 other teams in the league could make that work.  KC has already gone there and they're on the cusp of heading to their 3rd straight SB.

 

I pray that Bean sees it this way. And while I don't pretend to know squat compared to Bean & McD this seems so damn RIGHT.  It's a no brainer.  We should be drafting & signing studs for the offense and trying to fix the D with role players likes Sanders was on the O this year and Kroft was on the O the last 2 seasons. If Bean/McD try to do it any other way they will squander having an elite QB; a guy the franchise has been desperately trying to find for the last 25 years!

 

 

 

 

[Matt_In_NH]

The reality is the Chiefs are going to their 4th straight AFC C game and probably 3rd straight SB.   The Bills are a bump on their way to  a couple of those so until you beat them in the playoffs and win your own SB, you wont be as good.  Allen will also be judged second for the same reason until he wins the whole thing, it is just how it is.   We don't need moral victories, its time to win championships.

[Mat68]

The middle of the season slump caused the game to be played in Arrowhead.  They have to maintain focus the whole season.  Need to get the 1 seed and play at home.  Mahomes hasnt played a road playoff game.  That is the key at that level.

[reddogblitz]

3 hours ago, nucci said:

how did we make progress? We were in Championship game last year and didn't get that far this year. Had a lead with :13 left. I don't see progress except we may have the best QB in the league now

 

We also had a better regular season record and higher playoff seed last year.

 

Even though we did beat KC once and played 'em to OT, 2020 season was better IMHO.

 

 

Edited January 24, 2022 by reddogblitz

[Nextmanup]

Smells like a moral victory post to me.

 

 

[CircleTheWagons99]

The players closed the gap, now its time for the coaches to get their heads out of their a$$es.....

[UKBillFan]

We're level with the Chiefs yet still managed to lose when it mattered.

[Ethan in Cleveland]

1 hour ago, Last Guy on the Bench said:

That "choking" reputation is what I'm talking about. It's juvenile. Reid won lots of big games before Mahomes. So did all of those coaches. I don't put so much weight on whether a person wins one particular game - the Super Bowl. There is too much randomness in there and too small a sample size. Coaches that go to multiple Super Bowls or even multiple conference championships win tons of big games along the way. I don't subscribe to the idea that there is only one big game. If you do, you are bound to be disappointed in most coaches most of the time. I believe there are many big games every year.

 

That's not to say that all coaches are equal, or that different coaches don't have different strengths and weaknesses, including game management. That goes without saying. I just don't find it so obvious that someone is a genius or an idiot based on, say, whether a kicker hits a kick or not. If one play goes differently yesterday, McD just beat the big bad Chiefs on the road and likely wins a Super Bowl this year, or at least gets there. Is he a different coach based on any one of those plays? Not to me.

 

That being said, I do think McD and Frazier made mistakes in that 13 seconds. I'm particularly troubled by the way they were guarding the boundary as if out of bounds mattered at all with time only for three plays and with three KC timeouts left. Out of bounds or not wasn't going to make any difference. I also don't understand how you don't put two bodies each on Kelce and Hill, and I agree with people who argue that you didn't really need much pass rush, since Mahomes was going to throw it quickly no matter what. Still, we could be wrong about all of that, and even if we're right, so what? They made a mistake. I don't see it as indicative that they will never win "the big one." It's just something they'll have to learn from.

 

To answer your question, I would never put a specific result on a specific year to decide whether to fire a coach, if it were up to me. I'd look at the overall body of work, I'd look at the way that coaches and players do or don't improve over the years, I'd look at the relationships between coaches, players, front office staff, support staff, etc. All of that matters to me. If the Bills continue to field a competitive football team that is generally in the playoff hunt, and if they continue to cultivate what looks like a very healthy organizational culture and learning mindset, I would keep the coach. The only reason I would fire a coach that had that kind sustained competitive success is if it grew clear that things had gotten stale, that he had stopped growing and progressing, and/or that he was no longer relating to and developing players well.

 

So pretty much nothing next year short of a player revolt would make me in favor of letting McD go.

 

Again, I wasn't originally a big fan of the hire. And I still don't think he's the kind of guy I would really jibe with. Not my kind of personality really. I also suspect he might never be the sharpest tactical tool in the shed. And I do wonder what Reid saw in him that made him fire him. Still, with all of that, I think he is doing an absolutely fantastic job and I hope to see him as the Bills coach for many years to come, unless something major changes in his approach.

Good take.  There is no one solution.  Steelers and Ravens stick with their guy. Bears fired Jauron and Lovie Smith both with winning records if memory serves and they have never recovered.  Eagles moved on from Reid and won a SB a few years later. Obviously Tampa and Dungy/Gruden is the most extreme example of making a change that worked out. 

It is so odd. Had they lost by 10 and McD never had to coach those last 13 seconds you probably just chalk it up to KC being better and maybe a change needs to be made at DC.

However when you are winning because your superstar QB made amazing plays, and you call timeouts to prepare and you still manage to screw it up by defending against a TD and the boundaries he deserves criticism.

Like I said there is zero chance he is not coming back as HC.  Hope he doesn't melt in the moment again. 

[FilthyBeast]

44 minutes ago, Mat68 said:

The middle of the season slump caused the game to be played in Arrowhead.  They have to maintain focus the whole season.  Need to get the 1 seed and play at home.  Mahomes hasnt played a road playoff game.  That is the key at that level.

 

That and being 0-6 in one score games.

 

And it's still mind boggling how something like this could happen in terms of winning 12 games by 12 more points but losing 6 of 7 games by a single score.

[reddogblitz]

1 hour ago, Last Guy on the Bench said:

That "choking" reputation is what I'm talking about. It's juvenile. Reid won lots of big games before Mahomes. So did all of those coaches. I don't put so much weight on whether a person wins one particular game - the Super Bowl. There is too much randomness in there and too small a sample size. Coaches that go to multiple Super Bowls or even multiple conference championships win tons of big games along the way. I don't subscribe to the idea that there is only one big game. If you do, you are bound to be disappointed in most coaches most of the time. I believe there are many big games every year.

 

Agreed.

 

My Dad used to say you gotta win big games to get to big games.  What about the 2 playoff wins last year?  What about beating the Cheats*** at their house to win the division?  What about beating the Cheats*** in round 1?  Weren't any of those big games?

[Last Guy on the Bench]

41 minutes ago, Ethan in Portland said:

Good take.  There is no one solution.  Steelers and Ravens stick with their guy. Bears fired Jauron and Lovie Smith both with winning records if memory serves and they have never recovered.  Eagles moved on from Reid and won a SB a few years later. Obviously Tampa and Dungy/Gruden is the most extreme example of making a change that worked out. 

It is so odd. Had they lost by 10 and McD never had to coach those last 13 seconds you probably just chalk it up to KC being better and maybe a change needs to be made at DC.

However when you are winning because your superstar QB made amazing plays, and you call timeouts to prepare and you still manage to screw it up by defending against a TD and the boundaries he deserves criticism.

Like I said there is zero chance he is not coming back as HC.  Hope he doesn't melt in the moment again. 

Good points. It's very fair to criticize decisions and strategy in that game (or in any game).

 

 And I totally agree that there is no one solution. That's why I think you have to look at the gestalt of the thing, rather than focusing on one year or one result. There are definitely coaches that are reasonably competent and kind of plateau and don't grow into greatness. Maybe Jauron is a good example? Still, give Jauron Josh Allen and who knows how that goes? Even the Bucs Dungy/Gruden example is questionable to me. Yes they won the SB so it's hard to argue. At the same time, they only made the playoffs twice in the ensuing 17 years and got bounced in the wild card round both times. So was that really the direction to take for the team? Might Dungy have won a SB along the way and kept them more competitive? I don't know. I do know that when he arrived they hadn't made the playoffs in 13 years, and under him they went four times in six years. Pretty good.

 

The alchemy of a good team is mysterious. Maybe it will become apparent over time that McD's weaknesses outweigh his strengths. But for me right now, his considerable strengths dramatically outweigh his weaknesses, even assuming I have a good read on his weaknesses, which I probably don't. And I do think he is a guy that will attack his weaknesses head-on. That's one of his most admirable qualities.

 

 

Edited January 24, 2022 by Last Guy on the Bench

[HalftimeAdjustment]

3 hours ago, Nextmanup said:

Smells like a moral victory post to me.

 

 

 

If you want to wallow in negativity, there are definitely plenty of threads for that.

[billsfan714]

4 hours ago, 13 Second Prevent Defense said:

The reality is the Chiefs are going to their 4th straight AFC C game and probably 3rd straight SB.   The Bills are a bump on their way to  a couple of those so until you beat them in the playoffs and win your own SB, you wont be as good.  Allen will also be judged second for the same reason until he wins the whole thing, it is just how it is.   We don't need moral victories, its time to win championships.

Amen to that.