McBeane's constant use of premium draft picks on role players

[Process]

Rousseau - 65% 

Epenesa - 43%

Cook - 33%

Basham - 31%

 

I've said it before, but the d line philosophy is the worst thing about McDermott. Having to constantly invest into a ten man rotation. At the expense of the offense. It's killing this team.

 

Add in the fact that McBeane clearly suck at evaluating d line talent and we have a complete disaster on our hands. 

 

Even if the guys we drafted didn't suck a**, they wouldn't play more than 65% of snaps. What are we doing spending first and second round picks on guys that will never be close to full time players?

 

A pass catching RB in the second round?

 

New rule...if McDermott is going to insist on a rotation on defense, he shouldnt be allowed to draft one before round 4, I don't care how big the need is. 

[SoCal Deek]

Put another way…if we’re going to rotate all these players in, we’re going to need to ask the league for fourteen rounds in next year’s draft. 😉

[ClemsonBills]

THANK YOU! The defensive line rotation simply pulls money away from other positions. No other team in the NFL has a rotation like we do. The philosophy would make sense if it was backed with championships. 

[BarleyNY]

Just now, ClemsonBills said:

THANK YOU! The defensive line rotation simply pulls money away from other positions. No other team in the NFL has a rotation like we do. The philosophy would make sense if it was backed with championships. 

Or if it helped in the playoffs 

[Yobogoya!]

Our first round pick couldn’t get stay on the field despite the crap we were rolling out at that position, our second round pick flashed some explosiveness but is still a less than part time player. Our third round pick… I had to look up, I completely forgot who that was. 
 

And that’s just this year’s draft. 
 

People used to give Beane a lot of credit for pulling in some late draft capital for bust players, completely ignoring that he was, you know, the guy who drafted those bust players. 
 

And our whole defensive rotation to keep the line fresh? Um… fresh for what? They don’t take down the quarterback when they’re fresh, winded, or anything in between. 🤷‍♂️

[bobobonators]

Its hard to argue against the points in this thread. 

[Southern Bills Fan]

It's definitely disappointing that we have poured so many premium assets into the D line over the past few years so that we have had to ignore the O line and WR depth and they could do absolutely nothing against 3 backups.

[SCBills]

Bills need to copy the Chiefs moving forward.

 

Invest heavy on Offense.  Hope Von can be our Chris Jones for the next two years when comes back and fill in with some good players/cheap contracts.

 

Chiefs Defense without Chris Jones is rough.  They have some guys like Karlaftis (Rousseau), Bolton (Milano), McDuffie (Elam) etc.., but they rely on Spags to elevate them beyond what they are.  

 

We have a defensive head coach.. if McD can't do that, he has no reason to be here. 

[Brianmoorman4jesus]

We dress ST only guys over real players and then you watch punts go down field with no Bills on the screen. You’d think we are the greatest ST unit in NFL history for the assets we use. Every other team figured out STs is about dead years ago. We have some great players, organization of complete idiots other then that 

Edited January 23, 2023 by Brianmoorman4jesus

[78thealltimegreat]

They just can’t get away with neglecting the oline and WR positions anymore. Period.

 

[gobills404]

Don’t forget a 3rd rounder on Bernard, who will likely never play any significant snaps in Buffalo

[Process]

Just now, SCBills said:

Bills need to copy the Chiefs moving forward.

 

Invest heavy on Offense.  Hope Von can be our Chris Jones for the next two years when comes back and fill in with some good players/cheap contracts.

 

Chiefs Defense without Chris Jones is rough.  They have some guys like Karlaftis (Rousseau), Bolton (Milano), McDuffie (Elam) etc.., but they rely on Spags to elevate them beyond what they are.  

 

We have a defensive head coach.. if McD can't do that, he has no reason to be here. 

That's the thing.... McDermott doesn't elevate crap.

 

For his defense to work, he needs a ten man rotation on the d line. And very specific and talented players at every other position. If we lose one or two guys, the entire defense falls apart and is complete garbage.

[papazoid]

theoretically, the so called starters should be fresher with a deep rotation

 

the bigger problem is the starters, except von,  arent getting to the QB

[Bruffalo]

3 minutes ago, gobills404 said:

Don’t forget a 3rd rounder on Bernard, who will likely never play any significant snaps in Buffalo

There needs to be a fundamental shift in draft strategy moving forward, because it's obvious that drafting on defense and spending next to nothing on offense isn't working. 

 

Knox has done a ton more for the team than Bernard, Basham, and probably Elam (at this point) combined. 

Offense is how you win in the modern football league. Period. 

[BarleyNY]

11 minutes ago, Process said:

Rousseau - 65% 

Epenesa - 43%

Cook - 33%

Basham - 31%

 

I've said it before, but the d line philosophy is the worst thing about McDermott. Having to constantly invest into a ten man rotation. At the expense of the offense. It's killing this team.

 

Add in the fact that McBeane clearly suck at evaluating d line talent and we have a complete disaster on our hands. 

 

Even if the guys we drafted didn't suck a**, they wouldn't play more than 65% of snaps. What are we doing spending first and second round picks on guys that will never be close to full time players?

 

A pass catching RB in the second round?

 

New rule...if McDermott is going to insist on a rotation on defense, he shouldnt be allowed to draft one before round 4, I don't care how big the need is. 

This has been a gripe of mine too. Using 3 picks in the second and third rounds on stable RBs, a second on a back up DL in Basham, a first on Rousseau. Let me speak to the strategy I think was employed with the Rousseau pick. I see him as a solid complementary DE who only will be here through his fifth year option. That’s because he’s a first round pick at DE and the expected extension with his drafting team will be a lot higher than his value. Exceptions happen where the player take their MV with that team, but they’re rare. So this was a cost control move by the Bills. It cleared space for Von Miller so I get it, but it’s a short term, win now move at the expense of long term team building. A backup DL in the second round who will be here for no more than four seasons is even more egregious.
 

Back to Rousseau. Late first round picks don’t have that high of a success rate - 1 in 3 get a second contract IIRC. It’s 1 in 2 for the whole first round. So again, I get it. But when you don’t have success in that early window, you screw yourselves long term. That seems to be the path we’re on. 

[Shanahan's Horseshoe]

Mcbean’s drafting ineptitude should be put into one big mega thread. 
Their record speaks for itself.  Tons of JAGS.  
My favorite thing is when one of the JAGS makes a play someone saying, “Oh is he a bust now!?” Then said player is never heard from for the rest of the game. 

[Process]

47 minutes ago, papazoid said:

theoretically, the so called starters should be fresher with a deep rotation

 

the bigger problem is the starters, except von,  arent getting to the QB

We shouldn't be spending 2nd round picks on rotational players that are here to keep the starters "fresh."

 

AJ and bashams production could easily be replaced by day 3 picks. 

[Billz4ever]

1 hour ago, Process said:

Rousseau - 65% 

Epenesa - 43%

Cook - 33%

Basham - 31%

 

I've said it before, but the d line philosophy is the worst thing about McDermott. Having to constantly invest into a ten man rotation. At the expense of the offense. It's killing this team.

 

Add in the fact that McBeane clearly suck at evaluating d line talent and we have a complete disaster on our hands. 

 

Even if the guys we drafted didn't suck a**, they wouldn't play more than 65% of snaps. What are we doing spending first and second round picks on guys that will never be close to full time players?

 

A pass catching RB in the second round?

 

New rule...if McDermott is going to insist on a rotation on defense, he shouldnt be allowed to draft one before round 4, I don't care how big the need is. 

I've always said, what good is a D-line rotation if most of the guys you're rotating are mediocre?  You just have a fresh, mediocre line.

[LabattBlue]

Where was Groot(he has a cool nickname so he must be good), in each of the two playoff games?  Or does he get a pass for sucking with Basham, Oliver and AJE all because Miller wasn’t there?

[Royale with Cheese]

I'm to the point of allowing Edmunds, Poyer and Oliver walk and putting the resources on offense.

If this is the performance we get with them on the field, no sense of paying that much for it.