Stats, PFF grades, Thoughts on Offense, and Miami coming up

[Thurman#1]

8 hours ago, billsfan89 said:

"The starting offense only scored 24 points" 

 

The offense excluding the final TD drive with backups scored on all but 3 possessions with one of those three possessions starting at the one-yard line (and that drive resulted in a shift of field possession as the Josh INT on that drive occurred deep in Commander's territory). The only concerning moment from the offense was the inability to get 2 yards on a 3rd and 2. 

 

The offense in the red zone played conservatively because they were playing complementary to the defense and just taking points to try to build up a multi-score lead. Had the offense "needed" to score more I think they could have. The game got into garbage time with 10 minutes left in the fourth quarter which means despite "only" scoring 24 points the offense likely could have score more had the game been closer.  

 

I think comparing the Bills offense in a blowout WIN over the Commanders to the Broncos offense in a blowout LOSS is extremely misleading. 

 

 

Thank you. Yes, exactly. Einstein was seriously spinning. The starting offense kept the Commanders really good DL on the back foot the whole game.

 

The starting offense maybe wasn't great, but they were very good. They wore down the Commanders D and that's why near the end of the game they were getting what they wanted.

 

And yes, Einstein's comparison to the Broncos offense was simply ridiculous. The Broncos were in desperation mode from the 1st quarter, throwing wildly. We very much were not. If anything we were battening down, running a ton. Of course their Yards per Play was high. They were awful. We were really really good.

 

Edited September 26, 2023 by Thurman#1

[Generic_Bills_Fan]

I have never heard getting home with 4 being described as a possible problem before lol sure it might be called similar to fraziers defense but they have the bodies to run it this year

Edited September 26, 2023 by Generic_Bills_Fan

[mrags]

3 hours ago, Einstein said:

 

He is getting rid off the ball so fast that it is certainly possible. Tua is, on average, releasing the ball only 2.3 seconds after the snap. That is #1 in the NFL

He’s also only been sacked once. And only been hit 5 times in 3 games. 

[LABILLBACKER]

18 plays that resulted in 2 yards or less. The entire first half felt like 2nd & 10.  That's gotta get cleaned up or teams like Mia., KC & Cincy will school us.

 

As long as Torrence protects Josh I'm happy. He can learn run blocking techniques down the road.

 

Bernard looks special and hopefully he can continue to make plays alongside Milano.

 

I want to see more Elam & Kincaid on Sunday and less Harty (other than returns).  

[GunnerBill]

We still blitz too much. I might have mentioned a few times how much I hated that third down blitz on Howell in the 3rd quarter that extended a drive. 

 

Leave that ***** for Madden.

[TheBrownBear]

1 hour ago, GunnerBill said:

We still blitz too much. I might have mentioned a few times how much I hated that third down blitz on Howell in the 3rd quarter that extended a drive. 

 

Leave that ***** for Madden.

How often are we blitzing and how does the rate compare to the rest of the league?  Just curious.

[GunnerBill]

9 minutes ago, TheBrownBear said:

How often are we blitzing and how does the rate compare to the rest of the league?  Just curious.

 

6.7% bottom of the NFL apparently. 

 

But I fudging hated the 3rd down blitz on Sunday. 

[Mikie2times]

13 hours ago, Einstein said:

• Don’t let the incredible play of the defense distract you from the fact that this was not the best game for the offense. The starting offense scored 24 points, which feels low considering the defense forced 5 turnovers and continuously gave the offense the ball. The starting offense's last three series were Interception, Turnover on Downs, Touchdown. They ended the day with 322 yards and 5.9 yards per play. To put this into perspective, the Broncos put up 399 yards and 6.4 yards per play against Washington. The offense will have to be better against Miami. On first down, we ran 7 plays that resulted in 1 yard or less, 9 plays that resulted in 2 yards or less, and 2 plays that resulted in negative yards.

 

• I feel confident writing that Bernard is a good Middle Linebacker. No qualifiers needed. No comments such as "he is good enough" or "better than expected". He is a good player. Period. He is good defending the pass and he is good at defending the run. He FLIES through gaps on run downs and is very physical for a player of his size. And we have seen his athleticism on back-to-back game interceptions. He is just plain good.

 

• Torrence had the highest pass blocking grade against the Commanders. Brown had the worst. Dawkins had the highest run blocking grade. Torrence had the worst (PFF graded him abysmally in run blocking).

 

• The Bills have the lowest blitz % in the NFL. As I mentioned in the offseason, I do not think this defense will be called much different than Frazier did. I'm sure we have all seen some differences, but it is remarkably similar to Frazier's defense.

 

• People hate calling an early season game a “must win” and I understand why. But this Miami game is, without a doubt, a very important early season game. If Miami wins, they go to 4-0 and we fall to 2-2. Miami’s next two opponents are 1-5 combined: the Giants (1-2) and Panthers (0-3). Any given Sunday, but in all likelihood, they would be 6-0. We need to hand them a loss.

 

• Kaiir Elam has done well against the Dolphins. He had an 88 coverage grade against them in the playoffs, and a season average of 75 against the Dolphins. That is the highest grade of all our cornerbacks against the Dolphins last season. By a lot.

 

• It’s a long season, but as of now, Harty seems like a miss. Beane signed him to a 2 year, $9.5M contract, which I thought indicated that we planned to use him heavily. We did draft Kincaid too, but even when Kincaid is not on the field, Harty has no real role.

 

• NextGenStats records player speed in every game. The 5 fastest times this season are ALL Miami Dolphins. Every. Single. Spot is taken by a Dolphin. Hill, Mostert and Achane have all reached speeds of 21MPH with Hill reaching 22MPH. Miami trading for Hill was such a great move. You can’t teach speed. I was hoping the trade would blow up in their face but it was honestly worth every pick they gave up and every dollar spent. As Robert Griffin III said yesterday, Hill has something that no other player in the sport has - INSTANT SPEED. This is so incredibly dangerous because he can be open within 1 second, which completely negates the defenses pass rush. Then they team him up with Waddle and turns into “pick your poison”.

 

• Fans can denigrate Tua all they want, but he is an incredibly accurate and quick thrower of the football. He will always have limitations due to size, arm strength, and height, but his incredible accuracy and quick delivery makes him lethal. YardsPerPass noted on film that he will rarely (if ever) throw to the far side boundary - likely due to arm weakness - so smart teams (such as the Patriots) are playing a lot of Cover 3 while clogging the middle of the field and forcing short side throws. The Broncos didn’t get the memo.

 

• 70 points is impressive, but make no mistake, the Broncos gave up in that game. They were also incredibly inept. Look at the carnage in this photo.

 

 

 

Really solid post. I will add, the performance we had last year in the playoff game will get us beat. It almost got us beat by a 3rd string QB. Josh has had a very solid two weeks. We will need a clean game from him this week. 

[Dan]

I don’t understand what is going on….is this real life?

[SoTier]

So far this season, the Fish have shown that they can:

... outscore a team with a good offense but a crappy defense

... score enough points to win against a team with a good defense but a meager offense

... score a carload of points against an outclassed team that quit in the first half.

 

They haven't faced a team that was tough on both sides of the ball yet this season.   The Bills have the best defense they've faced so far this season, and despite all the whining about the offense on TSW, the Bills have a potent offense.   Miami will score points but the Bills can score them, too.   I think the Bills D will make Tua's lfie miserable all afternoon -- if he lasts the entire game.

[Chicken Boo]

Further proving that football WILL ALWAYS BE FOOTBALL, Shanahan and his disciple (McDaniels) have the 2 best and most balanced offenses in football.  

 

They are numbers 1 & 3 in RUSHING.  #2 is Philly.  Bills are #7.  Hopefully they keep that going.  

 

 

[Matt_In_NH]

19 hours ago, Einstein said:

The Bills have the lowest blitz % in the NFL. As I mentioned in the offseason, I do not think this defense will be called much different than Frazier did. I'm sure we have all seen some differences, but it is remarkably similar to Frazier's defense.

This has been my observation also, many other seem to have a different opinion.   Still low sample size though...

[newcam2012]

18 hours ago, Einstein said:

I believe the Dolphins game plan will be to negate our DL by throwing passes within a second or two of snapping the ball. 

We need to tackle well.

You have to take the blueprint from the Chargers game last year. Their defensive backs were very physical and bumped and pressed the Miami's WRs all game long. It completely disrupted the timing of their passing game. 

 

That's not really the Bills strength. Elam is probably the only guy who can be effective here. Hard to predict how he will play if active because he hasn't played. 

 

 

[Matt_In_NH]

19 hours ago, Einstein said:

NextGenStats records player speed in every game. The 5 fastest times this season are ALL Miami Dolphins. Every. Single. Spot is taken by a Dolphin. Hill, Mostert and Achane have all reached speeds of 21MPH with Hill reaching 22MPH. Miami trading for Hill was such a great move. You can’t teach speed. I was hoping the trade would blow up in their face but it was honestly worth every pick they gave up and every dollar spent. As Robert Griffin III said yesterday, Hill has something that no other player in the sport has - INSTANT SPEED. This is so incredibly dangerous because he can be open within 1 second, which completely negates the defenses pass rush. Then they team him up with Waddle and turns into “pick your poison”.

historically, teams that tried to build speed offenses failed but mostly because speed alone is not enough.  What Miami has is great players who are all exceptionally fast.  The motion, no look shuffle passes, general design of the offense is outstanding.  This is a real challenge for sure.

14 minutes ago, SoTier said:

The Bills have the best defense they've faced so far this season

Maybe...the Patriots are very good on defense....they have played the Eagles and Dolphins which are two of the best offenses out there so the stats may not totally show it.

[newcam2012]

13 hours ago, ndirish1978 said:

I have a hard time thinking we're going to win this week. Our D has been good to great this year but I still see our CBs as the weakest link on our team. I've lost confidence in Josh when he's not playing with a lead. 

You make some good points but the Bills can definitely win this game. In fact, I'd argue they should win the game. 

 

The Bills are at home, have Allen, and the D is looking very good. There's a lot to like about Buffalo here 

 

Conversely, Miami can win the game too. Their offense is rolling like a well oiled machine. 70 points is 70 points. Don't discredit that. They are much more balanced and can beat you in so many ways. I can see them running the ball well early; which will set up the big pass plays. Their speed is scary good. 

 

Both teams know each other well. All three games last year were very close. I suspect another close game here. 

13 hours ago, Billznut said:

I think everyone agrees this is a huge early game. But it is also just that, early. Dolphins will have a big two game lead plus tiebreaker with the win, but there will be 13 games left to play. Miami did this exact thing last year. Hot start, Tua’s stats through 3 games are identical to last years first 3 games. Then Tua missed time. Everyone has to keep that in mind. Yes we will be in a decent hole if we lose Sunday, but unless you’re telling me now that Tua will start and play in ALL 17 games this year for Miami, I won’t concede the division theirs after Sunday’s game. 

A win by Miami certainly may indicate a charging of the guard. 

[GunnerBill]

1 minute ago, newcam2012 said:

 

Both teams know each other well. All three games last year were very close. I suspect another close game here. 

 

Same. It is a toss of a coin game IMO. Can see 34-31 type score. 

[newcam2012]

9 hours ago, 27yanks said:

Bills  Rushing defense:  56/Carries  332/Yards  5.9APC

Better shore it up or we're going to get gashed Sunday!!    

I think this is the key to the game. Robinson was running well against Buffalo. 

9 hours ago, Thurman#1 said:

 

 

Thank you. Yes, exactly. Einstein was seriously spinning. The starting offense kept the Commanders really good DL on the back foot the whole game.

 

The starting offense maybe wasn't great, but they were very good. They wore down the Commanders D and that's why near the end of the game they were getting what they wanted.

 

And yes, Einstein's comparison to the Broncos offense was simply ridiculous. The Broncos were in desperation mode from the 1st quarter, throwing wildly. We very much were not. If anything we were battening down, running a ton. Of course their Yards per Play was high. They were awful. We were really really good.

 

I think the Bills offense will play well vs the Miami defense. Their defense is nothing special and beatable. Allen just needs to stay patient and I think his legs will show up big time in this game. 

[boyst]

35 minutes ago, GunnerBill said:

 

Same. It is a toss of a coin game IMO. Can see 34-31 type score. 

could also very much see this as a game where it's a chess match close to the chest and the total points under 45 with a final 21-20.

[colin]

i haven't seen season stats comparing different teams, but we must be just the worst team on 1st down.  sacks, no yard plays, and only a couple of big ones seem to happen for us on 1st down.

 

im thinking like that one dude said, every single 1st down should be an under center snap, lets us run and run play action out of it.

[Bleeding Bills Blue]

19 hours ago, Bangarang said:

Tua is having a great year. He plays so well into McD’s offense and McD is on another level when it comes to his use of motion and getting guys open. I’m actually jealous of that. 
 

Our DL needs to have another great game if we’re going to have a good chance at winning.

 

Tua's timing and short area accuracy are on another level right now.  They've also kept him well protected and ran the ball effectively when presented with soft fronts. 

4 minutes ago, colin said:

i haven't seen season stats comparing different teams, but we must be just the worst team on 1st down.  sacks, no yard plays, and only a couple of big ones seem to happen for us on 1st down.

 

im thinking like that one dude said, every single 1st down should be an under center snap, lets us run and run play action out of it.

 

I dunno, watching other games it seems like the same thing happens constantly.  

9 hours ago, LABILLBACKER said:

18 plays that resulted in 2 yards or less. The entire first half felt like 2nd & 10.  That's gotta get cleaned up or teams like Mia., KC & Cincy will school us.

 

As long as Torrence protects Josh I'm happy. He can learn run blocking techniques down the road.

 

Bernard looks special and hopefully he can continue to make plays alongside Milano.

 

I want to see more Elam & Kincaid on Sunday and less Harty (other than returns).  

 

Between the Jets and the Commanders, thats two of the better front 4's we're likely to face this season.