Why is it so hard for fans to admit reality?

[loyal2dagame]

11 hours ago, oldmanfan said:

The reality is we were lucky yesterday.  Josh was bad Josh until the last drive.  Cook had a pivotal fumble.  The defense let a guy with no experience in the league almost win the game for the Bolts.  The only guy that played really well was Oliver.  
 

Just admit they sucked yesterday and got lucky.  They won’t be that bad every game; I suspect they’ll squish the Fish like Josh always does.  But they sucked yesterday and have too many times this year against inferior competition and that’s why they’re in the position they’re in.

Here's some clouds for you to yell at: 

 

[Big Turk]

42 minutes ago, Mikie2times said:

Given our sterling history in close games how do you think these chips fall come playoff time? 

 

Against Miami? Pretty good.

[GunnerBill]

1 hour ago, Big Turk said:

 

OP apparently is a person that refuses to admit luck plays a much larger part in wins, losses and teams making the playoffs than one would like to admit.

 

It 100% does. 

[Kaenon]

Username checks out.

[Jrb1979]

1 hour ago, Big Turk said:

 

OP apparently is a person that refuses to admit luck plays a much larger part in wins, losses and teams making the playoffs than one would like to admit.

For playoffs yes luck plays a big part. As far as winning a Super Bowl, the best teams for the most part end up in the game. The Giants winning as a 9-7 or wildcard team is rare. 

@Successwhat's your issue? This team is not as good as many think they are. Truth hurts. 

[Big Turk]

5 minutes ago, Jrb1979 said:

For playoffs yes luck plays a big part. As far as winning a Super Bowl, the best teams for the most part end up in the game. The Giants winning as a 9-7 or wildcard team is rare. 

@Successwhat's your issue? This team is not as good as many think they are. Truth hurts. 

 

You mean other than when teams drop giftwrapped game ending INTs that allow a team to advance when they should have lost like when the Rams beat the 49ers and went on to win the super bowl?

[Success]

7 minutes ago, Jrb1979 said:

For playoffs yes luck plays a big part. As far as winning a Super Bowl, the best teams for the most part end up in the game. The Giants winning as a 9-7 or wildcard team is rare. 

@Successwhat's your issue? This team is not as good as many think they are. Truth hurts. 

 

If people want to be relentlessly negative, I don't really have a problem w/ it. But I'm not down w/ eyerolling or giving the thumbs down on posts that are more positive.

 

We disagree on what this team is.  They're inconsistent - but when they're on their game, they're as good as any team.

 

[Big Turk]

Bills are the 4th most unlucky team in the league this year. Not surprisingly, Philly is the luckiest by a wide margin.

 

https://www.teamrankings.com/nfl/ranking/luck-by-other

Edited December 25, 2023 by Big Turk

[Straight Hucklebuck]

11 hours ago, oldmanfan said:

The reality is we were lucky yesterday.  Josh was bad Josh until the last drive.  Cook had a pivotal fumble.  The defense let a guy with no experience in the league almost win the game for the Bolts.  The only guy that played really well was Oliver.  
 

Just admit they sucked yesterday and got lucky.  They won’t be that bad every game; I suspect they’ll squish the Fish like Josh always does.  But they sucked yesterday and have too many times this year against inferior competition and that’s why they’re in the position they’re in.

The passing game is lethargic right now.

 

It’s not a well oiled machine throwing the ball.

 

On defense, have to hope Epenesa can get healthy, so that Von can take a seat on the bench.

 

Have to hope DaQuan can come back close to 85% - 90% and give the line a boost. 
 

And I will agree with you that the local media was taking victory laps all week and predicting Super Bowl runs. 

[Big Turk]

13 minutes ago, Jrb1979 said:

For playoffs yes luck plays a big part. As far as winning a Super Bowl, the best teams for the most part end up in the game. The Giants winning as a 9-7 or wildcard team is rare. 

@Successwhat's your issue? This team is not as good as many think they are. Truth hurts. 

 

Yes...and typically happens when a team that is actually far better than their record has a few things go against them during the year but manages to get in.

[oldmanfan]

17 minutes ago, Kaenon said:

Username checks out.

Look at page 18.  Merry Christmas

[Mikie2times]

1 minute ago, Big Turk said:

 

Yes...and typically happens when a team that is actually far better than their record has a few things go against them during the year but manages to get in.

I would say with our consistency issues it's certainly debatable how "good" we actually are. It's not like we have a lot of postseason success. All it takes is one inconsistent effort and we are out. I think people get excited about Buffalo based on how average the AFC has been as whole so they think what happens if they "get it together"? Well, what happens if this is just who we are when we have it together? Despite mountains of evidence that suggests that could be the case, people are choosing fairy tales with McD and concepts like Dorsey being the sole reason we can't win close games. The playoffs have been a failure on both sides of the ball and if you want to assign a third side of the ball to coaching, they have been a failure at all three levels. Why is it going to be different? If the answer is people choosing an optimistic path I don't blame them. If the answer is we have some sort of actual data or indicator outside maybe net point differential, I can argue that all day. This narrative of us being dangerous to win it all was created by people, not evidence that we have somehow figured out areas we have been historically awful in. 

[Big Turk]

5 minutes ago, Mikie2times said:

I would say with our consistency issues it's certainly debatable how "good" we actually are. It's not like we have a lot of postseason success. All it takes is one inconsistent effort and we are out. I think people get excited about Buffalo based on how average the AFC has been as whole so they think what happens if they "get it together"? Well, what happens if this is just who we are when we have it together? Despite mountains of evidence that suggests that could be the case, people are choosing fairy tales with McD and concepts like Dorsey being the sole reason we can't win close games. The playoffs have been a failure on both sides of the ball and if you want to assign a third side of the ball to coaching, they have been a failure at all three levels. Why is it going to be different? If the answer is people choosing an optimistic path I don't blame them. If the answer is we have some sort of actual data or indicator outside maybe net point differential, I can argue that all day. This narrative of us being dangerous to win it all was created by people, not evidence that we have somehow figured out areas we have been historically awful in. 

 

Well...not really. Pretty much every advanced metric has the Bills as a top 5 team. DVOA they were 3rd, SOS 5th, a few others 4th or 5th as well.

 

A team that hasn't lost a regular season game by more than 6 points in over 2 full years now seems pretty good to me. That is an absurdly long time to maintain that level of play.

[GoBills808]

10 minutes ago, Mikie2times said:

I would say with our consistency issues it's certainly debatable how "good" we actually are. It's not like we have a lot of postseason success. All it takes is one inconsistent effort and we are out. I think people get excited about Buffalo based on how average the AFC has been as whole so they think what happens if they "get it together"? Well, what happens if this is just who we are when we have it together? Despite mountains of evidence that suggests that could be the case, people are choosing fairy tales with McD and concepts like Dorsey being the sole reason we can't win close games. The playoffs have been a failure on both sides of the ball and if you want to assign a third side of the ball to coaching, they have been a failure at all three levels. Why is it going to be different? If the answer is people choosing an optimistic path I don't blame them. If the answer is we have some sort of actual data or indicator outside maybe net point differential, I can argue that all day. This narrative of us being dangerous to win it all was created by people, not evidence that we have somehow figured out areas we have been historically awful in. 

I think our W/L is happily normalizing wrt how good the metrics have suggested this team actually is but I agree w your overall point

 

Imo the Bills were neither as bad as was bemoaned early on nor as dangerous a potential postseason opponent as we are being made out to be now

[Mikie2times]

2 minutes ago, Big Turk said:

 

Well...not really. Pretty much every advanced metric has the Bills as a top 5 team. DVOA they were 3rd, SOS 5th, a few others 4th or 5th as well.

 

A team that hasn't lost a regular season game by more than 6 points in over 2 full years now seems pretty good to me. That is an absurdly long time to maintain that level of play.

So when we finished 3rd in 2020, 2nd in 2021, and 1st in 2022, did you ever start to wonder if maybe DVOA over ranks us because teams who rank lower always finish higher and we have never actually played to or outplayed our DVOA ranking in the McD era? I wonder if the same goofy stats are impacting our net point differential. It's almost as if we have a chronic history of underplaying data points that generally have a good level of forecast accuracy.

 

Maybe it's because we crush teams, juicing our advanced stats but when it comes down to one on one  single games it's a total crap shoot and we default to our .500 record in games decided by 7 or less. I do think it's likely we will see more games decided by 7 or less in the coming weeks given that it's the playoffs and all.

3 minutes ago, GoBills808 said:

I think our W/L is happily normalizing wrt how good the metrics have suggested this team actually is but I agree w your overall point

 

Imo the Bills were neither as bad as was bemoaned early on nor as dangerous a potential postseason opponent as we are being made out to be now

I agree with this. We also never play up to our advanced stats like DVOA. Never happened before. So I think that goes back to how we create those advanced stats. 

[Generic_Bills_Fan]

3 minutes ago, GoBills808 said:

I think our W/L is happily normalizing wrt how good the metrics have suggested this team actually is but I agree w your overall point

 

Imo the Bills were neither as bad as was bemoaned early on nor as dangerous a potential postseason opponent as we are being made out to be now

I think it’s just sloppier football leaguewide this year and we’re right where weve been in previous years compared to the other afc teams as far as odds of a playoff run goes.  Offenses have been inconsistent all over the place this season 

[Big Turk]

7 minutes ago, Mikie2times said:

So when we finished 3rd in 2020, 2nd in 2021, and 1st in 2022, did you ever start to wonder if maybe DVOA over ranks us because teams who rank lower always finish higher and we have never actually played to or outplayed our DVOA ranking in the McD era? I wonder if the same goofy stats are impacting our net point differential. It's almost as if we have a chronic history of underplaying data points that generally have a good level of forecast accuracy.

 

Maybe it's because we crush teams, juicing our advanced stats but when it comes down to one on one  single games it's a total crap shoot and we default to our .500 record in games decided by 7 or less. I do think it's likely we will see more games decided by 7 or less in the coming weeks given that it's the playoffs and all.

I agree with this. We also never play up to our advanced stats like DVOA. Never happened before. So I think that goes back to how we create those advanced stats. 

 

Pretty much ALL teams over a few seasons normalize to a .500 record in one score games. Almost without fail teams that are great in 1-score games like the Vikings were last year are not good and revert to the mean the following year.

 

Why? Because luck is the biggest factor in 1 score games which has been shown in studies on this.

Edited December 25, 2023 by Big Turk

[Mikie2times]

Just now, Big Turk said:

 

Pretty much ALL teams over a few seasons normalize to a .500 record in one score games.

Tom doesn't agree. Nor does Pat. In fact, run it man. Your the one who said it. 

 

Pat is 33-16

Brady 91-43

Manning is 77-40

 

Josh has a losing record. Is that Josh or McD? You made the statement so I would think the burden falls on you. 

[Big Turk]

6 minutes ago, Mikie2times said:

Tom doesn't agree. Nor does Pat. In fact, run it man. Your the one who said it. 

 

Pat is 33-16

Brady 91-43

Manning is 77-40

 

Josh has a losing record. Is that Josh or McD? You made the statement so I would think the burden falls on you. 

 

 

How many of those were "true" one score games versus "name only" one score games where a team scores a garbage time TD to make it look good but never really had a chance to win?

 

Mahomes lost his last 2 one score games he played against Allen. And he had the ball last both times and didn't get it done.

 

How many times has Allen drove down to give the Bills the lead with under 2 minutes in a game only to see the D lose it? 

 

3 times this year, Arizona game in the Hail Murray, 13 second game(TWICE!!), probably at least one or two others.

 

That's on him they lost those?

 

https://jaydpauley.medium.com/is-winning-close-games-in-the-nfl-luck-6118d3d8a701

Edited December 25, 2023 by Big Turk

[Mikie2times]

Just now, Big Turk said:

 

https://jaydpauley.medium.com/is-winning-close-games-in-the-nfl-luck-6118d3d8a701

That analysis looks at teams, without consistency of coach and QB and by outcomes of 3 points or less. So if one was to say does a random team with a random coach in a small sample have a likelihood of finishing a game decided by 3 points or less at basically neutral probability? Sure. The 3 points alone almost make it a defacto coin flip. I said 7 or less. Which will make good teams fall more on the right side as history has shown, just not with McD.