Sunday’s Loss Was Just a Replay of the Win in KC

[UConn James]

3 hours ago, billieve420 said:

I don’t understand why we don’t use Cook more on screens and dump offs as he is clearly our best player in space. Yet we can throw a million WR screens that are painful to watch.

Did you not see Cook’s drops on screen passes this year? It was brutal, especially in clutch situations.

[billieve420]

15 minutes ago, UConn James said:

Did you not see Cook’s drops on screen passes this year? It was brutal, especially in clutch situations.

Was it much different from the WRs dropping passes all year. Still rather put the ball in Cook’s hand and letting him create. 

[GunnerBill]

Another coach trashing thread. Goodo.

[Scott7975]

 

[GunnerBill]

3 minutes ago, Scott7975 said:

 

 

Yea I am a huge Ed Oliver guy and over the years he has had very good games against KC even if the "stat box" hasn't shown it necessarily. Sunday was not one of them. The Chiefs interior oline is the best in the NFL for my money and they won that battle against Oliver and Jones handily. 

[Zerovoltz]

I've had a chance to rewatch and think about the game.  

 

2 BIG things that I think as reasons why the Bills lost this game. and a significant, but important 3rd thing.

 

1.  You have Josh Allen.  Joe Brady nuetered him.  16 passes completed behind the LOS.  No plays over 20 yards.  The Bills O was NOT EXPLOSIVE.  It wasn't just this game.  Joe Brady shifted the Bills to a running team and turned Josh into a game manager.  You have JOSH FREAKING ALLEN!  Not Jimmy G!  Does Josh have alot of the Brett Favre hazards to his game?  HELL YES HE DOES!  That's the cost of doing business when you have a guy who can sling it.  You sling it and sometimes when you put the ball in jeopardy it aint gonna land where you want it to, but the big plays, the fear, the explosions....that's what you want and they nuetered him.  I know as a Chiefs fan, KC can frustrate a QB And bottle up some targets.  Doesn't matter.  you should be agreessive when you have Allen at QB.  Go rewatchthe Chargers game if you don't believe me.  By the time the Bills played them, that was a team that had quit on it's coach, it's season was over, their D had been gashed all year and Joe Brady nearly lost you guys that game singlehandedly with the playcalling.  You have Josh Allen....LEAN INTO IT...not away form it.

 

2.  Maybe it's just that when you run into good QB's it's hard to play championship caliber D, but McDermotts defenses in playoff games VS Burrow and Mahomes, have been BAD.  I don't claim to know why....I just know they are.  Even the 13 seconds game, if KC doesn't miss a FG and XP, we never get to 13 seconds to begin with if you look back on it...and KC was moving it up and down the field...like they have in every playoff game they've been in.  Even Skylar Thompson had himself a day against the Bills playoff D.  Phillip Rivers should have come out of the playoff game he had against the Bills with a W...they were able to move the ball.  Something is lacking with the Bills D when post season arrives.  The common denominator is McDermott.  

 

3. The Bills will have a fighters chance every postseason because of Allen....but I think the current coaching staff has taken him as far as THEY can.  McDermott is a very good coach.  He's overseen a complete overhaul of the culture and the development of the rawest QB prospect pretty much ever, into an elite QB.  His efforst should be applauded.  He's done very well.  He's not the right fit to take the Bills to the next level.  He's marty Shottenheimer and Dan Reeves.  

 

1. Free Josh!

2. Figure out your playoff defense

3. probably find a coach to get you from here to there.

 

Just my two cents.

Edited January 26 by Zerovoltz

[Drew21PA]

17 hours ago, st pete gogolak said:

The win in KC.  14 - 7 at the half. Yards in favor of Bills 226 - 176.  Bills dominate first half and could have come close to closing it out if not for a careless INT by Josh near the end of the half.  
 

Second half.  Chiefs D completely throttles Bills’ O and Chiefs outscore Bills 10 - 6, win yardage by 170 - 101.  Of course, Toney penalty wiped out additional Chiefs’ TD.  Not saying Bills were fortunate to win.  It was a tough, close game but Bills clearly outplayed in the second half.

 

Sunday.  Bills lead at half 17 - 13.  Lead in yards 234 - 164.  Second half, outscored 14 - 7, outgained 197 - 134.  Again, tough, close game that could have gone either way.  I firmly believe Bills win but for the injuries on D.  Nevertheless, the drastic drop off on the offensive side of the ball in the second half of both games is stunning.  
 

Chiefs made adjustments, Bills didn’t.  If they played five more times, I see it happening over and over.  Yeah, it’s the coaching.

Not a fan of these criticism threads

 

its a game of football - made adjustments but Josh connects on the most amazing throw I’ve ever seen to dogs go 70 in the air?

 

tune changed and those adjustments are nonexistent

 

we we drove the ball up and down the field all game - only adjustment was luck

[SirAndrew]

2 hours ago, Zerovoltz said:

I've had a chance to rewatch and think about the game.  

 

2 BIG things that I think as reasons why the Bills lost this game. and a significant, but important 3rd thing.

 

1.  You have Josh Allen.  Joe Brady nuetered him.  16 passes completed behind the LOS.  No plays over 20 yards.  The Bills O was NOT EXPLOSIVE.  It wasn't just this game.  Joe Brady shifted the Bills to a running team and turned Josh into a game manager.  You have JOSH FREAKING ALLEN!  Not Jimmy G!  Does Josh have alot of the Brett Favre hazards to his game?  HELL YES HE DOES!  That's the cost of doing business when you have a guy who can sling it.  You sling it and sometimes when you put the ball in jeopardy it aint gonna land where you want it to, but the big plays, the fear, the explosions....that's what you want and they nuetered him.  I know as a Chiefs fan, KC can frustrate a QB And bottle up some targets.  Doesn't matter.  you should be agreessive when you have Allen at QB.  Go rewatchthe Chargers game if you don't believe me.  By the time the Bills played them, that was a team that had quit on it's coach, it's season was over, their D had been gashed all year and Joe Brady nearly lost you guys that game singlehandedly with the playcalling.  You have Josh Allen....LEAN INTO IT...not away form it.

 

2.  Maybe it's just that when you run into good QB's it's hard to play championship caliber D, but McDermotts defenses in playoff games VS Burrow and Mahomes, have been BAD.  I don't claim to know why....I just know they are.  Even the 13 seconds game, if KC doesn't miss a FG and XP, we never get to 13 seconds to begin with if you look back on it...and KC was moving it up and down the field...like they have in every playoff game they've been in.  Even Skylar Thompson had himself a day against the Bills playoff D.  Phillip Rivers should have come out of the playoff game he had against the Bills with a W...they were able to move the ball.  Something is lacking with the Bills D when post season arrives.  The common denominator is McDermott.  

 

3. The Bills will have a fighters chance every postseason because of Allen....but I think the current coaching staff has taken him as far as THEY can.  McDermott is a very good coach.  He's overseen a complete overhaul of the culture and the development of the rawest QB prospect pretty much ever, into an elite QB.  His efforst should be applauded.  He's done very well.  He's not the right fit to take the Bills to the next level.  He's marty Shottenheimer and Dan Reeves.  

 

1. Free Josh!

2. Figure out your playoff defense

3. probably find a coach to get you from here to there.

 

Just my two cents.

It’s good to hear an opposing fan prospective. I’m seeing it the same way. I think fans get lost in wins and losses, often forgetting what’s sustainable. The winning streak under Brady isn’t a sustainable way to win championships with Allen at QB. Allen was throwing for around 200 yards a game in the last seven regular season games, that’s not how we win a Lombardi. This regime seems set on playing ball control offense. It’s a delicate game of keep away that leaves a thin margin of error. One mistake, turnover, or punt is devastating when you don’t play full throttle on offense. 

[Ethan in Cleveland]

This is the story of McDermott.  He seems to make some adjustments early in the game but then when the other team counters he falters.

That is a gross oversimplification but seems to be the pattern over the McD era. 

[GunnerBill]

2 hours ago, Zerovoltz said:

I've had a chance to rewatch and think about the game.  

 

2 BIG things that I think as reasons why the Bills lost this game. and a significant, but important 3rd thing.

 

1.  You have Josh Allen.  Joe Brady nuetered him.  16 passes completed behind the LOS.  No plays over 20 yards.  The Bills O was NOT EXPLOSIVE.  It wasn't just this game.  Joe Brady shifted the Bills to a running team and turned Josh into a game manager.  You have JOSH FREAKING ALLEN!  Not Jimmy G!  Does Josh have alot of the Brett Favre hazards to his game?  HELL YES HE DOES!  That's the cost of doing business when you have a guy who can sling it.  You sling it and sometimes when you put the ball in jeopardy it aint gonna land where you want it to, but the big plays, the fear, the explosions....that's what you want and they nuetered him.  I know as a Chiefs fan, KC can frustrate a QB And bottle up some targets.  Doesn't matter.  you should be agreessive when you have Allen at QB.  Go rewatchthe Chargers game if you don't believe me.  By the time the Bills played them, that was a team that had quit on it's coach, it's season was over, their D had been gashed all year and Joe Brady nearly lost you guys that game singlehandedly with the playcalling.  You have Josh Allen....LEAN INTO IT...not away form it.

 

2.  Maybe it's just that when you run into good QB's it's hard to play championship caliber D, but McDermotts defenses in playoff games VS Burrow and Mahomes, have been BAD.  I don't claim to know why....I just know they are.  Even the 13 seconds game, if KC doesn't miss a FG and XP, we never get to 13 seconds to begin with if you look back on it...and KC was moving it up and down the field...like they have in every playoff game they've been in.  Even Skylar Thompson had himself a day against the Bills playoff D.  Phillip Rivers should have come out of the playoff game he had against the Bills with a W...they were able to move the ball.  Something is lacking with the Bills D when post season arrives.  The common denominator is McDermott.  

 

3. The Bills will have a fighters chance every postseason because of Allen....but I think the current coaching staff has taken him as far as THEY can.  McDermott is a very good coach.  He's overseen a complete overhaul of the culture and the development of the rawest QB prospect pretty much ever, into an elite QB.  His efforst should be applauded.  He's done very well.  He's not the right fit to take the Bills to the next level.  He's marty Shottenheimer and Dan Reeves.  

 

1. Free Josh!

2. Figure out your playoff defense

3. probably find a coach to get you from here to there.

 

Just my two cents.

 

 

1 - personnel issue not a coaching issue. We cannot separate vertically at all. We are forced to play small ball. Dorsey got fired because he was still trying to run an explosive offense with players that couldn't do it. We have to get more explosive in the offseason. 

 

2 - yep it has. Being down to our third string linebackers did not help. KC exploited that masterfully. 

 

3 - I disagree. 

[SoCal Deek]

You can dissect the game over and over again but these two teams are VERY evenly matched, and have been for a few years now. The games have come down to who does what in the final minutes, or dare I say thirteen seconds. In the regular season matchup Toney blew it by lining up Offside and we all heard the whining and saw the memes coming out of KC for two straight months. This game it all came down to our last drive and the Bills let the moment get away from them. In a game where they KNEW that they KNEW that they KNEW they could only win with a ball and clock control strategy (which was working flawlessly) they panicked and made a total mess of their final offensive series, apparently forcing the Coach to put the season on the toe of a woefully inadequate kicker. Really inexplicably bad decisions in the moment….period! 

Edited January 26 by SoCal Deek

[Ethan in Cleveland]

25 minutes ago, SirAndrew said:

It’s good to hear an opposing fan prospective. I’m seeing it the same way. I think fans get lost in wins and losses, often forgetting what’s sustainable. The winning streak under Brady isn’t a sustainable way to win championships with Allen at QB. Allen was throwing for around 200 yards a game in the last seven regular season games, that’s not how we win a Lombardi. This regime seems set on playing ball control offense. It’s a delicate game of keep away that leaves a thin margin of error. One mistake, turnover, or punt is devastating when you don’t play full throttle on offense. 

This is a good point. Ball control is fine for some teams but not when you have Allen. 

We need an OC that elevates Allen as a passer. We need an OC that opens up our passing game and schemes easy throws.

Our passing game seems so lethargic and always more difficult than soem other teams. A better WR to go with Diggs will help too.

[Goin Breakdown]

My son always would say to me at half

time " we'll bows this time Buffalo stops scoring and hopes the other teams stops too"

It really was pretty predictable that third quarter would slump and you probably get some kind of score in the fourth.  

[Epstein's Mother]

18 hours ago, Ballhawk said:

What surprised me the most was how effectively the Chiefs loaded up the box and stopped our running game, on first down especially. We stopped getting 7 to 8 yards on first down and instead got 1-2 yards.

 

In the 2nd half the Bills ran the ball 7 times on 1st down for a total of 15 yards.  Allen had a run for 8 yards and Cook had a run for 8 yards.  The other 1st down runs were for 1, 3, -2, -4 and 1 yard.  A total of 5 attempts for -1 yard.  I'm not sure what the Bills should have done but it had to be clear to Brady and McDermott that KC had made an adjustment on 1st down defense and they needed to try something different.  But they didn't.

[billieve420]

6 hours ago, Scott7975 said:

 

 

My keys going into the game was for the Offense to put up at least 30 pts and the defensive line showing up with all the injuries. Neither happened and we still had a shot at winning game if team had played a better 2nd half.

Edited January 26 by billieve420
Spelling

[Cash]

2 hours ago, GunnerBill said:

 

 

1 - personnel issue not a coaching issue. We cannot separate vertically at all. We are forced to play small ball. Dorsey got fired because he was still trying to run an explosive offense with players that couldn't do it. We have to get more explosive in the offseason. 

 

2 - yep it has. Being down to our third string linebackers did not help. KC exploited that masterfully. 

 

3 - I disagree. 

 

Agreed on 1 & 2.

 

On point 3, I hope you're right.  My worry though, is that the team is consistently close to KC, but also consistently just enough worse to lose these big games.  I still haven't read Tyler Dunne's full hit piece* on McDermott, but the "tightness" talked about in the free section does seem to add up with the results on the field.  My hope is that McDermott can get better as a coach, which includes setting the tone in a better way than he has been. 

 

McDermott has shown the ability to learn from his mistakes before, and I'm willing to give him the benefit of the doubt for another year.  But at some point, we need to see a playoff game against another elite team where our guys look more energized than their guys.  Take the last game for example:  Our stars on the D-line went up against their stars on the O-line, and theirs won handily.  It wasn't a back and forth, where we won some and they won some.  It was our guys getting smoked every down, all game.  KC had a massive advantage in yards per play, and it showed.  Position-by-position, they looked like the better team, and if we won it would've felt like we stole the game to some extent.  Some of that is our injuries in the back 7 on D, and missing Gabe.  But we were healthy on both lines, and both lines got way outplayed in the 2nd half.  When the whole team (except your superhuman QB) is underperforming, you have to start pointing fingers at the coaching staff.

 

 

*McD haters: Yes, it's a hit piece.  That doesn't mean I doubt his sources, or think that anything in it is factually incorrect or otherwise unfair to McD.  I'm going to read the full thing with an open mind.  But the lede is written in the style of an editorial, and specifically calls for McD to be fired.  That's a hit piece by any reasonable definition of hit piece.

[GunnerBill]

23 minutes ago, Cash said:

 

Agreed on 1 & 2.

 

On point 3, I hope you're right.  My worry though, is that the team is consistently close to KC, but also consistently just enough worse to lose these big games.  I still haven't read Tyler Dunne's full hit piece* on McDermott, but the "tightness" talked about in the free section does seem to add up with the results on the field.  My hope is that McDermott can get better as a coach, which includes setting the tone in a better way than he has been. 

 

McDermott has shown the ability to learn from his mistakes before, and I'm willing to give him the benefit of the doubt for another year.  But at some point, we need to see a playoff game against another elite team where our guys look more energized than their guys.  Take the last game for example:  Our stars on the D-line went up against their stars on the O-line, and theirs won handily.  It wasn't a back and forth, where we won some and they won some.  It was our guys getting smoked every down, all game.  KC had a massive advantage in yards per play, and it showed.  Position-by-position, they looked like the better team, and if we won it would've felt like we stole the game to some extent.  Some of that is our injuries in the back 7 on D, and missing Gabe.  But we were healthy on both lines, and both lines got way outplayed in the 2nd half.  When the whole team (except your superhuman QB) is underperforming, you have to start pointing fingers at the coaching staff.

 

 

*McD haters: Yes, it's a hit piece.  That doesn't mean I doubt his sources, or think that anything in it is factually incorrect or otherwise unfair to McD.  I'm going to read the full thing with an open mind.  But the lede is written in the style of an editorial, and specifically calls for McD to be fired.  That's a hit piece by any reasonable definition of hit piece.

 

I don't agree that our oline got outplayed. Even second half. I think both offensive lines neutralised both defensive lines. I don't buy that the whole team underperformed on Sunday and yet was 1 or max 2 plays from beating the Chiefs. Unless of course you believe on paper we are just a lot better than them and I don't think that. I think they are two very evenly matched teams. The last 4 matchups have gone right to the wire. We are 2-2 in those games. Sadly they won the 2 most important ones. We had chances in both but couldn't make a play. They had chances in both the regular season games too and couldn't make the play they needed.

[FireChans]

7 hours ago, GunnerBill said:

 

Yea I am a huge Ed Oliver guy and over the years he has had very good games against KC even if the "stat box" hasn't shown it necessarily. Sunday was not one of them. The Chiefs interior oline is the best in the NFL for my money and they won that battle against Oliver and Jones handily. 

As much crap as Josh or the coaching has gotten for not being good enough in our last games of the season, the DL is sneaky biggest no show crew.

 

They did nothing in a game where we NEEDED the front four to help cover the back 7. And last year, the entire front 7 all got blown off the ball against the Bengals who were playing a couple backups that game.  I think the only one who made any kind of a play last year was Milano. 

Thuney is the best OG for a reason and the strength of the KC line is their interior. But stars who are paid like stars are supposed to make star plays in big moments. For Ed to basically not win a rep and Rousseau and Floyd to no show vs the shaky OT’s is unacceptable. 
 

 

Edited January 26 by FireChans

[Ray Stonada]

1 hour ago, Epstein's Mother said:

 

In the 2nd half the Bills ran the ball 7 times on 1st down for a total of 15 yards.  Allen had a run for 8 yards and Cook had a run for 8 yards.  The other 1st down runs were for 1, 3, -2, -4 and 1 yard.  A total of 5 attempts for -1 yard.  I'm not sure what the Bills should have done but it had to be clear to Brady and McDermott that KC had made an adjustment on 1st down defense and they needed to try something different.  But they didn't.

This is such a great point. Just one time if they lined up in the heavy set and went play action, Kincaid down the seam and Ty on a wheel route… huge play. 

[Success]

I haven't seen a single pundit talk about the failure of the defense all week.  Ridiculous average yards per play for KC. They marched up & down the field all day.

 

All they've talked about is "hero ball" Josh blowing it again by going for the big play.

 

Why do I like sports? When I compare the amount of time I'm aggravated to the amount of time I'm actually happy, it makes no logical sense..