The much much much too early 2024 expectations thread.

[Buffalo_Stampede]

1 hour ago, TheWeatherMan said:

As long as McDermott is the head coach, my expectation is another year of under achievement from a team that has/had SB level talent.  

My goodness. The Bills are a top 5 franchise since McDermott took over. 

[TheWeatherMan]

9 minutes ago, Buffalo_Stampede said:

My goodness. The Bills are a top 5 franchise since McDermott took over. 

No doubt, and that’s as high as we will be with him.  Again, this has been a team with SB caliber talent the last 4 years and he has failed to deliver.  It’s SB or bust every year you have JA17 on this roster. 

[Chaos]

4 hours ago, Shaw66 said:

On average, a bit less than 50% of rosters turn over from season to season.   Players come and go all the time.  The success of teams is largely attributable to how they manage the change.   The Bills roster has gotten better year over for the past five years.   I expect we'll like the free agent deals, and we'll like the draft, and by July we won't be looking at any serious roster weaknesses, let alone holes.  

 

Bills are fine.  If the coaches do their jobs, the Bills will be in the playoffs and will perform well.  

If the roster is better every year for five years and the coaching is fine why are the results not better year over year?

[Buffalo_Stampede]

6 hours ago, JohnNord said:

Your using last years results to project next season.  I’m going to save this tweet and we’ll all have a nice chuckle next offseason…when someone else will say “brutal schedule in 2025” 🤣🤣🤣

No. Im predicting schedule strength based on what I believe our opponents will do this offseason.

 

 

Edited March 8 by Buffalo_Stampede

[GunnerBill]

Right now? Win the AFCE and make the playoffs. 

 

I can say that even without knowing what the rest of the roster looks like because we have Josh Allen. But this is going to be a 30-40% roster turnover based on the moved this week. So it is way too early to be any more specific than that.

[NastyNateSoldiers]

10 hours ago, Chaos said:

My personal opinion is that all sports franchise gms and coaches spend a considerable amount of effort to manage expectations. Thier key to personal success is not winning championships, the key to success is beating expectations.  The lower one can set the expecations, the more likely one is to succeed. 

 

Another personal opinion is that the Bills organization is masterful at managing expectations.  One pillar of that strategy is "we were so awful in the past, that any appearance of competence oughta be satisfactory to the fans in the cheap seat". 

Fans love activity in the offseason. We have been treated to a lot of activity this week.   
 

The consensus opinion about every decision seems to be "this is great" and "this had to be done".   
So I polling at this point, what does it all mean for 2024?

If that's the case these guys should be fired with a QB like Josh it's Super bowl or bust. 

[Buffalo_Stampede]

2 hours ago, TheWeatherMan said:

No doubt, and that’s as high as we will be with him.  Again, this has been a team with SB caliber talent the last 4 years and he has failed to deliver.  It’s SB or bust every year you have JA17 on this roster. 

I fail to understand why people think we will never win a Super Bowl being really good every year.

 

 

 

 

[JohnNord]

2 hours ago, Buffalo_Stampede said:

No. Im predicting schedule strength based on what I believe our opponents will do this offseason.

 

 

So you’re predicting moves by opponents that haven’t even been made yet 🤣🤣🤣

 

Solid logic.

[PBF81]

12 hours ago, Buffalo_Stampede said:

It is. You can’t predict injuries but they have one of the hardest schedules I’ve ever seen.

 

 

 

That's what we said last year about this past season and it ended up being our easiest since 2008.  

 

 

[PBF81]

12 hours ago, GoBills808 said:

Divisional Rd exit or earlier

 

That is the pattern.  So until further notice. 

 

We were all but injury-free on offense and yet the offense still underperformed previous seasons.  

 

The narrative on Brady is already outrunning the reality.  Expect that to not go as well as everyone is hoping.  

 

This team went to four straight Super Bowls under Kelly, it can't get to one with Allen.  Which is a little astonishing.  

 

A lot of unknowns and newness will be in our defense.

 

Expect to win the regular season again, but what you said is the current standard.  

 

 

11 hours ago, Ethan in Cleveland said:

I'm sorry to be a broken record. We have a top 3 QB. If you expect anything less than the SuperBowl I really don't understand you.

Please anyone that votes anything but SuperBowl win explain?

 

 

But we don't have a top 3 coach or even close.  That seems to be the deal breaker.  

 

Until this team can beat a top-4 seed in the playoffs, the expectation should be Divisional Round loss tops.  

 

 

Edited March 8 by PBF81

[PBF81]

7 hours ago, NoSaint said:

Milano has a running partner 

 

Milano first has to come back to what he was himself.  That may not be as guaranteed as we think.  

 

 

7 hours ago, NoSaint said:

Von can’t be worse. 

 

That's like saying that the wings can't be worse than they are at 7-11. 

 

 

7 hours ago, NoSaint said:

better offensive coordinator

 

We do not know this yet.  Contrary to narrative, it did not outperform Dorsey's.   The last three games of our season the offense averaged 19.3 PPG.

 

 

Edited March 8 by PBF81

[Bob Jones]

11 hours ago, Ethan in Cleveland said:

I'm sorry to be a broken record. We have a top 3 QB. If you expect anything less than the SuperBowl I really don't understand you.

Please anyone that votes anything but SuperBowl win explain?

 

It's a team game, and we are thinking rationally. 😉 I will be very surprised if they get past the divisional round.

[Buffalo_Stampede]

47 minutes ago, PBF81 said:

 

That's what we said last year about this past season and it ended up being our easiest since 2008.  

 

 

Every year will be difficult on paper when you finish 1st, but look at the schedule and make a conclusion.

[PBF81]

22 minutes ago, Bob Jones said:

It's a team game, and we are thinking rationally. 😉 I will be very surprised if they get past the divisional round.

 

It's pretty difficult to advance past the Divisional round when you can't ever beat a playoff team seeded better than 5th and having done that only once.  

 

In 6 playoffs McD's never done that.  It's difficult to imagine that he's in good company there.  

 

 

[TheWeatherMan]

4 hours ago, Buffalo_Stampede said:

I fail to understand why people think we will never win a Super Bowl being really good every year.

 

 

 

 

Have you watched this team play in the playoffs? 

[Buffalo_Stampede]

Just now, TheWeatherMan said:

Have you watched this team play in the playoffs? 

Yeah. They’re a couple plays from beating KC a couple times.

[NoSaint]

1 hour ago, PBF81 said:

 

Milano first has to come back to what he was himself.  That may not be as guaranteed as we think.  

 

 

 

That's like saying that the wings can't be worse than they are at 7-11. 

 

 

 

We do not know this yet.  Contrary to narrative, it did not outperform Dorsey's.   The last three games of our season the offense averaged 19.3 PPG.

 

 

*milano has to return to better than a street free agent in December to be a step forward from last year. Milano-Bernard has to just be better than Bernard-Klein or Bernard-dodson

 

*I agree it’s a low bar. I’m not holding my breathe that he’s great but he won’t be worse and could be better 

 

*having followed much of Brady’s career and being well familiar with Dorsey I feel comfortable speaking on a level higher than ppg in a 3 week window while running Dorsey’s offense - and am totally comfortable with saying who I’d hire if I had a choice between the two 

Edited March 8 by NoSaint

[Gregg]

Hard to answer without seeing how FA and the draft play out. Not just with the Bills but all teams in the league especially our AFCE rivals.

[mjt328]

14 hours ago, Gunsgoodtime said:

Only on TBD can the Bills lose Hyde, Poyer, White, Morse, Neal, Harty, Sherfield, trade Bates, lose Araiza to the Chiefs and sign Hack, Rapp, and Trubisky and be better than they was with no current replacements or money🤣🤣🤣.  Btw other teams have draft picks too, and most of them have way more cap space including the Chiefs.

 

I'm pretty sure everyone except Bills fans see this as quite the set back, but carry on daydreaming 

 

Anyone can just rattle off a bunch of names.  They show zero knowledge of this team or how they have impacted the Bills success.  Most of the "losses" you just threw up here contributed little or nothing last year.  Siran Neal and Deonte Harty were worthless outside of a couple special teams plays.  Trent Sherfield had one nice catch against the Dolphins.  Ryan Bates almost never got on the field.  Matt Araiza, really?  Even Tre White has barely played in the last 2.5 years.

 

Micah Hyde and Jordan Poyer were the best safety duo in the NFL... about 2 years ago.  Hyde missed almost the entire 2022 season and was a fraction of himself last year.  Poyer was banged up all of 2022 and clearly lost a step this last season too.  He also spent a good chunk of time playing coverage linebacker (for Matt Milano), meaning Taylor Rapp has already proven a solid fill-in at the actual safety spot.  Truth is, we haven't gotten an All-Pro duo since 2021 and have been better than good in the secondary.  Considering half the starting safeties in the NFL are set to be available in FA, the belief this is a strong draft at that position, and our front office/coaching staff's past in developing that position... we should be MORE than confident the Bills will find good replacements.

 

I can understand the concern about Center after losing Mitch Morse.  But the Bills did re-sign David Edwards and still have a good starting 5 players on the O-Line.  Connor McGovern does have a bunch of experience at Center too.  

 

And above all... it's absolutely ridiculous to judge ANY roster before Free Agency or the draft has even begun.  The Bills still have around 40 slots to fill.  Consider what our team looked like LAST YEAR at exactly this time:

- Needed two starting guards:  (Later added McGovern, Edwards and O'Cyrus Torrence)

- Needed a starting right tackle:  (Spencer Brown developed)

- Needed another pass rusher:  (Signed Leonard Floyd)

- Needed a starting middle linebacker:  (Terrell Bernard developed)

- Needed a starting strong safety: (Jordan Poyer re-signed)

Not to mention the depth we added at Running Back (Damien Harris, Latavius Murray), Tight End (Dalton Kincaid), Defensive Tackle (Poona Ford), Safety (Rapp). 

 

 

[OutOfBubbleGum]

8-8 No playoffs.