I'm really starting to love this WR room. We quietly got better

[bigK14094]

On 6/23/2024 at 8:09 AM, JerseyBills said:

Lets just start with the top 5 WRs, Bills just dropped a video yesterday or the day before , so pretty much confirmed our top 5..

 

Last year                This year

Diggs                       Coleman

Davis                        Samuel

Shakir                       Shakir

Harty                         Hollins

Sherfield                   MVS

 

There's obviously a huge question mark with Coleman, as with any rookie WR but should be dynamic in this O. 

 

I'm huge on Shakir, I really think he's going to be a stud this year and eclipse 1k yards. 

 

Huge fan of Samuel,  he does it all, you can put this guy anywhere, including the backfield and he's explosive and makes plays and that was on a terrible O with terrible QB play. Skys the limit, loved the signing. 

 

Hollins is interesting but he's an elite run blocker , which Brady has shown,  we're running the ball, bottom line , and not a great year statistically last year but I could see him having his 22 season where he put up 57 rec 690 yards 4 TDs. This was Gabe his first 2 years and this is his replacement for much cheaper. Plus he's a certified leader..

 

MVS , yes the drops and statistically wasn't great in the regular season but you can argue he's the reason KC won the SB. In our game he had 62 yards, 17 more yards than Kincaid who was our top guy w 45 yards. Would've loved to have him in January last year. Made huge big , long catches. Meanwhile Diggs is dropping wide open TDs which win us that game.. 

 

And at 6 , Claypool, Hamler, Shorter etc will fight it out 

 

Bottom line , this is a much deeper WR group. Harty/Sherfield were busts, they were awful. And with Gabe injured vs KC, it showed how weak our depth was. No offense,  but I never want to see Andy Isabella playing in a playoff game and that won't happen again with the depth added. Sherfield/Harty also had no business being out there. 

 

Obviously Coleman is a huge key to this group and puzzle but I see no reason he can't be the guy we expect him to be. Plus Kincaid year 2. Cook year 3. Upgraded RB room

This is going to be a fun O to watch. Probably the best we've seen with Allen because of WR depth, elite RB/TE and Brady calling plays

 

*Not to crap on Diggs, I really admire his game and intensity, I have him as my profile picture but the fact that Beane ate 30+ mil and took a future 2, clearly they thought he was just to disruptive in the locker room, as a leader. The Cincy game leaving his teammates,  as a captain, speaks volumes.

McBeane has built this team on family and doing your 1/11th on o and d and Diggs just didn't fit that culture. Good luck but good riddance 

 

Isabella has wheels, and McD sees something or else he would not be here.

[QCity]

Heat wave has people chugging Kool-Aid.

 

What could you have seen in the last few weeks in shorts that changed your opinion into "starting to love" the WR group?

Edited June 24 by QCity

[PBF81]

52 minutes ago, hondo in seattle said:

 

There are three kinds of lies: lies, damned lies, and statistics.

 

Statistics are not effective measures of individual talent in the NFL.   For example, Passer Rating was invented to measure how good QBs are.  Josh Allen was 16th in Passer Rating last year.  According to statistics, Brady would be a fool to build his offense around such a mediocre QB.  

RBs are often rated by the yards they gain.  In 1971, OJ was ranked 15th in rushing yards.  Yet Lou Saban built an offense around him and we know what happened.  I'm glad Saban used his football smarts to evaluate Simpson and not a stat sheet.  

 

Catch percentage has a lot to do with ball placement.  Scheme helps, too: If the OC gets an receiver wide open, he's more likely to make the catch than when a receiver is fighting for a contested ball.  

 

If talent was perfectly measured by stats, we would let analytic guys run teams.  Yet when the Browns tried that (DePodesta, et al.), they failed.  

 

And if Catch Rate is your Be-All/End-All stat, then we should be good with Samuel because his catch rate last year (68.1%) was better than Puka Nacua's (67.1%) and yet Puka - with a better QB - had 1,486 receiving yards.  And Samuel had only two drops so it's not like has hands of stone.  I'll take the 1,486 yards.

 

Samuel will have the best QB throwing to him that he's ever had so I expect a good year from him.  Though, I think Brady intends to spread the ball around far more than Dorsey did.  I wouldn't be entirely shocked if none of our receivers broke 1,000.  It's going to be an interesting season.  

 

 

 

When arguments deteriorate to this kind of stuff ...   

 

You're missing the point otherwise, and again, you continue to fail to answer a simple question.  

 

What do you envision Samuel getting for targets, catches, and yards?  It's not a complicated question.  

 

Once again, this team has never had two 1,000 receivers, of any sort, WR/TE/RB, and the closest that we ever came was Beasley in 2020 with Daboll running an entirely different system than we'll see this fall.  The next closest was Davis with 836, and the season that Beasley posted 967 the third best receiver on the team had 599.  

 

As to this statement of yours ... 

 

Quote

Statistics are not effective measures of individual talent in the NFL. 

 

That's pretty funny considering how you're the one that laid out the 6-1 finish last year, the most superficial of all statistics.  

 

Otherwise, and unfortunately for that statement, that's pretty much how they measure things in sports.  Yards thrown for, TD passes, Total TDs, Home Runs, 3 Point stats, Rebounds, Goals/Assists, plus/minus, etc. etc. etc.  

 

 

[BADOLBILZ]

41 minutes ago, hondo in seattle said:

 

There are three kinds of lies: lies, damned lies, and statistics.

 

Statistics are not effective measures of individual talent in the NFL.   

 

For example, Passer Rating was invented to measure how good QBs are.  Josh Allen was 16th in Passer Rating last year.  According to statistics, Brady would be a fool to build his offense around such a mediocre QB.  

 

 

 

Well Allen wasn't very efficient as a passer in 2023.   In great part because his weapons weren't up to the task.  

 

What stat claims to tell you anything that doesn't take into account surrounding talent?    

 

In 2020 Allen was 4th in passer rating because he had better receiving talent.

 

So there.

 

There also are other stats that take into account more of the things that Allen does.

 

Josh Allen was 3rd in NFL QBR in 2020 and 2023.   Second in 2022.  

 

I mean just because you don't know enough statistics and cherry pick a more narrow statistic doesn't mean that there aren't those out there which illustrate what a player means to their team/league.

 

In 2023 Purdy and Prescott were only ahead of Allen because those teams had better skill around them.    Having WR's who had seasons like Aiyuk and Ceedee Lamb will do that.    

[Kirby Jackson]

2 hours ago, Bleeding Bills Blue said:

 

I'd say they got worse at the top 2 spots for sure, at least on paper. 

 

- Samuel is objectively worse than diggs.  I'd say the only thing Samuel offers more than Diggs is YAC.  He's faster, but I'd trust diggs to create more separation on a deep route.  However Diggs is going to be 31 in November, and while he's largely avoided injury - age is always creeping up.  Is Diggs today the same as the Diggs people compare to Samuel?  I think an argument can be made that he is not the same Diggs.  I'd still take Diggs the player over Samuel though.  

 

+/- Coleman is a rookie.  It's a see it to truly believe it type of thing - but rookie WRs have come in and made huge contributions in the past so it wouldn't shock me.  Higgins (also pick 33) had 67/900/6 his rookie season with a rookie QB and Boyd/Green taking a lot of targets.  Comparing him the player vs. Davis?  Davis had certain routes that he was really good at, and flashed an impressive catch radius at times.  Great sideline feet.  He was also a plus blocker.  My issues with him were concentration drops, and miscommunications.  It just felt like the majority of throws to "no one" were almost always with him reading the coverage differently.  I do think this spot in the offense may get more targets, and i think there is the strong possibility that coleman exceeds davis production.  Big strong dude too, who likes the physical blocking aspects of the position.  

 

= Shakir is the returning player... but he's also in year 3, had a very strong year 2 despite giving up targets to players like Kincaid Diggs and harty.  And i think he's primed to take a good step.  He has become a very solid blocker as well.  

 

+ Sherfield couldn't create much in the way of separation, played special teams on a lousy unit so i don't see much of a reason to bring him back anyway.  Hollins can hopefully help improve the teams unit, and has made much greater offensive contributions to his prior teams.

 

+ MVS technically replaces Harty, who never really got going here.  Did have an absolutely money return at a critical juncture, and made a few plays here and there but never saw the field enough to make any noise.  Buffalo drafted a returner who also is a DB, so judging him just based on offense - He's been upgraded with a superior deep threat, and any of his gadget type contributions are likely upgraded with Samuel/Shakir.  

 

I think the thing is - we weren't particularly strong at WR before either.  Just had Diggs as a reliable bonafide #1.  

The problem is that it isn’t a position where all 5 guys are the same. The Bills depth is fine. They stink at the top of the depth chart. That’s a problem. They may not have a top 60 WR on the roster!! They may end up their statistically but, for example, the Bears have 3 WRs, unequivocally better than our best. The Bills WRs are at or near the bottom of the league. Perhaps they outperform that but I’m not holding my breath. When you start taking number 3’s and running them out there against Sauce or Ramsey it isn’t good. These guys will see attention that they’ve never seen because they’ve been pushed up the depth chart.

[Kirby Jackson]

3 hours ago, boyst said:

it is lauhgable that anyone thinks we are a strong WR team. we are not. we are average to good at RB. we are good at TE (so long as Knox isn't awful this year). we are below average at WR. We overachieved at OL last year and if we do not this year we will be average. the only spot on the team where we are above good is QB.

I just have a different philosophy than Beane. If I had Josh Allen, my focus would be on his weapons and protection. That’s where I’d spend and that’s where I’d invest my prime draft assets. They haven’t done that. I’ve posted the data on here before but don’t feel like looking it up. Their philosophy has been, “if I have Josh Allen he will cover holes.” My philosophy would be, “if I have Josh Allen, let’s turbocharge him and worry about everything else later.” You will win BECAUSE of Josh Allen. If you throw 97, don’t spend a lot of time working on your average curveball. Try to turn 97 into 102.

[ColoradoBills]

13 minutes ago, BADOLBILZ said:

 

 

Well Allen wasn't very efficient as a passer in 2023.   In great part because his weapons weren't up to the task.  

 

What stat claims to tell you anything that doesn't take into account surrounding talent?    

 

In 2020 Allen was 4th in passer rating because he had better receiving talent.

 

So there.

 

There also are other stats that take into account more of the things that Allen does.

 

Josh Allen was 3rd in NFL QBR in 2020 and 2023.   Second in 2022.  

 

I mean just because you don't know enough statistics and cherry pick a more narrow statistic doesn't mean that there aren't those out there which illustrate what a player means to their team/league.

 

In 2023 Purdy and Prescott were only ahead of Allen because those teams had better skill around them.    Having WR's who had seasons like Aiyuk and Ceedee Lamb will do that.    

 

Isn't it funny that Josh Allens 3 most "efficient" pass catchers are still on the team (Shakir, Kincaid and Cook).

Beane got rid of the WRs that did not help the team and we all know the Diggs situation.

Through all of that Josh Allen had his career 2nd best completion % which would have been better is Davis and Sherfield weren't in the 50's.

 

Redzone TDs will be the key this year.  No one (even you) knows how this offense will be in relation to that.  We have to wait and see.

Like I posted in another thread.  Knox has triple the playoff TD receptions that Diggs had in the same number of games.

That's the key to success.

[WhitewalkerInPhilly]

I'll stay consistent with what I've said across the board, but especially at WR: the Bills have less proven talent than last year.

 

That isn't to be Mr. Doom and Gloom. I am very high on Shakir's development and I think Curtis Samuel is a really interesting wrinkle. But with Diggs and even Gabe you knew what you were getting. You might have wanted more out of them, but Diggs was at least a confirmed WR1 and Gabe was a streaky #2 who helped make the team better with his blocking.

 

I don't think a single person on here thinks Coleman is a finished project. There is a reason Mack Hollins, MVS and Chase Claypool were available on the cheap and why Shorter was not activated even when the cupboard was bare.

 

But no one NO ONE in the salary cap era maintains full WR rooms for long without being massively too heavy. How many late 1st and 2nd to 3rd round WRs wash out? How many people thought Nakua or even Shakir would contribute like they did. We are going to see. Even even one of those fringe bets hit the Bills are in great position long term 

[GoBills808]

40 minutes ago, BADOLBILZ said:

 

 

Well Allen wasn't very efficient as a passer in 2023.   In great part because his weapons weren't up to the task.  

 

What stat claims to tell you anything that doesn't take into account surrounding talent?    

 

In 2020 Allen was 4th in passer rating because he had better receiving talent.

 

So there.

 

There also are other stats that take into account more of the things that Allen does.

 

Josh Allen was 3rd in NFL QBR in 2020 and 2023.   Second in 2022.  

 

I mean just because you don't know enough statistics and cherry pick a more narrow statistic doesn't mean that there aren't those out there which illustrate what a player means to their team/league.

 

In 2023 Purdy and Prescott were only ahead of Allen because those teams had better skill around them.    Having WR's who had seasons like Aiyuk and Ceedee Lamb will do that.    

saying 'passer rating was invented to measure how good QBs are' should have been the first clue lol

[Just in Atlanta]

Diggs is a generational talent but he had to go. Also, many Superbowl winners don't have a true No. 1 receiver. They spread the ball, which our current OC is focused on. Losing Diggs should hurt, at least until Coleman officially arrives. 

 

Davis' departure is irrelevant. 

 

Coleman looks promising - above average vs press coverage and appears to have a good attitude and a likeable personality. 

 

Overall, the receiver room looks at least the same in production potential. I don't think it will be worse. But I'd be pleasantly surprised if it were better. 

 

[hondo in seattle]

46 minutes ago, PBF81 said:

 

When arguments deteriorate to this kind of stuff ...   

 

You're missing the point otherwise, and again, you continue to fail to answer a simple question.  

 

What do you envision Samuel getting for targets, catches, and yards?  It's not a complicated question.  

 

Once again, this team has never had two 1,000 receivers, of any sort, WR/TE/RB, and the closest that we ever came was Beasley in 2020 with Daboll running an entirely different system than we'll see this fall.  The next closest was Davis with 836, and the season that Beasley posted 967 the third best receiver on the team had 599.  

 

As to this statement of yours ... 

 

 

That's pretty funny considering how you're the one that laid out the 6-1 finish last year, the most superficial of all statistics.  

 

Otherwise, and unfortunately for that statement, that's pretty much how they measure things in sports.  Yards thrown for, TD passes, Total TDs, Home Runs, 3 Point stats, Rebounds, Goals/Assists, plus/minus, etc. etc. etc.  

 

 

 

I think you're getting me confused with someone else... 

 

You never asked me what I envision for Samuel's targets, yards, etc.  It's a good question, though, and I'll give it some thought.

And I never laid out the 6-1 finish last year.  Though I will add that wins and losses are not a meaningless statistic.  What I said is that stats are an ineffective way to measure individual talent.  Stats, particularly wins and losses, are a great way to measure team performance.  

51 minutes ago, BADOLBILZ said:

 

 

Well Allen wasn't very efficient as a passer in 2023.   In great part because his weapons weren't up to the task.  

 

What stat claims to tell you anything that doesn't take into account surrounding talent?    

 

In 2020 Allen was 4th in passer rating because he had better receiving talent.

 

So there.

 

There also are other stats that take into account more of the things that Allen does.

 

Josh Allen was 3rd in NFL QBR in 2020 and 2023.   Second in 2022.  

 

I mean just because you don't know enough statistics and cherry pick a more narrow statistic doesn't mean that there aren't those out there which illustrate what a player means to their team/league.

 

In 2023 Purdy and Prescott were only ahead of Allen because those teams had better skill around them.    Having WR's who had seasons like Aiyuk and Ceedee Lamb will do that.    

 

I'm not sure if you're refuting me but I actually agree with everything you say here. 

 

My point was that I don't think we can accurately predict Samuel's production with the Bills going forward because he had a low catch percentage in the past.  I don't think catch percentage is the most predictive stat.  And it neglects the "surrounding talent" which influences even something like this.    

[Jimmy Harris 69]

On 6/23/2024 at 10:18 AM, klos63 said:

If the Dolphins or the Jets had this group of WR, we'd laugh at them. 

 

They don’t have Josh Allen and he, old stick, makes ALL the difference. Just ask Cole Beasley and John Brown. Now if we had Rodgers or Tua as our quarterback, I’d expect tons of sneering and semi stifled laughter. One is a shadow, the other is Mr. October. Concerning the quality of our receivers, you are as wrong as wrong can be.  

[Bleeding Bills Blue]

46 minutes ago, Kirby Jackson said:

The problem is that it isn’t a position where all 5 guys are the same. The Bills depth is fine. They stink at the top of the depth chart. That’s a problem. They may not have a top 60 WR on the roster!! They may end up their statistically but, for example, the Bears have 3 WRs, unequivocally better than our best. The Bills WRs are at or near the bottom of the league. Perhaps they outperform that but I’m not holding my breath. When you start taking number 3’s and running them out there against Sauce or Ramsey it isn’t good. These guys will see attention that they’ve never seen because they’ve been pushed up the depth chart.

 

There are a few teams in similar spots - 

 

KC - Rice was their strongest but is also a 2nd year player with some off field challenges, and a rookie Buffalo passed on.  Hollywood Brown is a nice upgrade for MVS, but I'm not sure he's much stronger of a player than Samuel.  

LAC - Palmer, Johnston, McConkey 

Den - Sutton, Reynolds, Mims and rookies.  Meh.

Pitt - Pickens, jefferson, Rookie.  Meh.

NE - Bourne and Douglas plus rookies.  

NYG - Rookie #1 and scrubs.  

GB - Reed was a pleasant surprise, doubs and Watson are 3rd year players looking for a jump.  I don't put this group ahead of buffalo by much at all.  

 

[HappyDays]

14 minutes ago, Just in Atlanta said:

Also, many Superbowl winners don't have a true No. 1 receiver.

 

Zero Super Bowl winners or losers have not had a clear top tier pass catcher in the last 6 Super Bowls at least. I don't know why this statement keeps getting repeated? It flat out isn't true.

[gordong]

they are worse until I see production on the field...   bottom line is all that matters.  not having that go to guy,  could hurt them a lot going to forward.  hopefully someone steps to the forefront but way to many questions to say they are better.... love or hate diggs the guy could get open. 

Edited June 24 by gordong

[boyst]

1 hour ago, Kirby Jackson said:

I just have a different philosophy than Beane. If I had Josh Allen, my focus would be on his weapons and protection. That’s where I’d spend and that’s where I’d invest my prime draft assets. They haven’t done that. I’ve posted the data on here before but don’t feel like looking it up. Their philosophy has been, “if I have Josh Allen he will cover holes.” My philosophy would be, “if I have Josh Allen, let’s turbocharge him and worry about everything else later.” You will win BECAUSE of Josh Allen. If you throw 97, don’t spend a lot of time working on your average curveball. Try to turn 97 into 102.

he's a cannon. a cannon without targets and without a mount is only going to shoot so well.

 

Emmanuel Sanders and a host of other smurf WR's, Von Miller, countless JAG OL, taking Basham over OC, Knox contract, Quinton Spain's issue, Jerry Hughes, the fallout from 13 seconds... and more.

 

I think he has done a good job for his strategy but it has not been successful. I just don't think we have made the right moves when we were supposed to in order to advance our offense. We should have Creed Humphrey starting his second year at OC, We should have been able to get 1 more year out of Hughes, JAG OL to big contracts just to hit on a few starter gap fillers. Quessenberry was terrible and a dumb signing but a stop gap i can live with unilke Emmanuel Sanders, and the rest of the other bald tire WR's we had brought in.

[Mikey152]

1 hour ago, PBF81 said:

 

When arguments deteriorate to this kind of stuff ...   

 

You're missing the point otherwise, and again, you continue to fail to answer a simple question.  

 

What do you envision Samuel getting for targets, catches, and yards?  It's not a complicated question.  

 

Once again, this team has never had two 1,000 receivers, of any sort, WR/TE/RB, and the closest that we ever came was Beasley in 2020 with Daboll running an entirely different system than we'll see this fall.  The next closest was Davis with 836, and the season that Beasley posted 967 the third best receiver on the team had 599.  

 

As to this statement of yours ... 

 

 

That's pretty funny considering how you're the one that laid out the 6-1 finish last year, the most superficial of all statistics.  

 

Otherwise, and unfortunately for that statement, that's pretty much how they measure things in sports.  Yards thrown for, TD passes, Total TDs, Home Runs, 3 Point stats, Rebounds, Goals/Assists, plus/minus, etc. etc. etc.  

 

 

Here's a post I had from another thread...I feel like this is pretty realistic. Feel free to tell me why you don't think this works..

 

Ok, let's try something here...

 

Lets assume the Bills throw the ball ~550 times this year, and the target breakdown is something like:

 

Cook - 50

Shakir - 80

Samuel - 80

Coleman - 70

Knox - 50

Kincaid - 120

MVS - 50

Everyone else - 50

 

And everyone is around the same ypt as last season

 

Cook - 8.2 (410)

Shakir - 13.6 (led NFL among qualifiers) (1088)

Samuel - 6.7 (536)

Coleman - 9.2 (this was Gabe's) (644)

Knox - 5.2 (260)

Kincaid - 7.4 (888)

MVS - 7.5 (375)

Everyone else - 7 (350)

 

That puts Josh at 4,551 yards passing (8.2 ypa), which would be a career high on what is also his lowest attempts since 2019.  

 

Even if you see regression from Shakir and Coleman, that would likely be propped up by some positive regression from MVS (8.5 in 2022) Knox (8.0 in 2022) and Samuel (7.1 in 2022 and 8.8 in 2020 under Joe Brady)

 

I think a lot of you are underrating just how inefficient Diggs was last season with his targets. He was in line with a TE, not a #1 WR.

[msw2112]

1 hour ago, Kirby Jackson said:

I just have a different philosophy than Beane. If I had Josh Allen, my focus would be on his weapons and protection. That’s where I’d spend and that’s where I’d invest my prime draft assets. They haven’t done that. I’ve posted the data on here before but don’t feel like looking it up. Their philosophy has been, “if I have Josh Allen he will cover holes.” My philosophy would be, “if I have Josh Allen, let’s turbocharge him and worry about everything else later.” You will win BECAUSE of Josh Allen. If you throw 97, don’t spend a lot of time working on your average curveball. Try to turn 97 into 102.

 

Despite trading back, this season's top draft pick was a WR (weapon).  Last season's top draft pick was a pass catching TE (weapon) and last season's second draft pick was a guard (protection).  This season's biggest free agent signing was a WR, who can also line up in the backfield (weapon) and last season's biggest free agent signing was a G, who is now switching to C (protection).  I realize that none of these moves were big splashes, but they do demonstrate a focus on weapons and protection.

 

Also, the increased focus on the running game under Brady reflects protection, as (i) Allen is not going to get hit and banged up on running plays and (ii) an effective running game, or even the threat of one, will draw more defenders into the box, opening things up downfield and also forcing teams to be less aggressive on the pass rush.  I believe that the NFL was catching up to the Bills over-reliance on the Allen-to-Diggs as the focus of the offense and spreading the ball around was more effective and will continue to be more effective, even if Allen's statistics are not as good.

 

Finally, the Bills were 6-1 in their last 7 (7-2 in their last 9, including playoffs), so whatever philosophy they were using seemed to be working. 

Edited June 24 by msw2112

[PBF81]

51 minutes ago, hondo in seattle said:

 

I think you're getting me confused with someone else... 

 

You never asked me what I envision for Samuel's targets, yards, etc.  It's a good question, though, and I'll give it some thought.

 

Possibly, sorry if so, but that's also been repetitively woven into the season-ending theme.  

 

But yeah, it's a great exercise.  It's easy to say that WR A is going to get 1,400  yards, WR B will have 1,000, etc., but before you know it you're at 6,600 total passing yards and 54 TDs.  LOL  Doing the entire roster puts it all into perspective.  

 

 

51 minutes ago, hondo in seattle said:

And I never laid out the 6-1 finish last year.  Though I will add that wins and losses are not a meaningless statistic.  What I said is that stats are an ineffective way to measure individual talent.  Stats, particularly wins and losses, are a great way to measure team performance.  

 

The point is that one cannot discount stats but then apply the most superficial ones.  You know that.  

 

 

51 minutes ago, hondo in seattle said:

I'm not sure if you're refuting me but I actually agree with everything you say here. 

 

My point was that I don't think we can accurately predict Samuel's production with the Bills going forward because he had a low catch percentage in the past.  I don't think catch percentage is the most predictive stat.  And it neglects the "surrounding talent" which influences even something like this.    

 

Thanks.  My point however is that Samuel in that season where he "played well" under Brady, had absolutely no one that was going to challenge him for playing time or targets.  Moore, a 1st-round draft pick was their #1, clearly, and Anderson/Chosen as an undrafted FA has outplayed Samuel in their careers.  

 

Samuel as you recall was an early 2nd-round pick, much like Coleman, came into the league with similar fanfare.  

 

There was absolutely nobody on that team as a WR/TE, quite literally, that has done anything significant in the NFL otherwise.  Here is the rest of the roster for that season;  

 

TE: 

Colin Thompson

Chris Manhertz 
Ian Thompson 

 

WR: 

Keith Kirkwood

Seth Roberts 

Pharoh Cooper 

Brandon Sylstra 

 

It is and was garbage otherwise.  

 

So what Samuel did that season should be considered a minimum expected given his 2nd-round draft status and the notion that Anderson/Chosen is what he is, a WR that's averaged south of 700 yards and 4 TDs a season.  

 

The same argument was made by myself about Sherfield last season, met with the same stuff.  He too was on teams with limited receiving options, so yeah, of course he (or anyone in the same situation) will get more targets than they normally would.  

 

Either way, Samuel isn't contending with just Moore and Anderson/Chosen here.  He's contending with Shakir, Kincaid, Coleman, Knox, and MVS.  

 

Last season our top-5 targeted receivers posted 160, 91, 81, 54, and 45 targets.  We threw less under Brady as well. The season prior to that even less.  The #2 target getter over the past four seasons here has logged 91, 93, 112, and 107.  

 

Let's unrealistically suppose that Samuel's second in targets and logs an average of those, ... 101.  Let's say he matches his career high 79.4% catch% for 80 grabs and his career average of 10.7/catch, ... 856 yards.  But think about what that would mean, it would mean that Kincaid, Coleman, et al. are all behind him.  I hope that we didn't expend 1st-round draft pick last season on a receiving TE that's going to put up performances akin to TEs taken notably later in drafts.  

 

 

Edited June 24 by PBF81

[Mikey152]

1 minute ago, PBF81 said:

 

Possibly, sorry if so, but that's also been repetitively woven into the season-ending theme.  

 

But yeah, it's a great exercise.  It's easy to say that WR A is going to get 1,400  yards, WR B will have 1,000, etc., but before you know it you're at 6,600 total passing yards and 54 TDs.  LOL  Doing the entire roster puts it all into perspective.  

 

 

 

The point is that one cannot discount stats but then apply the most superficial ones.  You know that.  

 

 

 

Thanks.  My point however is that Samuel in that season where he "played well" under Brady, had absolutely no one that was going to challenge him for playing time or targets.  Moore, a 1st-round draft pick was their #1, clearly, and Anderson/Chosen as an undrafted FA has outplayed Samuel in their careers.  

 

Samuel as you recall was an early 2nd-round pick, much like Coleman, came into the league with similar fanfare.  

 

There was absolutely nobody on that team as a WR/TE, quite literally, that has done anything significant in the NFL otherwise.  Here is the rest of the roster for that season;  

 

TE: 

Colin Thompson

Chris Manhertz 
Ian Thompson 

 

WR: 

Keith Kirkwood

Seth Roberts 

Pharoh Cooper 

Brandon Sylstra 

 

So what Samuel did that season should be considered a minimum expected given his 2nd-round draft status and the notion that Anderson/Chosen is what he is, a WR that's averaged south of 700 yards and 4 TDs a season.  

 

The same argument was made by myself about Sherfield last season, met with the same stuff.  He too was on teams with limited receiving options, so yeah, of course he (or anyone in the same situation) will get more targets than they normally would.  

 

As to your point about catch%, here's the thing, that particular season it was nearly 20 percentage points higher than his career catch% otherwise.  While we can attach that to Brady, the question then arises that in Brady's second season as OC there, why did Samuel's catch% drop by over a dozen percentage points.  It's rhetorical, but if that was Brady, then that question arises.  

 

Either way, Samuel isn't contending with just Moore and Anderson/Chosen here.  He's contending with Shakir, Kincaid, Coleman, Knox, and MVS.  

 

Last season our top-5 targeted receivers posted 160, 91, 81, 54, and 45 targets.  We threw less under Brady as well. The season prior to that even less.  The #2 target getter over the past four seasons here has logged 91, 93, 112, and 107.  

 

Let's unrealistically suppose that Samuel's second in targets and logs an average of those, ... 101.  Let's say he matches his career high 79.4% catch% for 80 grabs and his career average of 10.7/catch, ... 856 yards.  But think about what that would mean, it would mean that Kincaid, Coleman, et al. are all behind him.  I hope that we didn't expend 1st-round draft pick last season on a receiving TE that's going to put up performances akin to TEs taken notably later in drafts.  

 

 

Clearly you don't know much about Curtis Samuel...

 

He was a RB in college, not a WR. He was "converted" in the NFL. So judging how he played as a WR in his rookie season on a trash team is a really crappy way to judge him. He was drafted high because he is extremely fast and magic with the ball in his hands. If he was a polished WR, he would have been a first rounder.

 

All that said, his physical measurables are identical to Diggs. He was one of the best in the NFL separating against man last year. He is a quality player who arguably has never met his potential. This year, we will see if that is a CS thing, or a situation thing.

 

Most great WR (and great players for that matter) are generally a byproduct of opportunity.