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And yet which team won? The one with the better defense? Hmmmm guess trying to outscore opposition not always best strategy. Yet I know we won cuz of just Josh.

Do you buy 3 drinks at last call? Do you hide in the restroom when they're closing?

I'll have to re watch that first 3rd down as maybe I missed that. Ya I am saying it loosely. Essentially what I mean is they are playing zone coverage with lots of space off the receivers and are playing over the top. correct me if I'm wrong of course but that's what it looked like to me and Olsen mentioned that 2-3x on the opening drive also

Fox had 11 defensive snaps. Zero STs snaps. Groot and AJE handled most of the game.

This is right on the money. And there's more to it than just that. It's an integrated team-building approach. They don't do anything except by design. Two things happen when you get the right quarterback. One is you win a lot, so you're never in line for premium draft picks. The other is you pay him a fortune, so you never have cap room to buy much premium talent. It's just a given. (The exception is if your QB blossoms early, when you have a two- or three-year window with cap room.) The result is that it's very difficult come up with stud players to add to your roster. You have to get lucky with a Pucua or a Benford. McDermott's and Beane's approach to this problem always has been the same - build depth. That has two benefits. One is that instead of chasing after high-price talent and leaving yourself exposed at some positions, you have guys at every position that you can afford. It also means that your bench players are nearly as good as most of your starters, so when injuries happen, you usually have a guy on your bench who can fill in quite well. It also means that you platoon some positions, particularly the receiver room and the defensive line. That keeps your players fresher throughout the game, and it also means you can survive injuries with guys who have been playing a lot, anyway. Just about all of the Bills receivers have missed time, and so have many of the d linemen. The team moves on without missing them too much, because the replacements are all starter quality. Now, I know a bunch of people reading this are screaming, "That's nonsense. The Bills receivers are terrible, and their dline is a sieve." Well, the Bills are 11th in yards per game passing, 7th in passing touchdowns, and 6th in passer rating, and that's with a team that has one of the top rushing attacks in the league - first in yards per game and second in rushing touchdowns. That means they have a very good passing attack, despite the absence of a high-end receiver. Then people will say, that's because they have Allen. Of course, but if you don't have your QB, we aren't having this question. Sure, the Bills have Allen - he's what makes it possible to save money by having a receiver by committee approach and he's also the reason the Bills have to save money. And yes, the Bills give up a lot of yards rushing, but they're near the top of the league in yards passing allowed and they're 8th in defensive passer rating. The defense is 10th in yards per game and 14th in points per game, not great but not a disaster. So, the total defense is holding up, despite the absence of a stud dlineman. This personnel philosophy is also complementary to the Bills' approach to offense and defense generally, which is that teamwork can produce greater advantages than marginally better talent. They believe that eight talented guys rotating on the dline will produce better results than four guys, one of whom is Watt or a Chris Jones. You can argue with that, but that's what they believe. (And, as noted above, those eight guys rotating almost certainly are better than a team that relies on a Watt or a Jones when that guy is injured and out of the lineup). So, it isn't simply that Beane prioritizes depth because he likes depth. They value depth over a few highly talented players and a bunch of other guys, because it fits better with their payroll, their draft status, and their ability to deal with injuries. And we see it working this season. Depth at receiver is working. Depth at o line has helped. And as much as people whine about it, Beane signing retread depth like White, Poyer, Philips, and Shaq Thompson has helped the Bills get to where they stand now.

I think Sean wanted to test his new toy first in Morgan Fox. I can't say recall him playing much unless was more on ST.

To administer the testing? The team doctor can probably say one way or another whether he should go back in, but i'm not sure how much the coaches talk to the team doctors during a game if at all. If they're testing - Balance, speech, coordination, vision as they claim Speech will be a comparison to a baseline. The players know this, and its probably the piece they can most manipulate. Balance can't be faked Coordination can't be faked Vision test... i dunno maybe but i'd imagine also can't really be faked. All this to say - we know his balance and coordination weren't affected because he was mossing everyone in the secondary. He cleared all of his tests, and there is no requirement to take him out because he cleared protocol last week or whatever. If they want teams to take players out, then they need to change how they do these things.

They should be fined for this. Just unbeliable the NFL pretends to promote safety and allows this to happen.

Hardly the worst case, there are multiple examples of retired players who committed violent crimes after their playing days and were later found to have CTE.

One thing I can say in somewhat of a defense is this. I have had a LOT of concussions in my life. From high school sports to just messing around to a few work place mishaps. In any event, I would estimate I've had between 15-20 concussions. They all present different. Sometime the bell is wrung and it's an immediate thing. Other times I gotten them and not felt it for a day or two. Was perfectly fine. Sometimes the symptoms were gone in a day or so...other times it's lingered for weeks or longer. It's easy to be cynical and say, yeah he had one, they knew it and they played him anyway. And that may be the case. But that's not ALWAYS the case.

It would be for the team but fans would call it a learning experience for a young team learning to win.. either way I just want both teams come out as healthy as possible because nothing worse than having your season ruined by a terrible injury (like what happened to Indy) You can’t control who you face and who’s healthy… mind you we’re the Bills that good against the Steelers or have the Ravens D regressed that bad? That game yesterday was hard to watch

Hopefully it was enough time to get him actually healthy and not just throwing him in the lineup. We need him to be full go for the playoffs including his wrist being good to go .

The first third down was 2 man and we sent the backer. What coverage is soft zone? That term gets thrown around here a lot and doesn't mean anything.

Josh saw that, as did Shakir and he snuck it right behind his back. amazing improvised version of the back shoulder

And the Bengals minus Burrow and Chase.

Honest question, do you mean when they get pressure to make him go to his left instead? Because he has completed most of his passes inside the pocket as is and like you said rolling to his right he is really good too, not so much to the left so far..

I voted re-sign now. When he is healthy, the talent is obvious. Which leads me to the second part; I personally believe it is way too early in his career to give him the injury prone label, which means the risk is worth the reward..

You ever think Joe burriw was just on a heater he literally was making passes in the first half that were supreme touch throws with great catches.. Mike g had a crazy catch on a corner out with tight coverage You can't beat a perfectly thrown football And you just can't sit under their wide receivers and press them when we don't have a pass rush that is getting there... Houston could play more aggressive coverage than the bills can We need to dial up our aggressiveness strategically.. and guess what it worked Anybody who was thinking we were going to win this game 21 to 17 doesn't know Joe b was coming to play

This is literally the football equivalent of every hitter in your lineup trying to jack every single pitch out of the ballpark in the first inning, or every player on the court shooting NOTHING but 3s from the second the game starts.

This one goes out for the shoulda double dipped class of 2024 class. Kinda glad we missed on him but who knows coulda been a not good mix with him and Cincy.

#5. Last time we saw a QB pick us apart on short passes, pretty much the entire history of the Tom Brady Era. The de was ridiculous in the first quarter, they were so deep. On his two ints, i think both were reasonable attempts, Benford just had perfect height and timing, on the next, that is like 50% of NFL passes, sometimes the D Line gets their paws up and Phillips got his hand on one and we got lucky. I attribute both picks to better D than terrible Burrow decisions. Regarding TEs, no love for Hawes. He made two critical receptions including that 4th d TD conversion where he non-nonchalantly held up his hands like saying gee whiz that was easy. And no pass rush, I will chalk that up to the slippery field. Bonus on the time out. I can only imagine McD was flusterd as whether or not kick the extra point or go for two.

I do think it's a bigger game for the patriots though. Bills don't really have a lot of pressure as they are pretty firmly going to be a wild card team barring anything crazy happening. Pats are playing for the 1 seed, and it's still a measuring stick game for them to see how really good they are. I think it will be gut punching for the Pats if the reigning 5X afc east champs came into their building in a December game, and made a statement