GaryPinC

A guy who simply wanted more of an opportunity here? He can't help where we drafted him or others' perceptions, and I didn't feel like he was holding himself up as some great player. Maybe you did? I don't know, maybe to you I am too sensitive but I just don't get why you have to look down on the guy? He's not a super star but there's little demand for one dimensional run thumpers like him so kudos that he's managed to stick around the league and on one of the top teams.

Well, you can turn that around and say with the limited free time players have during the season, do they want to be stuck in a small city or a larger metro area with a "lot more" options? There are plenty of people who prefer the big city and plenty who prefer the smaller towns(*ahemJoshAllenahem*). I'm a smaller town guy. Had the chance to meet Eric Steinbach and Joe Thomas of the Browns a number of years ago, both seemed to enjoy Cleveland and had to cut themselves off from discussing turkey and deer hunting and steelheading in the area with me. Could have spent hours but they had obligations to the event!? Hopefully the Bills sell Toronto as part of their enticement as I doubt any of these large city types realize the proximity. Plus, it's a different country which I think would be pretty unique to those wanting a scene to check out. Some kind of arrangement to get players across the border easily would also really help. But, I definitely think it's an ignorance and the guys willing to visit get their eyes open at least a little! Consistent playoff contention goes a long ways too.

No, I was totally fine with what he said. To me, he wasn't talking down the city or the organization, he made clear he understood why he was cut just that he wished they would have given him more of a chance. I couldn't find anything bad he said about Beane or McD and I respect the fact he was willing to talk with some candor. Backup or not, the man's a competitive professional, and he felt like he never had a chance here and wishes he had. I can respect that. The only sour grapes I see here are from the posters, none of these former players "blasted" the franchise and trying to belittle his words because he's only a "backup" on a talented superbowl contending team is the closest thing I see to sour grapes here.

I agree with you, my perspective for being disappointed was his loss of focus early in the Baltimore game and latter half of the playoff game. I think at times he focuses on the wrong things (not waiting for his late read to develop, instead putting the ball into tight coverage), this I can accept as part of the growth process. I do have a lot of faith he is our franchise quarterback, he should have a good leap forward next year but maybe it's his 4th year where he never loses his focus and excels consistently.

I'm happy with McCoy's time here, I felt he was professional and overall represented the team well and wish him luck for his ring and that he gets to play. Plus, he was talented and fun to watch. A blessing as we rebuilt. I think most people realize that running backs lose that powerful first burst step that accelerates them through trouble. Not necessarily cutting and faking. Problem is, running backs like Shady are the last to realize it. I felt the beginning of the end showed in 2018 and wish we would have dealt him then. He doesn't overall seem like a bad guy, probably a bit of a douche though. In his own way, I think he was simply saying he wishes we would have traded him in 2018 instead of talking him up only to be cut before next season. I can't honestly blame him for that, and in a league of ball-washing the fans ("best fans ever here in (insert city)!"), coach-speak, player-speak, and front office-speak, I always welcome honest talk and insights of behind-the-scenes.

For me as a scientist (cardiology research), the real problem is when scientists (and doctors) become activists. Kind of like when our "free press" jumps bandwagon on allowing their personal views to cloud their objectivity in reporting. There should be no doubt CTE is real. The real question should be how much of a problem is this? I can't emphasize enough the vast majority of the data was hugely biased with professional football players who clearly had neurological-based problems before being enrolled in the study. It was not an open sampling of every NFL player. It was not an open sampling of athletes. It is perfectly welcome to be overcautious as the research develops, my only hope is that the research will address the question of actual risk in ALL football athletes (and all athletes) and not just elucidate the disorder with scare tactics thrown in. I have coached both my kids through youth sports and anecdotally, there was clearly an individual susceptibility to concussion in my opinion. Around 1 million kids a year play high school football. I played high school football. Am I going to develop CTE, especially given I don't think I've ever sustained a concussion and definitely never experienced anything like post-concussion syndrome?

I'm a bit disappointed, but it's with his consistency. He clearly made great strides in his pre-snap reads, though still missing hot reads sometimes. He struggled with understanding Daboll's play designs, and having the patience to let them develop. But at times he was right on getting the ball in anticipation of the open breaking receiver. My take is that he should take his biggest steps forward this year, as expected, but he will maddeningly still struggle with his consistency. His lack of past development, plus the fact that his whole life was small town football where hero ball was all he did will continue to slow his consistency. He seems to have the drive to overcome all this but overcoming your ingrained past is not a given for any player so that's definitely my worry. His lack of 300 yard passing games I think is a combo of conservative game plans, lack of receiving talent and Allen's consistency.

Unbelievable everyone here who wants to condemn Daboll for the woes on offense. Sure. Let's forget about the role the head coach plays. Let's forget about the role a young, developing quarterback plays. Does anyone have proof the conservative shift with a lead was from McDermott or Daboll? McDermott is a huge proponent of avoiding turnovers on offense. Hmmm, how to do that with a lead and young QB? Do people realize Josh Allen wasn't consistent enough to always take advantage of Daboll's complex play designs? I witnessed this myself against Cleveland. Does Daboll request Gore be in there or was that McDermott, who is on record as feeling a two RB system is necessary? I agree that sometimes Daboll tried some stuff that was ill conceived (assuming Allen didn't audible), but it was infrequent and I like that he's always trying different approaches. I also saw a lot of diverse, excellently called series to get us down the field and score. Bottom line for me is Daboll isn't perfect but is doing a solid job overall and seems to mesh greatly with Allen who is going into his most important developmental year. Yeah, let's fire him or let him walk??

Do you consider a pure lateral move to be a DB coach a dream job?? I think you're making more out of a potential block than there is. Daboll interviewed for HC and most coaches would understand if the Bills deny this purely lateral interview. If Bills denied a position coach the chance to be a coordinator then you might have a good point. Quite frankly, I would think less of the FO if they allowed an excellent position coach the opportunity to interview for a pure lateral move.

I'm not so sure. A couple defined areas of safties: https://operations.nfl.com/the-rules/nfl-video-rulebook/safety/ Exceptions: It is not a safety: If a forward pass from behind the line of scrimmage is incomplete in the end zone. It does not specify legal or illegal and I'm not sure if it includes both. But the rule defines a safety as either the offense commits a foul in its endzone or the ball goes dead in the endzone or the ball goes out behind the goal line. That's it. Hence this exception for the forward pass. There's also these rules on an interception: If a player of the team which intercepts, catches, or recovers the ball commits a live-ball foul in the end zone, it is a safety. If a player who intercepts, catches, or recovers the ball throws a completed illegal forward pass from the end zone, the ball remains alive. If his opponent intercepts the illegal pass thrown from the end zone, the ball remains alive. If he scores, it is a touchdown. So on a change of possession rule 2 allows an illegal completed pass out of the endzone, but it seems to me an incomplete illegal would be a dead ball in this situation since it allows the illegal completed pass. Now how does that apply to kicks and the receiving team? WRT Periera saying the player have himself up, as a soccer ref I judge intent all the time and I agree with him but this is football and the NFL likes to exhaustively define things and not judge intent. And by rule the player did not give himself up properly.

Anybody have the rule # on that? I saw it defined that way for offensive possession but not on kickoffs.

There is one other angle worth discussing. The toss to the ref being an illegal forward pass. Receiver used a forward motion and the ball did go forward towards the oponnents goal line, so I think it fits that description. It hit the ground (wasn't intercepted) so would be a dead ball and 5 yard penalty from the spot of the foul. Being in the end zone, there's no guidance in the rule book on enforcement from the endzone on kicks so that may be why the extra refs came on to discuss and they decided thusly. Though I think they could have ruled safety despite no line of scrimmage. It'll be interesting if the NFL redefines a player giving up for the touchback or stipulates the penalty for illegal forward pass in the endzone on kicks. I'm thinking the latter. Maybe both!

Please. I do. Though most people are good and friendly, there's always the handful of idiots, just like anyplace you live, including Buffalo

I agree with ya, and another reason why I don't think he tracked it well. Underhand allows the ball to come across your body more and give you an extra split second to react to the ball.

I can't agree with you, I simply don't think Duke was tracking the ball well as it arrived. Look how far apart his hands are, instead of being in a tighter basket. He had enough height off the ground regardless of the arm bar. He makes no attempt to bring his left hand over to his right and the ball squarely hit his right hand. He had enough elevation, bringing his left over would have meant twisting his shoulders (dropping the left/raising the right) and I don't think the defender arm bar inhibits that.

Just a friendly reminder from one of my favorite articles: https://buffalonews.com/2019/09/04/buffalo-bills-bill-polian-jim-kelly-peyton-manning-jim-kelly-josh-allen-nfl-football-2019/ “Year 1, in pro ball, you learn to get in and out of the huddle," Polian said. "You learn the nomenclature. You learn how to call the play. You learn what the calls are that the offensive line is making. Josh had great benefit of being injured and sitting and having the ability, during that time, to take a deep breath and say, ‘OK, I have to do this, this, this and this in order to master this.’ “Second year, you learned the concepts of the offense in the offseason. Not how to do it, but why you’re doing it. And why you are doing this, that or the other thing to beat a certain defense or a certain player or doing it in a certain game situation." In the third year, Polian said, there should be significant progress. “You should see the arrow really going up, because if you’re learning how to apply it, you’re eliminating the rookie or young person mistakes," he said. "Because if you’re learning and how to apply what you’ve already learned, you’ve learned not to put the ball in places where it doesn’t belong, go to the wrong guy, etc. “Then, in the fourth year, you learn how to manipulate a defense. How your eyes will make certain players react, how ball placement will make certain players react, how certain audibles or dummy audibles will cause people to react. And then after that, you’re a complete quarterback. Can't wait till next year! I think as this all progresses, he'll learn to trust his teammates more and eliminate the selfish hero ball mentality. I do hope Daboll stays one more year.

Actually, I don't believe the refs cut us that break. That's their Billsy.

A couple points I feel worth considering: During live play is the official considering a neutral part of the field of play? If so, was the play really some kind of forward pass if there was no passing target anywhere near? Also, is a forward fumble/pass entirely inside the end zone possible? The endzone has no yardage markers and is a special area of the playing field where the goalline and sidelines are the most important aspects. Is the ball and possession inside or outside of the EZ is how it's treated.

Is it? This is an interesting question to me. The endzone has no yardage marks like the field of play and what is important is the goalline, sidelines, and endline. In other words, it's a unique area of the field, where the ball is either in or out of the endzone. So, is it considered a forward pass/lateral? Also, as much as I think soccer has it right with intent being part of rule interpretation, this is football that supposedly sticks to rules. It should have been a turnover with TD/safety

Are you really going to put Parcells over the afore mentioned coaches plus Shula and Tom Landry? All of these coaches have a better winning percent, won the same or more superbowls, and with the exception of Lombardi coached longer than Parcells.

This. McDermott got the lead and went conservative with almost all runs. He let Houston hang around and they found a way to seize the momentum. Don't microanalyze the individual failures. It's not on Daboll. Look at the game he called to that point. He was told under McD to limit the playcalling. Continuous improvement Sean. You neutered our offense and it was the beginning of the end. You had Houston on the mat and instead of that last finishing move for the pin, you were content to ride on their backs hoping the lead would hold up. Not good for our offense's confidence either. Don't get me wrong. I'm a fan of McD overall and glad he's our coach. He just needs to modify his philosophy here. We do need to grow up also. Great season though. Obvious optimism for the future!8

For all the good work that you do, trying to imply a Spacey conspiracy behind this death is intellectually dishonest and lowers you to Tibs level. Do better.

Speaking as a soccer referee who has interacted with football referees, you're on the right track but I feel your perspective is incorrect. The majority of the job is picking out what looks wrong about a play. Yes, knowing how competent teams are playing does bias you to a small degree coming in, but ultimately it's what unfolds in front of your eyes. Yes, you have to anticipate where the play is going, but it's far from the " majority" of your job. The very best games to ref are when two excellent teams play each other. They play smooth and fast, any infractions are unusual and stick out like sore thumbs, making calls easy. But with an excellent team vs a sloppy one, the sloppy team is usually half a step or more behind the good one, tends to get frustrated because they are out of position, and so more fouls tend to be committed. This sloppy play tends to start a pattern of fouls, thus drawing more of the ref's focus. So yeah the more disciplined team can often get away with some because of this. For the Patriots, factor in that Belichick probably knows the rulebook better than most of the officials so there's an intimidation factor also.

Nice little facet of Rooney's statement: “Additionally, having asked numerous ex-White House Counsels and well-known government attorneys, there can be no “obstruction of Congress (or of justice)” while the person refusing to comply is relying on a claim of executive privilege. Only after losing in court, and still refusing to comply with a subpoena, would a claimant be obstructing." Reasoned, well thought out statement by Rooney, worth reading if you haven't. And it's fairly brief!

Why does the record matter much? McD got this turned around with culture and attention to detail. Certainly also some talent courtesy of Beane. I feel like A Lynn is a good coach but doubt he would have taken McD's approach and so no way would I switch McD out for any other coach. Contrast to the Browns. There's a talented mess with an immature coach. No veterans and zero winning culture. How about the Steelers? Great winning culture until last year when LB and AB exploded that locker room. Now the locker room's reset, Tomlin's getting it done with a scrub QB. Best of all, McD is a constant improvement kind of guy. Hopefully that means he changes his approach and offense conservatism if needed. I already think he has compared to 2 years ago. WRT Mahomes, he threw the ball like a pitcher in college, it was a bad look for a "system" QB and so there was definitely room for doubt. As with Tom Brady, which everybody missed on. In my mind the only two quarterbacks considered "can't miss" since the 80's were Elway and Luck. Drafting a QB is still a crapshoot and it's pretty low class arrogant to use hindsight and hold it over newly minted coach/GM, especially since they ended up drafting Allen.