WhitewalkerInPhilly

Factoid: the highest round the Bills have drafted a WR in during the McDermott tenure (both Whaley and Beane) was Gabe Davis in the 4th round. I think they can get someone competent in round 1 or 2

Obviously some wrinkles, but there is absolutely a difference between what you can do on the fly in 8 weeks and what you spend an offseason scheming and May-August installing and field testing.

There's a difference between picking better play choices and installing your own offense

Thank you. I don't think his numbers are perfect but the upshot remains. It is relatively easy to get under the cap. We can probably retain some departing FA. But we will not be heavy bidders without consequence

So you're admitting that Josh passed up the easy receiver for ten yards to gun it to the end zone taking the risk that protection would break down when he had. Dude did you tune in at the 2 minute earn? The Bills had gone 55 yards purposely bleeding the clock. The ball was moving. Brady had fired up blitz beaters that were averaging 6-8 yards a play. They were 25 yards away. If Allen completes it to Diggs it's at the 15 while strangling the Chiefs. And if they don't get a TD? Congrats, you've gotten Bass a kick he can hopefully make but with less chance of a KC last minute score. If Diggs drops it congrats you are where the Bills wound up anyway. I'm not calling for Josh to be pilloried. But he made a mistake in an otherwise excellent game. It wasn't even a fatal one, but it was the first in a fatal string.

I respectfully disagree with both of you. I think we all can agree that Diggs had a down year. That he looks slower, his hands aren't as good, he's not as gamebreaking as he was before. He was still 13th in the league in yards, 7th in receptions. And that was with Gabe Davis showing up once a month at the other boundary. He is still absolutely a #1 receiver in this league. Now, with 2024 looking like a "take your medicine" year, can I justify keeping his contract as is with an expectation that we could feasibly flip him for assets or cut him if he really drops off? Yes. But Larry Fitzgerald still had a heck of a career once he stopped being a boundary WR. Restructuring him through 2025 isn't necessarily crazy, but should be a judement call from the brass based on their plans. Because #1 WRs aren't easy to pick up.

hey, dumb question, what is easier to make, a 30 yard pass thrown later in your protections or a 6-8 yard pass thrown earlier? Your inability to understand situational football is noted. Maybe hang out with Ken Dorsey a bit.

Pretty much. With the defense so damaged, and having no much difficulty stopping the Chiefs from getting chunk plays, Brady's plan (which worked up into the 3rd quarter) was to bully the Chiefs D-line and do as much TOP as possible to keep Mahomes off the field and give as much rest as possible. And when the Chiefs moved to run blitzes, Kincaid was able to work blitz beaters. Thus my consternation at suddenly deciding to go for high speed kill shot within 2 minutes.

That's a real question that doesn't have a great answer. Now, Aaron Rodgers and his sports doctors will disagree with me but from my knowledge around the league Achillies is a long painful rehab to come back from. Rodgers at least has the excuse that he can be a statue in the pocket and sling it, Tre needs some measure of speed. Even if Tre is back and ready Week 1 (which sounds like a very generous timeline) I doubt he would ever have the same speed which means you are paying CB1 money for another Douglas or Benford (or worse play). Complicating matters is that as he took an in game injury he can't be cut outright. He would need to reach an injury settlement That means that out the $16.5 M cap hit, $10M is dead money already guaranteed. Injury settlements prorate the cost of expected missing weeks, so how much of $6.5 is worth a hole on the roster. My wild card idea (which might be crazy) would be sliding him over to safety. His skill were never elite speed, it was technique and recognition. He'd never be a thumping S, but as a center fielder? maybe. IDK. No option is great

Did we watch the same game? yes, they had two 3 and outs. But the offense was very much clicking going into the 2 minute warning. After that, it was Allen gunning it to Shakir for a killshot rather than taking the easy check down to Diggs. Allen rolling right and not seeing the open guys (they highlighted it in the broadcast) and then a missed FG. I can't blame Brady for that, especially after creaming the Chiefs on TOP.

Interesting. This is the best that I have seen the Bills O-line for a while and I would hate to break it up once it finally seems to click. His cap hit is tough though, he'd need to take a cut or restructure. While I do support the Bills doing their due diligence, for comparison around the league Brian Johnson, he who oversaw the collapse of the Eagles offense while given with an O-line with a long history of success, a franchise QB, a stable of running backs and a one two punch of AJ Brown and DeVante Adams at WR. He's getting HC interviews. So it's not out of the question that if the Bills defer, there's a reasonable chance he'll get snatched. This one infuriates me because we *needed* Bernard. If he's guarding Kelce instead of AJ Kline (even at 60%) I think we win that game. I'd argue too that even in a down year, he would still be a #1 receiver on a majority of teams in the league. But he *really* needs help on the other boundary

Hey they are no powerhouse like the PAC 12 *ducks*

I'll say this: I will not rule out trading back out of the 1st. I will actually be more surprised if we stay at 28 than not. While the process is early, it looks like there is a deep crop of receivers. I anticipate that there will "the guy" who the Bills would try to go up for or "a guy" who looks like decent value in the second round.

Sorry, I mean the OTHER massive throwing ACC team 😁

I am sorry that your mind is boggled. Tight window on long developing play for a TD: high risk high reward Simple pass to your #1 receiver that reaps multiple benefits in the game spot: Low Risk high reward. what part about this are you not getting? I am not saying that Josh played terrible. He had a good game. But that was a bad decision.

Coverage was not bad on the play you are talking about. This coverage was blown.

No. Just no. First off, Shakir was NFL open. He was not wide open. Wide open was Kelce's first TD. it was a tight window that likely works if Allen isn't hit as he's thrown. But it's the wrong decision for a few reasons. One, he has close to an instant 1st down if he tosses it to Diggs on the crosser. Diggs goes down in bounds it forces KC to use a timeout or the clock winds down to ~1:20. We get 4 more chances at a play like the Shakir throw or Bass gets a little more space to work. Two, even if the pass works exactly as intended...KC has the ball back with 1:55 and two timeouts. They need a TD, but with our defense giving up at least eight 20+ yard plays? It's a risk I would never take.

...because...your #1 WR is open for an easy catch that gives you a fresh set of downs and ticks off 40s or forces a KC timeout and 4 more chances to score (at minimum) Look, I am all for the "don't mistake a bad outcome for a bad decision" approach. If that's the decision Allen makes in quarters 1-3 I am applauding his guts and noting that it means that the defense is going to have to play back more. In that moment? Did you blame Singletary for going down at the goal line vs the Dolphins game 2 last year? Because that let the Bills put in the dagger. Same philosphy. You want to give Mahomes 1:55 and 2 timeouts to close out the game? With the way the D had been playing? Are you out of your mind?

Can we use cap space to bribe GMs to get a better draft pick? I know you're trolling, but WR is going to be a big focus in the draft

And if I told you that it was possible to free up $73 million in cap space by doing restructures, only cutting Harty and Hines and taking our medicine on Knox and Von? (from the Greg Tompsett breakdown) No Brainers - Cap Saved Restructure Josh - $23M Restructure Diggs - $13M Restructure Ed - $3M Release Hines - $5M Release Harty - $4M Extend Dawkins - $7M Extend Douglas - $6M Extend Johnson - $5M Release Siran Neal - $3M Release Sam Martin - $1M Restructure McGovern - $3M

yeah but...you do understand that teams do not radically change schemes midseason, right? Brady ran a lot of 3 WR at Clemson and arguably that's a better fit for Josh. But he couldn't do a full install on the fly. HC ain't changing. Don't know what to tell you. I don't hate McD's calls this game overall (unless he was part of the fake punt).

Greg Thompsett from Cover 1 did a breakdown about how getting back over the cap is easy, getting enough to be a bidder in FA is hard. It is using a cap number higher than current estimates, but the released money is accurate. No Brainers - Cap Saved Restructure Josh - $23M Restructure Diggs - $13M (his words not mine) Restructure Ed - $3M Release Hines - $5M Release Harty - $4M Total - $48M Being $29M OVER cap right now, these moves alone put us $19M UNDER. Tompsett's Preferred/Likely Moves - Cap Savings Extend Dawkins - $7M Extend Douglas - $6M Extend Johnson - $5M Release Siran Neal - $3M Release Sam Martin - $1M Restructure McGovern - $3M With these moves added to the above, the Bills would be $44M UNDER

Unfortunately, 2024 is a "take your medicine" year. I think the only possibility for a departure is White. I think Von Miller deserves his ripping, but remember how Tre came back from an ACL and only looked himself at the start of 2023? I am all for eating his guaranteed money this year, and if he gets suspended it does the most of the cap. But I am not making a roster spot by releasing a likely HOF player AND losing cap. Agree on Knox, but the only way you reducing his cap hit with an extension. Take your medicine. Same issue with Diggs. Less quickness, bad hands. Buuuuut unless you can get some team to bite on a trade that is worth losing a #1 receiver (which he still is, if no longer elite) AND cap space (multiple 1 and 2s) the more likely answer is drafting a WR as high as possible and then taking pressure off Diggs. White...maybe. An injury settlement complicates things, and it would reduce the return the Bills would get. I have floated the idea that they might put him at safety since but who knows.

There’s a saying I am fond of: “Success knows many fathers but failure is an orphan.” Well, that is inverted with the Buffalo Bills. The Bills deserved to lose that game last night, and there were many, many contributing factors. If I am to pick one person who doesn’t have feces smeared on his face this morning it’s Joe Brady. I won’t say that he called a perfect game, but if I told you that the Bills had put up 24 points while holding onto the ball for 14 more minutes than the Chiefs I think a lot of people would have expected a blowout. Even if there was a bit of a stall when the Chiefs adjusted to stop the run, the offense was clicking up to the 2 minute warning. At 2nd and 9 at the 26, the Bills were in position to burn the clock and either force OT with a chipshot FG or put the dagger in with a TD. And guys were open. I can’t fault Brady for that. Maybe the offense wasn’t high flying, but if I was going to write a game script, the long drives (mostly for TD) is exactly what I would have tried to do to keep KC off the field and the defense rested. That is, if the defense could actually get a stop. If I am the Bills, I am doing everything I can to keep him, even if its just for one more year. Look, I get it. The defense is banged up. We all know it. We were running AJ Klein out there. But having AJ Klein on Travis Kelce? OOOOOOOF. No wonder the Chiefs spammed that advantage. It seemed like nothing changed up until it was far too late. I saw the stat of 20+ yard plays and they absolutely crushed the Bills on those. The Bills would methodically grind out a TD and then the Chiefs would zip down to match. I said this week that it was time to push all chips into the table, and someone asked me what it mean. It meant that if the injured players were anywhere near to go we had to start them. I am not on the medical staff, but we clearly saw the difference. I will say this about 2023: Josh’s WRs, as a whole, let him down this season and I think it’s why things seemed to struggle. I get it that Mahomes isn’t working with his best cast but my god, those drops my Sherfield and Diggs were backbreaking. For people who said that it can’t get worse than Gabe Davis, this is my retort. Even one of those deep catches working out changes the script. Special teams. Oof. Where do I even begin? I know I don’t like Matt Haack, but even he would have been better than Martin last night. Martin was clearly not ready and he gifted field position. Bass has been unclutch, and if he can’t kick in December winds I think it might be time to move on. But for the love of god, what was with that fake punt? I know they saw a mismatch, and it wound up not giving points, but sweet mercy was that painful to watch play out. With that kind of advantage, what does it say about coaching one of the highest paid ST units in the league? We pay guys for this level of play. Josh. I love Josh Allen. He is a special player. But for the love of god did he screw the pooch inside of 2 minutes. It’s not that I hate taking a shot at the end zone on a 2nd and long. In most situations, I am fine with it even if it doesn’t work out. But you have to know the situation here. The decision to gun it at that moment is terrible. Say it worked, that the Bills gun the ball into the endzone to take a 4 point lead under two minutes. That is 1:55 and 2 timeouts for the Chiefs to score and they had shown little issue moving up and down the field. Diggs is wide open on the crossing route for what should be an easy 1st down or a makeable 3rd. The clock keeps ticking. The Bills don’t need to hurry they have 2 timeouts and Kansas will be burning some too. Josh is a veteran at this point and while he had a good game on the whole those are the kinds of things people point too when they say that Mahomes is on another level. So that’s my autopsy. Where do we go from here? Well…there actually isn’t a lot the Bills can do. I know the cap is malleable but even if I wanted to advocate burning it all down the Bills really can’t. (I know, I looked into it after Denver and Philly). Our top 4 cap hits are Josh, Diggs, Von Miller and Dion Dawkins. Dawkins is the only one we could cut outright and get cap space for, and why would we? He played at a Pro Bowl level. Josh, if anything, will be looking at an extension. Even if I wanted to move on from Diggs and Von on down years, knowing their potential makes me loath to lose cap space. The biggest pending FA departures are set to be Hyde (who I think might just retire), DaQuan and Floyd. The last two I think we have a decent chance of getting back. In spite of everything, I do think there is legitimate reason for optimism. The one thing about the utter devastation on our defensive starters is that we found that we have extremely talent depth who looked good as starters in big moment. Bernard really came on as a LB and we thought was a Pro Bowl snub. Back with a healthy Milano that looks like an incredible talent pairing with solid depth in Williams and Spector. We still have a solid CB group (Douglas, Benford, TJ). The O-line had its best year in a while and looks to be mostly intact going in (I can see only one potential cap casualty). James Cook looks like a superstar. Our draft classes over the last two years hit in big ways. We saw starters and significant rotation from our 2022 and 23 drafts (Cook, Bernard, Shakir, Benford, Spector, Kincaid, Torrence, Williams), which speaks very well to longevity. 2024 will be taking some medicine on some contracts (Knox, Miller, possibly Tre White if the team thinks he’s washed), and this team can still compete. Coaches! I really hope the Bills retain Brady and give him another year to scheme. For reference, around the league Brian Johnson of the Eagles (and the second half collapse that has every fan howling for blood) is apparently a hot candidate at the moment. Compared to that Brady is Bill Walsh. McDermott needs help too, I expect a DC to help him even if he handles play calling still. Offseason: WR, WR, WR. If I am Beane, I am grinding film on every 1st and 2nd round prospect. Draftek does good work, and there are 14 WRs with the measurables to be a potential Peerless Price class player in the top 100 picks. There has to be someone available at 28. I don’t care if it’s a reach, get them.