Alphadawg7

2023 vs 2022 Diggs is well Diggs, no change there. Davis is at worse the same, but with the injuries behind him has the potential to be better. Sherfield >>> Kumerow: This is without question an upgrade, where Kumerow was predominantly a ST player who offered little in the pass game. Harty >>> McKenzie: McKenzie was a gadget player where as Harty is a true deep threat who can take the tops off defenses and stretch the field. Shakir 2023 >>> Shakir 2022: By default, Shakir will have more to offer now with a year under his belt. Slot WR Position: Combo of Shakir & Kincaid >>> McKenzie/Beasley. I cant see any scenario where we don't have better slot play this year from Shakir and Kincaid over a gadget guy who struggled and an aging WR. RB's as Receivers: Having Hines here a whole offseason will get him involved, and Cook has a year under his belt now too. These guys will be more established receiving weapons compared to last season. TE: Knox is back and very good as it is, now we have Kincaid playing both TE and a big slot role, making this position even better for us. So IMHO, I think our group of pass catching weapons is very nicely rebuilt compared to last year and is the best set of weapons Allen has had in his career thus far.

Yeah, this is more or less what I was alluding to as well when I said the only way I can see him landing here is if he finds the market lower than he expects and what ever we have offered is competitive to any other offers he got. So yeah, I agree with this too

Hopkins >>> OBJ However, at this point in the offseason, with tighter cap space and teams already have filled their rosters with draft and free agency, I think he has less leverage and is either going to get about the same or lower with maybe more incentives. He should get more, I would take Hopkins 10 times over OBJ at this point, but not sure the teams he wants to play for can afford or are willing to pay him more than OBJ at this stage of the season.

Players don't realize anything near their contract...Taxes, Agents, Managers, etc. Shaquille O'Neal was talking about his first season where he had a $100M contract at $20M a season...he only saw $10.9M of that, and after he bought a house and stuff it was gone fast in 3 months. And then you factor in how much shorter an NFL players career is compared to other sports, how much less they make, and the contracts not being fully guaranteed and its not a surprise that a guy nearing his last significant earning opportunity in his career is going to look to get as much as he can. Buffalo was not the only team he wanted to play for...Allen was not the only QB he wanted to play with. He was always going to take the best contract he can get amongst the teams he is interested in playing for. And quite frankly, he should, I don't blame him.

I think you need to make peace with the idea DHop likey is not going to be a Buffalo Bill. You seem to think every vague reference, facial expression, hand signal, smoke signal, etc means we are getting Hopkins but then deny any credible person or report that suggests we are not in on him as much as you think or we may not be in on him at all anymore. If Beane was willing to do all things you think he could do, and wanted Hopkins bad enough, he would already be a Bill. What has most likely gone on is we have made a highest and best offer and left it at that. If DHop was good with that offer, he would already be a Bill because he stated he wants to play here with Allen multiple times. But he has also listed a number of other teams and QB's he would like to play with too, so no surprise he is looking for the best offer amongst those teams. And as of right now, we are not the best offer clearly. There is no way Beane feels like DHop is a "must" get player, or again, he would already be a Bill. We rebuilt the cupboard of weapons for Allen as it is, rebuilt the OL and refreshed the run game. At this point, it is pretty clear Beane has interest, but only to a certain extent and isn't going to go past that, or once again he would already be a Bill. I would love to add DHop, but won't panic if we don't get him either. And at this point, my expectations are that he won't be a Bill because there is zero reason for him not to already be a Bill if we were offering him enough, which we clearly are not. So I think the only way he comes here is if he finds the market for him to be lower than he expects and that our offer is competitive enough that he is willing to take it.

And her next tweet after this was this 👇👇👇 https://twitter.com/heyitsandreah/status/1664142491287732227?s=46&t=tdXmDQAmKLuxS59WLD047Q

Agree to disagree on this one. All good either way

No, this is again inaccurate. He has a 2 year contract for one. 2nd, teams didn’t just magically have cap space at the start of the offseason, in fact in many cases, especially the ones most interested in him, did not and were actually over the cap. Buffalo for example early in the off-season had to make moves and restructure deals just to get under the cap, let alone to sign other inexpensive free agents and our rookie class. Other teams did the same, even cut or let go of good players to get under. Sorry, that is not at all what I said. It is the narrative you’re trying create with the inaccurate statements above, but it’s not at all what I am saying nor is it an accurate reflection of the majority of the views on him across the NFL. Just because teams can’t afford his contract does not mean they view him as a low end WR1. That’s just a conclusion you want to get to, but that’s not reflective of how the business of the NFL is conducted. First, given his age and cost, he only makes sense for contending teams, that immediately crosses a majority of teams off as a landing spot. Of those teams, they need to have the cap space for the next 2 years (based on trading for his contract) to take him on and also have the need for him. Teams like Cincy and Miami for example are pretty loaded at top end WRs, and there isn’t a “need” to squeeze him in. Then you have teams who have huge QB contracts and they still need to keep guys on both sides of the ball. Teams have to weigh what taking on his contract will do towards retaining other players next year too or impacting what other holes they can fill this year. I could keep going with many reasons this cut and dry conclusion you are trying to get to him just isn’t reflective of reality, circumstances, and context of all that is in play when considering a trade for him or signing him to a multi year contract, but I think my point is clear enough as is. It’s totally cool to not be in favor of signing him, I am just saying I think you’re making some leaps in logic on how others view him to get to a conclusion that fits your personal opinion that he doesn’t have much left in the tank.

That is not true though...teams were willing to trade, they weren't willing to take his salary as is because of the cap. Big difference there.

I definitely understand your position on that, and ideally they would keep Davis. The issue is just the math of the situation...they are not going to keep 8 WR's and we don't know if they would even keep 7. Especially with Kincaid being essentially a big slot WR in their offensive plans, makes having to keep more WR's less a priority because they might want to keep an extra TE that is better suited for blocking. Diggs, Hopkins, Davis, Sherfield, Harty, Shakir is already 6 guys...plus they have UDFA they signed for 3 years and Shorter who they like. So I think if we sign Hopkins, then the staff could be looking at a Davis vs Sherfield battle to see who wins a roster spot. And between those 2, Davis has more trade value and they could move him for a trade asset potentially and let Sherfield run as the WR3. Personally, I think Sherfield has some pretty good potential and could be better than some realize. So far he has been getting rave reviews from the staff and especially Josh Allen who seems to have taken a big liking to him and referenced no one is putting more work in than him. He was the biggest beneficiary of Diggs absence and got a lot of time with Allen and they seem to have clicked. Harty and Shakir have different roles, and unless either of them struggle during camp and preseason, they have a pretty clear path to the roster. Harty is a deep threat like no other on the team who can take the top off and Shakir is set up to be our main slot WR (likely sharing time there with Kincaid). And Shorter and the other UDFA kid they signed for 3 years are special team guys too, so at least one of them should make the roster. So if we sign Hopkins, there is a numbers game and could be hard to keep both Davis and Sherfield, so it could come down to them battling it out for WR3 but also what value Beane could get for either of them in a trade. Injuries or other guys having bad camps could easily change that of course.

With Hopkins...I am more concerned about him signing with one of our top competitors, especially KC, than I am worried about missing out on him. Buffalo already has an elite WR in Diggs and has restocked the WR room, while still having a very good (albeit underused) TE in Knox and now adding Kincaid to the mix. Not to mention, a couple of RB's who are very good at catching passes as well. So if Buffalo adds Hopkins, yes we instantly get better still, but not by the same margin KC would if they added Hopkins. KC is already the reigning SB champs and did so with JuJu being their top WR last year who isn't nearly the player Hopkins is. Hopkins would just have a bigger role in KC and they just need him more than we do. I want Hopkins personally, but in terms of our own team, I don't fear not getting him either as I think we have a pretty good upgraded group of weapons for Allen, a new OL, and potentially a better RB attack this year both running and receiving out of the backfield. BUT...Hopkins is still a top 10 WR in the league and would not be thrilled to see him land on a top AFC contender either. So for me, the value in signing Hopkins is 2 fold...bolster our own offense while preventing a top threat to our pursuit of a SB birth from upgrading themselves with him.

Gabe Davis, playing in one of the 2 most prolific offenses in the NFL over his 3 year career only has 3 total 100 yard career games (1 each year). In 7 playoff games, he has just 2 big games. The issue is he is more myth than fact. He got the "Big Game" moniker to go with his name because of the KC playoff game essentially. But the reality is "Big Game Davis" is more like 1 big game a year, a couple solid games, several games where he made game hurting mistakes, and a whole lot of games where you don't remember if he even played. I was really high on Davis last offseason, thought he was entering the season ready to break out, especially with the heavy attention Diggs get. But, not only did he struggle to catch the ball, but he struggled with concentration, confidence, separation, etc. I like Gabe and would love to see a bounce back, but I have started asking myself what am I expecting him to bounce back to? His drops are a career long issue. His limited route tree is a career long issue. His lack of consistent separation is a career long issue. I am not sure it is realistic to expect much more than last year because not only was it his best statistical year, all the negative aspects of his game were not exactly anomalies and on par with is 3 year career. And that makes me think that it is more "what we see is what we get" with him and he is just a lower tier WR2 who is better suited to be a very good WR3. I will continue to root for him, I like him, I am just now at a point where I find myself less optimistic than in the past and more concerned about his reliability. PS: All that being said, I don't feel we "must" sign Hopkins because this team is reloaded on new weapons and feel like Allen no longer has to be so heavy dependent on Diggs and Davis. However, I still would love to sign Hopkins as he would be a significant upgrade to Davis and make this offense almost certainly the #1 offense this year.

All good, and respect your opinions too. For me, I think I probably have more confidence in Sherfield than most as I think he is better than people think. Plus we have Kincaid, Knox, Shakir, Cook, and Hines too. We are not short on weapons even without Hopkins. Gabe was someone I was previously high on, but he is more myth than good. He only had 3 games with 100 yards in his 3 year career. He has only had 2 good playoff games out of 7. “Big Game Davis” nickname is mostly built off the lore of the KC playoff game. Drops, mental lapses, struggles to get separation, not getting his feet in bounds, etc just start to add up to go from a necessary piece to expendable if we upgraded to someone like Hopkins. I hope he bounces back this year, I do like him even though my confidence has been shaken in him. However, if we sign Hopkins, there is 0% chance we sign him and I would rather get a trade asset from him than use him as our 4th receiving target behind Diggs, Hopkins, and Kincaid. Not against keeping him by any means, just think he has trade value still and if we can get the right value I would be willing to move him if we signed Hopkins rather than lose him for nothing. That being said, I do think odds are he is here this year regardless if sign Hopkins.

I mean I wouldn’t give him away, but if we could get a decent pick I would move him.

It’s actually better Diggs is not there. He doesn’t need the reps with Josh or the work on his game. It is all the other new guys that benefit and get more balls and reps with Allen that are MUCH MORE needed than Diggs. And I think that is why it’s not that big of a deal to Allen, the coaches, or to Diggs.