Thurman#1

It was one hell of a lot more impressive when Marino did it. Everyone else is from recent eras and there's a reason for that. In the old days it used to be almost impossible to be really good before you'd played three seasons or so. These days a lot of guys start with college offenses that they are used to and can start much earlier. Not to mention the gradual stiffening of the rules concerning legal contact with receivers. In Marino's first year he had 20 TDs. The league leader had 32. In his second year, Marino had an insane 48, highest in the league. The second-highest guy had 32.

Josh is terrific. But it is much much easier to throw for TDs than it has been for most all of NFL history. Again, though, Josh has been terrific. And Mahomes is actually still in his fifth year, since he spent all but one game of his first season on the bench. And he has 179 so far, just passing. Herbert looks like he'll make it in five as well. But again, Allen is terrific.

Cool!! He really had a great game.

He's doing a really good job. And certainly an awful lot better than Star was last year.

Right. Couldn't be assault. Couldn't be getting in a fight. Couldn't be severe drunkenness. Couldn't be racial slurs. Couldn't be attacking a player. Couldn't be yelling at the head coach. Insubordination. Drunken driving. Pissing or crapping in public. Pushing a metermaid. Pissing on the Mexican equivalent of the Alamo. Stealing someone's burrito. Going into the other team's locker room and causing problems. Attacking or screaming at the refs after the game. Driving a rental car into light pole and running away. Hitting his girlfriend. Hitting his mistress. Think I could go on? No, no, couldn't be one of those or something else. You're totally right. It happened in Mexico and he got fired. Must be prostitution or drugs.

Wow, as I look through the thread I wonder about some of you folks. Mexico is mentioned and it goes straight to prostitution and drugs. And that's thought hilarious. It's a beautiful country with a fantastic culture. Yeah, there are drugs and prostitution there. I've heard there are one or two places in America also where you can find those.

"His bio has been removed from the website." Yikes. EDIT: oh, man, he fondled someone who was unwilling? Fair enough. To think he was on the Bills staff for a while.

Not a reasonable comparison. Cook was minimized for half a season or so. After training camp. Same as Singletary was rookie year. And Moss. After that first half a year or so they were allowed into more action. It's only after training camp and that first half of a year where you spend more time learning than playing that "handing the ball off to Cook works." He works after they did things the McDermott way. Before going through the usual McDermott rookie RB script, Cook had been inconsistent but OK. After, looks very good. Same as happened with Singletary. Hines has been here three weeks. It'll come. And it ain't like he's been Superman over the course of his career. He's got a career YPA of 4.0 and a career YPR of 7.3. I expect him to be good, but people here seem to expect huge returns. That would be lovely, but expecting it is premature.

Josh has not been good recently. Or rather, he's consistently had bad moments mixed into the excellence. The headline for this thread is "Ken Dorsey bears the brunt of the blame," but actually Turner continued the sentence with, "and not just the QB." Turner mentioned many Allen mistakes as well as OL problems and a few WR gaffes. Dorsey sure does get some blame, but there's plenty to go around.

Dang, that's an accomplished family!! Best of luck to him and them.

Not using Cook isn't head-scratching at all. It should have been completely expected, it was very predictable. In fact, it was widely predicted. It's how they use rookie RBs. In the first eight weeks of his rookie season, Singletary had 40 carries. And that was after he went four carries for seventy yards and six carries for fifty-seven and a TD in weeks one and two. Then in the second half of the season they started using him much more. Exact same thing with Moss, though they waited a few extra weeks before starting to use him consistently very much in his rookie season.

Just because he was injured there doesn't mean he'd have been injured here. There's no connection with the Bills, validation or criticism in an injury to McKissic. He himself must have been frustrated. They didn't use him as much or as well this year there. He's a good player and isn't getting the chance to show it in DC.

And .... boom. Missing the point, folks.

Nonsense, "most patient." What crap!! He's simply among the five or six absolute best coaches in the league, and Bills fans recognize it. He's doing a terrific job, and only a few people, no names of course, don't get that. And that thing about only five head coaches have five years or longer is a statistical fluke. Belichick had five full years with the Browns and a record of 36 - 44. As of last year, Zimmer was in his 8th year without an SB Reid had 14 years in Philly without a Super Bowl win. They had that longevity because they were very good coaches, even without Lombardis. As is McDermott. "Most patient." What crap!

Mental issues? Good grief, what is with you people. I guess mental issues are possible, but no reason to think it's White who has them.

Well, you'd be the one to know. Oh, wait, no. You have absolutely zero idea.

Haven't heard him for years and years after getting NFL Game Pass. So recently I have no idea. But as recently as around ten years ago he was really really good.

Hines has never averaged 5.0 per carry rushing. Running behind arguably the best OL in football the past couple of years he put up 4.3 and 4.9. Singletary has a higher career YPC behind a line that was clearly inferior. And Cook's YPR is way higher than 8. Not that I think Hines isn't going to be good. But the desperation to see him soon isn't really called for.

Beasley had training camp. And didn't run at RB or on STs, so his role was much less complex. Beasley also in the years when he was one of our best two or three options put up 11.6 and 11.8 Y/R. Hines has never been that dynamic. His high is 7.8. He's right, you're imagining a different Hines. Comparing him to Beasley or Davis just doesn't make sense.

Peterson absolutely did NOT say that he knew what play we were running. He did say that he knew two concepts we often use in the red zone. So he thought he'd see those concepts, but didn't know for sure. He was prepared for some types of plays we run in the red zone. And he did say that Gabe was running only in-breakers all day. (If that's true, it should absolutely be corrected. Gabe runs out-breakers really well. If they fell into a pattern this game without noticing, that does need to be addressed.) Most teams have red zone packages and go with things that have worked for them. So Peterson knew what types of things to look for. He did think that if the D went quarters he might see a dig or a double post, and Gabe was indeed running a post there. Peterson also says, "Everybody loves to run that." It's not just the Bills. But he had the right idea. But if he so clearly knew what was going to happen, how come it took a bad throw for him to make that INT? Peterson was beaten on the play. A good pass there is a touchdown. Peterson was behind and to the right. Allen threw low and behind, right to him. If he'd led Davis correctly and put it high, it was a touchdown. It was a pass that just wasn't good enough. Someone on here the other day said that it seemed Josh was forcing balls to Diggs and Davis. That's what seemed to happen that play. Two guys were opener on easier throws. That's a tendency, and probably one of Josh's rather than Dorsey's. That was the crucial bit of Peterson's quotation. He said, "Josh thought he had it, and like I said, Josh is a guy that trusts his arm strength. He's a gunslinger. Coach alluded to it all week. 'Stay plastered into your coverage. Stay tight into your coverage. He just might throw you one.' " Yeah, that's what happened. Three guys were open, the closer two very open and Davis a bit but the throw had to be perfect. Josh picked the receiver he most wanted there, the guy who was least open but furthest down the field, and he does indeed trust his arm. That throw had to be a really good one and instead it was, what, a yard and a half to the right and low and hard instead of thrown over the top. That was a shame. Most of the game he was his usual terrific self, but he had five or six throws that weren't up to his usual standards. That's how he's looked the past two or three games. And it's cost us.

Yes, I know that there isn't an offense in the NFL that doesn't require route memorization. But what you don't seem to get is that some require much more than others. It's not the same offense for all 32 teams, dude, it really isn't. Ours requires an awful lot more than others. Look it up. If you want to ignore this, that's your business, I'm not going to continue to tell you how wrong you are on this. Just look up Erhard Perkins. You will find the word memorization featured prominently. How the routes fit together is crucial. You're not just running your own route, it's how yours fits in with the spacing of the others as well.

Yes. In some systems it can work. In others it doesn't. The system we run requires memorization. Every route must be memorized. Again, if the main idea of an offense were whether or not it could be quickly learned, this would be really bad. But that is not the idea behind any offense. Some offenses fit it more easily than others. But the main idea is to be effective ... not to be easily used by a guy who arrived in mid-season. Thanks. This. "With that, it takes time," said Hines. And he's also working on kick returns, often as a blocker, something he's never done.

The purpose of an offense or part of an offense is not to be easy for a new guy to pick up. It's to work well. As we're the #1 offense and the #2 scoring offense, ours does. If it's easy, that's great. But not necessary. Because other teams do something does not mean that we need to do it. The Erhardt Perkins system for catching passes is what we were running last I knew. And it is indeed complex. "It was developed to maximize efficiency in cold weather." https://baltimoresportsandlife.com/erhardt-perkins-system-part-2/ Gee, I wonder why we use it. Don't know offhand whether Hines has used it before. But you don't bring in a guy because you want him to be useful his first two weeks. You want him useful long term. If he can do it his first two weeks, that's a nice bonus. But simply not important in the long run.

Indeed. I always appreciate your posts. Glad to know what you consider acceptable. I know during your time in the locker room, you've ... oh, wait. No one needs to simply accept anyone's claims. But Wawrow has a ton more access than you or I and if he says it's true, that carries weight. Players do tend to deny problems in the locker room, especially on the record. Off the record we'll never know what they say. But John very well may.

Like you're not constantly trying to be condescending. You're just not very good at it. And yeah, you didn't say it's all Dorsey's fault. You only said this: That's your whole post, and it really does basically mean that Dorsey's the problem. Which again, is nonsense. He's been up and down, but the offense has overall been very good this year. He deserves his share of the credit for that and his share of the blame for when they haven't performed well. But overall they've been very good. The idea that because the offense hasn't performed well in three second halves (and that we can then ignore the rest of the season) simply doesn't stand up.