Thurman#1

Certainly Josh wasn't the reason we lost. The teams just weren't equal. But Josh deserves his fair share of the blame. Mahomes didn't kill drives with major sacks from holding the ball too long. But we got little pressure. That hurt. Part of that was that Mahomes was hitting the short passes when we pressured, and Josh was looking long. If a team schemes to take away the long ball, take the short ones all day long. That's mostly what Mahomes did, and it was what the Chiefs needed. Agreed. If Josh has shown anything it's that he's a voracious learner. He'll get a lot better from this.

Figure out whether Morse's problems are only temporary. He has been very good for most of his term here, but not lately. And spend more time with the OL on run blocking. We just don't appear to have a group that this year was a tough group on run blocking. Our OL was very good pass blocking, but not very good run blocking. Getting Ford back, at guard, should help. But they probably need one more interior DL, not to mention figuring out RT in terms of whether or not we can afford to keep Daryl Williams. If we don't, it doesn't look like his replacement is on our roster. Run blocking is often a lot about mindset. Didn't appear we had that this year, we were mostly devoted to keeping Allen upright, with some good reason behind that.

He's made a difference in several games, along with Moss. Running the clock down at the end of several games, getting several important first downs, making some nice catches and runs and doing an absolute ton of terrific blocks keeping our QB unsacked. And a couple of TDs on top of that. Oh, and thanks for the total lack of any new spin, facts or point of view on this.

Morse hasn't been the same since he went out for the concussion, but overall that wasn't a bad move at all. If he doesn't regain his former level, yeah, he could be gone, but he might easily regain his old level. And while some on here thought Dawkins should be a guard, the Bills never thought so, nor did many of the rest of us.

He's generally considered the best in the league at handling the blitz, though Brady has always been terrific, and Allen lately has looked just as good. You can blitz him, but not regularly. Regular blitzes he handles like an advantage to him. Occasionally, as a surprise, it can work. And it also helps if you do it in a non-standard way, like blitz an LB on the left and back up a DL on the right. If it's obvious how you're doing it, Mahomes knows just where to throw, into the area the blitzer vacated.

Is this a Tonya Harding thing? Because I think that's wrong. Probably.

Or it's a totally reasonable decision based entirely on the medical evidence. No reason to think that's not so. It's possible it isn't true, but this decision doesn't underscore anything, really. I mean we don't even know for sure he ever had a concussion. Could've been a sleeper hold type of thing, as reported.

He was kind of a coach on the sidelines and in the meeting rooms while he was playing. I think that's what they're referring to. So maybe yeah, if anyone can do it he can. I doubt anyone can do it, myself. Always liked the guy. Good luck to him. It would not be a good decision now, though. After 10 or 15 years of coaching experience, then maybe. It's really too bad, though. I understand why Watson feels he wants to pressure them to get a good head coach. But the instant he did so he made the job toxic and the possibility of actually getting someone good pretty close to zero. It's now a self-fulfilling prophecy, making his departure much more likely.

They're not saying Josh's career has been as good as Mahomes'. Wouldn't make sense to say so. Over a three-year span, sure, Mahomes. But that's not what they're talking about. They're saying right now who's better?

Rings are a team thing, not a QB thing. MVPs are a one-year thing. It's a discussion. Not there quite yet, IMO, but very close, and Allen is younger and has thrown 300 fewer passes.

Come on, man, answer what he said rather than what you think would be the easiest thing to counter-argue. He didn't say or in any way imply the Bills were playing "simpleton" teams. He had great respect for the Ravens offense, but yeah, thinks most of their offensive productivity came from the run game. How can anyone argue? He knows the Steelers offense has been pretty good, but how can you argue that their productivity came mostly from the passing game and particularly the short passing game, especially late in the year? I mean, since Week 7 they have exactly one game in which they managed a hundred yards on the ground ... and out of those twelve games, in only four did they manage more than 68 yards! And frankly, how can anyone argue that the Pats isn't very solid in the run game but pretty weak in passing? They're closest to a "simpleton" I guess, and they aren't that bad, nor did he say they were. The Niners run game is really good, but with no Jimmy G, their pass game is pretty poor. And those were four of the Bills last seven games, the other three being the Broncos, Fins and Colts. The Broncos offense is just pretty crappy. The Fins, when Tua is QBing, just aren't all that strong anywhere. The only time of those last six when we played a team that was good at both facets was the Colts. He wasn't using that as an argument the Bills D were bad. Just that the Frazier/McDermott defense has shown itself to be very very good at stopping one-dimensional offenses, even good ones. And KC is not one-dimensional. The Chiefs last seven games were the Bucs, Broncos, Dolphins, Saints, Falcons, Chargers and Browns. Which of those offenses are good to very good but one-dimensional?

He didn't "point out they wouldn't be able to handle the Ravens." He never ever pretends to know the future. He gave an opinion. He gives his best educated guess about each game. And he's a hell of a lot more educated than most. But absolutely nobody correctly predicts NFL games correctly against the spread at a very high rate. If they did they'd quickly be new Rockefellers and the sports books would shut down. "Tough to follow"? Um, I guess I can see that. He puts words together in weird ways sometimes, creates Simms-isms. "Self-scout thyself," and so on. And he gets excited and talks really fast. I generally understand him well, except with the football jargon which sometimes goes beyond me. I find that fascinating, though, and treat it as a chance to do some homework. I'll trust you on the Chili's thing, though. I've never been to Texas but if he said that it does show some questionable food preferences.

T'anks.

I'd put him a level above that. Certainly not a star or a guy likely to make the big bucks, but a guy who's performed pretty solidly at his role. It's not always so easy to find one.

Go to Alabama? Worked fairly well for Daboll.

Gunner, yeah, it's seemed really interesting to me how the Bills have handled these one-dimensional teams so very well. Due to that and the relatively good result last time of holding the Chiefs to 26 points, I kind of thought we might see the Bills running the same kind of D. Simms is saying that both offenses handled poorly what the opponent Ds did to them and he thinks both offenses would do much better if faced with the same defensive approach. Interesting, I thought.

41 minutes on this game, with a lot of reference to the Week 5 Bill - Chiefs game. 00:20 Burmeister: (in the Week 6 game) ... the Chiefs offense didn't look the way we've become used to seeing it. It wasn't explosive. They didn't hit the 30s with the point total. But they found a way to win. So what is still relevant, three months later about that game? Simms: Well, I think there's not going to be a ton that's relevant. Both teams I think now are in different spots from where they were then to where they are right now. And I think the biggest thing is ... this game was a bit of an adjustment for KC too. They were still getting used to, "Wait, teams are still playing these deep coverages on us and what are we going to do to answer that," because the week before they'd lost to the Las Vegas Raiders. The week before that they had issues against the Patriots. They won in overtime a few weeks before that against the Chargers. So they were trying at that point to adjust to ... "Wait, how are we going to adjust to these teams who play these vanilla deep-dropping type defenses against us and take away our big plays?" They were in the midst of trying to figure that out. The other side of that coin is that the Buffalo defense, it's not even recognizable to where it was at that point. They were 1) a beat-up football team at that time, not playing well, and so vanilla on defense it was embarrassing. They played two defenses. It was like you're basically telling Kansas City, "Hey, look at this hole we've left on the left side, just keep running here." And they were having issues at that time either way. The big thing I'm trying to say is, "I don't know if we're going to see the same approach from either team in this matchup. I think you could see it different on both sides of the ball here." Simms suggested that what KC should do differently is to spread out. Even if they want to run the football like last time, they should do it while spreading out. That way they'd still have the ability to run but also make the Bills worry about them getting it downfield. Last time they were in 21 and Mahomes was under center. Simms said that played into the hands of the Bills. He also said that the Chiefs have since figured out how to handle it when teams play vanilla deep drops. 6:00 Simms: "The Bills defense has been really good. The one advantage they've had down the stretch, though, and even last week, they've played a lot of one-dimensional offenses down the stretch. Oh, it's New England? We've got to stop the run. Oh, it's Baltimore? We've got to stop the run. Oh, it's Pittsburgh? All we've got to worry about is the pass. McDermott's unbelievable when he can pin you to 'they're mainly this kind of team.' Burmeister: What about Indy, though? They were fairly balanced. Simms: And that gave 'em issues. They were in deep *****. They couldn't stop the Colts. That's where I was just about to go. I mean the Colts ran it and threw it at will. At will. They won the game because one team had Josh Allen and the other didn't. That's where I worry about this and that's where I would say with Kansas City, you know, 'Don't get in power running formations. You can still run the ball out of the shotgun and be effective but you're going to force Buffalo in a real bind of, 'Wait, they can run on us, but man, Kelce and Tyreek one-on-one? Holy crap, what do we do? 22:30 Burmeister: I was looking back at your [week 6] notes ... you wrote 'The Bills let the Kansas City D off the hook.' What did you mean? Simms: I did a Josh Allen interview last week. He talked about these two losses they had, the Chiefs and the Titans, those are the first two teams this year that played soft zone-dropping coverages for them too. They didn't know how to react. He referenced it specifically to me last week. It was his worst game, and he said 'I didn't handle it well. And I don't think we were prepared to play that style of defense yet. We hadn't figured out how we wanted to attack it. They kind of did the same things that the Chiefs did, where they tried to get into these 21 personnel sets and get underneath the center where we're gonna run a balanced offense. And to me it played into the hands of the Chiefs. Simms pointed out that the last 5 or 6 weeks, KC's red zone offense hasn't been all that great. A lot of field goals. It was interesting stuff. He said that both offenses in game 6 were dealing with a new offensive wrinkle, and interestingly, it was the same wrinkle. Both offenses were facing defenses that wanted to drop way back and take away their big plays, and neither had figured out how to handle that yet. And that by now, both teams have figured it out. So the offenses we see this week won't have the same problems they did in the earlier game. I'd thought the Bills D would do some of the same things they'd done early since they stopped the Chiefs from scoring much. Simms said that kind of D won't hold back the Chiefs the same way this time, and that the same is true of our offense, that the Chiefs won't be able to hold us down the same way either.

Actual savings would be far less than $10M, yeah, somewhere around $8. Yes, you could push some of that dead money to the next year. Still has to be paid, though. Would also create holes that have to be filled, costing money. When they gave Farwell a wish list, his first choice was Matakevich. I don't think they want to cut him. They will have to cut some people they would rather not. I don't think Matakevich will be one, but it's certainly possible.

Your math here is way off. I mean, not even close. Cutting Lotulelei would leave us paying $11.8 in dead money. Unless his play goes far downhill there is no good reason to cut him this year, none. Whoever replaces Gaines on the roster will cost just as much as Gaines. No savings. Matakevich and Morse would save a bit, but far less than $10M.

The dead cap would be just above $20M, the remains of the signing bonus only. The rest of what is listed as dead cap is actually just guaranteed money, which the team that trades for Watson would take over. $20M is still onerous, but not nearly as onerous as having a franchise QB who is not with the program.

Yes. I do indeed, if Brady or Mahomes asked for the courtesy. Kraft without question, and whoever owns KC if he has any sense. Pretty sure they would've reserved the right to listen and go another way. But I doubt it would've come to that. You absolutely need to keep those guys happy. Hell, apparently Kraft forced Belichick to trade Garoppolo because it's what Brady wanted, over Belichick's protests. Absolutely they would've given Brady a voice. Mahoes too.

Oh, and as for the hardest playoff schedule, of course they do. The #1 seed never has a hard schedule. That's how the playoffs are set up. Whoever faces the #1 seed, assuming they make it, as they have, will of course have a harder schedule. And yes, the AFC playoff field was a bit harder than the NFC. So of course they do. Difficulty of playoff opponents isn't a big mention because it generally isn't, unless somebody beats the #1 or #2 seed. Win or lose, and eke by or dominate, that's going to be the story every year.

To see that nationally most of the talk is about the Bucs, Packers and Chiefs, he would need not just WNY roots, but also a willingness to ignore reality and probably some alcohol besides. There's a ton of Bills talk out there. #2 in power rankings: https://www.thelines.com/betting/nfl/power-rankings/ #3: https://www.arrowheadpride.com/2021/1/19/22238594/conference-championship-ap-nfl-power-rankings-the-best-possible-final-four #3: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v_Wn1PwNNuk #2: https://walterfootball.com/nflpowerrankings.php #3: https://www.sportsnet.ca/nfl/article/nfl-playoff-power-rankings-conference-championship-x-factors/ #2: https://www.radio.com/sports/nfl/gallery/nfl-power-rankings-who-are-the-postseason-favorites It goes on and on and on. Haven't yet found one where we're #4. There are long clips of Cowherd, Simms, the NFL network groups, Eisen, and on and on and on talking about and extensively praising the Bills. I haven't seen anyone rank them #1, so I guess there's that, but why would any neutral person rank them over the 14-2 Chiefs, assuming their QB plays? But I also haven't seen people giving them no chance over the Chiefs, outside that buffoon Bill mentioned above.

Yup. And apparently the Bills are the same. Fairburn and Buscaglia were cracking up about that this week on their podcast. They told several stories about how the Bills at various times had said things along the lines of, "We know you all thought we were gonna lose." And the reporter would crack up and say, "You know half of us picked you to win this week, right?" And the players would say, "No, we meant the national media." And yet the national media had also been picking the Bills. Buscaglia said the Bills thrive on it. They love that feeling, the way the Pats for years, even after winning championships would find ways to think everyone doubted them. What good it does for fans though, I just haven't a clue.

I'm not quite clear on how you think Yeldon, Winters, Norman, Murphy and Kroft are going to save us money. And I have no idea who TN is, but I assume like the others he's not under contract next year. None of them are signed for next year. Somebody will have to be signed just to replace their spots on the roster. The very very low amount of money left to us on the cap next year ($1.5M) is already accounting for their absence. We have $1.5M left, with only 41 guys on the roster. Their leaving does not save us money. It might be possible to keep Williams, but if we sign Feliciano and Milano, pay the $6 or so mill that our draftees will take and then sign the 5 - 10 or so more guys who will be necessary when we make some cuts, we're going to be squeezed. It will depend on who gets cut, obviously, and we can maybe kick a few cans down the road, but this isn't going to be easy. Fair enough, but if they cut Jefferson, Butler or John Brown, or whoever else, they will be creating a lineup hole that they will have to spend money to fill.