Thurman#1

I'd offer that. My guess is they already have, and that he is not going to sign for anything close to that low. Recently? Who? And in particular, who who was in the neighborhood of 1009 yards rushing, 1248 yards from scrimmage and 485 snaps (48%)? I personally estimate his chances of holding out this offseason to be about 1% if we're talking about a holdout of more than a symbolic day or so.

Some team will pay him Barkley money and we'll get a high comp pick. I think they can live with that. And it's a smarter use of resources. And you're assuming he can be signed for that. It's certainly possible, but it's less than Cook wanted. He might not sign for that even if they offered. Which I wouldn't. Not for a guy who is going to get less than 50% of snaps probably, unless he steps up his blocking game quite a bit.

Worth the headache for having him on the team this year without signing a new contract? There'll be virtually no headache. Hell yeah, he'll be worth it. His saying this on social media is a big nothing. Worth actually signing him to a new contract for near what he's asking for? No, I don't think so. But I don't think fan disapproval for an un-extended Cook will go beyond about (maybe) one tepid boo at camp on the first day. Probably not even that.

Possible death? Lack of arm strength making a fumble when hit by a charging linebacker a likelihood and not just a possibility? If by "little person," Leach was referring to someone like Tyrion Lannister. If you're only talking about smaller NFL-sized guys like Codrington, it's still not all that easy to throw 185 pounds three yards high to get over the line and three yards forward to make the first down, all in about two seconds. And man that guy would be open to some absolutely vicious shots on the way down.

Haven't watched anywhere near enough tape but if Ezeiruaku falls, I'm hoping they think he's a game wrecker.

That last option shouldn't be "No trades," it should be "None of these trade-ups". Wouldn't mind trading up a bit but not giving away major pieces of draft capital.

Might've easily been able to play if he hadn't missed most of TC with an injury. We'll never know. Agreed that you don't take a 3rd round DB in round 2. But I don't think that's under consideration. Could be, though, that you think he's a round 3 guy and they think he's a 2.

No, that would be the fact that in the first two years we in no way were a good enough roster due to what they inherited and the smart decision in the situation to rebuild, and after those first couple of years, it was the responsibility of the whole team. McDermott gets his share of the blame, yeah, but so does everybody else.

Actually, nobody takes big discounts early in their career, but a few do it late, after they've cleaned up their early contracts. I wouldn't expect Simmons to do it, but it's conceivable, or it is if the Bills offer him that kind of a contract. And again, we don't know if the Bills were in on Simmons earlier. We just don't know. They might have been but lost out. Not all contacts and negotiations become public. An awful not never become public knowledge.

Butch Byrd, maybe. Might have been Stephon Gilmore if we'd kept him. I really loved Antoine Winfield. Watching him tackle in the open field was an absolute joy.

They might have wanted him last year but not been able to come to a contract agreement. It could happen, I'd guess, but would he come here for, say $2.2M for one year when he gets an offer for $5M elsewhere? If they think he's still got it. I haven't a clue, myself.

I'd argue Beane has had some home runs over the years as well. Milano, Taron, Benford, Shakir in the 5th. Bernard if he can stay healthy. Plus a guy many forget named Josh Allen. He's at least a triple, I'd say.

Seems like I'm saying this every year. It really isn't the defense in the playoffs. It's the defense in the playoffs against the Chiefs. And not to many defenses have stopped the Chiefs in the playoffs if they're playing well. Mahomes had a bad game in the SB this year. The Eagles defense was part of it, but not all. Even early when not rushed, he just wasn't throwing well. Having said that, yeah, the D needs work right now, and the draft looks set to make a big start on addressing that. Heh heh. Cracked me up!!

IMO they'll keep [Cook] for this year and just take the comp pick in 2026. Wouldn't mind being proven wrong on that, though. But they'd likely then have to use a 2nd - 4th on an RB. It'd leave us with no proven starter, though Davis might be just fine starting.

Franchising him next year would be in the neighborhood of $14.2M (Overthecap.com estimate). That's just too high, and if you were going to do that, why not just give him the $15M he wants? But a second year would be $17.07M. That's nuts. No way they do that. Bottom line is he's very good but at 190 pounds, you can't make him a bell-cow back without greatly increasing his injury potential or just wearing him down. And you don't want him at 3rd down back because he can't block. $15M, as he's asking for, is nuts unless you're a bell-cow and a game-wrecker. The franchise number is virtually as high. They're trying to put some weight on Cook and buy him a house here.

Who says the acquiring team would want to use him as a bellcow? Has he learned to pass block yet? Has he grown from 190 pounds to where teams would want to use him as a hammer on 3rd and short? $5M for Cook would indeed be a good deal but my guess is nobody would want to use him as a bell-cow.

It's not clear what the Bills actions say about Douglas being in their plans. You might be right. Equally, it could be a case of, "You've got our offer, Rasul, let us know if you can agree." There'll be room for him if they want him, and they might. They might also go with six this year. Last year did not turn out well in terms of CB depth. Priority re-signs don't always sign quickly. Sometimes there is a difference in contract terms, and sometimes guys, especially old vets, don't want to have to go through the whole offseason program. And yes, he didn't look as good. How much of that was from injury? We don't know. He could easily be here. Or not. Time will tell. Oh, and I'm with Logic in that I'd rather see this year's Rasul rather than Dane Jackson.

While I think we do move up using some of the later picks, there's some things people are not saying about the fact that we've got a lot of picks and fairly little roster space. First, plenty of those guys who don't make the roster might easily make the practice squad. Not necessarily all. But generally almost all. When fifth rounders are cut, they might more easily be picked up elsewhere. But not necessarily. More, there's an advantage to using a lot of picks even when there's not enough room. Let's say all of the picks from the top four rounds make the roster, and only two more will be able to do so. So in this case Beane has kept all ten of his picks. Hell, maybe he even traded back one of the fifths and got an extra 7th, leaving 11 total picks. Having 11 picks give you one simple, factual advantage. You get more guys to look at. So say that two of the 5ths don't make the team. But the 7th does. It happens. Sometimes those 7ths, as do UDFAs, are better than expected. When you have more picks, you have more chances to find a later guy who's a lot better than his draft spot says. Again, I guess we will trade up a bit here and there. But 6ths and 7ths aren't nothing, even though we tend to talk about them as if they are in situations like this. They're a chance. Anyway, OP, I think you're over-rating S as a need. I don't think it's top three. Maybe 4 or 5 would be my guess. Other than that I think you're totally reasonable. Oh, and the odds of Cook holding out or holding in or whatever ... THIS YEAR? Wildly unlikely. It's really uncommon after the third, though we do get some posturing sometimes. If they tag him next year, though, now at that point it becomes a lot more possible, but he's not going to do anything this year.

Jeez, I saw us clicking on all cylinders often. Not always, but nobody does it always, nobody. Kirk Cousins? That's a good comparison. 13 wins? No, I don't think so. Kirk is no Josh Allen, but he's pretty good (not that I saw him much last year but from what I hear the problem there was a lot deeper than Kirk). IMO the Cousins of the last four or five years gets us to maybe 11 or 12 games or so. Maybe closer to 11 than 12. Maybe 12 because of how awful the rest of the division was, but Josh had that advantage as well.

Cha ching!! This!!

Dude, no problem. There's so much going on here all the time, I swear I miss half of it.

I get that you may well have wanted to be taken with a grain of salt. Just wanted to quickly go through what it'd probably take in draft picks to get from #30 to #12. On the Rich Hill draft pick value chart, #30 is 620 points and #12 is 1200 points. Meaning that to go up that far we'd need another first rounder this year at about the same level. Or if we could give up both our 2nd rounders this year and that would about do it, though teams moving up usually have to pay a bit extra to do so. Anybody think any other teams are valuing Cook at the value of a late first rounder, or two seconds? I greatly doubt it. Throwing in Cook with #30 might get us up to the late teens, maybe. But maybe not. Any team we trade him to knows they are likely to have trouble signing him at what most would consider a reasonable valuation. It is $15M AAV he talked about.

Good point, Bill. $3.8M for four years, he's receiving. Getting that bonus check will take a huge weight off his shoulders.

I'd agree, he's an asset on the field. Just not a $15M asset, and not really close. My guess is that Cook is going to hold on unless they do indeed come close to $15M, and that that will turn the Bills off. Cook will be here next year whether they extend him or not. 2026? Now, that's up in the air. I don't quite get your point when you say that Beane has knocked down these contracts with hometown discounts and that Cook will be paid about what he wants. Why would we treat Cook better than we treated the others? Who's gotten away for big money? Tremaine Edmunds. Harrison Phillips got more than the Bills probably wanted to give him. Stephon Gilmore. Beane went public about how he wanted Robert Woods back but just couldn't afford him at that time. Guys get big paydays from here sometimes. No reason to think Cook won't, particularly if he insists on close to that number. And I couldn't blame him if he did. RBs in particular have to cash in quick. But I wouldn't pay him much more than $10M. $10 or $11M would put him sixth in AAV behind McCaffrey, Jonathan Taylor, Saquon, Alvin Kamara and Josh Jacobs. It's above Derrick Henry.

I'm sure that a bond must be part of it. But you're almost always going to get some discount when you sign guys this early. Players are highly aware of what could happen if they don't sign and get injured in the 4th year. Or have a bad year, or whatever. Getting the big payday and a big hunk of cash early is huge for these guys.