Thurman#1

GamePass (or international GamePass for me) has a mode called "Game in 40' ". So you can watch all the offensive plays in around 20 mins. It's too disorienting for me, personally. I never use it. Too little time between plays.

Not sure I buy that rumor, but if you love Burrow and you don't believe in Tagovailoa and you aren't getting Burrow for less, it might be a good idea. Not sure all those ifs are reasonable, but it's interesting anyway. Especially since they have three 1sts this year it's more reasonable. Make that trade and you then will have a first next year to start putting talent around your guy.

If Pennington hadn't been injured, we'd have been speaking of him in hushed tones. The guy was terrific. Look up his 2002 season and compare it to other QBs that year. Tore his rotator cuff twice, though, and was never again able to throw the ball with enough zip to be more than fairly effective. From a "What if Pennington had never gotten hurt" article: "The numbers partially describe how great Pennington was before he got hurt. Before that fateful game in Buffalo, he had completed 65.7% of passes in his career. He had 49 touchdowns against 22 interceptions. He had a 94.7 rating. And his team had won 19 of his 30 starts. He was averaging 7.3 yards per attempt in a span where that put you in the top five in the league. When Pennington got hurt in 2004, he was completing 68.2% of his passes with 8 touchdowns, 2 interceptions, and a 99.1 rating. The Jets were 6-1 at the time. The numbers do not tell the whole story, however. It wasn't just about them. "Everybody remembers how the Patriots won three of four Super Bowls from 2001 to 2004. Not many remember what happened the one year in that stretch when they did not go all the way. The Jets came to Foxborough Week 16. The Pats, Jets, and Dolphins were in a tight race for the AFC East title. A Patriots win would have eliminated the Jets and left New England in control of its own destiny. A Jets win kept Gang Green alive and put New England in deep trouble. "Pennington lit up Bill Belichick's defense that night to the tune of 22 for 33 for 286 yards, 3 touchdowns, and no interceptions. Tom Brady was 19 for 37 with 133 yards, 1 touchdown, and 1 interception. In the middle of the Patriots dynasty, Pennington went up to Foxborough in a huge spot, outplayed Brady, and carried the Jets to a win. The next week, Pennington threw 4 touchdown passes as the Jets routed a Brett Favre led Packers team playing for the top seed in the NFC 42-17. This won the AFC East for the Jets. In the first round of the Playoffs, Pennington hit 19 of 25 for 222 yards and 3 more touchdowns as the Jets blew out Peyton Manning's Colts 41-0 before the dream season ended the next week in Oakland. "When Pennington returned from his first injury in 2004, he took the Jets on the road in the first round and hit 22 of 33 for 279 yards and 2 touchdowns as the Jets registered an overtime upset win against the Chargers. A week later against the Steelers, Pennington and the Jets took over the ball on their own 24 with the game tied 17-17 and 6:00 to go. The crowd in Pittsburgh was going nuts. Facing the number one defense in the NFL and a 15-1 team, Pennington hit passes for 22 and 17 yards to get the Jets into field goal range. Doug Brien missed the kick and then another as the Jets lost in overtime. "Far from being the limited guy with a ceiling, Pennington was a top statistical quarterback building a clutch big game resume. He looked like a guy headed for greatness." https://www.ganggreennation.com/2013/3/27/4154264/new-york-jets-what-if-wednesday-what-if-chad-pennington-hadnt-gotten Feel free to disagree, it's a fan article, but there really is very good reason to believe Pennington would have been exceptional if not injured. I've always felt this way, but until this article, I hadn't remembered that even after the second operation he was second in league MVP voting in 2008 in Miami. I knew that was a good year but I didn't remember it was that good. He was going to be a player if the rotator cuff hadn't gone.

Many. All should. It's far from the be-all and end-all but it's important. It's also still a bit early in the life cycle of this team to get them. In the 3rd and 4th years of Belichick's reign in NE, they got no comp picks. Whereas in year 5 when he was mostly dealing with his own players, he got a 3rd, a 5th and a 7th. And Belchick values comp picks very highly indeed, as do the Ravens, the Steelers, Packers, etc. And as pointed out above, they're even more valuable now that they're tradeable.

Don't see any LT problem, really. He's not terrific, but he's good. Other than that, concerned? Yeah, sure. Until the season starts, everybody should be concerned about their team. Injuries, regression, stuff happens. Not terribly concerned, though, and certainly not so early in the offseason.

Yup, and I'd argue you should replace "decent" with "good."

If you call that dissing Rosen, you'd have to say that he also dissed the Miami Dolphins. When the interviewer said Brady was available, Ross said he didn't think Brady would be interested in coming to the Dolphins as they weren't good enough now. It sure wasn't a vote of confidence, but probably 25 or 26 teams wish their QB was better, though not all the owners would say it publicly.

"... often looked like a jail break" is a huge exaggeration. Yeah, there was definitely room for improvement. But they were above average last year, IMO, though only slightly so. They looked to me like a group that improved as the year went along and they got some continuity together, a group that needed a spot improvement or two rather than wholesale improvements. I expect another move or two before the season start but maybe none of those producing a starter. And they weren't five guys last year, more like four and a platoon at RT. Still plenty of time for some changes at LT in terms of one or both getting better and taking over or them bringing somebody else in.

No. Minshew didn't go 6-6. That was the Jacksonville Jaguars team ... in games started by Minshew. I mean, if someone wants to pretend that whether or not a defense plays well or a field goal kicker missing or making a kick is caused by a QB, they should feel free, but pretending is what is happening. The official name of that stat isn't "QB Record." It's "Team Record in Games Started By This QB (Regular Season)". And there's a reason for that. Way way way too many other variables than QB performance. You judge a QB by how well the QB plays. Not by how well the defensive line plays or whether the running back fumbles. I like Minshew and it's very reasonable to say that he played worse than Foles, but an awful lot of that was because Foles was awful.

... which makes it hard for defenses to predict what you'll do well and what you'll do poorly, which is often an advantage for young QBs when they first play. That did come into play here, as shown by the fact that his passer rating for the season was 91.2, and that in his first five games he exceeded that three times (60% of the time), whereas in his remaining nine games, he only exceeded it three times, 30% of the time. Minshew went downhill. Whereas it was the opposite for Josh. After the NE game in week 4 (exceeded his average passer rating one time in those four games), he was much better the rest of the year, exceeding his average in seven out of twelve games). He improved in nearly every way, measureable and non-measureable, after those first four games.

Yeah, I could see him. Funchess, maybe. Beasley or Quinn, maybe at DE. They'll have a salary ceiling for people and we'll see a bunch of guys they'd have wanted get signed for more money than the Bills want to pay, IMO. Van Noy? I'm really looking forward to this.

Oh, I thought it was a top 100 draft. In the top 32, it's not a surprise that Lawson and Phillips don't make that, IMO. Thanks for posting it. Fun read.

People thought that last year before we drafted Ford. You're right that we can roll with that, but will we? Anyway, I like the signing.

Fans seem to think so, but the idea just doesn't make sense, especially when you're comparing him to picking up Harvin as the 2nd-worst. This defense has been excellent the past two years with Star in the middle. McDermott has proved a lot of things the past three years but if there's one above all others, it's that he knows how to build a defense. If he thinks he needs a guy like Star, if he pays that much, if he brings him in as a guy he knows a ton about from his time coaching him for years at his previous stop, if he plays him consistently and if the defense is flat-out excellent ... then yeah McDermott needs him and thinks he's doing a good job. With Harvin on the other hand, he was seen coming in as a massive injury risk, having played in 14 games the previous two years combined, and - who'da think it? - turned out to be a massive injury risk, playing five games for $6M. Clay and Harvin were the worst two by a long way. It's fair to say the two safeties were maybe the two best. The D has been terrific at pass defense all year and those two are two of the biggest reasons for that.

The article is looking at the period since 2015. Since 2015? Percy Harvin comes immediately to mind. $6 mill if I remember and a smidge over 200 yards for it. EDIT: Nope, Harvin's a distant second. Having gone back to look at 2015 again I have the definitive answer. That was the year they wildly overpaid Charles Clay. Clay wasn't a bad player but for those who think we paid too much for Lotulelei, look at the Clay deal. Lotulelei at least plays a position that our coach needs filled, and he performs on a defense that has been terrific since he got here and costs less than the offense does. (Offense $74M, Defense $63M this year according to overthecap.com) Clay got 20% more in guaranteed cash than Jimmy Graham at that time and twice the percentage Gronk got. The Bills signed him to work with Manuel or Cassel, but Tyrod won the competition and was never threw much or well to the deep or intermediate middle. And it was originally a $38M contract over 5 years with more than $20M guaranteed, but it also had a $10M roster bonus in his third year, and the Bills ended up paying that as well. Awful contract. The new regime hasn't got a contract in the Harvin - Clay neighborhood of badness.

Yes, that is indeed how to think of it. A huge percentage of 6th and 7th rounders don't turn into much. That is the expectation and if you do end up beating the odds, you've done well. Genius is far too strong, but you've been very successful if you get much more than STs guys And our WR group is not full of bums. John Brown and Cole Beasley are for real. Did we need WRs in 2018? Yeah. Thing is we needed players at pretty much every position. And that draft looking back is starting to look like a very good one, though it will depend on Allen's development in the end.

Beasley. John Brown. So that's just wrong. As for drafting WRs, Beane has spent one 6th rounder and one 7th, and that's it. Yeah, it only brought in McCloud and Proehl. But that's not so much picking WRs badly as it is not spending any resources on them. Fair enough if you want to include the trade for Kelvin Benjamin (who was not a good pickup by any means, but without whom we don't make the playoffs in 2017, as Benjamin was crucial in winning two games) but the Zay pick was made by McDermott and Whaley while Beane was still in Carolina. And again, Beasley and Brown were excellent pickups, so Beane has not been brutal by any means. It's very reasonable not to have much confidence in him being able to pick a good WR. He hasn't used any real draft capital to try. He's got a lot to prove. But Beane's WR picks so far don't show any inability either.

I don't think you can call the trade-up for Allen business as usual. It was a very specific thing for a very specific need. Trading up for a franchise QB is a move they absolutely felt they had to make, without a guy like that on the roster and with their rebuild starting with no pick higher than 10th in either of the first two years. The Edmunds pick was one where they had two third-rounders left and were able to give away one and still be able to make a pick in the third. They had tried to trade up higher for a QB, as high as Denver at #5, and would likely have been willing to trade away the pick they traded for Edmunds. It's possible they would have made the trade even if they didn't have that second 3rd rounder, but as far as business as usual ... even including the Allen trade, Beane hasn't traded away any pick without either having made two picks in an earlier round (he traded away the 2019 4th, but had already made four draft picks, a first, a second and two thirds in Singletary and Knox, and the Allen pick when he traded away two 2018 2nds leaving him without a 2nd, but having already made two picks in the first). In fairness, McDermott and Whaley did leave that kind of a blank round in the 4th in 2017. But we haven't seen Beane do that yet, though that certainly doesn't rule out the possibility. In fact, it seems likely they'll do it soon in later rounds, if not this year then soon. You're right that they do trade up for guys like Ford and Knox, but those involved smaller picks being traded away and again, Beane didn't leave any blank rounds unless he'd already essentially made that round's pick but in an earlier round. And yeah, having Brady was huge, but the Pats have stockpiled picks not just through comp picks. They've also consistently traded a lot, trading down quite a bit more than they traded up. https://www.sbnation.com/nfl/2017/4/15/15164566/nfl-draft-trades-patriots-won-bill-belichick https://www.pro-football-reference.com/teams/nwe/draft.htm

Certainly possible, but I doubt they would make any trade that would require then to give away their third-rounder. I mean, if someone they thought was a top seven pick fell, yeah, possible. But when you're trying to build through the draft, a third-rounder is a pick you want to cash in on. We'll see.

Fair enough if you think so. But year after year guys don't work out at the combine, there's a fan firestorm about it along with a few quotes from scouts and pundits, and then the guy goes about where expected. The teams don't seem to care, which makes total sense to me, personally.

This was a story reporting on something said in another story. When you go to the original story, here's what was said: "2. The Bills showed plenty of interest in running backs at the combine. In the past, McDermott has made a point about having a veteran leader in every position room. It looks like the team will lose Frank Gore in that role as he mulls retirement and will become a free agent in a few weeks. The question is whether Devin Singletary needs another veteran in the room or if he’s ready to assume that role after learning from Gore for a year." There's nothing here ... nothing but a guess.

Trying to trade him for either of those two? At the end of last year? Please. Packaged is right, it would have taken an awful lot more in the package than Lawson. And neither of those guys makes us competitive for a Super Bowl last year. They don't get us over that hump.

Aargh. I edited to try to make it clearer. And you've already posted. Sorry. I'll try again. The $22.5M, the "original cap hit," is a sum that only makes sense when the guy is on the team. When he's on the team, all $22.5M is applied to the cap. From the perspective of the team, all $22.5M is positive, it's added to the cap, both what you are calling the "savings pot" and what will become the "dead money pot," though it's not dead money till he's cut. All positive. That's no longer true when he's cut. When he's cut, the dead money is still positive. It's still applied to the cap. But the salary, roster bonus and workout bonus are NOT applied to the cap anymore. They're negatives, and must be subtracted from what the old cap was. They work against that amortized but unapplied portion of the bonus. Now, how can you take subtract $20M (salary, roster and workout bonuses) saved from the cap and add $2.5M applied to the cap and come up with $22.5M? Or rather a negative (saved) $22.5M? Put another way, everyone here clearly agrees that the salary, roster bonus and workout bonus equal $20M and are NOT applied to the salary cap anymore since the cut. They are savings. So $20M has been saved without in any way accounting for the dead money. And yet people are saying that the total cap impact is $20M, the same $20M. Before considering the dead money, the saved money is $20M and after considering the dead money, the saved money is the same? How is that possible? Is the dead money not any factor on how much is saved and spent when you cut a guy? Still willling to apologize big-time if someone can explain this to me sensibly. But I just learned I have another big project that I have to work on through early Monday your time, so I won't be able to reply till then.

Gunner, I totally see that you are not applying it twice. In fact, if you're saying that to find the total cap impact you must now take what you're calling the "savings pot" and then subtract from it the "dead money pot," then you're saying what I'm saying. That makes sense to me, with the proviso that total cap hit is only important if the guy is still on the team. When he's cut the two figures can't be added, as the "saved money" is now subtracted from the cap since it's not paid, whereas the "dead money pot," is still applied to the cap (though depending on the "Post June 1st Release" designation, a bunch of the money may be applied next year, though it's not relevant for Dareus). Adding them together as positive numbers at that point makes no sense at all. The other folks talking about this here, on the other hand, have the "saved pot" as $22.5M, precisely because they include what you do and then also add in the unapplied portion of the amortized signing bonus there. And then also use the same money again, over in dead cap. The way you're doing it, though, the saved money is essentially all of the unspent money, the pluses, the money you expected to spend but can now save. And the dead money is all of the minus money, the money you must apply to the salary cap now. So if you want to calculate the total cap impact of cutting a guy (not just the impact on one year but the total impact on team cap), you take the savings pot and you subtract the dead money pot. And that leaves you with a total cap impact of $17.5M. I'm not just looking at this year's impact, as many of them appear to be doing. I'm looking at the total impact of cutting the guy. $17.5M. Am I misrepresenting what you said?

Yes. Many don't remember DC Buddy Ryan actually physically attacking OC Gilbride on the sideline for not running the ball and burning clock. The surprise onside kick was also brilliant, saving the Bills a ton of time when it was successful.