Thurman#1

They trailed by 20 - 10 in the game vs. the 49ers, right? And then didn't they do enough to catch up and win? Exactly as history says they will do. Did I say that KC doesn't go to OT? Or did I say that they have consistently done enough to win and not much more? And did they? Did they get behind and quickly come back, doing what they needed to do? The Chiefs offense did just what they needed to do to win, not much more. Which is their tendency. Which is my point. Mahomes had a rough game with some bad decisions in that 2021 season game that they lost. And the Cincy defense played very well. In both games. That shouldn't be questioned. but I watched that game as you probably did, and Mahomes was not so good. Not so much this year - which gives me hope - but over the past few years if an opponent wanted KC's offense to get potent and start scoring, all they needed to do was have their own offense start putting up points. The Bills have been the best at scaring the Chiefs. And by the way, the one problem the Bills D has had over the past few years is an inability to rush well. When they brought in Von before the injury it looked like they were going to be able to hassle Mahomes enough to knock him off his game. Unfortunately Von got injured and while he seems better, he is not the same as he was. This is a very legitimate concern about this D, that they don't have that one guy with a jet-assisted get-off. Makes it hard to defend against great QBs. Nope, that would be your logic. But go ahead, find a place where I said that.

Really? OK, sorry, let me point out what I think is the logical flaw there. You are assuming that if one thing changed in those games that everything else would have stayed the same. Which isn't a reasonable assumption. Again, the Chiefs offense seems to do just what they need to do to win. If the other team doesn't score much, the Chiefs often don't score much either. If the other team does score a lot, it seems to light a fire under Mahomes' butt and he performs better, again doing what it takes to win. That's how they've looked mostly for years now.

Ray is dead. So those appear to be more hallucinations. Did the hallucination say why Mahomes plays best vs. Buffalo? Did they say that it might well be because the Chiefs play their best when behind or under pressure? And that the Bills offense does that better than nearly any other? Because that is the pretty clear (and IMO reasonable) view of the Chiefs offense. They have turned it on when they needed it.

Then your numbers don't show what you think they do. What you have there are QB stats. They are not team stats. You're also apparently misunderstanding my point. I don't believe I every said anything like, "if we forced an INT or multiple INT's [sic] or reduced a completion % by 8 points, that it just wouldn't matter."

Nobody can have an intelligent response to this. What, precisely, do those numbers represent? And what, specifically, do you feel that these numbers show?

Yup. https://www.nytimes.com/athletic/1167351/2019/08/29/is-your-guy-ready-for-the-league-inside-the-bills-decisions-meetings-and-scouting-trips-that-led-to-josh-allen/ "Beane knew this decision would define him as a general manager, so he meticulously laid out a plan. He and assistant general manager Joe Schoen studied the prospects extensively on film in August and made plans to see them live that fall. They saw Louisville’s Lamar Jackson play against N.C. State. They schmoozed their way onto the field at USC to watch Sam Darnold and Josh Rosen go head to head from the sideline. Beane relayed his findings to McDermott throughout the fall. 'He would go out and scout and come back, and there’s not a lot of GMs that do that,” McDermott said. “Some do, some don’t. He goes out, which I like. I appreciate that. It makes it harder on us during the week sometimes because we can’t do sitdown face to face. That said, player acquisition and knowing who’s out there is important.' "McDermott knew he needed to start scouting quarterbacks earlier than he had the previous year. When the Bills flew to Atlanta for their Week 4 upset win over the Falcons, McDermott spent the time in the air watching film of Allen. “'First thing that jumps off the film is how big he is, and you think about our weather here that we get and how much we needed a guy that you didn’t question the arm strength as the top guy,' McDermott said. "With Beane scouting live and McDermott watching tape, the Bills’ brain trust started to formulate baseline opinions on the quarterbacks. Neither one had overseen the process of scouting and drafting a quarterback, but they drew on their prior experiences to know what they wanted in their franchise guy. Beane had been around for Cam Newton and Jake Delhomme in Carolina. McDermott saw Newton and Donovan McNabb when he was in Philadelphia." And then from the Senior Bowl: “It’s a little intimidating, walking into a room with unknown coaches, unknown faces and them sitting down expecting you, getting ready to drill you with questions,” Allen said. “They have video up. That part was just the most nerve-racking part. Everyone else was just kind of meeting in the hotel where we were at with everybody, nothing crazy. I remember walking into that room and greeting coach McDermott first and then everybody else. It was definitely an eye-opening experience.“ And then from their visit to Laramie: "The next morning, Daboll put Allen through a workout. “'We threw a lot of footballs that day,' Allen recalled. "With every pass, Allen had the owner of the Bills standing by filming. “'That’s the coolest part about it,' Allen said. 'As I was going through drills, Mr. Pegula was filming me on his phone, like in my face as I was dropping back, going through all of these progressions. It was awesome to know the owners of the Buffalo Bills are very hands-on and very active in what they want to really accomplish with their franchise here.' "While Allen was going through a strong workout, Schoen got an alert on his phone. The New York Jets had traded the No. 6 pick and two second-round picks to the Colts to move up three spots to the No. 3 pick. “'We’re all like, "Oh man how is this going to work out?” 'McDermott said. 'He had a really good workout and it’s one of those deals where you leave that workout, it’s like leaving the store and you’re saying, "That’s a really cool whatever," but you’re leaving saying, "I don’t know if I can get that.’ It’s kind of bittersweet, like what did we come out here for?” Did McDermott make the decision? Hell, no. That's Beane's job. But was McDermott involved in the decision? Absolutely yes.

What are the odds the Chiefs have their best offensive game in the postseason vs the Bills in the AFCCG? Yeah, pretty high. What would the odds be against any other defense in the league? Yup, also pretty high. When playing well, the Chiefs seem to become almost unstoppable, at least in the postseason. Same with the Bills under Allen. Both guys, aided by the rules that make QBing and route-running easier have been almost eerie in their ability to be spectacularly productive. Mahomes slightly more so than Allan. That ... is what has happened. Yeah, I'm not arguing that the Chiefs have been sensational on offense in the playoffs recently. Have you seen me arguing that? If you had, you ought to really let me have it. But let's be honest, you haven't. I haven't made that argument. So don't act like I have. It's intellectually dishonest. As for all those other teams "not letting them play one of their best offensive games" against the Chiefs in the playoffs, yeah, I remember all of those games where other teams had the Chiefs down by less than a score and the Chiefs offense had the ball at the end and were coming down the field and those other defenses rose up, stomped the Chiefs and knocked them out of the playoffs. Yeah, I remember well, there was the .... the ... um, the ... er, um. Give me a few weeks on that. Three Super Bowl championships tell you. This Chiefs offense has done what they needed when they needed it. Nobody has stopped them when they were playing well. Pretending it's only the Bills says more about you than about other teams. The only team that stopped 'em was the Bengals that one year, and honestly that looked more like Cincy lucked into Mahomes just having a terrible game. Oh, and the Bills defense against the Bengals was pretty bad. So was the Bills offense, including Allen. So was the STs. The whole team appeared absolutely emotionally devastated a And that's not even mentioning the swatch of injuries to our defense in two of those years, specifically to the best players on our defense. When it's a fact, it's not an excuse, it's a justification.

Yeah, it's really sad how the Bills can't seem to stop the Chiefs offense and all those other teams do. For instance, there's the ... um ... all those teams that stopped them consistently when they needed a successful drive to win ... um ... the uh ... the uh. Hmm, it's almost as if they won those SBs for good reason.

Everyone else we've played in the playoffs after the team came together in 2020. That's who. Including the Colts, who we held to 24 points though they were averaging 28.2 PPG for the season. And again, it was the defense who salted that game away. Up three, the Bills got the ball back with 6:13 to go in the 4th Q, and a chance to ice it. But Indy forced 'em to punt. The Colts got the ball back with 2:30 left on the clock, a ton of time left to go when you only need a field goal to tie. But the defense absolutely throttled them, finally leading them to have to go for a hail mary on 4th and 11 from the Buffalo 47 with 0:04 left on the clock. Lost the ball on downs as time ran out. Oh, and defensive EPA is as much on the offense and the STs as the D. It's highly affected by field position when you get the ball. Not to mention that Expected Points matter a whole hell of a lot less than the actual ones. Which again, amounted to 24 for Indy, significantly below their season average.

Yeah, OK, though not sure how that disagrees with anything I said. Again, when the Chiefs are playing really well, they can beat pretty much any defense., or at least in past years Same with our offense.

We really haven't. In fact we've had very good regular season defenses - borderline elite? Well, maybe - produce very good results in the postseason until they ran up against the Kansas City Chiefs. Who have won a number of SB titles mostly because nobody could stop their offense when it was firing on all cylinders. Though the Chiefs defense was also pretty good. Except when they ran up against the Bills who kinda ripped them apart as well. If we'd won the coin flip in the 13 seconds game, we would have won the game. They couldn't stop us. The two are somewhat mirror images, with the Chiefs being a bit better, damn it. There is the one other game, the Bengals game, but our whole team played listless, both offense and defense. They looked to me like they were simply emotionally emptied by the Hamlin thing, the home game being moved, the mass shooter, Knox's brother dying, the dozens killed in the blizzards, and so on. If you want to include that game, fair enough, go ahead, but include the offense also. As for how confident I am ... reasonably. Not without reservations, but reasonably confident that if the offense plays well the defense if they're healthy can do enough to keep us in a game with anyone.

Yeah, he's very good. Nah, gotta disagree, "everybody eats" work fine. We scored a lot. Including many plays that didn't involve Cooper. Coop was in 31% of our offensive snaps. We did fine with and without him, same as it's been since he got here. We're apparently better with him. But everybody eats works, if your QB is Josh Allen and you've got our personnel. I'm sure they'll be open to bringing him back, but it'll depend on money, contract, situation and so on. I'd like to see it, myself, if they can work it out.

Not surprised you don't have the energy. It's tough being that wrong that consistently. And it must be irritating too, you're a smart guy, you're not usually this wrong, particularly so obviously. I mean, you got all macho and said you "did the work and checked the facts," but what you really meant was that you did a deep dive on how Cooper's numbers could be made to look bad. Without bothering to show any comparisons of the numbers to anyone else's, except if I remember correctly, a very very quick overall Amari Cooper and JaMarr Chase. And that's a stupid comparison from instant one. Cooper was never in Chase's league. Of course Cooper is going to have more unproductive games; Cooper gets many fewer targets and has DeSean Watson and Jacoby Brissett throwing to him rather than Joe Burrow the last four years. Clearly the comparisons you were making were the wrong ones, comparing Cooper to true #1s. Which is dumb. They get far more targets than Cooper has and that's the reason they have fewer unproductive games. You also got so weirdly twisted up about this that you have to make dumb arguments like saying that Cooper's Under 30 and Under 40 numbers are "a little worse" than Deebo's (in reality Cooper's numbers were 1% higher at Under 40 and 1% lower at Under 30). That isn't lower. It's the same. Same with Sutton and Pickens, the differences are 1% or 2% different, statistically completely insignificant. Your rabid opinions on this force you to pretend there are differences there. The point is obvious. When you compare Cooper to his peers as you should, all of them have very similar numbers, Cooper's 35% and 28% to Sutton's 35% and 26% and also Cooper's 35% and 28% to Pickens' 34% and 26%. Virtually the same. Right around the top of the bell curve, very close. Because, simply, that's how stats work for guys who are much the same type of player with roughly the same opportunities.

Great stuff. Glad you had a wonderful time!!!!

He really isn't conservative, dude. The stats speak to that, he's statistically top ten most aggressive at going for 1sts on 4th down for instance. He certainly was conservative his first couple of years. But he's changed.

First, those might have been blunders. Or might not. Hard to know what would have happened if they'd done something different. But let's say they are blunders, 100%, for argument's sake. Did he have some good calls in the rest of the game? Was everyone else on our team perfect? You can pick two or three plays out of a loss and blame it on virtually anyone. There'll be drops, there'll be plays Allen missed his guy or went to the wrong guy, missed tackles, a fumble ... it goes on and on. Blaming it all on McDermott with that little causation just speaks to not liking the guy. There are legit arguments against some of his decisions. But there are also terrific calls, and folks on your side don't mention those. Oh, and I think we've got a really good shot at beating the Ravens. Particularly at home. I'm with you in that I'd rather see any team other than KC and then the Ravens. But we can beat any team this year. Also we could lose, particularly to KC, the Ravens and maybe the Bengals if Burrow is on a heater.

Agreed with virtually all of this, Bill, until the last couple of sentences. I could be wrong of course, but I don't think Amari gets anywhere near $26M from anyone at his age and with his production this year. Now, if he absolutely destroys the playoffs, I'll be forced to eat my hat on this, but my guess is more like $18M - maybe $20M as his ceiling (excepting one of those wildly high unguaranteed years at the end of the contract that he'll never actually be on the roster for). Again, I could be wrong, but that's my guess.

More like I proved you don't know how stats work. Or more strictly, you proved it, not me. Oh, and you're dead right when you say that comparing Andre Reed is not fair because he came from a different era. Quite right. Which is why I said the exact same thing before you did. Do you actually read the posts you respond to? As for the six guys in my main comparison, though, you're dead wrong, and very obviously. Here's how the comparisons look. DeVonta's numbers are slightly better than Cooper's, but close. Both are in the center of the bell curve. Yes, DK's numbers, as I said, are a lot better. Very impressive. That's a very significant difference. Which is why I said so in my post. You say he's much better as if you're proving me wrong, when you're only agreeing with me. Again, it's as if you don't even read most of the post before you respond. Aiyuk is also better, but the difference is not large. They both fit right into the fat part of the bell curve, around 27 - 36%. You say that Deebo is used differently, and I have to admire you on that one. Excellent red herring. That's a sweet little diversion tactic, a really nice little straw man. In the passing game, they're used much the same, and in fact make an excellent comparison. Their pass yards per year are almost exactly the same, to the yard. Comparing a guy who puts up about 797 yard per year in the pass game over his career to a different guy who puts up 798 yards per year ... well, it's an excellent comparison. Duh. Now, if you threw running stats in, yeah, it would be a horrible comparison. But I didn't do that. In the passing game, they're an extremely sensible comparison. Deebo has 34% to Amari's 35% of Under 40, and 29% (higher) to Amari's 28% in Under 30. So when you say So when you say that Deebo is "a little better than Cooper," at having fewer games of lesser impact in the pass game, that is what we in the business call "wrong." Or at the absolute best, very misleading. In the real world, outside your fervid little imagination, when a guy is 1% higher at one of the two stats, and 1% lower at the other, that is virtually the same. The differences are statistically insignificant. To pretend otherwise says far more about your desperation to be right about this than it does about what the numbers actually say. Like Deebo, Courtland Sutton and George Pickens are also virtually the same as Cooper, the difference is statistically insignificant. Cooper's 35% and 28% to Sutton's 35% and 26% Cooper's 35% and 28% to Pickens& 34% and 26%. Statistically insignificant differences.

I always enjoyed it when announcers referred to guys I'd never seen like Y.A. Tittle or Otto Graham. I'd go read about them and I'd feel like I had some sense of their style. Always made me feel like I was getting deeper into the world of football. Oh, and I like Harlan. Last time I saw Jim Brown he was threatening to mount a comeback in his sixties. And he looked tough and capable enough even then that it almost seemed like he still had a shot.

You've mentioned these numbers several times, percentage of games of under40 yards and under 30 yards. Thought I would do a bit of research on that. Figured I’d start with the six guys I just mentioned above as being good receivers but not top ten true #1 types. Those gus would likely get targets far close to Cooper-type numbers. Here they are, along with the results: DeVonta Smith Under 40 17/62 (27%) Under 30 13/62 (21%) DK Metcalf Under 40 21 /96 (22%) Under 30 12 / 96 (13%) Deebo Samuel Under 40 27/ 80 (34%) Under 30 23 / 80 (29%) Brandon Aiyuk Under 40 20/ 69 (29%) Under 30 13 / 69 (19%) Courtland Sutton Under 40 34 /96 (35%) Under 30 25/96 (26%) George Pickens Under 40 16 / 47 (34%) Under 30 12 / 47 (26%) Metcalf looks terrific in this company, far fewer days with lower numbers. Everyone else looks grouped around the same sort of range, around 27 – 36% for under 40yards, and 19 – 26% for Under 30 yards. Exactly as you'd expect, a rough bell curve and Cooper in the midst of the biggest gathering near the middle of the curve. Thought I’d check Golden Tate, an old favorite of mine, just for the hell of it, too. He’s got a few more games of lower production than Coop. Golden Tate Under 40 67/159 (42%) Under 30 43/159 (27%) This is just how these kinds of numbers look. Then I thought since I’m looking up favorites, why don’t I check Andre Reed. Needless to say, I figured in that era, numbers of lower games would be a bit higher, as the rules hadn’t yet been adjusted to favor the passing game yet. But as I watched Andre I always thought of him as tremendously smooth and consistent. This one’s more for fun than for the comparison, but yeah, Andre was far from consistent if you just look at his lower games, same as anyone would be Andre Reed Under 40 90/229 (39%) Under 30 63/229 (28%) Not as far away as I'd have expected. Hunh.

Yeah, he is spot on. Precisely so. Nearly everyone who's not a real top ten guy fits into the 35 - 45% range. As does Amari. It's what happens, due to variance, to guys who don't get the huge numbers of targets that the top ten guys do. You are obviously comparing him to guys who get a lot more targets. Getting that many targets smooths out the variance, and make it easier at higher target per game numbers to reach the lower numbers you are referring to. Again, look at guys outside of the true #1s and you see his numbers are well within the normal range. They just are. Again, you said this, "The number of games he has under 50, under 40, even under 20 yards is higher than what top end WR1s should have." And again, comparing him to true #1s in ingenuous. He's not one of those guys. He never was. He's never gotten the target numbers they get. You also say, "Go compare how many games Chase has under 20 yards compared to how many Copper has." And again, Cooper doesn't get the number of targets that Chase gets ... not to mention that Chase has had Burrow throwing to him rather than lesser figures who were throwing to Cooper. Oh, and will you stop pretending that I am against you as to whether we should re-sign him? If you're curious about what i think - why would you be? And yet you keep bringing it up in your replies to me - go read what I've written about it. It's not that far back. Till you do that, stop replying to me about it. I've never mentioned it since you and I started talking. Yes, few catches in the last four of his 6 games. But it's just dumb to pretend that we know why that is, and that the reason is that Cooper isn't good enough. Pure nonsense. Is it because he's injured and not as explosive as usual? Maybe. Is it because Josh isn't confident they're on the same page? Likely, IMO, but certainly that meets the Maybe Standard. Is it because they want to save him for the playoffs? Maybe. Is it because he simply hasn't had a lot of snaps? Because he hasn't. Maybe. Is it because he just isn't very good? I greatly doubt it after seeing those terrific plays he made, but t's absolutely not impossible. Could be something else. Fact is, you simply don't know, regardless of how well that fits your narrative. I don't know either, don't get me wrong. But if I've got a narrative it's that we don't know yet how well he'll do. That's far more defensible, not to mention sensible.

Joe Marino in his All-22 review: "Kaiir Elam, definitely not as bad as I think some people felt watching the broadcast tape. "On the one touchdown that he gave up to Kayshawn Boutte, I thought it was a really silly defensive play call on a third and four if I'm not mistaken, just straight man coverage and Drake Maye just hit his back foot and threw it up.It was a great throw, it was a great catch but let's not act like that wasn't sticky coverage. I mean Kaiir Elam was probably an inch away from deflecting that ball. "I thought his run defense and his tackling was really good in this game. And so I don't find myself down on Kaiir Elam. I find myself optimistic with a young player that I think just needs reps. And I think he should absolutely be given an opportunity to be the starter next year. "Again, certainly didn't feel like it was this disaster performance that I think some people are feeling like coming out of the game."

It's very very clear that at this point he's no longer keeping him out because he has no zone experience. That was a year or two ago. At this point they're keeping him out because Benford is better. Douglas also, but not so much lately. Douglas may be coming back to Elam, whether from age or injury or whatever.

Yeah, I get that it's not about that there is variance in the first place. And yes, it's about the significance of the variance. Get all of that and didn't say anything different. The fact that there's a ton of variance means that pretty much everyone has stats that are pretty similar to that, 45% of games under 50 yards is in the ordinary range, 35% - 45% is what people tend to be grouped around. That's the results of variance. There are a few higher than that, most particularly the few true #1s who tend to get an absolute ton of targets. And comparing him to "top end WR1s" is disingenuous. He was never a true #1. He was a top end #2 for most of his career probably, top 20 - 30 or so but he was never a top ten guy, he just wasn't. Although his QBs may have played into that. So yes, MDH is spot on. Yes, game by game, Amari's been a boom or bust type of guy. Nearly everyone is. That's how the stats work if you're not getting top ten targets, for guys like DeVonta Smith, DK Metcalf, Deebo, Aiyuk, Courtland Sutton, George Pickens ... Oh, Nico Collins is at almost 50%, though there are reasons, but that's just the point ... in a lot of games there are reasons, for everyone. Xavier Worthy is way over, though I only mention him because he's on so many people's minds here, apparently, he's not really a fair case study as a rookie.

Hell, no. They hate the Bills.