Thurman#1

Fact: "none of them even came back for a 2nd interview" Completely unsupported opinion: "were basically interviewed for the hell of it"

IMHO, by "solid starter," people tend to mean that a guy is easily in the top 32 QBs in the league. Whether or not your whole team can beat a good team has little to do with that. By that definition anyway, Tyrod is absolutely and without question a solid starter. Yeah, he has more to prove, especially after last year's regression. Teams are looking for more than a solid starter. They want a guy in the top 10 or 12 QBs. In any case, wins is not a QB stat, it's a team stat. QBs should be judged by how well they play QB. Alex Smith is a good QB. A team can win a Super Bowl with him. Bradford last year completed 71.6% of his passes, had 20 TDs and 5 INTs and a passer rating of 99.3. He's a good QB too. Smith and Bradford when he's playing well are both sort of in the very good game manager with real upside category. 7-9? Bottom of the middle of the pack.

It is indeed. For a while it was that he wasn't willing to restructure. Which honestly you could understand with a six-year $92 mill contract. But that was the original report. Then the one that he was willing to re-structure but not willing to give up any money. Feb. 9th: "It's pretty much an either or proposition, because, based on everything I've been told, Taylor is unwilling to agree to a restructured contract that would reduce his pay. He and his agent, Adisa Bakari, are firmly convinced they would receive every bit as much as the Bills would have to pay in accordance with the extension -- if not more -- in the open market." http://buffalonews.com/2017/02/09/vic-caruccis-bills-mailbag-taylor-either-proposition/?utm_campaign=puma&utm_medium=social&utm_source=Twitter#link_time=1486679573 Then the new contract where his pay was reduced. I'm not sure I understand what you're saying, particularly in the first sentence. But before the renegotiation there was a very real argument that the Bills were not going to pick up that option to pay that $30.75 mill guarantee. And he didn't have to be Brady-esque to get that guarantee. He didn't even have to throw a single pass. All he had to do was be on the roster this last March, the third day of the league year and ... boom ... $30.75 mill guaranteed. Schefter's original report that the Bills were not going to pick up that option didn't say they didn't want Tyrod. It said that they weren't going to pay that much for him.

What he said was that he would consider restructuring but was not willing to do so if he had to give up any money. Whoops.

Agreed that what the Bills did was smart and hedged their bets. Yeah, they shortened his deal. But they also made it infinitely easier for them to cut him after one year. With the old deal (assuming they'd taken the option, of course) if they'd cut him after one year, they'd have had to pay a penalty of around $14 - $15 mill in dead money. And the alternative - keeping him on the roster through March 2018 - would have meant guaranteeing him about $24 mill more ($40 mill total guaranteed from the beginning of the contract if he was only on the roster in March 2018 ... minus his 2017 impact). If they'd kept the old deal and picked up the option, to keep him or let him go would have cost the Bills a ton more than the new deal will. Either way the Bills save a ton and Tyrod makes a lot less. In the new deal, Tyrod makes $14 mill less money if he's here for one year and $10 mill less money if he's here for two. And his guarantee, a number players fight like rabid dogs to increase, will also be a lot less.

Shaw, you're wrong about the effect that money will have on the likelihood of him getting cut. The way it's structured will make it extremely easy to cut him. Very very easy. Here are the two choices: 1) Cut him before March of 2018: He'll cost the team $8.6 mill in dead money against the cap 2) Keep him for 2018: He'll cost the team $18 mill against the cap, in salary, a major March roster bonus and the prorated portion of his signing bonus. Cutting him would save them almost $10 mill on the cap. That's not a penalty for cutting him, it's a windfall. And let's not pretend guys don't get cut for money-related reasons even when they beat out (or would beat out) the other QBs on the rosters in the NFL. It happens a lot. Not to the franchise guys, but to the guys farther down, who the team thinks won't allow them to be competitive for a title. And that's Tyrod. Osweiler's a good example, the best QB on that roster but not good enough to make that team competitive, so he's gone before they have any idea what they might get in the draft. We don't know whether or not it's likely. Too much is up in the air in terms of what QBs will be available in the draft when we pick, how much Peterman and Cardale will develop and whether or not Tyrod does as well as they hope in the new system, as well as whether the team and the offense are competitive next year with Tyrod. Unless things fall well for him, it could easily make great sense to cut him. The money is a reason to cut him, not to keep him. They could easily keep him for two but it would be just as easy to cut him.

That's not naivete, its hopefulness and an understanding that the world isn't as predictable as people generally imagine.. Yeah the odds are seriously against it being anyone but Tyrod but stuff happens. Including injuries.

Yeah, I'm focused on the final draft board, since that's what McDermott would have had to know to know that he would have had to leap up ahead of Carolina to get our guy. McDermott would have had to know more than just that Carolina had roughly a 2nd round grade on Dawkins and that he was for example the third-highest ranked tackle on Carolina's board to know that the Bills would have to leap above Carolina or they'd take him. He'd have had to know that Carolina didn't have guys ahead of Dawkins left on their board. Guys at other positions, for example. And there's no way he could have known that from what he'd learned in Carolina before January 2nd when he was contacted about interviewing with the Bills. Would've had to know the Panthers liked Dawkins more than Moton, as you mentioned, but also whether or not there were other guys they were going to pick above those two. Everyone knows the Panthers had a need there and that Dawkins was ranked generally in that area. But they had several needs and for McDermott to have had inside info he'd have had to know much more than that, and again, on January 2nd other than that they - maybe - liked Dawkins in that very general area he wouldn't have had more specific info. Hell, if you look at the Big Boards published by draftniks before the draft, guys like Gil Brandt, Dawkins was in that general area. This wouldn't have been big news for anyone. But again, what is being ignored in all of this is how involved a coach would have been in scouting during the NFL season. Particularly a serious grinder like McDermott. It's not like a DC doesn't have a ton of other work to do during the season. Yeah, coaches get involved, but no almost certainly not much that early in the process. And yeah I know that scouts go to practice and watch it when they visit schools. That's not a trade secret. As I say, yeah, I'm focusing on the draft board itself. That's what's put together so late, and what McDermott would have had to know to make it some kind of dirty trick to skip ahead of Carolina. Of course they discuss the players a ton before that, but they don't rank 'em that early in the way that would have made McDermott's info in any way proprietary. Agreed that narratives are being made up here. And that most of them don't make much sense. And that unless he was getting info pipelined from Beane late in the process - wildly unlikely for many reasons - integrity wasn't an issue here.

Scouting them for years? Maybe the best few. But if they've got so many guys all scouted how come they have to spend so much time looking again at the guys who come out early? They watch them but don't do intensive work on them till they're likely to come out, seniors or guys who're particularly likely to come out for some reason. "At the SEC spring meetings on Tuesday, Saban said he’s part of a committee working with the NFL on the idea of “Junior Day” combine on campuses in the spring after their second year. The grades that underclassmen can currently get from the NFL are only based on film, and the results can be inaccurate." http://coachingsearch.com/article?a=Nick-Saban-working-with-NFL-on-Junior-Days-to-help-scout-underclassmen-more-accurately And yeah they have scouting meetings and collect info throughout the season but that's to collect and synthesize all the info on each guy. There's too much info coming in and being integrated on each guy to start ordering guys that early, Yolo. As for scouting meetings, the scouts are on the road through the whole season. They don't come home for anything, certainly not for meetings, through the season. They send reports is what they do. After the college season ends they come home in December and certainly there are a lot of scouting meetings at that point. And the bowl games are for more than confirmation, particularly the Senior Bowl and the all-star bowl games, the Shrine game and so on. Those are huge for any player from smaller conferences. You have to see how they play against big school talent. And you get to see how they practice. Even the standard bowl games are important as extra info, watching to see matchups and so on. But I don't know what teams you're referring to about having their board set up that early. The Bills set theirs up just before the combine as pointed out in the article I linked to. The Panthers set theirs up later still. "The Panthers will spend another week or two evaluating prospects and then set their draft board. In the meantime, fans will continue to hear lots of speculation about what player or players will be at the top of the board." (Article written April 3rd) http://www.charlotteobserver.com/sports/nfl/carolina-panthers/nfl-blog/article142457519.html "General manager Dave Gettleman has said repeatedly what the Carolina Panthers do in free agency will set up the draft." http://www.espn.com/blog/nflnation/post/_/id/233531/panthers-set-up-to-draft-a-running-back-or-tight-end-in-first-round Again, he could've known some guys they liked or were particularly watching but wouldn't have known where they were ranked on their boards. Teams don't rank guys till the info is in. It wouldn't make sense to do so. Teams "know who they have high," yeah, fair enough, but that doesn't mean they're ranked.

The News, and newspapers generally, care extremely little about clicks. They're on a digital subscription-based profit model. There are plenty of click-based folks still out there, Bleacher Report, for instance. But the News don't allow you to access more than 10 stories per month. That shows how much they care about clicks. They care about getting people to value their services enough to subscribe. Sully is careful about his facts. He has plenty of opinions which people are welcome to disagree with or ignore, but yeah, he's paid to react in interesting ways, not to dig up scoops.

Sully's fine. Disliked by people who don't like seeing bad things written about a losing team, but he's fine.

Claiming it is year seven shows nothing more than a respect for facts. It's year seven. That's not the whole picture, but it's a fact. As is the fact that the amount of people who developed after year six into franchise QBs can pretty much be counted on one finger of Rich Gannon's throwing hand. It's highly unlikely Tyrod will manage that. If he did, it would sure be terrific news for the Bills, though. Worth hoping for, But not only should nobody hold their breath, we probably shouldn't even agree to listen to a song we hate every day till it happens.

Not taking up his fifth year option and "likely a FA in 2018" are two wildly different things. We're not taking Sammy's fifth year option. If it looks like a good decision, we'll work hard at re-signing him during or after the year. I'll believe Bridgewater is available when I see it. The difference being Bridgewater has been in the league for three years and Tyrod for six. Meaning Tyrod has most likely approached his ceiling and Bridgewater could easily take a huge leap. Last time we saw Bridgewater was his second year. During which his YPA and completion percentage were better than Tyrod's in his sixth year. And his passer rating was very comparable. Also, Teddy in his two years of play has more fourth quarter comebacks and game winning drives than Tyrod in his last two years. I take Bridgewater in a heartbeat, though Tyrod was maybe a bit better last time we saw both of them. Doubt Bridgewater will be available, though.

Great. We're also gonna have a consolidated thread for the "uppers", right? For all of their "look at me" threads?

He may have known some guys who they liked, but teams don't generally do their boards in January. Hell, the Senior Bowl was January 27th. Here's a story dated Feb. 5th about how the Bills just flew their scouts into town to assemble their board over the next ten days so they can have a first version together before the combine. That's the calendar most teams use. http://www.buffalobills.com/news/article-2/Bills-draft-board-rounding-into-form/8acc2efa-ef5d-4c2c-b3d8-1eba744ec687 The Panthers last game was Dec. 31st and there was a story in the paper on Jan. 2nd that the Bills were going to interview McDermott. And it just was never a mystery that he was a top coaching candidate. The guy's a demon on prep and he's taking time off to supposedly talk college scouting before they've done their post-season analysis? Sorry, the idea just doesn't make sense. Could he have heard some names of guys they liked? Sure. Could he know where they ranked them? Seriously, no. Belichick first put together a terrific locker room of character guys. After that he took some chances. Not many.

Certainly he's better than Fitz was, and worse than Brady. You look at the stats and it looks like Tannehill is passing better than Tyrod, a much higher completion percentage and a considerably longer YPA (8th vs.26th), significantly more INTs but more late-game success than Tyrod (3 fourth quarter comebacks and 3 game-winning drives vs. Tyrod's one and one). But certainly Tyrod runs better. So overall, well, it's not out of the question. I'd take Tannehill, myself. But to each their own, I guess. Neither guy's that great, but I'd take Tannehill's future. No, that's the record of the teams he played for in games he started. The name of that stat is actually "Team Record in Games Started By This QB (Regular Season)". Grading a QB based on how well the defense plays or whether the kicker makes or misses field goals is utterly ridiculous. And if you go back and check the records of the teams he recorded wins or losses for, you find that without McCown they performed slightly worse. He's been on awful teams. But I'd take Tyrod over McCown, though both are bridge guys, IMHO, I think Tyrod's significantly better.

The deadline's May 9th. Teams aren't running to sign guys before that deadline. And at this point what they know of the formula allows them to predict comp picks with roughly 80 - 85% accuracy and that they can often tell which predictions are more or less firm. No, it's not 100%, but the basic rules are well-known since AdamJT13 (I used to read him back in the day and it was insane how accurate he was). No, you can't predict perfectly this early because one of the requirements seems to be that the signed CFAs have to stay on the new team's roster through at least week 10. But that happens most times. You mentioned Blanton getting signed. Last year he earned, what? $10K more than vet minimum? CFAs only count towards comp picks if the average per year of their deal is in the top half of all players on NFL rosters. I suppose it's possible Blanton will get there, but pretty unlikely. I'd doubt Gragg makes that threshhold either. Are comp picks a huge deal? No, but good teams go for small advantages. And if exploited consistently, small advantages over time make a larger and larger difference. It's mostly the best teams in the league that go after these comp picks, though the Niners appear to have hopped the bandwagon as well. All you have to do is think about it when you're making personnel decisions.

Of course there is obsession with comp picks. They're picks. In the NFL draft. Did you not see the obsession with the draft and the picks in it recently? And yeah, the odds are lower later on. Which is pretty much entirely beside the point, which is that some picks from later on make an impact, some even a great impact whereas not having any picks is exactly like the Gretzky quote about not making any of the shots you don't take. You're infinitely more likely to get something from comp picks than if you have no comp picks, which would give you no chance. And as for the original question, after so many people blabbing on and on about how we were going to get tons of picks because of all the FAs we were losing ... nope. No comp picks is what it looks like. Now, which team is more likely to get something from their comp picks in 2018, the Pats who according to overthecap.com have will probably have something like one in the 4th and one in the 5th? The Dolphins who will probably have something like one in the 6th and three in the 7th? Or the Bills and Jets who will likely have a sum total of zero? Exactly.

Yeah, it's speculation. So is who we grab for GM. Speculating about the Buffalo Bills' future is about 90% of what we do here. No need to wait as long as we take it with a grain of salt. Which we should do for any guesswork about the future, really. Particularly approaching the deadest part of the offseason, why not look further ahead? The "we aren't keeping 4 QBs" thing is not the fact that some people seem to be saying it is. Either we are or we aren't but the one thing that's for certain is that it's too early to know. Especially since the rule about not dressing five guys if you think someone's a good developmental candidate, there's room to keep him. And another thing to know is that even assuming we only carry three, Peterman isn't any more likely to go than Cardale or even Yates.

My impression is that if Carucci actually meant no starts, he's wrong. Carolina has a few, Cam, Kelvin Benjamin, and one or two guys on defense as well, if I recall. Looked to me more like the article meant they aren't going to base the team's player acquisition strategy mostly around getting stars as they have in the past. Also the difference between 12 attempts and a bunch more. And it doesn't help if a couple of those attempts were trick plays that had Reggie get the ball way behind the LOS and not heading downfield. Not that I was thrilled with Reggie, but he wasn't given much of a chance. And again, the Buffalo News has no interest in clickbait. Nor do most newspapers. If they did, they sure wouldn't stop you from getting more than ten articles per month. They make their online money from digital subscriptions and thus need people to want and like their articles.

Cracks me up. When people talk about defensive or offensive ranking, they mean yards. Period. It's how this is judged. Until Buffalo does well in scoring for a year. Then suddenly Bills fans change how they evaluate everything. And it will change back if we score poorly but make a lot of yards. Offences are ranked by yards for good reason. Yards figures are much less affected by defence and STs than is scoring. Yards better isolates how well the offence itself is doing. Scoring is affected a ton by field position. Not to mention that defences and STs sometimes actually score points (and the Bills were top ten in that department last year). And the offence had the 11th best average drive start in the league. While leaving the defence the 23rd best average drive starts. Which meant the defence helped the offence while the offence left the D in bad situations. In any case, yeah, we've had a very good run game the last two years, during which we've had bad defences. We've whipsawed back and forth between different offensive and defensive schemes during Whaley's term, and it has killed us. And isn't it possible that that's exactly what the article is about? That Whaley didn't have a vision on team building and so he just brought in players and picked coaches who had their own visions, meaning the team had little or no continuity.

Agreed that it is a bit scary. But Rex's hire seemed to be based on his personality, and McDermott's on his insane commitment, work ethic and preparedness. This doesn't prove anything but it does give me more hope than I had early on in the Rex administration.

It's not about what evidence we as fans have. We'll never have enough evidence of that, fans of any team at any time before that regime has started winning regularly. That's a straw man, right there. Of course we don't have evidence of this. Nor will we till he either builds a good team or doesn't. 2013 offense: 19th 2014 offense: 26th 2015 offense: 13th 2016 offense: 16th In any case, thanks for the thought-provoking article, OP.

In 2002, Pennington was "limited" to 68.9% completions, 22 TDs and 6 INTs, 7.8 YPA and a 104.2 passer rating. And it's gotten a lot easier since then for QBs to get much better stats. At that point, though, those numbers put him 1st in passer rating, 1st in completion percentage, 3rd in YPA, 8th in TDs (after missing the first four games of the season and only playing 12). He led the league in TD rate and was second-best in INT rate as well, which is freakish. He never had a great arm, just good enough, but after those two rotator cuff surgeries he wasn't even good enough. Pennington was looking like an elite QB until the injuries. And the same kind of caveat for Fitz. The problem has never been his arm, it's been his decision-making. You're right that he's never had more than a decent arm, but that was enough. It was his gunslinger tendencies and inconsistency that always caused him problems.

Nah. You don't spend $16 mill to "send a signal" to fans. Not on a salary cap-starved team you don't. Sorry, this makes absolutely no sense. And again, you don't spend $16 mill to trade a guy for what you would get for Tyrod. Again, makes absolutely zero sense. Could Peterman start? Well, it's not impossible, but it won't happen unless he legitimately beats out Tyrod. Which is quite unlikely to happen in his rookie season. Tyrod's offensive coach is a head coach now. Roman is also very highly respected. Coaches weren't the problem with Tyrod. You're right, we'll see. The offense was good because the run game was superb. The pass game was bad. Again, 29 running TDs and 17 passing TDs in a league where not a single other team had more run TDs than pass TDs.