Thurman#1

Nonsense. Allen's turnovers did a hell of a lot more to lose the Broncos game than the (admittedly stupid and unbelievably frustrating) 12 men on the field penalty. They lost six points directly from the two INTs. And that's ignoring the rest of his not very good game. The first INT, they were on the Broncos 28. That's 3 lost points, minimum. The second INT, the Broncos got the ball on the Bills 31 and hit a field goal. That's a six point turnaround minimum, and the Bills lost by two. The stupid 12 men penalty would never have happened, as the Broncos would have needed eight points to tie and would have been forced to go for a TD. Allen was a major factor. Even larger in the Jets game, yes. But really big in both.

You say "he said Mahomes had the 4th most interceptions in 2022 and Brady the 6th most in 2021," did he? I only watched the first three minutes or so because he was so off so many times, but I sure didn't hear him say that. Where does he say that? Can you give me the time where he says that? What I saw, at is that he said that "the last three Super Bowl-winning QBs have been in the top five in INTs," and he shows a graphic where he says that Mahomes was tied for 4th last year. Both objectively wrong.

When you are wrong time after time after time in the micro, your macro ideas can't be taken seriously. When you can't come up with logical and factual reasons to support your main idea, there's likely a problem with that main idea. And "unanimous MVP"? Sorry, man, that's just stupid. It's about as far from unanimous as you can get, as few people think so. Know what happens to guys who should be the unanimous MVP? They win the MVP.

Agree with you on what the MVP is about. 100%. But you're saying that Allen "lost" one game this year? Josh's three turnovers had a massive effect on the Broncos game. And he didn't play all that well in several of our losses. QBs don't lose games anymore than they win them, it's a team stat. But Josh was one of the main reasons for probably three to four of our losses and had bad games in a couple of wins besides. I'm sure he'd agree. He also had some terrific games, and he's played a lot better down the stretch, which is really encouraging.

So, losses against bad teams are OK, because being beaten by bad teams is OK? Also, I think I've come up with a brilliant new quotation here, check it out: "Wins and losses are not a QB stat, they are a team stat." Brilliant fresh new idea, right? Oh, not so fresh? Fair enough, but it's still right on target. You get it, I know, as you're using the slashes there, "Josh/Bills," but it's still being ignored in a lot of arguments here. Lamar has been more consistent this year. Which is really big.

This is a guy pursuing clicks rather than logic. This guy makes mistake after mistake. He says that "the last three Super Bowl-winning QBs have been in the top five in INTs," and he shows a graphic where he says that Mahomes was tied for 4th last year. Um, no, Davis Mills, Dak, Josh, Derek Carr and Cousins all had 13 or more. Mahomes was in a four-way tie for sixth, putting him in the top nine. Not 4th. The same graphic says that Brady was tied for 3rd with 12 the year he won the SB. Yeah, um, wrong again. He also was tied for sixth, though with three other guys. And why the sudden switch to Super Bowl winners? We're talking about MVP winners, aren't we? The year Brady won the SB, he wasn't the MVP. Rodgers was, throwing 5 INTs. The next year, when Stafford was the SB winner, Rodgers was again MVP. This time with 4 INTs. So the last three MVP winners had 5, 4 and 12 INTs. Josh has 18 this year. In that group of four, see anything that sticks out? Here are the INT totals for the last 10 winners of the MVP: 2022: 12 2021: 4 2020: 5 2019: 6 2018: 12 2017: 8 2016: 7 2015: 10 2014: 5 2013: 10 Again, Allen has 18. His INT numbers do not fit with this group. No wonder the guy in this video suddenly and without explanation switches away from SB winners and completely botches the INT rankings of two of the three guys he cites on top of that. It's filled with logical problems and he is spinning like a dreidel. He cites the opposing argument, "But his interceptions directly cost the Bills wins." And his riposte is to cite EPA per total plays. But you can have a very good EPA per total plays and still have cost your team wins. The stat doesn't really address the argument he's trying to knock over at all. Yet he immediately goes on to argue that his EPA data shows that he can't have lost games. Sorry. Very little logic here at all. Clickbait. Allen has had overall a top five season. Which is damn impressive. We're lucky to have him. But arguing he's the MVP is greatly stretching it.

If we hadn't accumulated so many injuries, I'd agree. But we did. I'm worried. And wasn't till we lost Bernard and the others. And KC has gotten better the last two games. This isn't the easy game it looked to be before the Steelers game.

I thought it could go either way. I couldn't have been upset regardless. I don't think the defender tried to hit him hard. I think Josh probably thought he did try to hit him hard, but I think he dove at him but didn't tighten up and try to strike him at impact. These calls will always lean towards protecting the QB. It's understandable. When a starter is knocked out for the season that basically ends that team's Super Bowl chances, with very rare exceptions. Mason Rudolph is a good example. There are exceptions such as Hostetler, but again, they are very rare and with today's passing rules in place, the Giants might not have won that Hostetler SB.

It absolutely is just the opponent. Every opponent is different. Which often means different personnel groups and game plans work better against some teams than others. The offense is better varying personnel and tactics week to week and depending on the game plan and the defense's capabilities, personnel and specific game plans for the Bills offense. The Steelers are the 21st ranked defense. They aren't playing that badly right now, but without Watt they also weren't themselves at all. Oh, and don't act like you're being intellectually fair by mentioning the "TWO missed field goals" and then forgetting to mention that one Bill TD came on a 1-play 29 yard drive. Drives that start on your opponent's 29 yard line aren't mostly on the defense if you score. And one of the missed field goals came on a drive starting at the Pittsburgh 32. One more drive started at the Bills 44. Drive starts like that will greatly jack up your odds of scoring more. If by "definitely" you mean that it's not impossible, I'd have to agree.

You generally make sense. Not here. He was faking but not fake sliding. He didn't fake going down, he faked direction, and he slowed up to set up the blocks and make the defenders commit. He may well have considered going down there, but there's nothing wrong with that. Agree that fake slides should draw penalties, though. It's tough enough on defenders. Doubt it will ever happen, though.

Always cracks me up when people apologize for saying things that clearly don't make sense. Don't apologize, we're not worried or offended that you have a weird idea.

Look at the picture I posted just above. He was completely and totally boxed out by Shakir and his defender. And that was when Josh was still looking. Yeah, he didn't actually come off the rub till later in the play, but Josh had already looked away. Which is Josh's problem, he had it just as the play was written, he had time in the pocket and he decided to play hero ball and bailed. I agree you're right that Allen came off that read too early. He should've taken that read, and done so earlier in the play, when the guy was absolutely closed off and making his decision to go over or under. Either there or when he makes the decision to go over, you throw that ball and the play is yours. 85 - 90% chance of a first down there, IMO. It's a timing play, and by the time of the frame I put in my reply to you, the timing is a bit late, though still possible. If there's one thing Kincaid is excellent at, it's not falling where he's hit, particularly if the defender is coming from the side rather than downhill. He's going to get that 1st. And just as high a percentage hitting Shakir cutting across the middle. He's making the cut and his defender is flatfooted, having been pushed back by Shakir after bumping him. Josh bailed there from a clean pocket.

Really? Honestly, I think that's a hard argument to make. This is about when Kincaid should have been recieving the ball, but instead Josh is bailing despite the fact that Dawkins has anchored down and isn't taking another backwards step, and there is now a beautiful pocket. The defender would have had to go full bore to the outside and IMO Kincaid probably beats him and if not cuts back and the defender overruns him. Plus you can see that after the pick, Shakir is now cutting hard across the middle and his guy will be a yard behind him the whole way, which is indeed how it turns out.

Sorry I couldn't make that bigger. This site wouldn't accept a larger download. I think you can see it, though. Josh is still looking and his man is downfield five yards and totally blocked by Shakir and his man on the pick. He went over Shakir and was four or five yards upfield of Kincaid and a yard or so behind. Couldn't agree with you more about taking the high percentage throws more often. Maybe, but again, it simply is not true that those were the only two alternatives. In the design of the play he had two alternatives, both of which were significantly open, and he wasn't seriously rushed. Could've backed up or taken half a step left and stood there for about four seconds, but instead he bailed out. And again, both of those two alternatives were open in plenty of time.

We'll have to agree to disagree on this, then. I mean, of course they don't go through a long chain of thought about INTs to glory to stats to contracts. Not enough time. But we consistently see guys who make correct judgment calls in complex situations a great majority of the time making this same bad call, again and again. It's mis-performed far more often than not. They're taught to knock it down on fourth down. In the old days before the huge contracts this was almost never screwed up. These days it's almost never NOT screwed up. I wouldn't be surprised if their agents don't tell them (quietly, in confidence) to make the INT in this circumstance. The memory of that one play won't last all that long, but the extra INT on their stats will last past their final contract negotiation and on into their autograph-signing show attendance days after they're retired. And I think it's pretty clear they're not taught to run them back. If they were, we'd know it. It's not like we don't mostly know what the analytics guys are telling the coaches. It's not a secret. They're taught to knock these down. In the rare case they can be sure they've got a chance at a runback nobody minds a bit if they make the play but it's almost never possible for them to look back upfield until the INT is already made, unless they're running directly towards the QB in order to make the INT. Even then they generally are focusing on the ball to have the best shot at getting there at the right moment and at the exact right spot. The Taron Johnson play was a bit different because it wasn't fourth down so he absolutely should have made the INT. It was third and goal and making the INT at the very least prevents three points for Baltimore. You appear to have been talking more about the decision to take it out of the end zone, but making that decision also was a bit easier than it at first looked. Watch this from the 0:44 mark onwards. At that point, the first replay has a beautiful end zone view. When he makes that INT, he's moving to the side but also backwards. He jumps, makes the catch, lands on the back leg and takes three or four super-quick steps backwards stopping his backwards momentum. At the same time, when he makes the catch, his head is pointed straight upfield and he can start processing immediately, and it's clear from the first instant that if he can get past the Raven who's about three steps away from him, Andrews, the intended receiver, that the whole right side of the field is absolutely empty. And Milano cuts right in front of Taron to block that one guy. Watch it again. It's perfectly set up for Taron to take one quick look and know that he has a sensational chance at going a long way. Agreed, though, that the Miami interceptor probably should not have taken it out. That was a mistake.

The idea is stupid. And not a little bit. Hugely massively stupid. Know what happens to big conspiracies, real ones, anyway? They come out. Somebody talks. Look at the number of criminals caught when somebody gets drunk and talks or tells someone he's sure he can trust or starts spending money wildly and stupidly. And those are tiny conspiracies compared to what this would have to be. Go to a business school and ask them if this would make sense, even taking the idea of illegality and jail time completely out of it. The NFL putting together a big conspiracy would be wildly stupid, risking tens of billions over the next few years for a few tens of millions with the odds greatly stacked against the risk panning and staying secret. Which it would not. It would come out. It would kill the golden goose, and as such, be massively stupid, taking a huge risk, for minimal gains percentage-wise and with poor odds of keeping it secret. A vastly stupid risk. The owners, particularly individually, will make some stupid moves. But not this obviously stupid. And of course we got the benefit of some 50-50 calls along the way. Not because it was fixed. Because you get the benefit of about 50% of the 50-50 calls just from the nature of what 50-50 calls are. We had calls go against us and for us. That's the way it works.

Of course they do. Bills fans think it's rigged against the Bills. Fins fans think it's rigged against the Fins. Jets fans think it's rigged against the Jets. That's how confirmation bias works in a normal functional system.

Oh, my God, you're right, that was really funny. The stuff about Rodgers' family and moustache had me howling. Thanks for posting this, I really enjoyed it.

Stefon Diggs, who we got for a 1st rounder, says hi. Having said that, I hear you. But generally one of the main advantages of having an elite QB is that he can make good skill players look very good and very good skill players look excellent so you can use your draft and free agent ammunition elsewhere. And the Bills have now used two 1sts and a 2nd on skill positions fairly recently (Diggs, Kincaid and Cook). Wouldn't mind at all, but I'm not expecting it, personally, unless the draft falls just right.

I greatly agree with both of your points here, but I would respectfully add this: Third, as it was 4th and two, a completed pass of two yards or more would have been a vastly better outcome. People are treating this as a one or the other scenario. A short completion would have continued the drive. It's easy to forget that this wasn't fourth and long. They only had to make two yards. And the All-22 shows very clearly that this should have been a first down for the Bills. And Josh's first look on this play (you can see his head move, it's clear) is to Kincaid going towards the left sideline on a rub route. And the rub works perfectly, Kincaid ends up open by three or four yards with a very easy route to get the two yards. That's where he should have gone. That was the failure of that play, making the wrong choice on where to go. While he is still looking at Kincaid, the picture on the play is a bit complicated, but it is unfolding exactly as Brady must have wished, Kincaid's man is running directly into Shakir's pick, and Shakir's guy is bumping him, so it's a two-man pick rather than just one-man. The set-up is absolutely perfect. It's Josh's first look, the play is working exactly as it should and looks like a very easy throw with a very high chance of getting the first down. And Josh comes off it almost immediately. He has no pressure on him not just up to where it looks good, but right through to where Kincaid is obviously open. Dawkins is being bull-rushed toward him, but sinks down and stops the guy cold. Maybe a half-step to the right, and the pocket was going to stand up all day. Instead Josh takes off right, eventually allowing the LB who was mirroring Josh to run around the pocket and close on Josh to the side after he gets towards the numbers. More, after Shakir is stoned executing his rub, he breaks right and runs across the middle about a yard beyond the first down. He's not wildly open, but he has a yard or a yard and a half on his guy. If Josh had stayed in the pocket - still a clear pocket - this is an easy completion. But he was already high-tailing it towards the sideline. This appears to have been Josh playing hero ball on a play that should have worked, a play that provided one excellent opportunity within the framework of the play, and another that was maybe not excellent but still plenty good. That should have been what happened. This should have been a first down, with the drive continuing. Again, he didn't make the most of what was available. The opportunity for a first down was right there. It wasn't falling apart till he gave up his first and best two options for converting this to a first down.

Yup, good point. On some small percentage of those long throws the DB will be able to run it back past the LOS resulting in a net gain from the play for the defense. Overall, though, it's better to knock it down. But like it or not, DBs and football players generally know that stats affect life. Stats affect contract negotiations, Pro Bowl selections, public perception, etc. Every once in a while you still see guys knocking it down on fourth down with no attempt at an INT. I really respect the players I see make that play. But it's getting rarer. Thank you too!! Hadn't thought of that till now. Jeez, that play made me furious.

No, it really isn't. INTs are issues. They hurt your team. Most of Peyton's INTs came in his first four years. In Peyton's sixth year he had 29 TDs, same as Josh this year, but only 10 TDs. Peyton 's experience in the first four or five years of his career with a ton of INTs allowed him to greatly decrease them from his sixth year onwards. Peyton's first 10 years: 28, 15, 15, 23, 19, 10, 10, 10, 9, 14 Josh's first 6 years: 12, 9, 10, 15, 14, 18 Peyton cut the INTs. Josh is increasing them. And because anytime you say anything bad about Josh or any Bill, people here think you hate him, let me address that. We're lucky to have him. He's terrific. But he'd be even better if he cut the turnovers.

Oh, man, is that sweet. Perfect answer. The Bills are at their best when feeling aggrieved, overlooked and underappreciated..

I'm sorry, but you really can. And should. I hear that justification again and again in the media. It's nonsense. The year Peyton Manning had 49 passing TDs, he had 10 INTs. That's one example. There are others. It simply is not "the way it is." Brady's passing TD:INT ratio in 2007 was 50:8. In 2021 it was 43:12. Hell, it's not even "the way it is" for Allen himself. Josh had 37 passing TDs in 2020, more than his 29 this year. Throw in the running TDs and he had one more TD that year than this. And only 10 INTs. He's got the ability to limit turnovers while still scoring a ton of TDs. Unfortunately, he's still scoring well, but has turned the ball over a bunch more. What would be unreasonable would be to ask for no turnovers. Nobody is doing that. Asking for turnovers to be minimized is simply reasonable.

Thanks, Logic, I appreciate the tone and the information. I have to say I don't have the energy or time to go back through and analyze what the EPA was on all the INTs. I do remember two or three INTs that weren't any worse than punts. Don't know whether that explains the EPA numbers you are talking about. I know you already get this, but less bad doesn't mean good. Thanks again for the info. Good stuff. Wish I had more time to go through and try to figure out why this is so. Mays, in your cited tweets there, says he's looking at INTs and sacks. Including sacks would doubtless help Josh a lot as he has so few of them. Two QBs were actually in the 60s in sacks this year, crazy. Howell and Young. Josh's 24 sacks is lowest of anyone who played even more than 11 games, and Josh has played all 17. Yeah, I agree about those three that were basically punts. Do you have the stats on how many of those other QBs have? Do you have the feeling that Josh is the only QB who ever suffers diving INTs or over the shoulder INTs? He isn't. And it's nonsense that those are "good plays." Less bad, certainly. But a good play would have made the first down, that's what a good play is. Josh creates a ton of good plays. But don't pretend a play is good just because it isn't significantly worse than a punt. Punts aren't good. They're just less bad than turning it over on downs closer to our own end zone. Three out of nineteen that aren't worse than punts still leaves sixteen. Again, Josh is a terrific QB. We're very lucky to have him. But that doesn't mean that having so many INTs is really OK. It hurts the team.