Thurman#1

Or they change their opinions - very reasonably - as facts and situations change. That's what thoughtful people should do, the intelligent process, as the world changes.

It's not clickbait. If he says that's what he thinks, it's what he thinks. Doesn't mean it's anything more than one man's opinion, though.

The stuff you're calling facts here are indeed facts, but facts carefully chosen to fit your own narrative. Fair enough, but let's not pretend that they're telling the whole story. Anytime a coordinator switches systems, and from a defense that wasn't good anyway, the first year is likely to be pretty bad. It was for McDermott. After that he had four very good years in a row, followed by a bad one. As I pointed out above (and for years and years here, and it's not a thought original to me) Points Allowed is probably 30 - 40% offense and special teams. The way to isolate defense as much as possible is to look at yards. That's why they rank the team with the fewest yards allowed as the best defense. It's not perfect, nothing is, but it's significantly better than points allowed, which is more of a team metric. And in his 2nd, 3rd, 4th and 5th years, their defense ranked in the top ten. That's consistency and effectiveness. Also fair to point out that his 6th year had a massive drop. That has to be considered as well. Oh, and part of the reason the schedules have looked so easy is because we have dominated the division, giving each of those three teams two losses most years. The more effective your team is, the less effective your field of opponents will look after the season because of the lickings you put on so many of them. It is legit to say that we may have had some easy-looking schedules those years. But a team can only play who they're scheduled against. And in DVOA, which accounts for easy schedules, we've been consistently rated very high the last four years. We weren't the only team interested in him at that time. That's because he was considered a very fine DC.

And again, neither did Reid's. Till they did. And he's not the only one. Madden, Cowher and Landry are the examples that spring immediately to mind, but look at Dungy. Look at Coughlin. Look at Vermeil, who made it four times, was fired because they thought he couldn't take a team to the Super Bowl, and then .... If you think there is evidence in that post, your definition of the word needs work. You provided your own opinion. That's not evidence for anyone but you. Heh. Yes. In fairness, so do they all. Even the ones who win SBs.

Typical. "It's just wrong," followed by no evidence. Just dumb. But typical. And there is plenty of "yeah, but," including the ones you used in your previous posts. You folks want to be able to use all the "yeah, buts" for other coaches, but when people point out that that's exactly as legitimate to use for McDermott, suddenly the stuff you constantly throw out for guys Reid, can not be used for McDermott because they're excuses or better yet, "tired old excuses." But for Reid, though they're even older and tireder, somehow they're OK for you. Utter nonsense.

Donovan McNabb was a top QB too. Not elite, but plenty good enough to win a Super Bowl with. Andy has teams that were good enough to win a Super Bowl in Philly. He didn't break through. There's always a "yeah, but". Always, in any situation, failure or success. Reid had teams that were good enough but didn't break through. Till they did. Again, there's always a "yeah, but." Always. Want me to list them for McDermott? I can. There are plenty. Reid was in position to win. Several times. And he didn't. Until he did.

He really did have success as a DC. That's why he was a top contender for HC jobs for a couple of years. Averaging those stats doesn't really present a full or fair picture. Throw out his first year for example, when he didn't have the pieces in place, and the average gets much better. 14.4th in points and 9.8th in yards. And as I've been pointing out for decades now, Points Against is as much a team stat as a defensive stat. Points scored by opponent defenses count against your own defense in this stat. If your QB throws a pick six, somehow your defense has seven more points charged against it. The opponent runs back a punt or a kick for a TD? Your defense's Points Allowed goes up by seven points. On the face of it, that's dumb. And that doesn't even include the fact that where the opponent's offense gets the ball is a huge factor in the likelihood of scoring points. If your RB fumbles and their team recovers on your own 20 yard-line, the EPA for your team is minus 5.5 points. Starting at your opponent's 20 gives you an EPA of minus 0.2. It's a huge difference and it simply means that when it comes to how many points teams score against your defense, your own offense and STs have a large share of that. If your quarterback is sacked on fourth down at your own one-yard-line and the defense knocks them back to the four in three plays and they kick a field goal, that's a tremendous stand by your defense that looks like a failure in PA, as it shows the defense as allowing three points. Yards do a much much greater job in isolating the performance of the defense. If the other team runs back a kick for a TD, it doesn't affect the defense's Yards Allowed, which is exactly what should happen to isolate defensive performance. Your QB is sacked in the end zone? No affect on Yards Allowed, but somehow your team's defense is charged two points in Points Allowed. Leodis fumbles a kick and it's recovered on the five yard line and they drive the five yards and score a TD? Your defense is charged five yards, which is what they should be charged for. Yard Allowed is a much better measure of defensive success, and McDermott's YA figures in Carolina look like this: 2011 28th rookie season with a scheme switch 2012 10th 2013 2nd 2014 10th 2015 6th 2016 21st That still leaves a very serious drop in 2016. That absolutely has to be taken into any consideration. But four years of being a top ten D is sustained success. That's why he was a top head coaching candidate. He was very successful.

No. No particular reason to make that comparison as opposed to an Andy Reid before he won a Super Bowl comparison.

Not with Knox's contract. It's the K & K era.

No.

It's not an excuse. It's an explanation. And it's not getting old. You're getting sick of hearing it despite the fact that it makes a ton of sense, that it fits the facts better than anything else. You're sick of hearing it because it busts your narrative. If old matters, your blame-shaming is just as old but stupider. That chart you post about how we didn't have as many injuries as some other teams? Where's the chart about which teams had the most important injuries. With Von Miller we looked like a Super Bowl favorite. Without him a possible contender. The guys we lost on defense were some of the most important players for us, the ones we could least afford to lose, Hyde, Miller and Da'Quan in the Bengals game are crucial pieces for us. And some of the guys who still gutted it out and played as well as they could but well below their usual standard, Phillips, with one arm, replacing Da'Quan, Tre' White just not able to play anywhere near his standard even though he was on the field, and Jordan Poyer looking like a Buffalo rather than a shark, were also key pieces. That chart is deceptive, because some games missed due to injuries are much more important than others and we lost some of our most important players. And pretending that chart is very accurate about quality of players lost is ridiculous. It determines value by AV. And AV is OK at summing up careers, but not particularly accurate at all with picking out value to a team in any particular season. On defense we lost a lot of our most valuable players and several of the ones injured but playing were not able to play close to their usual level. Where's the chart about which other teams had guys die on the field? Seriously, where's that chart? Where's the chart about how many other teams had player's brothers, healthy college football players, die during the season? Where's the chart about mass shooters? Or the one about all the other teams that had home games moved to away stadiums, or the one about all the other teams that had never in NFL history had so many away games in so few days as we did in Weeks 11 - 13. Is this a "so everything's OK" get out of jail free card? No, they still had a bad game, but anyone who doesn't realize that all this and the blizzards and the rest of it was a huge factor is busier pushing a narrative than actually noticing how the world works. If you don't see that that season was one of the hardest most draining seasons in NFL history ... you just don't get it.

Can they see the forest for the trees? It's hard to tell. They're too busy saying that that thing over there isn't a forest or trees, it's a burnt-out ruin of what could have been a forest.

IMO, this likely isn't the whole rule, it's just saying how one term from the rule will be interpreted differently than it has been in the past.

It'll depend on the wording. Perhaps the OP's article misstated slightly. I see the rule elsewhere this way: "By Competition Committee; to make the penalty for illegally handing the ball forward consistent with other illegal acts, such as illegal forward passes." That's a whole different thing. As of right now, "illegal forward handoff" refers NOT to handoffs made behind the LOS, but to handoffs made AFTER a completed forward pass. The correct wording will be huge.

The wording of the rule will be key. In two different articles, they worded it this way, "Proposed by Competition Committee: Make the penalty for illegally handing the ball forward consistent with other illegal acts, such as illegal forward passes." In a 3rd, Jack Deignan has it the same way the OP's article does. https://clutchpoints.com/nfl-news-rule-changes-2023-season We'll need to see the exact wording. It does seem to be a big change depending which wording is correct. As things stand now, an "illegal forward handoff" is only called after a completed forward pass is followed by a handoff. In that case you can't hand forward. The wording of the rule will be key. In two different articles, they worded it this way, "Proposed by Competition Committee: Make the penalty for illegally handing the ball forward consistent with other illegal acts, such as illegal forward passes." In a 3rd, Jack Deignan has it the same way the OP's article does. https://clutchpoints.com/nfl-news-rule-changes-2023-season We'll need to see the exact wording. It does seem to be a big change depending which wording is correct. As things stand now, an "illegal forward handoff" is only called after a completed forward pass is followed by a handoff. In that case you can't hand forward. The wording of the rule will be key. In two different articles, they worded it this way, "Proposed by Competition Committee: Make the penalty for illegally handing the ball forward consistent with other illegal acts, such as illegal forward passes." In a 3rd, Jack Deignan has it the same way the OP's article does. https://clutchpoints.com/nfl-news-rule-changes-2023-season We'll need to see the exact wording. It does seem to be a big change depending which wording is correct. As things stand now, an "illegal forward handoff" is only called after a completed forward pass is followed by a handoff. In that case you can't hand forward.

When you ask a yes/no question, you have to accept when everyone says no. And it should tell you the question had a very very obvious answer. I'm wirh everyone. They have a good circumstance and a chance to be better, maybe eve a lot better. But a lock? This early in the off-season? No, absolutely no way.

That makes me trust him more. He doesn't pretend to know more than he does.

Please, that language you're using isn't clearly asking the correct question. It's spinning and obfuscating. "If we had elite talent, do you think they would be taking them off the field as much as possible?" Um, no. As much as possible, would be no snaps. So, no, you wouldn't keep your elite talent entirely on the bench. But that answer is the result of a poorly phrased question. But if we had elite talent, would we platoon them? Yes. And it's not even a question. They've said they would, again and again. They've showed they would again and again. And Von Miller is elite talent and they platooned him. The rate they'd rest them at changes, depending on age, injury status and how banged up they are, opponent, matchups and lots of other things. And the majority of teams in the league platoon DLs. This isn't something unusual. And McDermott has done it not sometimes or most of the time as the OP said, but all the time. The DL with the highest snap percentage in McDermott's tenure was Kyle Williams in 2017, at 68%, with Hughes at 66% the same year, and nobody else ever that high.

We believe that it was his decision because everyone says so, including the reporters who know the guy and would have good reason to have a juicy opinion about it. It almost certainly was exactly that. And yeah, he had this DC job, but if anybody is aware that being the DC on this team isn't enough to get him a head coach job, it's Frazier. He's done a terrific job. And somewhat fairly, McDermott gets most of the credit. Bienemy wasn't getting anything OCing under Reid and Frazier had the same problem. Even two SB wins didn't get him a head coaching job because the credit went to Reid. And Bieniemy is a lot younger than Frazier. It just would not have hurt Frazier to be fired from this job. McD might very well have hired another DC if it had been early enough in the process that this happened. I get it. It's much more dramatic and a better story this way, and everybody loves a conspiracy theory. But there's no real reason to think this was anything but what they say it was. If they'd fired him they wouldn't have waited till February 28th. That's five weeks after their season ended. What makes sense there is an older guy realizing that he wasn't as charged up as he'd always been before combined with a feeling that another year at the job he was in wasn't going to get him closer to the job that was his long-time dream.

Seriously? Good lord, dude! He spends two days each with three teams, and you're saying it now doesn't count as taking the year off? Again, good lord!!! If he puts down the pina colada before he finishes it, is that also not a year off? Jeez.

He said $11M, but didn't say how many years. If it's true at all, more years would make it more reasonable.

He's old enough that nobody wanted to give him the long-range contract he wanted. And this was an absolutely awful season to be out there as an older DE, with many really good guys in the same situation: Justin Houston, Robert Quinn, Clowney, Melvin Ingram, Trey Flowers, Pierre-Paul ... those guys are out there now and still unsigned. It was easy for teams to feel no pressure to sign any particular one of them. Just give the same cheap offer to each and say, "Whoever takes it first, gets the shot." And the Bills are a team with a legit championship shot, and there aren't that many of those out there, so our offer looked a bit better than most.

That would be true if Oliver was overpaid. But there's no particular reason to think that's so. It'll depend on how he plays. And it's certainly possible that he underperforms. But to think that you know better than the people who saw him in practice every day, in the locker room every day, and had access to his exact medical situation based on the best experts in the business ... well, it's laughable. You could turn out to be right. Being as sure as you show you are when saying this is just ridiculous.

This was a much bigger need than WR. Always looked like one of these FA DEs would be here cheap. Sort of hoped it would be one of the ones I knew better, Ngakoue, Ingram, Houston or Quinn for poor reasons if I get deep enough into my psyche. Whether I knew them better is beside the point. I don't know enough about Floyd to have a sharp opinion. But getting one of these guys is a good, good idea, that always looked like an extreme likelihood.

Hunh? Plenty of #2s get paid. They get paid as #2s, not #1s, but they get paid. Hunter Renfrow. Tim Patrick. Jakobi Meyers. Tyler Boyd. Tyler Lockett. Diontae Johnson. Plenty. This could easily happen. Don't know if it will but it's a good possibility.