st pete gogolak

I think Burrow is a terrific quarterback but you can't put him up there with Mahones and Allen. He has zero escapability. I understand his OL stinks but nine sacks! I can't see Mahones or Allen taking nine sacks if they were behind a high school offensive line.

OK, engaged in a bit of nerdness and looked at all of our kickoffs during the regular season. Excluding touchbacks, kicks returned from the end zone and one onsides kick, there were 31 kickoffs fielded between the 1 and the 19 yard lines. Excluding kickoffs fielded between the 1 and the 5 (because of the chance kick returner would let it go and hope it made it into the endzone), there were 13 kickoffs fielded between the 7 and the 19. Average yard line ball caught - 9.5 yard line. Average start line - 23 (not counting two penalties called on the return team). Worst result for ball caught was the 19. Worst starting field position 32. I'm convinced Reid would have instructed Pringle to fair catch a short kickoff. If he does anything other than a fair catch, and doesn't get any farther than 30 - 35, there's maybe 7 seconds left and KC has ONE play to move 30ish yards to get into field goal position. If he calls fair catch, say between the 10 and 15, no time runs off the clock but that's an extra 10 or 15 yards KC has to cover in the 13 seconds. That's 45 or 50 yards in two plays in order to try a 57 yard field goal. Of course, Pringle could have busted a return and taken to the house. That would have been a total outlier given our special team play this season. Of course, given what our defense did, could Mahones covered 50 yards in two plays? Sure. He covered 45 in two to get the FG. But there is no question that kicking it into the end zone was the wrong call.

Hell, you don't have to go back to the Patriots game. Chiefs did it to us in the FIRST HALF OF THIS GAME! Got the ball with 37 seconds left in the first half and three timeouts and comfortably moved down the field until Mahones threw two incompletions and Butker doinked a 50 yard FG off the upright. Maybe a squib or a pooch at the end of the first half was in order!

Milano gave up the 25 yarder to Kelce? That must be news to Levi Wallace. Oh, and agree that Edmunds was useless and atrocious in the game.

Congratulations! You're the first person to put Addison and Mack in the same sentence!

All this hand-wringing as to what we need to do in the offseason is nuts. Name two teams you'd rather be heading into the offseason. Realistic projections for offense and defense for next year WITHOUT making any moves other than resigning a couple of our own free agents and not considering the draft. Offense: Davis - Diggs - Beasley or McKenzie - Knox - Dawkins - Bates - Morse - D. Williams - Brown - Allen - Singletary. Defense: Rousseau - Oliver - Phillips or Star - Basham or AJE - Milano - Edmunds or replacement - Poyer - Hyde - White (midseason) - Jackson - Wallace or replacement. I think we're in great shape with some tinkering, especially in secondary.

Yes, yes, yes! Butker was going to attempt a FG if they got within 60 yards, maybe a yard or two beyond that. That was why I was anything but comfortable after the last Davis TD. I went back to the play-by-play and forget that the Chiefs got the ball with 37 seconds left in the first half with three time outs and Butker doinked a 50 yarder off the upright. That was after two Mahones incompletions. To think that the Chiefs couldn't pick up 30ish yards from the 25 in two plays was fanciful, especially playing a defense to prevent a Hail Mary.

Or the 49'ers trading up to take Jerry Rice. Seriously, I am in favor of trading down to get more #2 and #3 round picks and trading up to get more #2 nd #3 round picks. Go through NFL draft history and you will see tons of first round busts and tons of great players taken in the 2nd and 3rd rounds. After that, not so much. Not saying you don't trade up in the first round to get the guy you want (duh, Josh Allen), but generally, I'm in favor of accumulating draft picks but especially in 2nd and 3rd rounds. Agreed. I think Spencer Brown will be an All Pro in two years. Yeah, he had a lot of ups and downs this year and Melvin Ingram abused him Sunday night and could have ended that game a lot sooner than overtime, but for a 3rd round pick from a small school to perform like that as a rookie is impressive. I believe he's only going to get better and better. It's a home run pick by Beane.

Yeah, because the offense never struggled in a game this year.

He'd be an idiot to take an OC offer from another team if the Bills offered him the OC position. If he turned it down, I wouldn't want him because I would question his judgment, maybe his sanity.

Right. They played to prevent a touchdown. Everyone is acting like KC had to get to our 32 to get a FG attempt. They didn't. Anywhere around our 42 - 43 is going to give Butker, who has a big leg, at least a shot at a FG. I'm guessing that was what KC was thinking. Get to somewhere around the BIlls ' 40. The key to the last 13 seconds was Hill's 64 yard touchdown. It had us scared ####less that Hill would win the game with a TD. Which of course is nuts. The last thing you wanted was the game to go into overtime and be decided by a coin flip.

Yeah, agree and I know that it's not their job to satisfy the curiousness of the fanbase but I'm genuinely curious now as to what the hell happened. Was the intent to kick it deep or was something else called and it wasn't conveyed to Bass or was it conveyed to Bass and Bass screwed up? To me, it's looking like one in the middle.

Then why wouldn't McD just say that the KO was executed as intended? Clearly Bass' intent was to hammer the ball. So the only explanation for a "screw up" is if Bass was told to kick short or squib and he doesn't do it? That seems ridiculous as well.

With all the discussions about the last 13 seconds, I'm finding out that there are a bunch of NFL rules I didn't have a clue about (being able to fair catch a kickoff, ref can call "intentional" defensive holding and make it a 15 yard penalty with no time run off the clock etc.). What is the rule if it's kicked short - say to five or ten yard line and kick returner wants to gamble that it goes into the end zone? It is an automatic touchback with no time left on the clock? Does the kick returner have to at least cover the ball in the end zone and does a second or two run off the clock?

I'll say it again. It's not just the fact that they kicked a 49 yard FG starting at the 25 with 13 seconds to go, it was that it was so damn easy. I was worried about Butker being jacked up and hitting a 60 yard FG, or maybe Mahones pulls an Eli Manning and does a Houdini escape and makes a pass to a KC receiver who makes a David Tyree catch. Nope. Nothing. Two plays where the Bills seem to be protecting against a TD and not a FG and give up 20 and 25 yards with basically no resistance. Insanity!!

I hope someone more technologically savvy then myself can put together a video of Bass' "short" 2021 kickoffs. Just from memory, I believe Bills were extremely successful doing this strategy this year. Again, from memory, I can't recall many returns past the 20. I'd also be curious where the kickoffs were caught assuming KC would fair catch the pop up kick. Even starting at the 20 instead of the 25 would have helped.

I believe there has been discussion of a rule change eliminating onside kick and giving a team the option to try to convert a fifteen yard pass to keep possession. If that was the rule in effect, what do you do? Convert and you're one first down from FG range or fail to convert and give KC the ball at the 35?

I agree. You're also telling your defense that you don't think you can stop KC with 13 seconds left on the clock.

I think a more intriguing "what if" is if Bills went for two after the last Davis touchdown. You're up 2. If you are successful, you're up 4 and KC has to score a touchdown to win. KC is utterly deflated at that point and if you have any "special" two point try, you pull it out - Allen power sweep, Knox pass to Allen, etc. If it's unsuccessful, your D can't play it safe or it loses the game. To me, it's like going for it on fourth down. "OK boys, here is where we win the game."

I'll buy that there was a miscommunication and Bass incorrectly thought he was supposed to kick it deep. On the other hand, I'm not buying that he tried to kick it short but kicked it deep because he had the adrenaline flowing. He hammered the ball on purpose. We've seen him do the short pop up kick all season. It was overwhelmingly successful and usually pinned teams inside the 20. The short pop up kick was absolutely the right call. First, Butker has a big leg. KC would have been trying a FG from 55 yards out, maybe even longer. That means if you give them the ball on the 25 with no time off the clock, they have 13 seconds and all their timeouts to move the ball to the Bills' 38 - 40 yard line - 35 - 37 yards. Difficult but certainly not impossible. Plus, a pop up kick gives KC kind of a Hobson's choice. KC returner (not Hill) can (1) let the ball bounce and hope it goes in the end zone. If it doesn't, game over. (2) call for a fair catch around the 10 or 15 yard line. No time runs off the clock but now Mahones has to pick up 45 or 50 yards in two plays. Not impossible the way Mahones was moving the ball but even a 15 yard play to Hill like they ran would have left them in a tough spot. More likely Mahones is throwing down the field with 8 defenders protecting against a 20 - 25 yard pass. (3) return the kick and hope to break it. I'm guessing that Pringle was told under no circumstances return the kick. Even a good return to the 30 or 35 leaves 6 maybe 7 seconds on the clock. Time for one play to pick up 25 or 30 yards. Again, doable but difficult.

LOL. You really believe Daboll is the main reason for this team's success?

I understand concept of giving himself up but is that instantaneous? When does the ref blow the whistle?

He hammered the kickoff. No way was that an attempt to kick it short. Even if it's not a "great" short kick and KC downs it at the 15 or so, it runs a second or two off the clock and KC starts 10 yards further out. If they try to run it back, anything other than a kick return touchdown leaves time for either one play and a long FG or a Hail Mary.

It would have been really smart and contrary to every football instinct, but watch last catch in regulation by Kelce. He goes to the ground with about three seconds left. If he isn't touched, refs can't blow whistle and KC can't call TO until the whistle blows. Hey, I'm grasping at straws here but baiting KC into throwing to the middle of the field and NOT tackling the KC receiver could have been a viable strategy.

Bingo. They played scared the last 15 seconds. There's elite then there is a defense giving up 45 yards in 10 seconds.