billsfan89

The drafting in the drought years made you want to bang your head against a wall. Either making "luxury" picks at RB with Spiller and McGahee or just drafting the wrong prospects that everyone thought were wrong at the time like Whitner or Ngata or Maybin over Orakpo. That 06 draft where the team could have set up it's trenches through the decade and into the 2010's by selecting Mangold over McCargo and Ngata over Whitner only thing that semi-salvaged that draft was finding Kyle Williams in round 5 but the Bills drafted two DT's anyway so they could have had Kyle Williams and Ngata in the same draft while also getting Mangold at center.

Every year if you account for NFL UDFA’s and try out rookies only 1070 rookies come out of college and get drafted, sign as a UDFA, or just get a tryout as a UDFA. Making any rookie who makes it to the NFL at even the most tertiary level in the top 5% or so of draft eligible players

Outside of WR (which the Bills addressed by signing Palmer and now Moore and I suspect if it is an issue in season they will make another move there) the Bills offense had no major issues. Offensive line was/is a top 4 unit in the league with solid depth/development in place (and they added another prospect there late in the draft). RB room is in my opinion a top 10 unit in the league and the TE combo also top 10 in the league. And of course Josh the MVP QB. Even at WR the unit still has a top tier slot WR and a prospect in Coleman coming off a solid rookie year at 21 years old plus solid vets in Palmer/Samuel and now Moore added in. The issues were the defense and the team imported a lot of talent in via the draft and free agency.

To act like Sanders as a talent wasn’t a QB with at worst a “2nd round grade” is just revisionist nonsense. He’s a talented QB who on talent alone shouldn’t have slipped past the early 3rd round he just really turned off a lot of in his potential teams and it cratered his value due to off field issues

I think the Bills much like at WR are gonna bring in a vet LB before camp. I was very surprised the Bills didn’t grab a LB in the mid to late rounds in the draft for depth and development. My read on that is that they must like Spector and Ulo as depth more than fans think. But given that they carry 6 LB’s usually I think they are gonna bring another body into camp. Not sure who’s out there at LB. I think a name to look out for is Jalen Reaves Maybin, a bit older at 30 but not a lot of wear and tear and a special teams ace with 14 starts under his belt. Could be a solid back end addition if he’s still out on the market.

In 2022 and 2023 when D.Jones was out there and healthy as a dominant run stuffing pocket collapsing DT the defense was completely different and much more dominant. I doubt Walker is gonna come in his rookie year and be that. But if they can patchwork something with an older an older Jones and Walker rotating in maybe that’s the difference they need?

Its all people got to do.

Reminds me of when in 2023 the Bills after the draft didn’t hit edge rusher as a need and signed Leonard Floyd. Bills likely just didn’t like what fell to them at WR so they are now in the market for a veteran makes sense. Moore reminds me of MVS last year, vet burner type but Moore is a bit younger than MVS.

The league is so starved for offensive line play that it’s gonna be hard for him to clear waivers. He’s right now competing with Green for the 10th offensive line spot. If they feel like he’s not ready maybe they find a way to IR him for a season and get him to pesudo redshirt

Typo I made the edit. He’s a better blocker than Morris but not as good a pass catcher

Are people really thinking Hairston is short? Corners on average range between 5 foot 10 and 6 feet so Hairston seems to be right in that range.

Bills got that niche TE3 with some upside. Much more of a blocker than Morris but not that great a pass catcher but has some traits as a receiver. Viewed as the best blocking TE in the draft so getting him for a 5th round pick is not bad at all. Bills had a lot of niche roles open and they filled one with a 5th rounder. Solid piece of business.

Hoping he can step into the Smoot role this season, and then in years 2-3 develop into a monster DE. But he definitely adds more physicality to the defensive line which is much needed.

I am thinking the Bills probably feel like the back injury held him back in 2024 and that proper rehab is gonna help him get back to his 2023 form where he was a much more dominant player. I think they feel like a return to health and a NFL strength and conditioning could sure up his lower body. Not too many men on the planet are that size.

Oliver is a very good player, you could argue has he been good enough for a top 10 pick but let’s not pretend Oliver isn’t a good player. The Lions had a top 2 Offensive line last season and Oliver took over that game. Yeah Ed’s had some bad or subpar games too but that’s dam near every single defensive player

I would think the Larry O suspension keeps him a bit safer. You got Ed, D.Jones, and the two draft picks likely to make the roster and the Bills like to carry 5 so with Larry O out 6 weeks that’s gonna keep Carter in a good spot to hold down slot 5.

Seems like a “fair” trade” basically amounts to a pair of mid round picks to trade up 16 slots in round 2. Bills got a DT just not the big run stuffing player the fans wanted. Still plenty of picks to go

I like the pick. Harmon/Grant/Nolan were all gone at DT the value was at DE and CB and the team took the CB which you could argue was the teams biggest need. I like what the Bills could do at in round 2 at DE and DT or WR. Cross CB off as a need nice move just wish one of the better DT’s fell.

100% knows the system and is a locker room fit, is older (29 turns 30 in January) but not ancient, and is going to be coming up on two years removed from his last serious injury. He's a starting caliber option which is what the Bills needed. Not gonna take CB off he draft need list but it makes the Bills at least a little less desperate there which is a positive.

Jets are tearing it all down and have no direction at QB. Fins are heading for an implosion and are already in a tough cap situation. Two divisional rivals that are not likely doing too well. The Pats could also still be a year away and if Maye isn't the guy or isn't quite good enough then it's looking like a few more years of dominance in the division.

Is there any way to get a split of what his grades and stats were when he was with the Ravens? According to Ravens fans and some pundits he looked a lot better when he joined the Ravens later in the season. Rams fans said he looked completely washed.

He was terrible with the Rams but Ravens fans and pundits liked they way he played there. Up to could be doing a lot of heavy lifting.

I thought it was more likely the Bills would bring back Douglas as their veteran starting option at corner but Tre while a surprise isn't that shocking. Tre is a bit younger and while he's got an injury history he's gonna be close to two years removed from injury. Tre looked a lot better with the Ravens according to their fans and pundit so while he flamed out with the Rams he ended the season strong.

Fox owning it makes sense in terms of how this is functioning. The USFL 40 years ago was the only spring league to ever have success and that league only had a few franchises that actually made money most of the league lost money. That was in an era when the NFL salaries hadn't exploded to a point where it became fiscally unviable to even try to compete for top football talent without having a massive media contract pouring money in. The USFL investors burnt about 600 million in todays dollars on the league. The USFL was able to get top college talents and some NFL players for salaries that adjusted for inflation would be 1.5-5 million a season. If the UFL or any spring league could bring in first round level talents for 1-3 million a season topping out at 4-5 million a season (All in todays dollars) that would be doable for a big network. Now you would have to pour in Billions yearly to get these talents and poach NFL players. And only the Saudi's who could burn 10-50 billion on such an insane venture could afford to do so and they likely wouldn't make money on it. So for a current style spring league to be successful you have to find some sort of way to make the league successful with third rate talent. Which I think is a massive challenge unless you have the backing of the NFL in some way and even then like NFL Europe that would require burning tens of millions yearly for likely decades.

USFL has some success doing Spring Football in fact their downfall was moving away from spring football and attempting to move head to head. I think the NFL should have stuck with NFL Europe. I think if the NBA which is a much smaller league could have the foresight to stick with the WNBA for decades subsidizing the product despite losses year after year the NFL could have stuck with NFL Europe. It would have served many purposes and seen growth once the NFL did intentional games more regularly. The NFL pinching penny’s cost them a chance to turn that into something