Buddo

Sounding like an all new version of Incarcerated Bob, or maybe Dunkirk don.

I think Beane and McDermott are still 'joined at the hip', but Beane's comments, are enlightening about how they go about things. I'd guess they both disagree to an extent, about different players, yet get to a decision between them, and then stick by it. Once the decision is made, it's done with. In those sorts of situations, I think sometimes Beane, and sometimes McDermott gets the decision, but it's done by both sides acknowledging the others arguments, for and against. I believe that it is something they encourage throughout the FA/Draft process, where scouts/personnel guys are allowed to make a case for someone, if they feel strongly about it. Beane has spoken about this sort of thing in the past, and if a guy feels strongly, then they will go back and review the tape. Might still decide against, but itwon't be for double checking their assessment.

I think much depends on how much other teams like the look of Shaq. Imho, the Bills coaches/FO like what they have got from him, i.e. continuous improvement, including attitude. I believe they will let him test the market, if he wants to, but with the idea that he comes back to them with what he's been offered, and see if they are prepared to match, or do a little better. Any 'bonafide' offer, will be what they have decided they are prepared to pay up to. I have no idea what that might be, but I wouldn't be surprised if it was more than many might expect. Mainly due to the belief that he can become better still, is at the right age for a deal to be done, and it sends the right message to players, both on the Bills and in the rest of the league. i.e. perform and you will be paid. As regards contract structures, I think we will see increasingly, more guaranteed money through the length of deals, but it only becomes guaranteed if guys are on the roster each year. Make the team, make the money. An example of this might be a 5 year deal for $50 million, with $35 million guaranteed. Each year the guy remains on the roster, he gets $7 million guaranteed, but only if he's on the roster. That might be an excessive example tbh, but I think the principle is there. The above 'style' of deal, makes life a lot easier when it comes to managing the cap, as you aren't having to look down the road all the time at dead money for signing bonuses etc. The biggest hurdle to overcome with it, would be players understandable desire, to get as much as possible 'up front', yet I think that type of deal shouldn't be too hard to 'sell' to genuinely competetive players.

You could look at it in a different light Hapless, in that if he decided to sign here after weighing all his options carefully, it means he sees a lot to like about where the Bills are at.

Olsen has been a good player for years. Injuries aside, he's always made plays. Tbh, all of the TEs, apart from Smith, could learn a great deal from him. And given his production, he immediately improves the group. That's what the off season in particular is all about - improving as much as possible. Adding Olsen = improving the TE position.

Thanks for that. In that thread it shows Allen's 40 at the combine. There is no way he is 'full on' when doing it. He eases up in the last few strides at the very least, and tbh, if he was particularly trying, he would be showing a deal more signs of effort after it.

He could undoubtedly train to go faster. It would almost certainly require a different set of exercises, and emphasis, than he has now. Very likely to the detriment of his ability to play QB, mainly due to weight loss and consequently being less able to absorb punishment. Iirc his combine 40 didn't look as though he was going at it full on, so I'd treat that time with a pinch of salt. Allen was often around the lead of the guys for top speed attained - more particularly in the 2018 season. I would assume that those top speeds, could be extrapolated, and put into a different 40 time, that might give a better idea of how quick he is relatively. I wouldn't say he's the quickest 'off the blocks', but you really don't want to give him a few yards to get going, because he's plenty quick enough to make many guys look silly. I've only watched the first of the two clips, but I didn't see (m)any instances of him being brought down from behind, which is a pretty decent indicator of having some serious game speed.

Sweeney appeared in 5 regular season games. Somehow that doesn't equal inactive all year to me.

As with many things in life, it doesn't have to be one way or the other, yet finding the right balance is incredibly difficult, due to political philosophies and priorities. 'Socialist' countries, like Cuba, and number of the old eastern bloc countries, are still world leaders in certain types of therapy and care, often developed because they didn't have access to the same level of pharmaceuticals. Which is by no means a bad thing. 'Big Pharma' has had plenty of success in innovation, although often that is based off of post graduate research in heinz variety of educational facilities. They have also had an often dubious track record where it comes to ensuring that all the relevant testing procedures have been done (and followed). It has also been the case with different 'Big Pharma' companies, that they will bleed every last cent from wherever, seeking to protect patents rather than human lives. As to the OP, I'm somewhat ambivalent about the individual. Fact is, there is a problem with CTE, in pretty much any contact sport. Sometimes it takes an individual to make a song and dance about these types of things, for the world to sit up and take notice. I'm eminently unqualified to comment as to the accuracy of his diagnosis/conclusions/claims, but they are definitely based in reality, unlike much of what we see and hear these days. ;(

I suspect there will be decent amounts being allocated to the likes of Lawson and Poyer, with decisions to be made on getting Milano done also. Tbh, I can't remember all of the guys who we might want to retain, but it will be just about anyone on the D. How many we do, and can, is another matter. There are also guys like Spain, who apparently wants to return. Might not be dirt cheap, but might not be very expensive either. Not sure about Waddle, but there might be interest again there, as I think he was only on a 1 year deal. While the above will not kill the cap space, it will eat into it quite well. That's not to say they won't be capable of adding someone like a Clowney, but it isn't the sort of move I'd expect, mainly because I think they want to have enough space to be paying the likes of White next year, while also looking at possibly adding another solid WR from FA, which again, might not be excessively expensive, but could easily chew up another decent chunk of room. Clowney appears to be an obvious 'fit', yet there will be other guys who can make significant contributions who aren't going to be the most expensive 'fit' going. Another aspect of it is that will Clowney be interested in coming to the Bills, as he will have enough suitors to be choosy. I think Beane will not waste time chasing him, if he doesn't show genuine interest in coming here.

I believe they will pay Poyer. I also think that it won't be huge money, but will have a substantial portion guaranteed, which will reflect the fact he has out-performed his current deal. At least that would be the way I'd do it. Say for example (and to be clear, it's an example, not what I think he should get or will get), an extension for 3 years and $20m, with $15m guaranteed. Where ordinarily you would have done the deal with only $10m guaranteed.

Spain has said he wants to come back, and I'd like that to be the case. Keep the O-Line together for continuity, while looking to add another tackle. I think the Bills would have him back also, but they might let him go to FA to find a fair value for him, but be prepared to match reasonable offers. I think his deal would be one of the more difficult, because he's a vet, who hasn't earned any real big $ in his career (relatively speaking), yet has started plenty of games. The Bills will probably need to make a serious decision on the length of contract they want to sign him to, and then how much for. He will only be 29 come next season, so be in approximately his prime going forward. I think Shaq gets a fair offer - he's actually earned it. After his rookie season was derailed by injury, he's steadily improved. I think there's room for him to get better still. Johnson has done pretty well, and likewise deserves a fair offer. Tbh I don't know how much that might be, but regardless, the guy performed and can play both inside and outside as necessary. Not too old either. I'm not averse at all to getting Phillips back, but as others have pointed out, he's probably the most 'expendable', with the returning Harry. And he's probably going to be the most expensive, to boot. In fairness, he's done nothing wrong ini the time he's been here, and does bring a deal of energy to the table. He also can make some big plays. There's a lot to like about the guy, except in the Bills case, the likely money he will get from someone else. If we can manage to keep the top 3 (Shaq, Spain and Johnson), I think Beane will have done a good job, and in effect, kept the D (and O-Line) intact. McDermott would no doubt be happy at that too.

He had the target on his back early on, but it was removable. Now it's fixed on after the incident with a zebra on the way to the locker room. Going 'scorched earth' about the fine and poor calls, is only going to work if you make it a campaign, because you have to keep it up to ensure that the team doesn't get stiffed regularly. I don't think it's either sustainable, or worth it. It's far too easy to argue 'what are you going to replace them with' and it would become a distracting narrative for the team. Where you can express feelings about these things, is at the owners meetings, and I expect that that will be done. I hope it's done as forcibly as possible, with a push to get the rules reviewed and altered if necessary. Tbh, I've long been of the opinion that they need to re-write the rules completely, in plain english, so everyone has a chance at understanding them. Inconsistency is the root of many of the officiating issues, and it happens even within games. Zebras let a lot of stuff go, early on in games, and then when things start to heat up, especially in the late 3rd and 4th quarters of games, the flags start coming out. This simply shouldn't happen. Throw the flags the whole game, or not at all. Ford is in the unfortunate situation of being fined a big chunk of change, in effect on a technicality. I don't want to get into the 'was it wasn't it' debate, but the bottom line is that the NFL sets 'tariffs' for fines for specific offenses. Thing is, they didn't have to do it. They could quite easily have said that while it was called correctly, there was no malice or intent, and so there will be no fine. The NFL really does like to shoot itself in the foot on a regular basis.

While the mantra around OBD is 'continuous improvement', there's also another adage called 'if it ain't broke, don't fix it'. For that reason I'd like both Shaq and Phillips re-signed. Much like the O-Line, the 'continuous improvement' can be had by keeping guys together. Fwiw, especially as he's already indicated he wants to stay, I'd look to get Spain re-signed also. My eyes told me that Lawson comfortably out-performed Murphy, and Murphy actually played better than the year before. The Athletic grades Lawson out over the season as the 11th best Bills player - and that is out of the whole roster. While those grades are to a degree subjective, it does confirm largely what my eyes told me, and that was that Lawson was one of the better Bills over the whole season, and on a team that performed well overall, that's saying something. He graded out well above Murphy. I'd also say that I believe Lawson could comfortably handle more snaps, and he started getting them through the season, simply due to his superior play. Lawson has become a good solid performer, and while not elite, you will be hard pushed to replace his performance, if you let him walk. Much will depend on what other offers he gets, tbh, but I can see him get above what Murphy gets, with no trouble at all, and tbh I'd pay him in the region of $9 million per, if pushed. That doesn't preclude doing something else at Edge in FA, where we do need to try and bolster the pass rush outside, but it would mean that Murphy then could become unnecessary, should we get another guy. It also covers the position in case we can't get anything done, or can't find a guy in the draft. I'm somewhat bemused by the often seen attitude around here, that guys can be replaced willy-nilly. They can't. Johnson might eventually develop into a handy pass rusher, but it won't be before another season has gone by. I really like Phillips, his attitude etc. but sacks aside, he can disappear at times. We also have his replacement on the roster in 'Orrible Harry, as a guy who can rotate in to spell Oliver - who I think will become a beast next year (Oliver). We don't have a ready made replacement for Lawson, just inferior alternatives (on the roster). I'd still like to keep Phillips as he brings energy, and he does make plays, but I fear he will be priced out in FA.

Fwiw, in Beane's presser, a member of the media said that Spain wants to come back, and has told his agent that, as well. No idea what he could get on the open market, but he's the right age (28), and hasn't actually earned big money through his career. I think he could be given a 3 year deal, at reasonable money, and build some continuity. He wasn't the worst lineman on our line, and seemed to generally gel quite well with Dawkins.

There's nothing to say they can't find another sensibly priced guy like Brown or Beasley, who can contribute similarly, while also snagging one of the plethora of good WRs supposedly coming out in this draft. Someone like a Robert Woods, who runs good routes etc. but at about $7million per, for his level of production (last 2 years 1000+ yds) is really good value for money. You need to identify a guy like him, who is after his first decent payday, but isn't an obvious #1, but is showing signs of being able to be around a long time. Woods with the Bills, was getting around 50 catches a season. With the Rams the last two years, he's had 80 and 90.

Well Taylor didn't have a good or bad day., iirc he was inactive. The rest of them were obviously worn out by the 4th quarter from toting all that bling around with them.

There's plenty of blame to go around tbh. The second half and OT, seemed a bit like an exhibition of shooting ourselves collectively in the foot. Poor play calling lead to some of the time management issues. There's absolutely nothing wrong with playing a soft zone coverage on 3rd and 18, providing you don't drop all the way beyond the 18 yards needed, fcol. Someone, somewhere, needs to be looking at the sticks and making sure the drop is 3 yards before, not after. Right play called, awful execution. Similarly with the blitz that Watson escaped to set up the OT FG winner. Great play called, but another combination of poor execution (tackling), and a good job by Watson, and the game is done. I don't think it was wrong of McDermott to answer the question as he did. Allen did try to do too much. But as others have pointed out, it was largely as a result of poor play calling on the early downs. The perpetual run up the middle on 1st down for 1 yard (if we were lucky) immediately gets you looking for harder plays to get your yardage. Defensively, I think we generally do a good job. We could do with being more consistently aggressive with additional blitzes, but for the most part the balance isn't too bad. We have given ourselvesproblems by going to 'prevent' too early in some games, but the D is more than capable of making RZ stops to leave just FGs as an option, so we get away with it somewhat. Offensively, I'm not too sure what the plan is, because we regularly go from stuff that is working to extremely vanilla. I don't know what it is that makes them like it, but you too often see OCs in the NFL, get so cute they fool nobody, except themselves, by thinking that bad plays called will work, when they haven't all game. I do like a lot of the play design by Daboll, but I don't like the notion that we only play 'proper' offense, to get a lead, at which point it's stick it up the jersey, and let the D do its thing. We might need more talent on offense (we do for sure, it was a figure of speech), but there's still enough there to be continuing to try and make plays, rather than simply control clock.

So, most of the Offense, Lawson who is injured anyway, and Roberts, ditto. Iirc, White would be a healthy scratch. I'm sure many on here will be delighted about those decisions, aside from Allen being active (but for how long?) I'm of the opinion that it isn't going to hurt Allen to get some reps, but tbh, I think it's a pretty sensible move to rest just about any other weapon we have on offense. The D has a lot of room to limit guys reps, or even hold them back, as we do rotate personnel a lot ordinarily.

Seems to me that people re getting crosse4d up about what the role of the QB is supposed to be. I'd rather have Kelly than Marino as my QB, any day of the week, and twice on Sundays. Kelly was far more of what a QB was supposed to be, than many here are giving him credit for. Think back about what the original ideas about the game were - the QB was the General on the field. Kelly was about the first guy of the 'modern' era, who actually was that General on the field. Imho, Marino shouldn't be even close to the top 10 QBs of all time, because he pretty much only passed the football (admittedly as well as anyone else ever had), but was incapable of reading the game like many other QBs could. Tbh, there might be a good number of other QBs from the past, who deserve a hard look, for displaying more of the traditional 'atributes' than some of the more recent guys. I'm not convinced Kelly should be in the top 10, but I'm equally convinced that Marino should be below him, however it shakes out.

Lol. Reminds me of something from my schooldays, where spoof book titles got displayed around the time of some sort of school function, that was probably looking to raise money. It was 'One Page Special - Italian War Heroes'.

Have only seen a few highlights from 'back in the day', but even those tell you he was something special. R.I.P.

If Nsekhe is fit, then I would certainly entertain getting him some snaps. Not necessarily that many, but just enough to get him back up to game speed. 7 weeks is a long time out, vet or no vet.

While it can be argued that we have 11 'starters' on offense, the same can't be said for the D, with the variety of rotations we use. Ultimately, I think there will be quite a lot of 'snap count' management, as we can't rest everyone we might like to anyway. Guys who are carrying 'knocks' will probably not see too much action. Some who have been inactive, will probably get to see the field some. It should be an opportunity to get guys some playing time, just in case they are needed, and that would include Barclay, who I'm sure will get to see the field.

I wouldn't be at all surprised if come Sunday, there are a lot of guys given limited snaps. I think the method will be to have everyone practise as normal, but then make decisions based off of fitness etc. come the Sunday. Keeps actual preparation disruption to a minimum, and maintains routines. The team really hasn't played especially well in the last few games, to warrant time off for good behaviour Offensively they have barely done enough, and defensively there was regression in the Cheaters game to some poor tackling, in particular. Both sides of the ball need to show they have put things right, before getting time off (or rested). There is no sense in playing guys who are dinged up, however.