Utah John

Some ups and downs are still to be expected. He's been playing great the last three games. I hope it continues, of course. Either way, this stretch has (I hope) convinced Beane he does actually have the QB he needs. No need to spend a high pick on another QB in case Allen doesn't work out, which at the beginning of the season was a possibility. Allen could just as easily have gone south as north -- we've seen that happen a lot. Not this time. So, getting FAs to Buffalo will get easier, WRs will be fighting each other to come catch his passes, and the draft can be used to continue the building process. Happy days.

At least Kyle Williams got to play in a playoff game. Not so for Fred Jackson. He had the satisfaction of beating out Marshawn Lynch, and the great respect and affection of Bills fans, but never got widely recognized (except the Chicago Bear he dismissed with a classic stiff-arm).

There's no downside to the Bills' win, but since this loss drops Dallas to 6-6, we still have beaten only one team (the Titans) that's currently over .500. I do NOT care. That stuff matters in college football where if the team you beat loses later on, you don't look as good. What's up with that, anyway. In the NFL, the Bills are 9-3 against professional players. Don't try to tell me Miami hasn't figured out how to be competitive using the players they have left. The Jets are showing up. Any given Sunday, all that, but the Bills aren't losing to the teams they're supposed to beat. Tough. Smart. Good combination.

A warning?? He would have gotten an ejection if he had hit Brady like that.

I think there's a morbid fascination about the Cowboys, wondering when Jerry Jones will open the trapdoor under Jason Garrett's feet. Jones said yesterday that Garrett's job is safe, a kiss of death if there ever was one. Also I would like to know how the ratings changed during the game. I wonder if the word got out that the Bills were putting the hurt on the Boys, and a lot of Cowboys haters piled in to watch.

I want to think the refs make mistakes, and we tend to notice those that go against us the most. But then I see Jerry Hughes trying to rush Prescott while a Dallas O linesman has his arm around Hughes, right out in the open. I see a phantom hands to the face penalty wiping out a good play for the Bills. I just don't see so many calls going in favor of the Bills.

What that play by Dallas, going for it on fourth and one at their own 19, showed me, was that Dallas was worried about us. If they think their defense can handle us, they play it the normal way, punt away, and expect to stop us. I agree with the people saying the turning point was the Oliver strip-sack. That guy seems to have figured things out.

The Bills have this year and a couple more to win, before Josh Allen's rookie contract expires. Dak Prescott is making $2M this year, and will jump up to $35M or more next year. There's no way the Cowboys keep all their talent together once the salary cap bites. The same thing will happen to the Bills. We're in great shape now, and I hope Beane has a plan to keep us on track even after all the young talent all wants to get paid. Milano, Oliver, Edmunds, White, Allen, Singletary, Ford -- all are on their rookie contracts and all will come due for $$$$$ at about the same time. Let's go Bills!

I'm glad they skipped the bickering Bills period and went straight on to the tight group.

I started a list of the bad calls against the Bills, but I quit when the Bills took control and it was clear the Cowboys wouldn't be challenging them. Right from the start, the Bills were losing a yard or so on most of the spots following Bills plays, and the Cowboys were getting extra yards for free. There was rampant holding going on. One pass play in particular had me screaming at the tv -- the Bill (probably Jerry Hughes) was trying to get to Prescott, and the O lineman had his arm completely around the Bill's neck. No holding call, and the Cowboys got a big pass play out of it. Watching today was fairly strange. I was happy and pleased, but not very nervous. Could it be we're just getting used to this team being really good? So now they have a long week to prepare for the Ravens, and to see what San Francisco's defense tries to do to slow down Lamar Jackson. Things are breaking right.

The Patriots have several players missing practice because of illness, not injuries, and it's not surprising considering they were playing in cold rain the whole game. Apparently there's some contagious illness going through the Pats' locker room. Wouldn't it be a darn shame if several of the Cowboys got whatever is taking down the Patriots? Considering how much physical contact there is between players, it would be really hard not to pick up something the players on the other team have. The only way they could fit in another bye week, creating an 18 week regular season, would be to shorten the preseason. Which a lot of players and teams want to do, but which means a lot of marginal players don't get a chance to show what they can do.

I don't see the league scheduling byes before Thursday night games. The one thing I think they should do is minimize having a team play on Sunday night before a Thursday game, as the Cowboys had to do this week. I realize this is the team the Bills are playing, but it could just as well be the Bills in that situation in the future, and that would really suck. Those few hours difference between an early and a late game could be crucial, especially for the coaches trying to work up the game plan. On that topic, does the league try to get game films out early to the teams playing on Thursdays? In this case the Bills tape would go to the Cowboys, and vice versa. The more time the Bills coaches have with the tape of the Cowboys, the better. If the tape doesn't show up until Tuesday, that doesn't let them get any use from it.

No. One reason is simply to let the players get their stats. When they're doing well the stats help them with their next contract. The way teams that are ahead by a lot try not to rub it in is to become more conservative in play calling, but you don't tell players to go less than full speed, because they're more likely to get hurt like that. So an offense will switch from passing to rushing. Of course if it's rushing that's killing the other guy, there's a problem.

Gore is now tied with Marshall Faulk for the fourth most combined scrimmage yards. At 11.88 MILES.

FWIW, it was great and sad to see Foster yesterday. Great speed and skill -- where has that been all year? And now he's hurt, and may have played his last game as a Bill. There must be something about Duke Williams that the coaches see that we don't, holding him back. I think we need at least one tall WR.

Bruce is a gentleman and knows it's much better to speak positively about other people. Well, look at the big picture. Without that horrible record, the Bills wouldn't have had the draft picks that made the great years possible.

Yes, Dalton isn't the problem, but the problems are so pervasive that there's no way Dalton will still be there when they get everything else sorted out. The Bengals should trade Dalton in the offseason, and give him a chance to play somewhere else. I live in Alaska where it's legal. The Bills seem to have taken their game up a notch or two lately. They have a good chance to win on Thursday, and then they have the mini-bye before playing the Ravens in Orchard Park. I'm not smoking anything and I think they have a good chance.

Kuechly is a MLB, where Edmunds has been playing. I've thought for a while that Edmunds might be better suited to SAM than MIKE so he can use his speed more. So possibly Kuechly would fit, with Milano playing WILL. But, Kuechly isn't young anymore, and he's expensive, so probably not. McCaffrey with Singletary. Whoo. Yes please. I think Beane is looking 3-5 years down range, as he should. We have a lot of young, good and improving, players who will all be looking for big paychecks. The extra cap space will come in handy. I think we might need to win whatever we're going to win, while Josh Allen is still on his rookie contract. Once a QB proves himself and gets the first big contract, the team's entire salary structure goes sideways.

I'm happy for Gore. His achievement is amazing. A real testament to professionalism, preparation, conditioning, and dedication. That said, it seems to me that for the other backs at the top of the career list, each had at least one season when he was the top back in the league. Gore never did. He just keeps going and going like the Energizer Bunny, beating that little bass drum, but that doesn't make the bunny the best drummer around. He's been consistently very good or excellent, just never the top. Maybe this makes his lifetime achievement all the remarkable. So kudos and I'm glad he got this milestone as a Bill. Now I hope he gets a ring as a Bill as well.

With the new rules on kickoffs, it's getting harder for return teams to be effective. Almost always, a high kickoff that reaches the 1 or 2 yard line and has to be returned gets the returner tackled at the 20, or before. There are exceptions when coverage units break down, as ours did in Miami, but that doesn't happen often. What happens more often is that the receiving team gets bad field position, at the 18 instead of the 25. Go ask NFL coaches whether they want that or not. As for punts, when a punter can pin the other team back within the 5, or even closer, it usually leads to points for the punting team. Aside from the occasional safety, the receiving team struggles to get a first down, and when it punts as it usually has to do, the original punting team gets the ball inside the other team's territory. Punting can be an offensive weapon when your team is anywhere beyond your own 40.

If Elway offered four #1s for Josh, and the Bills accepted the offer, Josh would be injured in the next training camp. The Broncos are snakebite about QBs.

Elway's quest for a new franchise QB seems like something out of Greek mythology. Some of the players he's obtained were pretty decent, but Elway doesn't seem able to surround them with a good line AND good RBs AND good receivers. Great QBs can overcome limitations of their teammates, but it takes time for QBs to get the experience they need to become great.

Let's face it, any QB would be in the Pro Bowl if he could play against the Dolphins every week. I'm actually more impressed with how Allen played the past few games against better DBs, better pass rushes, better LBs. He's being careful, which is what he needs to do. His progression is very promising.

There are so many plays where the Bills receivers are all covered, play after play, particularly against man defense. Beasley and Brown can find holes in zones, but against man to man, they're just some guys going for a jog with a defender right beside them. The point is, Allen doesn't get to make a dozen throws a game because the receivers aren't open. If he had a target, and he could hit it 8 or 9 times out of 12, that would be another 100 yards a game, easy. The O line is doing OK, and Allen is being smart with the ball. It's the receivers who aren't helping him. I'm happy for Lamar Jackson and Patrick Mahomes, who are both very talented and are doing great. I don't think either one of them would do any better than Josh Allen has done, playing with this team's personnel and coaches. As for Mahomes, he's been terrific, but if he hasn't reached his ceiling, he doesn't have one. I have to figure he's as good as he's going to get. He'll get more experienced with time but his wheels will wear out. Jackson, geez who knows. Can he keep improving? As a fan, I hope both Mahomes and Jackson get better. As a Bills fan I wish they both played in the NFC. The Falcons gave up a ransom for Julio Jones. They had Matt Ryan and they ended up looking brilliant. The Bills gave up a ransom for Sammy Watkins. Was it Watkins' fault he didn't make the Bills look smart? Or was it injuries, or Tyrod Taylor?

Next year the Bills will need to win the division to get into the playoffs. Next year the AFC East plays both the NFC West and the AFC West. With the Bills and Pats holding the first two positions in the AFC East this year, both will play equivalently hard schedules with a lot of travel, which never goes well for the Bills. Teams from other divisions of the AFC will have a much easier schedule than the Bills, and both WCs will come from elsewhere. I think only the AFC East winner will make it next year. And, I think we have a shot at the East next year.