Ronin

Fully agree on this. If nothing else the league and its owners, generally speaking and for sure the bunch in the top-20, care about money and nothing else. All it takes is a quick google to see that the NFL Stadium Credits issue is real. This was one of the first links that came up; https://www.thestadiumbusiness.com/2019/07/03/stadium-credits-mooted-nfls-next-cba-report/ It's clear that the issue is real. That's also why I believe that the performance of the team during the stadium lease-extension years which overlap the CBA is critical. I don't think it's going to be good if "The Process"/McBeane fail, it won't help to be sure.

LOL, well that may very well be true. I do think that the greatly diminished space for tailgating will ultimately be a major factor in determining it.

Outstanding post! On this part of it, what are your thoughts on how tailgating factors into the mix? Mine are simple, as I see it tailgating in Buffalo is as much a part of the game-day experience as the game itself, perhaps more even. By building a downtown stadium it's unlikely that the tailgating climate stays intact. I'm not sure it can given the proposals that I've seen thus far.

Which were what precisely?

LOL What'd you do, wake up and inadvertantly put automotive grease on your toothbrush this morning.

Myself as well. The only certainty is that money trumps everything amongst players and owners. As to Bills fans, I don't think we're normal. LOL By that I mean I don't think that most of us care about the "modern amenities" like most fans around the country do. I could be off, but it seems to me that the biggest concern, by a country mile, is having the ability to tailgate and do it "properly." That's why IMO a downtown stadium relying on parking garages and the like would be a drastic mistake in Buffalo. Again, perhaps I'm off, but if the tailgating situation changes, I see fans becoming far more connected to the performance of the team in terms of attending games, and if that ends up happening, meaning a new downtown stadium, if things don't straighten out soon it wouldn't be good as such. At the end of the day, and since we don't know the figures, I have a difficult time believing that we are anything but near the bottom in terms of our contribution to revenue sharing.

Oh, it would make a huge difference, but pushing it from 30th to elite? Milano had 12 TFLs and 3 QB Hits last season. Not sure how many were in the Red Zone. Would have to go thru the game logs to find out. All that is easily ascertainable is that 10 of the 12 were in losses. Kyle had 6 TFLs and 14 QB Hits. The only other players with double-digit TFLs were the diminishing Lorax and Hughes.

Agreed. One of the "dirty little secrets" that the politicians in NY don't talk about is how immigrants are the big reason for a mitigation of diminishing population. That's not a positive development.

Indeed, but what Florio adds is that if the players are contributing, whether it be directly or indirectly as may be the case, then they should have a say in how their money is spent. Kind of like shareholders that want to maximize their investments. So too, why wouldn't the players, in that case, want to see the money spent where it will yield the greatest returns where it will impact their bottom lines. Obviously they would. To them, as with the owners, this is pure business. That's essentially what Florio's implying, they don't want that. Why would they if they can simply have the money instead. Maybe I read that wrong, but it seems as if it may be forced on them. It reads to me as if Florio is merely repeating what he's been told by someone involved in the process.

I generally agree with that although I'd say that a good edge rusher would only transform the D moderately given the losses and diminishment due to retirements and aging. A good edge rusher doesn't address our very average run D and we still have to elevate our Red Zone D from 30th. I don't know if a simple edge rusher pushes us from 30th to elite. You know my take on Oliver, I hope you and everyone else are correct. If not, and if Allen doesn't make play equivalently, we'll be looking for a new coach and GM.

So in essence, you're implying that where Beasley will be this year on the field, we had no open receivers last season much at all then. There's no other conclusion to draw based on your comment off of my comment. All I can say is OK, if you think so. Not really worth discussing further.

Yes, I passively mentioned that some of that factors in. That's been exactly my point, they were better because their front-7 performance was notably better than ours. Point being, w/o that front-7 performance, we're always going to have those issues, eh. So yes, it will come down heavily to whether Oliver plays up to expectations, whether Phillips or someone can fill Kyle's shoes otherwise, either individually or by committee, and to what extent an inconsistent and aged Lorax and aging Hughes see their play diminish, if at all, and who picks up that slack if it does. Either way, this is Lorax's last season and Hughes is aging to the point where expectations will have to be lowered and accounted for as such.

Concur, although I was addressing some of your more specific comments. In my estimation we're going to see more from Phillips than we saw last season, I think he'll become very good but not premier or impact however. We'll see to what extent Oliver does the same, we'll find out if he's a "hell of a football player" in the NFL. Phillips was the third youngest defender on the team last year older than only Edmunds, who was the youngest in the entire league, and Taron Johnson, the next youngest on the D.

Great stuff there! And thanks! I'll respond to the bold after this, but think about what you just said? Essentially you implied that the secondary was built all but by accident and in spite of their best efforts elsewhere. Hyde was always a good pick-up outta the gate, but the others as you say they more or less "lucked" into. "Cheap free-agents" as you put it and day-3 draft picks, and I concur. But then, consider, their bigger moves haven't really panned out as such which raises several questions, doesn't it? Phillips (3rd round) hasn't worked out particularly well. I think he'll take a big step this season but until that happens ... Here's the thing, their (McBeane's) entire MO seems to be "cheap free-agent contracts," particularly involving players with known injury histories. It almost reads as if it's a sling as much "acquisition mud" up against the wall that you can and hope that enough sticks and sticks well to effectively build the team. That's my take, but I also don't think that's how championship teams are built. I can't think of any other teams that have used such an approach while getting as little from their day 1 & 2 draft picks as we seem to be. Agreed although I would add C to that list along with MLB if you're running a 4-3. But let's take a closer look at that. #1 CB they've done well with in White although he was inconsistent from his first to second season. QB - jury's still very much out until this season. LT - Dawkins, jury's also out there but for a 3rd he's fine, but I don't really see any big effort to fill that role, hence my draft strategy of having taken Dillard. Pass rusher - Murphy, with a signicant injury history was their solution. He was never great to begin with and questionable straight up. I don't see that signing as a great move by any measure. #1 WR - Jones was their big effort and that's failed. I don't see that changing this season. If Jones manages to put up 1,200 yards and 8+ TDs we can discuss further when it happens. Not seeing anything even close however. If anything I think that Jones is closer to being off the roster next season. C - Morse, again, another player that they're heavily relying upon that has a very significant and recent injury history having kept him out of nearly half of his games over the past two seasons. It's already an issue. MLB - LOOOOVE the Edmunds pick, as I've oft said, I'd have taken him at 12th. But the long and short of it is that they're overall strategy, as I said above, appears to be one of mass 1-2 year low-risk signings, often featuring players with previous significant injury histories apparently hoping that those histories don't arise here. But as you said about the stats and data above, it's about averages etc., which means that probably at least half of them will again rear their injury-issue heads. Either way, their draft strategies and results certainly aren't earning them league honors at present, and if Allen and Oliver don't pan out to anything besides the sales pitch associated with each, their strategies as such will have been pivotal in terms of them being shipped out of Buffalo. Well, sort of. I'll assume that you have a working knowledge of statistics. But you can take two averages, one with a standard-deviation of say 1 sigma, and the other with 2-sigma, and the 2-sigma one means far less consistency. The closer that s.d. is to zero the better. Statistical Process Control typically applies to other things, like production processes and the like, but it can quite easily also be applied to sports as such although it rarely is at this level. That's what sites like Football Insiders and PFF do generally speaking. The closer a production/manufacturing process can get to hitting the mean/average every time, the better for overall quality. That's what "6-sigma" quality that no doubt you've heard about is all about. The "6-sigma" is the error or "unsatisfactory" part of it, meaning that fewer than one in one million pieces fails. The same applies here although to a far higher (less minute) level. Either way, the consistency of a defense, offense, or any aspect of a team definitely falls into this category. Chicago and the Ravens were much closer to their "means" than we were. This means far greater consistency regardless of the opponents. The greater your s.d. is the more one must look into the reasons why. This is particularly true for production/manufacturing processes but again, equally so in this case. Our s.d. was notably higher and I explained why, but that shouldn't be dismissed for a thorough and proper understanding of the workins behind it. Again, our schedule is absurdly favorable this season for both O and D. For D, we only face three teams that were ranked among last season's top-10 passing teams. The Pats, Eagles, and Steelers. If our defense plays lights out ball against them we can consider it an improvement. All other things remaining equal, that would narrow down that s.d. If not however, then we'll have two straight seasons of history w/o any indication whatsoever that our pass D, including secondary, is even capable of hanging with playoff caliber offenses with great passing offenses. But it's statistically erroneous to assume that two teams with the same average in one area are necessary equal in that area, as in this case, particularly given the plethora of varying factors that influence the average in question. In short, it doesn't actually value them the same at the "end of the day" analysis. In trying to conjure up an analogy I can't really come up with a good one, but I will add that when a standard deviation is larger than another, it's a very good idea to look at the individual data to see if there are any trends or patterns that explain it. That's what I did and do, constantly, the proverbial nine-ways-to-Sunday. It's not popular if it's not favorable amongst fans, hence the entirely objective mathematical approach, which takes most (never say never) of the subjectivity out of it. Someone here constantly posts that "stats are for losers" - Bill Belichick. But consider, the man that Belichick leans on the most is long-time analyst Ernie Adams, who does specifically that as a full-time job for Belichick. I had no idea before I looked, that our pass D simply didn't play well against passing teams that couldn't run all over us on those game days. That includes teams like Minny or GB that had crap for RBs. I only noticed that trend/pattern upon looking specifically for trends and patterns as such. Frankly, the team, all teams in fact, should be doing this for themselves, it would DRASTICALLY help them improve, in many ways. I don't know why they don't other than to suggest that the likely reason is that the people that tend towards football admin and coaching do not have Operations Research & Analysis masters degrees, Industrial Engineering degrees, or Management Science degrees. The field is littered with people possessing liberal arts degrees, communications degrees, sports admin, etc. That's why when James Lofton threw his hat into the mix for coaching us years ago I was all over him, he has an Industrial Engineering degree from Stanford no less. I have no idea how he would have worked out, but he got stuck coaching college for WRs, which is likely because no one saw what I saw in him, but I would have loved to have found out.

This is a very good discussion! Oliver will be what he is, either the answer or not the answer. Not much to discuss until the season when we find out there. I'll address the bolded parts. Yes, the secondary can excel, no argument there, ours has, but only generally speaking, it has struggled against top passing teams and QBs. But I wish that instead of continually pouring resources into an already excellent secondary that McBeane would focus on the other parts of the team more. To me that means that they're A, in over their heads, and B, in McD's case, focusing, overly so, on what he's known because he's good at it. The problem is that there's 80% other parts of the team that he's not as good at running. But if teams can run the ball down your throat pretty much at will, then that's a way around our excellent secondary to overcome it, and as everyone knows, that's how good OCs will take advantage of our D overall until the entire unit is corrected. That is what in fact happened. If that doesn't change this season then IMO McBeane's competencies need to be examined. That addresses the next part in bold. A pass D is more than just a secondary, it's the very directly related ability to put pressure on opponents passers, which we are not good at. In pass D yardage we ranked 1st, but as I just explained, a good reason for that was because we ranked 16th in rush D yardage allowed. Combined with the notion that against average-plus passing teams we shut no one down that didn't run the ball ridiculously well on us. We ranked 26th in sacks. We ranked 21st in QB hits. We ranked 17th in sack %. But again, also don't dismiss the notion that while yes, overall our pass D based upon the secondary was tops, we still didn't play well in that regard against above-average passing teams that didn't run all over us. That's not a good sign. All it means is that as long as we play only below-average passing teams we're fine, our pass D is great. But the moment we play passing teams that are above-average, we are not good. That's not the mark of a playoff-competitive pass D or D, it's something else. Against the 6 above-average passing teams that we played, we lost 5 of those games. Against Indy they didn't need to throw because they ran for 220 yards. Still, Luck posted one of his most efficient games of the season. 74% complete and 4 TDs on only 156 yards. We logged no sacks. In the first NE game Brady threw for the 4th most yards he had all season. In the second NE game Brady didn't play well but he didn't have to since we allowed nearly 300 yards of rushing. Against the Chargers Rivers ripped us to shreds on 85% completion, 256 yards and 3 TDs. He posted similar games against defensively horrific Arizona and Oakland. Against Green Bay in what was considered a bad game for Rodgers, he posted his 5th highest yardage passing game in what was still a rout. Again, it was a bad game for him. Even Cousins played a good game, 73% complete (40 or 55) for his 6th best passing yardage game on the season. Yes, I realize that it was a blowout, but still, he had literally zero rushing support. His RBs ran the ball 4 times for 12 yards. Cook didn't play that game b/c he was injured. Latavius Murray was no better than any of the garbage we had after Shady. Cousins did all that by himself, literally. None of those 5 teams had above-average rushing games except for NE. To me that's highly problematic as a team attempting to cement itself as a playoff team. It's masked because of the overall global stats. It doesn't even approach showing that we can hang with playoff caliber teams, which is why we didn't beat any. In that sense, as I see it, you're overrating it. We've learned this lesson as Bills fans in the past, both ways, that having a stellar secondary and building from that on in is not the way to build a team. Our SB teams were top-notch front-7s with the secondaries being good but never great. We almost never had top-notch talent in our secondaries. They were good, good enough, but that was about it. A great secondary w/o a matching front-7 isn't going to help a team become a playoff caliber team and it's the wrong bass-ackwards way to create such a team. It really is that simple.

Yeah, again, agree on Allen. My big problem with the D is that they played very well against below-average teams while it didn't play well against above-average teams, it was anything but consistent. Granted, better teams are more difficult to play against, but if a D is really that good then it'll play consistently all season long, which we did not do. As an example, we were #2 in yardage D and the Ravens were #1. Yet, we were 18th in scoring D, which is more important, while they were 2nd in scoring. The Bears were 3rd in yardage D and 1st in scoring D. Both the Ravens and Bears were consistent, we were not. We allowed 20+ points in 11 games, the Ravens in 8 games, and the Bears in 6 games. No need to throw out stats, our pass D was better than the Bears or Ravens pass Ds. But our rushing D was nowhere near as good. We allowed over 200 yards three times, neither the Bears or Ravens allowed a 200 yard rushing game. we held opponents to under 100 rushing 8 times, the Ravens held teams to under 100 rushing in 11 of 17 games, the Bears in 13 of 17 games. The Bear rushing D was ranked 1st in yards, the Ravens 4th, us 16th. In yards-per-carry allowed, Ravens 3rd, Bears 4th, us 10th. In rushing TDs allowed, Bears 1st, Ravens 6th, us 25th. That's the problem with our D, it's weak up front. That's why we were 6-10 and the Ravens were 10-6 and Chicago 12-4. Neither team had a great passing O. Bears 21st, Ravens 22nd. In rushing O Ravens were 2nd, we were 9th, Bears were 11th. So it wasn't their offenses that carried them much more than ours didn't. It was their Ds, which again, were far more consistent. It all stems from the DL/Front-7. The effect of a great secondary w/o the associated pressure up front is grossly overrated. The thing is that even in today's NFL rushing yards on a yard-for-yard basis are more valuable than passing yards, easily. So despite the notion that it's passing that generates today's higher scoring games, teams that can run on you have a better chance of winning if they do. It was true with all three teams. Of the 6 games in which we allowed the most rushing yards we lost 5 of them, we beat Jax who sucked otherwise on offense. Same for the Ravens, 5 of their worst 6, they beat Denver, who also sucked otherwise on offense. In the Bears worst 4 they lost 3 and beat Detroit, also not good on offense otherwise last season. Here's the big difference between us and them, in the aforementioned games, we averaged 163 rushing against us, the Ravens averaged 123 against them, and the Bears averaged 129. That's an enormous difference and in the other games the Ravens averaged 61.4, the Bears 61.6, us 75.3. Again, that's due to the lack of a solid DL, which is a more significant issue than most care to prefer it to be. Obviously wins/losses are more complex than merely one thing, but that's a big thing that contributed to the differences between us and those teams. Offensively there were similarities as all three QBs ran significantly. In short, one needs to be able to shut down an opponent's passing game, which we were only able to do essentially against poor passing teams. The only teams that we held below average passing yards that didn't run the ball down our throats (Indy 220, Pats 273) were below-average passing teams. We cannot say the same thing about the Bears and Ravens who both held several top passing teams to well below-average passing yards w/o allowing bookoo rushing yards. Again, that can all be attributed to the respective DLs.

That's fair and that's pretty much my position, except that I think you're overrating the impact of a stellar secondary w/o the associated pass-rush. Other than that, and particularly in that this team, including McBeane, goes as Allen goes we're in full agreement. But as to the optimism, I guess I have as much optimism to hope for the same as last season on D, but no more, again, pending Oliver where we disagree, but that's a sizeable disagreement with you and others expecting greatness while I'm expecting Phillips to outplay Oliver. All we can do is wait and hope that Allen steps up as such and that I'm completely wrong on Oliver.

Yeah, who knows right now and we haven't studied that changes that they've all made either. Some will be better than we think while others won't. Which bring up something else, McDermott. Last season of the 6 games we won, I'd say that we were better than the Jets, Jags, and Fins but comparable to the Titans, Lions, and Vikes. The best team we beat in terms of record was the Titans at 9-7 which was probably overachievement for them. Unless you're a Mariotta believer they didn't have much better talent than we did, perhaps worse. Their top-3 WRs were Corey Davis, Taywan Taylor, and Tajae Sharpe. Hardly inspiring. On the flip side, we also lost to the Jets, the Fins, and Green Bay which wasn't good last season. So you never know who we'll beat and who we won't. But if we assume that we're capable of beating teams that finish with 9 wins or fewer, as we did last season, and using last season's records, we could win 12 games, it's an easy schedule. Besides the Pats the only two teams on our schedule that won 10 or more games were Dallas and Baltimore, both at 10-6. It couldn't possibly, literally, be any easier. Only 5 of our opponents ranked above-average in sack production including Denver, Washington, and Philly, and only 6 ranked above-average in INT production including Miami, Washington, Giants, and Denver. Re: McD, keep in mind that we beat the Titans and Lions by merely a point and the Jags by only 3, all three of those games were home games. We averaged 17 points in those three games. Who knows what's going to change this season, which is why IMO predicting record is among the most difficult things to do except for teams like the Pats.

LOL, yes, Dillard, I do that all the time. I'm sure I'll keep doing it. Keep in mind that teams are still, unless something has changed, built from the lines outward. A great secondary is good to have, but it's no replacement for an equally good front-7. Otherwise, the players that you mention, A, were here last season so there's no change. Sure, we can expect improvement form Edmunds, as I've chimed in, I fully expect Edmunds to be Kuechly-like in a couple of seasons and a premier MLB. Milano, who knows, but if we had a dollar for every time we heard that a player was going to improve upon a rookie or soph year and didn't, ... Those could very well be offset by dimishment in Lorax's and Hughes' play, we don't know, but it's fairly safe to say that that group overall isn't going to be a huge difference on its own. We definitely need an infusion of talent and a pass rush. Absolutely none of McBeane's players brought in have added to that signiifcantly and to levels that will make out pass-rush above-average much less stellar. Also, there's a whole lot of talk about Milano and how great he is, look, he's good, I'd put him at above-average, and he was a fantastic 5th-round pick, but let's not get ahead of ourselves, he's hardly Von Miller either. A pleasant surprise but still, no premier or impact player. In two seasons, 18 starts, he's got 1 sack, so he hasn't really been a boon to our pass-rush either. He seems to be good in pass coverage however. He's been a very pleasant surprise, but let's also see if he can keep it up. Maybe he'll improve, maybe he'll stay the same, or perhaps he'll not keep it up. We don't know. Either way, that core was here last season, we'll see how it develops. But I'm not sure it's wise to assume that it's going to propel us to correct what was a 30th ranked Red Zone D and 18th ranked scoring D. Do you? I'm optimistic in Edmunds and Milano, hugely so in Edmunds per above and possibly more so than anyone here, but not at all about Lorax who's been as inconsistent as can possibly be during his stint here. I've pointed this out numerous times before, but Lorax came on with a bang for us logging 10 sacks in his first 9 games here, but after that he finished that season with 2.5 sacks in his last 7 games. In '17 he posted 3 sacks in 16 games for 5.5 sacks in his last 23 games at the time. He began last season with 1 sack in his first 5 games for 6.5 sacks in that stretch of 28 games. He then had a stretch where he posted 5.5 sacks in 7 games again before finishing the season with 0 sacks in any of his last four games. Inconsistency has been the operative term regarding him. And remember, he was considering retirement last season, I'm not sure that there's much basis for optimism at the age of 36. He's trending downard, not upward like Edmunds. So is Hughes. As far as Hughes, if we're living in 2013 & 2014, yes, perhaps I'm optimistic, but we're not. For a DE that's averaged a mere 5.5 sacks/season over the past four seasons, and with that as his primary role, I'm not sure I'd say I'm "optimistic." He'll nail down one DE position with still a huge weakness at the other DE position, and he'll do it until his contract expires following the 2021 season. That's how I view it.

Once again, keep the crux of the discussion in mind, "upgrade" is one thing, the degree or extent of the "upgrade" is yet altogether another. I've agreed that there's been an "upgrade," but by the way everyone around here talks we sucked moose chestnuts in terms of talent on the team last season. So "upggrading" to average or so may not exactly match the narrative(s) here. That is all.

What about you?

And honestly, if that's the difference then we're hurting.

It's in the initial post. No, they didn't, they mentioned every change. See, part of the problem here is that so many people assume that the other 31 teams are simply remaining idle and also not improving when the reality is the opposite. Who knows why he said that, some things simply have no viable explanation.

If he wants to run then he'd better learn to slide more often. Too often he took the tackle hits. If you think it's inconsequential feel free. I beg to differ. Either way, if his passing doesn't improve, then he won't even be as good a passer as Taylor, which is saying something. If he lofts 35 TDs and runs, fantastic. If he struggles to hit the 20 TD mark and runs it'll be problematic. It's below-average passing TD production.

Of course, it was for a variety of reasons, but it would be foolish in the analysis to discount the first two, eh. IMO if he can achieve average NFL QB passing it will be a huge step in the right direction, including minimizing his TOs. Last season he had 8 fumbles but was fortunate to only have lost two. My biggest concern insofar as his passing goes is his riskiness which was manifested, at least largely, but INTs. I've said it often, what killed Kizer was his INTs, he had 22 or 1.5/game, his INT% was 4.6%. Allen had 12 INTs in 11 starts, his INT% was 3.8%. The only one higher was Fitzpatrick who was 36 and who hasn't played well in several seasons. If he continues to average an INT+/game and has 11 or 12 fumbles which would likely result in more than 3 lost-fumbles, then his TO issues would remain significant. If he can overcome the INTs IMO he'll have corrected, by default, a number of the issues that are plaguing him. If he can do that then his passing TD production will be there as well. As to numbers, as I've maintained, average would be a significant stride in the positive direction. Average last season was about 22 TDs and 11 INTs. I don't think that the yards will matter as much as that ratio and Compl.% will factor in as well as will YPA, which should also be in the average range, approx. 66%/7.5. I don't think that happens unless all of those metrics move together, they're at least somewhat related, as it pertains to him. That would put him in the company of a Stafford, Manning, Prescott, Dalton, or Trubisky for last season, which is far from too lofty a goal, none of those QBs had fantastic seasons last year.