BADOLBILZ

I agree that they will try to extend Shakir but I think he'll have to leave a lot of money on the table. I doubt they offer him market rate like they would if he were a true X or Z. If he's patient and stays healthy he could get a Christian Kirk deal after the 2025 season from a team that is trying to prop up a rookie contract QB. I'm sure Jerry Jones spit out his coffee when he found out what Buffalo paid Beasley in 2019. Teams can plan around guards and slot receivers being available in FA so they do.

I think the GENERAL consensus from draftniks was that Shakir was a day 2 pick but the people who thought Shakir could play outside are like the people who thought Cook was a WR playing RB. Wrong. At least thru 3 NFL seasons. Fortunately they are really good at what they CAN do. Just so happens those things aren't valued as highly as the things they can't do. Which is why there is a good chance that neither gets extended.

The @SDS story about him getting outraged at Hog boy is probably my favorite TSW story ever. RIP John.

The 2020 offense was only at it's best early in the season when John Brown was healthy. That group got OPEN and open deep. It didn't really matter who they had at TE or RB with that group of WR's. THAT version of the 2020 WR corps was stacked and top 3 in the league, if not the very best that year. The version they took to the playoffs is the one @FireChans is comparing them to and that one wasn't nearly as good with Brown compromised and then got much worse by the AFCCG due to injuries to Beasley and Davis. League-wide, the bar has been raised at the WR position since 2020 and that shows in how teams are playing defense now. So, in addition to not being as explosive as that first half of 2020 offense..........this current unit's rank in terms of skill players isn't as high as it was then relative to the rest of the NFL. As you say, hopefully Samuel comes back looking like the player he's been most of his career and then if Cooper gets back to 2023 form then it's possible that this could be the best group but I will take the one that was speed-boating teams early in 2020.

To say that they weren't even going to "sniff the playoffs" is just hindsight. They had the talent to be a wild card team, they were just poorly coached on the defensive side of the ball that first season. They were a hell of a lot better than that Broncos team they stomped late in the year which went on to win a playoff game.

I think Coleman can improve as a separator. He's probably not as experienced as a lot of WR coming into the league who have been focused on playing football or 7 on 7 football all year round because he's only been a full time football player since 2022. Some of the comps I've seen(Mike Williams and Tee Higgins) of guys who really have to make a living on contested catches are players I think Coleman is more athletic than. I also think Coleman might have a tendency to play to contact from years of playing in close quarters on the basketball court, which is something he should try to get away from.

Yeah we agree. I think the wording of Coleman as a "Gabe replacement" is what I was disagreeing with. I know you had some appreciation for the value that Beane gleaned picking Gabe in round 4......but to me calling Coleman Gabe's replacement rings like saying Amari Cooper is Mack Hollins replacement. Beane dropped the ball entering the season without a WR1. I know the "everybody eats" people are trying to retract their apologies after the Bills trounced a Seattle defense in disarray without production from Cooper........but anyone with common sense knew that they were "asking everyone to play up a spot", as you say, and that might be the difference between being undefeated now versus 6-2 with Josh Allen having a couple more concussions in his medical history.

Bass can't be moved without a re-structure because of dead money. If the Bills get another kicker I suspect they'd have to keep Bass on the 53 all season anyway.

I don't think Elam has any more than LATE round pick swap and he's worth more than that to Buffalo, I think. Jeffrey Simmons is still a good run defender and brings a physicality the Bills lack but I don't think he nearly garners a 1st. Maybe Jeffrey Simmons, K Nick Folk and a 4th for one of the Bills 2nd rounders. Even then it's a tough match because TN would have to eat about $5M this season for Buffalo to afford Simmons. A pick swap for just Folk wouldn't surprise me. He's on a expiring deal.

Yeah I think you are giving Gabe too much credit. His hands are really, really bad. It's not yips or anything like that he just has hard hands......which is a failure of hand-eye coordination where an athlete just can't make the very subtle adjustments needed to quiet and control a fast moving ball. If you are a good HS athlete in the US you usually play 3 consecutive seasons of sports where you need soft hands to be a good skill player. How Gabe made it thru the cracks with that deficiency is a mystery(although generally speaking, participation in football is low).........but that's why Gabe throws his hands or claps at the ball, he has to make a broad movement to compensate for not being able to make the slightest of adjustments. Subsequently, there just isn't anything Gabe Davis can do with late hands or in a 50/50 situation. Which, of course, is particularly important when you aren't a natural separator and that really lowers his ceiling. Gabe was always best suited as a WR3 or a specialist. I don't think there is any one quality that Coleman has to prove he's not terrible at the way Gabe did. I'm not going to get carried away with him having some good games in this soft spot of the schedule but I think he's really answered some questions about what he's capable of.

Beane waking up to the Diontae Johnson news. Good thing Overdorf wore his brown pants this am.

Yeah you were probably the biggest Coleman supporter all thru the winter on TSW. There weren't many who actually advocated his selection thru the process. I know @Coach Tuesday really loved the pick. I loved the Davante-Adams-esque ceiling but had serious doubts about the learning curve fitting a 2024 timeline. Especially without a true WR1. As horrific as those road games in Baltimore and Houston were that truly horrible passing offense forced Beane's hand to get Cooper. Which I suspect has taken a good deal of pressure off the rest of the group of weapons and then the subsequent flat spot in the schedule has created a lane to feed Coleman and build him up. Hopefully he maintains the trajectory like Rashee Rice did for KC once he got going last year.

Maybe some? There will be a lot of Bills fans giving away or eating their groups of tickets, even if they are particularly meaningful games to home field advantage etc... The more the merrier but there is still a wide difference in commitment between the core fan base and the ever-growing balance........many of whom are our over-acting, living-their-best-lives instagram vacation fans. It used to be that traveling to road games was a sign of extra commitment as a fan but in our case(with so many transplants) it's often the exact opposite so I take these "take-overs" with a grain of salt.

By the standards of the day Bills fans were traveling in great numbers. It's different now, so many of these games are either in what have become "destination" cities or places with tons of WNY transplants. It's bittersweet to me because my dream scenario as a Bills fan was for the fan base to become it's own entity(in the same way that Cubs fans had been able to do) and separate from the team's dysfunction. We have totally achieved that with the Bills mafia shtick. But at the same time.........fans will be GIVING tickets away for the Dec 22 and 29 home games. Those traveling fans won't travel to Buffalo and sit out in the cold to cheer the team on. We have great numbers but more than our share of posers because it's become so trendy to be a Bills fan.

Chritian Benford. He's been consistently excellent and has stayed on the field.

Yeah I will go with Benford this season. I can't really go with a RB, they have 3 of them who all make big plays. And an off-ball LB wouldn't be my inclination either but when healthy Bernard is their best player on D. His nose for the ball is epic and those plays change games. He is the anti-Edmunds in almost every way both good and bad(durability). He's even their best pass rusher.

Maybe one day Ankou will finally become a rosterable rotational DT but given that Daquan Jones has been bad this season and Austin Johnson has looked washed they need a more capable option in that mix. The Seahawks don't even try to run the ball so that game was not one to take seriously when evaluating DT against the run.

It's just not that popular of a dish in WNY. It wouldn't be a challenge to get excellent next day fresh sea food affordably enough but there is not enough demand. We have lobster boil parties and someone will run up to Maine and bring a couple hundred home. The money saved is far more than worth it and it's caught the day before. But you need the volume and that's the limitation for restaurants in Buffalo and Rochester.

First off........his name is SHILL Carpaccio. Get it right. And yes, he is a d-bag but it's because of all of the organizational knob polishing he has done on am radio to get and retain that sideline gig. Most men wouldn't go to the lengths he does to keep Maddy Glab from her rightful position. So, IMO, he has earned the right to dance and twirl. Hey-hey......hey-hey......hey-hey......hey-hey

It won't be a yearly occurrence if Hal doesn't get accustomed to spending $350M+ on payroll like the Dodgers and Mets are willing too. His payroll reduction rhetoric is concerning. The league has wisely done everything they can to penalize big spending teams and promote parity without actually instituting a salary cap. So if you want to LITERALLY keep winning every year you gotta' spend. Sure, you might be able to find an unlikely superstar once-in-a-while like the Astros did when they fleeced LA of Alvarez and extended their window for a season or two..........but realistically when you never draft early in round 1 and international money is capped your best chance is just too excel at finding average starters and bullpen depth. You gotta' keep buying difference makers to make up for the lack of cracks at top draft prospects because free agents(except Soto) are usually on the backside of careers. You gotta' be OK with overpaying. And given their ridiculous profits, Hal should be more than happy to spend more than anyone else.

You could say the same thing about Hopkins or Cooper the way they'd played prior to being traded. Sometimes vets need to be on a winning team to bring out the best in them. It's Kyle Van Noy syndrome. That guys looked washed 5 different times but put him in a playoff race and he suddenly becomes one of the more impactful players on that defense. I suspect Armstead and Jadeveon Clowney will revert to prior season form if they join contending teams at the deadline.

Yeah Cooper played on Raiders and Cowboys teams that greatly underperformed expectations. I mean when that Carr/Cooper team went 12-4 they looked like a team that was going to be around for awhile. And they totally fell apart. Cowboys teams he was on regularly fell way short as well. Wins and losses aren't often mentioned as a WR stat but for comparison sake he's 77-70 in his career despite playing on a lot of talented teams........and hindsight-perceived locker room cancer Stefon Diggs is 96-46. But Cooper is a big talent. The fact that he has four career 200+ yard games speaks to how explosive he can be.

IMO teams want their best players to want to win the most. It sets the tone. So his "it's-a-business" demeanor isn't seen as ideal for a star player. I don't disagree....he has been associated with more losing than you'd expect given the talent on the teams he's had so there could be something to it. But the Bills were beggars in this market. He is very talented and in the short term at least he opens up the offense greatly. If he plays in the NFL for a lot longer and settles in as a WR2-WR3 somewhere I think he will be more appreciated.

I wouldn't be shocked if the long rumored Elam for a bag of balls trade happens and a released White gets picked up by the Bills to fill the roster spot but White sure has looked cooked.

He can play both. And with the injury to Carter they need 3 tech help too. Yes. Hornell, specifically. The family own a car dealership there.