BADOLBILZ

Well, of course. But the 10 and 20 yard splits give a pretty good idea of how quickly someone can accelerate. In general you are always going to get close to the same readings from those "dashes"..........whereas in the field of play in an actual game you have so many variables.

Top speed is such a very different measure than 40 yard times. If Diggs could run 20.7 mph for 40 straight yards that dash would take 3.87 seconds.

The thing is, Pro Bowl level isn't very descriptive.........that could mean you are the best MLB in the league or the 18th best. That distinction matters. The NFC has A LOT of good MLB'ers that are clearly better than Edmunds...........the AFC has very few. When you start talking about being All Pro........then it's a lot less subjective.

The only real downside is the new NHL rule that a team can't pick #1 overall more than twice in a 5 year period. So even if they finish dead last again the next 4 seasons they can only qualify for #1 overall one more time.

That is the popular imaginary version of what happened, yes. In reality, production-wise not much changed at the 1 tech position. Doubles were still drawn. Doubles didn't turn into combo blocks at a higher rate. Milano and Edmunds were significantly injured for most of the season. Alexander, Phillips and Lawson were also not back from the 2019 team..........and all played more snaps and had greater impacts in 2019 than Star. And the Bills went from a very easy 2019 schedule to playing the most playoff teams of anyone last season.

As I said......I'm aware he gets some doubles.........regardless of what practice squad level DT is on the field they will draw their share of doubles at 1 tech. I explained that for you and anyone who doesn't understand the importance of the ALIGNMENT in that equation. What % of double teams drawn do you expect for a guy with a $10M AAV who averages about a tackle per game and doesn't make any impact behind the LOS? The problem with your take is the assertion that in the "less than 50%" of plays where he isn't doubled he does a good job of beating his man and making plays. If they go out of their way to give attention to another DL then it becomes his responsibility to make plays. Which he OBVIOUSLY does not do. FIFY........courtesy of @BarleyNY

Has nothing to do with it not being "innovative". And being the first pro league to do something qualifies as innovative. The salary cap was something new to pro football that would later become the modern way to keep and actually expand parity in pro football as the players inevitably gained more freedom of movement (the USFL also hastened free agency in the NFL and greatly increased player salaries which brought more talented athletes to the sport). All those things elevated the popularity of the sport (and without a salary cap Buffalo doesn't even have a team). The AFL was innovative as well........but in the grand scheme I'd suggest the financial aspects driven by the USFL are bigger than changing the texture of the football.

Technically, very incorrect. The 2 point conversion. Allowing coaches to challenge an officials call. Utlitized a "salary cap". All things the NFL later adopted and have GREATLY impacted the game. Also the first professional usage of the "run and shoot" that was a harbinger of modern pro passing attacks.

I'm not sure why it's so hard for people to accept the FACT that he hasn't been consistently "drawing double teams and clogging up the middle". I know some people don't want to pay for gamepass and don't record the games..........but c'mon.........there are plenty of people here arguing that he is a force in the middle who have plenty of access to the recordings. They just don't seem to want to know. They'd rather scream at PFF for giving him very poor grades for his individual work.

Entirely incorrect.......and intentionally misleading. I simply stated the medically accepted correlation between obesity and illness..........and that 300# NFL lineman are going to be clinically obese by definition. Both common sense. @Royale with Cheese then demanded proof that all NFL 300# lineman had underlying medical conditions. That's just internet douchebaggery...........a straw man..........I never claimed that. But also, it's not MY job to prove that obese NFL players are exempt from that which is medically accepted as true. Royale thought he could just point out that NFL players have to train to play the game to prove they aren't at risk for health problems due to their obesity........but as he stumbled and bumbled his way to finding out.......the question of whether it's fair to compare the general population to obese NFL players is too complex to argue against effectively.

Terry Pegula was a hockey fan. He thought or still thinks he knew hockey well enough to run a hockey team well. He was not a big football fan........despite living in Orchard Park for many years, including the SB years, the first Bills home game he attended in person was AFTER he bought the team. So not being as comfortable with football he was likely more inclined to hand the keys over to McDermott after his first hiring ended up as a high profile moment of embarrassment for the family.

No he ended up fighting and getting the decision against another 50 something in an exhibition after people theorized that he might be a heavyweight title contender based on that short video. But if Star doesn't work out..........get this guy on the phone Beane.........look at the feet on that 1 tech........the camera don't lie amirite? He might not make plays either but it's been said that all he does is win.

Yeah you simply aren't going to win NFLDPOY if you don't make big plays to attract attention to your play. Edmunds has played 3 full seasons.........he amazingly doesn't have ONE signature, memorable big, game changing kinda' play. Even Star Lotulelei has one of those in Buffalo. Even Preston Brown had a TD return INT against the Dolphins once.

As I said here at the time.........Donald was the best defensive player in that draft. He had been the most dominant defensive player in the NCAA as well. The Bills were in perfect position to stand pat at #9 and select a player who will likely go down as the best DL of the first 25 years of the 21st century(including JJ Watt). The reason why the Bills didn't pick a defensive lineman is because they had "The Cold Front".......a STACKED DL......with Williams/Dareus/Williams/Hughes in place. Trading multiple picks(including the next year's #1) just to move up to select a DL would have made NO sense at the time. In hindsight it would have been a good value and a great story though.......but as good as Mack has been......he has not been in the shoe-in first ballot HOF class of Aaron Donald.

The guy with the 7' wingspan hasn't forced a fumble in 42 games. He's never recovered a fumble. Just 3 career interceptions. Only 5.5 career sacks. You don't win NFL DPOY without making plays............as stated on OBL today, getting 100 tackles is nice but SOMEBODY gets a tackle on every non-scoring play. I agree that he has DPOY talent..........if he had been utilized like a TJ Watt I think he'd have been a big time playmaker..........but the position that he plays requires A LOT of instinctive play to stand out.........but with 6 seasons under his belt as a college and pro LB he hasn't shown those instincts.

His play dropped off in 2017 in Carolina. That looked like bad timing with him hitting UFA. The perception was that he was looking at a $3M-$4M per year aav kinda' short term deal. Which made the $50M 5 year contract he got even more astonishing and harkens to @GunnerBill point about Beane having a blind spot for certain declining vets in UFA. His meager gross numbers are worse in Buffalo but he's also played A LOT less snaps per game.

Aaron Donald is the best defensive player in the NFL.......a 6 time first team All Pro........3x NFL defensive player of the year..........and they wouldn't have had to trade up for him.

It's neither encouraging or discouraging to me. The fact that his head looks twice the size that it did before could mean he's just at a post-career weight goal. Or it could be construed that he realizes that there isn't much demand for traffic cones in a pass happy league and wants to extend his career as an active DT. That seems a little less likely because if he played well he'd get the same amount of money over the next 2 seasons as if he got cut. I'd remind everyone that it doesn't take much to look good in one take of a short burst of activity. Below is 53 year old Mike Tyson. "Everyone's got a plan (for social media)"

You literally jumped into this thread to argue against the correlation between obesity and illness. An association that is understood to be common sense. You couldn't comprehend the broad scope of arguing that NFL players were exempt from obesity related health concerns.........for example something like 3% of the NFL being of samoan descent........mostly big lineman.....40x the general population % in the US.........and that samoans have some of the highest rates of heart disease and diabetes in the world. I'm just throwing some dirt on your dead argument. You've earned it.

I had faith you'd find the obviously slippery slope in your illogical arguments. All the hand-wringing about me simply applying the common medical assertion that obesity puts one at a higher risk for illnesses/disorders was absurd. You immediately jumped to the assumption that all 300# athletes were too fit to be compared to the general public..........but of course ignored the fact that there are 10-15x the % of 300# people on on NFL team versus the general population...........or that the risk factors are higher for african americans and 69% of the NFL are african americans versus just 13%-14% in the general population. Sickle cell can cause heart failure/death......and HAS on the football field....... and that is exclusively an african american affliction. The numbers also apply for things like diabetes and kidney failure.

FIFY

So what is Star's responsibility in the "less than 50%" of snaps where the offense doesn't assign two blockers to him? (mind you, he only played 44% of the defensive snaps to start with which was less than "part timer" Lorenzo Alexander) This is where the rubber meets the road with the defense of Star as "misunderstood". When the 1 tech doesn't draw a double team it is his job is to get off his block and make a play. Which he doesn't do. As I said........Marcel Dareus earned 1st team all pro and put up 10 sacks as a 1 tech. The position is not to be confused with NT. If what Star provided was so important they would have tried to replace him with a reasonable facsimile thereof.........not Justin Zimmer. I guess your argument is that he is just so unique they couldn't hope to find someone to do what he does.........which would explain why he had to take a pay cut and his contract was set up to make it easy to move on from him after the 2020 season(we know how that worked out).

All winter Tompsett was talking about Star possibly not playing and the need to draft his man-crush Tyler Shelvin to fill the 1 tech spot.........so I guess call it an attempt self deprecation. The part about being afraid to tell the Bills he's retiring? If someone said that.....well that narrative never made any sense. All he has to do is show up and not violate the terms of his contract and collect about $10M over the next year and a half........whether he is effective enough to even make the the roster or not.

Thank you, because the presumption here is that he is always or near-always double teamed......which was not the case. The 1 tech alignment lends itself to double team blocking by attacking the gap between the guard and center........while the 3 tech alignment is designed to create a one-on-one matchup by putting the DT on the outside shoulder of the guard.......a position where it is difficult for the center to reach and where it's presumed the tackle is otherwise occupied. What good is a traffic cone DT who can't get in the backfield if he isn't absorbing two blockers on nearly every snap?

None of this counters the point that I was making that you jumped into the thread to argue against. That clinically obese people are generally considered to be at a higher risk to have underlying medical conditions than those that are not. The fact that it's typically the 300# plus guys that are dropping from heatstroke when doing team workouts illustrates the obvious...........they are likely to be in the least quality cardiovascular shape of any players on the team. Doesn't mean they can't ride a bike or dunk a basketball............just that they are at higher risk. And as it pertains to Star Lotulelei.............the point is that MANY obese players could have claimed they had underlying health conditions. Most did not. For most, taking the $350K was to take a big paycut and/or risk losing their career. For Star, his other money was guaranteed. Jon Feliciano pointed this out right after Star opted out. The skepticism from Feliciano about the reasoning for some opting out was pretty obvious by that otherwise unnecessary tweet. There is no factual basis that we are aware of to presume that Star was at a greater health risk than A LOT of other 300# NFL lineman.