hondo in seattle

Claypool had a nice sideline grab in this game. Unfortunately. Desperate times call for desperate measures. Beane is looking for the good in people and trying to fill up the WR room with inexpensive guys who will compete, hoping one (or more) of them will surprise.

The CBS article reporting the trade said, "there is a talented player somewhere inside Claypool."

Back when men were men...

I once listened to an interview with a scout. He attributed the high miss rate during the draft to the fact that scouting is a predictive science/art. He explained that very, very few college players are good enough to play in the NFL. He did mention some difference among positions groups but, generally speaking, nearly all college players have to get better before they'll be good pros. A scout has to predict who's going to get stronger, bigger, and faster. Who's going to devote themselves to the weight room and playbook. Who's going to have the maturity and discipline to sign a huge contract, stay hungry, and work every day. These predictions include physical, emotional, and psychological factors. There's a lot of (informed) guesswork going on. None of us can know how much Coleman will grow as a player (there are some natural/genetic limits involved) nor how fast his growth will happen. That's why I take the guesswork of fans and media pundits with a grain of salt. He seems like the kind of guy who will put in the work so that's a plus. And Beane and his staff, with all their due diligence, thought him worthy of our first pick so that's encouraging to me, too. But there's no certainty here. All we can do know is hope.

Interesting highlights. I think his college tape is more impressive than Groot's. However, when you look at the size differential (Solomon vs. OT), he kind of looks like a blitzing CB up against an offensive lineman. Yet he gets by those guys with a variety of moves. I wonder how well his skills will translate to the NFL at his size. (Yeah, I know he's only a few pounds lighter than Von. But, to me, he looks small for an edge. Maybe I'm wrong?)

I'm an old far and not up on current lingo so let me ask... What does going "banco" mean? Banco can mean bank or bench in Spanish. Not sure if either meaning fits here.

96 starts in his career. Brings a lot of experience. Ran a 4.38 40 at the combine 8 years ago. Wonder how much of that speed he still possesses? PFF rated him as the 7th best LB in the league back in 2021 but only graded him a 66.3 last season in limited action as a backup.

Thoughts about wideout speed. Samuel has speed. While not routinely used as a deep threat, his speed combined with Josh's arm will force defenses to respect the deep ball. Shakir isn't slow. Gabe was considered a deep threat despite having an average-ish 40 time. Sometimes 40 times don't tell the whole story. While a bit slower than Gabe (according to GPS tracking), Coleman might find ways to get open deep occasionally. With so many teams playing two-high shells and otherwise trying to neuter Josh's arm advantage, we need to get proficient at the short and midrange game. Kincaid is helping there. Coleman will too. If Brady's a good OC, he should be able to scheme up a diverse and productive aerial attack. Though, I admit, it would be fun to have a young Lee Evans on this roster too to make teams truly afraid of the long ball.

Augie, I'm with you 100%. I've called it out in other threads and am happy to see you call it out here. IMHO, the Bills Mafia should be a Band of Brothers who support each other and support the team. Of course, that doesn't mean we respond to everything with Pollyanna happy talk. We're going to be upset when players, coaches, personnel guys, and refs make mistakes. And we'll argue with other fans with different opinions. But - hopefully - all this remains respectful. There's enough sh*t coming our way as it is (e.g. old age, disease, IRS notices, reality tv, death). We don't need to sh*t on each other, too.

It's not a full rebuild but it is a heavy reset year. But I don't think it'll be a bad one when I think about the key players we've lost. For example, Diggs wasn't very productive in the 2nd half of the season. While Davis gave us a couple of very memorable games during his time here, in most games he was just ordinary. Tre hardly played the past two years. Hyde and Poyer, a fantastic duo in their prime, were starting to become injury prone and aging out. We made our run last season without major contributions from these guys. So why not another run this year? There are three things I'll be watching closely: (1) The rookie class. Can they - especially Coleman - contribute this year? (2) Brady. Can he scheme a high-powered offense? (3) Injuries. Can we enter the playoffs reasonably healthy for once? If we have positive answers for these three questions, I think we'll be able to challenge in the playoffs this season. And we should be even better in 2025 with more cap space to play with if Beane plays his cards right.

Teams are afraid of Josh's cannon arm and often use a two-high shell against us, or otherwise try to take away the long ball. We must be able to dink and dunk and, so far, we haven't demonstrated a consistent ability to march down the field that way. Despite some of the analytics on his route tree, I think that's why Coleman was drafted. I admit, though, I'd still love a legit Lee Evans type deep threat on this team. Or better yet, an all-purpose stud receiver like Moulds or Reed. I want the Bills to have the ability to threaten every inch of the gridiron and force opponents to try to defend everything.

Our OL stepped up last year but I still wish it was better. And I wish we had added a stud wideout to the WR room. But if Brady is smart and creative, he's got a diverse group of runners and receivers, each with their own unique skillset, with Josh Allen as the centerpiece. The toolbox isn't empty. This offense can potentially score a lot of points. Though, I don't know yet if Brady is smart and creative.

That's probably true. But is this a Super Bowl roster?

I think Malazan already decisively demonstrated that 40 times don't correlate with NFL success. So why are we still arguing if Coleman is fast or not? It doesn't seem a particularly vital question. Guys with his speed and slower have succeeded in the NFL. But will Coleman? That's the question that matters. Personally, I have no idea. But I like his attitude. He said the right things in his first interview as a Bill and has already reached out to Andre Reed for advice. Seems like he's got his head on straight and is ready to work. I'm rooting for him.

I don't think Beane is looking at it as a punt year. But I also think the cap is mostly spent and the draft is over. Realistically, what can he do?

The best laid schemes of mice and men are often thwarted. I don't think the offense we've seen from the Bills is exactly what Beane intended when he put the roster together. I think some of his player acquisitions have been disappointments to him. And Beane is the GM, not the OC. I believe that there have been times when Beane has thought Dorsey or Brady has underutilized the tools provided. While the OL was better last year, I do wonder why Beane hasn't made the OL a bigger priority. When you have a highly talented - and compensated - QB, you would think acquiring a skilled bodyguard would be critically important.

Well, we needed talent almost everywhere. And Beane found players he liked for a variety of position groups. So far, so good. I have an open mind about each new player. But I also know, historically, that most draft picks do not become valuable starters. So, there's that. I'm intrigued but I'll wait before judging Beane's work a success or failure.

I haven't read the book but am familiar with the concept. I don't think any individual fan can compete with a pro scouting department. But I think the idea of a collective group of smart fans competing with a professional scouting department is interesting. For example, could the fans on this website collectively make better picks than Beane and his staff??? I went to college 40 years ago and remember little, but I do remember this... In a psych class, the professor handed out a list of random items and asked us to list the ones we would want with us if we were astronauts faced with an emergency situation in space. Then we did the same exercise in 6 person groups. I was cursed to be grouped with the most unscientific, illogical clowns in the class. Or so I thought. To my shock, our group list more closely resembled the official NASA list than my personal list. Amazingly, every group list was better than any individual's list. Collective intelligence is a remarkable thing. But it has limits too - group think, for example. So now I'm curious... Do you think a large mafia group can draft better than Beane and his staff?

I've been thinking about Einstein's complaints about 'anecdotal' arguments. My argument isn't actual an empirical one; it's one of values. I think people should be humble and kind. I can't back that up with science. But I think Einstein is looking for proof that pros are better than amateurs at scouting. As far as I know, no one's yet done a double-blind randomized controlled trial to determine if professional scouting staffs are better at talent evaluation than fans. But wouldn't it be fun to try? Except I wouldn't want the experiment to be entirely random. I'd run it like this: The Chiefs, Pats, Jets, Fins, and 12 other teams would be required to fire all their scouts. Instead, they'd pick some random fan the day before the draft to make all their picks. The Bills and 15 other teams would be allowed to retain their professional personnel departments and scout prospective players as normal. We'd do this for ten years and then compare the results. We could collect the empirical data Einstein is looking for and win a bunch of games in the process.

I sometimes think the #1WR is overblown. What if a team rotates 5 wideouts, none of whom surpass 1,000 yards. But when you add in the TEs and backs, the offense still gains 5,000 yards through the air. Do the fans then think: "Well, we would have had 6,000 yards if we had a true #1!"

Einstein, you know drafting isn't an exact science. You also know it's not purely a game of chance either. It's something in between. Brandt-the-Commentator may have been right more often than some front offices, but he wasn't right often enough for me to feel like I could entirely trust his judgment. Was it luck or skill when Bill Walsh drafted Joe Montana? I don't know. But I do know that Walsh made more good picks than other GMs during his time. I think Beane does, too. Or, more broadly, I think Beane has put together a better roster than most (though not all) GMs in the league. I also think it's absolutely fair for us to judge Beane by the roster he's put together. We can evaluate players like Allen and Cook because we've witnessed how they perform at the NFL level. I just think it's fan hubris to call Beane a moron or idiot for a draft pick when we mafiosos lack the expertise to make those judgments. We might not like a pick. Fine. But let's not rush to judgment and call each other names.

I'm not opposed to inexpert second-guessing. I do it, too. I do question the name-calling, hair-pulling, and gnashing-of-teeth. Especially, the name-calling. Years ago, I would read draft profiles on all our picks and watch their highlights. And then I would turn to a select group of trusted experts. High up on that list was Gil Brandt, who was a scouting innovator, helped Dallas win some Super Bowls, and was inducted in the Hall of Fame. After I digested all that information, I thought I had a reasonably good idea of how our draft went. But I noticed that a lot of even Brandt's takes turned out to be wrong. Of course, Brandt-the-Commentator didn't have the scouting staff and other resources that Brandt-the-Vice-President did. But I think the bigger issue is that it's impossible to unerringly project the future success of college players. There are just too many variables at play. I'm now like Socrates when it comes to the draft: I know that I know nothing. There is no certitude here. There can't be.

Well, I'm admittedly Debi from Depew too and I don't. But I suppose some versions do.

Yeah, I agree. Drafting is such an inexact science that I like accumulating extra swings at the piñata. It's true that 1st round lottery tickets are better than late round lottery tickets but I like lots of lottery tickets to improve the odds. I'd love for the analytics guys to come up with a true equivalency and trade chart based on historical hit rates at different places in the draft. If being a good GM was easy, Matt Millen would have succeeded. In truth, Millen knows more about talent evaluation than 99.99%+ of the human beings on the planet. Yet, despite being supported by a multi-million dollar scouting organization, he authored one of the worst 7 year stretches in NFL history. However smart he may have been, he was still worse than the 31 other GMs. I used to walk away from drafts thinking, "This is a good one," or "This is a bad one." But I never actually had a freaking clue. Now I turn off the TV, read the online scouting reports, and say, "Well, this is interesting. Let's see how it works out."

Every blue moon, an intrepid crime podcaster breaks a criminal case. But imagine your daughter was kidnapped and you had a binary choice: (A) You can have the FBI, with all its trained investigators, forensic scientists, labs, subpoena power, police connections, and other resources handle the investigation. (B) You can have Debi from Depew, who views herself as an investigative reporter because she podcasts from her mom’s basement, search for your daughter. I don’t know about you, but I’d choose A. It's part of fandom to stand by our unfounded opinions, call the GM a moron, and generally spout nonsense. But, if we want to be honest about it, we’re all - to varying degrees - Debi from Depew. Fans are notoriously lousy at assessing draft picks. Many of us criticized Beane when he picked Josh in the draft while few of us offered up flowers when he chose Milano. And, look, talent evaluation is hard. Go back and look at what sportswriters said five years ago about the draft. Their hit rate isn’t high. Even the analytic guys, armed with their algorithms and statistical analyses, aren’t good. They told us that if Josh became a successful NFL QB, it would shake the very foundations of all math, science, and human knowledge. I doubt if there’s anyone on this board who knows as much about scouting college players as Tyler Pratt who starts researching and evaluating players at 5:30 am each day and keeps at it until 8pm. Tyler is an area scout for the Bills Personnel Department which includes 18 dedicated fulltime professionals, not including the admin folks, and is aided by 7 equally dedicated professionals in the Analytics & Football Research Department. While none of us matches Pratt hours and expertise, we don’t hesitate to act like we’re smarter than Beane and his entire, fantastically resourced organization. So when someone starts spouting that Beane is an idiot because he drafted a slow wideout, a lineman with short arms, and a guy who never played football before, I just yawn. Debi from Depew doesn’t interest me. Beane and his team have spent millions of dollars, studied thousands of hours of tape, conducted hundreds of interviews. I just hope the Bills FBI (Foot Ball Investigative) unit is better than the FBI units at our rivals. Time will tell. But I trust Beane and his team of experts far more than Debi from Depew.