jwhit34

How in the world did this get up to 8 pages for a guy who has never played a game, regular or preseason, and was on the practice squad for < 4 weeks. Can it reach at least 10?

Back a bunch of years ago, many wanted the Bills to hire Cowher as HC because of his fiery temperament. Others get on McDermott for clapping (cheerleading?) too much. Now this? Much ado about nothing.

Chubb out for season, Watson inept, I sense a top 10 draft pick being used on a QB...oh wait the Texans have that pick from the Watson trade. Signing a vet (Cousins, Tannehill, Mayfield(?!)) probably not possible since Watson has a cap # of $64 million and dead cap of $201 million. On the bright side, they have their top picks in '25. Anyone know what the QBs look like in the '25 draft class? Not looking good for them.

If Cook continues to do well and Bernard holds his own, the opinion on the 2022 draft class will change. Add a real find in Benford and that's pretty good. Elam is the question mark but maybe it's more they struck gold with Benford vs. Elam is a bust, it could be they have 2 good CBs. Shakir is a contributor from the 5th, Spector made the team 2 years. The Araiza thing was unfortunate. So far the '23 draft is looking good. Very valid point made by many about oldest vs. youngest team not being a big difference.

Based on the numbers being mentioned, there must be a lot of people posting here that are starting Kincaid on their fantasy teams and hoping. Hoping for a good start for him. Yes I have him too but he is my Kittle insurance.

Good chance Miller is activated off PUP. If so, the 4 DEs getting playing time are Rousseau, Miller, Floyd and AJE. The interesting play in terms of roster manipulation would be to have Miller on the 53, K. Jonathan as DE5, Lawson cut and signed to practice squad (not subject to waivers). MIller can practice right away. Then if Miller isn't ready week 1 or 2 you elevate Lawson. That would be the carrot for him, he'd get a couple of game checks in the first 2 weeks.

There is about 0% chance they are trading him. First they wouldn't give up on him after 1 season in which he actually played pretty well, as others have pointed out. There is also the salary cap consideration. He has a dead cap number of over $11 million. The signing bonus hit alone would be a $5.4 million hit this year, I don't exactly how that works in trades but they would have at least the $5.4 million hit of the bonus. The other is guaranteed money I think and I'm not sure how that works. Let's see how things play out. The trade Elam sentiment is the classic "glass is half empty" scenario. How about Dane Jackson is playing well and they may have found a late round gem in Benford and as a result all 3 are starting caliber CB2s. Nice to have the depth.

The 1990 Bills went 0-4 in the preseason. We all know what happened that year... Maybe we should check to see how Norwood kicked in the preseason.

This is misleading, if you look at Bills draft picks that are still playing in the league: 2019: 7-8 (Vosean Joseph not playing, Ford, Singletary, J. Johnson, D. Johnson, Sweeney on other teams) 2020: 6-7 (Fromm out, Moss, Hodgins on other teams) 2021: 7-8 (Stevenson out, WIldgoose, Anderson on other teams) 2022: 7-8 (Tenuta on GB, Araiza out) That's 27-31. And the 2018 class 7-8 still playing, Teller, Edmunds and McCloud on other teams, Proehl out. To pile on, 2017 class all 6 on rosters, 3 on Bills, Zay Jones, Peterman and Vallejo on other teams. Total still in league: 40-45 or 89%.

The 1985 draft is the best draft all time for the Bills, not only Bruce Smith but Andre Reed in the 4th round. Frank Reich was the 3rd round pick, they had a second pick in the first round which was Derrick Burroughs who was a good CB but had his career cut short by injury. They had 2 others that played in over 100 games: WR Chris Burkett (131 games, 4,352 receiving yards) and long snapper Dale Hellestrae, who played in 205 games. Ron Pitts was also in that draft (66 games) and Hal Garner, who was good but then had a performance-enhancing drug suspension (67 games).

Blindside II - Can they get Jack Nicholson to play the father and channel his best Col. Jessup when he takes the stand in the civil suit trial? Sandra Bullock can play Leann again, I am thinking Charles Barkley as Michael Oher.

To move this discussion in a different direction, in 2024 the Bills have all their picks, an extra 6th and most likely a 3rd round comp pick. Looking at the last few drafts, it's been tough for 6th and 7th rounders to make the team. Picks have been cut, poached off the practice squad, or last a year or two. From the '23 class Nick Broeker probably isn't making it and Justin Shorter is questionable to make the team, at least he is in a battle for the WR6 spot (and probably keep him because of his draft status). Trading a surplus player or two for late round picks sounds very appealing, especially since we know Beane likes to move around in the draft and the extra picks could enable him to do that. But also remember the last two years he gave up a 4th to move up in the 1st round, so a 6th or 7th is not getting the job done. So it really wouldn't be to draft someone that will help a lot, it may be to move up the draft board. What would be intriguing would be a player and a 6th or 7th for a 4th. I don't know if that deal exists. I agree that this time of year a lot of fans tend to overvalue some of the perceived depth. I think for the Bills this year the positions where that is true are WR and CB. Legit surplus depth is on DL, but the trade options are limited to Epenesa, Basham and maybe Settle or Ford. They are not dealing Rousseau, Miller, Floyd, D Jones or Oliver. Phillips and Lawson have no trade value. Everyone passed on signing Ford until the Bills signed in June. Beane turned some OL-men into picks but I don't know if that player exists this year. Boettger? No. Edwards? I think they want to keep him. Doyle, VanDemark? Unproven no trade value. Quessenbery? Doubtful trade value but who knows...

The projected cost overruns are likely the result of the subcontractors' bids coming in higher than expected. It's not necessarily because the work to date has been more expensive. My guess is that since Ron Raccuia was overseeing the project, he was responsible for final signoff on the budget that was used to get funding. Connecting the dots between this and Raccuia's exit, it would be easy to surmise that this played a big role in his exit. This process started 18-24 months ago and we all know that we have just gone through the worst inflationary period in the past 40 years. If I'm Raccuia 12 months ago I am letting everyone know that the bids are going to come in higher because of that - maybe that wasn't done. Also companies in the building trades have been extremely busy since late 2020, so contractors have jacked up their prices because they have plenty of work - simple supply and demand. I think some people may be thinking "they just started how can they be over budget by that much?" It is not for the work done but for the work contracted for in the future. None of us know what percentage of the work has been contracted for already, so who knows how much more it will change. This is how it goes, we recently did an addition on our house and redid some outdoor living space and despite a firm contracted price, with some changes that could not be anticipated until doing the work the price escalated by about 11%. 11% increase on the stadium amounts to a little over $150 million, so projecting out 3 years $300 million isn't a real shocker.

It seems that it has been said so many times that Sean McDermott does not usually give substantial playing time to rookies that this is accepted as fact. I looked at the snap counts of all draft picks that made the roster in their rookie year from 2017-2022. Here is what I found, grouping by round: First Round Player # Snaps % Snaps T. White 1,093 99% J. Allen 719 68% T. Edmunds 926 91% E. Oliver 556 54% (most by a DT, only behind Hughes and Murphy on DL who had 64% and 65%) G. Rousseau 531 49% (3rd most behind Oliver and Hughes, 58% and 52%) K. Elam 477 45% (3rd behind D. Jackson and T. Johnson) 2nd Round Player # Snaps % Snaps Z. Jones 792 75% D. Dawkins 781 74% C. Ford 739 69% (5th on OL) A. Epenesa 291 27% B. Basham 201 19% J. Cook 269 25% 3rd Round Player # Snaps % Snaps H. Phillips 389 38% (3rd for DT behind K. Williams and Star) D. Singletary 530 50% (most by RB, Gore 2nd with 35%) D. Knox 646 60% (more than double any TE) Z. Moss 403 37% (2nd to Singletary) S. Brown 726 61% T. Bernard 110 11% 4th Round Player # Snaps % Snaps T. Johnson 405 40% (only behind White and Wallace) G. Davis 797 73% Notables - Rounds 5-7 Matt Milano (5th) played 41% of snaps but started last half of season Wyatt Teller (5th) played 45% of snaps and had 3rd highest # for guards Darryl Johnson (7th) played 22% of snaps Tyler Bass (6th) has been their kicker since his rookie year Dane Jackson (7th) played 18% of snaps Christian Benford (6tth) played 34% of snaps despite his injuries Conclusions: First rounders have all started their rookie year with Elam the only one that was a part time starter. 2nd rounders have played less as the team has gotten better. Bernard has been the only 3rd rounder who did not get significant playing time as a rookie. The 3rd round has been pretty good for them. Beane likes to trade his 4th round picks but given the success of Davis and Johnson maybe he should hang onto them more often. Rounds 5-7 you don't expect contributions right away but it seems just about every year they find someone who can get on the field. Opinion seems to be influenced by the last 2-3 draft classes. The reality is that as the team has gotten better it is more difficult for rookies to play a lot in their first year, it's not necessarily that the coaches don't want to play rookies. This data would indicate that McDermott does not hesitate to use rookies in meaningful roles in their first year.

It has been fascinating to hear many, especially in the national media, state things like the Super Bowl window is closing for the Bills, the division has caught up to them, etc. Looking at the roster objectively and factoring in some of the TC news (and not overreacting to news out of camp), it is difficult to find an area of the team that should be worse in '23 than it was in '22 except MLB: QB - Unless you think J Allen has had his career year(s) he will be no worse than the same. RB - To err on side of being conservative, about the same though the optimist in me thinks Cook will be at least as good as Singletary and Harris/Murray > Rookie Cook/Hines/Moss WR - Better - Diggs/Davis at worst the same, Harty/Sherfield/Shakir should be better than McKenzie/rookie Shakir/??? (last spot revolving door in '22) OL - Better and better depth. McGovern a big upgrade, I think Torrence starts and Brown will be better. Only concern would be that we have seen peak Morse and Dawkins and their ceiling is probably the same. The interior OL depth is way better. TE - I have 2 words for you Dalton Kincaid - excitingly better. He very well could be the best addition to offense since Diggs (funny how that happens when you spend a first round pick on offense). DL - All back so at worst same but Floyd and Ford should make it better. Need Von Miller to come back at same level as '22. Contract year for Epenesa. LBs - Worse without Edmunds DBs - Better because of health of White, Poyer and Hyde, and another year of experience for Elam, Benford and Jackson make this possibly the most improved unit. Specialists - same guys Coaching - Dorsey year 2 better, McDermott calling defense > Frazier One other comment about Elam: it is entirely possible that CB2 is a competition more so because Jackson and Benford have outperformed expectations rather than Elam having been a significant underperformer. I think the narrative needs to change. By all accounts Elam is having a pretty good camp and his performance in the playoffs last year was very good. The coaches recognize that. There aren't too many teams in the league that have 4-5 starter-worthy CBs, the Bills seem to have that with White, Johnson, Elam, Jackson and Benford. They do seem to have a knack of drafting roster-worthy DBs.

There are several fundamental flaws in the business model for ESPN and most network sports departments: 1. Studio shows: With the exception of TNT's NBA show with Kenny Smith, Charles Barkley, Shaq and Ernie Johnson, they are all horrible and pretty much unwatchable. Networks have loaded up these shows with ex players and coaches with bloated salaries. This would be one of the first areas I would cut. The challenge ESPN has vs. the others that just air the games is they have 24 hours of airtime to fill every day. Halftime shows are a joke. If you have a 15 minute halftime (and NFL is 12) on TV there is about 6 minutes of commercials, another 1-2 minutes cut in back to the game before the 2nd half resumes. That leaves about 4-5 minutes on NFL games, maybe 7 for the NBA or college hoops. If you have 4-5 people on the broadcast, and go around 3 times so each person gets about 20-30 seconds to make a point. Hardly in-depth analysis. I'd go with showing highlights, update scores around the league and be done with it. Pre-game shows I would reduce to no more than 30 minutes and simply preview the games. 2. Game commentators: Virtually no one watches a game to hear what the commentators have to say, they are watching the game. Viewers want competency, not name recognition in their broadcasters. So I'd get rid of the high-priced, high-profile no value add commentators. The other aspect of broadcast crews is the sheer number on a game. Lots of 3 person booths, sideline reporters which contribute nothing meaningful, and of course the Gene Steratores or the world deciphering officials' calls. Bloated booths have to go. You could easily go from a crew of 5 to 3 at most. The coaches/managers interviews in football, basketball and baseball are awful. Coaches hate it, they never say anything of substance. 3. Simulcasts: Every game is shown on TV and there is a radio broadcast too. You end up with 3 broadcast crews: one for TV and a radio crew for each team. The stars of the game are not the broadcasters, it's the players. If I was a TV network, I would use the local radio crews for the TV feed, with the visiting team's crew doing the first half and the home team crew doing the 2nd half and any overtime. This would save a ton of money not only with the on-air talent but there has to be savings on production costs. 4. "Experts": Huge overkill. Do you need both Todd McShay and Mel Kiper? Are they really any better at predicting drafts than anyone doing some modest level of research online today? I would get rid of a lot of them and instead of having a lot of these guys under contract throughout the year you could do per-diem or contract employee (1099) deals. They would become part-time employees and in addition to reducing the annual wage outlays you could eliminate benefit costs since part-timers and 1099 employees don't get benefits (and 1099 employees the company doesn't pay payroll taxes). These are major changes in the business model but when the current model is broken, you have to make major changes.

The Bills were not going to miss a beat at RB when they traded OJ because they drafted Terry Miller.

This is the easiest to fix - do what the NBA does and when the play clock (NBA shot clock) gets to 5 go to showing tenths of a second. Can't get any clearer than that.

What does everyone think about the starting OLine?

The challenging thing for teams is that the 3rd QB has to be on the 53 cannot be a practice squad call up. Will that lead to more teams keeping 3 QBs. How about the Bills? Would they roster Barkley and if so what position gets cut back? If 3 QBs: QB 3 RB/FB 4 WR 6 TE 3 OL 10 DL 9 LB 6 DB 9 K/P/LS 3 I think in this scenario they go with 9 DBs (4 S, 5 CB) instead of 10, but I could also see them keeping 9 OL (4 OT, 5 IOL) and 10 DBs.

Guard comparison: 2022: Saffold, Bates, VanRoten, Mancz, Boettger, maybe a little Doyle before injured 2023: McGovern, Bates, Torrence, Edwards, Boettger, maybe Broeker To me, the improvement of the interior OL is the most important and biggest story line to come out of the offseason as it relates to 2023, with the potential of Kincaid a close second. The change at RB is story #3. Cook, Harris, Hynes can they combine for around 110 yards from scrimmage per game? Josh throws for 250/game and runs for 35-40 that's an average of almost 400 yards of offense (minus sacks). The offense will be much better and it was already really good.

In terms of how fans judged/valued/overvalued him, I equate McKenzie to Don Beebe, though Beebe had a more accomplished career. Beeb played 6 years in Buffalo, never had more than 40 catches, was in the low 500s in yards, and had that one big game vs. Pittsburgh when he had 4 TDs. McKenzie had more modest production, though had over 400 yards last year, but had the New England game and also the Miami end of season game in '20 with 2 receiving TDs and a punt return TD. Both were WR4 type players, pretty one-dimensional (speed). Every fan base seems to have players that they overvalue because they are "their guys" but the rest of the league views them as a very replaceable, down-the-depth chart player.

I found this data of average number of regular season NFL games played by draft pick by round: Round Avg. # Reg. Season Games 1 62.3 2 56.3 3 48.1 4 44.4 5 40.5 6 32.5 7 28.1 I thought it was interesting that round 3-5 were separated by only 7.6 games and that there was a big drop from round 5 to 6 (8.3 games). One way to think of it is for every 6th rounder that plays 4 seasons there is 1 who never plays. 6th rounders get about 2 years. So Stevenson to some degree has been an average 6th rounder - been in league 2 years.

Gronkowski and Hernandez had 1,327 and 910 yards, respectively in 2011, their best year. If Allen throws for 4,500 yards (265 yards/game), here's a possible breakdown: Diggs 1,250 Kincaid 850 Davis 800 Knox 500 RBs 550 Other WR 550 I don't know if Kincaid gets to the record (and keep in mind it's in more games). I think this is a reasonable distribution, maybe Allen goes for 5,000...

There are 6 non-white/mixed race: Tomlin, Bowles, Ryans, Salah, Rivera, M. McDaniel Your comparison to the entire US population is not a valid one. The more relevant analysis would be how does the racial makeup of coaches compare to the racial makeup of the players, since pretty much every coach has played the game (at some level, at least college). To that point, about 56% of players are Black/Hispanic, 11% Mixed Race/Bi-Racial, 25% White and the remainder other or non-disclosed. The point is that the NFL has 6 of 32 or 18.75% of head coaches are non-white while the players they are coaching are at least 67% non-white. The NFL still has a long way to go. I'm not saying 2/3 of coaches should be of color, but it still is not where it should be by a long shot. By contrast, about 72% of NBA players are Black and half the coaches are Black. By HamSandwhich logic, there are too many Black coaches in the NBA (since only 13.6% of population is Black) and that clearly is not the case.