Wayne Cubed

Imagine having Josh Allen as your QB and playing keep away ball, limiting the numer of chunk plays and just playing to score 1 more point than your opponent. I don't even think it's borderline insane, it's just insane.

I’m not sure if it’s an issue of not having the right receivers or the offensive philosophy but the Bills seem content in just getting a new set of downs. And that’s not more apparent than on 2nd and short situations this season. The Bills have had 35 2nd and 4 or less this season. They’ve run the ball 27 times getting a new set of downs on a little more than half of them. They average 6.1 yards per play on those runs. The 8 times they’ve thrown? 100% success rate, with 10.9 yards per play. To me, there’s just not a lot of chunk plays when the opportunity is there to attempt them. Is that we don’t have the horses to do them? Or we want to play conservative ball? Or both?

Having watched the play a few times now, I'm failry certain it's man-beater concept that Brady called, the shallow crosser/rub routes are the give away to me. The problem is, the Pats show Cover 1 but they drop into some zone variation. I think the play is intended to go to Shakir on the shallow cross/rub and Samuel is meant to occupy the safety and drag him away from where the first down is, which would have given Shakir loads of room to roam after the catch and get at least to the first down marker. I also think because it's a bad play call against that defense, it's why Allen bails the pocket so soon, knowing that play has no chance of success.

Yea the amount is quite odd. Every team does it but 7 former players is a bit much. Surely you'd want a look at other players who maybe carry traits you don't have on the roster already?

Again, he's wide open AFTER Allen rolls right. The Safety, is over the top, he's litterally sitting there in Sharps freeze frame AND Gonzalez is gaining depth. The whole defense flows right when Josh rolls right, leaving Samuel open. If Josh's eyes take him back to Samuel, the Safety, LB and Gonzalez all will move in that direction. Now, if you want to argue he bailed on a clean pocket and the crosser would have been there for a nice gain, setting up a possible 4th and short, I'll buy that. But when Allen hits his drop back, Samuel isn't open.

I sent a message to my dad who was at the game that this seemed like a Week 1 game, in terms of officitating. The officials are always super strict in the begining of the season to set the tone. Odd for a week 5 game in prime time.

I don't think it's nearly as open as you do, both the CB and the Safety are watching Allens eyes and where he's looking. Gonzalez(CB) is already getting depth and as you move the frames forward the Safety, flips his hips as Samuel starts flattening his route. Allen would have to put air on the ball to get it over the LB, so he's not throwing a rocket. Which allows both the CB and Safety to cover that hole you are suggesting Allen can get the ball into. I've freezed the frame at Allens drop back, when he would have had to make a decision on throwing to Samuel.

I want to know what deal Mike Tomlin has made with the football gods to have tihings end up this way. I thought for sure this was going to be the Steelers first loosing season in 21 years but the division is a mess and actually looks like they could take it.

It never felt like we were going to lose last night. Any type of disappointment is only because I wanted them to Mortal Kombat style 'Finish Them', which I thought they were well on there way to, until the missed field goal. There was a point where I thought just score 1 more TD and their heads will drop. Plenty to work on, just keep winning.

Yes it is. See ya later.

Excecpt 4 Verts concept, is a classice Cover 4 beater. It stresses the safeties and opens the seams. It's also a Cover 2 beater.

This. When it's 3rd and 10, with Hill and Waddle in a stacked set, with just Benford standing in front, with Bishop running over late, that's odd and concerning. And something to discuss because what the hell was that defensive call. What's up with Rousseau? Again, something to discuss and speculate on. Especially against a team that had a weak OL and was focussing more on Bosa. When Bernard makes a game ending interception, it's a great play and we all love it. What else is there to discuss on that?

I think the Bills could have a vertical passing attack problem. Thursday games, short week, I always feel like are sloppy and hard to determine much from. Saying that, the couple of times the Bills wanted to look deep, or even intermidiate, it's not been there. This could cause problems in the running game later on and requires a level of perfection from the offense that is hard to sustain.

Also, are some suggesting it was McD/Beane who told Allen to seek out Palmer? That it wasn’t Josh’s idea and desire to improve that saw him go to Palmer in the offseason, 3 seasons in a row? That was all Josh and he would have done that wherever he landed in the NFL.

I thinks it's somewhere around 80/20 or 70/30 the player, then the coaching. Tom Brady was on a podcast recently and talked about this. Mostly because they were talking about Caleb but he was talking about coaching and how much it helped him. He was saying to think of it like this, we rank players on teams but do we ranking OCs or DCs on teams? Or QB coaches? Do we think the 32nd best QB coach is as good as the first? No, probably not. So, I think he believes it has some affect on your development. He then gave a good example of his career. During his rookie year, the Pats QB coach passed away, so Billy B took the job over in the interim. He said he would come into the QB room, show them next weeks opponent. Tell them about what they do in Cover 3 or how they play man or this is what they do in this situation, etc. So Brady was getting a lot of deep insight into the defensive side of the ball. He said it helped his growth, a lot. Now, saying all that Brady still had the desire to get better. To prove people/teams/scouts wrong. He was open to learning and engaging with the coaches. He had the desire to get better and sought it out. If a player doesn't pay attention or doesn't practice or doesn't want or feel the need to learn more. No amount of coaching is going to make them any better.

Yea, I’ve not seen whether they were going to copy that exactly, and I’m not sure that’ll work for Buffalo haha. But it was just nice to be able to stand in concourse and see the field still. And then the concessions were on like an outer ring.

I loved that about Tottenham Stadium, they have glass going around the entire concourse, so you can see the field, and then a glass door into your section.

I do wonder if some of it is this pre season and how players now don't really have one. I agree with what you said about the 2nd level. The LBs and Safety's just looked slow to react or weren't reading the plays correctly. Rusty, I would call it. I thought for the most part the DL as a whole, outside of the rookies, did a decent job. And then Oliver obviously adjusted and took over.

Got caught without Oliver on the field. Same thing they were doing in 1st half, that Ed adjusted to 2nd half, except TJ Sanders was in and not Oliver. Run away from the 3T. Scoop blocked TJ and Bosa out of play so they couldn't collapse the running lane, hence why it's a massive hole to run through. Bernard tries to fill the gap and key on Hnry but the hole is massive and he get's blown up. Rapp either makes businss decision or wrong angle or is tired. This is the same I formation the other long runs from Henry came from.

Yea the gap control in the 1st half was awful, and the Ravens would target away from the 3T(Oliver) and that's where Henry's big runs came from. The Tackle would scoop block Oliver with the backside tackle, so he couldn't disrupt the running lane. Which is really want you want to do for Henry. Need him going East/West not North/South. Great 2nd half adjustment by Oliver and recognising formation and tendecies, he started speed rushing the scoop block, which resulted in those 2 big stops by Ed. But yea, if you watch the Gap control, it's pretty bad, saw Milano and Williams, completely miss filling the gap on a couple plays.

Where you at now Flowers?!

I think Dallas loses this trade in terms of what they got. Those two 1sts, will probably end up being worth 1 top 10 pick. Clark is a legit DT, but is 29 years old. I think the Packers lose in terms of the contract. Why do this trade a week before the season starts? So odd.

Was in elementary school in late 80s and early 90s, in WNY and this was definitely a thing. I remember the kid in my class who was a Dolphins fan and in my neighborhood friends there were a couple Cowboys and Niners fans. Just easier to root for the teams that were winning it all, I guess. Weirdly I didn't notice it in high school as much, when the Bills had just lost 4 Super Bowls.

Agreed. It’s just coincidental that those games happen to fall when they do. It’s not like every big Chiefs game falls in the first 5 weeks(they are all big games), they play the Giants and Jags as well. And they still have the Lions, Chargers(again), our Bills and the Commanders the rest of the season. Plus the Texans. Rice could be suspended for all those games. And I think and agree the fact there has been no settlement means the NFL wants to drop the hammer.

Good first episode, enjoyed the Josh part, the Tre and Dion parts were good. Will be interesting to see where they go with the other players they choose to feature. It'll be hard for them to really feature any fringe players as this team is pretty solid. I would assume next episode features more of the rookies.