Haplo848

Doesn't this statement just contradict everything you said previously? Because Ed Oliver's upside is Aaron Donald level production. That doesn't mean he will actually deliver Aaron Donald level production, but that is where his upside is. Ed Oliver is NOT a "safe/high floor/ ground-rule double" prospect. He's an undersized DT who shows remarkable penetration, but was used horribly in college as a 2 gap DT instead of a 1 gap penetrating type DT, and so was not used to his best ability most of the time. His upside is that he is used correctly in the NFL, penetrates Olines on a regular basis, and becomes just as disruptive as Aaron Donald. His floor is that he's out of the league in two years after he gets pushed around by superior competition because he's undersized. I was with you 100% until that last line. But yes, the draft is where you obtain (and perhaps more importantly, RETAIN) your stars. FA is used to fill in around them. Which is why it's never made sense to me that FA comes BEFORE the draft...

Drafting for a certain position instead of BPA is inane. That's what got us in the position we're in in the first place. There's not really any Olinemen in this draft worth better than 9 other players. If you draft for need, you end with decent players that are not resigned after their contract is up, instead of star players with the organization for a decade plus. Draft your star players as they come to you instead of reaching, and use FA and later draft picks to fill in around them. You draft for need, you end up still needing to fill that position the next year and the year after, and the year after, and the player is gone the year after that. It's what got us C.J. Spiller instead of Earl Thomas, Marcell Dareus instead of A.J. Green, Julio Jones, or Patrick Peterson, Sammy Watkins instead of Khalil Mack, Aaron Maybin instead of Clay Mathews, etc. The draft isn't where you fill needs. It's where you get and develop stars. There are better players at 9 than O-linemen. And just because those better players aren't at a position of need THIS YEAR, doesn't mean they won't be at one NEXT YEAR. Load up on the best players you can, get as many blue chip players as you can, things will fall into place.

I just had another thought. What about dime formations, for when there are 4 WRs on the field? At least in 3rd and long situations, I can easily imagine having Lorenzo Alexander and Lawson as DTs, Hughes and Edmunds as DEs, Milano and White as LBs, and three CBs on the field. That's scary enough in a "get after the passer" way, but considering that the offense would never know who's ACTUALLY rushing, as pretty much all of those LBs can rush and the D-linemen can drop into coverage, the front six is virtually interchangeable, and you can create a pass rush from anywhere. And that doesn't even consider blitzes. That would be a scary defense.

So the people saying that the Bills and the NFL have been moving to two LBs in a nickel formation, and so we don't need a third really good LB seem to be missing something. The reason for the change towards nickel is that more athletic people who are able to cover are needed in order to stop pass heavy teams that regularly go in 3 WR sets. But here's the thing: the Bills run a lot of zone defense. And if you have three very athletic LBs that do really well in coverage, then you don't NEED to play nickel. You can stay in your base 4-3 even when teams go to 3 WR sets. Then you have the flexibility to still be able to defend the pass, but also are better able to defend against the run than if you had taken a LB off the field. So if we had Edmunds, White, and Milano, we wouldn't NEED to take any of those three off the field for nickel situations. There's not a whole lot of reason to ever take any of those three off the field in that case. If White somehow miraculously lasts until us in the draft, we should absolutely run to the podium to draft him, put his locket next to the Lorax's, have him attached to the hip to the Lorax through training camp and practice, learning everything he can from him, and use the Lorax in more pass rush situations, instead of needing him to come in and play in coverage like he occasionally had to do last year. It would result in a phenomenal defense that was able to fly all over the field, stuff the run, that would inspire fear in offenses for a decade or more.

I put "These options suck" because I trust the FO to select the BPA, no matter where they play. Who knows where that's going to be, or how the draft falls out. If the first 8 picks are all D line, BPA might not be there. Otherwise it likely will. But I'm not going to limit myself to the BPA of just one to three positions. I'm going for BPA, period.

Amani Oruwariye in the 2nd. Went to Penn State, saw him play a lot, he's a good CB, but I just don't feel like he fits a need for us as much as some other positions would.

I'm confused why this thread started 7 minutes ago, when the reports that this deal ISN'T HAPPENING, that Rapaport jumped the gun, have been around for hours now...

Let's be honest, nothing is going to happen. The Panthers owner not only sexually assaulted women, he also used a racial slur towards a black team scout. If they hadn't removed him, half the league would have protested. But Kraft, a much more high profile owner, going to a massage parlor for sex where women are regularly forced into sexual slavery? The NFL doesn't care about women, unless there's a video. Out of sight, out of mind. Nothing stirs up the passion and disgust more than seeing people do those horrible things. Without a video, the outrage isn't there. And so the NFL doesn't feel the need to act to harshly. And if you think I'm exaggerating, go back and look at Kareem Hunt and Ray Rice situations. Until the videos came out, the public didn't really know about it, and the NFL and their respective teams felt they could get away with a suspension whose length was either less than or equal to one for a failed drug test. Failing a drug test and assaulting a woman had the same penalty. Until the video came out. Then those players were essentially out of the NFL. As for Kraft, there's no video of Kraft committing a crime that's been released, no video of the horrible conditions those women have suffered under. Most people consider it a joke, and are making fun of Kraft for it. "Six Super Bowl Rings and One Prostitution Ring," or "One Human Trafficking Ring." The same level of outrage isn't there. So Kraft will get a slap on the wrist. He'll be asked to not be so publicly visible, and the NFL won't do zoom-ins on his booth, and that's about it. The only way anything happens is if the courts make it happen. But don't hold your breath. Kraft is a rich, old, white guy. The system works for his benefit. Nothing's going to happen to him.

I mean, it's not like it's this guy's job to do so...

I don't know, this list seems kinda messed up. I get that it's his favorite draft prospects, but Greedy Williams in the mid-30's? When he's projected as a top 10 pick? Something seems wrong there...

So a little less depressing, I was a grad student at Penn State, and in my first semester there, taught three Penn State football players in a lab class; Johnnie Troutman, who played a couple years as a guard in San Diego, Nick Sukay, who was briefly on the Bills practice squad (I thought it was REALLY amazing he was on the Bills, but he didn't last long), and Jared Odrick, who was projected to go in the first round. We didn't have any picks anywhere around where he was expected to go (we were drafting early, he was expected to go late first), so unless he somehow fell to us in the second, I wasn't expecting too much, and was just thinking it would be cool to follow his career, root for him personally. The problem? He got drafted by the Dolphins! I'm just sitting there on draft night, stunned, thinking "how the hell can I root for you now!?"

It's literally only our plays. As long as there are 10 plays total or more, it's possible to figure out the top 10.

I was impressed with the breakdown. Thought they had some interesting things to say, especially with regards to how Allen has been going through his progressions. Also, I had seen some "Is Robert Foster a #1 Receiver?" threads in the past, and had kinda chuckled, shrugged them off, remembered the preseason and the early games, didn't even bother to go into the thread, and just thought to myself "Nope, definitely not." This breakdown really made me rethink that. Foster is demanding all kinds of attention from safeties. The Lions at least rolled coverage his way a lot. He was definitely impressive in this game, and so it's not just Allen that we can talk about making progress. Foster's become a much better route runner, a smarter receiver, on top of being incredibly fast. Now if we can just get him to be able to catch a bit better, maybe just catch it on the first attempt, rather than having drops or him having to double catch it sometimes...

So the only free agents I'm currently seeing for next year from the defense are Kyle Williams, Lorenzo Alexander, (technically) Vontae Davis, Jordan Phillips, Lafeyette Pitts, Eddie Yarbrough, Dean Marlow, and Mike Love. If Williams and The Lorax want to play again next year, I'm sure they'd be welcome back with open arms. Jordan Phillips I'm having trouble seeing leave, considering he seems to love it here, and he's been a good rotational player that I don't think anyone would want to see leave. I figure he'll probably be resigned in the offseason. Beyond that, no really earth-shattering losses. Simply by the fact that we're not really losing anyone next year, unless they decide to retire, I think your goal of keeping the defense intact is already accomplished.

I mean, it's interesting? But like people are saying, there's no context. And how their stats were rookie season only seems to lightly have a correlation with how they end up. The guys who are just bad tend to stay bad, while others grow with experience. Stats alone are never going to tell you all you need to know. Sometimes you just need to do the eye test to see if a guy has what it takes to eventually become special.

HAHAHAHAHAHAHA

Not a chance in hell. The NFL has their favorites and tries to prop them up at every opportunity.

Even if it wasn't if it was the Chiefs catching the ball, and the Chargers were on defense, that flag would have been thrown.

And where's the helmet to helmet penalty on that catch?

Wow, Chargers get the ticky tack penalties, Chiefs get away with the big ones. Refs deciding games again. What a disgrace.

Finally a call on the Chiefs...

I'm actually kinda surprised how okay most people would be with Greedy. I figured more people would be shouting for offensive players, but I kind of like the BPA approach. Stars are more important than starters. And locking down the top 2 WRs of an opposing offense, forcing defenses to throw at Hyde, Poyer, Johnson, Milano, or Edmunds? Not the worst way to play defense. We just need to make sure the OLine gets upgraded, and fast.

You seem to have selected "Other." Is the last name the reason you'd draft him? Or should I put up other options?

I've seen a couple mock drafts where people have the Bills selecting Greedy Williams with their 1st. On the one hand, he is one of the highest rated players, generally assumed to be a top-5 pick like Jalen Ramsey or Denzel Ward, and a defensive backfield of Williams, Taron Johnson, Tre White, Micah Hyde, and Jordan Poyer would be ridiculous, and would be in place for years. On the other hand, the offense obviously needs work, at just about every position. Despite this draft having much better defensive players than offensive ones, offensive players are who we need right now. So, what are your thoughts?

Let's see, McDermott has been drafting well, getting starters at the least, stars at the most from picks in the first round through the fifth, has developed players so that those young guys have made a big impact on the season, and with one more good draft/free agency, and/or continuing to develop his players, puts the Bills in place to make waves in the NFL going forward for a long time to come. McCarthy, on the other hand, has squandered some of the best years of one the NFL's most elite QBs in history. Tough choice, troll...