mjt328

Wish I could see it. But I don't. Right now, I'm seeing Josh Allen struggling to complete anything beyond the line of scrimmage with even the slightest level of consistency. I can't say that for any of the other quarterbacks starting - Baker Mayfield, Sam Darnold or Josh Rosen. Those guys are struggling, but at the very least, they seem to have the basics down. The most common play we've seen from Brian Daboll's offense is the bootleg/swing pass to the right side of the formation. It's probably the simplest play for a quarterback, because he's not forced to read the defense and not throwing down field. But even on these plays, Allen is about 50-50 on throwing the ball too low for his receiver. Anything where Allen is required to actually scan the defense has been a total disaster. He hesitates, holds the ball too long, then panics and either drifts backwards or bails to his right side. To me, this is an area where he is actually regressing from the preseason. He's feeling phantom pressure, and trusting his legs instead of his protection. We are only seeing maybe once per week where he steps up into the pocket and delivers a decisive throw. And even then, most of these have been off-target. For all the raving about his arm talent, I don't think he's thrown a single catchable deep ball the entire season. Sure, there are flashes a few times each week. But they are sporadic and inconsistent. You can't look at his mechanics and say - "It really looks like the coaches are working with him on his footwork." It was all over the place in college, and it's still that way 90% of the time. You should see him making a conscious effort to stay inside the pocket - even when it goes against his instincts. Instead, it looks like he's hanging his helmet on the Minnesota game and trying even harder to win with his legs. Compare how long it takes Allen to read the field now, versus how it was in Week 2. I'm not seeing improvement. Of course, it's way too early to make a judgment on Allen. Several quarterbacks (Alex Smith, Jared Goff) were absolutely dreadful as rookies, but eventually progressed and became very good. Hopefully our guy does the same. But I don't think we need to pretend we are seeing something that we really aren't.

Actually, this might not be a terrible idea. If the game went into overtime, the Bills could just defer and kick the ball to the Texans. Then hope for a quick turnover to put them into field goal range. Considering how the rest of the game went, I have more confidence in this scenario than Nathan Peterman driving the offense down the field.

Kyle Williams was considering retirement last year, and I just can't see him coming back. He's not the consistently disruptive player we've seen throughout his career, and at some point he must realize this team is too far away from contention. Fortunately, with the way Harrison Phillips is playing, I don't see this being a big issue. Kyle will be missed more because of leadership. Lorenzo Alexander is still playing at a very high level, and likes being here. As long as he keeps it up, the Bills will probably just keep giving him 1 year deal. Jordan Phillips and Eddie Yarborough are decent depth players, who shouldn't command big contracts. It shouldn't be tough to bring either of them back. Phillip Gaines and Ramon Humber are replaceable. Bottom line, the defense should be in good shape for the next few years. I certainly wouldn't recommend ignoring that side of the ball completely. But I think we can feel confident enough to invest most of our upcoming picks/cap space into the offense. The exception would be finding a #2 cornerback to play across from Tre'Davious White.

When you watch Brandon Beane and Sean McDermott make personnel moves, they usually seem to have a patient/confident/controlled manner on dealing with things. Even when they make unpopular transactions (such as trading Sammy Watkins), there is sense of wisdom behind the decision. And most of the time, they have proven to be right with how they have handled the roster. You almost get a sense of their "master plan" being slowly put into place. The obvious exception has been with the Quarterback position. Instead of patient, confident and controlled - our front office and coaching staff comes across as confused, desperate, unsure and ultimately lacking a solid plan. One week they seem to be going in a particular direction, and the next they are going somewhere else. Benching Tyrod Taylor for a totally unprepared Nathan Peterman, and almost destroying our chance at a playoff spot in the process. Then immediately regretting the move and putting Taylor back in. Signing AJ McCarron as a veteran placeholder. Then trading him before the season starts, leaving us with nobody experienced on the roster. Putting Peterman back into the starting lineup on Week 1, based purely on a few good quarters in preseason. Then panicking after two quarters, and immediately replacing him with an unprepared Josh Allen in Week 2 - even though you stated to the media that it's possible to ruin a young QB playing him too early. Then suddenly 6 weeks into the season, they suddenly decide that having a veteran QB on the roster is maybe a good idea. What comes next? Cutting Peterman? Benching Allen? Starting Anderson? Signing another guy off the street and shoving him into the top spot? Does our front office even know yet, or are we just winging it from week-to-week?

Our offensive futility all comes back to the Quarterback position. Right now, the Bills have the worst starting QB in the NFL in Josh Allen. They have the worst backup QB in the NFL in Nathan Peterman. It would be very hard to dispute either of those statements, whether statistically or judging by the eye-test. Although we certainly aren't loaded with talent on offense, I believe we have good enough players to at least be competent. The Offensive Line looks worse because our QB is holding the ball too long and bailing from the pocket. The Wide Receivers can't catch passes that aren't thrown accurately, and getting open means very little when the QB doesn't see it. Our Running Backs have no space, because teams are crowding the line of scrimmage. Put even a below-average veteran under center, and we are sitting at 3-3 without question... and we would be a legitimate wild card contender. For the most part, I think Brandon Beane and Sean McDermott have done a masterful job with the Bills roster. This was a project destined to take 2-3 seasons, and at this point we've used 75% of our rebuilding resources on the defense. Most of the resources we traded away or lost to retirement came at the offense's expense. It's not surprising the talent level is way behind on that side of the ball. I expect next offseason to be very heavily slanted towards the offense, both in the draft and free agency. So no... I'm not worried that Beane and McDermott can build a strong offense... when it comes to the other 10 guys. However, I am very worried about whether they have made the right decisions regarding the QB position. I'm worried that Allen was the right pick. I'm worried that he's too raw, and our coaching staff doesn't know how to teach him. I'm worried they are ruining his development by playing him too early. I'm worried that our front office/coaches don't have a real plan, and are just winging it.

The Bills record in 2017 was better than their record in 2016. So...

As of this moment (after Week 6 of the 2018 season), Josh Allen is the worst starting quarterback in the NFL. And it's not even close. The other rookies (Mayfield, Darnold, Rosen) all look light-years ahead of him. Allen wasn't ready in Week 2. And a month later, he's still not even close to ready. Instead of small improvements being made to his game, I personally think he's taking steps backwards. His accuracy and mechanics are all over the place. And they don't appear to be getting better. It's one thing to be hesitant when progressing through reads. But he even hesitates on quick slants. His pocket presence is awful, and he consistently bails on clean protection instead of stepping up. I'm not worried about the 2-4 record. I'm not worried about him simply struggling. I'm worried about whether our staff is doing the right thing by playing him right now. Maybe he would be better off sitting the bench for awhile. Maybe not. I really don't know. What worries me the most, is that Sean McDermott doesn't seem to have a solid grasp on what to do either.

Quite possibly. I'm not sure I've ever seen an NFL quarterback with such a weak arm. No velocity. No zip. Everything that comes out of his hand just hangs in the air for an eternity - even on passes that are only traveling 10-15 yards in the air. Cornerbacks keep picking off the same route, because he literally doesn't have the strength to get the ball there. Once Derek Anderson has an understanding of the playbook, it's time to cut bait. I just don't see us being able to salvage anything from this guy, even as a backup. Even if he gains an understanding of the QB position on the same level as Tom Brady, he's just not physically talented to do anything with it.

The problem here is that you are defining "project" by things like overall draft position, how successful they were in college or how quickly they ended up progressing in the NFL after-the-fact. None of these are particularly applicable. Tim Tebow was drafted in the first round, and was possibly the most successful college QB ever. Yet most observers (outside of Denver) felt he was a massive project, and needed to re-learn the quarterback position from the ground-up in order to be successful at the pro level. Many felt he would be better suited to use his athletic skills for another position like tight end. Go back and read the scouting reports on Aaron Rodgers. Go back and read what Green Bay reporters observed in practice while he was backing up Brett Favre the first 3 seasons of his career. You can't tell me that he wasn't a project. In my opinion, it's all about HOW MUCH a player needs to improve from the time they are drafted in order to become a successful starter in the NFL. It doesn't matter where they are drafted, how good their stats were in college or even how quickly it happens once they hit the pros.

Agree 100%. Every QB is a "project" on some level. They just come with different starting points. Some need to have their mechanics tweaked. Some may need a complete overhaul. Some come from pro-style offenses. Some need to learn it from scratch. Josh Allen came out needing lots of work on his mechanics and accuracy. He also came from a small school, and didn't see much high-level competition. On the other hand, he did come from pro-style offense, which gave him experience navigating a pocket and going through multiple reads on a defense. So while Allen may be a bigger project than someone like Josh Rosen (big school, excellent throwing mechanics, pro-style offense), he was far-ahead of someone like Cardale Jones (who pretty much needed to learn the quarterback position from scratch).

Since arriving in Buffalo, Sean McDermott has done a great job of keeping the locker room motivated and playing hard. Even in the midst of a rebuild, multiple trades, starting a rookie QB - he's somehow managed to convince the players they are going to win every Sunday. As someone who believes highly in the mental aspect of sports, that's something I don't want to see change. It's one thing to trade away a malcontent like Marcel Dareus, an underachiever like Sammy Watkins or someone struggling to adapt like Ronald Darby. It's quite another to trade a team leader, who is clearly the only weapon on offense. At some point, the players aren't going to hear what McDermott is saying. They are going to see him sacrificing this season for future picks, and the effort is going to drop.

I'm starting to think that fans don't understand the term "develop." Josh Allen doesn't need to be throwing 30 times a game in order to learn. I definitely agree that Allen's development should be our #1 priority. But I have no problem with us executing run-heavy game plans, limiting how much pressure we put him under or doing what is necessary to win games. We can accomplish both at the same time.

Let's give it some time. Defenses are just starting to see what Patrick Mahomes is bringing to the table. Last year, Deshaun Watson was absolutely tearing up the NFL as a rookie. This year, he's struggled pretty bad at times. It just took awhile for defensive coordinators to figure out the best way to counter his skills. I know it's frustrating to see Mahomes (and Watson for that matter) playing great in the NFL, knowing we could have drafted either. Unfortunately, it's more about bad timing than anything else. You can't blame Brandon Beane. He was in the Carolina Panthers draft room at the time. Yes, Sean McDermott was here. But he's a coach. Not a scout or a GM. If anyone gets the blame here, it would be the owners. The Pegulas made the decision to keep the GM and scouting staff until after the draft, because they didn't believe a new group had enough time to properly prepare for the offseason. At the time, lots of people praised them for trying something different. Maybe we will all look back, and realize it was a bad decision. Maybe there is a reason all the other teams replace their GMs in January. There is a ton of evidence that Buffalo was drafting mostly players that Carolina had shown a heavy interest in, so it's very likely that McDermott was "winging it" off the information he had gathered while with the Panthers. I think he passed on the QB position, because he's a methodical decision-maker and didn't want his biggest draft pick coming without full input from a GM and Scouting Staff that he trusted. So he traded down and punted the QB decision until 2018.

Jordan Poyer is probably the biggest veteran bargain on our team. Vlad Ducasse struggled badly last year, but seems to have stepped up with his move to the left side. One of the problems with evaluating Brandon Beane's roster additions right now -- is that every position is getting dragged down by our inexperience and poor play at other key positions. It's like a circle. Everyone is making everyone look bad. The offensive line is a great example. It's easy to look at the sack statistics and say the blockers are all terrible, and Beane is awful at his job. But you need to consider that our rookie QB is still a half-second behind on diagnosing coverage (compared to most vets), he is frequently scrambling from the pocket instead of stepping up into his protection, and he is failing to spot the unblocked blitzers. Everything connects. My advice is for everyone to relax. Sit back. Take a deep breath. Quit screaming about firing people. Just accept the Bills are going to struggle this year. Their offense is going to be near the bottom of the NFL. They just don't have the talent (yet) and this is what happens 95% percent of the time when you start a rookie QB.

If you averaged out all the QBs in the league (both good and bad ones), it probably takes around 2.5 seconds to read a defense. The really good ones like Brady, Rodgers, Brees, Roethlisberger, etc. are closer to the 2 second mark. The bad ones are usually closer to the 3 second mark. It's only a split second. But that split second is often the difference between Pro-Bowl stars, and guys who fail in this league. The most obvious drawback for Josh Allen's game right now, is that he's really slow at reading a defense. Which is completely understandable at this point. Our hope is that with experience seeing defenses in front of him, he will continue to shave that reaction time down.

Yes, the Bills finished #12 in scoring in 2015, and then tied for #10 in scoring in 2016. But this was done almost entirely by running the ball. During those same years, our passing game was in the bottom-quarter of the league in every measurable statistic. Whenever the Defense struggled and we were forced to move the ball through the air, Tyrod Taylor was completely worthless. Rex Ryan ruined a Top 5 defense, which could have gotten better if the players were used to their strengths. Instead, he stubbornly forced his system onto talent that didn't fit the scheme. In contrast, Brandon Beane/Sean McDermott were forced to dismantle the offense, because we had reached our ceiling with Taylor - and it clearly wasn't good enough to consistently win in today's NFL. Not to mention, a run-heavy approach wasn't sustainable long-term anyway, with Eric Wood and Ritchie Incognito retiring, and LeSean McCoy reaching 30 years old. Unfortunately, the only way to upgrade the QB position (unless you could win the Kirk Cousins sweepstakes) was to draft one in the First Round. And 95% of the time, doing this results in a team going backwards before it goes forwards. The Bills, Jets and Cardinals are all starting rookie QBs this year, and all have been much worse than a year ago. The Browns have looked better in Baker Mayfield's brief time, but they were 1-31 over the last two years and had nowhere to go but up.

I consider the Bills a "young" team. The most important player on their roster (Quarterback) is a rookie. The guy standing in the middle of the field and calling out all the defensive plays (Middle Linebacker) is a rookie. Every single game they play this season is going to be seriously impacted by the youth and inexperience of those two guys alone. That's very significant. Compare that to a team like New England or Pittsburgh. Those teams are starting rookies as well, but their mistakes can be easily overcome by the vets elsewhere.

I voted for Kansas City. The others are all going to lose in Week 4.

Let the season play out a few more games, and give the defense a chance to turn things around. They had some very bad stretches last season too.

If the choice is between Nick Bosa and Ed Oliver, I probably have to go with Bosa. We need an edge rusher much more than a defensive tackle. It's hard to make a determination at this point though. How deep is this draft truly going to be, and what trade-down options would be available?

Brandon Beane didn't come around until AFTER the 2017 Draft. The first moves in the roster tear-down were the Sammy Watkins/Ronald Darby trades, both of which occurred during the Preseason in August 2017. That's just about 13 months ago. Calling it "Year Two" of the rebuild is quite a stretch. The main reason for the Bills regressing is that we traded away our veteran QB (Tyrod Taylor) and replaced him with a Top 10 rookie (Josh Allen). Even if we fielded a better overall roster than the 2017 team that went 9-7, the Bills almost certainly would have STILL taken a significant step backwards this year. That's what happens when you play a young/inexperienced Quarterback. The only realistic way the 2018 Bills could have been competitive this year was by keeping Taylor another season. That would have cost us the extra 3rd Round Pick we got from Cleveland, along with an additional $13 million on the salary cap (Taylor's hit was $16 million, McCarron was $3 million). Which means that we probably would have filled LESS holes on the roster, for the sole purpose of maybe competing for a Wild Card spot this year. Personally, I would rather take our lumps this season... get a Top 5 pick... and then be ready to move forward next year.

Based on the number of holes we had in the offseason (QB, WR, C, RG, RT, DE, DT, DT, SLB, MLB, CB), it was never going to be slightly realistic that we would be able to fill every weak point on the roster. It had nothing to do with the person sitting behind the desk. The Bills went into Free Agency with about $25 million in space for 2018, then raised that to about $32 million after trading away Cordy Glenn and Tyrod Taylor. Out of that amount, a team needs to keep roughly $8-10 million in reserve for the rookie contracts and emergency signings. By my counts, they had at least 12 starting spots that needed serious upgrades - without even starting to consider the depth/bench positions. A decent starting-level free agent will usually run a team between $4 and 8 million each. Big names can often be twice that amount. Do the math. At most, the Bills were looking at around 3-5 decent free agent signings at the absolute max. By the time they re-signed Kyle Williams, then added Star Lotulelei, Trent Murphy, AJ McCarron and Vontae Davis - that money was pretty much gone. To make matters worse, Ritchie Incognito retired well AFTER free agency had run its course, opening another massive hole on the roster. Now, it's definitely fair to say that McCarron was a busted signing. But the other suggested free agent options on the market (Case Keenum, Sam Bradford, Teddy Bridgewater, etc.) all signed for WAY MORE with other teams, and would have virtually wiped out our cap space by themselves. Same with keeping Taylor. Considering the fact that Beane was already planning a big move up the draft board, I think it was smart to wait and take the chance with a bargain in McCarron. We got him for $3 million. The Cardinals signed Bradford for $20 million, and he probably won't make it through the first month of the season before getting replaced by Josh Rosen. It's also fair to criticize the swap of EJ Gaines and Davis, especially after the nonsense that happened this week. And I would guess that even Beane admits this decision was a mistake. They could have brought back Gaines for roughly the same amount. My guess is that Beane believed Gaines was unreliable because of injury, and was hoping Davis was ready to return to Pro-Bowl form. It was a bad calculation. At this point, it's too early to judge the additions of Lotulelei or Murphy. Personally, I think both guys are playing OK. And the signings of Jeremy Kerley, Corey Coleman, Marshall Newhouse, Russell Bodine, etc. were basically the front office trying to get something out of the few dollars/resources they had left. This is something every team is forced to do when cap space is gone. Bottom line... This front office decided the best course for Buffalo was to rebuild from the ground-up. They didn't see a way of long-term success without a franchise quarterback. They didn't see a way of long-term success with the bloated underachieving contracts they current had on the books. The solution to both problems was trading away talent for draft picks. A season like this was the unfortunate side-effect. It just wasn't possible for us to re-stock talent as quickly as we got rid of it. Next year is completely different story.

I've read through their methodology before. It's definitely interesting, but it's still unclear at times. My opinion is that it works better for some positions, but not so well for others. A great example is with Defensive Tackles. Kyle Williams always explodes off the ball quickly. This often gives him the appearance of beating his blocker, even when an O-Lineman purposely uses his over-pursuit to help create a big running lane. He gets a big score, even though he helped contribute to a bad running play. Meanwhile, Star Lotulelei basically holds up 1-2 defenders and lets the guys behind him do their job. He never appears to get penetration, so his score remains low. Another person pointed out the problem with someone like Tre'Davious White. How do you score a guy when quarterbacks are scared to throw his way? The guy has been total lock-down so far, yet he fails to crack our Top 5.

I've always been confused about how PFF rates quarterbacks. I like Josh Allen's potential. But if he wasn't a rookie playing his first snaps in the NFL, I don't see how anyone could be rating his play very high at this point. There are numerous times he's missed open guys, held the ball too long on sacks, thrown off target and made bad decisions. Nathan Peterman's score sadly also seems too high, so maybe it's just a QB thing. Count me down as another who thinks Star Lotulelei is getting unfairly knocked. PFF seems to like DTs who penetrate in the backfield, so they have always given Kyle Williams very high scores (even when he doesn't have a good game). Someone like Star is basically a space-eater who occupies blockers. He's basically invisible on game film, not going forwards or backwards. We can argue whether that kind of player is worth his big contract, but I certainly don't think he's been terrible for us. Although Ryan Groy has definitely been our worst O-Lineman, I'm shocked that Jordan Mills and John Miller aren't on this list. They have been almost as bad. No push in the running game, constantly confused about who to block, and sometimes getting knocked onto their butts. It's been awful. Re-watching the game, I'm noticing that most of our defensive breakdowns are due to "discipline errors." Edge players not keeping contain. Linebackers biting too hard on play fakes. Tacklers take bad angles to the ball. Guys in the secondary in poor position. I'm curious how PFF rates these kinds of plays, considering that Tremaine Edmunds is not on the negative list, and Jordan Poyer is listed very high.

We've been irrelevant since the turn of the century mostly because of our quarterback situation. Although we've gotten a few decent seasons from some vets (Flutie, Bledsoe, Fitz, Orton, Taylor), we haven't seen consistent top-level play since Jim Kelly retired. The reason I use the word "irrelevant" instead of something like "terrible" - is because the Bills have NOT been bottom-dwellers for the majority of the last 15-20 years. During the ENTIRETY of the 17 year drought, the Bills had exactly three seasons with less than 6 wins. We haven't been embarrassingly bad. We've been frustratingly mediocre. Unfortunately, the constant 6-10, 7-9 and 8-8 finishes kept fooling the Bills front office into patching holes. They realized we had decent talent. So they kept treating this roster like we were a linebacker or receiver away from contending. And every season, we would see the play of our quarterback drag a fairly talented roster to the ground. The Bills would end up with a draft pick between 5-10, which of course was just far enough back to keep us from drafting a top QB or elite positional prospect. Sean McDermott and Brandon Beane were smart enough to identify the problem (lack of Franchise Quarterback). But instead of complaining that his team was in "purgatory" and hopeless to do anything about it, they set forth a plan to ENSURE they would obtain a top QB prospect in the 2018 draft. They did this by trading away talented players to other teams for draft picks. This gave them the capital needed for a trade-up, but also left them with multiple holes on the roster and too much dead-space on the salary cap to get much free agent help... this year. Without the extra picks, we probably couldn't have made a move for Josh Allen. And if you replace Allen with all the guys we traded away (Sammy Watkins, Ronald Darby, Marcel Dareus, Tyrod Taylor), we are back in the same situation we've been for almost 20 years. Honestly, I figured our fanbase would be smart enough to figure this out. But I guess not. Everyone is so worried about being a "laughingstock" or being labeled the worst team in the NFL, they forgot that we already were a joke and haven't received respect from anyone in almost two decades. Even in seasons that we win 8-9 games, the Bills are regularly lumped in the same conversation as the Cleveland Browns. If Allen turns out to be a star in this league, the 2018 season will be nothing more than a blip on the radar. This front office will have plenty of resources to build around him over the next few seasons, and you will be shocked how quickly we can re-stock this roster into something good.