Bleeding Bills Blue

He's only turned it over twice during the winning streak. He played really well against cleveland, not so much against carolina and LA. 6 games over 70% completion, but he's got a pretty short average depth of target, but the numbers been trending up. I think he's playing well in their structure.

I think NE is playing good football, and they're built for a playoff run. Just need to avoid any serious injuries and they'll be dangerous. Honestly i don't think there's a team in the AFC that wants to play either of them in the first round. Good defenses that don't let you establish a rushing attack , and take the ball away. One offense that pounds the rock/exploits the boundaries, and the other has a top 5 QB with weapons. I think both teams stats are propped up a bit from weaker opponents - but that doesn't change the remainder of the AFC's perception of them. At the end of the day, fans posturing (not saying you are doing this, its a bills board so its probably bills fans) and media coverage is meaningless and this will be settled on the field at least twice this year - possibly 3 times.

Would be fun for kickers too! Or they could do it like Horse. Put the ball wherever they want and the other guy has to try and kick from there. Get some weird rugby angle kicks

Oh good call - 11-6 then. Which, if buffalo can (worst case) tie and split with them they'd take the division based on the tiebreaker.

Agreed. They should just do a shootout after 10 minutes. But its FGs at the same goalpost. Start at 50, then move backwards. No increased chance of injury or anything.

I didn't watch the game - interested to see how it got so out of hand. 7-9 on 3rd downs, 1 punt, 1 FG, and no turnovers. Defense absolutely dominated on 3rd downs, and had a pick that set them up for points at the 5. Really good red zone efficiancy. Offense was mostly clean on penalties. Any team that plays this efficiently is a problem, but those 3rd down splits are extremely uncommon. I had them at 10-7 before the season, but i could see even 12-5 if they split with buffalo and drop 1 of tenn/indy. People ask if I'm worried about NE, and I say no. Because Buffalo will most likely be in the playoffs pending some sort of major injuries. Would it be nice to win the division? Sure - but its doubtful either team is getting a bye in the first round and they'll probably split the home games anyway.

I don't see it having much blowout potential. This is a tough matchup for NE. It is a home game which helps but, they're playing a team that doesn't turn it over much - and one of the better defenses in the NFL. Both things NE thrives on - takeaways and bad defenses.

Eh - it can. Especially when you run 80% of the time under center. They are almost expecting you to run when you PA.

Yep - traditionally that means you run out of shotgun, and you run toward the boundaries and cut up field. The big problem in buffalo is the backside blocking is brutal, so the cutback lanes that are created get swallowed up by backside players. I think you could try some jet action to create an additional conflict (or pin block). You could also run speed option instead of read option - get to the boundary faster and pitch to the back or create RPOs with sprint out plays. The team doesn't run well under center. And those splits are terrible. If he takes the snap under center its almost always a run, and they don't run heavy play action much from it either. A lot of the pass plays are RPO screens where the ball is almost immediately thrown.

Yeah. Julio worked out... fairly well? But i don't think I'm trading multiple firsts for a non-QB. I know LA and Seattle did it for like, established all-pro players coming off rookie deals. But still, you're giving up a ton of value to then pay someone a ton.

Gonna go with Hughes. I feel a nice blindside FF coming.

He just had this wonky running style and catching style that I didn't notice until he was with Buffalo. Hindsight is... if you sit there - beckham? Or ya know... aaron donald, taylor lewan, zach martin.

No - they're worse at running the ball than buffalo, and they don't have a QB to carry the O. They've scored 20 or fewer points in 7 of 10 games, and they're statistically poor on both sides of the ball. They're good at taking the ball away, but also good at giving it away. If their receivers get healthy i can see them making some more noise, but saints titans patriots to end the season likely kills it. I wouldn't feel particularly confident against NYG or Carolina either. They did a good job of crowding the LOS, and daring the ravens to adjust. The ravens continued to run RPOs and run into a wall. Kind of the exact opposite of what teams have been doing to buffalo - they were also attacking LJ in his drops with DBs. Its a smart strategy though - Roman loves to run out of condensed formations which makes crowding the line easier. They should have spread out more to force them to adjust out of the blitz.

The offense was just killing themselves though. 2 big drops that would have been first downs. Total whiffs on a few pass protections. Holding penalties setting them back behind the sticks. Dead on arrival run game. Allen just being horrifyingly careless with the ball.

I just feel like we could have hammered them with Diggs in this game and won.

I think it'll be chiefs. They need a better #2 - hardman isn't it, and gordon hasn't played enough football to trust down the stretch. He'll see some easier DBs and easier looks - and he's money on shorter routes and creating YAC. If teams play their 2 high against that look, they'll just heavily target beckham and get back to using hill deep to catch you when you adjust.

Depth? I thought singletary made some nice plays in the passing game. Almost all of his catches were like at the LOS and he made some plays to get yards in space.

The problem is the DEs were getting super far up field - which traditionally you just... let them do that. You've created a rush lane for allen to escape, and you've created space to step up in the pocket. But in this game the twists and stunts and 5 man fronts they saw just confused the hell out of the interior so it was constantly muddy. Boettger looked absolutely lost out there.

Agreed. It was like 3rd and 7 on one of them - why would we run the ball there? I'd be pissed if we did that. What you shouldn't do is throw into double coverage. And on the 3rd and 2, we did run the ball. We should have got the first if he handed it off, and would have kicked the FG had allen not fumbled. And on the 4th and 2, JAX were Offside and that was veeeery much on the edge of FG range. Teams are mostly playing zone in tight... get to the soft spot and chuck it in there. We're holding the ball scrambling and cutting the field in half, or throwing short of the EZ and hoping to get in. Throwing it in short like that usually works in man since you only have one to beat, but they're swarming the swing plays. I can't even remember throwing it INTO the end zone the last couple of weeks. Timing is super off.

Biiiiig drop there on the final drive (or 2nd to last, i don't feel like looking it up). He catches that and we are firmly in business to at least tie the game, but get them on their heels to actually win it. Instead we followed it up with williams late off the snap and a brutal sack out of FG range. I thought that was a free rusher but man, williams just whiffed completely. 2 massive mental mistakes in a row - and the last 2 of many throughout the day.

The outside struggles are usually on the backside - so the guards and tackles (williams especially) are killing us there too. They need to get moving more - drilling the LBs at the 2nd level and getting the WRs more involved in the run game. Motioning can be used A - as eye candy, and B- as an extra blocker to the non-play side. If mckenzie is running at speed he can put a hit on a DE and take them out of the play - freeing the tackle on that side to pull or at least get to the 2nd level.

I think buffalo will win comfortably. This team is going to be fired up in practice this week - and Allen knows he needs to be better.

Yeah - get that guy outta here. I was fine with him as depth but in this one he looked massively unprepared. He doesn't know how to play guard as far as i can tell - he can block just fine - its the blocks he misses completely that bother me the most.

Sure? A - they may be healthier or have a different grouping B - they may gel better There were serious miscommunications along the line in this one. They struggled with speed rushers on the outside, and twists and stunts inside. Literally everything jax did worked - which sometimes isn't so much skill or ability but technique and line calls. Seeing Ford completely miss a twisting lineman, or williams fail to get off the line on that 3rd and 7? Those are mental breakdowns. I hope to see less dancing at practice this week. And the DBs QB competition and stuff - get back to freaking business.

You failed to mention that bobby hart - the turnstile - played meaningful snaps at LT in that win for the Titans. And you wouldn't have noticed... so something scheme based needs to change here. I don't think you need to fire Daboll, but they need to simplify some stuff here. Stunts and twists were killing them all game, boettger was getting pushed back, and williams and dawkins seemed to struggle mightily with speed rushers. Essentially it was a pin your ears back and rush sort of game, and we couldn't get anything to work - when we should be running draw plays, screens, and just general RPOs out of shotgun. If you iso diggs or sanders to one side and they play bail coverage there should be a nice window between the linebackers and the corner in cover 2 - but if the LB play the pass every time you run. They need to figure out how to run the friggin ball, simple as that.