Bleeding Bills Blue

I see it like this, burkhead got underneath him to knock him off balance, and wynn pushed them both which appeared to really screw up his balance.

Spain was definitely not doing a ton as a rush blocker weeks 1 and 2. If Boettger can handle the pass protection duties, he seems to be a superior runblocker.

This is the plot to the TV movie second string. I never saw it, but I assume the random shane falco type leads them to victory. I'd rather lose to Wilson 😄

Knox vs. Smith (or whoever we had when knox had covid) is a big upgrade though. Can play some snaps like the patriots did with develin/burkhead/gronk - spread them out wide and pick your favorite matchups. Basically forces them to play man, or show blitz. I liked the DS/Moss on the field at the same time sets too.

Yeah, if a team has a heavy dime gameplan, you can run 2 TEs or 2 backs and really mess with em.

He's not playing well.

He did have 8 sacks last year.

I still think they're probably better than the worst 3rd down defense in the NFL. If they can improve that and get off the field it'll go a long way. Maybe lamar wasn't a great passer but they were #1 in scoring and #2 in yards. They had a season low in yards against buffalo in 2019.

Always game to kick the tires on a pass rusher.

I don't think the defense is good, but this board acts like they are some level of historically bad. Improvements on 3rd down would go a long way for them. KC was 9/14, Tenn was 6/10, Vegas was 8/14, Rams 6/10. Right now our % is higher than the worst defenses in the league a year ago, and the average yards per drive is also up considerably as a result. If they can figure out how to get off the field they go from a poor defense to an OK defense. This is legit flipping 3-5 play results per game. Better tackling, better pressure (Buffalo is tied for 10th in sacks, but losing contain and generating more pressure up the middle would help), and better awareness could help tip the scales here. This also harms the offense - they currently have the 2nd fewest total drives of teams who have played 8 games. They have a low points per game average as a result. Fewer drives leads to fewer plays leads to fewer yards leads to fewer points.

To me? His eyes seem too slow. Some figure it out, others don't. They honestly seem slower than they did last year.

It's crazy how bad the bills defense is considered on the board - 20th in yards per play, 15th in points allowed per game. So... basically middle of the road. The biggest concern to me is the 3rd down defense which is ranked 30th. The rush defense also needs to improve, which will help keep teams in harder 3rd down situations. If they can get off the field more they'll allow fewer yards and points. On offense they're 9th in yards per play, and 19th in points per game, 9th in points per drive. They have the best 3rd down offense in the NFL, and are 12th in RZ TD%. While our defense is "holding us back", the media ignores the Miami offense being as bad or worse than buffalo's defense. 23rd in yards per play, 11th in points per game (this is propped up considerably from the Rams game where their 28 points were generated from 34 total yards of offense). I don't think their offense will see significant improvement under Tua, mainly because they still can't run the ball effectively. They won the SF game, and were in the SEA and BUF games because of fitz - and he's now on the bench.

If diggs turns to his left instead of his right its a 1st down completion. And it seemed like he justifiably checked to runs on 1st and 2nd downs when they had numbers in alignment.

I mean i look at this and see tough games except for the Jets. Zona - a tough matchup for anyone with Murray running around, hopkins, and a pretty solid D. SD - 2 beast WRs and a QB who's playing as well as any rookie in recent memory. Den - Not a good team, but the type of team who is capable of beating a good team on a good day. Cin - Same as denver. KC - On to NE NE - Already beat miami. Rookie QB's tend to struggle against NE as well Oak - They can pound the rock against miami Buf - Already lost to buffalo. If they had a good offense I'd feel more confident on their ability to win more than like 4 of these games. But they don't - and that should be a concern. They have to play mistake-free and score like 20 points. 2-2 when they turn it over, and one win was against the Jets. The other was the rams game where they scored twice on D/ST - and had TD drives of 33 and 1 yards. Punting 9 times in a game isn't usually a recipe for a W. They had 2 really good offensive outputs against Buffalo and SF, and they have a new QB so its hard to even project what their offense might be. Fitz was probably their best player in both games, and the reason they won. They can't run the ball well, and they do it anyway. I dunno, hard team to figure out.

Miami has the #1 scoring defense... But that involved shutting out the flacco jets. They've also played 1 fewer game than buffalo. Their yards per play is similar to buffalos. They blitz more than buffalo, and pressure less. Basically they're better on 3rd down - but that number is a bit propped up by the 2/17 that the flacco jets put up against them - and takeaways. Takeaways are always going to be relatively random. Much like buffalo of last year, their numbers may be propped up a bit by the bad offenses they face. I'd much rather face that defense than Indy, Pitt, Baltimore, hell even KC.

With Phillips and Dodson both on IR i think they had to play him a little bit just because klein is unplayable on 3rd downs. They tried Andre smith some too (he actually played more than milano in this one).

Ugh - i hate man 2 against mobile QBs. Like asking to see wilson pick up like 60 yards and a TD on scrambles.

If Kleins the will on a play, i'm running to the other side since... you don't need to even block him. He'll take a bad angle and have no influence on the play.

Both of those games had a ton of mistakes too. Roberts drop/INT, False start on 3rd and 1 causing a 3 and out, 40yd punt return, Diggs drop, Allen int. 3 big mistakes = 3 short fields. KC is some of the same. Down 3 before half, out of the 2 min warning we call a run on 2nd and 3 and lose 6 yards. The kelce play was big, but don't forget we could have been tied or even up if we had better offensive execution. Down 10, stuffed on 3rd and 1, penalty on 4th and 1. You can't do that kinda stuff and win games.

I love the comparisons to weeks 1-4 where they say he's turnover prone again! 1 INT was literally dropped by roberts, and another was down 2 scores with less than 2 minutes left (had no effect on the outcome of the game). I remember xavien howard saying he had allen's number, and they'd reference the 2 INT game. One was a halftime hail mary bro, congrats. Context is important.

Small sample size. I think they trust Feliciano with line calls as he did it some last year. I did think Ike had a nice game though honestly. I think his run blocking is a reason he may have passed Spain on the depth chart.

I like most of them. Vets on the PS gives you a chance for an extended tryout. Expanding the active and gameday rosters are a nice benefit for depth when having multiple injuries. The short term IR is nice as well.

Insanely good blocker, and their number 1 third down target.

They were up 2 against Miami with 8 minutes to play. They beat minnesota with 20 seconds left. Scored to lead Dallas with less than 2 minutes left. NE almost beat them as time expired. They lost to Zona in OT. And this past week they had 350 yards and were aided by a fumble on a kickoff return. They've definitely improved their pass rushing recently, but theyve given up 400+ yards every week except one. And the garbage time excuse isn't really there.

Its a tough position i think. Hand usage - explosive burst - leverage. You can be a giant and if you lose your leverage, you miss your gap and lose your assignment. Yeah, his burst is elite. He just needs to keep it up with his arms and counters.