Dont Stop Billeiving

Calvin Austin, Dylan Parham, Leo Chenal, or Nick Cross...fingers crossed!

Fingers crossed that one of Skyy Moore, Chad Muma, Christian Watson, or Calvin Austin falls to #57...

Thanks @muppy! Agreed, had a chance to look through Gunner's draft guide earlier this week, great content! I enjoyed Giuseppi's recent video as well. Still figuring out the different features of Google Docs (it's blocked at my work so I've never really used it before), but this document should continue to update throughout the day as I make some final adjustments. Not long to wait now, going for a power nap given that the Bills won't likely pick until 4:30 AM GMT 😴 https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1xTjFml8zm4f2AEeIyBbfV2N1nRqbGTSvzZyDZ0sHO7c/edit?usp=sharing

Haha thanks! Hardly any free time since we've just had a baby, but this is just a passion project that's gotten bigger and hopefully better every year. I started this year's version in late December lol.

How’s it going? Only about 48 hours until the draft now so I just wanted to post this for anyone who is interested. I have been creating this sort of document for myself and a few friends for 5-6 years now and shared it on this board for the first time last year. For 2022, I have made several enhancements and switched to Google Docs instead of Excel which should be easier to view. Over countless nights on the late shift with my newborn son Leo, I have gathered stats, combine/pro day results, Relative Athletic Scores, and some facts/bits of analysis along with some of my own notes/observations from watching film and ultimately determined an overall grade for the 228 prospects I feel should be drafted this week (all sites/links included in the doc). Any column can easily be filtered to compare players/position groups and I also find it helpful to update column V of the doc as the draft is happening in order to see what prospects are remaining on the board and the draft haul/needs of each team in real time. As a disclaimer, I do this just for fun to prep prior to the draft and then keep track of how the draft is going once it's started. Please also note that I tend to take an optimistic/glass half full view of many players and often grade them based on their ceilings/potential if they were put in the right situation or scheme (we know that doesn't always wind up being the case). Hopefully, everyone is able to view the Google doc using the link below, but let me know if there are any issues. Cheers and Go Bills! https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1xTjFml8zm4f2AEeIyBbfV2N1nRqbGTSvzZyDZ0sHO7c/edit?usp=sharing

Agreed. Now maybe the ideal draft is McDuffie in the 1st, Calvin Austin in the 2nd, and a C/G in the third.

Good for him...more than we could probably afford, but the team and community will miss him. And I suspect Phillips will miss them and be back in 3 years.

Agree 100%, hoping they can extend him this offseason. Sky's the limit for Knox. If you offer him the Logan Thomas contract now, I think he takes it. Will be a lot more painful/expensive in 2023 after he's taken another step.

A name I haven't seen listed yet...CB Donte Jackson. In his prime at 26 years old, played for Buffalo South (Carolina Panthers), and ran a 4.32 40 time pre-draft. Brings the top end speed, athleticism, and play-making ability that we have lacked in an otherwise very good secondary.

Would love Kirk on the Bills, but surprised that Mikey G has projected him as a $12M per year contract. Seems a bit high IMO, paying for potential rather than his production to this point which can be a risky move in FA. Kirk would add youth, speed, and YAC ability to our WR room though. No interest in Connor Williams for me. Dude got beaten like a drum by just about everyone he faced last year and better scheme fit or not, $7M per year for a struggling guard is a hard pass. I'm hoping we get Darryl Williams to take a pay cut and also add an IOL in the first 3 rounds of the draft.

Very happy Dorsey stayed and we continue to promote from within. Continuity and Josh's involvement in the decision making process are key and glad that the Bills prioritized that (the kind of influence Rodgers has never been granted in GB). Still very curious why we interviewed two West Coast guys for OC, that would have been a disaster IMO. Now work on keeping Chad Hall and then hire a proven O-line coach who will use a gap blocking scheme and more of those pin and pull blocks that we found success with late in 2021. Enough of the zone blocking, it doesn't play to our o-line's strengths.

Good OP, an interesting idea that I hope the Bills will be working towards. In my mind, the Bills defense can become more versatile in four ways: - A huge defensive tackle who can stop the run and provides some upside rushing the passer. Hopefully means more success stopping the run using a light box and more pressure when only rushing four. - A third LB to run alongside Edmunds and Milano who can hold up in coverage / run with TEs so Milano doesn't always have to be assigned to that role and the QB doesn't know who's going where. - A CB with either elite length and/or speed (we don't have either of these traits on the roster despite having a pretty good CB group). Would allow Buffalo to stay in man coverage when needed. - Another starting-caliber safety to run some of the three safety looks that Tampa and NE have utilized so successfully in recent years. I wouldn't expect Buffalo to be able to obtain all four this offseason with limited cap space and a draft I hope will lean towards the offense, but getting two out of the four should help keep offenses guessing more often.

Thanks for posting! This really pushes back on the theme that the KC defense has been elite or even above-average in the second half of the season. DVOA takes a team's opponents/strength of schedule into account and also weighs recent performances more heavily so it's the perfect metric to measure their recent play. KC's Defense DVOA is still 25th which ranks as the worst defense left in the playoffs. Honestly, I think a lot of us (myself included) probably give the KC defense too much credit based on the performances of Chris Jones, Frank Clark, and the physicality of the Chiefs secondary in the 2020 AFC Championship Game. Jones is still a beast (although worth pointing out that 3.5 of his 9 sacks came in one game against Connor Williams and the Cowboys), but Frank Clark has been really inconsistent and is not the same player, finishing with his lowest sack and tackle totals since his rookie year in 2015. Bolton has been a productive draft pick at LB for them and the KC secondary has some nice pieces in Tyrann Mathieu and L'Jarius Sneed, but our 2021 WR corps is much healthier and more talented. I don't think their outside CBs can hang with us and as long as we can prevent that interior pressure from Jones, I'd expect Allen and the Bills to put up 30+ points.

Not as nervous about this match up with KC as I have been for the previous few...I fully believe this 2021 Bills team is more balanced, more talented, more experienced, and healthier than the 2020 version that lost in last year's AFC Championship Game. This team has paid its dues and remembers the sting from that loss last season...they're ready.

I'll take a stab at this @eball, it's definitely the million-dollar question this week and the reason why Sean McDermott and Leslie Frazier get paid the big bucks. I share the concerns you guys have noted and I think in today's NFL, elite offense beats elite defense every time. The QBs are too good, the field is too big, and the rules are stacked against the defenders. It's next to impossible to truly stop a high-octane offense like KC's or Buffalo's, the best you can hope for is making them work their way down the field over double digit plays, tackle well, allow FG attempts instead of TDs in the red zone, and try to force negative plays or turnovers. I wouldn't expect the Bills defense to dominate this Sunday and they very well could struggle (which I would consider as giving up 25+ points and 350+ yards based on their usual league-leading averages). That said, I do believe in the "defense was built to beat the Chiefs" narrative @ScottLaw mentioned. For one, I think there's a direct correlation between the way Tampa Bay was able to affect Patrick Mahomes using its pass rush in the Super Bowl and the way the Bills struggled in that area last season which led to the double dip of Rousseau and Basham in this draft class by Brandon Beane. The Bills have used a lot of resources including several high draft picks to build a very deep and versatile defensive line group that rotates/keeps everyone fresh and is mostly made up of long-limbed guys at DE who win with power, set the edge, get their hands up to disrupt throwing lanes, and collapse the pocket to prevent a Mahomes from scrambling. The Bills definitely have a type and this kind of outside rusher in theory combines well with the interior pressure someone like Ed Oliver creates against a mobile QB. Now, you can certainly argue with the effectiveness of the execution of this strategy (for example, I wish AJ Epenesa was better at this stage/could we have drafted a more dynamic player with that pick?), but it feels like as good of an approach to the defensive line as you could take without having a Bosa or Watt on your team. In the back seven, I think Tremaine Edmunds and Matt Milano are ideal LBs to combat KC's offense. Edmunds gets a lot of criticism (some fair, some not) for his run defense, but KC is not particularly effective running the ball (16th in run yards per game and the YPC of their primary RB tandem is only 4.1) so this matchup plays to his strengths AKA using his pterodactyl wingspan to take away the middle part of the field in coverage. Milano (who missed our Week 5 game vs KC) can be a tight end eraser when deployed that way (just limited Mac Jones' favorite weapon in Hunter Henry to one catch). Behind them is the most fundamentally sound secondary in football led by the best safety tandem in football. Hyde and Poyer do an outstanding job of showing one coverage pre-snap and rotating to a different one, they're the reasonBuffalo gives up so few chunk plays. Taron Johnson has put together a career best season so far and he's excellent in run support as well. Levi Wallace and Dane Jackson are smart, steady CBs, but that's where I think most of our anxiety lies as they have the toughest match up and cannot hang with KC's elite speed at WR. Buffalo will miss Tre White's instincts and ballhawk ability, but to be honest, White can't keep up with Hill or Hardman one-on-one either. It's all about the secondary working together and knowing the scheme inside-and-out, they'll have to guard these guys as a complete unit and there's always going to be some element of safety help over the top when trying to defend the Chiefs (Hill in particular). Basically, my plan of attack would be to play contain and collapse the pocket with four rushers with seven defenders back in coverage on the vast majority of plays (very few blitzes). They need to play with proper gap integrity and leverage to prevent those QB scrambles or escapes to extend the play. If they can't reach Mahomes, the line needs to get their arms up to bat down passes especially with some of those weird arm angles Mahomes employs (the perfect example was the TJ Watt tip and Devin Bush INT this past weekend). KC's interior offensive line is really strong, but I think both tackles (Orlando Brown Jr and Andrew Wylie) are beatable. Next, I would chip Kelce with a lineman on as many plays as possible to disrupt their timing and use a combination of Milano shadowing Kelce on some snaps with some bracket coverage using a CB and safety mixed in to keep them guessing. Edmunds needs to patrol the middle, affect those quick slants/crossers, and fire downhill in the screen game. The secondary needs to bracket Hill with safety help and force targets away from Hill/Kelce in general. It's cliche, but you have to force those other secondary weapons to try to beat you (Hardman, Pringle, Robinson), none of those guys are special as WRs. Overall, I think you live with short completions, then rally and tackle to prevent YAC, and make KC drive the length of the field. Take Hill and Kelce away to the extent possible and limit Mahomes' ability to escape the pocket. It's a tall task, but we did it rather effectively in Week 5 and I trust McDermott, Frazier, and the Bills to figure out a way to do it again. Interested to get your thoughts, Go Bills!

A Devin Singletary tweet disguised as a Josh Allen tweet disguised as a Rashaad Penny tweet. Singletary is the top RB left on that list whose team is still alive in the playoffs. Running hard and racking up those TDs, you love to see it.

100%, love that we were able to lessen the workload for Diggs and some of the starters this past weekend. Same thing with the defensive line rotation all season, you would have to think our d-line guys have more tread on the tires than most around the NFL. And great point about the WR health compared to 2020. Plus not only are we healthier, but we upgraded from John Brown to Sanders and Davis/Knox/McKenzie all took that next step. A significant increase in offensive firepower compared to the 2020 Bills.

Chris Jones is a monster, but I think our IOL is much better prepared to deal with him compared to last season (mainly because Bates >>> Feliciano and Morse is playing some of his best ball right now). You make a good point about Spag's blitz packages and scheme (which I have a lot of respect for), but as far as Clark and Ingram go, those two guys have 5.5 sacks between them for KC this season. Clark was a big factor in that loss in 2020, but he doesn't look like that level of player anymore. Frazier needs to devise a plan to limit Jones and stop him from wrecking the game; if we can do that, I actually don't hate the matchups for our offensive line the way that we're gelling at the moment.

The highlights from our earlier win against the Chiefs are worth a watch...my key takeaways: 1) I had forgotten that we didn't have Matt Milano for this game. AJ Klein played reasonably well in his place, but that makes the defensive performance even more impressive. 2) We wasted the early forced fumble on the kickoff return by Siran Neal which set us up in field goal range. Moss had a 20+ yard run down inside the ten yard line called back by a Dawkins holding penalty. Then Allen took an intentional grounding penalty on third down, forcing us to punt. 3) Also forgot that this was Josh Gordon's first game with the Chiefs and there were rumors all week about him being a huge X factor. Had one great leaping grab early on to bail out Mahomes on a broken play, but otherwise we did a good job on him. 4) We saw the potential of Zach Moss in this game, so instrumental in grinding out the clock in the fourth quarter. Ran hard, blocked well, and was an effective outlet in the passing game. It's too bad he's been so inconsistent especially with his vision, doubt he gets many snaps on Sunday. 5) Allen's two TD throws to Sanders were equally beautiful...put the perfect velocity and arc on the first one and Allen did an outstanding job of manipulating the safeties with his eyes as well. The second one was a laser in between two defenders while rolling out to his left...might only be two other QBs in the league who can make that throw. 6) This was Greg Rousseau's breakout game and the best of his rookie year. Had a big run stop/TFL on a 3rd and 2 to force a punt and then had the tipped ball turned INT later on. Consistently held the edge and helped to collapse the pocket. 7) Spencer Brown really held his own against Frank Clark...obviously everyone's focus will be on limiting Chris Jones on the interior, but Dawkins and Brown vs Clark and Melvin Ingram will be important 1-on-1 battles on Sunday. 8) Daniel Sorensen was beaten like a drum in this game...wonder how KC will adjust. I believe Juan Thornhill is getting more snaps these days in his place. 9) Both QBs had a lot of room to scramble and picked up several key first downs this way. 10) Micah Hyde had the play of the game with that pick-six. Felt like that's when you knew for sure the Bills were going to win. What a player. https://youtu.be/yxiOnaTUows

5 hours ahead here in N. Ireland. Was prepared to pull my second near all-nighter in a row in an effort to scout the Chiefs. Not sure if this is worth it though. Then again if I go to bed, I'll have nightmares about Pittsburgh's "offense." Last night was so worth ******* up my body clock for though, have been buzzing all day. Go Bills!

Pittsburgh on offense: run play up the middle, run play up the middle, 25 yard pass down the sideline to either no one or a well-covered receiver. How??????

Agreed and I think we should all want that...we play better as the underdogs. Keeps the pressure on the Chiefs as well.

McKinnon is looking good. His issue has always been staying healthy, but he's looking like their best option and is a flashy player when he's 100%.

Diontae Johnson's hands and route-running interpretations are going to be the Steelers' downfall. Insane, this Pittsburgh offense isn't anywhere near good enough to overcome stuff like that.

There we go, the underhand TD toss that makes everyone go nuts.