HappyDays

I think this is the biggest misconception among Bills fans, that we can just get by with late round picks at CB. But Benford was an exception. The likes of Wallace and Jackson are good finds on late day 3/UDFA but ideally those are backups. The best CB we've drafted was Tre White who of course was a 1st rounder. So I don't subscribe to the common sentiment that we should never draft CBs high. I think currently CB2 is our weakest position on the roster by far and I would like a legit talent there. Not that I want Beane to do what he did in 2022 and only target a CB in the 1st round, but I'm hoping that's where the value ends up being.

I want us to draft a CB in the 1st round but it's not a position I would trade way up for. WR and pass rusher are the only two positions I would trade up for (excluding QB obviously) because those players have the ability to take over a game. CBs are critical but they can't take over a game. Personally I don't see any player in this class worth trading up for. Maybe if Tet McMillan falls below 16 you think about it but honestly his skill set seems a bit redundant with what we already have on the roster. There's no explosive WRs or premier pass rushers that are realistically going to fall low enough for us to trade up. I would just stand pat or trade down, and then package a couple 5ths to trade up into the 3rd.

We recovered every single fumble and Mahomes randomly dropped the ball as an unforced error. Bass made all his kicks. How many breaks do you expect us to get?

I remain discouraged that Andy Reid treats our defense like a scout team in every single playoff matchup. They spent the entire 1st half marching up and down the field uncontested, which is pretty much what they've done every other time. I see no practical reason to be optimistic that this outcome is ever going to change under McDermott, but I have no choice but to wait and see what happens.

Again it's not the crime itself. I'm talking about what it is like for the victim to report the crime. That is the relevant difference. But you continue not to acknowledge that and I continue wasting my time trying to get it through to you, so I'd say we're done here.

Then I'm afraid you are just completely disconnected from reality. If you don't understand the differences between what rape victims experience when they report their crime versus what car theft victims experience when they report their crime, especially back in the 90s, this is not a conversation worth having. It has nothing to do with the crime committed. What we're talking about is the experience of reporting the crime. You're the one that made this ridiculous on the face of it analogy and now you're refusing to acknowledge the differences. Like I said, you're not engaging in good faith. I did try.

Ok sure, I'm a glutton for punishment. Do you believe the administrator's response would have been "please don't report the car thief, you'll ruin his future"?

I tried to meet you at your level but you won't engage in good faith. That's what I expected. Have a good one man.

I will probably regret this but I'll try to meet you at your level on this. Starting with a question - if a woman went to the Columbia school administration and said "this student beat me up and stole my car" what do you believe would have been the administrator's response?

Incentives are classified as "likely to be earned" if the player met those incentives in the previous season, or "not likely to be earned" if they didn't. Likely to be earned incentives count on the current year's cap, but would be credited to next year's cap if the incentives are not met. Not likely to be earned incentives instead count against next year's cap if they are achieved. For example Von Miller's sack incentives last year were all classified as "not likely to be earned" because he had 0 sacks in 2023. He ended up getting 6 sacks last year so we owe him $4M which counts against the cap this year.

He also had just under 1,000 yards in 2022 despite playing under Nate Hackett and Russell Wilson. I was banging the drum to trade for him back in 2023 when the thought was it would take a 2nd. I remember saying even a 1st I would have been fine with if that's what it took, which in hindsight would have been a much better use of that pick than Kincaid. The fact that he went for a 5th and 6th last year, and got less than the combined AAV of Samuel and Palmer, that was a no brainer to me. Every year we overpay for defensive linemen but when really good or great WRs become available we get gun shy. I really don't get it, but I guess I'm on the extreme end of the WR discussion compared to most fans.

If you go to our 2026 salary table on Spotrac all of next year's cap hits are listed. The void ones are highlighted in a different color so I just added them up. It's a little over $32M. McGovern I expect to be extended, the others I don't. And I'm thinking we'll cut Samuel next offseason so his dead cap hit of $3.45M will get added on. Altogether it is definitely going to be over $30M we will be paying players not on the roster. Beane needs to nail this upcoming draft.

Another one that gets less notice for some reason is Jerry Jeudy. Cleveland acquired him last year for just a 5th and a 6th. They then signed him to an extension for just $17.5M AAV which now looks paltry compared to the WR market. He went on to collect over 1,200 receiving yards while playing with maybe the worst QB situation in the NFL. I continue to be dismayed by Beane's failure to properly invest in weapons for Allen. Opportunities have been there but he hasn't jumped on them.

Our dead cap for 2026 is really piling up. According to Spotrac it's already at $32.2M and that's before accounting for any earned incentives that hit the cap next year. I don't mind Beane kicking the can as far down the road as possible during Allen's career but I wish he was doing it with more impactful players.

I'm on record that failing to trade for Metcalf was a big mistake and we will regret it. Other than that the FA class on the whole was weak so I don't have strong feelings either way on the rest of our signings. Ogunjobi I'm lower on, Bosa I'm higher on, the rest I'm fine with overall. I'm disappointed Benford wasn't extended, to me he was the #1 priority re-sign but obviously the team didn't agree. To be fair no other contenders seriously improved their roster this offseason either. That's not really what FA is about these days. Drafting well has become more important than ever with teams not letting their stars get away, although again that's why I wish we had taken the rare opportunity to trade for a star in Metcalf. I'm confident we can find a CB2 in the draft. I'm less confident we can find an impactful WR which remains a big need.

But the injuries don't explain what I believe was the bigger problem which was his cerebral game. He does not have natural instincts for reading a defense and making himself available to his QB IMO. He runs past zone windows, he doesn't properly adjust routes, he drifts away from where his leverage should take him. That is the part of his game I am more concerned with. Sure he can get stronger and separate a little better in man coverage, but he isn't going to become our version of Kelce unless he can read the defense as well as Kelce does. I think that's why we were using him on nothing but basic route concepts in shallow areas by the end of the season, because they didn't trust him to be where he was supposed to be downfield. Knox is by no means an elite player but when Allen looked at him he was where Allen expected and the higher efficency on those targets speaks to this.

Zach Ertz?

Milano was supposed to make $9.375M base salary in 2026 plus whatever bonuses he was scheduled to make. Almost no chance he is making that on the open market next year. He is also willingly giving up $3.6M in salary this year and is not likely to earn all of it back, as his agent would have made very clear to him. No player who takes a pay cut is "betting on themselves." Agents would never advise that. They're just accepting the reality that if they get released they're likely to take an even larger pay cut from their next team. The positive spin about Von taking a pay cut out of the goodness of his heart was a total fabrication. The team knew he was going to be suspended and came to him with a compromise that favored them, and he smartly took it because the alternative was to get cut and make even less money on the open market. I would think that aphorism doesn't ring true for a 30+ year old player with a vast injury history. Make no mistake - Milano didn't want this, but it was the lesser of two evils.

That's the usual positive spin given by the player side, just like with Von last year. The truth though is that Beane approaches the player and their agent and says something to the effect of "we don't want to cut you, but we will have to under your current numbers" and then they try to find a compromise that works for both sides. The player knows if they get cut they're likely to make even less than the compromise number. The team knows it will be hard to find a replacement player while also paying the dead cap. So it's a give and take from both sides. If you want to phrase it harshly, the team basically tells the player "if you don't rip up your current deal and willingly take less money than we signed you for, you're on your own." By the way when fans get on James Cook or other players for using hardball tactics or not "playing on the contract they signed," I hope they realize teams do this kind of thing all the time. I don't begrudge either side for it. The initial contract signed is a framework, not a lifetime guarantee. It's a brutal business with players trying to maximize a short career and teams trying to maximize a short championship window.

Before anyone asks - this doesn't signal any upcoming FA additions. OTC is reporting Milano signed the revised contract on March 5 so this was done basically in secret to let the Bills make the additions they've already made.

Did any serious contender meaningfully improve this offseason? The Bills didn't - we spent the offseason re-signing our own and signing decent but unspectacular free agents, and still have a couple positions with glaring holes on the roster. Teams like the Pats and Panthers went on a spending spree because they could. The contenders are all going to have to "draft and pray" because that's the part of their window that they're in. Legitimately good to great starters at premium positions aren't making it to free agency. Like what was Cincy supposed to use Higgins' money on? Should they have given Dan Moore $21M AAV? Milton Williams $26M AAV? It's a fair point that they have serious concerns across their roster, but that doesn't mean they should start spending bad money just to say they tried to improve weak positions. Their only mistake in this saga is that they waited too long and cost themselves a few extra million a season.

FWIW they met with Troy Frankin a ton last year and then passed on him three times. It might be a similar case of trying to nail down a difficult evaluation more than a sign that they love the player.

I don't disagree but the question is does paying Chase and Higgins stop them from adding OL talent? Starting caliber OTs don't just hit the FA market. So if the question was pay Higgins or pay a similarly talented LT, the LT makes more sense. But the question is pay Higgins or save the money for some hypothetical OT in the future... I think you have to just pay the talented player that is right there in front of you. To improve their OL they need to draft better.

I haven't actually seen that in his game though. I loved him coming out of Utah for that reason more than any other. He seemed to have a knack for making himself available to his QB. That ability is what makes Kelce an all-time talent. But somehow in the transition from college to the NFL he seems to have lost that ability IMO. Too many times I see him over-run an open window in zone or fail to adjust his route properly. I've come to believe the NFL is just too fast for him and he doesn't have the natural instincts that a player like him needs to be successful. He's never going to physically dominate so he needs to cerebrally dominate.