HappyDays

Backup OL has looked pretty good although it's hard to tell what kind of motivation level they're facing

I don't really understand Maye not getting more than a series in this game. They don't want their potential franchise QB to get reps?

?

Yeah we have to prirotize an X WR over anything else, whether that's re-signing Cooper or adding someone through trade. If extending Cook wouldn't get in the way of that, and wouldn't get in the way of extending Rousseau and Benford, I really couldn't complain. It's probably not what I would do but it's not a franchise altering mistake either. Cook still has relatively low career mileage and has taken his game to another level this year. He still has room to grow as a pass catcher too so there is some upside.

The thing is Cook is NOT Barkley or Henry, obviously. We mostly take him off the field on 3rd downs because a guy we picked up off the waiver wire has a better 3rd down skill set. I don't mean that as an insult to Cook, I love his skill set and fit in our offense, I'm just saying he is not a permanent fixure of the offense the way the truly elite backs are. 17 TDs is hard to ignore though. I'm not in favor of paying RBs but I can't sit here and pretend that all of those TDs would be scored by any random RB. And I think about all the free agency money Beane has spent on complete busts and I wonder how much it would really hurt our team if we gave Cook a decent extension. Give him the money instead of the next Curtis Samuel for example.

It's going to be Denver and we should all be very satisfied with that outcome.

Patriots 17 Bills 9

I'm hoping to see Grable get the start at LT for the entire game. He looked great in the preseason so I'd like to see where he's at. His physical traits with Kromer's coaching give me hope we may have hit the jackpot. I could see him being our starting LT in two years, Dawkins will be 32 and it might be a perfect time to move him to LG.

Total QB yards (passing + rushing + receiving) / total offensive yards

And by the way I'm not denigrating Lamar (I know you're not saying that I am). I agree he has had a special season that usually would be an MVP year. Just like Allen in 2020 would usually have been MVP but got edged out by Rodgers having a truly special regular season. This year Allen is having that truly special season and it deserves to be recognized as such. The historical heights he's taken this offense to, the records he's broken, the negative plays he's avoided, all with what neutral observers consider to be an average at best supporting cast; it's one of the all-time best QB seasons IMO. Not in total production for a number of reasons, but in value added.

You know what I made the mistake of trusting a video I watched and not checking my work. Lamar is responsible for 70.8% of his team's production, Allen is responsible for 73.0% of his. A small difference but not enough to matter. Like I said it is two MVP type performances. I still stand by everything else I said about their respective supporting cast and the value they add to their team.

I mean this logic seems pretty flimsy when you consider that there have been two teams this millennium that have dominated the Super Bowl conversation in their respective eras. I don't think the Patriots and Chiefs just happened to win more coin flips. Personally I think it boils down to elite coaching and elite QB play in high-leverage moments. The formula for a dynasty is established. The problem is that we only have half of that formula.

Yeah but that's why I mentioned snap counts specifically. If he's on the field a lot and doesn't get a ton of targets because his presence opens up the rest of the passing offense, I'm good with that. The weird part is that he's been on the field significantly less than Hollins or Coleman in recent games.

I only see that take on here. Every analyst I've seen discuss the MVP race has conceded that Allen doesn't have the same caliber of supporting cast. By the way TE is not debatable. Look at Baltimore's roster again. I'll agree we have the better OL. Offensive coaching I'll call a wash because it's too hard to separate the coaching from the QB play on both sides. Every other measure of supporting cast goes to Baltimore - RB, TE, WR. I am certain almost every GM in the league would agree with me. Lamar is responsible for 68% of his offense's production. Allen is responsible for 80% of his. It's two incredible MVP type performances, there are just too many factors going slightly in Allen's direction to not call him the clear winner.

Actually QBR likely graded that play extremely high because it adjusts for opponent quality, down/distance, and game situation (score differential, time left in the game, etc.), and it includes QB scrambles as part of the calculation. So I would bet that play approaches the ceiling of what a single play could calculate out to in QBR.

The run blocking thing is the only reason I can come up. It's just extremely unusual to divy up WR snap counts based on run blocking. Like I said I've never seen anything like it before. And I guess it's hard to argue with the results, but the offense has been somewhat clunky the past two games. It certainly hasn't been the dominant score at will offense that I think we'll need to make a Super Bowl run. Shakir has been MIA. Coleman as we can see is still learning the technical nuances and isn't reliable as an on schedule option. So I think it's time we get our best pass catcher involved as a featured option especially in the vertical game. I mean at least put him on the field, that's the part that doesn't make sense.

Also the Titans game. And those are the two games where we fell behind early. So it's like Brady knows he is our go-to passing weapon when we need one, but he's only funneling him the ball when absolutely necessary. I've never seen anything like it before.

I'm still a bit perplexed by his usage. Over the past two games Cooper had a 54% and 31% snap share, while Hollins had a 71% and 54% snap share, and Coleman had a 66% and 90% snap share. Even going back to the Lions game Cooper was out-snapped by Hollins and Coleman. And Cooper had just 5 total targets over those three games, while catching 4 of them. I mean it's good that when we need him to make a play he's making one but I really thought he would be a key feature of the offense by now. I guess Brady's offense just doesn't use the X receiver much?

Wait what

I would say Brady is the OC equivalent of a very good game manager QB. Nothing overly special, but consistent and mostly mistake-free. I've discussed this with @GunnerBill a couple times. Brady's best strength is that he knows what his players do well and he doesn't ask them to do more than that. He knows Hollins is mostly a blocking WR who should only get sporadic targets. He knows Cook is the gamebreaker but Ty Johnson is the 3rd down do everything back. He knows Shakir can catch short/intermediate passes in space. Etc. He isn't, say, asking Gabe Davis to read option routes and separate consistently from #2 CBs. As soon as he took over last year we eliminated the mistake-prone plays and started feeding the ball to our highest efficiency players. The bad side of his approach is that his offense is maybe too simple and maybe grabs from the same bag of plays too often. I don't see much creativity, I just see him finding what we do well and leaning on those plays to a fault. That approach has its merits but like I said back in August it's low risk, low reward. It requires a lot of consistent high level execution because any mistake disrupts the whole operation. This is perception more than reality: I just strongly disagree with this. Allen having a superstar season is the only reason we're having this discussion. Superstar doesn't mean 20 passes a game off his back foot 30 yards down the field. Brady had non-stop superstar seasons while making none of those plays. Allen's efficiency, field vision, and understanding of defenses are just as valuable this season as those Superman plays. His consistency has been amazing. He had, what, one half of football all season where you could say he was below average? To go along with like a full 50% of his season where he's been otherworldly? That is absolutely a superstar season. There are many games where I feel that he personally carried the team to victory - the first Jets game, Colts, 2nd Miami game, Chiefs, Lions, the Rams game we were only in it because of him. Every one of these games had drives and plays that required him to put the team on his back and he delivered in every big moment. I genuinely feel an average QB would have lost every one of those games and nobody would be sitting here today talking about Joe Brady the historic genius. Everyone around Allen has really just done enough to not get in his way as he's made the rest of the league look like junior varsity. Brady hasn't needed to do more than call simple concepts and lean on his players' strengths, because the QB has made it so difficult to fail.

Because people watch the games and he clearly is not the engine that drives that train. I would compare his season to Brock Purdy last year. I had said all along it was a joke that Purdy was in the MVP conversation and that he would fall back to earth if he lost even just a little of his absurdly good supporting cast. This year I feel vindicated in that take. Darnold is the same. He still makes his share of typical dumb Darnold mistakes but they don't punish the team because they have such a high margin for error. Jefferson is going to be a 1st ballot Hall of Famer. Addison has been a very good #2. Aaron Jones is close to elite. The OL is stout. The play caller is elite. You can't have all of that as a QB and be in the MVP conversation unless you have a historic season. Minnesota instead ranks 12th in YPG and 9th in PPG. An MVP QB would have that group at #1 in both categories.

They've managed to play very efficient football. I mainly credit Allen for taking his game to another level. It's a low margin for error style of offense and to his credit he has by and large removed errors from his game. It's a level that we've seen from him before but never so consistently and over such a long stretch of games. So basically what we needed for that style to work was for our QB to have an all-time great season and Allen delivered. Also the supporting cast has its faults but they aren't mistake prone like Gabe Davis and Isaiah McKenzie to name a couple former culprits. They don't drop passes, they don't run option routes in the wrong direction, they don't fumble the ball. We essentially excised mistakes from the offense and asked Allen to deliver 5 superstar plays per game, and that combination was enough to lead a middling offensive personnel to historic production. I both perfectly predicted it and completely missed the mark. It's been fun to watch it all develop.

Honestly man you're just way off base in this entire thread. Every superstar cares about their own achievements. Of course Allen would take a Super Bowl win over any individual accomplishment. That doesn't mean he isn't allowed to have some personal pride. If he didn't have that pride he wouldn't be a superstar.