HappyDays

He was in town to see Shane Gillis' show. It was unrelated to his release. I was told he was shocked to get this news today, didn't see it coming.

It won't even be that expensive. I wouldn't be surprised if a team throws a 7th at Jacksonville before he's officially released at 4PM today. The trading team would only be on the hook for $1.5M. If he doesn't get traded, it will probably cost around the same. He's still rehabbing a knee injury and teams mostly have their rosters set at this point.

My ranking assumes everyone is fully healthy: Shakir Palmer Samuel Knox Kincaid/Coleman Moore Shakir is easily #1. Palmer is easily #2. After that it becomes tighter. I put Samuel #3 because when healthy he has proven to be the most productive of the remaining players. It's possible he has just totally fallen off a cliff in which case he'd be near the bottom, but I'll give him the benefit of the doubt for now. I'm surprised everyone is ranking Kincaid over Knox. Based solely on last year Knox was clearly the more reliable pass catcher. And I don't take Kincaid's knee injury as a good enough excuse for his lack of production. To my eyes he was drifting on routes, he wasn't adjusting to defensive coverage, and his hands were too unreliable. He has a higher ceiling than Knox but as of today Knox is the better player. I put Kincaid and Coleman together because I have them in the same bucket of young pass catcher who has been inconsistent but appears to have a higher ceiling than what they've shown to this point. I'd say I'm probably slightly more optimistic about Coleman at this point because he's younger and more raw, so more room to grow IMO. Moore I have last. I'm pretty down on him. He's entering year 5 and hasn't been able to stick anywhere. Bad QB play doesn't fully explain that career arc. I see him as just Shakir's and Samuel's backup. He'll play when injuries inevitably come up but he's been way too unreliable throughout his career to count on him for a full time role.

Thanks... fixed my post.

So basically Davis will almost certainly play for the vet minimum this year. Jacksonville owes him $11.5M guaranteed for 2025, but whatever his new team pays him Jacksonville will be able to recoup from him because of offset language in the contract. So unless some team is paying him $12.5M or more which is obviously not happening, he has no incentive to play for more than the vet minimum. He's making the same money in 2025 either way. This makes me slightly more willing to bring him in if we want to keep 6 WRs and use Moore as our punt returner. Slightly.

Hilarious and entirely predictable outcome for Jacksonville. As for the Bills, it seems like the team is invested in Moore at this point, they gave him a press conference which is usually a signal he's close to being a roster lock. So I don't see where Davis fits in. And frankly I wouldn't want his error-prone skillset back in this offense unless it was like his usage in 2020 when he had 3 legit WRs ahead of him on the depth chart and he had a very specific role.

One of the few trades I dislike for both sides. Pittsburgh's offseason makes no sense. They currently don't have a QB and didn't make a serious attempt to draft one. If they want to compete they need as much offensive talent as possible. If they don't want to compete, why did they also trade for Metcalf? Offseasons like this are why they get stuck in wildcard purgatory. For Dallas they still haven't paid their best player in Micah Parsons and now they're trading for a WR in the last season of his rookie deal? And adding another diva to the team in their head coach's first year when he should be establishing his culture? I mean who is the last WR to leave Mike Tomlin and work out elsewhere? And I don't think Pickens really gives their offense the skill set it needs which is explosion and YAC ability.

This makes me feel more confident in my theory that the whole thing was somewhat of a planned stunt. I don't think Beane goes off like that unless he gets the okay from Pegula. Wouldn't surprise me if WGR knew about it ahead of time too, free content for them for a full week in a slow part of the NFL offseason schedule.

I still contend that Kincaid needs to work on his mental game more than his physical game... We didn't draft him to physically dominate his coverage man or pancake defenders. We drafted him to use nuanced route running and understanding of leverage to make himself an available target for his QB. Kelce is more physical than Kincaid but the cerebral game is what makes Kelce possibly the GOAT. I hope Kincaid is watching film as much as he's strength training.

This is my worst fear, that people are going to start taking me seriously 😁 Good question. I'd put coaching first honestly, and I want to be more specific by saying that it's Andy Reid having McDermott's number that has been the biggest factor holding us back from a Super Bowl. KC's offense is regularly producing much better against us in the playoffs than they are throughout the regular season and in other playoff games. They've never punted more than twice against us. Our defensive talent and their offensive talent have changed but the outcome has always been the same. So I think McDermott takes the bulk of the responsibility. After that I'd go defensive talent. We haven't had a legit #1 CB play a full game against them since Tre White played in our first AFCCG. Our DL talent has always been middling. We've had injuries throughout the defense, and I don't think that fully explains the utter collapses we're seeing on that side of the ball but certainly it has been a contributing factor. And then lastly I'd put the offense which has regularly kept us in those games but has also failed to close the deal in the last two games when it had the ball last. So all that being said I do understand wanting to focus on the defense this offseason, especially since both the FA class and draft class were stronger on defense. I'm not blind to the fact that the defense has been a massive disappointment in each of our playoff losses. I just feel like I trust Allen to get the job done more than I trust McDermott so I wish we'd give more of our resources to him.

I think you have the cause/effect backwards. Part of the reason I think that is that McDermott's defensive scheme and philosophy is built around the idea that every time your opponent runs the ball it's a net positive for your defense. This has been a common criticism of his defense, that we too easily invite the run. So it would be weird to make that concept a staple of your defense, but then on the other side of the ball intentionally go run-heavy. I'm all for a balanced offense. But the team was forced to run that small ball style more than they really wanted to I am sure. No way McDermott wanted his offense to have 6 4th down conversion attempts in the AFCCG, and needing to convert at least 5 of them to even have a chance of winning the game, but that's what happened. The personnel dictated the game script and the game script dictated the outcome.

So I guess I don't necessarily care about total passing yards. I was just illustrating that although you said a lack of WR talent didn't impede us, the clear decline in volume passing stats and passing success rate is an indication that it in fact did impede us. And of course wins are what counts. Especially playoff wins, where the Bills have now fallen short two years in a row because no one other than Allen was able to make a play at the end. This past AFCCG Cook made a clutch play to score a TD on 4th down. We need more of that from the players around Allen because those moments more than season-long stats are what win championships. When we were leading by 1 with a chance to go up by 8, our offense stalled out on 4th down because we were forced to try and drag ourselves downfield a few yards at a time. On the final offensive drive Cooper slipped on a 3rd down WR screen that should have been a 1st down and more, and then Kincaid dropped his clutch moment on 4th down and the game was over. All of the pretty looking season-long stats meant exactly nothing when we needed someone to come through in those moments. It's funny you say wins are what count except to fantasy football people, but your whole argument is that our PPG means our WRs were good enough. My whole point is that what I'm talking about doesn't show up in any stats. It shows up in moments. Isn't it obvious? I'd have traded a 2nd and a 5th for DK Metcalf. His contract would have effectively replaced Diggs' contract which Beane had already been accounting for as part of the future salary cap before Diggs went scorched earth. That's the type of player this offense is missing, a true #1 that creates explosive plays downfield. And yeah that would have meant sacrificing a couple of our defensive signings and probably not extending Bernard. I'd have easily taken that trade off. But we'll find out if Beane's strategy was the right one.

But the passing game did suffer. For the first time since 2019 Allen was below 4,000 passing yards. Passing TDs also was the lowest since 2019. Passing success rate was below 50%, and again the lowest since 2019. It's inarguable that the weak WR talent made the passing offense significantly less productive. The offense made up for it however with great tackle play, getting explosive plays from the run game, and an all-time elimination of negative plays in the pass game (literally all-time - Allen had the lowest sack/INT/fumble percentage in NFL history). They were able to mask the WR room by playing an intentionally safe ball control style of offense and by Allen delivering the best performance of his career. That doesn't mean the lack of WR talent wasn't a problem; the volume passing stats show clearly that it was. And ball control worked great, until the final two games of the season. Against Baltimore our inability to do anything on offense for the entire second half almost cost us a game that we had well in hand. The narrative of that game swung on a dropped 2 point conversion. Against KC we were forced into multiple 4th down conversion scenarios as a direct result of our small ball philosophy, and predictably we couldn't convert all of them so we lost. The needle proved too narrow to thread. I worry this season will suffer the same ending. But this regime has made its bed and they have to lay in it. Looking at the total resources spent on the offense vs on the defense, the 2025 Bills really should be led by the defense. We shouldn't need to put up 30+ PPG to win 13+ games. KC went 15-1 (ignoring the farce that was week 18) scoring 23.1 PPG. McDermott and Beane are telling us with their spending that that is the style of team they want to win with. So they better prove that the strategy can work. I still worry that all the defensive investments will mean nothing when we inevitably face KC in the playoffs, and that the offense will once again fail to close the deal when they have the chance because no one other than Allen can step up and make a play.

The weird part about it is he gives you nothing that Hollins did. I actually see Palmer as the Hollins replacement/upgrade in the sense that he can play outside, and what you sacrifice in high end run blocking you more than make up for in route running ability. Moore is kind of a weird fit on the roster. He doesn't give us the vertical element that remained our #1 need in the WR room coming out of the draft. I feel like his role ultimately will be spelling Samuel or Shakir in case of injury. Given those players' injury histories it's probably not a bad idea to have a similar skillset able to step in but you'd really rather that player be someone on the PS, not taking up a roster spot. Also a common refrain after the draft was that we need our #5 WR to contribute on special teams but Moore doesn't give you anything there. So he mainly just exists as a redundancy on the roster.

I like on paper the changes they've made. They've added coaches that bring new schematic wrinkles to the table. They've added a legit CB to cover twitchy/speedy WRs. They've attempted to make the DL 10 players deep which has proven to be a successful strategy for overcoming the Chiefs. So I like the overall direction of the offseason. We just have to see if on paper translates to on the field. And nothing we do in the regular season will make me confident we can beat KC when it counts until I actually see it happen.

Why was a 25 year old WR available after the draft for $3.5M if he was really that good?

I can respect that answer too. I think we match up better now than we have because we have a legit speed CB who can at least keep up with Chase, which allows Benford to cover his better matchup in Higgins, and with the revitalization of our DL we can actually take advantage of their bad OL. On defense they are way under talented and they lost Lou Anaruno who was somewhat of a Josh Allen neutralizer (and Mahomes for that matter). I was terrified of them as our potential wildcard opponent last year. Now I feel a lot more optimistic.

I think Kincaid and Moore suffer from somewhat of the same problem. When you watch them move on the field they both LOOK like NFL players whose pure athleticism and talent should make them super productive, which is why they both got drafted high. But NFL bust history is littered with great athletes who could never adjust to the speed of the NFL. I think that's the hardest thing to project from college to the pros and you just won't know if a player has what it takes until they get there. Kincaid's terrible catch percentage this past season despite a low ADOT, while his counterpart in Knox was higher in both categories, is an indication that he wasn't ending up exactly where his QB expected him to be on targets. And Knox isn't exactly a cerebral player but he has developed more of a feel for the NFL game than Kincaid has as of yet. By the end of the season Brady had reverted Kincaid back to his rookie year usage of basic short routes and was only feeding Knox the downfield throws, so Brady was seeing the same things. Hopefully the light clicks for Kincaid this year, he would be far from the first player to have the game slow down for him in his 3rd year. Having watched a fair amount of Moore's 2024 snaps over the past couple days, I see similar flaws in his game. He drifts on routes, he doesn't make himself an available target in zones, he gives away leverage to DBs which creates INT opportunities. He's a good but not elite route runner and he plays small with no catch radius to speak of. I know the common narrative with Bills fans and media right now is that Moore only underproduced because of Cleveland's QB situation, but NFL front offices are smarter than that. 25 year old WRs with great film that demonstrate a lot of untapped potential aren't available after the draft for $3.5M... The NFL is telling you who he is as a player. And unlike Kincaid we're entering year 5, not year 3, so it's much more likely Moore just is who he is at this point.

KC for sure. Their coaches and players have a psychological advantage over us in the playoffs and we won't shake it until we finally beat them when it counts.

Man I was ready to take a victory lap on here after the Seattle game. For anyone who forgets what that looked like: The following Miami game he was not good, and then of course after returning from injury he was a shell of himself. But the player from that video still exists.

No Detroit mentions yet? They lost both coordinators and made no meaningful improvements to their roster, at best I would say their losses and gains in FA were a wash. And then there was their draft which I thought was awful with a lot of reaches. Taking a 1T who underperformed in college in the 1st round was bad value, then they reached for a guard in Tate Rutledge, then they used three 3rd round picks (their original 3rd rounder plus two future 3rds) to draft Teslaa who was seen as a 6th or 7th round option. They still have an extremely talented offense and Hutchinson will hopefully come back fully healthy, but I don't know how you can say their team has gotten better. With the coordinator losses I'd say on the whole they got significantly worse.

I watched some game reels yesterday from his time with Cleveland and there were definitely some targets he could have come down with. Here's a good sample game that I posted earlier in the thread: Some of the targets are absolutely uncatchable, but there are a couple that a bigger more physically gifted WR would have come down with. But we're talking about the 5th WR on the depth chart so as long as he can get some decent separation and catch passes that hit him between the numbers he'll be worth his roster spot. If Samuel ever gets injured which feels inevitable Moore can step in and do some of the same things.

I don't remember what interview or press conference it was, but Beane recently said they got no trade calls for Cook during the draft. So what does that tell you? Teams know what Cook is asking for and not a single one is willing to pay it. You'd think Cook and his brother would get the message. I can respect what they're trying to do but eventually you have to accept the value the NFL places on you. His only option is ball out this year and hope that next offseason some team is willing to pay him what he wants. EDIT - I found the interview snippet:

Body control and size. The upside with him is he becomes a player that can consistently box out defenders to create leverage and then contort for the ball in the air. His best case scenario profile was never Stefon Diggs, it's Brandon Marshall. Obviously he has a long way to go to hit that ceiling.

The forgotten outcome of that thread is that after week 5 just about every person on this board, including the person who started that thread, agreed that adding a WR was a necessary move. Beane himself has defend the Cooper trade by pointing out our offense scored 7 more PPG with him in the lineup. They are hoping that Palmer can replace or improve on what Cooper brought to the offense and that Coleman takes a big step forward in his development.