Logic

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Too early to worry about all this "playoff probability" nonsense and tiebreakers. Win five more games and let the chips fall where they may.

I once did the whole ordeal before a Pearl Jam show: Waited in a really long line to get in, ran in with the other crazies, staked out my spot on line, got my poster tube already, and snagged one of the last few posters. Just then I noticed the guy in front of me get HIS poster. He -- and I'm not making this up -- folded it in half, tucked it under his arm, and off he went. ?

I'm a huge Pearl Jam fan and have multiple Ames Bros posters. As you said, it's a good thing the Bills don't do this, otherwise I'd be a lot poorer and have a bunch of posters I don't have room for in my home. As it is, I have a backlog of Pearl Jam posters that I don't have space for. Still, very cool. Not gonna lie: Despite being happy for monetary reasons, I am also jealous. These posters are dope.

He's allowed to think these things, but it's a bad look for him to say them and to act that way. For comparison/contrast, look at how Deshaun Watson recently answered a dumb question by a reporter:

I am an obsessive football fan, through and through. I'm not just into sports in general. I don't care at all about hockey or baseball, and I only casually follow the NBA. Football, though? Inject it into my veins. There is hardly a day of the year that I do not come to this message board or seek out football news and/or content on the internet. The offseason is just as fun for me as the season, because I love the roster building aspect of football. I love the run-up to the draft, free agency, mini camps, all of it. I spend way too much time watching All-22 breakdowns on Twitter. I spend the whole week after most Bills games watching GIFs, reading breakdowns of the game, visiting the message boards of the opposing team we just played, and diving into the "hows and whys" of the previous Sunday's games. Obviously, within the realm of football fandom, I'm a diehard Bills fan. I can name every player on the roster, every year. I know most of their jersey numbers. Generally speaking, I have a good mind for the useless trivium of football fandom. I can name much of the roster of MOST teams, I know where way too many NFL players played in college, I can name every head coach and most offensive and defensive coordinators in the NFL. Like I said: useless trivia. It just sticks in my brain for some reason, even though I could hardly tell you what I ate for lunch yesterday. I play Madden online and always use the Bills. I am in two fantasy football leagues with a decent amount of money on the line. I watch NFL Films productions and old games a fair amount in the offseason to get my football fix. I have read and continue to read various football books about the history of the game and the Xs and Os. Some of my favorites have been "The Games That Changed The Game", "GM", and "Take Your Eye Off The Ball". Next, I plan to read "The Genius of Desperation". I'm always trying to improve my knowledge of the game. I used to have season tickets, but nowadays I live on the west coast. I still try to make it back to western New York for one game a year. Two if I'm lucky. Attitudinally, I am optimistic to a fault. I cannot stand being around negative Nellies, especially on game day. During the Bills-Dolphins game this year, I sat near a Bills "fan" at New Era Field who was just ridiculously and repetitively negative. It took all the self control I could muster not to punch him in the face. We're all watching the same game, bro. Hearing you B word and moan and freak out after EVERY. SINGLE. PLAY does none of us any good. I prefer elite defense to elite offense, though I have to admit that after so many years of bad offense in Buffalo, it sure would be nice to watch an honest-to-God, top five offense one of these years. My favorite football player names are Equanimeous St Brown, Poop Johnson, and Plaxico Burress. I thought Reggie Corner and Nickel Robey were pretty funny, too.

The all white throwbacks are the best jersey in the NFL. And as our quarterback Josh Allen once said on Twitter: If it ain't white, it ain't right.

Was just about to post this. Thanks. The video that accompanies that writeup backs up Buscaglia's claims with visual evidence. Imagine that: first impressions of a player's effectiveness -- and an already divisive player, to boot -- from fans during the game proving to be inaccurate and overly reactionary. Shocking.

Taylor's a 3-technique. The reason Peko was activated and not Taylor -- aside from the fact that Peko has been with the team longer and likely knows the playbook better -- is that Peko was the practice squad's 1-tech while Taylor was its 3-tech. I'm not saying Taylor CAN'T play 1-tech. I don't know enough about him as a player to say that he couldn't do that effectively. However, by trade and by skillset, he IS a 3-tech.

Please, oh please, brilliant one: Tell us who the Bills SHOULD have traded for that was going to magically improve their team to a considerable degree.

Beane is a bold move maker in terms of trades. HOWEVER...he is not a sucker. He is not a dupe. If the value isn't there or the player doesn't fit the long term vision, he's not going to force a move just for the sake of making a move. This is a good thing. Beane's smart enough to know that there weren't any players on the market this year that were somehow going to transform the Bills into Super Bowl contenders in 2019. The Bills are NOT one player away from a championship. I like Beane. I trust Beane. I trust the process. On to Washington.

If Bills fans think THEY'RE upset that the Bills didn't get Watson or Mahomes, try being a Bears fan! They traded UP in that draft to pick the first QB off the board, and it was neither Watson nor Mahomes. The guy they DID take is likely to be a backup at best for the majority of his career, IF he doesn't flame out of the NFL entirely. Yikes.

I mean...I want a quality 1-tech as much as the next guy. But who's available that fits that mold? The only defensive tackle I've heard of that MIGHT be available is Gerald McCoy, but that seems more like a pipe dream. And even if McCoy IS available, he's a 3-tech. I'm not against the Bills trading for someone. I just don't see, out of the names who are realistically available for trade, who is going to make Bills fans happy or alter the team that much. Bengals insist that AJ Green isn't available. Robby Anderson isn't exactly a "process" guy. Gordon and Bell are nice, but why give up assets for a running back when the Bills don't use the running back they just drafted who averages 8.6 ypc? The needs the Bills have don't seem to have any legitimate, reasonable players available for trade that would fill those needs. Oh, still living in the past I see. Now if you want to make a more reasonable commentary on the 1-tech situation in Buffalo, you'd mention Harrison Phillips, who was starting to take playing time away from Star this year and was a monster at that spot until he got hurt.

All Bills fans seem to want at the moment are some flashy Bills trades and for Josh Allen to throw for 300 yards in a game. Me? I'll take better tackling, 5-10 more touches per game for Singletary, re-incorporating Foster into the offense, and a win against the Skins.

Boy is there going to be a lot of belly-aching today when the Bills do not make a single trade. Beane, McDermott, Daboll, and Frazier have all stated that they believe they already have what they need in house to turn things around. In the offense's case, I agree. We ALREADY have a big, fast WR in house who was regularly collecting 100-yard games last year. His name's Robert Foster, and we don't use him. We ALREADY have a shifty, playmaking running back in house. His name's Devin Singletary and we don't use him. My crystal ball foresees no Bills trades and a lot of Bills fans' tears.

A few things bothering me about the Bills right now. 1.) Mid-season fall-off is legit. And there's more: It usually seems to involve getting absolutely man-handled in the run game. That's the primary catalyst, in my view. The Bills better hope they find the answer to their run defense woes, because Bill Callahan -- who would just as soon run the ball 50 times a game from the i-formation as greet his mother with a hug -- is on deck for this Sunday. If you think things are uninspiring in Bills land now, just imagine what a loss to the woebegone Redskins would look like. Yikes. 2.) At the midway point of the season, we pretty much know who teams are. Sure, there may be a scheme tweak here, a playing time adjustment there, but for the most part, you is what you is at this point. As such, I've come to realize and accept what the Bills are at this point in time: a middling team who is likely to eek out a Wild Card spot based on an easy schedule, but who has a long way to go to be consistent competitors and to be among the upper echelon of teams in the league. For a while, due to their record and stifling defense and the belief that the offense would improve as the year went on, I thought they might be more. I thought they might ALREADY be a really good team, and one with at least SEMI-realistic aspirations to win a playoff game or two. Now? Reality has hit, and accepting that reality will make the rest of the season easier to watch and accept. The Bills aren't "there" yet. The defense needs some edge rushing talent and direly misses Harrison Phillips on the interior. The offense needs a few game-breaking playmakers. 3.) Brian Daboll is like Jekyll and Hyde. Some games he establishes a really good offensive rhythm, some games his offense is herky-jerky and can't get anything going. Hard to tell if it really is the Xs and Os or if it's the Willies and Joes. Most of all, I hate how easily he seems to abandon the run game sometimes. I understand that philosophically, he wants to follow the New England model of "tailor your offensive gameplan each week to specifically attack your opponent". The problem is that I don't think his offense is good enough or cohesive enough or talented enough yet to follow that model. What I see is a team whose offensive line is WAY better at run blocking than pass blocking, and who has two good running backs in Gore and Singletary and a quarterback who is WAY better on play-action than normal drop back passing. What does that all mean? It means that they should be operating a power run game with play-action deep shots built in. Instead they're insisting on being a ball control, pass-first, short passing offense. Again, I understand WHY Daboll wants this. Analytics all point to pass-first offense being the way to go in 2019. But on the other hand, it's all about winning games. No one is disparaging the Ravens for being run-first in THEIR march to a 5-2 record. Do what wins. Right now, running the ball seems to be the way to go. 4.) This leads me to my biggest gripe: Lack of intelligent use of Singletary, Foster, and McKenzie as of late. While lots of Bills fans want the team to be a player at the trade deadline, I don't really see the need. People want Robby Anderson. Well, we already have him. His name is Robert Foster. We don't use him. People want Gordon or Bell, both of whom are shifty, playmaking running backs without breakaway speed. Well, we already have him. His name is Devin Singeltary. We don't use him. As far as Singletary, I just can't figure out why the offense isn't using him more. He seems to be potentially the biggest offensive playmaker on the team, and he's getting maybe four carries a week. It's unacceptable and illogical. I also don't understand why the Bills can't ever seem to incorporate McKenzie and Foster into the gameplan in the same week. It's always either a McKenzie week or a Foster week, with the other guy being inactive. It seems quite obvious that an offensive lineup that features Brown, Foster, and McKenzie all on the field at once would be quite dangerous and difficult to defend. That's A LOT of speed. And why do we go two or three games at a time without using McKenzie, when he has proven that his presence as an end-around decoy on every single run play is a great boon to the offense? I feel like Daboll sees certain things work really well (like McKenzie as the end-around decoy and occasional pitch man) and then completely scraps them for the next week. Part of his "weekly hand-tailored gameplan" strategy. It's very frustrating. For a team without much offensive explosiveness, the inability/unwillingness to use Foster, McKenzie, and Singeltary -- arguably the three most explosive players on the Bills offense -- is baffling. Need a boost to the deep game? How about making Foster a meaningful part of the gameplan?! I mean...he was routinely collecting 100 yards a game last year against pro defenses. Did he suddenly forget how to play football?! Need a boost to your run game and offensive explosiveness in general? How about giving real run to Singletary and McKenzie?! Phew. That was a lot. Thanks for the opportunity to vent, even if no one listens. A middling football team who runs into inexplicable stretches of bad football defensively and who refuses to use their best offensive playmakers. Enraging.

I cannot believe that this thread reached 10 pages. JFC.

Thanks for the post, Shaw. I was at the game, too, and it was exactly as you described: A perfect fall day in every way. I brought a friend with me who had never been to a Bills (or any NFL) game before, and I made sure to take him on the full tour of the lots. He got a particular kick out of Pinto Ron and the bowling ball shot ceremony pageantry. If I could go back and re-live that day over and over again like Bill Murray in Groundhog Day, I would. Well...the football watching part was a little painful for three and a half quarters, but other than that... One thing I wanted to mention, regarding the onside kick: I could be wrong, but I was of the understanding that there is only one primary "up man" on the hands team who is intended to field it. Hyde is that guy for the Bills, as you stated. Lee Smith's only involvement on the hands team is as a primary blocker, though. At least I THINK that's the case. I suppose the opposition could kick it right at him and he'd have no choice but to field it, but...hmmm. Now you've got me wondering. Check out the video below of the onside kick from the All-22 view. Pretty cool to see how Alexander and Poyer allowed that play to happen the way it did.

"Oh really? You don't say!"

Yeah...I should have figured you wouldn't recognize a joke when you saw one. ?

I definitely believe this. I expect them to start collecting some wins, and by the time their matchup with Buffalo rolls around, it won't seem so easy any longer. That defense under Fangio is starting to fire on all cylinders. They're not as bad as their record says they are. Conversely, as you mention right below that, I don't think the Rams, Ravens, or Colts are as good as their records say they are.

Respects the process. Believes that iron sharpens iron. Likes to stack good days on good days. Has a growth mindset. Digs camo hats.

May I borrow your crystal ball when you're done with it?

Gosh! You're right! That highly specific graph citing the difference in net passing yards per play gained and allowed sure showed me that the Dolphins don't have any chance of beating the Bills this Sunday! ? By the way, you might want to look up "straw man". I don't know that it means what you think it means.