Logic

I hated it. Put simply, and to steal a line from Twitter: When the Chiefs call, you simply answer "new phone, who dis?" and hang up. It doesn't matter to me that we weren't gonna pick Worthy or whatever. It's possible another team would've beaten the Chiefs to the punch on drafting him, but we helped ensure that couldn't happen. You don't help your biggest enemy get the guy they covet. You don't hand a 4.21 guy to your arch rivals. You just don't. Hope Beane is thrilled with his extra mid to late picks in a shallow draft, though.

I'll certainly give Beane the benefit of the doubt and will wait to see how the rest of the draft turns out, but... Helping the team we can never get past in the playoffs get a 4.21 WR, trading out of the first round completely and losing the fifth year option, and collecting a pile of late picks in a shallow draft has me going to bed pretty discouraged tonight. I felt the Bills needed to try to find a difference maker or two in this draft, and instead they seem content to just keep trading back and adding a big pile of okay-to-maybe-good players instead. It's hard to see who at pick 60 or 95 is going to help get us over the hump. Not only that, but they handed to their arch rivals a guy who -- by virtue of his rare speed -- MAY actually be a difference maker. I'm typically a huge optimist, and if you go back through my history of draft night posts over the years, you'll see me constantly espousing a glass-half-full outlook and talking up the BIlls' pick(s). But tonight? I don't feel good about the way things went down. First time in a while that I've ended night one of the draft feeling this discouraged.

Un-*****-believable. We just handed the Chiefs THAT player?! We just handed the Chiefs the fastest player in combine history instead of taking him ourselves? We just facilitated a Chiefs WR corps of Hollywood, Worthy, Rice? Perfect. Just perfect. But we hadddd to have that 3rd round pick, right? Ridiculous. We're going to regret this. Why on EARTH would we help the Chiefs? I just....Goddamnit. *****. *****.

This is the last time I'll say this for a while, after having said it a thousand times this offseason: I'm sick of no other difference makers stepping up for the Bills in big playoff moments. I'm sick of the Bills hitting singles and doubles in the draft, but never home runs. I'm ready to swing for the fences and try to add a potential superstar to this team. I'm ready to see Rome Odunze catch a toe-tapping, game winning touchdown to beat the Chiefs and advance to the AFCCG, and I don't mind losing out on a safety and a couple backup d-linemen in order to make it happen. I know I won't win any new converts to my way of thinking, but I'm not feeling at all risk averse this year. Bring on the risk. Bring on a blue chipper. Let's do this thing.

We don't really have an "Official Draft Day Thread", so I'm just gonna put this here instead...

Is it just me, or is today an objectively crazy day to be asking this question?

Disagree. You talk about him like he wasn't actually a good college football player. He was a freshman breakout and posted three years of good production at Texas. But honestly...I don't want to spend the second best day of the football year arguing about any prospects. I've done enough of that the past few months. Today is a day for joy and pizza and booing Roger Goodell. We'll stick with "agree to disagree" on Worthy, and we can check back in with each other as his NFL career goes along.

I take it all back. GM of the year!

If I'm understanding correctly... **spoilers ahead for those who haven't seen** ...The GM in this movie desperately needs a quarterback, but instead mortgages his team's future to select an off-ball linebacker and a punt returner, because he finds out none of the top QB prospect's teammates attended his birthday party... Do I have that right? I understand watching it for the camp factor (and Jennifer Garner's dimples), but other than that....

Belichick's wisdom and insight will be fascinating -- even though he was awful at drafting the past several years (and beyond?). I always said that Bill the Coach is the best ever, but Bill the GM suuuuucks. Nevertheless, he's forgotten more about football than any of us could ever hope to learn. He and McAfee will be a weird pairing. Like oil and water. Clearly Bill is on his "rehabilitate his image so that he can get another head coaching job" world tour. Smart move. I'm glad draft coverage has expanded. I usually watch NFL Network's, but in recent years, various web-based draft day shows have surpassed even that. Thank goodness. Never much liked ESPN's coverage. Now who do I have to call about not going to commercial when the Bills are on the clock for the 14th year in a row?

Dude. It's not a secret if you tell everybody.

Just to circle back to previous Xavier Worthy discussions. Not that it should be at all shocking that the fastest guy in combine history would go in round 1, but...Vegas seems to think that's what's about to happen.

"ThE BeNGaLs WinDOW iz cLoSiNg!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!"

If we're using the word "comfort", then... The Office Parks and Rec Brooklyn Nine Nine Abbot Elementary All four have an easy-going, predictable, pleasant rhythm to them. All four have a host of lovable characters. Now if we're just talking "shows I re-watch often and never get sick of", then I'd list Seinfeld, Curb Your Enthusiasm, and Its Always Sunny in Philadelphia. But...none of the three is bringing anyone any real "comfort" any time soon.

I'm on the west coast, so thankfully the draft is on earlier for me than most. By the time I get home from work, grab a pizza, pour a beer, and sit down, the draft should be starting. By a great stroke of luck, the wife will be out of town. That means I can be a total degenerate lunatic football fan and watch the entire draft without interruption. I'll be ordering a pizza, getting a 12-pack of good microbrew, pulling out my draft magazine and Dane Brugler's "Beast" draft guide, and watching all of night one and night two. To be honest, I cannot bare to sit through all of day three, mainly because the TV coverage turns from discussion of the drafted players to puff pieces, promotional stuff, concerts, and other not-at-all-interesting nonsense to fill the time. If they kept talking about the prospects, I'd keep watching, but they won't, so I won't. Instead, I'll likely go for a nice long walk on day three and occasionally check my phone to see who the Bills drafted. Once its all said and done, I will dive into all the players the Bills drafted, watching every highlight, cut-up, interview, and reading every article and draft writeup I can about them. I love the NFL draft. I ***** love it.

Thanks for this post. It likely won't get the play it should, because many don't care to get into the nuance of positional alignments, tight ends vs split ends, etc, but...it's good stuff. I appreciate you taking the time to type it up. For what it's worth, I agree. I think the Bills are going to try their hardest to come away with a traditional X anyway, but if they don't manage to get one, I think they'll be fine, for the reasons you stated. The scheme versatility and creativity of modern NFL offenses -- not to mention the way NFL rules are currently set up -- make it so that you can have all sorts of non-traditional collections of personnel and can still produce on offense. NFL offenses are more likely to be limited by the imagination of their playcaller than by any personnel shortcomings they may have.

I see things have gotten........weird in this thread. It's like the dog days of training camp when fights start breaking out between teammates. Everyone's tired of hitting their own guys and desperately need a preseason game to get here so we can hit someone else. Draft night can't come soon enough!

Yeah. The other problem is that the Bills likely aren't the only team that doesn't have 28 first round grades on players this year, so why would trading all the way back to 28 be particularly attractive to anyone?

Yep. Only way I can see it not happening is if the Bills simply try their hardest and fail, and some team feels as strongly about Odunze as the Bills do and takes him rather than trading back. It always takes two to tango. Bills can try 'til they're blue in the face, but they can't force anyone to trade with them.

Benjamin Albright, who was discussed earlier in this thread and who was all over Allen to Bills and Oliver to Bills early in those draft years, has released his one and only mock draft. He has Odunze sliding to 15 and the Colts taking him there. He has the Bills "trying and failing to trade up" and then drafting Xavier Worthy at 28. Personally, if Odunze DOES slide as far as 15 (which I don't see as likely), I can't imagine the Bills NOT trading up to get him. But it takes two to tango, and if they were to get shut out, Worthy is a fine consolation prize.

I traded him from my dynasty team after his rookie year because I thought he wouldn't replicate that success in year two. I used the pick I got in exchange to draft.......Skyy Moore. I still think about it pretty much daily.

I'm not doing this with you today. It is my opinion that you're fixating on and exaggerating Worthy's negative qualities and completely ignoring his positive qualities. The fastest 40 time in combine history, to go along with a freshman breakout season, three straight years of quality production at Texas, and a likely 1st or 2nd round draft position, all indicate that Worthy is a legitimate weapon, and that NFL teams view him as such. It's fine that you don't like the prospect. I do. Like I said, we can agree to disagree. We'll see in a day or two where he winds up, and we can check back in with each other as his career in the NFL goes along. People get far too certain about draft prospects and far too emotionally invested in their success or failure. I like him. You (very clearly and evidently) do not. C'est la vie.

I think saying there is "next to 0 chance Beane takes Worthy", when the Bills have clearly done a lot of work with him and met with him -- including some late-in-the-process extra work -- is silly. YOU may not like him, and if it makes you feel better to convince yourself that there's "next to 0 chance" of the Bills drafting him, that's fine. But the reality of the situation is that it's very much a possibility. As for him being a massive bust: I disagree. All this "he'll never get off the line" stuff completely ignores the way modern NFL offenses scheme receivers open. It completely ignores the recent success of guys like Tyreek Hill, Zay Flowers, and Hollywood Brown. It ignores the success of offenses like the Dolphins. The modern NFL game is all about speed. Speed, speed, speed. It's one of the hardest things to defend. Having a guy who can both take the top off a defense and open things up for the players underneath AND be explosive in terms of RAC is hugely important. It's not just me saying it. Beane and McDermott both spent the offseason talking about adding speed, explosivity, and RAC to the offense. Worthy has all of those things. He also has three years of quality production at Texas. He is NOT a "straight line speed only", one trick pony. He has lateral quickness, route running ability, toughness, and smarts. We can agree to disagree on the issue. I think Worthy is gonna be a very good player, and I think he would make perfect sense as the Bills' preferred choice.

After sleeping on it, I still think the plan, in order of preference, is: A) Trade up fairly high for Odunze or Nabers B) Draft Xavier Worthy either at 28 or even after a small trade up C) Trade down to net a 3rd round pick, draft one of Franklin, Legette, or McConkey I'm sticking with that. Any outcome other than one of those three will actually surprise me. The late-in-the-process smoke around trading up (for Odunze in particular) and the late checks on Worthy ring true to me. Many will say "smokescreen!", "lying season", etc, but...nah. I buy it. Both guys would give our offense something it currently lacks. Odunze would give us a true playmaking X. Worthy would give us an explosive downfield and RAC threat that would open things up for the other guys. We'll see in 40 hours or so!