Drunken Pygmy Goat

OP strikes me as the kind of person that's always late to parties. In 20 years, there will be a thread about how the Bills beat the Giants to go to 2-0. Meanwhile, the rest of us will be somewhere on Mars, sharing cocktails and talking about how the Bills are about to replicate the dynasty they created in the early-mid 2020s by winning their 5th championship.

There's more than just that. IIRC, the Bills do not play a team that is coming off of a bye this year. Also, the Eagles at Bills game is the Bills' 3rd home game in a row, while it's the Eagles' 3rd straight road game. The Bills have already had the benefit of the Jets and Giants missing key offensive weapons, and AJ Green may not suit up next week, especially since the Bengals have a divisional matchup with Pittsburgh in week 4. The back end of the Bills schedule looks pretty tough, although Pittsburgh may not be as difficult as we thought. The first half of the Bills schedule is pretty decent. If the Bills have less than 5 wins going into the 2nd half, they'll have a tough time getting into the playoffs, but they could easily have 5 or 6 wins by then IMO. If the Bills are for real, they'll win a few of those tough games down the stretch.

@K-GunJimKelly12 this line of thinking has more to do with my train of thought on the matter. Williams is a good player, but there are more factors to consider. Channel your inner McBeane. I don't see it as a move they make. What he's doing in Washington is the kind of stuff this staff wants to avoid, and until the Bills become a perennial winner like NE, they probably avoid these type of guys in most cases. JMO

TRIGGERED You brought up TE and 4-0 to try and make a counter point. And while I get what you're saying, 4-0 does make a difference. This team is light years ahead of that team. Do you really think Beane makes a move for Williams at 4-0? The Skins claim they aren't trading him, even though that's probably just to drive up the cost. I don't think the Bills would come off of anything more than a 3rd for him, but that's just my opinion. I didn't call you an idiot or insinuate as much...that's not my style. Ok, maybe my JA/TE comment wasn't exactly relevant, but take it easy bud. Have a nice day.

He missed 2 throws, and was slighlty off on 1 or 2 completions. A- at worst IMO

What's a fair price in your opinion? And in case you haven't noticed, Allen>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>Edwards

Immediately after the play, I thought of a quote from Josh during camp, something about how hard it is to overthrow Smoke. Maybe he was a bit overconfident there, but it was a good read on the play.

If he hits him in stride, I think he only had a safety to beat. But, it may have been a miscommunication on a hot read for all we know. Allen does need to take some heat off of certain throws as well. Those passes that bounce off of WRs will lead to INTs at times. All in all, very good day from Josh. To be fair to Philthy, his kicker missed a couple FGs earlier, and he probably didn't want to put the game in the kicker's hands (feet). It wasn't a smart throw, but he was being uber aggressive for that reason IMO.

Like I said, I wouldn't hate it. I just don't think it's a move that McBeane would make, given the circumstances on both sides. And the Skins aren't budging for any bargain deals. And no way he would be happy coming off the bench.

He's looking more and more like Big Ben, and less and less like Cam Newton. His stiff arm is great BTW. He had another one today, and his stiff arm on Miles Jack last year in the way to the end zone was epic

If you're 4-0, don't fix what isn't broken IMO. TW doesn't strike me as a "process" guy either. It's still really early. Knee-jerk thread/idea IMO

If Josh hits him in stride on the slant, instead of throwing behind him, this thread doesn't exist...

It also has a significant effect on the cap and roster moves. Neither player "bought into Buffalo". They were ready to leave as soon as they got here. The players here now want to be here

Nah, this was the plan all along. They're doing what the Bills did before the 2017 season, but to the fullest extent. This is what I told my good Fins fan friend in February: "Dolphins are a bottom 3 team this year. If they want to be good in 2-3 years, they need to get rid of older, overpaid, underperforming contracts, sign a bridge QB like Ryan Fitzpatrick (called that one easily), re-sign Howard, and suck it up for a year and get a top 3 pick". They've done everything exactly the way I said they should, so at least they're tanking right... Only thing I didn't see coming was Rosen for a 2nd. I then said that Fitz will be benched by no later that week 6. I did say that they should strongly consider starting Rosen right out of the gate, because if they're going to suck, at least they can get as much film on Rosen as possible to see if he's at all worth building around. Then the preseason happened, and he still sucked.

Nah. It's still early in the season, and this is a group of guys that haven't been playing next to eachother for very long, in football terms anyways. Mistakes will happen, especially early on. Hopefully that gets cleaned up. I'd rather allow them to gel, than to give up assets for another new face that will be late to the party. Wouldn't hate it, but I like where this is going. Why not just go with what's been working at that point then?

Cheesey, but clever...I'll allow it

Don't worry, I did the same thing this morning, but only because our espresso machine is in need of cleaning. What has become of me? Ahh...hell with what y'all think. The **** is GOOD!

But none of those week 1&2 road teams played in the same building that's only a 45 min flight away. Also, teams that lost the turnover battle by 4 or more won only about 5% of about 800 games since 1970. Bills are bucking the trend 2 weeks in a row

Having that defense to lean on certainly dictates how you call a game on offense, to some extent. Last week, the Bills started with 18 straight passes, which is unheard of (ESPECIALLY for the Bills), but it was the game plan going in, to attack what was a weak secondary. That plan, in theory, helps speed up the development of our young QB. Allen looked pretty good on those first few drives, until mistakes happened. With the bad comes the good, though, and those were "good" learning moments for him. And in the end, what we all learned about Josh is that he has a very short memory, and bounces back well. He's very confident in himself, and that resonates throughout the roster. Sorry for side-tracking...your thread is self explanatory. In most cases, teams with good defensive play are going to be a bit more conservative on offense, because they can afford to be. Oppenent strengths and weaknesses can play a role and dictate variances, but generally coaches will play to their own strengths first. Very rarely do we see teams with big leads get greedy like the **Pats did @Buffalo in 2015. It nearly came back to bite the hoodie in the butt, which is why you typically don't see that happen. It's much safer to control and kill the clock in that scenario and preserve the win (they nearly blew a very high "win probability" percentage with that lead). I think they were just pissed that the Bills were selling ball pumps in the Bills Store leading up to that game, and wanted to make an example out of them. I like the idea of keeping your foot on the opponent's throat in certain scenarios, but at some point, you have to stop being greedy and have to limit putting the ball in the air, and protect it by running and killing clock. See the Falcons/**Pats SB in the final minutes. That was more of a colossal collapse than it was a miracle comeback, and that falls squarely in the guys calling the plays.

Thanks for diving deeper WRG Wilson and passing yards. Like I said earlier, I think this team is built very similar to how the Seahawks were built, and defensively, the scheme is very similar. The Bills seem to disguise blitzes more (while seemingly not blitzing at a high rate), and show a lot of double A gap, but IMO the comparisons are there. Lots of cover 1 and 3. Strong DB and LB play, good pressure and solid containment up front with 4. It's a mix of Seahawks '13 and Panthers '15 defenses. Where the Seahawks benefitted most IMO was having multiple starters on defense, and their QB, that were on rookie contracts, many of which being cheaper, late round picks. The window for success that the Seahawks created revolved around those factors, and the Bills have built their roster in a similar fashion. Wilson was a second year QB in '13, Allen a second year QB now. He was certainly a better, more accurate and consistent passer than Allen currently is, but both are good running QBs that make things happen outside the pocket when plays break down, Allen being a much stronger runner. Allen's development may be behind where Wilson's development was at the time (he played at a high level at NCS/Wisconsin, beat out highly paid FA Matt Flynn in camp), but Allen has shown improvement in key areas, especially areas that were viewed as weaknesses in his game as a prospect and NFL rookie. As the game continues to slow down for Josh, and more balls are released on time, the passing attack should be more efficient, and giveaways should decrease a bit. I don't expect a 3/1 TD:INT ratio from Josh, like Wilson had that year, but approximately 3,300 yards passing, along with 350+ yards rushing and something around 2/1 should be good enough. He doesn't have a tough, grinding RB like Lynch, but Singletary looks promising. With him, Gore, and Yeldon, the Bills at least have a formidable backfield, and an improved offensive line to give them opportunities. As far as 300+ yard passing games goes, there's really no correlation to winning. In fact, if I had to guess, I would think that it correlates more with losing efforts, since teams that play from behind need to pass more towards the end of games, and defenses are more concerned with taking away the big play. Guys like Matt Stafford and Jameis Winston have several 300+ yard passing games, but not too many wins to go along with them. And while that's not always all on them, much of those numbers likely came in garbage time or while playing catch up. Playing with leads generally should lead to lower passing yards, and higher rushing yards.

Passing yards shouldn't be the measuring stick. Efficiency is what matters. I've been comparing this defense (and team in general) to the Seahawks in 2013 for a couple months, mainly based on scheme, style, roster, and strategy. Through one game, they certainly look prominent enough, but I'm not going to truly compare them to that defense until I see more. They were really good last year, but they were the most inconsistent defense in the league. Shore that up, and they'll be great. Those Seahawks had a great defense, so there wasn't much necessity on offense to throw too much. They more often than not played with the lead. https://www.pro-football-reference.com/teams/sea/2013.htm Wilson threw for less than 3500 yards thst year, and while that's better than what we've been used to in Buffalo, it's far less than 300 ypg. A couple statistical categories that stuck out to me was yards per play for and against, and field position. Those numbers represent efficiency, and the Seahawks ran fewer plays than they defended that year. They were great against the pass, and while they were pretty good against the run, they gave up some yards there, including a couple 200+ yard games. On Sunday, the Bills won the ypp battle, but (without looking at the stat) they lost the field position battle by turning the ball over, and getting pinned deep on a few punts. Granted those types of games won't be the norm (hopefully), but coming back and winning those games is a sign of a good team. Not great, still a long way to go, but good. How good remains to be seen. I don't think we'll hear many complaints if the Bills are winning and passing for 220 ypg. Thats classic football. Strength is the defense, lean on the run to control the tempo and kill clock, and pass efficiently enough when called upon to move the chains and create balance and keep the opponent on their toes. Comparing this team to the 2013 Seahawks is obviously pretty lofty, but if they can play anywhere close to that level this year, playoffs won't be a question. The question will be "how far in the playoffs can they go?".

Poor Jet Man...

That was a "Let's be glad we're only down by 6, and keep it that way for the 3rd quarter" kind of kneel down. With 4 TOs in the first half, McDermott had seen enough of the first half. I don't blame him for wanting to get out of it as soon as possible.

I get your point about the speed of Allen's development, but that won't be the reason or a factor in the Bills' run/pass ratio this season. I'm sure more passing will lead to faster development, but probably only to a small extent. If the Bills are passing more than around 60/40 on the year, it's probably because they were losing more games and needed to mount comebacks, and I'd prefer to see that as little as posssible this year, even if that means Allen develops slightly slower as a result. For a young QB, confidence is important. Some of that comes from being better at dissecting defenses and executing difficult plays, but some of that comes from simply winning ball games.

Aaaannnnd he's gone