Ayjent

Here is the thing about EJ - he was a much more finished prospect than a lot of fans realized - he played a lot of games in a pro-style system with good QB coaching at FSU. He wasn't some raw talent that just needed good coaching, he was an inaccurate passer and had a multitude of inconsistencies in his game and mechanics and it was maddening to all of his coaches because once one thing was addressed the others would pop back up. Someone who covered FSU called his inconsistencies "whack a mole" and it was as if these inconsistencies became more pronounced every year and especially in games against good defenses. That's why a lot of scouts didn't really see him as a NFL starter, and really the Bills seemed to ignore the book on EJ as if they were much smarter than the rest or just so sure they could be the ones to right his issues (maybe both). The coaching he got wasn't helpful either as you pointed out - he needed someone who was really good at his craft in grooming QBs. EJ would have been serviceable, but not really good - probably as good as Jason Campbell in his peak (that's not really a compliment, but I think they were similar prospects with Campbell having better mechanics).

No argument here, but he also needs real coaching and we're about to find out what we have in that department. They obviously didn't think he was ready, but can you really trust the "process" when it comes to judging QB talent? Early results are in and the answer is looking like a "no", but I hold out hope that they can get this turned around. Maybe Allen has it start coming together for him over the next couple of games, but he needs a game plan and play calling that helps him succeed.

The question about Carr was how much did he have to do with getting hit so much. I think he had a lot to do with it, because he had poor pocket presence and he really was never that good at making quick reads and getting rid of the ball - he was a skittish QB and it wasn't just the OL in front of him. It's one of the things that worries me about Allen to be honest, he holds the ball too long and gets a little skittish back in the pocket as well. It's not a consistent trait, because sometimes he moves well in the pocket and makes the right call when to tuck and run, but he needs to be more fluid in the pocket and be quicker getting the ball out even if he has to force some throws into tight coverage.

Doubtful he has what it takes even if everything was "properly" handled. He doesn't have enough arm strength and he doesn't have enough tools to overcome that issue. Couple that with the fact that he doesn't make great decisions under pressure and you have a guy that probably doesn't last in the league very long. I'll give you that the Bills may have accelerated the time table for him to get out of the league, but Peterman doesn't have what it takes to be an NFL starter, and its doubtful he has what it takes to be a backup.

Goff may still very well look like trash and be on his way out had Fisher remained coach. Good coaching and player develop matter a lot, as much as natural ability. I think you need both to be successful in the NFL as a QB, and it's not a one or the other proposition. Good coaching can make a marginal talent look passable, and good talent look great, but it can't really make a bad QB magically into a passable starter. There are guys that just don't have what it takes and it is usually pretty clear off the bat. It's not always the case, but look at Watson and Darnold the past two years (played well right away). You can see guys like Wilson, Prescott, Newton and Ryan who also came into the league playing well. Goff is a good demonstration of what bad coaching vs. good coaching can do to a QB. Sometimes guys are so good they can overcome bad coaching and shine, but not all can (see Alex Smith and how his career turnaround once he was coached by Harbaugh/Roman, then another QB friendly coach in Reid, and now another one in Jay Gruden). Some guys do take a little time to develop, some guys come out and they are who they are with a little improvement along the way. Andy Dalton is who he is - he's been about as good as he's been since he started as a rookie, not much improvement. Matt Stafford improved a lot more, but he's still prone to making silly mistakes that have plagued him since he was a rookie. Mariotta has improved some since starting, but not a ton. Winston has improved a little but still does things that are maddening.

Brian "da Vinci" Daboll - I agree 1 game is not a fair assessment - but the most impressive part of his resume was that he was part of excellent teams that were good before and after he left, and the most damning are his stints where he was asked to be the guy to improve a team. I'm hoping for the best with him because it will take true genius to get this unit to look like a capable offense.

Me too. He's the type of guy that has always been a good OC, but terrible HC. But definitely a guy you can feel comfortable handing the keys to as an OC - problem is that he may have wanted to turn over much of the staff or not be stuck with guys McDermott absolutely wanted around like Castillo, who was hand picked by McD and hired before an OC.

The question is were they available when Dennison was fired or before he was hired last year? McCoy - yes - http://www.nfl.com/news/story/0ap3000000910830/article/cardinals-hire-mike-mccoy-as-offensive-coordinator Haley - yes - http://www.nfl.com/news/story/0ap3000000909559/article/browns-hire-todd-haley-as-offensive-coordinator Norv Turner was hired about the same time Dennison was let go, but the Bills certainly didn't fancy Dennison as their first choice and I would imagine that they had a good idea that they were going to look for another OC in the Offseason. Turner was available all year for contact and was also available when Dennison was hired. https://www.si.com/nfl/2018/01/10/panthers-offensive-coordinator-norv-turner Maybe they had no interest in Buffalo - that is entirely possible, but more proven options were available.

Norv Turner - great track record with QBs Mike McCoy - proven OC with success Todd Haley - another proven commodity, but a jerk All with HC experience as well, and way more success as OCs. You think DaBoll is a better option? If so, why?

Okay best QBs in the league right now? Brady - started playing on a playoff calibre team taking over for injured Drew Bledsoe Big Ben - team around him was very good and could really protect him and overcome his mistakes (although he didn't make that many) Aaron Rodgers - took over for Brett Favre on a pretty good team, not great, but didn't walk into a mess. Drew Brees - a worse situation than all of the above and didn't really show much in his first year - by the time the Chargers drafted Rivers, Brees was playing pretty well - not to mention they also drafted Ladanian Tomlinson the same year as Brees and had a decent line. *Philip Rivers - I'm a lot lower on Rivers than many people, mainly because he's done nothing when it matters to get any accolades and he puts up good numbers but doesn't really play as good as his numbers. But he had LT in his prime, a good line and a lot of weapons in place when he became starter. Russel Wilson - great defense, good running game, and solid line Matt Ryan - Had a good team around him, good WRs, good RBs, solid line (Went 11-5) Cam Newton - Had Steve Smith, good RBs, and a serviceable line. I could keep going, but the fact is that these goods are all bona fide good QBs in the league and they all had a much better situation than this. There are guys that are just so good they do excel (Peyton Manning - and even he had Marshall Faulk and a GM that understood they needed OL and WRs to help their QB), but that is the exception and hardly any walk into this type of mess and succeed. The recent young guys having success are coming out looking polished and playing well, with the exception of Goff who had to suffer one year with the worst HC you could have as a QB (Jeff Fisher). I'm not necessary sold on Goff, but he is playing pretty decent and has a great offensive head coach that knows what he is doing on that side of the ball. The Bills are basically the closest thing to the Rams situation with Goff, a conservative HC with a pretty barren team on Offense, other than a good RB, and a good defense (although I would argue that both sides of the Ball for the Rams were better in Goff's rookie year in terms of talent than the current Bills roster). His situation drastically changed and so did his success. My point is that there is a much higher likelihood for guys to fail in bad situations than good and the best in the league usually start off in decent situations. It definitely happens at times when guys succeed in bad situations and other fail in good situations, but the success stories are more frequent the better the situation. Now Allen's situation has to get much better by next year too. I'm not sure they are going to unearth the next great offensive mind to coach Allen, but the pocket book should be wide open to attract the very best OC they can that has shown he can develop the position. But would that happen under Beane and McDermott? Was Daboll really the guy they thought was the best OC for a new QB or was it a position they needed to fill knowing that they may be in the market again soon? I don't know if I'd buy the latter with a straight face, because they knew they were getting a QB in the draft and they knew the other guy on the roster they were going to keep and liked was only a second year guy. So they had a good idea that they would have a pretty inexperienced QB group - Daboll has to be their guy they think is best for this job. Seriously, think about that for a minute - we are talking about a HC that is not an Offensive mind that is going to call plays, so this is Daboll's show - an unproven OC to coach unproven talent at QB who doesn't look like he had any say in the staff. However, Daboll can't really get a fair shake with the talent, but if it is horribly inept as it appears it could be, will they make him a sacrificial lamb to the masses and search out a OC that is fully capable of improving Allen's situation at all costs? Not really fair to Daboll unless they are just putrid - if you are any good, I suppose you can make it work to some degree with smoke and mirrors, but really that's not a pretty lineup out there. Hell I'd rehire Anthony Lynn or Greg Roman in a heartbeat fair or not to a semi-unproven guy like Daboll (I guess you could still say Peterman is unproven too despite a couple of bad stints as a starter). Lynn (who knows how patient they will be with him if they don't win this year) and Roman (OC would be a promotion for him) can get a lot out of marginally skilled players at QB and I'd love to see what they could do with a guy like Allen. Norv Turner would be a great option (could possibly leave if the new ownership wants to start with a different staff and replace Rivera). Someone innovative, someone who help define the development of a player, not be part of a greatest organization as an unremarkable replaceable part in a well oiled machine. Daboll's success came with Alabama as co-OC and the Patriots as a positional coach, not much outside of the evil empires. They need to make some big moves outside of personnel, as well as with it. But they've got to get it right ASAP. I'm glad there are some people optomistic about the chances that they get it right. My point is that they have to get a lot of things right and not miss on much to get this turned around - they better be really as good as they think they are by getting into themselves into this position. The question is whether they knew this was the position they were getting into?

So how easy is it going to be to lure FAs to Buffalo if the Bills can’t right this ship? I’m asking that question because it is a negative factor along with the perception of Buffalo as a place to live. If the team looks totally devoid of talent or very lean on talent it’s going to be a hard sell and utilizing that cap space isn’t going to be easy to do efficiently and to avoid toxic contracts. The cap room argument for this team getting better is a red herring. Drafting is going to be key to this team getting rebuilt and there better be a massive focus on the OL and then some skill players on offense - they can’t slow roll getting a decent offense around Allen if they actually want to be able to properly evaluate him, but given what they did to help out the inexperience at the position this season that should be concerning people...a lot.

I get the patience and understand it, but the evidence is starting to mount and I'm afraid the results aren't going to be much better next year. I don't understand what all the cap space is going to do for the Bills other than get them into more bad contracts.

You do realize that NFL coaching, scouts, and front offices are full of guys that are meatheads where many played the game and loved being around the game, but aren't exactly geniuses, right? Fans that pay attention aren't at all incapable of making better calls on personnel than the guys in the NFL coaching and FO positions, they are just in no position to ever be hired because they have never been involved in the game anywhere near the pro level and the avenues for people to get into any part of an NFL organization are very limited unless you have some exposure to an organization as a player or part of a coaching staff at some level. I've always hated that rationalization for people in the NFL know more than the fans (on average maybe, but not all fans) - they are not infinitely more knowledgeable and they have far more resources to evaluate players - but yet they still make horrible decisions that are predictably bad. The amount of egotistical behavior from these GMs and FO people is amusing to some degree, but they certainly buy into believing they have a golden touch and know better than everyone else. For example, people who are fans of FSU and the Bills see a guy like EJ Manuel get drafted in the first round and they know what a dumb decision that is off the bat, absolutely laughable to someone watching him play thoughout his career, but you understand how someone who didn't do their homework enough could be fooled. This happens all the time - scouting isn't nearly as thorough as people believe and draft boards aren't even close to as polished and vetted as people believe them to be - teams regularly go off the rails of the board during the draft based on hunches and hasty decisions.

We'll see if he is legit, but he's got a long way to go and there is no guarantee he is going to make those strides to get there, and I'm not sure they have the offensive staff that will do the best job in helping him get there. His pocket presence is skittish - he's a good athlete and he sometimes moves well and other times looks very nervous and uncomfortable moving into pressure rather than away from it. He holds the ball too long and he's not a master of moving around in the pocket or elusive AF, and that results in getting sacked a lot (hello Rob Johnson). Those are my biggest issues with his game so far, but his footwork looks much, much better and his accuracy does as well from what I saw in college. Still a lot of things to get corrected and pocket presence isn't the most coachable thing - guys usually have it or they don't and many don't ever get better at it. However, there are guys like Aaron Rodgers who was sacked a ton early on in his career and got better and more comfortable in the pocket year after year, but also played behind Favre and had time to develop and learn. It's disheartening to see guys in their first action light it up that the Bills could have had in the past two drafts, and see this QB situation with a guy that looks like he needs a lot more work to be a capable starter - it'll take a few years to tell for sure, but when you see guys as rookies take things by the horns and show command you know they are going to be good most likely, when you see guys like Allen you know its a long road ahead to be good. It's not as bad as the Bears situation where they've got to be absolutely kicking themselves for taking Trubisky, but if Allen doesn't show a lot of progress by this time next year it's going to be a huge indictment on the FO and McD who already has trotting Peterman out on a few occasions on the negative side of the ledger.

Stick to being nice. You’re not good at being a dick.

And I’m saying they both sucked really bad. No need to point the finger at one side more than the other. Neither did anything to help the team do enough to win. A total team loss from top to bottom, from players to the front office - every one has their hands on this one.

The Ravens scored on their first three drives and had somewhere around 10 yds/play in the first quarter. The Bills had the ball for 2 minutes to the Ravens 11 late in the first quarter - you can blame the two minutes on both the offense and defense - the offense couldn’t stay on it and the defense couldnt get off of it. But they both came out of the gate looking like crap.

How was defense a priority when you don’t have anyone to protect your biggest investment in the draft and where you lost 3/5 starting level players? Oh because you decided to let your Starting CB and MLB go, and said we need to get someone from Carolina who was a poor performer and widely regarded as a horrible pickup for 10 mill/yr. Self-inflicted wounds that were avoidable and demonstrate that the process is flawed.

To a real estate agent to start looking for property elsewhere...wait...probably not because that would mean he was good at contingency planning in some way.

It wasn’t even close to hot it was in the 60s, and if the D could actually defend they could have gotten themselves off the field more often, especially in the first quarter. Gaines’ technique should have had his ass on the bench the first time he spun almost all the way around on an outside route leaving about a 7 yd cushion, but it happened at least two more times that I saw and who knows how many other times we didn’t. He was a huge liability. The D line put very little pressure on Flacco. It wasn’t like they were playing well and the the wheels fell off, they started with no wheels. They couldn’t even force a third down after the Ravens got into a 2 and 26 - they gave up a 28 yd completion thanks to the exceptional coverage of Gaines and a coverage scheme that looked like a prevent where you have a 10 point lead with 30 seconds left in the game.

Last year gave them too much confidence in their ability to make the right calls on players and trades. Last year was remarkable, and I get why fans were trusting. I saw a team that significantly overachieved with a lot of problems on the long term horizon where they would need to use every pick they had to try to restock the team. It’s finally caught up with them and I dont think they believe they have a bad team, but they are in for a hard lesson because it’s a team that simply is not good enough. Gutting a team isn’t hard, winning with a gutted team is.

That is the most concerning part. They were obviously convinced enough that they were okay with a raw rookie and a 2nd year guy that had shown nothing in live regular season action to trade away McCarron. Not that McCarron was a good pickup or would’ve been the best option, but my god Im getting the impression that they can’t assess the position at all.

You know he’s going to likely get to add to those stats and that’s the scary thing. It’s impressive - that the coaches and FO could be so clueless as to the talent they have at QB and on the OL.

Or provide necessary criticism and suggest how it could be better, do things to make it better and try to convince others to do the same.

When has Tyrod ever been that bad? If you referring to the circumstances that lead to Peterman starting last year, that was a case in point about how bad the offensive coaching and protection was, and quickly quieted any controversy. Tyrod was maybe a 1/3 of the issue with the Offense during that stretch and that’s being unkind to be honest - the defense was a sieve, the line was as strong a wet paper bag, the offensive play calling was putrid, and the WRs couldn’t get open. Expect more of the same this year and more often. The controversy by the end of the season is going to be - who’s responsible for this team being so crappy and what the hell should they do. People are projecting patience now, but they won’t be so patient near the end of the season when they’ve had to endure the rotten fruit of the Process. Seriously, gutting a team and creating a ton of dead cap space isn’t a hard job. Creating a talented winning team is - Beane has only done one of those. I keep asking the same question - what are the Bills going to do with all of that cap space? This isn’t the NBA where you get great players in Free Agency and can put together a dream team with a bunch of cap space - that never, ever works out in the NFL. This team doesnt have a a core group of proven young talent that they need the cap space to keep on the team. The cap space is not a big deal because this team has limited options to use it wisely. That dead cap space is how they were able to get decent hauls in some of the trades, but even then a 6th for Dareus wasn’t exactly a haul. What they’ve allowed to happen to the WR position and O line is embarrassing, and there is no QB, much less the two inexperienced guys they have on the roster who could succeed with the guys around them. Throw in an unproven OC who has had absolutely no success as an OC in the NFL, and has shown his coaching can’t overcome talent deficiencies, and you have a recipe for a sh!t sandwich.