Ayjent

It was a bizzaro scenario for the Bills - a series of events that just hasn’t gone the Bills way in forever. The Bills aren’t an exciting or particularly impressive team in any particular aspect other than heart and determination. The team had some highs and lows and if you were to ask me whether the staff was good I’d say hmm...lots to like, lots to dislike, but you have to give the staff credit for keeping the train from going way off the rails after that horrendous stretch following the 5-2 start. Maybe not the best game day and Xs and Os coaching, but mental prep and getting team to have an undeniable work ethic is clearly present and has a lot of merit. They could be better for sure, but still an impressive feat. I like Tyrod and I think you can do much worse at QB, but at the same time I understand the criticism and desire for a more explosive passing game. However, you don’t get rid of a guy as good as him without being sure you have a better option. I think that there was an embarasiing amount of hubris starting Peterman. It was really an ill timed decision and even more Ill conceived game plan against that defense. Moreover, if there was any need to change starting personnel they should've started on the OLine considering how poorly they played in the 2 prior games. If they get a chance in the first or second round round with a guy great, go for it, but no need to trade up giving up away draft position or picks. This team still needs an infusion of cheap, gifted young talent to build a long term winner. I think McDermott has put together a good teaching staff, not necessarily chess masters on game day though. I think the staff remains intact, but I’d like to see the team evolve more to the talent they have rather than rigidity in scheme. Although I think they did evolve some during the season after the rough patch.

This list loses all credibility right here - 14.Beth Mowins, Jay Feely: CBS: They've only called a handful of games this season, but Mowins is solid. Sorry, I'm not against a female calling an NFL game, but she sounds like a Robot and talks way more than Jay Feely. Her voice is grating, and I just want Feely to start talking, so that she talks less. Feely was a kicker and he doesn't add much to the broadcast - I'm not sure if he isn't just nodding his head and binge watching something on Netflix during the broadcast. The "Chick n Kick" combo blows. Every time they call a game, it feels like a broadcast of Friday night college football game between Florida International and Louisiana Tech on ESPNU that no one is watching or even in the stands for - I would have preferred the field audio with no commentary. As for any team including Chris Spielman...it should always be last or next to last given the team above. Listening to Spielman call a game is just infuriating, his insight is often just flat wrong.

The last one I can think of is a Monday Night game against the Panthers a couple of years ago. But they get the lion's share in their favor. Maybe it's just chance, but it certainly doesn't feel that way. If it is just chance, maybe it's time for them to be screwed more times than not.

Do you think maybe Hughes was actually one of the people who took offense to this garbage that was going on and let the refs know about it? He's a hot head and takes bad penalties, but I think in this case we need to give Jerry the benefit of the doubt. It's an embarrassment to the game that after everything that happened the Bills are the ones that came out with a 15 yard penalty and Gronk was not ejected. The refs should be embarrassed, the NFL should be embarrassed, and the Patriots should suspend Gronk on their own regardless of what the league does if they have any class. Problem is that not a damn one of those things will happen.

Jauronic: playing not to lose with highly motivated, but marginally talented players. I hate to agree with this line of thought but there is absolutely nothing that is aggressive or adaptive about this team except it’s desire to move players from the previous regime, and it does seem a lot like history repeating itself. I was skeptical about this hire,especially the staff put together and the jettisoning of players. Then they looked like they might just know what they are doing collectively although nothing made you feel like things were stable, but we’ve watched the Pats do this smoke and mirror act for years where guys just come together as a team and start playing well together. maybe we had our own guy capable of that as well...nope.

Bill Barnwell writes in his column how Dennison has cut back significantly on using Shotgun sets with Taylor and McCoy which had been very productive in the past for the Bills.

How did you evaluate Peterman? Seriously...if that's the kind of situation this team is going to put players in to evaluate them, I feel really bad for the players. He looked like hot garbage, but there are few QBs that could have commanded a decent offensive performance with that blocking and gameplan. Again, I don't care who the QB is as long as the Bills win, but that was a really bad time (when your line has been a sieve the past two games) and really poor way to evaluate a rookie QB. I guess you can rationalize this as ballsy, commendable coaching and a fair evaluation of a player, but I see it a lot differently. I think it is way more likely that the coaching staff is scrambling and grasping at straws, and it was the equivalent of grabbing a powerline instead of a straw. How are they going to evaluate the next guy and what kind of awful situations are they going to put him - that's what this staff has me seriously questioning after this game, not that they made a cold, calculated move. It also shows me that if they have adverse circumstances where injuries force them to adjust their schemes they are going to be listless.

I’ve got no dog in the hunt as to the QB, but I’m clearly pointing out that to put the offensive ineptitude on Taylor is completely misplaced, when the line is getting abused repeatedly and the offensive coordinator has no counter, schematically or personnel wise. I like what Taylor can do by buying time and making plays with both his arm and his feet, but I also think the team could improve at that position. He has limitations, but he’s a lot better than the Bills have had in a long time and the offense before Dennison was pretty capable by Bills standards. I just think they need to be sure that they have that guy before they get rid of Tyrod or this could get real ugly. I’ve seen them move on too quick without stability and certainty in that position and it never works out. Also, never said that the Bills should go to a quick passing game, I said they should go to a spread alignment. The reason is to give him more time to asses the rush. Thinking a 5th round pick that isn’t nearly as mobile as Taylor was going to have success with a pass focused game plan against a good pass rushing team was ludicrous with the way the line had been playing, especially with no mix up on the line. And although McDermott is taking the credit for the bad decision, you have to wonder what the hell is going on. To me it was I’ll timed because there are consequences to this thing blowing up while you are still in the hunt,and it was already a hot mess coming in. And maybe it was a desperate move rather than a measured one - certainly looks that way to me.

And now they've still got a bunch of guys not giving effort that they kept and brought on to the team, but they are just less talented. If you're going to tell me this isn't the worst stretch of listless play in the history of the playoff drought, please enlighten me to what is. I've never seen a team go sour so fast in my life. You had a team at 5-2 that started to mail it in during the second half of the Jets game. Maybe giving effort has something to do with coaching putting players in the best position to succeed. And if players can see that is not happening, it's tough to not think about self-preservation first and foremost. Dennison and his staff are pretty poor, and by effectively laying blame to the QB (benching Tyrod) for the offensive woes after the OLine looked like it would have trouble be the starting lineup for a college cupcake. The fact that there was no shake up in the OLine is just mind boggling to me - are they watching the game film? There may have been plays to be made to open receivers, but if the QB is getting constant pressure from all angles on designed in the pocket pass plays what the hell do you expect? With a less elusive guy you saw what you can expect - turnovers, and lots of them, and a generally ineffective offense. I can't imagine being a player on this team right now - it would seem pretty clear to me that if these guys didn't bring you in, there is a good chance you are on your way out eventually, regardless of your talent. The team has received that message loud and clear and the results are showing on the field. This is the job of the HC to get this shipped righted and it appears to me the captain has no clue how to get things under control. We shall see, but this is going to be a true test of whether he has what it takes to be a good HC.

The QB in the pocket is not even close to the whole problem with the scheme. It's the run blocking, the situational playcalling, the lack of adjustments, the personnel starting on the right side of the line, etc. However, to your point. Can Taylor be effective when the scheme highlights his strengths? The answer is yes. When teams try to force him to stay in the pocket that is one thing, but when your OC forces him to do it, doesn't that benefit the defense? It's not like Dennison doesn't have a blueprint for what works and a lot of resources in the players that ran that scheme last year. He clearly only wants to run his Offense and thinks it is superior, regardless of the results last year. Look if you aren't making things better with a change, then it's not a good change. And it hasn't been growing pains learning the Offense, it's that it is that the guy comes off a clueless as to what actually works well and what doesn't. News flash - not much is working well. The problem in the two prior games (not including yesterday) was that the pass rush up the middle was completely disruptive and there were no escape routes because the blocking outside wasn't much better. They could have gone to more spread shotgun sets to counter the tactic of bringing 5 guys almost every play (this is how the spread offenses and hurry up developed after teams were blitzing relentlessly with success), but they continued to run the same stuff out of the same formations with the same amount of success until the defenses backed off and the games were out of reach.

You know JP Losman would do this thing with his foot on running plays and you knew it every time - happened all season long too. You know that opposing players and coaches pick up on this even if only subconsciously. I didn't notice the hand gesture throughout the game, but I couldn't really watch it too closely after the 1st quarter.

I don't get wanting to lose, now or ever, because the draft is no guarantee, and if you don't have the right coach to develop those players, then it doesn't really matter how you well you draft. Keeping players engaged and wanting to be part of the team because of good coaching and gameplanning, while you develop younger players is a good path out of a playoff drought, but losing to gain draft position is the biggest red herring in sports, especially football where you've got to coach and coordinate 53 players and over 24 starters (including Special Teams). One player at QB can certainly change things some, but it's not going to cure bad coaching, bad line play and a lack of talent around the QB. One or two drafts aren't going to fix everything either, especially when players may have completely checked out of being a part of the organization after nose diving at the midpoint of the season.

No. 7 nails it for me. If you are a coach and objectively look at the film and get that you need to change the QB to a more stationary passer and do not feel the need to address the OLine being less competent than a blocking sled, then you are just terrible at what you do.

To me it looks like they are platooning Dawkins just to eventually replace Glenn, instead of saying - well we've got two guys at Tackle that can start so that we don't have to start Mills. Castillo is a historically bad OLine coach, so you can probably place some credit on his coaching finally taking hold.

The fact that they trotted out the same line the past three games is not a sign of good coaching.

The Offensive scheme was a problem and continues to be a problem. I'm not arguing that there are not execution problems that are more pronounced than they were, but they sat Miller for Ducasse and the OLine has been much worse since doing so. The Defense was on the good side of the bounces for the 5-2 run, but there were certainly questions about how good they were against the pass. What is really stark though is how bad they've been against the run the past three weeks, especially on the line. And it is really hard not to make a connection between moving Dareus and the decline, and I'm not saying it is Dareus's play necessarily that they are missing, but more so that this move was not well received by the Defensive players who are not playing well or cohesively. I tend to think there is something under the surface going on that we just don't know that has cause this team to nose dive. I don't think players just automatically go from playing well to playing like garbage without something changing significantly in the locker room.

Good coaching is a lot like good players, they usually show you something good right away and are usually pretty consistent. Not always, but a good deal of the time this is the case. Coaching matters a lot in the NFL, especially in the middle of the season when the better coached teams start to make a noticeable leap when they have a good assessment of what their team does well and what deficiencies need to be masked/addressed. Frankly, I don't see that with this coaching staff and it really bothers me that the staff and FO put such an emphasis on guys of a certain ethos and character and this is how they are responding to adversity. To me, there is a difference between guys happy to be on a roster that are looking for an opportunity versus talented guys that are also high character guys. Ideally you'd like both, but you don't jettison talent just because you don't think that they'll buy in, maybe you need to prove something to have them buy in, especially after being sold a lemon with Rex.

Are players like Dareus really a cancer in the locker room? Seems to me that there may be something to losing the locker room when Dareus was traded, and possibly this miscalculation by the FO and coaching staff may have a part in this team nose diving. By some accounts Dareus was well liked by his peers, and maybe just maybe the FO and coaching staff have been in scramble mode (trading for Benjamin, benching Tyrod despite awful OL play in front of him). To me, teams just don't go south like that unless there is something more going on beneath the surface. Maybe it was that trading Dareus fractured the locker room when people started speaking more freely about how they felt about him when he was gone, or how some players viewed the Front Office and coaching staff. It could have simply been a breaking point where many issues that were bubbling came to a head followed by a bad outing and then the bottom falls out. I don't agree with coaching that puts scheme above all else, because you are always going to have to adjust not only to your talent, but also to how teams attack your schemes. Inflexibility in scheme is problematic for both of those reasons, because its an easy cop out to point to talent when things don't work, when in fact the scheme is flawed as well. And to be honest any scheme that doesn't work as well as another with the players you have is flawed.

You have to wonder if the trade of Dareus didnt lose the locker room, and the Front Office and Staff have been scrambling ever since (trading for Benjamin, benching Taylor). I would think not, but Im sure we will know more as time goes on.

Nice start to his career: 2 INTs in the first 5 minutes.

Sustained success in football is about coaching first and foremost. Getting big plays that win games is talent on the field, but over time those things equal out for and against you if talent is equal. This offense went from a strength to a struggling mess with effectively the same line except for RG, same QB, same TEs and same RB - the difference coaching and WRs. Tyrod has his deficiencies for sure, but he has proven that he can be effective if put in the right situations. The line has proven that they can block well if given the right blocking schemes. The running back is on the downside of a HOF career but still very effective and dangerous. If you can't see Dennison as the biggest issue, then you are looking to rationalize the offensive woes of the team because of your dislike for a particular player or group of players. The zone blocking schemes are garbage and the playcalling is cowardly. It's Jauron Ball 2.0.

If they don't fire Dennison and a lot of his staff, McDermott is going to have a rough go at winning consistently. Dennison is one of those guys that gets a job in the NFL, because he's had one before and happened to have a ton of talent on the team that he was part of so his deficiencies were not completely exposed or costly. That's called moderate success in the NFL, but he has shown time and again that he is a below average offensive coordinator. The contrast with the past two seasons where you had OCs that were pretty good and at least adaptive to the talent they had. You get the impression with this staff that form (the scheme) is more important than the function (the production of the players), and when you couple it with cowardly playcalling when the team gets behind the sticks (usually as the product of a ****ty play call earlier in the drive) you get the 2017 Buffalo Bills Offense. I think we all saw the problem with the Offense, but the way the Defense has imploded is even more concerning at this point.

This is the kind of coaching that you find too frequently in the NFL and it sucks. Translation for the coachspeak impaired = We're happy not turning it over and punting.

That was succinct, true and a nice sarcastic touch at the end - love it. The only thing Whaley was good at was acquiring veteran defensive talent from other teams. His offensive moves were so/so with some questionable Free Agency pickups (Percy Harvin, overpaying for Clay) and questionable drafting on Offense. There isn't a starter he drafted currently on the Offense (not counting 2017) (Miller and O'Leary are the only players left on the Roster that he even drafted on Offense). He wasn't a great GM and I don't know what the roles were of others in the Bills FO were in limiting him, but in my opinion that is also a fault to let those limitations be put on you and work within them if that was actually the case as others have suggested who defend him.

Bingo! The pressure up the middle is missing. I think Kyle is outplaying Marcel by a large margin, and to this point of the season Marcel is just another guy in the rotation and unless something drastic changes I don't see that changing. This is a team playing well, and the excuse of not being motivated by the team's direction is not really valid. I also think the philosophy of the D is to stop the run consistently and keep guys in coverage in the passing game. Nothing complicated, but its not going to generate much in the way of sacks unless you have guys that are just unblockable freaks of nature.