Shaw66

Yeah, Happy. These threads are great; it's like reading play by play. Thanks to everyone who contributes this stuff.

You know what's great about the Bills these days is how many guys the Bills have who could be believably described as "the best player on the field." Think about skill players. Who might be called that? White, Johnson, Rapp, Bishop, Benford, Bernard, Milano, a half dozen dlinemen. That's a lot of good football players. And on offense, the same thing. Is anyone surprised when any of the wideout has a good day in practice? I'm not. It's almost a matter of who's turn it is to make some plays. Running backs? Good players. O line? Quality players across the line. The Bills have a really solid lineup.

Yes. Total no-brainer as far as I'm concerned. Experience starts, youth works its way into more snaps as the season progresses. He does it that way all the time. The objective for McDermott's players is to execute the play as called 100% of the time - that means go in the right direction, go to the right place, react to what the offense is doing in the right way. If White does that 100% of the time and Hairston is at 95%, White will play even if on Hairston's 95% he's a half-step faster. McDermott does it that way he abhors having 5% of plays where a player has left a hole in what is truly a team defense. The result is that the younger players sit until they can execute more or less flawlessly. Bishop sat, Bernard sat. It wasn't so true in the earlier years, because no one knew the defense as well as McDermott wanted, so Edmunds and Milano played a lot, even though they were making mistakes. Now, it's different. The only way Hairston starts in September is if (1) he's a really quick learner or (2) White has nothing left and Hairston has learned at least enough to make him better than Jackson and Lewis.

I have no stats whatsoever, but I think that there are a few guys who are accurate on the deep ball - no more than a half dozen - and Josh isn't in that group, but he's in whatever the next group is. Ten or 12 starting quarterbacks don't have the arm strength to get the ball deep with any accuracy at all. Josh's arm strength alone puts him above all of those, and his accuracy is in fact decent, as we've seen often enough. Most QBs, including Josh, are going deep only once or twice a game, if that. It simply isn't a big part of the game. So, I don't get worrying about him being mediocre on a play that most QBs are mediocre or worse and that only happens once or twice a game. If I could be a fly on the wall when Brady and McDermott are discussing the passing game, I seriously doubt that discussions about Josh's deep-ball accuracy would come up very often, if at all.

A lot of downtown hotels are booked for Saturday night. You may want to start looking.

Yeah, and frankly slightly below average is what I would have guessed.

Actually, on the first page Old Coot said this: I don't know where he got his data, but if he is correct then 75% of second rounders play out their full rookie contract with their teams.

Thanks. Amazing how difficult it is to draft well. Teams should be better than that.

I know you didn't say it was bad. Interesting that you think 50% is better than average. I don't know at all, but I'd like to get starters on more than 50% of second rounders.

Do you know the league average for guys getting the second contract? And actually, it's 3/6, since Cook is certainly second contract worthy. The question with Cook isn't whether he should be kept; the question is whether he and the Bills can agree on a price. I'd think a 50% yield on second rounders is not bad. Not great, but not bad.

Thank you all. Great information. I passed it on to my friend. Go Bills!

Hmm. I was sure we'd get some responses to this. Is Hammer's closed or something?

I have a friend who's planning a trip with some guys to see the Bengals game, of 4:25 start. He's heard that Hammer'slot is a good place to hang out pregame. He has some questions: Can he park an RV there? Can he stay overnight there? What time should he arrive to get in, or can he get a reservation? Thanks!

I didn't say any of that, so I'm not sure what you're talking about. I expressly said the season doesn't depend on Jackson.

As I said, I agree with your conclusion - pass rush is the paramount problem. That's not overstated. You overstate the importance of Reid/Mahomes. The Chiefs are far from the only threat. Building to beat the Chiefs is a mistake. The Bills have to be able to beat the Ravens, beat the Eagles, beat the Rams, and beat whichever other teams emerge. You overstate when you say Josh guarantees 30 points against the Chiefs. You overstate that it's paramount that Jackson outdo Epenesa's numbers. Jackson is not the only possible answer to enhanced pass rush. That's all overstated.

I think you overstate a lot here, but the basic point is correct: The Bills' most consistently problematic area has been pass rush. Better performance there could have meant a Lombardi or two. I don't think it's a crisis, but the Bills need be better getting after the QB.

I don't have a player for either category. What I know is that McDermott's mantra is continuous improvement, so his players do not regress. Each season, they're better than the previous season - UNTIL their bodies start to regress. There's nothing to be done about that. So, whoever said Milano could be right - last year we may have seen the beginning of his physical regression. White is another one.

Late 70s through the mid-80s. I was living in Connecticut and the Bills games were rarely on TV. There was no way to see them, and there was limited reporting about them on local TV and in the local newspapers. I was newly married, raising young kids, starting a career, and working on an old house. Before then, from 1960, I was all in. As the Bills began building a powerhouse team in the mid- to late-80s, they started showing up on TV more often, and my sons became Bills fans. Have been full bore ever since.

You can feel that way if you want, but I think you're wrong. Are Tom Cruise, Johnny Depp, Ed Norton, and Bradley Cooper failures because they never won an Oscar? McDermott has coached 8 seasons. If he goes 16 more seasons on the same pace as he's on now, and never wins a Super Bowl, he'll be fifth on the all-time win list. That's failure? Dan Marino was a failure?

You want to trade Beane's magic for magic beans.

I've always heard that phrase the other way around - perfect is the enemy of good, meaning at some point the right thing to do is accept the good and move on. But it's also used the way you've used it. I wasn't suggesting that anyone should settle for as much as the Bills have accomplished and no more. I really was commenting on the fact that the Bills have an outstanding football team - it isn't easy to build a consensus top-three team, and that's what the Bills have done. And now, let's close the deal.

This is good. The Bills have brought in a lot of guys with potential to be upgrades over last year. And have guys developing. They ALL be stars, but neither will ALL of them bust. If Palmer and Moore BOTH emerge, watch out. But even if only one has a nice season, Bills are in good shape. If Hairston shines with Benford, it's a huge upgrade. Bills have other guys who can play the corner if Max grows more slowly. As I said before, some D lineman will emerge. Many fans outside Buffalo don't understand. They see no splash free agents or draftees, and they think there's nothing good going on.

The Bills brought in so much DL help that's SOMEONE is going to make a splash. This defense is going to be a lot better.

Fans are the best!

There's nothing to talk about. We've had all of the conversations about receivers, about Cook, about the defense, about not winning the Super Bowl, about just about everything. Since there's nothing left to talk about, I find myself thinking about how amazingly good this football team has gotten. I say it often; when McDermott and Beane got here, they said they were going to build a team that keeps getting better and better, and that is what they've done. I've been thinking since I saw the thread about the Bills being the favorite, at least clearly in the top three, to make it to the Super Bowl. We can argue about whether we agree or not, but the reality is that among the bookmakers and bettors, there is a clear consensus that the Bills are at the very top of the league. And it's a bigger consensus than it was a year ago and two years ago. Granted, everyone thought the Bills would have a down season last year, but their success last season has convinced many people outside of western New York that the Bills were genuinely good last season and only got better in the off-season. And it's not simply because the Bills have Allen and because he's just that good. Put aside that Beane did a masterful job identifying Allen as the talent he is and then managing the draft to be able to get him; people around the country are recognizing that the other 21 starters, and the bench, make this a seriously good football team. And the Bills are set up to get better in the 2026 season, with the QB under contract, the salary cap getting back in order, and the opportunity to add more young talent in the draft. Everyone is looking at the Bills as a model franchise. Everyone thinks it's when, not if, the Bills win the Lombardi. Hats off to McDermott and Beane. Now, '25, '26 '27, is the time complete the climb to the top.