Shaw66

The Bills won their first playoff game in 25 years Saturday, beating the Colts 27-24. It wasn’t always pretty, but it was effective. Win and move on. The game was all about Josh Allen. He outgunned Philip Rivers in the passing game, and he led the Bills in rushing. In all, Allen accounted for 354 of the Bills 397 yards of offensive production. Allen was his usual spectacular self. Trailing 3-0 early in the game, he led the Bills on an eight-play, 85 yard drive. Along the way, he made multiple big throws, including a 37-yard flick-of-the-wrist bullet to Stefon Diggs. Maybe Aaron Rodgers makes that throw – no one else. And then, on second and goal from the three, on a cleverly designed run pass option draw play, Allen picked and probed along the line, looking for a seam to run through to the end zone. Finding nothing, Allen backed off. Off balance and on his way to the gound, Allen somehow delivered a wobbling, floating football to a wide open Dawson Knox for the touchdown. One key to the play was the offensive line not pushing downfield, as they would have on a straight running play, and avoiding a flag for having players illegally down field. The other key was having a 6’5”, 240 pound athletic competitor with the ball in his hands. Allen was at it again late in the half. After Frank Reich mysteriously passed up a chip shot field goal to extend the lead to 13-7 and instead watched his team get stuffed by the Bills defense, Allen took the Bills on a 96-yard drive, highlighted by two really special sideline passes to Gabriel Davis, one for 37 yards to the right and the other for 19 yards to the left. Davis tapped his toes so close to the line that both were reviewed, but there was not enough evidence in either case to overturn the completion calls. Inside the red zone, Brian Daboll relied on Allen to run the ball in for the touchdown. In the second half, Allen had a beautiful 35-yard TD strike to Diggs. The Diggs TD was one of twelve consecutive completions from Allen. Simply put, it was Allen left, Allen right, Allen up the middle all afternoon. He ran, he threw, he led the team. Yes, he threw a near-interception, he took a tough sack, and he fumbled; no matter. Allen was THE star. 26 for 35, 324 yards and two TDs passing, 54 yards and a TD rushing. That’s what the Bills need from their quarterback in the playoffs, and that’s what they got. The Bills needed all of Allen’s heroics, because Reich had a good game plan and Philip Rivers executed it nearly flawlessly. The Colts’ running game gashed the Bills all afternoon, including late in the game when the Colts repeatedly and relentlessly marched downfield for scores. In the fourth quarter, the Bills defense looked gassed, and the Colts kept coming. The Colts’ last gasp started with two and a half minutes left in the game; they needed a field goal to force overtime, a TD to win. The Colts managed to move the ball on that final drive, converting two fourth down plays along the way. On the second, Poyer made a spectacular, heady play, forcing a fumble that Tre’Davious White recovered. The officials ruled the receiver down by contact, but it was clear that the receiver went down without contact. Poyer intentionally didn’t touch the receiver until he got up to head downfield, at which point Poyer made the tackle and stripped the ball. The refs missed it live and inexplicably, on replay. No matter – the Bills kept the Colts out of field goal range, and Micah Hyde stopped the Hail Mary pass on the final play, his third defended pass on a day when he made plenty of plays. For the first time in a couple of months, the Bills defense seemed disorganized from time to time. There was more than the usual pre-snap checking among defenders, repositioning themselves, trying to get ready. Some misunderstanding between Milano and White and maybe others allowed a Colts tight end to run unchecked into the end zone, where Rivers found him for an easy score. In the immortal words of Dick Jauron, the Bills have some things to clean up. Tyler Bass provided the margin of victory in the middle of the 4th quarter, when he drilled a clutch 54-yard field goal into the wind. Drafting Bass to replace Stephen Hauschka is looking like a great move. There’s no doubt – teams have to learn to win in the playoffs. In 2018 the Biills were just glad to be there. In 2020, with a young and inexperienced QB, they stumbled at the end of the game and lost. The Bills have built on those experiences; they weren’t in total control of the Colts game, but they won and they learned again. The Division championship game is the next step. GO BILLS!!! The Rockpile Review is written to share the passion we have for the Buffalo Bills. That passion was born in the Rockpile; its parents were everyday people of western New York who translated their dedication to a full day’s hard work and simple pleasures into love for a pro football team.

It's funny that this is all so new that we get excited every time something like this happens. Actually, I'm already getting used to it - I saw the title of the thread, and I thought "oh, cool, another award." I'm already coming to expect things like this.

Right. What he's saying is "you can't blame me for not seeing this coming, because his improvement is just so unbelievable." Well, the only reason it's unbelievable is because you weren't paying attention to what was happening. If you'd been paying attention, it would have seemed so unbelievable.

Sorry, but I think this is wrong. Before the season started, I said - and I was not alone - that Allen probably would be a top 10-15 QB and possibly top 10. I said that sometime by his fifth season, and maybe earlier, he'd be recognized as one of the top QBs in the league. I'm not saying this to say how talented I am - as I said, other people saw this, too. All you had to do was watch the parade of great, great plays he made in his first two seasons, the almost unbelievable throws, throws that were as good as the best we see from Rodgers, watch his improvement, watch his leadership, and listen to what his coaches and teammates were saying about him. It wasn't an absolute certainty that he would become a star, but it seemed pretty likely. In fact, all you had to was watch Allen's first season in Buffalo. In May following his first season, I wrote this about him: It's incredible to watch, for sure, but that doesn't mean people didn't see it coming.

Pretty cool article. Thanks. However, I think the author continues to miss the point. The question is why did so many people, including the author "miss" on Josh when looking at the draft? The answer is NOT they didn't see that he actually could improve his accuracy. That's a cop out. He gets Jordan Palmer to talk about these little details in Allen's mechanics, and then implies that, well, it was okay for him to have missed on Allen, because who knew that he actually could improve that much by changing his mechanics. That's BS. The scouts knew there was nothing major wrong with Allen's mechanics. That's why so many people said he had the highest ceiling in the draft class. He had the best arm, the best speed (other than Jackson), the best size. The scouts knew that in shorts, the guy could hit any target, anywhere on the field, better than any other candidate. That's why he was projected as the number 1 overall pick heading into his final college season. So if the author had been paying attention to what was known at the time, he would have known that accuracy was not Allen's problem. Allen's problem, as so many people said, was that he was "raw." What they meant like that varied - some just meant that he played like a wild man, untamed. Others meant he hadn't had the training that a guy like Josh Rosen had - he hadn't had it high school, he hadn't had it in clinics, he hadn't had it in college. What that meant was that he was pretty far behind Darnold and Rosen and Mayfield, and even Jackson, in terms of his development as a QB. That's why he had a low completion percentage, not because his mechanics were a mess. What the author missed during the draft, and frankly what every team that drafted ahead of the Bills missed, was the one thing that Beane and McDermott value the most - football character. They could see Allen's ceiling, just like everyone else could see it; what McBeane wanted to know, and what they found out before the draft, was that Allen was an intense competitor, that he was smart, that he wanted to learn and get better, and that his teammates loved him. In other words, what they found out was that his head and his heart were ready to take control of the exceptional physical talents he had. That's what the author and so many other people missed. Most of the fans missed it, too, because most of us failed to understand that McBeane were looking at the most important criteria while we were watching video of his throws, and most of us had no way evaluate his football character. All I know is that the day I saw him throw that TD pass to Ray-Ray in that preseason game his rookie season, I was convinced. Any guy who could see that opening AND had the ability to put the ball into that opening was the guy I wanted on the field.

Thanks to Turk for posting that. It's really interesting to watch. Allen's voice has some urgency - the tone says "hey! listen up! change! change!" Then he sets McKenzie in motion, but McKenzie doesn't understand, it seems, what Allen wants, so Allen puts him right there in the slot on the left, right in front of the DB who's going to be blitzing. Allen saw it all and made sure everyone got ready. All of that leading to the perfect execution by Brown and Allen. Marvelous. Thanks.

Everything is a great story this season. Amazing that they have a guy with this kind of motivation in that position.

Simms really understands football, but he talks about it like he's your buddy having a couple of beers at the local watering hole. It's always fun to listen to.

You know, being a good QB is about having the right physical tools, the mental tools, and the coaching. I'm not a big fan of Tua and I always thought Tannehill had the physical tools. In hindsight, Tannehill's last three seasons in Miami were under Gase, and we've now seen how Darnold fared in two seasons under Gase. If the Dolphins had had the right head coach to begin with, Tannehill would be the Dolphins starter and Tua would be someplace else.

Gunner - This may be the best single statement of what's happened here that I've seen. McDermott will be the first to tell you that it's all about each and every person, and he's correct, but none of it happens with McD. Thanks for saying it.

Wow. What a look at how it feels on the inside. He says a lot of things that I've wondered about. I especially like the thing about E-Wood and the o line and how this team understands that they are playing for the veterans who came before them. I've always thought that Kyle Williams knew that he was a building block for a winning team - that was his role, playing for McDermott. They both understood it. When the McDermott wins the Super Bowl, Kyle is going to feel like the win is his too. Cool stuff.

That's cool. I knew I liked the Outsiders. Thanks.

Well, I don't know Daboll, and I have no idea what he will do, but I won't be surprised if he stays. Why? 1. He's a Buffalo guy and he gets, completely, what winning a Super Bowl in Buffalo means. He probably wants to be a part of that, maybe wants that more than anything else. 2. This season is the first real success he's had as an OC in the NFL. He had a lot of one and done failures in bad situations. He may want to keep building this, to keep learning, to prepare himself better. 3. As someone said, the Pegulas may give him a lot of money to stay. There's no salary cap for coaches, so they can pay him whatever they want. Remember, he's been making six figures for several years, and probably now making seven figures. He already has millions of dollars saved. He has 19 years in the NFL as a coach, which means, I believe, he needs one more year to qualify for the full coach's pension, which I understand is very nice (mid-six figures). This is a West Seneca kid who probably never dreamed of being set for life by time he reached 45 years old, but that's where he is. If the Pegulas start dropping, say, $5 million a year on him, it's quite conceivable that Daboll decides, like a lot of other guys have decided, that they don't need to be a HC to be satisfied. Remember, he coached with Josh McDaniels, and he saw McDaniels leave an OC job to be a head coach, then come back to his OC job. I'm not convinced Daboll is going anywhere.

Interesting addition. He's a guy who can play. And he's a guy who can get up to speed quickly. Still, even with Beas out, I'm not sure where his role is. Diggs, Brown, Davis, McKenzie seem to be locks for playing time. Maybe Stills was added to cover the possibility of another injury.

Maybe he just isn't cut out for it yet. Spend a few more years as an assistant and a coordinator, and maybe it will be a different story next time around. The mistake the Jets made with Gase, and the Bills made with Ryan, is hiring a guy hot off his failure as a HC someplace else. Coaches need time to recover from the experience first time around, to reflect on it, to learn more about the game and what it takes to be the HC. After they've learned, they have a better shot the second time around. Obvious example is Belichick. Which is not to say that it isn't possible to succeed the first time around. Obviously, plenty of coaches do that. But failing the first time doesn't mean you'll never succeed at it. The only point is if you fail once, you'd best go back to the job you have succeeded at and learn some more things before you take your second shot. Someone mentioned Gase to Chargers. For the reasons I just gave, Gase is the absolute worst possible choice. He failed, immediately tried again, failed. If he has any future as a head coach, it's after he's had a colling off period.

Happy, this is exactly right. Exactly. I've been watching this happen for a couple of years now, and it's why I've been so optimistic about the Bills. Others have seen it, too, I'm sure. And I didn't really understand the power of this process until yesterday. It was football on another level. So I was getting to the end of what you wrote, and got to "Well, that and our superstar QB." The instant I read that, before I read another word, I thought "but Allen is the product of the same process." Then I read on, and there it was. It's an amazing thing. (And as I've been saying for a couple of years now, it's what the Patriots learned to do with their team, year after year.)

I just have to comment on how extraordinary it is for someone who understands the game to be saying this about our team. I mean, I read it and my first reaction was "that's ridiculous, how could the Bills be so good that they shouldn't fear anyone?" These are my Bills, the team I've always wanted to be good but never believed they could be. So I read it and at first thought you had lost your mind. And then I thought about what I wrote about the Bills after yesterday's game, and I realized I was saying the same thing. This team has risen from what some were calling a dumpster fire in 2017 to a powerhouse in 2020. It's not that there are no teams who can beat the Bills. There are good teams are out there, but none of them is obviously better than the Bills. An extraordinary thing has happened to us Bills fans.

This is good stuff. You know, I wonder if I had just gone off my rocker, talking about how dominant the Bills were, but it turns out that others were feeling the same thing. Interesting comment about the screen to Knox. I didn't notice that it mimicked a Miami play, but what you say is completely plausible. Daboll was just a kid, playing with his toy - his offense - in the second half. There was one shot of him in the press box, leaning against the wall in his chair, watching the game. He didn't have any of the intensity we usually see when they show him. This time, his posture seemed show a guy comfortable as this machine he'd created was operating almost on autopilot. In the locker room after the game, every guy on the Bills must have felt invincible. For the second week in a row, they'd demonstrated that together they were on a completely new level. Amazing. In the playoffs, they're going to see some teams who are at a different level, too, and it won't be so easy. But getting to and understanding that level is another step in the progression toward being a great team.

Technically, yes. That ended it. But as I look back at the game, the Bills had established who was in charge by halftime. There were plays that still had to be made, and the Dolphins might make the score a little closer, but no one thought the Dolphins really had a chance, not with an offense that could score at will.

My, my, my, what have we here? It’s been a long, long time since Buffalo had a team that exceeds all expectations. Fans didn’t dare dream of a truly dominant team, a team that checks all the boxes. Well, let’s see: Make the playoffs. Check. Win the division. Check. Win a bye. Check, until the league added a team to the playoffs. So the bar moved, but the standard was to get to the top 2 – did it. Win home field. Nope, but close. Sweep the division. Check. Come from behind to win? Check. Win big games along the way? Check. Play your best football in December? Check. Begin to dominate games late in the season? Check. The Bills beat Miami, 56-26, Sunday afternoon in Orchard Park. The Dolphins are a pretty good team. They came to town needing a win to get to the playoffs. The Bills needed the win, too, but wanted to balance the benefit of securing the second spot in the playoffs against the risk of injury to a quality player. In other words, the Bills would try to win, but not too hard. The game was jaw-dropping. Just as they had done to the Patriots, the Bills spent most of the first quarter sizing up the Dolphins. The Bills offense started the game interception, punt, punt. Then they went to work. Touchdown, touchdown, punt return touchdown, touchdown. It was as explosive as the Chiefs at their best. And it wasn’t Diggs, it was Isaiah McKenzie, running routes, getting open, making catches, flashing his speed. Then it was McKenzie on a truly dazzling punt return, featuring his vision, his quckness, his change of direction and his speed again. The defense did its part. Over those final ten minutes of the half, the defense gave up one field goal and forced two three and outs. This was masterful football. This was a team that knew it was in control. For fans who in the past criticized Sean McDermott for being too conservative at the end of the half, consider this: Was McDermott planning to end Allen’s day by giving Barkley the last snaps of the first half?. It sure seemed like 21-6 was the right time for a conservative coach to let the air out of the ball. Oh, no! Not this team! Here comes Allen for a final drive. Four plays, 75-yards. BAM!!! Oh, by the way, John Brown is back. The game was over at half time. Miami wasn’t going to score enough to win, even if the Bills throttled back the offense. And then, almost unbelievably, here comes the second string! Here comes Antonio Williams, pounding and slashing and bursting through the line!. Here comes Barkley throwing 6 for 13 for 164 yards and a TD! Here comes Gabriel Davis with a spectacular run and catch. Here comes Matakevich, a tackling machine! Here comes Josh Norman with a pick 6! Here comes Dane Jackson, with a great goal-line tackle and two passes defensed Here comes Dean Marlowe with two interceptions. This is what football looks like when 60 players are playing together, completely together. On offense, the pieces are great, but it wouldn’t be happening like this without Allen. He is in command. He understands the game, he understands his role. And he’s physcially able to execute whatever the team needs him to do. He throws from the pocket, he throws on the run, he sees the opportunities, and he delivers the football flawlessly. His teammates know if they do their jobs, Josh will take care of the rest. And Josh knows his teammates will do their jobs. All of them. That’s what he saw from McKenzie and Brown and Williams and Bates and Davis and Winters and from all those swarming second string defenders. Everyone is ready to do their job, and everyone does. Two weeks in a row, the Bills have dismantled a credible opponent. They’ve done it without breaking much of a sweat. It’s magnificent football. And now the real challenge begins: to win as the opposition gets better. Can this team continue to practice and prepare and play in ways that can overcome anyone? GO BILLS!!! The Rockpile Review is written to share the passion we have for the Buffalo Bills. That passion was born in the Rockpile; its parents were everyday people of western New York who translated their dedication to a full day’s hard work and simple pleasures into love for a pro football team.

Yes, I agree about that. That's how it's being built. But Beane has added some talent each year out of free agency. Two types of guys - guys with 4-5 seasons in the league, good solid players (that's the objective - they don't succeed each time) and the occasional veteran for special skills and leadership. I'd put Lee Smith and Josh Norman in that category. There will be some free agent signings this season. Bills will replace some of the guys playing this year with free agents. So yes, the objective is that the youngsters will grow into stars, but I think we'll see some free agent vets sprinkled in every season.

Lots of places he might sign. I was just painting one picture.

I think he has a point. A lot of people would like to know. Obviously, they can tell us whatever they want, within the league rules, but it would be nice to know, for example, the nature of the injury.

You're a piece of work! Love ya.

It's up to Josh.