Shaw66

It was Josh Allen’s worst game of the season, until it wasn’t. Allen had been stymied by the Cardinals defense for pretty much the entire game. He threw perhaps his two worst interceptions of the season, one a poorly executed throw to Gabriel Davis in fairly tight coverage, a pass that if Davis had made the absolutely perfect play by stopping for the ball, he might have had a completion or interference penalty. The other, a classic young QB’s mistake, failing to see Patrick Peterson dropping into coverage underneath Allen’s intended receiver. Two critical mistakes. Allen took what the defense was giving him pretty much all day, which is, after all, what he’s supposed to do. He once again was great managing the pocket, taking no sacks, creating a couple of miraculous escapes, and making tough throws from tight situations. In addition to the two interceptions, several of his throws were just a bit off target. One of those throws, into the left flat late in the game, created the opportunity for Cole Beasley to make a great one handed catch for a critical first down on what looked like the game-winning drive. And then, with three and a half minutes left, Allen got the ball one more time. Until then, he hadn’t played so badly to have lost the game, but he hadn’t done much of anything to win it, either. The Bills had just completed a horrible, penalty riddled, drive to nowhere. That’s when Allen did it again – another fourth quarter comeback drive. He took control of the ball, the offense, and the game, running and passing the ball down the field, managing the huddle, managing the clock, managing the team. It was popgun offense at times, four yards here, five yards there, dink, dunk, nice throws but nothing special. Finally, BANG!!! The touchdown pass that could be thrown by only a handful of NFL quarterbacks, the touchdown route and catch that could be run and made by only a dozen receivers. Allen to Diggs. Touchdown! Game over, but of course, it wasn’t. The Bills defense needed one more stop; they played the last 39 seconds pretty much just as they had drawn it up. In the end, Kiler Murray made an excellent play, the kind of play that only Murray and a handful of other quarterbacks, including Allen, make, and Andre Hopkins made the catch to win the game, the kind of catch that only a dozen or so receivers, including Diggs, make. In a sense, all that happened is that the game ended with three and half minutes left, and then for a few more minutes two of the best QBs in the league and two of the best receivers in the league put on a show for the entertainment of a national audience. Could the Bills have stopped the final play? The Bills surrounded Hopkins with their three best defensive backs – Hyde, Poyer, and White, all four jumped, Hopkins was in perfect position to get his hands on the ball ahead of the others, and he didn’t let go. In a perfect world, White doesn’t jump, stands his ground and, as Hopkins comes down with ball, White knocks it out of his hands. The Bills were close, but just not quite perfect. The Bills are a good football team, a quality football team. So is Arizona. They fought for 60 minutes. Either team could have won. Both teams delivered under pressure. The Bills faded late in the third quarter and lost control of the game – had they put together a tight-60-minute performance, they could have won. But Arizona can say pretty much the same thing about how they played. When good teams play, it’s often the case that one team controls for a while, then the other controls. That’s what happened. The Cardinals were a little bit better. It’s a tough loss for the Bills, because it tightens up the AFC East race, a tough loss in a game they could have won. But it isn’t a disaster. It proved to the Bills, again, that they can play and compete with anyone. And the Bills aren’t done building and growing. Shout outs: Edmunds played well. Not perfect, by any means, but he was active, around the ball, making plays and making tackles. AJ Klein shone again. I don’t know where that quickness came from – if I had to guess, Klein isn’t quicker, but he’s anticipating better. He’s making a difference. Cole Beasley caught about 27 short passes. Man, what a security blanket for Allen. Diggs made his plays, too, and the touchdown catch was big-time, grown-man professional football. The running game disappeared again, and the run defense did too. The Bills kept Murray in check, more of less. The Bills need to go at least 2-2 in the third quarter of the season. They’re 1-1, with a bye, then the Chargers and the 49ers. 3-1 is within reach, which would get them to 9-3 and in a position to end the season with a solid run and a good playoff seeding. A lot of big football games between now and the playoffs. It won’t be easy. The good news is that the Bills have Josh Allen. 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.

I'm guessing that what happened is that someplace as the total was climbing past $400,000 Josh told the hospital that when the total got to $483,000, he'd add $17,000. Josh didn't time it; he simply asked the hospital to make his donation the one that got to $500,000. He wasn't sitting by his phone, watching the tally climb, and then at just the right minute send his gift in.

What a story!

Hap - I didn't say Jackson was trash and should be benched in favor of Joe Flacco. I was talking about the long run. I was talking about Jackson being unable to dominate the league like a premier QB unless he learns to play from the pocket. It's now several weeks since my original post in this thread, and yes, he's 6-2, but he's near the absolute bottom of the league in passing yards per game - he's under 200. How many people here have written how many thousand posts about Josh Allen, and Taylor before him, having to be able to throw consistently for more than 200 yards per game. Jackson is exactly the kind of QB who, when the game demands he put up 150 yards passing in the second half, he's going to struggle. Others have explained better than I that the fundamental problem is Roman's offensive style. Whatever it is, Jackson's long-term ability to be a threat to win the Super Bowl is dependent on one thing: the ability to be a top-10 passer from the pocket. That's been true for running QBs from Tarkenton to Young to Vick to Wilson to Newton. Jackson hasn't shown the fundamental arm skills to be that guy, and playing in an offense that doesn't demand that he develop that way doesn't help him. In the OP I said I still think that's true. Might the Ravens win a Super Bowl playing with Jackson's current style? Sure. Flacco won a Super Bowl with a great Ravens defense. The point is that no one is going to consider the Ravens to be a serious threat, year after year, until he shows he can play out of the pocket like Brees.

I agree with you. I think the Zoom environment is a large part of it, or rather the isolation. In the COVID era, there are no casual, off-the-record conversations between journalists and players or coaches where the journalist gets a better understanding of what's really going on. Sure, the players and coaches all have adopted the stonewalling benefits of saying it's all about the process, staying focused, one day at time, just doing my job and all of that, but that's always been true to some extent. Players and coaches stopped calling out their teammates decades ago. But the off-the-record conversations that could happen at the end of practice or in the locker room an hour after the game, those things are gone. Plus, I think two things about the Bills press corps. One is that after the drought, it's just so much fun to have a good team that the press is just having a lot of fun enjoying the moment. It's exciting, it feels good. It happens to the writers just like it happens to us. After they've had some more sustained winning, they'll get back to thinking and talking about flaws more. Second, I am certain that the Pegulas came down hard on the media, the Buffalo News particularly, at the low point - Rex failing, resigning before the last game, then the press going after Anthony Lynn after his very first press conference, all the dumpster fire reporting. I'm sure the Pegulas told the News that was going to stop, or the News's access and advertising revenue was going to be reduced. I think that action had something of a chilling effect on the "investigative" side of sports journalism, so far as the Bills were concerned. When McDermott came in, and then Beane, you could see that both sides were trying to build a better, more respectful relationship, but part of that relationship was premised on the understanding that the press wouldn't rip the Bills relentlessly. I think the press has been cautious ever since. The result of all of this, including Zoom, is that we're not getting very insightful stuff out of the Bills. We aren't getting interesting stuff about what it is that Daboll thinks about, for example. He was asked this week about why they passed so much, and all we got were really generic answers. No one pressed him by saying "yeah, we get that it's week to week and all that, but tell us SOMETHING about what you saw that made you decide to go so heavily to the passing game." That being said, the coverage is the least of my worries.

I'm not sold yet on Murray, either, but you're right - he looks much better. And you're right, he looks like a much better passer.

Hey Dollars - That's great. Thanks. I wish the mods had left it for more people to see. Thanks.

50 years ago a running back was a wimp if he ran out of bounds to avoid a hit. Happens all the time now. I've seen other receivers give themselves up.

Pretty high praise

Wow. That's a creative take, and I think right on the money. It's let Josh cook, and get some good cooks around him. That's what will work for the Bills. , And another thing - a philosophy based on getting the ball into Josh's hands often, frees up the defense. It says be aggressive, make plays, try not to screw up but if you do, we still have gotten the ball to Josh. It means you don't have to have physically dominant players on the defense - you need guys with quickness and brains. I think you're right. And I think that up until now the Bills haven't been playing to the defense's strength. They've been, well, defensive, and they are sometimes physically outmanned - just beaten by strength. Now they can be offensive, attacking, confusing, all of that, which is what they're built to be good at. Like the blizzard of blitzes and Tre's INT against the Seahawks. That was creative play, and that's the kind of thinking that guys who play in this defense can do. The Bills can afford to let the defense be creative, which makes the defense better. They can afford it because the Bills defense has Allen, just like the Chiefs' defense has Mahomes. Those defenses know they can take risks, because they know that the worst thing that can happen is their QB gets the ball, and that's not a bad thing. That's complementary football.

Excellent. I like the idea of having a scripted second half. Just a different look, and something that the defense hasn't seen yet. Also, I like McD doing the adjustments for the D. Thanks.

Thanks, those are good points. That late long TD pass really helped inflate the Seahawks' numbers. I can't say Seattle never really was in the game. With their offense, any time they are within 10 points with a quarter to go, they're in the game. In the third quarter I was getting uncomfortable. Some of that was simply that the Bills always make you feel uncomfortable in the third quarter. But you're correct, there was a feeling that the Bills were making Seattle work harder for their points. Wilson was uncomfortable. It seemed like the Bills could get chunk plays whenever they wanted, and Seattle was struggling to move the ball as effectively.

I think it's hard to say the Bills manhandled when they allowed the best offense in the league to score more than their average points per game and get above their average yards per game. The Bills certainly did not shut down the Seahawks. The story of the game was that the Bills offense is every bit as good as Seattle's, and the defense made plays. The most encouraging thing to me was that the defense just seemed different, even though they gave up a lot of yards and points - again. They made some big plays, as I said, but they also seemed to be attacking individually. Someone commented that Klein seemed to be playing with speed, instead of tentatively. Edmunds played like that too. If those two can contribute more than they were a few weeks ago, that would go a long way. Plus, the Bills really are getting high level play out of Hughes and Addison, and if they can get some better play in the middle of the line, the defense may start to look like what we expected.

Well, what you say is true, for sure. But that's not what's going on here, or at least that's not all of it. It's about the money. Colin Cowherd is the sports personality I've heard talk most honestly about it. In the middle of Tebow mania, I heard him talk about. He said don't write to ESPN and tell them not to talk about Tebow - they watch the ratings daily, and they know when people change stations. They were going to talk about Tebow until people started changing stations. He said the same thing once about why ESPN kept showing the Red Sox and Yankees on Sunday night games - those were the games that, by far, the most people tuned into. What the networks know is that people don't want to hear about the Bills. Yes, you can say it's because people have bought an established narrative about the Bills, but I doubt it. The Cowboys get altogether too much coverage, year after year. Everyone knows the Cowboys suck and have sucked for a long time, but Dallas is a big market and the Cowboys have a lot of fans around the country. The ratings are better talking about the Cowboys. The networks are not going to turn their backs on their listeners. It didn't take long to establish a Mahomes narrative. It didn't take the networks long to jump on Tua - exactly one game. There's no reason that by now they wouldn't have jumped on the Josh bandwagon. They probably have twice as many listeners who want to hear about Tua than about Josh. The media could make Josh a star overnight if they wanted to. Why don't they? Because the base of listeners they can build hyping Josh is much smaller than the base of listeners they can with Tua - in part because of the relative sizes of the two cities, and in part because Tua brought some fans with him. The fans will be interested in the Bills only when they are demonstrably on the top. As soon, as they are, they'll be covered. As soon as they aren't, they'll be dropped.

It will always be like this. The media are driven by one thing - ratings. That's all that matters. The Bills are the smallest market in the league, or close to it. More people will stay tuned in if they're talking about Miami than about the Bills, so the media are going to talk about Miami. Moreover, the general NFL fans do not believe the Bills are or ever will be good. It's a mindset they have. The Bills have to dominate the league like KC currently is before you can expect any kind of serious, continuous positive coverage about the Bills. Beating Arizona would help, but even that won't do it. Beat Arizona and Pittsburgh, then maybe you'll see some serious attention.

I can speculate all I want about his psyche. Players sign below-market deals - that's a fact. Brady took historically below-market deals for years - that's a fact. I'm just saying I won't be surprised if Allen surprises the market.

I'm thinking Josh might take a longer-than-usual contract, guaranteed. I don't know if dead cap money is roughly equivalent to guaranteed money, but I think it is. Mahomes looks like he has $160 of dead cap money. I could imagine Allen taking $5-10 million less in annual salary, $25-35 per year, but getting a 10-year guaranty. That would be a $300 million guaranteed deal. I'm telling you, don't expect Allen's agent to drive this deal. Allen is a different dude.

You misperceive what I'm saying. I'm not saying the Bills will lowball Josh and try to force it down his throat. I think Josh will volunteer the discount. I'm guessing, and it's only a guess, that Josh already has bought the total team concept, and that Josh already understands the impact Brady had on his old team by taking $5 million (or more) less than he could have gotten elsewhere. Josh has surprised people throughout his career, and I think he's going to surprise people when the time comes to extend his contract.

I've said for a year that I think Josh will give the Bills a discount. Josh is smart and a team guy, and he recognizes the impact of the mega-deals on the ability of the GM to put together a winner. I I think Josh will leave money on the table.

Over time, the statistics catch up to the eye test. A year ago, anyone really paying attention could see that Allen is a real QB, and for their own reasons they looked to the stats to prove he wasn't.

I haven't written about not being in the stadium, and that's a good perception on your part. It's easier to be funny if I saw the game live. It's easier to report things that people didn't see on TV, the feel of the place, the activity on the sidelines, whatever. Especially when I go on the road, which I'd been doing once or twice a year. There's a certain sameness when all I can see is what's on TV.

Thank you both for the comments. Virg gets his up so fast, I don't know how he does it. Maybe he writes it on Saturday and leaves a few blanks here and there, fills them in after game and he's done. I'm watching other games, stuck in the couch, pissed about the loss or thrilled about the win. Then about 8 pm I get started.

Watching other games today caused me to think that the Bills need more speed. I think we will see Beane get more juice on the field next year.

On the way to becoming a good team, you beat the teams you should, and you struggle against the upper echelon. On the way to becoming a good team, you must learn to win your share of the big games. The Bills beat the Rams and the Raiders earlier in the season, two teams that at least are in the discussion of good teams. Then they stumbled against Tennessee and Kansas City, and the question arose again – can the Bills beat good teams? Sunday against Seattle was the test. The Seahawks are a certfiable good team. They have the pedigree, they have the Hall of Fame coach, they have the true franchise quarterback, they have a couple of deadly wideouts. Yes, they have a suspect defense (and “suspect” may be an understatement), but the Seahawks are winning a lot. They came to Buffalo favored to win. The Bills handled Seattle. They didn’t manhandle them – it was no blowout, but they handled Seattle. A week after a grind-it-out win against the Patriots, a game in which the Bills relied on a solid ground game, they won an air-it-out shoot out with the Seahawks. They jumped out to an early lead, 17-0, which in some games would have been enough. But the Seahawks have one of the best offenses in the league, and the Bills defense isn’t shutting down good offenses this season. It was predictiable that Seattle would come back, and they did. The Bills were tested. By late in the third quarter, the lead had shrunk to 27-20, but the Bills kept making plays and closed out the win, 44-34. It was two great offenses against two defenses that have struggled. The difference was that the Bills defense returned, at least in part, to its 2019 form. Against the Seahawks the Bills defense made plays. They took the ball from Seattle four times. Each was a big play by a defender – Jerry Hughes forcing a fumble, Jordan Poyer dropping into the end zone after the pass rush had pinned Russell Wilson near the sideline, Tre’Davious White coming way off his man to undercut a Wilson throw, and A.J Klein sacking Russell and taking the ball from him. In a statistically even game, those four plays maintained the Bills’ grip on the lead and the win. White’s interception was the kind of smart, opportunistic defense that Sean McDermott and Leslie Frazier got from White and the Bills last season but had been missing this year. It was third and 25, at the Seahawks 10. White’s man ran a shallow out route, and after covering the intitial cut, White didn’t just cheat, he abandoned his man altogether and dropped 15 yards downfield. Wilson never saw White and threw the ball to a spot where he never expected to find a defender. Why did White leave his man so far open? Because he knew, no doubt he’s been taught, that if Wilson throws to the underneath receiver, there’s no way he’s going to make the first down. White knew what to do, timed his break well, and made the play. The Bills also blitzed – a lot. Like everything else the Bills do on defense, the blitzes often were well-designed. Guys coming from around the ends, guys coming from six yards behind the line of scrmmage, guys overloading one side, with defensive ends dropping into coverage. The blitzing was relentless, and Wilson was pounded all afternoon. And then, at times, there was no bliitzing at all. Wilson often seemed off balance. Still, Wilson put up some good numbers – 28 completions and nearly 300 yards, with two TDs, including an inexplicable blown coverage that resulted in a 55-yard touchdown. This was a different version of the 2020 Bills defense. Jerry Hughes continued his excellent play – he’s been creating problems for offenses for weeks now. Micah Hyde returned to the lineup and seemed to settle everyone down. Levi Wallace is playing like he did last season – not outstanding, but solid. Tremaine Edmunds seemed revived – he was playing with quickness and anticipation, and he made some solid tackles. A. J. Klein was active and didn’t look like a liability. Mario Addison was getting good pressure. Maybe the Bills defense has turned the corner. Josh Allen proved something Sunday that one would have thought the league already knew – you can’t let him stand in the pocket and throw the ball downfield. Allen’s too good, and his receivers are too good. By the time Seattle got serious about getting real pressure on Allen, and dropping him for a season-high seven sacks, it was too late. Allen shredded the Seahawks defense for 400 yards and three TDs, then added a rushing touchdown, just for fun. Seven sacks is troubling, except for a young QB in a win. The sacks didn’t cost the Bills the game, and sacks are how young QBs learn. Allen protected the ball all afternoon, never flirting with interceptions and surviving plenty of hits without fumbling. His growth continues. Allen’s worst play was the overthrow of Diggs deep down the left sideline. A well thrown ball would have been a big completion, an underthown ball probably would have drawn a pass interference call. After the game, Pete Carroll said the Seahawks had a lot of great plans for stopping the Bills running game. Sorry, Pete, Brian Daboll had other plans. Now the Bills go to Arizona – another big game. Those guys can play, and they have great playmakers. You can’t win ‘em all, especially against good teams, but you can be sure the Cards know the Bills are for real. 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.

Exactly. That is exactly how I felt. I saw the trade up and was so excited. Then the Bills drafte - whom? Who is TJ Graham? I don't think I've been more disappointed about a single pick when it happened. In retrospect, I was pretty disappointed the Bills took Watkins instead of Mack, but at the time I was thrilled. But Wilson - there was a guy with first-round talent but fourth-round height. It was clear that he was worth the risk in the third round. Russell Wilson ran the offensive, was a captain, and starred at NC State. Then he transferred to Wisconsin, and within a couple of weeks of summer camp, the players made him the captain - it was clear he is a natural leader. He was outstanding there in one season. It was about as obvious as it could have been that this guy was a player. This was the guy that we had hoped Flutie could be. And the Bills took TJ Graham. Unbelievable.