Shaw66

Interesting comments. I never really focused that much on McCoy in this regard, but it was dramatic for Gore. He was the same Frank Gore we've seen for years during the first quarter of the season, and then he was done. I don't, however, how much benefit the Bills would have gotten spreading those 75 carries over 16 games.

All of this. I say often that I really have very little understanding of how to build a football team. I spend my time watching what the regime in power does and ask myself whether it makes sense. I'm high on McDermott and Beane because after listening to them and watching them, I think what they're doing DOES make sense. That doesn't mean it's the only way, but while they're the guys, it's going to be done their way. As for the best way to get Allen up the learning curve, they've been very clear that their plan was that Allen would sit the first year. They couldn't stick with the plan, and as they've said, Allen had a rocky first year, but he seems to have survived it. He was better in 2019, but he had his stretches where he still looked like a rookie.

I suspect you're right that it was too complex for Josh at times. But McDermott addressed that last year. When asked about dumbing down the playbook for his rookie QB, he said everyone has a job to do. Each guy is asked to do what the job is. They're not going to ask players to do something less than the job. Allen was expected to execute the entire offense last season, and he was expected to do it this season. Part of the benefit of continuity of OC and QB is that the QB can grow into the complexity. And the OC can grow into technique for making the whole playbook effective.

I think the point of a complex offense, and I think this is something McDermott really believes in, is that with a complex offense you can adjust your style of play to attack any defense. A lot has been said about the Ravens game, and about how the Ravens zero blitz approach was known and the Bills weren't prepared for it. I don't know if they weren't prepared or they were prepared by couldn't execute. In any case, the point of a complex offense is that it fill your tool box with all the tools you need, regardless of what the defense is giving you. In addition, it makes it difficult for the defense to prepare for you, because they're forced to prepare for everything.

I'm loving this thread. I think you're making my point. I think what you say about complex is exactly right, and that's why guys with experience in the system play beyond the time many of us think they should. Taylor, Liuget and Peko have one big thing in common. They all play the same position, the single position on the team, offense or defense, where scheme and system are least important. Plus, they're guys brought in to take 15-20 snaps a game, more if they work out, but 15-20 is all they're really hoping for when the Bills bring them in. There's no position on the offense that can accept a part time player new to the system. Gore and Spain fit EXACTLY what Beane says. Exactly. Free agency is used to fill holes, not to build the team. Morse is the only exception, I think, since Beane has been here. He isn't looking for long-term players in free agency; he's looking for guys who can be useful on the team while they fill out the team in the draft. I'm not saying the Bills won't ever bring in additions to the offense in mid-season; I'm saying that's not what Beane wants to do. And in the case of the 2019 Bills, there were no mid-season additions necessary. No one got injured. They had the linemen they had, and there was no upgrade available mid-season. There were no receivers they were going to unseat with some mid-season free agent. No running backs - Yeldon's knowledge of the system was more valuable than any running back they could have brought in. And, by the way, I like the approach to complex offense. Complex offense is what makes your team difficult to defend. Allen is learning to lead a complex offense. Youngsters are beginning to work their way into it. They need at least one more year of young talent, probably two.

I think this is a good assessment. And I also appreciate Hap pointing out that the Bills did, indeed, run a lot. Both points are valid. Allen needs the experience passing to learn how to make the passing game effective. He has to fail before he succeeds. And the point about Singletary's backup is a valid criticism. In retrospect, keeping Shady and letting Gore go would have helped. Shady would give them the senior leadership they liked in Gore, but Shady would have added much more on the field. Yes, he runs with the same style as Singletary, and you'd like a change of pace, but I'll take similar styles over Gore's simple inability to do anything except run straight ahead and get stopped. And although it isn't Gunner saying this, to those who say it's been three years and the offense should be better, I'll repeat what I said earlier. It's a process. It takes time. 2019 wasn't the year they expected to be great. If a team isn't great, one side of the ball is likely to be worse than the other side. In this case it's the offense. In other case it might be the defense. Where they are isn't surprising. Disappointing to some who want faster progress, but not surprising if you've been listening to McBeane.

This continues to be a great discussion. I think there's an aspect to how McDermott operates that is on display in this thread and particularly in this post. McDermott believes in the process. The process involves teaching, development, growth, growing together as a team. He believes there is great strength, an advantage to be gained, by continuity - teaching and developing the same thing, game after game, season after season. That's all at the core of what he does. He believes in continuous improvement. Now, we can come up with all kinds of arguments about why he ought to do things differently, but that's how he does things. He believes in young talent, because his system expects that players will take multiple years to grow into guys who fit into the team and make the team better. So take Duke as an example. I was one of the biggest Duke fans around here from the day the Bills signed him. But Duke's not young, and he's in his first season in the system. Foster is young and is in his second season in the system. I would guess that Foster, all season long, showed a better understanding of what the team was doing, of what McDermott and Daboll expected of him, than Duke did. Again, we can holler all we want about size, catch radius, etc., etc. but that is only one aspect of the total evaluation they're doing of every player every week. Yeldon's the same thing. I don't get Yeldon at all. I mean, the guy has some skills, but he's never flashed (at least when I've seen him) any NFL-level skill that would make him valuable. I don't know, but I would guess that McDermott sees things in him that, with time, will make him a valuable piece in the offense, on a spot basis. I don't know that - pure guess. Josh is perfect for how McDermott sees his job. A guy with talent who needs to be developed, who can grow and grow and grow. He's young, he works hard, he's committed. McDermot wants a team full of those guys. I can't tell you what they're doing is right and is going to work, although I think it is and it will. But it explains why Duke sat all year, it explains why they didn't grab a running back off some practice squad (McDermott wants no part of adding players who haven't been through OTAs and training camp. It's about the system, and bringing a guy in in mid-season it's contrary to what he wants. He wants guys for multiple years.) And so we come back to Daboll. What I've been saying is that I view Daboll in the context of how McDermott does everything. McDermott is looking for growth and development and evolution. The fact that Daboll has survived two seasons with McDermott means that Daboll buys into that notion and is working at improving the way McDermott wants. And although I can't give any evidence, I am absolutely certain that Low Interest Rate is NOT what's going on here. McDermott is about winning, not about defense. There's just no way he is not paying attention to this. I just think that his approach to the game results in gradual, steady improvement that is supposed to result in long-term excellence. Whether that is the right approach, I don't know. I do know that it makes no sense to be disappointed that a slow-and-steady approach to development hasn't yielded short-term excellence. Beane never said it straight out, but he had a press conference in 2018 when he pretty much said that 2020 was the first season he expected to see a really good team in Buffalo. They said 2018 would be worse than 2017, and it was. They said 2019 was when we'd start to see the first results of their building process, and it was. 2020 was the season he expected, if all went well, that we'd start to see a good team. And his expectation was that after that, the team would continue to grow and improve. Everybody on the team is supposed to get better, every day and every year. Every player, every coach. And every player and every coach has a road map showing what and how he's supposed to get better. Allen has one. Daboll has one. McDermott has one. That's how the process works. I think it's wrong to assume that we will see the mistakes of 2019 repeated in 2020. McDermott's assumption is, because he believes in his system, that the mistakes will be eliminated. If he didn't think Daboll could improve in that way, he would have replaced him.

Actually, I don't pay much attention to personalities, so I really wasn't talking to anyone in particular. Thanks for clearing the air. Didn't mean to be a jerk. But I do think you're missing the point. McBeane were clear about the fact that they saw a three to five year process. None of us really understood what that meant, because they didn't lay it out. But we've now seen two full years of it, and it's much clearer now. They've said, and it's what they've done, that they'll build through the draft and plug holes along the way in free agency. That's what they're doing. So in free agency we get a John Brown instead of an Antonio Brown. They're taking their time acquiring talent. Now, if we're looking at a three to five year process, that means that the team shouldn't be great yet, and it isn't. If a team isn't great, one side of the ball is ahead of the other. In this case, the defense is ahead of the offense. If offense were ahead of the defense you'd say Frazier is failing. So the offense has to improve. The scheme has to improve, the playcalling has to improve, and the talent has to improve. We saw improvement from 2018 to 2019. They went from 30th in yards and points to 24 and 23 respectively. Not enough, to be sure, but it's a process and they aren't done. They haven't yet drafted a quality wide receiver, and they've taken only one o lineman high. So if Daboll is failing by McD's coaching standards, he gets fired. But if he's doing the job that he and Daboll agree needs to be done, and if he's making the progress that they have laid out in their evaluation process, then he stays, even though the offense hasn't yet done what everyone knows it needs to do to succeed. Put differently, Daboll isn't an underperforming OC just because the Bills don't have a top-10 offense. McBeane could have told you in the summer of 2018 the Bills wouldn't have a top-10 offense in 2019. They knew, because they knew they hadn't even begun acquiring (other than Allen) any of the talent they needed. They didn't have a running back they could count on in 2019, because Shady was year to year. They didn't have any receivers. And they had one, count 'em, one offensive lineman. They added two receivers - not stars but solid receivers for 2019. They got themselves a running back. They got two more linemen. That was pretty good. They aren't done. But with the cast of characters they had, whether Daboll is underperforming isn't measured by stats you and I see.

That's true, if you're talking record. But the team was on a path to nowhere. Nobody, including the fans who post here, were happy with the team. There was near jubilation when Rex was run out of town. They had Tyrod Taylor at QB. The Browns had a decent record this year, but the post I was responding to said the Browns were a bad team, so what does it say if they're looking at Daboll. T One and done is not the answer. It takes more than a year to build an oline, and the Bills have spent exactly one year building it. WR was substantially upgraded in 2019 and will be again this year. What are you saying? Fire McD? Some people just aren't listening. McD and Beane have done through three years exactly what they told us or signalled us that they would do. And the team has developed a solid foundation and is building. It's what they said they would do. When the GM and coach are giving you exactly what they promised, I don't see any reason to think they aren't doing the job. If you didn't want what they promised, you shouldn't have hired them.

It's not about the teams. It's always the bad teams that are looking. Good teams aren't replacing their OC. The Bills were a bad team when they hired McDermott. Not exactly a ringing endorsement. But that's no what it's about. People knew about McDermott. He was a hot item. We may not see why, but Daboll is one, also. The point is that the people in the league, the coaches and the GMs, know through the rumor mill who gets it and who doesn't. Certain names keep coming up, and that's because coaches and GMs know.

First. I don't study strategy much, and I don't know anything about Daboll's "multiiple" attack. But I think what McD has said, directly or indirectly, is that the Bills are going to have an offense that can play any kind of game - run, pass, eat clock, score fast. That involves the players mastering a lot, and that's why the Bills stress brains and competitiveness when they evaluate players. If the guy can't keep up with the highest of standards in terms of mastering the game, the Bills don't want him. Second, the jailbreak. I was in a thread where that was discussed, and watching the video and reading explanations from people who seemed to know, the jailbreak was on Allen or Morse. Someone misread what was going on and called the wrong blocking scheme, because the entire left side of the line looked to the center of the defense for rushers, and there were none. It was obvious that those guys were doing their jobs, and someone told them to do the wrong thing. You can blame that on complexity if you want, but they aren't the only coaches that ask their team to run a complex offense. Whoever made the mistake (I think it was Allen, because he seemed totally surprised when he realized he had pass rushers to deal with), he has to learn how to make that read. It's another example of why patience is required. They're all learning.

See my post responding to Nihilarian. Recognize these things: The ENTIRE offensive team was new this year, except for bringing back the left tackle and a rookie QB. So NOTHING McDermott taught his players in year one was still in the locker room, and very little of what McD and Daboll taught their players in 2018 carried over. 2019 was a new team. Also, as I watch the NFL, it's clear to me that the teams are all so good that everyone is looking for just little things that can give them an advantage. You get to the playoffs, and no one is blowing anyone out - except for what KC did. Most teams are looking for little things. That's what Daboll is doing, too. It isn't easy, and it isn't easy when all of your players are in their first year in your system. Give it time. They may fail, of course, but making a decision to pull the plug on Daboll after one season with these players would be a mistake. There's real value in continuity.

A couple of things about this. First, and I really do mean this, the quality of this discussion is great. I'm learning a lot reading what you guys are saying. And it makes sense. Second, about the Titans and Baltimore, I think the answer is yes, the Titans line IS that much better than the Bills line. I didn't think the Bills line was very good this year. Better than 2018, but, really, what wouldn't have been better? I've been saying for a couple of months that I expect certainly one and maybe two new faces on the offensive line in 2020. Singletary was the perfect runner for the Bills' offensive line, because he's good at making something out of not much. Third, the Bills are very much a work in process. There's a lot learn about football at the level these people are performing. Allen has a lot to learn. Daboll does, too. So when people say things about what was wrong in the Ravens game, as you do, I think you're right. And I think Daboll and McDermott are looking at that and asking themselves what it was they should have done, and what changes they need to make in personnel, and what capabilities their players need to develop, to play the game differently. It's complicated, detailed work, and what you learn today gets layered on what you learned last week, and over time you get better. That's the process. So, while you guys are coming up with some great insights, with quality detail and examples of where and how the Bills failed, that doesn't mean that changing the OC is necessarily the solution. Yes, it's probably, almost certainly, true that Daboll made some bad game planning judgments and some bad playcalling judgments. It's true exactly like Allen made some bad presnap reads and some bad postsnap reads. I expect Allen will continue to get better. And I expect Daboll to continue to get better. Josh McDaniel has been an offensive coordinator in the same system for 15 years, except for the brief time when he was a head coach. Daboll has been an offensive coordinator for ten years on SIX different teams. The Browns and the Bills are the only places he's had two consecutive years doing it. And he's done it in some pretty dysfunctional places - Cleveland and Miami. I didn't look it up, but I'm pretty sure he kept losing his job because his head coach kept losing his. His current job is the first time he's been an OC in a stable environment where he has the time to accumulate the talent he needs and the time to teach his system. 2020 will be the first time in his career that he has had players playing for him with two years of experience under his system. And, in fact, Dawkins and Allen and DiMarco about the only guys who have had two years of experience with him. We can say "yes, but" he should have done this or that. But the reality is that it's extremely difficult to do what they're doing at the level at which they're doing it. It's easy to sit back in January and pick through the games for things Daboll should have done. That's what he's doing now, all day long, at a level of detail that I can only imagine. Bottom line, I think we have to give it time. We're watching exactly what McBeane told us we would get: a building process through which they will build a team that has long-term, sustained success. They told us they Bills weren't going to get good fast. They told us the Bills would get good eventually and be good for a long time. So far, they seem to be on course. Two other things. One is that if Daboll were so horrible, teams wouldn't be continuing to inquire about him. Teams chased after McDermott for his last two or three years in Carolina. There's a reason teams are interested in Daboll. The other is that I agree with Hapless or whoever said it about Allen on the bench. He needs attention on the bench when things aren't going well. He was so red-faced in the Texans game, I thought he was going to explode. He needed to calm down. It's another thing he has to learn.

I don't think he's hands off at all. That isn't in his nature. McDermott is a guy who is 100% invested in his job, whatever it is. If his job is to play safety, he's 100% into play safety. If his job is DC, he's 100% into being a DC. Now he's a head coach. He knows exactly what a head coach's job is, because he's a student. He knows he is responsible, completely responsible, for how the offense plays, and there is simply no way that he turned the offense over to Daboll on May 1 and said "good luck, fella, we'll talk again in February." I can guarantee you that McDermott is studying everything he can about offense, he's challenging Daboll about every aspect of what he's doing. It's all about getting better. That's the process. McDermott applies it to himself, and he applies it to Daboll. If Daboll isn't capable of getting better, McD will replace him. McD is evaluating Daboll all the time, and they are working on the offense all the time. You can be sure of it. Does that mean the offense will get better, for sure? Of course not. But I'm sure of two things. McDermott is working intensely to be sure the offense does get better, and if he didn't think Daboll could do it, Daboll would be gone.

I like these arguments, but I'm guessing there's more going on than you think. I mean, what you say sounds correct and is consistent with what I recall from those games. But if you were right about all this, McD would have fired Daboll at the end of the season. That tells me McD has a different take on that scenario than you. I can't tell fou what that is, but I know McD isnt slow to let go of people who aren't getting the job done.

You describe exactly what will happen in the off season. It's the process. Study, evaluate, learn, improve. Daboll went be the same coach next season. If McD didn't believe he would improve, Beane and McD would have moved on. Doesn't mean he WILL improve, but o think it's a good bet.

That's what I was thinking.

This is great. Thanks. I said "almost always" inside out because I knew that sometimes it isn't, and I don't know enough about how this works to know when it isn't inside out. Your posts explains why the entire left side of the offensive line was doing the wrong thing - not because they missed their assignments but because Allen or Morse gave them the wrong assignments. I'd guess it was Allen, as I doubt Morse is adjusting blocking schemes for the linebackers - he can't see the linebackers the way the QB can. Anyway, thanks for the clarification. I had said in The Rockpile Review that it was hard to blame Allen for the sack/int grounding because the rush was on him so fast, but it turns out he is the one who has to shoulder the blame, for a different reason. It's another example of why QBs need multiple years of experience to get good in the league.

I think the OP is right about two things. First, the play should have been blown dead. Clearly. Three guys tackling him and he's still up, but the rules are the rules. I hadn't watched it before, but he's right about Singletary. The oline almost always takes rushers from the inside out, and the running back has to deal with the edge rusher - the linebacker or the DB. SIngletary is on his way our to protect the edge when Knox and Dawkins just let the inside guys run free at the QB, and when he saw the problem he tried to stop and help, but he was too late. Not his fault.

I just became a Dion Dawkins fan. Wow. Incredible that he feels that way. Even more incredible that he wrote it for us.

Excellent, and so is your next post. Team loss.

I agree with what you say. But what I'm saying is that it isn't always easy for o linemen to make the right judgments about whom to block. It IS part of what makes them good or not so good. On one play on Sunday Jason Peters was 10 yards downfield and blocked no one. I think they don't see the field as well as ball carriers, and they certainly don't change direction as well. If there's a guy more or less in their path, they make the block. I'd better that every game every team has missed blocks by olinemen downfield. That doesn't mean it was okay. Both Morse and Knox look at that film and say they should have made the block. That's the point that all the coaches and players always make - it's a team game, and every guy will say that he left plays on the field. It's in the nature of the game. The one I keep talking about that doesn't seem to bother anyone was on the Bills' last offensive play, after the blindside block penalty on Ford. Bills ran what I think was a hook and ladder to Williams with Singletary trailing the play. Bills needed 20 yards to get into field goal range, Houston was in some sort of prevent defense, giving Williams a lot of cushion maybe seven yards downfield. Allen overthrew him. Simple, simple throw. Allen makes that throw, Duke draws tacklers and pitches, maybe Singletary has to make only one man miss to get the 20 yards. Who knows? The point is that getting every man to execute properly on every play is impossible. To look at any one play and say that's the play that cost the game really is not the correct way to look at the game.

Someone asked McDermott about why Duke didn't play until the Jets game (ignoring his earlier stint). McDermott said what he always said - you have to earn your playing time, and he seemed to say that you have to earn the right to continue to start. It was kind of a backhanded way of saying Duke kept looking better in practice and someone, or some combination of players, gradually were producing less. Watching the Duke in the Texans games and then seeing Metcalfe again, it made me realize just how small the Bills' receivers actually were. I mean, I knew the stats about their size - the smurfs and all - but I was struck by how muck Duke looked like an NFL wideout. He just has the size to compete. Now, if the Bills draft a Metcalfe in the first or second round, Duke may be out of luck. That is, a guy with Duke's size and the same or better speed and hands may be paired with Brown, with Beasley in the slot, and that might do the trick. Frankly, I'd like to see a good sized big guy and Duke as the wideouts, and Brown in the slot. Run that trips formation with the #1 on one side, Croft, Brown and Williams on the other and tell the defense to deal with THAT. No. That's basketball. He can't leave the field and be the first one to touch it after he returns. He had no hope of making the catch on that one. The other one, however, he screwed up. As someone said, that should have been a routine toe tap and a reception. I don't know why that happened. I thought Brown had better skills than that. Beasley would have made that play in his sleep.

Morse didn't see him until the last second. You often see plays where the o lineman is out front and blocks the wrong guy. They don't read the field as well as the running backs do. I mean, Morse should have made the block, but stuff like that happens a dozen times a game.

I think you're right about this. Actually, I might take Duke over Beasley because he might be a better piece to have on the field if the Bills get a real #1. I know, Beasley can run the slot routes and all that, but I still think Duke's size and competitive fire might be the better weapon. It sure looks like they waited too long to get Duke in the lineup.