Shaw66

There's so much nonsense in this thread. Frazier doesn't blitz? Well in the first place, it's McDermott who doesn't like to blitz. He wants pressure from his front four. Frazier doesn't blitz? He blitzed on Edmunds safety. He blitzed on the Browns winning touchdown. He blitzed White at a critical point against the Redskins. The Bills aren't a big blitzing team because they are a bend don't break defense. That's how they play.

I think you're generally right about this. I have a slightly different guess, but it amounts to the same thing. Of course, I don't know what's actually going on, but I think Daboll is trying to do what he saw done in New England. That is - heavy film study to assess strengths and weaknesses. then intense planning to figure out what the coaches think they can do successfully against the opponent. Of course, that's what every team does, but the Pats have taken it to another level. I wouldn't be surprised if Daboll is trying to be as clever as he's seen Belichick's people be. The problem is that it takes a special form of intelligence to do what Belichick does, because he sees things others don't, and he's creative about how to attack what he sees. Belichick has a lifetime of doing it, learning and learning. So I wouldn't be surprised if Daboll is, as you and others have said, too clever for his own good. He may think he outthink the opponent, like he's seen Belichick do, but he can't, at least not yet. Belichick's a genius, but he wasn't outthinking opponents all the time when he was Daboll's age. He was still learning. He's still learning today. In his defense, I'd guess that he's trying be clever about his game plans because he knows he doesn't have the horsepower to simply overpower the opponent with the same thing week after week. Andy Reid may have that luxury, so he can just run his offense out there and challenge the defense to stop it. Daboll doesn't have a great offensive line, he doesn't an Amari Cooper, he doesn't have a Nick Chubb, and he has a young QB, so he needs to be creative. Still, he may be overdoing it.

Maybe he did. I was at the game, wasn't always seeing replays. It just didn't look that way to me. I didn't see him missing open receivers a lot. What I saw were a lot of throws into tight windows where receivers had defenders right on them. As I said, my take on it was that he was in the wrong play and/or he was throwing to the wrong guy. One of the coaches' complaints about him last season was that he'd take the difficult deeper throw over the easier shorter throw. I don't know how many easy throws he passed up - I saw a few, and there probably were more. I continue to think that it's his decision making that needs work, not his throwing.

I agree. I don't agree with people about Wallace. Landry is a #1 wideout, 22nd in the league last year, and Wallace is a #2 corner. Mayfield made some great throws. I agree about Singletary's touches, but a better Allen would have won the game passing. Gotta give it time. This is a team that's growing. There is one more talent upgrade coming next season. In the draft and free agency. Then the core will be on the team. Bills have to hope Oliver and Ford have some real impact next season.

I agree about going heavy. Eight mediocre blockers don't do any better than seven mediocre blockers. Going with Williams isn't going heavy. It's giving up some deep speed in exchange for a guy who (I think - this certainly hasn't been proved) could make big possession catches the Bills, like on the play I mentioned.

I just posted the Rockpile Review and said the same thing. If the Bills have a Beckham, a Landry, a Chubb and a Hunt, the Bills win. Those guys put a lot of pressure on the defense.

The Rockpile Review – by Shaw66 “The Bills Don’t Have Quite Enough” The Browns beat the Bills Sunday, 19-16, in a game that proved what a lot of people thought: The Browns were better than their 2-6 record suggested, and the Bills were worse than their 6-2 record suggested. The odds makers were giving the Bills 3 points or, in other words, giving the Browns the home-field advantage in a game that looked even. And even it was. The Browns made just enough plays to win, just a few more plays than the Bills made. The Browns won the statistical battle by a little here and a little there. The Browns were just a little better. The game reinforced the recurring themes about the Bills in 2019. They don’t run the ball well enough, they don’t stop the run well enough, they don’t pass the ball well enough. And, on Sunday, they didn’t kick the ball well enough, either. This was a game decided by the skill positions. The simple fact is that the Browns are better at all the big offensive skill positions – their two wideouts are better, their two running backs are better and at least on Sunday, their quarterback was better. The wideouts were the most important difference. Beckham demanded Tre White’s attention all day long, and he was a handful for White. White gave him a big cushion most of the game, which allowed Beckham some first down catches that hurt, but in general, White contained OBJ. That left Levi Wallace one on one with Jarvis Landry. Wallace survived, I suppose, but just missed defending the two biggest passes of the day. On Cleveland’s opening drive, Landry got behind Wallace and caught a perfectly thrown 17-yard TD pass. Wallace found the ball a split second too late, and his attempt to deflect the ball just missed. Then late in the fourth quarter, with the Browns attempting to put together a drive to win the game, Wallace just missed deflecting the ball again, this time on a 24-yard completion off a long crossing route. Wallace was beat early as Landry sliced through the defensive backfield, but Wallace closed late and had a play on the ball. He just couldn’t make it. A couple of plays later, Wallace was beaten for the winning touchdown. The Bills were in an all-out blitz and Wallace had to overplay the quick out route. When Higgins cut upfield and curled toward the center of the endzone, Wallace couldn’t recover. Mayfield did a nice job buying time for Higgins to make the cuts and then delivered the ball for an easy catch. It would be easy to blame Wallace, but the fact is that Landry has been a superior receiver for a long time, and Wallace often had no help. He just lost a couple of battles against a really good player. Brown and Beasley are nice receivers, but they can’t challenge defensive backs on every play like Beckham and Landry. Trade Beckham for Brown or Beasley for Landry and the outcome of the game is different. Brown ran some lovely routes, and Allen found him often enough, but Brown needs to be open to make his catches. He rarely comes up with the ball when he’s tightly covered. Beasley was solid again on Sunday, but he isn’t a receiver to really test a defense. Same story in the running game. The Bills’ defensive front seven were outblocked sometimes but did well enough to keep from being run over. The Bills’ offensive line didn’t block for the run as well as the Browns’, but they did well enough to give Singletary and Gore opportunities. The difference was Nick Chubb and Kareem Hunt, two of the most talented running backs in the league. Chubb combines quickness and power in a way that lets him hit and get through holes and break tackles for additional yards. He’s one of those guys who just doesn’t go down. And Hunt constantly threatened to break away. The Bills checked him adequately, but he still collected a lot of yards running and receiving. Josh Allen posted a typical losing QB stat line. He threw a lot – 41 times – and connected just enough – 22 times – to get decent yardage – 266. If the running game had been more productive, he would have thrown less often and completed a higher percentage. If he were a premier QB, he would have thrown 41 times and completed a higher percentage. Either way, the Bills likely would have won the game. But Allen isn’t yet the guy who is so good, so knowledgeable, that he can put the team on his back and win when the rest of the offense is overmatched. He might become that guy, but he isn’t that guy yet. Allen didn’t throw badly. He had some balls that weren’t as accurate as they should have been, but everyone has a few of those. His problem was that he didn’t have, or couldn’t find, open receivers. A premier QB would have been changing plays at the line of scrimmage, coming off primary receivers to complete more passes and keep the chains moving, and making passes with pinpoint accuracy, like the throw he could have made to McKenzie in the end zone at the end of the first half. Allen wasn’t quite good enough, and Baker was just a little better. A couple of weeks ago, the Bills replaced Duke Williams in the active roster and began to play combinations of speed receivers – McKenzie, Foster and Roberts. That experiment seems to be failing. None of those guys is making an impact in the receiving game. Williams would give Allen something that none of the other receivers offers – a big target with demonstrated ability to make contested receptions. Williams would be a guy that Allen could go to when his principal options aren’t there. A good example was Allen’s throw to Brown on 4th and 4 at the end of the third quarter. Brown made the in cut with the defender right on his back. Allen threw the ball well, although it could have been lower. The defender reached around Brown and broke up the play. Williams has a much higher probability of making that catch – Brown just isn’t the physical player Allen needs in that situation. There always are a lot of reasons to be unhappy when the Bills lose, but this loss was particularly painful because the loss wasted essentially three classic goal-line stands. The Browns ran eleven plays from inside the three-yard line, most from the one yard-line, on two possessions and came away with a field goal. In the end, the Browns were about to go for it on fourth and short, but a false start penalty pushed them back five yards and they settled for the field goal. A Browns fan sitting next to me said that the center intentionally took the false start to force Kitchens to take the field goal. The players knew the Bills simply weren’t going to let the Browns see the end zone. The goal line stands were magnificent, old-school football. Beautiful. And Edmunds sack of Mayfield for a safety highlighted again how the defense always seems to have a different look, a new wrinkle. Edmunds rarely blitzes, and he practically never blitzes when he lines up tight to the line of scrimmage. Mayfield ignored Edmunds at the left end of the line. No one expected he was coming. But the safety, too, was wasted in a game where the Bills were close but not good enough. The Bills defense gave up big TD drives to open and close the game and was solid enough the rest of the time. The Bills offense didn’t produce enough running or enough passing. Sixteen points isn’t enough. Simple as that. Oh, and then there’s Hauschka. I don’t like looking for scapegoats, because football teams win and lose together, but it’s a different game if Hauschka makes one of his kicks. He didn’t, and no one picked him up. I got to watch the game from a suite on the fifty. A big thank you to my host Mike, who was more than happy to have this Bills fan and my buddy join him for the game. Pizza, burgers, dogs, wings inside, with TV and radio play-by-play, seats on the fifty outside with TV and radiant heat above. Tough duty. First half I was inside and didn’t hear the crowd. Second half I was outside. The Browns fans weren’t as loud as I expected they’d be, until the Bills final drive, when they really rose up. And the Bills fans did a solid job making noise when it was their turn. My wife, who was not at the game, happened to hear Mayfield’s post-game interview. In a comment that makes you wonder if the guy is smart enough to be permitted to drive, let alone quarterback an NFL team, Mayfield complained that Browns fans have to learn not to make so much noise when the Browns have the ball. Really, Baker? You thought those were Browns fans making all that noise? The Bills are close. They need to get better, in every phase. They need a little more talent, and they need the talent they have to play a little better. On to Miami, another road game they should win, and if they’re going to make any noise this season, a game they must win. Fitz will be waiting. 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.

This is well said. As I've said, I want to see Mahomes and Watson continue. I'll give Flacco as an example. He wasn't a star like Mahomes, but he looked like a long time winning starting QB when he was young. He nevergrew, the league changed, and he became a castoff. I just don't trust short bodies of work as absolute evidence of greatness. Continual arc of improvement was what I was talking about. That's what you need to see. And I agree that if the guy hasn't shown consistent improvement and isn't looking like a keeper by the end of three seasons, hardas it is, you probably have to move on. Problem is when you have a coaching change in the middle. That's what complicates the Mariota decision.

I hadn't seen this for a couple of days. This is excellent. What you sort of say is if you don't have a dominant group of linemen, adding another to the jumbo package doesn't make your running blocking any better - you've just added one more guy who isn't dominant. Then, by bunching them, you allow the defense to bunch, too, which means that your already not dominant line now has to block the entire defense. I think what you say is correct - when you're not dominant you have to spread out and make the defense defend the entire field. Yes, that's a bit risky, but it plays into the Bills' offensive strength - the crossing routes, Josh rolling out, etc. Thanks for posting.

That's really interesting. Thanks.

Thanks. I love FItz, and that's a great story. Still, I believe he succeeded that day because he was doing what he knew how to do, and what he knew how to do worked well against Houston's defense. Houston plays a different defense, Fitz doesn't have the legendary day. If Fitz had a better arm, he'd have been an absolute star, because as Gailey first identified about him and we've seen repeatedly, he has great football smarts. His body just can't deliver the throws that the his brain, and the NFL, demands. Why do I love Fitz? Well, two examples. Press conference early in his stay in Buffalo. Asked what he was going to do if the NFL hadn't called. I would have gone to Wall Street and been an investment banker. Are you going to Wall Street when you retire? Hell, no. I'm going to Arizona and drink beer. Second example: His performance at that roast for Fred Jackson or Eric Wood. Hysterical.

Right. And one more thing. Like Fitzpatrick's first game, doing once is a function of facing a defense he understands. To be an success he has to learn to recognize and understand all defenses, and that is very difficult and takes time.

Well, I marvel at Watson and Mahomes, BUT ... I'll stick by what I said. Wentz was GREAT his first year. Goff was INCREDIBLE. Now we're scratching our heads a bit. I think the league catches up with guys who flash early, and it's only the great ones who keep doing it year after year. Look at all the flash-in-the-pan DEs. They all look like Bruce Smith for a year or two, and then, not so much. Playing QB in the NFL is incredibly difficult, and the fact that Watson and Mahomes are having success against 2019 defenses doesn't mean they will have what it takes against 2024 defenses. Yes, some of the great ones are great from the beginning and have sustained success, but a lot of guys are great for a year or two or three and then come back to the pack. I'll wait.

That doesn't make sense. You have to build an offense that defenses can't stop. I think, for example, it doesn't make sense for the Browns to structure their offense to what Mayfirld does well. Arizona and Baltimore? Check back in two years and tell me that Murtay is winning and Jackson is still doing it. Quarterbacks succeed by beating what defenses do, not by being themselves.

I read the article and found some of it interesting and insightful. However, I don't think it answered the question - how do teams actually make the judgment. I think I have some sense of how teams, or at least McD and Beane, are doing it. I think teams define the behaviors they want to see in a franchise QB. They are behaviors like pocket presence, scrambling ability, accuracy, decision making, reading defenses, leadership, adjusting in game, depth of understanding of defenses. There are a whole lot of things like that. McD has a list of them, I'm sure. What McBeane do is evaluate these things continually, evaluate them to see if their QB is getting better at them regularly. That's the mantra - continuous improvement. When you're a coach or a GM you know you have a problem with your young QB when he stops getting better at something, and where he's stopped isn't good enough. So you had a Jay Cutler who clearly stopped getting better at his decision making before he was a quality field general. It was obvious after two or three years in the league. When you see that, you have to give up and move on. In Trubisky's case, I'd be worried, because he doesn't seem to be continuing to improve. In Allen's case, I"m happy. I think he's getting better in many phases, but I admit I don't see and evaluate all the things McD sees and evaluates. I've thought from the beginning that people were getting sucked in by Goff and Mayfield and even Mahomes and Watson. I do not believe that ANY rookie, second or third year QB knows enough to have demonstrated that he will be a long-term success in the NFL. Any of Goff, Mayfield, Mahomes and Watson could be a Hall of Famer, but ANY of them could still turn out to just okay. It's a long process, and they're all on the path with Allen. Whether any of them stays on the path is, as far as I'm concerned, still an open question. So how do teams know what to do about Trubisky or Goff or whomever? I think they ask themselves whether he's continuing to improve at the many aspects of quarterbacking. If the answer is yes, keep him. If the answer is clearly no, move on. If it's yes with respect to some aspects and no with respect to others, you think very hard about those skills where his development seems to have stalled and decide whether you can live with it or get him going again.

The Bills didn't want to throw it a lot, either. The Bills were run heavy, but it's hard to argue with running a lot when Singletary is getting nearly 5 yards a pop. Gore really wasn't used all that much except on the goal line, which was a modest disaster. The call I didn't like was McKenzie down on the goal line. Go up the field, not horizontally. I don't worry about play calling. I think it's an overrated concept. If you're in a play that doesn't work against a defense, the QB is supposed to check out of it. If it looks okay, then you run it and execute it.

The Bills adjusted, the Redskins didn't answer, good move. It was pretty clear in the first half the Redskins didn't want to put the game in that wind in Haskins' hands, especially because the Bills D is so hard to read. The Bills went 8 in the box and the Redskins still didn't want Haskins flinging it.

Well they should be on the same level so far as the caliber of their defense. The Bills and Pats have played the same teams and put up the same defensive numbers; Belichick is praised as a genius and no one even mentions the Bills. I can make the arguments against the Bills as well as you, but when the stats are so compelling, the Bills should at least be in the conversation among rational people. The sports media want to be respected as journalists, but they're just a big hype machine.

Fair questions. I don't get any info from the national media. I get it here, and follow links. And I don't really care about the coverage all that much. What is most important is that it tells me not to believe what they tell us about the teams they DO talk about. For example, I mentioned this earlier in the thread and no one has talked about it. There have been stories in recent weeks (not after the Ravens game) about the Patriots having the best defense of all time. People in the national media were actually saying that. The Patriots have played the same teams the Bills have, the Bills defense has done as well against those teams as the Pats have, so logic would say that the Bills have one of the best defenses of all time, too. No one believes that about the Bills (I don't either), but the national media was actually selling it about the Patriots. Simply put, the quality of the crap the national media give us about pro football is crappy. Crappy crap. It's just talk, and it has very little to do with reality. They talk about Brady like he's God, and his passer rating 1s 18th in the league, one ahead of Gardiner Minshew. There's simply no objectivity at all in the reporting, and yet people watch it and believe it.

Nice comments. Thanks. From what McD said and what I saw, I think that Edmunds is doing what he's told, and that plays into his weakness instead of his strengths. He's attacking gaps aggressively, and once he's engaged, he's largely neutralize. He needs to move freely, so he can flow to the point of attack. Can't do that all the time, of course, or he's just another safety, but aggressively attacking the line really limits his effectiveness. Allen's making a LOT of plays. He knows the progressions, he sees the openings, and he is delivering the ball pretty accurately. The wind really didn't seem to bother him much. That one run by Singletary was astounding. Hit the hole, stopped and stepped left to avoid a tackler, burst forward and left a second tackler grabbing at air. Ten or 11 yards that he simply created. And he bounced the touchdown run outside very nicely. Lots to like, lots to get better.

The Patriots pass defense has a 48 passer rating. Allen had a 24 rating against them. Take away that game, against the best pass defense in the league, and Allen's passer rating is 92. That is definitely starter caliber. Unless Tom Brady (93) isn't starter quality.

Six of the Patriots 9 games have been against the same teams the Bills have played. The Bills put up the same numbers defensively against those teams as the Pats did, the Bills shut down the high flying Pats offense, and the Pats were being hailed, until last night, as perhaps the best defense in the history of football. How can the Bills get the same results as the Pats against the same teams and not even be mentioned?

That's really amazing. I heard today that beginning with Andy Dalton in 2011, the Browns are 0-5 in games against QBs starting their first NFL game.

Of course they favor the large markets. They get more viewers out of large markets than small markets, they sell more jerseys and caps and beer in large markets. So they cover the large markets. Earlier today I was looking at ESPN.com's football home page. Big Saquon Barkley story. Really? Jets on there. It's obvious. I agree with others who say it's okay if we keep sneaking up on people. The Bills are learning how to play well in the NFL. Learning week by week. If they learn fast enough, they'll make noise soon.

I just took a look at the stats. Bills are 6-2, as we all know. Bills are 3rd best in yards per game defense, behind the Pats and 49ers, and 3rd best in points per game defense, behind the 49ers and Pats, and NO ONE is talking about the Bills. Small market team, no sex appeal, no big-name stars, nothing that makes the Bills interesting except that their defense is great and they're winning. That's not enough to make them worth covering, I guess. If they beat the Browns, they're a game behind the Pats in the division, and no one is interested