Shaw66

One other thing about lukewarm, and some others have said something like this. As much as Beane, or I, may think that Allen is a star in the making, as much as we may think the world is going to see that in the next three months, it's all just talk right now. The passing offense didn't produce enough last season, and it hasn't produced anything yet this year. So from that point of view what Beane said about Allen is exactly correct. I think that is exactly the right take on Beane's words.

I've looked at some combine times. He's near the bottom. He isnt going to run past a lot of defenders. 5 o6 is another bbn piece of evidence un your favor.

This is excellent. Thanks. I will say, however, that Spencer is a different case. Spencer appears to be on the Broncos because they wanted a punt returner, and that is what he was known for in Canada. It's much easier to watch film of a guy and know if he is going to be able to return kicks than to know he can play wideout. So claiming Spencer on waivers, just like the Bills claiming McKenzie last year, is easier to do. And that, in a different, sense, is war I was saying about Duke. The things a pure wideout has to show to make the team are p retry complicated, and if you don't have something else going for you, like kick returning, you have more trouble making the team. Foster had speed last season and couldn't hold a roster spot. Still, I think yours is a very good explanation of why Duke hasn't made it.

That's absolutely true., that is how they will be judged. But as many coaches often say to the press, that kind of judging is what the press does. The coaches say that kind of judging isn't their job.

Like I say to people here all the time, it's fine if that's what you want and it's fine if that's the way you think it should be done, but none of that matters, because that is NOT what McBeane are doing. You may think your kind of goal setting is the best. The people who run Toyota think THEIR kind of goal setting is the best, and unless I miss my guess, Toyota is more successful than you. McBeane are trying to run the Bills by setting goals the way the people at Toyota set goals.

You just don't understand what they're doing. The Bills are operating a system where everyone in the organization has very well defined objectives that are established weekly, I believe. Everyone is told that he's performing this particular task at an 85% rate and he has to improve it to 95%, that he has to make this block more often, that he has to fill this hole, that he has to make this throw. Every practice is filmed and graded, and every player is told every week how he did, and if he hasn't improved, the player and the coach try to figure out why. The guys who get graded out the highest make the team. They're also graded on being on time, on sticking to their diets, on hitting their weight-lifting goals. They're graded on all kinds of things. If they aren't seriously committed to getting better at all these things, if they aren't working at it all the time, someone takes their job. Beane will tell you, I am sure, that the goals they set for players is to do their jobs right. If they all do their jobs right, the winning will take care of itself. Of, course, if the coaches are giving them the wrong jobs to do, it won't work, so all of the coaches are being evaluated all of the time, too. Everyone in the whole organization is focused on getting better at their jobs, and that's their goal. Not winning. I saw a long interview with Belichick after they had the comeback against Atlanta. It was February or March. The interviewer asked him what the Patriots had to do to win the Super Bowl next season. Belichick said something like this: "No one is thinking about that. Everyone is thinking about what they have to do today, and how they have to get ready for tomorrow. We won't start thinking about the regular season games until the preseason is finished, and we won't think about the Super Bowl until it's the next game on our schedule." A goal like "winning the Super Bowl" is the wishy washy goal. It doesn't tell you anything about you actually have to do to achieve the goal. What the Bills do is tell their players that their goal is to do the things they did today better tomorrow. If you missed that block today, make it tomorrow. What do you have do to make it? Maybe move your feet differently, take a different step, deliver the blow with your forearm, cut him, something. It didn't happen today, do it tomorrow, and keep doing it every day after that. That's the kind of goal setting the Bills are doing. It's like this: Think about climbing Mt. Everest. You start at the bottom. As you walk, are you looking up at the peak, or are you looking at the trail? You can't get there looking at the peak, because you'll fall and kill yourself while you're dreaming of the peak. You look at the trail, make the first step correctly, then the second step. When you string together enough correct steps you're at the summit and congratulate yourself. McBeane work very hard to keep themselves and the players looking at the trail.

Thanks for posting this. I read the article. Yeah, Beane's really lukewarm about Josh. That's a good word. I think he's underselling Josh; he doesn't want to put the pressure on him that the fans are creating. I'm expecting him to be a star on the rise, known to all football fans by the end of the season. Beane might believe that, but I think he just sees no point in saying it - it just puts pressure on Josh, and it puts pressure on Beane if Josh underperforms. Carucci was better about McCoy. That guy in the Athletic wrote a piece a week or two ago that suggested Beane has been lying to us for months about McCoy. I really don't think that's the case. What Beane said to Carucci, and I think it's true about what Beane always says, is that he says what he believes at the time (oor he says nothing). When Beane said several months ago that McCoy was the starter, I understood him to mean that as of that time, McCoy was number one on the depth chart. Beane wasn't making a prediction; he was talking about the status of that position at that time. He and McDermott are always clear that it's a competition for every position all of the time, so I understood Beane to be saying it was McCoy's job as of then, but what went without saying was things could change. I wrote somewhere the other day that I'm beginning to understand what Beane and McDermott mean when they talk about position flexibility. I always though it meant you could play two positions, like TE and fullback, or RT and RG, or DB and special teams. It means that, but more importantly, I think, it means combinations of skill sets within the room. He hints at it in this interview, talking about McCoy. I think they concluded that Gore, SIngletary and Yeldon could do more varied things among them than McCoy and any two of the others. Plus, when you come right down to it, the only guy with a sure spot on the roster was Singletary; one of the other three was going to get cut, and McCoy, who's most like Singletary, became superfluous. You can also hear Beane talking about that kind of flexibility in the receiver room, when he talks about the different mixes of speed, quickness and other skills that the group has. Good stuff. Actually, I think he has a very well-defined concept of success, which is sustained excellence. There are several measures of excellence, one of which being winning the Super Bowl. But excellence is the goal, because you always can improve on excellence. If your goal is winning the Super Bowl, what do you do the next year? You've already achieved your goal.

I'm glad this discussion got a little back down to earth. Yeah, Gunner, I really like Williams, mostly because I like his story. And I don't over-value him; unlike some folks around here, I think that the very best evaluation of players you can get is from the coaches, and if the coaches aren't putting the guy on the 53, then that tells me all I need to know about how much he can contribute today. He's not as good as Zay or Foster; if he were, he'd be on the team. However, if McBeane and Daboll thought Duke's lack of speed disqualified from playing the modern NFL where speed is so valued, he wouldn't be on the practice squad. Put another way, I think you're saying that if he had speed, he'd be on the 53, and I think that's right. But the lack of speed doesn't disqualify him. He didn't make the 53 because he didn't offer a good enough package, and he made the PS because McBeane think that he can learn what he needs to learn to be a contributor in NFL games. I don't know what that is, but if it were speed that he needed to learn, he wouldn't be on the PS. I think they're objective is to teach him what he needs to know and do in order to be valuable enough to be added to the roster. They're probably working him out on the special teams, so he can be a contributor there. Maybe his understanding of the passing offense is limited - maybe what he's supposed to do now is completely different from what he learned over two years in Canada. Maybe he lacks precision in running routes. Maybe he's deficient in reading defenses, recognizing coverages. I don't know, and McBeane do know. What I know is that Duke has demonstrated a very unusual and valuable skill - to come down with contested balls - and McBeane think he can learn enough of whatever else he needs to learn in order to play in the league.

Gunner - I don't think that's the right conclusion. Might be, but I don't think so. Anquan Boldin didn't play THAT long ago, and he was a monster ball catcher. I think it's more about the fact that he's still too much of a wild card to take a chance on. The only teams that have seen him in practice are Carolina and Buffalo. (Interesting that Carolina saw him and took Ray Ray instead, I'll give you that.) But no one else knows much of anything about how he practices, what his teammates think of him, all of that. On top of that, no one has any recent film on him except for the CFL, and that doesn't tell them a whole lot, given the level of the competition. Add that all to the constant worry that he'll melt down and become a liability and teams were reluctant to cut any know quantity they had to make a spot for him. We'll see. He will land somewhere, this year or next.

I have no idea what to expect, but I have reaction after watching the first half of Packers Bears: The defenses are way ahead of the offenses. The speed, quickness and proficiency of both defenses last night was impressive. Reveivers could find the smallest of openings, quarterbacks rarely had a lot of time to throw, running backs couldn't find much daylight. The defenders seem really quick and rarely were out of position. If that's what's happening across the league, if the Biills defense shows up, it will be a low scoring game, perhaps even a shut out.

I'm on the 40 yard line, about six rows behind the Bills bench.

And I just said the opposite in similar fashion. The story really is about whether you believe, this time, the comeback story actually is true or. You're correct that to this point, the comeback story is flopping. At least in a sense, though, it isn't. The guy continues to hang around continues to give evidence that you can't ignore. The comeback story isn't over yet.

Frankly, I think Duke was the victim of some NFL bias. When you bust in college like Duke did, then bust in the NFL like Duke did, the NFL isn't interested in your little comeback story. If you have a horrible fumbling problem and get cut from the NFL, you start selling your comeback story. There are dozens of guys with a comeback story, trying to get back in. They almost always fail again, so GMs and coaches aren't anxious to spend time on guys with comeback stories. So I think some of Duke's absence from the league is attributable to that. I'm not saying he's a victim, but I am saying he isn't exactly a retread trying one more time with his comeback story. He is a guy who actually IS coming back. Duke's a talent who's missed a lot of the formative years in college and then couldn't get into the NFL. He's a talent who has skipped a lot of what he was supposed to learn in college and as a rookie and now is trying to make it all up. That's what a lot of us think. He's different from the usual story. I mean, just watch the video of his catches in games and in practice today. Just watch it and appreciate how difficult those catches were. When do you EVER see guys catching the ball like that? You're absolutely right about Zay. He won his spot on the team, and apparently he, too, adds position flexibility. Zay's sort of like Brown, without the speed. He's sort of like Beasley, without the serious shiftiness. He's a little like a lot of people, but he is different from all of them. It's an interesting situation. There was a dogfight among all the receivers to make the 53. Duke was the odd man out, maybe clearly not ready for prime time, maybe ready. But with Duke on the practice squad and performing, Foster knows he's still in a fight. He has to do the things that make him good or Duke will get his chance to do his things. And Zay has to feel the same way - he's still in a fight for his position. In some ways maybe the most important thing Duke can do for this team is keep the pressure on the others. As of today, Duke said to them "I'm here and I'm not going away. Show McDermott you're better than me."

I think this is correct. I think when they signed Gore, they thought the he and Shady would be the 1-2 guys. Then when they got Singletary, the question became whether there would be one senior leader in the running back room or two. Over the course of the summer they decided it had to be one, and Gore was the one. In a sense, it's an example of what McDermott says - everyone is competing for his job, every day. Gore won. I think everyplace you look you see what McD preaches - position flexibility. In some ways, Shady was the add man out. I think they wanted three running backs, and Gore, Motor and Yeldon gave them the most flexibility. Singletary made Shady's shiftiness unnecessary, and Gore made Shady's leadership unnecessary. There are three threads going on right now - Singletary, Oline and Smoke Brown - that all are making the point that the units are all built with position flexibility. The receivers, the running backs, the oline, all can play different positions, different styles. THAT's what's going to be tough on other teams. Can the other teams match sustained excellence?

That's well said. And what McDermott and Daboll are trying to do is come at the defense like that every position - have the tight ends stress your defense. Have the mix of offensive linemen allow them to play different kinds of games - finesse, power, possession. Have an array of running backs. And have THAT QB, with THAT array of talents. AND HAVE ALL THE PARTS SOMEHOW BE INTERCHANGEABLE. That forces the defense to be prepared, in one week, to stop almost any kind of attack. The Bills are built not to be dominant at any one thing, but to be really, really good at everything. In other words, the Bills challenge to the rest of the league is going to be for each opponent to shut down EVERYTHING. And on defense, it's the same thing. The Bills defense is designed to say "you may have some success doing some things against us some of the time, but your are NOT going to have enough consistent success to score a lot on us. On offense and defense, the Bills are saying "we're going to do everything right and you see if you can match us."

And this is what has me so excited. I am not convinced that Mahomes or Goff or Mayfield is going to be a consistently good, long-term star. I'm just not convinced. But I really think Allen will be a star in a few years. It's part of the Bills being built for the long-term. I'm not sure about the Rams, certainly not sure about the Browns. I really do believe the Bills are going to be good this season and better, maybe dominant, in 2020.

I've thought this from the day the Bills acquired him. I've seen plenty of highlights of Brown on deep drag routes over the middle, where the corner just has to run with him for 35 yards, and Allen throws that ball beautifully. There's some explosiveness there that is going to be a problem for defenses.

Yes, this is true for some teams, but it's not true for EVERY team. Each year there are a few teams everyone knows WILL be good and a few everyone knows WILL be bad. What's exciting about these Bills is they look like they're being built to be consistently good, year after year. I feel like this is different, this is a group of young men who have come together to build something that is consistently excellent.

I really understand and agree with this. What ESPN said is true - Buffalo is a collection of really interesting talent that may or may not be able to win a lot. Still, you can't rate them too highly yet, because they haven't DONE anything yet. I think is true and a fair assessment. I happen to believe it's easy to see how nicely all of the ingredients fit, so the experts are likely to be surprised. But some of my belief is just based on how badly I want the Bills to be really good this time. Nothing matters in the end except the Ws and the Ls. Whether these guys actually can win a lot is yet to be seen.

I've always assumed that agents told their players to do exactly that, because it's in the player's interest to stay with the same team, if he can. He knows the system and the coaches.

1. As I've written, I don't think there are a lot of receivers in the NFL who can create separation. The offensive coordinator creates separation. If all receivers could create separation, offensive coordinators wouldn't be standing on their heads trying to figure out how to run legal pick plays. The pick play came into existence precisely because receivers CAN'T get separation. 2. Yes, he is slower than most wideouts, and yes he isn't Jeffries or Benjamin big. But I've watched the Buffalo Bills for 60 years, and I can't remember the Bills EVER having a receiver who consistently came down with the football like Williams has this summer. Like you, I won't say he can make it. I don't know. But when I see him make the catches he's been making, I'm smart enough to know NOT to say he CAN'T make it, because he has a talent that few receivers have.

Of course they matter, but a deficiency in a characteristic doesn't mean you can't play. It's just a limitation. Most players don't have great speed and most players can't get separation and they still play in the league. I learned the lesson a long time ago. I watched Adrian Dantley play in high school. He was fabulous. I and thousands like me said, well that's nice, but he can't play big time college basketball with that size and style of play.. Wrong. I and thousands like me said, well that's nice, but he can't play in the NBA. Wrong. The point is that players succeed with what they bring to the game, and there is not one set of characteristics that everyone must have in order to play. Nobody thought Adam Thielen could play receiver in the NFL. Nobody bothered to draft him. But, some will say, he had speed. Sure, he had nice speed, and not much else. Duke has this remarkable ability to come down with the ball in traffic. Maybe that's all he has. But that also may be enough to make him a player in the NFL. Whether he can make it, I don't know. What I do know is that none his detractors here actually knows either. It's just foolish to say he can't make it when he continues to make plays like this.

So Duke has limitations that will keep him out of the NFL, and Josh has limitations that the offense needs to be structured around to make him succeed. Do you have any idea how wrong that is? If Josh can't make all the anticipation throws that every other good quarterback in the league makes, HE WILL FAIL. Windows do not stay open in the NFL, and QBs who wait to see the window open FAIL. Tyrod Taylor FAILED. The QB MUST be able to read defenses, anticipate and pull the trigger before he sees the receiver in daylight. And, although most everyone chooses to ignore this simple fact, MOST NFL receivers do NOT get open because they can create separation. MOST NFL receivers get open because every defensive formation has weaknesses against a well-balance offense, and the offensive player whose assignment allows him to attack the weakness is the guy who gets open. That's a simple fact. Once again at practice today, against Kevin Johnson, a real NFL defensive back, Duke got open for a touchdown. Duke will either fail in the eyes of McDermott or he will get his chance in the NFL. Stop telling us that you see something that makes it clear that he can't make it the NFL. If you can see, McDermott can see it, and McDermott wouldn't have him on the practice squad. Oops. He grew. Seriously, then it's Wilson, Brees and Mayfield, plus Murray going #1 overall. The point is, players were too short to play QB in the NFL until, well, they weren't. The only rule that applies is that you can play in the NFL if you can play.

You guys are talking about a lot of stuff that just doesn't matter. He's too slow, he can't get separation, he should be a tight end, blah, blah, blah. That's exactly the same thing as people who used to say you can't be short and play QB in the NFL, until Wilson and Mayfield and Mahomes came along. People who say you need a tall wideout. If you can play, you can play, and if you can't, you can't. It's very simple. If you can catch passes in the NFL, you should be in the NFL. I don't care if you're too short or too slow or if you have red hair. If you can get open enough for the QB to decide to throw it to you, and if when the QB throws it to you you catch it, you should be in the NFL. In Duke's case, there isn't any question about the actual catching part - he does that just fine. He also seems to have been able to get open enough to have his QB decide to throw to him on multiple occasions. The only real question is can he get open enough against starting NFL defenses, because most of his success has been against second and third teams. But there is no way to know what he can do against first team defenses until he actually gets a chance to do that. It's just pure BS to say he can't do it because he's too slow or he can't get separation or he's a red zone receiver but can't play in the middle of the field. That makes no more sense than it makes sense to say Drew Brees is too short jto play QB in the NFL. The only way anyone will know whether he can play in the NFL is when he gets his chance to play in the NFL, or when it becomes clear to the Bills coaching staff that he's so hopeless that they don't even want him on the practice squad and no one picks him up. Answer me this: if Duke never will be good enough to play in the NFL, why did McBeane put him on the practice squad? He''s on the practice squad because he continues to show the potential to be a real NFL player, that's why. And tell me he's there because they're going to convert him to tight end - he has no realistic possibility of beating out Kroft, Knox and Sweeney.

That's about right. Unless there's a total disaster, like 5 wins, they will get another year, which is what I've said all along in response to those who used to post that this year is win or you lose your job.