Shaw66

Yeah, for three or four seasons I predicted the end was near for them. Then about three years ago, I stopped. It became obvious that the usual rules don't apply to them.

I think Belichick is a genius. Most of the coaches in the league are incredible hard worker, but they don't win like the Patriots. One characteristic that shows how much different the Patriots are from everyone else is how their offense morphs from style to style from week to week, depending on how they want to attack the opponent. No one else does that. That's technical brilliance coupled with hard work. When the Patriots beat you with a 250-yard rushing game, and Brady goes 13-24 for 126 yards, that's Belichick, not Brady. They do it to someone every season - last season it was the Bills.

Of course you may be right, but you aren't responding to the point. The point is that the Patriots are a much better team in the second half of the season than the first. The Patriots we all think of as unbeatable are the second half of the season Patriots. In the fourth week of the season, you will have two mediocre NFL teams playing each other, and the Bills will be at home. That's why I think the Bills have a good shot at winning the game. Why are the Patriots so much better in the second half of the season? Two reasons: First, the Patriots get better every week, by design. Belichick keeps taeching them more and more, and more variety, so that by the second half of the season they can come at you in a variety of ways. They can be a running team, a passing team, a burn the clock team, whatever they want. In the first half of the season they are more limited. Second, by the second half of the season, most other teams have become set in their ways, and by studying film of the previous three or four weeks Belichick has a very good idea of what the opponent is going to do. In the first half of the season, teams haven't settled into a particular style yet, and they are tougher to prepare for. Early in the season is the time to play them

I think the Bills will be a lot better this season, and I expect them to beat the Patriots once this season. It's a real benefit to get them at home early in the season. The pats always improve a lot when as the season progresses; every year they look beatable and actually lose a few in the first six weeks. Still, I don't see the Bills being much better than 9-7. Sure, they've gotten better, but the league improves every year, and winning isn't going to be easy.

Me too. But the other part of me thinks they will have 10 wins by Thanksgiving night and really start rolling after that.

Absolutely. There is nothing to talk about, at all. I just want to see this team on the field!

Here's what the Colts GM said about home games: On Sundays, the fans are there to watch the Colts compete. But just as much, they are coming to make connections and build bonds with family, friends and fellow fans, and experience special memories that you can’t get anywhere else. Football has the power to bring people together, and game day can be transformational. Every team in the league has stories about how their games make a difference in others’ lives. NFL games give fans a chance to disappear from their everyday problems and enjoy the game. It’s more than the game that brings us all together. We’re all there to celebrate, watch, and play football. — Chris Ballard, Colts GM

We need to hear more about you and the grandma.

I know Greg Pipes pretty well. Greg was a Kodak All-American in 1967, despite playing on a 1-8-1 Baylor team. The Bills drafted him, but he wanted to go to law school, so he played in Canada, where the schedule would permit him to go to law school in the off-season. One year in Canada he was the top defensive lineman in his conference. That's a pretty obscure Bill.

Roger Kochman wasn't exactly obscure, because he made a splash for a couple of games before he destroyed his knee. I met him after the injury.

Not many Allen fans in Connecticut. Everyone here loves Brady or Darnold. (Giants fans are in hiding.)

I try to be realistic. I mean, the uniforms suck, the team rarely wins, and the food in the stadium is pretty bad. Even the name is stupid. Buffalo Bills? Buffalo Bill didn't have anything to do with Buffalo. And the logo is just as bad - those are bison, not buffalo, and there weren't any bison in Buffalo. The whole thing is stupid if you ask me. The quarterback was awful last season and hasn't shown me a thing yet this season. EJ manual and JP Losman were exactly the same story. The running backs are ridiculous. I mean, why not sign Franco Harris and Crazy Legs Hirsch (or is he dead?)? The Bills have no pass receivers who have led the league in either (1) receptions, (2) yards, (3) TDs or (4) sideline shouting matches with coaches and quarterbacks. On defense, no one compares with Bruce Smith, Cornelius Bennett or Butch Byrd. The whole thing is just pointless. Like I said, I'm just being realistic. I can't deal with the knee-jerk negativity we see around here some of the time. And the optimists? What's with THOSE people?

it takes all kinds, as Gunner was just saying.

It is a good thread. It's marred by combative attitudes, but there a lot posters in this thread who know football and know the Bills.

In the case of Watkins, having kept him wouldn't have worked out, at least based one what we've seen out of him. He just hasn't become the performer everyone expected. But the fact that he wouldn't have worked out doesn't change my mind about what to do with talent. I think coaching is more important talent, but that doesn't mean talent is unimportant. Especially top talent. It's hard to duplicate. So I think when you have a guy who has special talent, a Watkins or a Dareus) but who hasn't accomplished what you want, especially when he's in his early 20s, the smart move is to keep him too long rather give up on him too early. Marshawn Lynch is a perfect example. You hate to have had a talent like that on your roster and have let him go, only to watch him be a true star someplace else. It's worth to keep four guys like Lynch and Watkins for a year or two longer than you might keep someone else, because one of those guys is going to turn out to be someone really special. The three who don't work are only going to be taking up the roster of some journeyman, so it doesn't cost much to keep them. It costs a lot to lose a Lynch. So I would have kept Watkins. McDermott did that with Dareus, although not for very long. He kept him because Dareus was such a special talent that McDermott had to find out whether he could get Dareus to be the kind of team player and leader McDermott wanted. When he was sure Dareus wasn't going to be that guy, McD let him go. I would have done the same thing, with Watkins for a full season.

It's also about all the data posters use to back up their opinions here. Some of our opinions are correct, some aren't, but the data doesn't prove the case one way or the other. We tend to remember and repeat the data that supports our opinions. Like, I think Andy Reid is a great football coach, and this article cites a bunch of facts that would support that. I'll remember those facts. Do they prove that Reid is a great coach? NO! There's a different set of facts that supports the notion that he isn't a good coach at all.

I wasn't as deeply into the Bills in those days as I am now, but I remember reaching this conclusion, too. Flutie was exciting, and I liked the idea that he could emerge into something like Mahomes - an unconventional guy who is just such a good athlete and such a winner that he's going to make plays for you. But when I left that dreamworld, Johnson was the obvious choice. Just doing my part to get to 100.

This thread is crazy. We've talked about all kinds of things. I find it interesting that according to some people McBeane got BOTH of these things wrong: They didn't pay Watkins $14 million or more (SEVENTH IN THE LEAGUE) for mediocre receiver performance and lousy locker room presence. They did pay Lotulelei $10 million (13th in the league and $4 million less than Dareus) for mediocre defensive tackle performance and good locker room presence.

You didn't ask me, but I never understood it. I try to understand the logic in movies that they make, and one reason I like McBeane is that they seem to have good reasons for doing things. This one I never understood. Watkins may have been less than a great team player, but he wasn't a cancer. He just seemed not to realize his potential. I always say it's better to keep good talent a year too long than to give up on talent a year too early, so I would have exercised the option and tried to get him to be the guy we all hoped he would be. Turns out that wouldn't have helped much, because he wasn't stellar for either of the next two years and would have left in free agency. Still, I thought he was worth the continuing investment.

Well sure. We can always bring it down to one play like that. I'm sure you understand the point.

I agree it's a pretty good discussion. I've said that in a couple posts. That doesn't change the fact that some people in the discussion steadfastly refuse to give McBeane positive grades for anything. This current discussion that trading Sammy was some kind of calamitous mistake is a good example. There were perfectly good reasons why that happened, and there is no evidence that having kept Sammy would have changed the fortunes of the Bills in any material way, and yet some people continue to point to it as some major failing. You want to argue about a player who has had success, like Mahomes, fine. I get that. But arguing that McBeane are failing because of Watkins is stubborn or stupid. I will listen to that argument when Sammy has a legitimate 1000 yard season, not before. I dont think there is even a 5% chance McBeane are in trouble if the Bill's are 8-8 this year. They have been completely clear that they're building for the long term and there's no evidence that the Pegulas aren't on board with that. The Pegs could grow impatient, for sure, but I think that happens only at 6-10 or worse.

Some people aren't looking for that evidence very hard, because they won't acknowledge the evidence all over the place. Still, you're right about the QB. Do everything else right and get the QB wrong, you're nowhere.

It's what happens when some people can't understand that it's possible to be doing a good job at a task without yet having a lot to show for it.

I have referred often to what Ernie Accorsi says in his book GM. It's something like "you cannot win with three prima donnas on your team, it's possible but not likely with two prima donnas, and it's possible with one." The evidence of that is on view year after year in the NFL. Who trades an OBJ? A coach and a GM who understand that they need to build a team, and guy with OBJ's attitude makes it very difficult. Th stories earlier this year about Aaron Rodgers and Mike McCarthy are another example. Rodgers has made it very difficult to win in Green Bay. So bashing McBeane for unloading Watkins and Dareus, particularly, doesn't make sense to me. It's bad for the team to ask the coach to focus his attention on the personal wants and needs of individual players. Coaches need those players to show everyone else how to behave. Those have both to be the MOST talented and have the best work ethics, not the worst.

I think it's kind of funny that people don't see this simple fact. Sammy was one of the most coveted receivers in the draft in the last 20 years. He was as much of a can't-miss receiver prospect as the league sees. Other than an occasional flash, he hasn't performed. Robert Foster's occasional flashes in 2018 were as good and as numerous as Sammy's. The problem with the NFL, something some fans have trouble recognizing, is that the NFL doesn't give you anything as a player - you have to earn everything you get. And it doesn't matter how good you were in college, you have to earn it in the NFL. Sammy never earned it. He had the talent, but he never did the work to be as good as he could have been. He admitted it a year after he left Buffalo. People are still in love with the IDEA of Sammy. Sammy the guy with speed, great moves, punt-returner type elusiveness, excellent hands, tackle breaking ability. He had it all. He just never put in the work to be what he could have been. Now, like a lot of guys after five years in the league, those really top-end attributes have been muted by age and injury. He still has enough to be a really valuable receiver, if the work-ethic and commitment to team and excellence finally emerge. I can understand the logic of complaining when you trade away a high pick, an identifiable talent who later becomes a star elsewhere, like a Marshawn Lynch. There reasons he had to go, but maybe he could have been salvaged in Buffalo. But I just scratch my head when people try to prove that a coach and a GM are doing a bad job when they give up on a failed superstar who can't become a consistent starting receiver for the best QBs in the league. Do we think Julio Jones would be the number 3 guy in Kansas City? The simple fact is that through this point in his career, Sammy has underperformed his promise - badly - and has done nothing more than dozens of journeymen NFL receivers. He just happens to get paid more than those others.