Shaw66

I've been saying this for years. You have to learn to take risks. If you don't you probably won't deliver when the time comes. You're right about Taylor. He didn't seem to learn. One symptom of that was his unwillingness to throw before his receiver came open. Maybe he will learn, but I don't think it's his nature.

The year Kuechly arrived, Carolina's defense moved up ten to 15 spots in points defense and yards defense. Yes, a lot of things have to happen, but the Bills have a rookie middle linebacker with a ton of talent, a great pair of corners in Davis and White, a veteran and talented defensive line. Yes, a lot of things have to come together, but setting a goal of top 5 isn't unreasonable. It could happen.

That's interesting. I have the same feelings about both. They are good guys, they work had at what they do, they are as good as half the starters in the league, and, for different reasons, they aren't good enough. Put Fitz's head on Taylor's body, and you probably have a a guy who plays like Drew Brees.

I was going to respond for you, but figured eventually you would do it yourself. You're right. Nobody throws for 375 every week, but a guy who has demonstrated that he CAN do it is as valuable or more valuable than an Adrian Peterson or LaDanian Tomlinson in his prime. Defenses have to prepare for the big thrower, and that preparation opens things up for the offense.

Houston. Already did Green Bay.

Like Hapless, I was about in the same place. I was a little shocked when Taylor was traded, not because he was the future but because I'm too risk averse to be a gm. I wouldn't have traded Tyrod until I knew I had my 2018 starter. It couldn't be a rookie, because I wouldn't put myself in the position of having to start my rookie. Maybe Beane knew he never could do worse than McCarron in the qb musical chairs that were about to begin, and, like Hapless, I'd figure that AJ would be what TT was the last couple of a years - a mediocre starter. So my shock at TT going lasted only until AJ signed. Then I thought talent-wise the Bills were in the same place they'd been with TT - looking for a long-term solution. Will I be completely surprised if Tyrod turns into a successful qb somewhere? No. He has NFL level physical talent. He's a better thrower than people give him credit for. It's possible that in a different environment, a different offense, he will blossom. But the odds on that happening got low enough for the Bills to decide to move on. Whatever the environment, a qb with four years on the bench and then three years starting should show progress, and Taylor didn't. J

I like the passer rating. The best QBs have thw best passer rating, and the mediocre qbs, like Taylor, are 10 to 15 points lower. The stat correlates well.

You're correct. As Zebra said, Taylor regressed over three seasons as a starter. Yes he had a coaching change in there, but still, his first season as a starter should not have been the best, by far, of the three. By season three he should have been making plays that made a difference to the team, and we weren't seeing them. Four seasons on the bench plus three starting should have added up to more.

This is what players always say coming into the second season under the same system. The second season is when you should expect the defense to make big strides, making plays instead of just stops. Players become comfortable with each other and have confidence that the other guy will do his job. Often I. Tebuukds, and it's true with the Bills, is that there's a lot of new personnel to work into the mix in the second season. Third season is when the entire defense typically is mature. But the Bills may mature faster, because not many of the new guys are rookies. Star, Vontae and Murphy shouldn't need most of the season to get up to speed. Much too early to know anything, ut this defense could be very good I. 2018. In my dream world, the defense is top 5 and Josh Allen is a top 10 passer. Thanks for the post.

Maybe Allen actually IS worse than the others. Ever thought of that?

But if he's the best in camp and in the preseason games, if he executes the offense better than the other two, don't you start him? The guy who wins the job plays, riggt? Or do you just ASSUME he's not ready for prime time even though he's outplayed the others in the summer? To be honest, I'm not sure I know the answer.

I hope you're not talking about me. I never cherry picked stats. I'm a passer rating guy. I said after his first year in Buffalo that if he had a passer rating in the top 10 every season, like he did his first seaon, I'd take him in a heartbeat. He wasn't close the next two seasons, and now he's gone. May or may not have been his fault, but that's unimportant. He wasn't getting the job done.

That's true. He admitted that the people who made the decision didn't agree with him. He just doesn't share their opinion, nor, apparently, yours. He's entitled to his opinion, as are you.

He said he'd done enough to deserve to stay. That's different from saying he'd done enough to win. If Shady said he'd done more than enough to do deserve to stay, would you trade him? There's nothing wrong with what Taylor said.

Yes, I agree that we should be fine with Gunner's comment - the offense will be, and should be, conservative until the Bills have an offense that can win opening it up. And I agree very much about the Steelers protecting Ben. Ben was something of a train wreck for several seasons off the field, and the Steelers had a lot of patience with him. I don't think Allen is likely to be an off-field problem, but it may take a while to get him up to speed as an NFL starter. McDermott is likely to be patient, so long as Allen is working at his craft and improving.

Several things: 1. I'm still not convinced about Tyrod, but once they benched him for Peterman, he had to go. That was a clear vote of no confidence, and there was no going back. 2. I sincerely hope he succeeds in Cleveland or somewhere else. He's committed to his craft, he works hard, and I like to see that work ethic rewarded. 3. Tyrod is a quality guy. Some guys would have griped somewhere along the line, on his way out the door, if not earlier, but he wouldn't do that. This latest comment isn't griping; it's just a statement of his confidence in himself and his recognition that the Bills had a different view. I've written before about my good friend who lived next door to Tyrod on Main Street most of the time Tyrod was in Buffalo. They had the only two apartments on their floor. She's 92, and she's a big fan. Recently she told me that one day she was in the lobby of their building with her wheel-chair-bound granddaughter. Some other people were there, too. Tyrod got off the elevator, in a hurry to go someplace. People recognized him and wanted to talk, but he was headed straight for the door. Then he saw my friend and her granddaughter, stopped and came over to talk with the girl. No one asked him to stop; he just wouldn't leave with giving the girl a few minutes of his time. When he finished chatting, he was out the door and gone. Good luck, TT.

McDermott is in the Reid coaching tree. Beane, too, I think.

I expect they'll overspend lile the Pats did with Gillis Lee and Hogan. They'll look for role players who fit the process, good teammates, etc. I don't expect they'll chase the big names at the top of the market.

In his first NFL game Marshawn Lynch runs out of bounds late in the game, saving clock for the Broncos to drive for the game-winning FG. I have enormous confidence in McDermott. I think you'll see increasing situational awareness from his team in the coming years. He needs a couple of years where the roster isn't turning over so much.

Right. And it's clear that especially with the marginal guys like that, the Bills are looking for character - competitiveness, full-time commitment, team mentality. Overachievers. Dingus - People aren't saying depth isn't a concern. Some are saying it's a concern everywhere. You can try to say otherwise, but I guarantee you that if you could talk candidly to 32 head coaches, all 32 would tell you about the positions across his roster where he'd like to have a better player on the bench. Most positions. What I and others are saying is the answer isn't better players, because better players aren't out there. The players are the players. The answer is coaching - getting marginal but committed players, and then getting them ready to play. I agree, the Bills need depth almost everywhere. They're going to get it, or not, from names you don't recognize, and I don't either, because they're going to prepare them to play. As an example, when Hyde and Poyer went out last season, there wasn't a huge drop off in the quality of the defense. The subs weren't making big players, but they weren't liabilities on the field. As I said, Milano is another example. If you have players committed to excellence, learning and practice, every day, you can manage your depth.

Shades of Belichick. He sets high expectations, and McD does too.

On to the fifth dimension of pro football analysis!

Milano is a good example. Probably at his best he's still only a marginal starter in the league. McDermott made him useful.

Ii agree that all teams are looking for depth. I disagree that it's about player selection. Bench players are by definition marginal NFL players. Only occasionally does a team have a starter caliber guy on the bench. Teams that have good depth have good coaches who know how to get good play out of marginal players.

I'm not worried about depth. Depth is about coaching, not players, and McDermott's system is a good system for developing depth. Here's why: Talented players, guys talented enough to play in the NFL or be among the last cut, are all out on the far right end of the bell curve. There are a couple of things that are true about players at the end of the bell curve: 1. The farther out the curve you go, the fewer players there are. 2. The farther out the curve you go, the talent differences get larger. Now, that's not true in every case, but on average, in most cases, it's true. What does that mean? It means when MIchael Jordan is the best basketball player, he's farthest out on the bell curve, there aren't many guys in his vicinity, and the differences between Jordan and the guys near him are relatively big. What's important about that is not who's out there with Jordan. What's important is the 300th best player in the NBA. He's not way out there with Jordan, not close. There are a lot of guys at the same place on the curve with him, and there's very little difference between them. That is, the 300th player isn't that much better than the 310th player or that much worse than the 290th player. They're all about the same - 20 guys, all about the same. Are there differences? Sure, but they aren't very big differences. When you're talking about depth, your talking about relatively small differences among players. Take offensive tackles. There are 64 starting offensive tackles in the league, and those 64 guys are probably in the top 75 or 80 of all offensive tackles in the league. A few teams have a backup tackle who is better than some starters around the league, but not very many. Most of the best tackles are playing somewhere. That means the backups generally fall between, say, the top 60 and the top 100 tackles in pro football, and the guys who got cut and are waiting to get a phone call are in the top 100 to 120. Because the bell curve works the same way wherever you are on it, the differences between a guy who's the 75th best tackle and the guy who is the 100th best tackle aren't that great - about the same, probably as the difference between the best tackle and the 5th best tackle. If you have the 5th best tackle, you don't care too much that you don't have the best. If you have the 100th best tackle, you don't care too much that you don't have the 75th. It's sounds odd, but it's statistically true. So fretting about the talent the Bills have on the bench doesn't make that much sense to me. The best you can expect to have is a guy who has started in the league but isn't starting now, like Ivory. Most of your backups are going to be guys who haven't started, which means they're in among the 60th to 100th best player at the position, and any guy the Bills can get to replace him isn't going to be much different. What matters is coaching. McDermott's "process" is designed to do what Belichick does - teach players with decent talent (backups) how to execute the position. And that's why there's so much emphasis on character. The difference between 75th best player and the 100th best player that matters the most is how hard the guy is going to work, how committed he is to getting every little detail right all the time, because it's THOSE characteristics that are going to make an average backup get the job done when the time comes. Austin Proehl is an example. The guy presumably doesn't have stellar talent. What he has is work ethic. He's the kind of guy who will get the job done because he will practice everything until he can do it as well as he possibly can do it. Belichick wanted Hogan for the same reason. I don't worry about backups. If McDermott is doing his job, the backups will be okay. I worry about the weakest starters, and I worry about the coaches who run the offense and the defense. Those are the guys who matter.