Shaw66

My cousin used to tell me that it's not just the number of injuries a team has and when they occur. Bills had the good luck to face the Jets after Rodgers got injured, and didn't take advantage of it. They had the bad luck of playing the Bengals in one of the few games when Burrow was at his peak and the Bills defensive backfield was a shambles. I'm something of a Burrow fan. I love his cool, and I marvel at his accuracy. Tee Higgins catches all those passes because every one is right on his hands, in stride, chest high. Burrow's amazing to watch, unless he's playing the Bills.

First, I seriously doubt that the OC benched Cook. I'm sure it was McDermott. And I know people had trouble with how long the guy was on the bench,; I see their point of view, but it didn't trouble me a whole lot. McDermott (like all coaches) is very much into the next-man-up philosophy, and he is not going to assume that Cook is the only guy who can execute the plays at running back. Josh may be the only guy McDermott wouldn't bench. I would have benched him too. When I guy fumbles on the first play from scrimmage, it says he wasn't ready to play. It's his JOB to be ready to play. In the old days, Jim Brown always made sure he was ready to play, because in those days a lot of players eased themselves into the game, so Brown knew that the first play from scrimmage was an opportunity. These days, everyone is ready to go on the first play, and Cook showed that he wasn't. It's the coach's job to send a message to a guy who isn't ready, and the only way to do it is to bench him. And McDermott's point is correct - Cook hasn't shown he can be trusted. He hasn't been around long enough, and he hasn't come through for the team in ways that have earned that trust. Taron Johnson, Micah Hyde, Stefon Diggs make a mistake, they are right back out there. I'm a Belichick fan. He takes the same approach. He regularly benches guys who fumble early in the game. And McDermott is a student of the game, and I wouldn't be surprised if he learned this from watching Belichick. Doesn't mean it's right, of course, but it's not like the benching was some kind of bizarre decision the suddenly popped into McDermott's head.

I agree about the roster turnover. I'm still in the keep-him camp, but the roster turnover is a good point. It's going to be a new team with Allen at quarterback, so the question is who is going run the transition to the new roster, and who is going to coach the new roster when it's assembled. Which means the question is are you going to give McDermott a second shot at building and coaching a winner? So, put another way, the question facing the Pegulas is this: Who do you want to coach the next run at success, because this one is ending? Do you want McDermott, or do you want someone else? And that raises a second question: Who is the GM? Would the Pegulas axe McDermott and keep Beane? Would Beane want it? And if the Pegulas believe in McDermott, would they double down on him by keeping him and letting him pick the GM? One advantage that McBeane have is continuity. Without knowing, I can guarantee you that Beane and McDermott already have a plan for the roster turnover. And they aren't thinking of it as a new team - they think of it as a continuation. The plan identifies the likely year in which guys need to be replaced, whether guys will stay with the team but in a reduced capacity - Dawkins to right tackle, for example. I mean, I have no idea that Dawkins might become a right tackle - just giving an example. They know which holes are priorities. That all goes into their draft planning and their cap planning. McBeane will have a much better formed idea of how to transition than a new team coming in. That is, it would be easiest for McBeane to manage the transition you're talking about, and that makes the transition riskier if led by newcomers. It's why there is a benefit in continuity. Of course, it doesn't matter if you've just had it with McBeane. But if the Bills are going to look preliminarily at who's likely to be in the head coach market, they need to ask if any candidate actually will give the Bills a better chance to win. I don't think it's so obvious that the Bills could hire someone better. Why? Because how can the Pegulas tell if any candidate can do an incredibly complex job - assemble talent, including coaching talent, install offenses and defenses, acquire players, develop a winning relationship with Josh, manage games, etc., etc., etc. There's no way to know. So, I think that means the Bills might very well see McBeane in a different light - they might decide that McBeane are doing the right things but they haven't succeeded yet. In that case, they might see McBeane as the best candidates to manage the transition to the new roster. I know, some people think I'm crazy. I'm okay with that. But think about this. When McDermott and then Beane came in, they actually did it. Right? All that stuff - acquire talent and coaching, install offense and defense - they did all that stuff. They turned a perennial loser into a perennial winner. They demonstrated that they can do it. Anyone the Bills hire from the outside has no track record doing that. And the fact that they built what they built, and they learned what they learned along the way in doing it, means they have a big headstart over someone coming in new. For McBeane, they've demonstrated they can build to where they did, and now they need to demonstrate they can get to the top. For every other candidate, he'll have to demonstrate he can build his team and win AND demonstrate that he can get to the top. That is why Mike Tomlin is still the coach in Pittsburgh. The Steelers' management strategy is that you hire someone who's good and you go with him for the long-term. Their strategy is to win based on the advantage that continuity gives them.

Thanks. I love the discussions. I want to respond only because we get this John Brown stuff all the time, and I think it's nonsense. He played for 8 teams in 9 seasons, and he stuck with none of them because he was a lousy route runner and an inconsistent ball catcher. Every team that ever had Brown decided they had to replace him. He had 1000 yards one season with the Bills, in Josh's early years when teams were letting Josh throw deep a lot. This off-season a lot of posters were making a lot of noise about Gabe Davis's 50% catch rate. Well, when Brown had a thousand yards, his catch rate was 63%, nothing to write home about. He made an occasional spectacular play, but in the end he wasn't any more valuable than Davis. Davis has played half as many games, has half as many yards and receptions, much more than half as many touchdowns, and their catch percentages are identical. John Brown is a myth.

Just not true. They signed a good free agent guard, and they spent a second-round pick on another. They signed Morse. They draft Kincaid in the first round and Cook in the second. All the more reason to believe that Dorsey WAS the primary problem. There's talent up and down the offensive lineup, and it's talent that's produced in the past. Over the past two years, there's been a steady increase in talent, and the offense has declined. The one change that took place that accounts for this is the change in the offensive coordinator.

Thanks. Great discussion. I believe in the pendulum in football. We're already seeing the running game come back some as teams overload to stop the passers. And I believe in the pendulum for coaches, too. I simply would not make a five- or ten-year head coaching decision on a factor that is a swinging pendulum. Yes, the Bills are behind the pendulum curve, and that's exactly the point. When you hire a coach, you want to keep him, and living with an offense minded coach in a defensive era is no prettier than the other way around. The one point in your favor, I believe, is that the QB is just so damn important, you have to have a HC who is in sync with the QB. That's why I said earlier I'd want to know how strong the McDermott-Allen relationship is. That's maybe the single most important data point for me. I don't want Allen picking the head coach, but I want Allen to be tight with whoever the head coach is. That's probably easier with an offensive head coach. But frankly, I think offense/defense is less important than the coach's ability to bridge the generational gap. That is, Reid and Mahomes connecting personally is more important than Reid calling plays for Mahomes. Just my opinion. You can deal with the poaching problem a bit with salary, and with a guy who's really committed to the QB and the coach. Josh McDaniel, for example. Reading all this makes me think McDermott better have struck some gold with Brady, because the clock is ticking. If Brady doesn't work and the Bills bring in someone knew, that's probably McD's last chance. Finally, if McDermott really has lost the locker room, and things fall apart down the stretch, then, of course, it may be time for the process to leave town.

I don't know if I agree with your conclusion, but the rest of this is exactly correct. The future of this team is Josh Allen; he is practically the only guy who will be with the team in five years, and a lot of familiar faces will be gone in the next two to three. True for every team. The question is exactly as you say - do you want Beane to assemble the talent coming behind the current talent, and do you want McDermott to coach it. If I'm answering that question today, I'm keeping Beane and McDermott.

Thanks. I love your stuff, and this is particularly good. Let me start with a couple of general things: 1. I haven't been writing for a lot of reasons, but one of the reasons is that I've concluded that I don't know what I'm talking about. I don't know how to manage a football team, how to coach a football, or anything else related to football beyond the peewee level. And that's not an admission that I'm wrong and others are right, because I don't think anyone else does either. Well, maybe you. GunnerBill is the only one here who says things that make me believe that he actually does know what he's talking about at a level that is somewhat comparable to people in the actual NFL industry. 2. I'm absolutely flabbergasted that 80% of respondents to your poll want to replace McDermott. Okay, responding to you: I hear what you're saying, I feel it, and you may be correct. I don't know if you're correct because as I said, I don't know what I'm talking about. I agree that you can have a good coach who isn't right for the team and the situation. Dan Reeves, who I've mentioned in connection with Elway. Tony Dungy with Peyton. I'm sure there are others. Andy Reid, possibly, with the Eagles. Reid, of course, is interesting both ways - the Eagles won the Super Bowl after he left, and the Chiefs won when they got him. On the other hand, no one can say whether Reeves and Elway or Dungy and Manning would have won if the team had kept the coach. It's unknowable. We can have opinions, but it's unknowable. I haven't been reading much lately about the Bills, so I don't know where this talk is coming from that McDermott has lost the locker room. I don't know. But if he has, that's serious, and that would certainly make me think more seriously about making a change. As for your whole offense/defense thing, I get it, but I'm guessing you're behind the curve on this. First, you left out DeMeco Ryans and Robert Saleh, two defensive gurus who are having success. Jets would be eating up a lot of teams if they hadn't lost Rodgers. The defense is superb. So, I don't think it's as simple as you say. Second, offenses are struggling more and more every season, and I'm pretty sure the NFL is going to be making rule changes to boost scoring. I'd bet that the rule about illegal man downfield will be changed this off-season, because it is being enforced in a way that hurts offenses even though almost every infraction that is called had nothing to do with the success of the play. That's just an example. The NFL is going to do things, as they have in the past, to make offense easier. When that happens, any old boy will be able to be an offensive coordinator, and the hot commodity will be the defensive wizard. Chasing the current winning formula is rarely a winning strategy in the NFL, because by the time you get up to speed doing what the other teams have done, the league has moved on. I hear you about the team's failures at critical moments, and I agree that that has to be counted against McDermott. But the mistakes of the past do not predict the future. He's had lots of successes in the past, too, but in times like these, fans forget them. So, when the Bills overcame a meltdown to come from behind against the Rams, the players get the credit, not the coach, but when they don't overcome a meltdown, the coach gets the blame. So, even though what you say makes sense, I don't think it's the right analysis. McDermott is under 50 years old, is devoted to life-long learning, and is no doubt his own toughest critic. He is not going to stand still. He will be a better coach five years from now than he is today. The question cannot be answered by saying the team needs an offensive minded head coach. It can't be answered by pointing out the mistakes of the past. The question has to be answered by a thorough analysis of what it takes to win in the NFL and asking whether McDermott has it. And I can't answer that question. I do know one thing: When you have a talent like Josh Allen, if must find a way to win championships. Like Montana and Brady and Peyton and Rodgers and Ben and Elway, he gives you an advantage over just about everyone in the league, an advantage that is so large that you should be a regular winner. And that means, as I've been saying, that when you have an Allen, you have to have a top-5 offense or you're screwing. Allen's team should be among the pre-season favorites to win the Super Bowl every season, and he should play in multiple Super Bowls. The responsibility for that success falls on two people: HC and OC. Now, it's nice, if you have both in one guy, but it's not easy. Even if you have a genius head coach in terms of offense, if he isn't a personality fit with the QB, it doesn't matter. And, by the way, Brady's mentor at the Pats was Belichick, not McDaniel, another argument suggesting that it won't work with a defensive head coach. So, if I'm Terry Pegula, I want to know if McDermott and Josh are bonded, if McDermott can keep Josh locked in to being the best he can be. It certainly hasn't happened this year, but I am convinced that Dorsey really did block Allen's path to success. Josh is the key to success for the next ten years. If McDermott is the guy to bring out the best in Josh, I'm keeping Sean. If not, I guess I'm looking for a replacement. But as I said, I don't know.

80-20 no. Astounding to me.

But this is the job of the QB. Yes, he may never be a great game manager like Peyton, Brady, or some others, but he has shown that he can be good enough. When they ran no-huddle a few weeks ago, he was really engaged, and he operated the offense almost flawlessly. He's not persistently pig-headed, like Cutler was. He's demonstrated over and over again that he can manage the offense with a high level of effectiveness. He needs an offense that works. Look at how stylized the Patriots offense was that Brady ran. They played a lot of seasons with no great talent at receiver, but they gave Brady options to execute. Then they had Moss, and they gave Brady options to execute. Then they had two tight ends. Then they had that slot receiver guy. Whatever the style was, Brady knew where the opportunities were. There is no reason Josh should not have an offense where it's clear where the opportunities. It's particularly true because his running ability puts a threat on the field that most teams don't have, so the defense has more to worry about. And it's particularly true that his passing ability is greater than just about every other QB, so that gives the Bills an edge, too. As I've been saying, when your QB has that talent, your offense has to be top five, and it's the OC's job to get there.

Fair enough. It's not worth arguing about, but I'd suggest that if Elway's game had been under control earlier, the Broncos would have won more, and might very well have been on your list of great teams. In his first ten seasons, Elway's passer rating was in the 80s once; every other season he was in the 70s or worse. For his final six seasons he was in the 90s twice and mid- to high-80s the other four. Someone got his game his game under control. Not coincidentally, when Dan Reeves left, Elway improved. Some will argue, see, the head coach needs to go when the star QB is underperforming, but Reeves was, of course, an offensive coach. When your HC is a defensive coach, then you need the right OC and you need a HC who gives the OC the reins. I may as well say it before others do: Or you need a HC who is an offensive guy.

I'll argue just with the thread title, as it's a little too hard to follow the OP. Allen is, in fact, Michael Jordan and not Scotty Pippen. Allen has transcendent physical skills, just like MJ. Allen is Michael Jordan before Phil Jackson. Jordan thought he was going to win by being the greatest player ever, when in fact he only became the greatest player ever when he had a coach who harnessed his talents in a winning system. That is exactly where the Bills are with Allen. Give Allen an effective offense that he can execute, and the Bills will win like Jordan's Bulls.

Yes, Bob, Josh has done all the things you complain about, but that's Josh. That's what the coaches have to work with. We've seen Josh NOT throw into double coverage, NOT ignore the underneath routes, STAY in the pocket, throw with TOUCH. We've seen him throw accurately. We've seen him do EVERYTHING a great QB does. He CAN do it, without question. I have said almost since Josh arrived that of all the great QBs, Josh is most similar to Elway. Premier physical talent - in fact, Josh is physically better that Elway was. Elway didn't win Super Bowls until the end of his career, because coaches failed to get him and his game under control. The answer is not to say that Josh makes mistakes, because without more that implies that the Bills should move on from him. The Bills should not move on from transcendent talent. Every great QB needs to be managed. Elway, Favre, even Manning. The only answer is to get coaches who can help him realize his greatness. Josh needs to be coached and managed. He is a supreme talent, and he can and should be executing an offense that is dominant in the league. It's up to McDermott and his offensive coordinator to reach that objective.

I think it's very clear just watching. Allen was spectacular earlier in the season. It was so clear - the offense was generating open throwing opportunities on schedule, Allen knew where they were, and he delivered the ball easily and accurately. For the past five weeks, either the opportunities weren't there, or Allen didn't know where to find them. Either way, that's on the coordinator (and not the QB coach). The coordinator has to figure out how to attack this week's defense in a way that can be managed by the QB. That's his job, and that wasn't happening. The simple comparison is the Chiefs. Reid always has an attack designed to work against this week's defense, and his QB is prepared to implement the plan. Yes, even Reid and the Chiefs don't get it right all the time, but they do often enough, and we all see it. What did Dorsey do to attack the Broncos? So far as I could tell, all he did was put Diggs in motion all day long. And what did that accomplish? Hard to say; it certainly didn't create mismatches that Diggs could take advantage of. Again, the way the Bills will have big success if by having an offense that can be executed by one of the most talented QBs of all time. If Allen and the offense were humming the way it should, we wouldn't be having these conversations, because the Bills would be on top of the league.

Agreed. And I'll give you a simple example that I didn't include in my essay yesterday, but that bothers me a lot. I said in the off-season that Allen and Dorsey had to be better. I said in particular that Allen had to get his completion percentage up, because the real measure of good offense is percentage of positive plays. Every incompletion is not a positive play. And so, in the beginning of the season, after the Jets, Allen's completion percentage was leading the league and he and the Bills were absolutely killing it on offense. Why? Because Allen was reading the defense and going to where the open man was supposed to be. That often was to the back, over the middle or in the flat. It was working great. But in recent weeks, defenses have figure out how to limit the effectiveness of those short throws. One play in particular was a two-yard completion over the middle to Murray Monday night. Two yards, and the defender was right on him. And the throws in the flat are getting them nothing, too. Well, if the defenses have adjusted to that strategy, then there must be other areas of the field to attack. If the linebackers are staying close to the LOS to stop the outlet passes, there are openings somewhere else. Dorsey's job was to know where those openings are, to install plays that take advantage of those openings, and give Allen the reads to decide quickly where the ball should go. Instead, what did we get? We got things like Allen throwing an interception on a deep out pattern to Davis, a play Allen and Davis had great success with two years ago, but a play defenses have long since shut down. Allen should have known that throw was not open, and he should have had open options elsewhere, option he understood and could find. And for the second week in a row, we saw Allen and Davis miscommunicate on a back-shoulder opportunity, with Davis stopping and Allen air-mailing it deep. Things like that shouldn't be happening to an experience QB and an experienced receiver, and it was Dorsey's job to be sure they weren't happening. Everyone can see the same thing: If you have a QB as talented as Josh Allen, you should be winning some Super Bowls. And the way you should be winning Super Bowls is with a top-five offense. That's how McVay won, and that's how Reid has won. Daboll was giving the Bills an offense that was at least within shouting distance of the top five. The Bills hoped Dorsey would continue and build on what Daboll started. He didn't. Obviously, those who say Dorsey was the wrong hire from the beginning are correct. It was a mistake. There were those who said he should have been fired after a year, and they were correct, too. We can discuss whether McDermott was late to pull the plug on Dorsey, but that's just a question of times. GMs and HCs make mistakes all the time, and mistakes are not the reason to fire them. Performance is the reason. This season is the first season where the Bills have underperformed, and the underperformance is tied directly to the failure of the offense to be top 10 or better.

You really can't see the answer to your own question. If Dorsey had been that guy, and the Bills had been scoring 30 points a game, they'd have two losses, or fewer, this season, and no one except the most pig-headed Bills fans would be complaining about whatever boneheaded decisions you seem to think McDermott makes. After Monday night, I won't argue with the people who say McDermott isn't getting his team prepared properly. The penalty at the end of the game is in the same category as 13 seconds and several others, where his team just wasn't prepared to execute. I get that. But, as I said, if the Bills had the kind of offense they should have with Allen, Diggs, Davis, Kincaid, and Cook, this morning they would be 8-2 or better and be a favorite to make the Super Bowl. I'll take that all day, any day.

Oh, yes. I agree that firing Dorsey is an admission by McDermott (and I'm sure he understands it) that his choice of OC was wrong. I don't agree it was desperation. It was the right move by an executive. There was no upside keeping Dorsey, and there was clear downside. There was no downside in firing him, and there is clear upside, if for no other reason than you get to try out Brady for the job. I don't know if McDermott is desperate, and I don't know how you'd know, either. I mean, has Terry told McDermott he's out if he doesn't get to the AFC championship this year? Has McDermott told his wife to expect to be moving our of Buffalo after the first of the year? I don't think so, but I don't know.

And when I posted, I knew it was just my opinion, too. I understand that people feel differently. The real point is that right now, in the middle of November and at 5-5, firing Dorsey was the right move. The idea that he was a scapegoat is silly - Dorsey demonstrably was not succeeding at his job. I don't believe McDermott should be shown the door any time soon, but I know others think differently. Whether one likes McDermott or not, firing him now makes no sense. There's no one to take over the head coaching job now, because there's no OC and no DC. Why don't I believe McDermott should be replaced? Well, as I said earlier, he has one of the best records of all active coaches in the league, and the chances are that whoever replaces him will be worse, not better. Sure, we all can point to things he could have done differently, starting with Mahomes, but it makes no sense to point to those things and ignore the fact that he a took a team with a historic losing record for twenty years and turned into a perennial playoff team (except maybe this season). I'm not prepared to unload quickly someone with that kind of record.

Yes, that's true. The alternative is to hire an OC-HC, if you can find the right one, but then you have the same problem on the defensive side. The fact that it will be hard to hire and keep a successful OC is more or less a given, unless you fire McDermott to keep the OC. I'm really not here to defend McDermott. I just think at this point in this season, the only move that made sense was the one they made. Dorsey was failing and gone at the end of the season. May as well try out Brady. Well, I'm not sure McBeane won't make the same mistake twice. Ralph Wilson made the same mistakes for decades. It's not a given that McBeane will succeed, and they've given us reason to doubt them.

I was with you to the end. As I just said, he hired Daboll, so why is it that the Bills won't get another good coordinator? Good for you, truly, that you knew Dorsey wasn't the right guy, but the fact that you were right about one OC and McDermott was wrong doesn't mean that McDermott can't hire and thrive with a good OC.

If I'm an up and coming coach and I get a chance to be Josh Allen's offensive coordinator, I'm taking it in a heartbeat. Jon Gruden rode Brett Favre to a great career - not with Favre, but that's how he built his reputation. Hiring one isn't going to be the problem. Finding the right one is the problem. Eventually, yes. I don't think he's there yet. He hired Daboll, and that worked out fine. So, he's one for two.

I can respect that opinion, and I can't argue with it. I have confidence the man will continue to get better. But I'll admit that my confidence has been shaken. Good criticisms of McDermott. Thanks.

Boston Globe writer Ben Volin says it’s “scapegoat season” in Buffalo, with Ken Dorsey being the latest scapegoat (less than a year after Leslie Frazier was the scapegoat). That "scapegoat" crap is what commercial journalists drag out every time a team fires a coordinator in mid-season. (It's like dragging out the "rust" discussion every time one baseball team sweeps and then has to wait a week or more to play again. At least rust is a real thing; this scapegoating is not.) They say it because some portion of the fan base believes the head coach should be fired; identifying Dorsey as a “scapegoat” (without proof, of course) proves, doesn’t it, that McDermott is the real problem. These headhunters imply that the Head Coach should understand he's the problem and - what - fire himself? Quit? The journalist doesn't necessarily believe it, but saying that the OC is simply a scapegoat is playing to the people who want the head coach out, and not journalism. So, I think Volin is taking a simple, hackneyed way out instead of doing his readers a favor by explaining what's really going on. The reality is that a lot of people who understand the Bills had the same view of the team as I did in preseason - that the defense would be solid, and the success of the team would be measured by the success of the offense. Success of the offense depended on (1) Dorsey running a good offense, and (2) Allen executing it. We're now seeing those two questions being answered. In other words, if the Bills were going to have a difficult season in 2023, the most likely reason was exactly what we're seeing. The team's defense has been decimated with injuries, but even so, they've kept the Bills in games. They are middle of the league average in yards allowed per game, but they are fifth in the league in points allowed per game. It's actually quite an accomplishment that McDermott as HC and DC has built a defense that is somehow surviving the injuries and still making opponents work hard to get something. It's the offense that has disappointed, not the defense. Allen is not performing well, and it's possible he's lost focus, hit a wall, or something, but that's less believable than he running this offense well. He still can make all the throws better than anyone ever, but he isn't making them. Sometimes he seems not to be decisive, and yes maybe he just can't master reading defenses and executing the offense. But, it doesn't look like that's true, and even if it is, no one is going to give up yet on his talent. He's a generational talent, and it's just a stupid play to trade him for a boatload of picks and players, or whatever. So, that means, one way or the other, Dorsey is the problem. Either Dorsey is failing to design a quality NFL passing offense, or he's failing at training Allen to execute. If he's failing in design, you have to move on to someone else. If his offense is fine and he can't get Allen to execute, then, again, you have to move on, because you're committed to Allen long term, and you need to find an OC who can harness Allen's talent. Dorsey's offense last season didn't look good as the season wore on. He picked up from where Daboll had left off, but he failed to build the offense further (and he has more to work with than Daboll had). Still, it was clear to me that he is a talented guy, and it was his rookie year. If you believed in his potential, you needed to give him another year to see. If you didn't believe in his potential, then you shouldn't have hired him in the first place. Now, ten games into the season, the Bills are five and five. The offense, after an early season explosion, with Allen looking all-worldly, is getting stopped consistently by most every defense they see. Whatever it takes to be a good offensive coordinator, whatever creativity it takes to keep tweaking your offense as the opponents tweak their defenses, whatever that is, Dorsey doesn't seem to have it. In his second season, his opportunity to prove the brass wise, he is looking somewhat less capable than in his rookie year. This team is now top-10 in yards and points per game, but they've fallen way off from their league-leading production in the first four or five weeks. Now, they are struggling, visibly and statistically. But even if they plateau around the top-10, that is NOT the expectation with this offense. The whole point is that with a talent like Allen, top-10 simply isn't enough. If your offense with Allen isn't top-3, then your offense is failing. (That’s true if injuries weren’t a problem, and Dorsey hasn't had many injuries. In fact, I think he started the same offensive line for all ten games.) Are there other problems with the Bills? For sure, and that was completely apparent against the Broncos. The special teams had three really bad plays, the final being an inexcusable procedural penalty that cost them the game. The defense seems to be getting gashed for the big play more frequently, and it is bending a lot and breaking sometimes. But, as noted, the injuries are serious - their best safety, their best corner, their best linebacker, their best interior defensive lineman ALL are out for the season. (And their best edge rusher (Von Miller) has not yet recovered to anything like what he was. He said he was going to play early, and he is playing. But it's common to take more than a year to recover from an ACL, and he's right on schedule. We might not see the real Von Miller again until next season.) Look at the scores in the Bills' losses: 22-16, 25-20, 29-25, 24-18, 24-22. It's a team that has a defense that keeps the Bills in games, despite their injuries. It's a team should have a top-5 offense with Allen but instead has an offense putting up numbers that are no better than ordinary. And finally, is it possible that for some reason (personality, ego, whatever) McDermott will never allow an offensive coordinator the freedom necessary to run the offense? In other words, is McDermott the problem? Well, yes, sure, that's possible. But the question is the same as with Dorsey: did you believe in him when you hired him, and do you believe in him now? When the guy has put together winners like he has, it's hard not to believe in him for a while longer. He's intensely committed to winning. So, yes, maybe the problem is McDermott, but let's say we bet: You can bet on the future career of the second-season offensive coordinator whose offense isn't getting it done; I'll take the future career of the fifth-winningest coach (%) among all active NFL coaches, behind, LaFleur, Belichick, Reid, and Tomlin and ahead of McCarthy, Harbaugh, Carroll, and McVay. (Oh, and total wins among active coaches? He's ninth, ahead of McVay, Shanahan, Vrabel, and Lafleur.) So, no, Mr. Boston Globe, sir, moving Dorsey out of there in mid-season has nothing at all to do with some "scapegoat" nonsense; it is, in fact, the logical decision under the circumstances. Maybe with a change, you can find a way to salvage the season, but whatever happens, you know now Dorsey won't be the guy in 2024. If he's not the guy next season, then at a minimum you can try out someone from your staff to see if he might be the guy. 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 every-day 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.

I'm hopeful. McDermott is a fighter, and his team will fight. Its a long season, and we're getting into the stretch that really matters. Dotson and Williams have to step up. (I'm out of touch - is Bernard playing?) Offensive line has to step up, too. The season isn't over, not by a long shot.

Oh, so that's what happened. I was there and confused like you. That play was obvious miscommunication between receiver and quarterback, and calling that intentional grounding is ridiculous. There was nothing intentionally about that ball falling incomplete. Its absurd to call that and not to call the 5-yard line drives thrown at the feet of screen receivers. That's pitiful.