SCBills

Was hoping there was a small chance he could come back for a few snaps against the Jets, even if a meaningless game, just to get some rust off before the playoffs. But if we can get him back at 80% for the playoffs, that’s still a big help.

Ok… **** this guy. Let him stay home. Cut him on December 29th.

Rousseau’s contract is fine.. not good, not bad. I criticize him, but alot of it is because we don’t ever have a DE1 across from him. Id point out that since Chris Jones has fallen off a bit, Chiefs fans are having the same frustrations with Karlaftis. Benford just needs to stay healthy in the playoffs. I was about to lose my mind when he was meh early this year, and we’ll see if he rises to the challenge this week, but he’s looked every bit of a legit CB1 as of late. Cook. Home run. Only a handful of RB’s you should pay and he’s one of them. Bernard’s extension is frustrating. Both in terms of paying him and the doubling down of their philosophy at LB. I’ll give him grace for being hurt, and maybe he makes some big plays when it matters.. he has a knack for that, but I just don’t think our undersized DT/LB combo is helpful both in terms of injury risk and play on the field in the current NFL. My most controversial annoyance of recent extensions is Shakir. I don’t think he’s a reliable slot. I think he’s a guy you move around.. slot, backfield, motion etc. A chess piece. I haven’t seen him be a reliable piece in a functioning passing offense. Some of that could be Brady, but I do think some of it is Shakir’s skillset. Good player.. not sure his skillset is something I’d pay what we did for though. I like Bosa a lot. In a vacuum love the signing. Still do. Get him healthy for the playoffs. That said, we had a plan and then completely deviated from that plan and played him a ton. Injuries etc, I get it. Priority 1 has to be getting him healed up now. Hoecht is someone, who as a vision, makes a ton of sense. But we signed him knowing he had a PED suspension. PED’s are known to make you higher risk for tendon/ligament injuries. This was always the risk. Ogunjobi, I’m fine with it. Beane couldn’t foresee all these injuries and wanted to make sure we were OVERLY stocked on the DL, only to have this year be so over the top with guys getting hurt. Palmer, WR room in general. No excuse for. Huge, monument failure. He just paid Samuel whos always hurt and turns around to do the same with Palmer. Two B level WR’s with injury histories and we expected anything different? His drafting has been middle of the pack in recent years with some huge misses in Elam, Keon and Kincaid. All for different reasons, but all showing that they’re guys we massively missed on with three recent top 33 picks. Just can’t happen. Some hits later in the draft, some TBD’s and some misses. Just very meh. This is the first year where I’ve thought Beane has now been hurting us, and I think McDermott believes this as well. I don’t think Beane is awful. I think he’s middle of the pack as a GM since drafting Allen and has been an acting like he’s some untouchable guy this year. If one thinks Beane assembling a team with an elite QB, elite OL, but pretty average everywhere else with a constant issue at WR is worth keeping, so be it. But I fear he’s trending down lately. I do hope this Defense gets healthy and balls out in the playoffs. I do hope our WR room makes some strides and makes Allen’s life a bit easier as they gel with him. I don’t actually want to feel like we need to fire the GM. I’d love to make a post here at the end of the season saying he’s won me back over.

If the Bills beat CIN, I think they go 4-1 down the stretch. Resting players against the Jets. They’ll beat NE and Philly. Since we likely aren’t getting a bye, or home game, I don’t care about seeding. Getting to a point where we can rest guys for a game, maybe even two, is the most important goal they should have.

From a purely business standpoint, you’re correct. I think there’s a bit of a honor code in the NFL when it comes to these situations. Maybe Beane violated it, maybe Slay violated it. Maybe both. My honest opinion.. this is way more on Slay throwing a temper tantrum. I’d just rather not be the team involved in that.

Did Thielen have anywhere he wanted to go? If it was just a contender.. I guess Pittsburgh could suffice. Im just saying, Beane clearly knew Slay was trying to get back to Philly. It wasn’t a secret. If that wasn’t the case, I’m 100% on board with Slay over Ingram. But it was… and I just don’t think this was ever worth it because it seemed clear, within an hour of this move, that this was a possibility. And while I’m pretty much done with Beane, I think he’s smart and is more connected to NFL circles than X users and Philly beat reporters.

I just think of it as this. For those defending us doing this.. how would they feel if Von asked for his release from the Commanders. Everyone sensed he wanted to come back to Buffalo. We desperately need a DE right now. And the Eagles, who don’t even need him, claimed him before us as emergency depth. Would we want to Von to do what Slay is doing? It seems this happens every year but nobody ever really does what Buffalo just did. Vets like Slay typically go through waivers and then sign wherever they want. But, counterpoint, if we get to a point where this becomes more common, how does the league regulate competitive advantage if vets all over are just asking for their release on bad teams or if they aren’t playing in order to orchestrate their way back to former teams they wink wink want to play for.

Ok. Glad you acknowledge I’m correct. I’ll try to be nicer next time. Maybe put a glitter emoji ✨ next to Beane’s name for you. So what IS the context? I grew up and all I knew of the Bills before Josh Allen was the drought. I want one, just one, Super Bowl while my Dad, who raised me in Bills fandom, is on this earth with me. We have the most talented QB, maybe, to ever play the game. And his GM has gotten worse and worse in recent years to the point where most unbiased folks would admit this is the worst Bills team Allen has ever had around him in our contending years. KC might not even make the Playoffs. Yet we’re in a dogfight for a Wild Card. Last year of Highmark, likely zero home playoff games. New England has caught up and has a ton of cap space next year. Divisions are no longer a given. We have 20M tied up in two WR’s we knew had injury concerns.. and they’re both never healthy. We seem to have missed on our last two highly drafted weapons.. one bc of talent/immaturity and the other due to injuries and an inability to be a complete TE. We extended a chess piece to play slot, but he’s really not a reliable slot player. Credit for the OL and RB room. 100%. Kromer is amazing and they can draft, sign and develop OL like few others. But the weapons, for the investment, might be the worst rate of return in the league… for Josh Allen. The guy most of us have waited our whole Bills lives for. Not rehashing Defense anymore. You should know where I stand by now. I hate the scheme and philosophy. Think they’d be pretty good if healthy, but could see that not having any chance of happening a mile away.

Couldn’t care less about Ingram. Do think perception around the league matters and im not sure blocking a vet from playing his last year with a team/city he and his wife love, is the greatest karma. On Beane.. I’d be interested to see the age breakdowns of his critics and defenders. From what I see on social media, older folks tend to defend him more and think he’s still doing a good job, whereas younger folks are just about done with him or are close enough to the ledge with him that their belief is he’s done some good but his act has grown stale.

Completely disagree with you about Beane being considered a very good GM. He’s getting dragged a lot this year and not just by fans like me or hot take artists. Vons injury was brutal. He was a beast before it. But that’s the risk you take when you can’t build a DL and have to pay a mercenary. Benford has been out in consecutive elimination games. Yet we still paid him. Hopefully that doesn’t continue. My only issue with the “it’s the injuries” crowd.. because in fairness.. we’ve been bit in big moments whereas Kansas City, against us, has not…. My only issue is that yall think it’s all bad luck. … I don’t. I think a lot of our injury issues lately are scheme (undersized defensive spine), philosophy (ball control offense that can keep scores close) and personnel (older, past injury history and/or finesse, undersized)

Josh Allen (and his durability) are the reason. Baltimore has had better rosters but Lamar has had injuries and chokes in the playoffs. Joe Burrow’s injury issues are the biggest reason the Bengals haven’t been consistent. You can say it’s because they’ve invested too heavily in WR’s at the expense of OL, which has perhaps led to his injury problems. Stroud and Herbert aren’t in the convo with the above 3.

We’ve been going back and forth but this is a good post - thanks. My issue is I hate how this defense is built. You point to injuries, which is valid, and I simply think our philosophy is a factor in that. I hate, so much, how small the spine of our defense is .. and it’s by design. Smaller players get beat up more.. and it’s amplified, somehow even more, by our offense wanting to be ball control - which allows the other team to continue pounding the spine of our defense with runs. Nothing about any of this makes sense. Small DT’s. Small LB’s. Injury prone DE. Hoecht off PED’s, which are notorious in leading to tendon/ligament tears. I’m not surprised. While it’s a great OL, the weapons are so poorly reflective on our GM. You can’t miss twice on B level receivers, because they’re expensive if you sign them in FA, and he did it with Samuel and Palmer. He strapped us with the Knox contract and then doubled down by drafting a finesse TE.. who, I’m not shocked, is hurt all the time. Busted on a WR hardly anyone in the NFL community thought could play outside at a high level. Thats a lot of poor asset allocation on a roster for a contender. And this year seems to be getting worse with his recent extensions and signings. Now this Slay issue is just comical. It was clear he wanted to go to Philly.. this was in the realm of possibilities when Beane decided to block that.

All I know is the drought, which is why I’ll gladly talk like this. My entire fandom was growing up during the drought. Sorry I didn’t get to experience Super Bowls like some of those upset I’m making comments about our GM that most of the NFL community agrees with. There isn’t some loud contingent of NFL people praising the roster around Allen. There is zero part of me that thinks he’s a good GM anymore. I think he’s fine - strong in certain areas, poor in others. And I think he’s fading. This year being almost comical. Bad extensions, bad signings and now two ridiculous situations where he’s somehow the focal point of our team.

Never said any of that. Specifically pointed out he gets an A+ for Allen, A+ for OL construction and A+ for Cook. We compete every year because of Allen. Not because of Beane and lately, it’s in spite of Beane.

Get to a Super Bowl and I’ll change my mind. He gets credit for Allen and his OL build. A+ on both accounts. He found, or via multiple trade backs, lucked into Cook, but drafted him and extended him. A+ The defense is built in a way to constantly have injury issues and, what do you know, we always do. The weapons are hilarious. Bust in Coleman. Bust, for different reasons, in Kincaid. Lit money on fire with injury prone Samuel and Palmer. Insane contract for Knox. And while im at it, Shakir is a luxury contract. Hes not a primary slot and is holding us back because he’s paid to be such. He’s a move around chess piece, not some Amon-Ra lite. We need an actual slot WR. And now we have Beane bringing the circus to Buffalo … again … for the second time in the same season.