SoTier

Keep telling yourself that.

You have nailed the relationship with McDermott and Beane dead on. McDermott makes the personnel decisions, and Beane does his bidding by getting the guys McDermott wants -- and McDermott's offensive philosophy is reminiscent of the conservative coaches' from the 1970s or 1980s where the job of the offense is to not lose the game while the defense and special teams provide the winning plays. I'm sure that Mike Ditka and Dick Jauron whole-hearted support McDermott's offensive views because it's the way they liked to play the game. My guess is that picking Allen -- or any first round QB in 2019 -- was simply to placate the fan base. Passing on better QB prospects in 2017 in order to draft a first round DB as well as trading away Watkins after letting Woods and Goodwin walk away in FA reflects how little McDermott values offensive football. That the Bills did nothing but sign bottom feeder OC Bodine and a couple of other non-NFL caliber scrubs to replace Wood and Incognito as well as waiting until late in the fifth round to start drafting offensive players other than Allen simply underscores McDermott's disinterest in creating a modern offense for the Bills by providing his young QB with protection and targets. That the Bills have FINALLY got around to getting him a real mentor -- five weeks into the season FCOL! -- tells you how little McDermott, Beane, and the Bills really care about Allen's success. You could very well argue that NOT signing Anderson or another experienced starter before TC was done deliberately to insure that Allen was going to be starting sooner rather than later, and that the idea that the Bills "intended" Allen to sit and learn for a while was just so much wishful thinking on the part of Bills fans. Allen is essentially on his own to sink or swim ... and be the convenient scapegoat for the team's poor record until the point where either McDermott/Beane get the boot or he's declared "a bust".

They really thought Peterman was NFL material because he looked good in shorts and red jerseys?

De-Nial isn't a river Egypt but rather where Bills fans who refuse to face facts that they don't like take refuge by trying to insult/intimidate fans who point out those facts. Fact One: McDermott/Beane traded for Benjamin on what was fundamentally a one-year rental despite questions about his knee issues and despite his lack of speed. Fact Two: McDermott/Beane also traded for Corey Coleman only to find that he was crap, not only losing a draft pick but also incurring a $3.5 million cap hit, when they could have waited for Cleveland to cut him outright and given him the same 10 day/2 week tryout that they gave him ... and it wouldn't have been a big deal if some other team grabbed him off waivers. Fact Three: The Bills traded away Taylor, and signed McCarron despite knowing what they had in Taylor and, apparently, not knowing all that much about McCarron. They wasted time, dollars, and cap space on a few months' rental of a backup QB before they moved on. With the signing of Anderson, they are sinking even more $$$ and cap space into the backup QB position. If they had gone after Anderson -- who has been around the league long enough to be a known quantity just like Taylor -- from the get-go rather than trying to pick the cheaper alternative in McCarron, they'd have saved both $$$ and cap space. I'll stand by my statement that McDermott and Beane -- and the people advising them -- are clueless about managing personnel matters.

I would not at all be surprised if the Bills actually did something like trading away picks for one year "rentals", especially on offense. It's exactly the kind of clueless stupidity that McDermott and Beane have demonstrated with their version of "team building" so far: trading for Benjamin and Coleman and signing and then trading away McCarron (and then adding Anderson).

The problem is deciding the definition of "project QB" because there's no standard definition of the label or how it's applied. The reality is that about 50% of first round QBs -- who are mostly the best prospects with only a few being "projects" -- either bust or become low level starters and/or career backups. Only the QBs who are picked #1 are consistently successful -- about 4 out of 5 of them become franchise QBs. Off-hand, I can't think of any first round QB who was labeled "a project" who has been successful in the last twenty years. Among QBs taken after the first round -- who would probably all be considered "projects" -- their chances of finding success are generally between slim and none. Most successful later round QBs tend to have reasons for why they weren't taken in the first round: Drew Brees and Russell Wilson were "too short"; Kirk Cousins was "too slight"; andTom Brady was a victim of athletic department politics that resulted in him being only a part-time starter at Michigan. Andy Dalton seems to be one of the few non-first round QBs to consistently play at a high level from the beginning of his career, but he's had success primarily when he has the right pieces around him. Successful real "project QBs" -- UDFAs -- are rarities, and there have only been two who have been bonafide successes in the last 20 years: Kurt Warner and Tony Romo. Case Keenum may be another.

The way it works around here, Billsfan1972, is that criticism = trolling.

Kudos, sir! I'm on the same bandwagon as you ... a long time Bills fan who's sick and tired of watching clones of the crappy Bills teams from the 1970s and 1980s playing against modern NFL teams. Be warned, though, that you're going to be mocked and told you should "get a life" or "sit back and enjoy the game" by the resident Bills cheerleaders because you dare to complain about the Bills feeding their fans bull manure wrapped up in cutesy phrases and promises of "wait until next year".

Unfortunately, while trading McCoy would be good for Shady, nothing is going to help the Bills offense with the current coaching staff.

McDermott and Beane deserve to be fired for McDermott's dismantling of the Bills offense since he was hired and given general control of player personnel along with his and Beane's failure to provide Allen with an adequate OL and a NFL caliber WR corps. If I had ever done my job as incompetently as these two have "managed" the Bills personnel over 2017 and 2018, my ass would have been out the door ASAP. "Accountability" isn't just for players.

The Bills "can't afford" to keep their own talented players but they apparently can always find the $$$ and draft picks to trade for some other team's first round bust, so I figure that it's a real possibility that Ereck Flowers winds up on the Bills. After all, if he was a first round pick, he must have shown "something".

Another TSW nazi censor wannabe heard from. If you want to be a cheerleader for the current crappy Bills regime, be my guest, but don't presume to tell others what they can post.

Get a clue. Those comparing McDermott to Jauron aren't doing so because of a physical resemblance or similar demeanor. ?

The Bills defense is hardly "great". It's good enough to stop flat teams. It's good enough to limit meh-offensive teams, but I seriously doubt that they can stop better offenses.

This is a pipe dream. Teams rarely even get to the Super Bowl without being regular playoff contenders for several seasons before they can even challenge for the Super Bowl, so they aren't going to get high draft picks unless they trade up like Philly did for Wentz in 2016 which means they either give up current talent or future talent to do so. More importantly, simply collecting high draft picks doesn't guarantee on field success as the Browns have demonstrated for the last decade. FTR, in the 18 Super Bowls in this century (2000-2017 seasons), 4 teams have accounted for 11 of the SBs: NE (5), Baltimore (2), Giants (2), and Pitt (2) while perennial playoff contenders Eagles, Broncos, Seahawks, Colts, Saints, and Packers all won 1 each. Tampa Bay was a playoff team for a number of seasons before winning the SB, but hasn't been back since, and hasn't really been a regular playoff contender since. Like the SB winners, the 6 other teams -- Falcons, Panthers, 49ers, Bears, Raiders, and Rams -- played in the Super Bowl since 2001 without winning a ring were all regular playoff contenders when they got their SB shots.

KC now up 30-7 over Jax.

Cinci has scored a TD. Miami 17, Cinci 10 just starting the fourth quarter. Browns up on Ravens 9-6 at the end of the third. Cinci just intercepted Tannehill on a weird play for a pick 6. 17 all. Jax finally scored a TD. 23-7 KC late in the third.

KC is putting a licking on Jax, 23-0 about 2/3 of the way through the third quarter.

Polian was a great GM but he built his teams in an entirely different era. His last years in Indy suggests that he wsn't a particularly good GM for the salary-cap era.

Reddick sounds like just the kind of player that McDermott and Beane love: a failed first round draft pick that another team wants to peddle with three or four years left on his rookie contract.

IIRC, Whaley and Brandon were pals going back to their college days or something like that, which is probably why he was originally hired to assist Gailey. I think Whaley was on board with Brandon's "money ball" philosophy, and accepted the Bills weird organizational structure where the GM was pretty much subservient to the HC as well being dictated to by FO bean-counters.

I don't "expect every single move to pan out" but some offensive decisions panning out would be nice. I just love watching ex-Bills who weren't good enough to play for the Bills tearing up defenses on playoff teams like NE, Philly, LA, and KC. You obviously love waiting ... and waiting ... and waiting ... for the Bills to build an offense that's NOT lost in the 1980s. Enjoy the wait.

Numerous defensive minded HCs have put together good/great offenses. Belichick is probably the most notable. But there have been some other HCs from defensive backgrounds who have attempted to win by with strong defensives and run oriented offenses that didn't lose games. The 1985 Bears under Ditka are probably the prime example, but this is NOT the same NFL as in 1985 or even 2005 when the Bears went 11-5 with the same formula with rookie Kyle Orton under center. In 2018 when offense rules, and yet McDermott is trying to build a team to be competitive in 1985. McDermott's is the guy who makes the decisions on personnel, and these decisions say he's clueless or disinterested or both when it comes to the offense. He was the guy who chose Zay Jones over JuJu Smith-Schuster and traded up to get him. He was the guy who decided that he didn't want Sammy Watkins on his team which completed the total dismantling of the most talented WR corps the Bills have had in this century -- and filled the Bills WR corps with has beens, never weres, and low draft picks and UDFA rookies. He was the guy who was okay with replacing two top notch OLers with backups and bottom feeders and trading away the best LT the Bills have had since they traded away future HOFer Jason Peters just because they had a rookie LT who played decently. He's the guy who kept Peterman and allowed McCarron to be traded away just because Peterman looked good against scrubs in preseason. If those four moves don't convince you that McDermott isn't the guy to build a competitve team going forward, I'm not sure anything can.

That's pretty much been part of the Bills "culture" for decades. Chuck Knox left because of it. Bill Polian was fired because he had an issue with Litman, Ralph's son-in-law. Whaley wasn't really an independent GM as most teams have as I think he was either equal to or subservient to the HC du jour. Brandon always had his sticky fingers in personnel matters going back to 2006 when he hired Jauron and installed Marv Levy as a figurehead GM. Probably Overdorf, too.

This isn't hard to figure out. It's called putting your QB in a position to succeed, which is a tried and true strategy (see LA Rams, KC Chiefs, Philadelphia Eagles, etc). The Bills drafted WRs Robert Woods (2nd) and Marquise Goodwin (3rd) in 2013, OTs Cyrus Kouandijo (2nd) and Seantrel Henderson (7th) in 2014, and OG John Miller (3rd) in 2015. He also signed LG Richie Incognito and TE Charles Clay in 2015 as UFAs and traded for LeSean McCoy. Even though Manuel was a bust, the offensive players Whaley assembled enabled the Bills to field mid-pack offenses with Kyle Orton and Tyrod Taylor at QB until McDermott decided talent on offense was apparently superflous.