Zerovoltz

What? Also....I pointed out where Smith came up short....and it wasn't in the stat line you get from the box score, and it wasn't QB Rating etc. ....Andy Ried didn't think Smith could win the big one....why would they move on from him and trade 2 firsts and 3rd for a guy alot of people were shaky about? Smith, with his 2 TD 0 INT performance also converted one 3rd down in he second half, and only 4 for the game total. This wasn't new. Smith ALWAYS valued ball security WAY more than risking a turnover to get conversions when you need them.

From a box score perspective, you might say he did well...and that wouldn't be wrong. He did. He was absolutely dreadful in the red zone....ranked like 31st in 2017 in Red zone comp%, TD% it was awful. Also not good on 3rd and long. notorius for throwing short of sticks. His stats don't show his deficiencies.

Good advice....I'm going to take a seat on the bench on this one. out.

What would have to happen to change your mind Yav? You've hated Mahomes from the beginning. you predicted he'd suck....and since he doesn't suck, you insist he only does anything because of the roster around him. Alex Smith didn't do much with the same roster. You do know KC CRUSHED the Ravens this year without their starting LT, without Hill, and without a RB..... Is there a rating system you like that suggests Mahomes sucks?

....If you only read Josh Allen posts, you might think that's all I do here...and somehow, when I have postive things to say about Allen...no one remembers because those get lost among all the many other similar posts.....I've posted in several other topics here about football in general, or about stadiums, draft stuff...ETC. Someone mentioned in a post that i didn't need to have gone to the trouble of posting all that crap I posted, and just say what I really think of Allen. I've said it before....here it is again. 1. I thought Allen wouldn't work out in the NFL based on his college career and numbers. 2. I noted at the time, as many others have, that Allen would be the ultimate test case of analytics VS. old school scouting. 3. I stated more than once here, that I wanted Allen to prove the analytics people wrong because that pendulum has swung too far toward the data, and forgets we are dealing with humans, and you can't put a metric on certain human qualities. 4. Even as I have thought he wouldn't succeed...I have rooted for him. I like him. He is fun to watch play. I like the Bills. I spent time with Poncho Villa at the 2018 draft, posted pictures of that, bought my kid a Bills jersey. 5. While still enjoying Allen play, and marvelling at his athleticism, charisma and arm....I still remain concerned and skeptical of the passing overall. 6. I completely agree 100% Allen is your franchise QB. He's well established and entrenched as the man, as he should be. The debate now isn't if Allen is going to be a successful NFL starter. He is that right now today. The debate is will he continue to improve and become that guy that carries a team to a championship... I remain skeptical that unless he becomes a more efficient passer (note, I didn't use Comp%) then I am not sure that Allen, can carry a team to a championship. I don't think my skepticism is unfounded...many others here are as well....I do think it's highly unappreciated because I am an "outsider". I do understand that it's like when someone beats up your brother, you want to go kick their ass. But....you can beat up on your brother because he's family. .......noted...... Fortunatly for everyone...we get to watch and see what happens.

.....does a meteorologist quit forecasting because he misses a forecast? Does a stock broker stop buying and selling stocks because they made a bad investment? I hadn't realized that making a incorrect observation or prediction meant you could never offer an opinion or thought again. .....I didn't predict Josh Allen would fail to continue to develop. I did point out that IF he does..it would be an outlier....MUCH LIKE his rise from a farm boy, unrecruited by big schools, then played at Wyoming and then drafted in the first round and so on....has been an outlier this entire time. I was offering up some anecdotes to consider, not telling anyone that Allen sucks, is going to suck, regress or any of that....I was purposeful to say Allen may very well continue to develop.....it's a hell of an interesting story, made more interesting. Can you, or anyone else point out where I said anything BAD about Josh Allen? I opened my post with the line...some unpleasant things to consider....because entertaining the thought the team might enter a down year in the up-down-up cycle some young teams go through, is not a thought anyone here would consider pleasant...nor is the idea that it's possible that Allen, if he trended like most QB's have...could be done with substantial development.....another thing that wouldn't be fun to think about here... No one at the end of last season thought the Bears wouldn't be a contender or that Trubisky would stall out.....the Bears 2019 season is a case that fits what I am talking about here.....I am suggesting it's a possiblity for the 2020 Bills...not that it's their destiny etched in stone.....Clearly these are unpleasant things to consider.....but that's all they are...just posibilities to think about.....BASED on a broad history. If history dictated everything that happened in the future...we'd all know the future....and no one would care or watch or discuss football....we'd all know the outcome of everything. You certainly don't have to like or agree with my opinion or my methods to support my thoughts......and clearly a good number of people here do not. ....so if I turn out to be wrong...then enjoy the crow that you can serve me...and I'll be here to eat it. I'm certainly getting full of it from my lackluster season predictions that I posted here.

I did copy and paste it...we were discussing this about Drew Lock on a Denver forum I post on. It's part of a post I made there. Easier than retyping it. If you'd like to the numbers I charted from the several I did, I could post them......and what is so hard to understand about saying that MOST, but not ALL QB's adhere to this....and that I further suggest that Allen may yet have more progress to make.....I was suggesting that it is likely that he's about done developing just based on the idea most guys are after 16 games...but I was purposeful to suggest he could be like the guys who improved even more after 16 games. .....did you read what I wrote? I think just about everyone stopped once they got to the part where I suggest most guys are done with major improvements after 16 games and you all just assumed that I must have said Allen is done developing and didn't read any further.

......I did not say ALL QB.....are done....I then brought up examples of guys...who like Allen....made dramatic improvements after their first 16. I didn't say he was done developing....I said he could be an exception....Not sure what you think I should have said? That it's a foregone conclusion that given his current trajectory, Allen will be the ulitmate QB ever in 5 more starts? That he's already the best? What am I missing here?

This narrative is kind of lazy. Mahomes played on a Texas Tech team with one WR who was drafted. (kiki Coutee) None of his horrible O line are even on an NFL practice squad, He produced at a very high level with very low level talent around him his whole career. Certainly KC has better players in place than what Buffalo had at the time, but to say Mahomes couldn't have operated at a high level in Buffalo isn't supported by Mahomes time in college ....When trailing by 2 scores or more.....QB Rating: Mahomes 112 Lamar, 60 You get out to a two score lead and ONE of these guys suddenly becomes pretty ordinary. Trick is getting out to a lead. Mahomes is 2-0 VS Lamar. Quoted this post just because I live that song. Same as it ever was! THIS. Granted, the idea was that McDermott simply wasn't going to allow a lame duck GM to draft his QBOTF ...and McD had only been on the job a month...is a D sided coach and didn't have the time or the area of expertise to pick a QB in 2017....he wanted to wait until the crop of 18 AND have the new GM in place to work wiht on that very important pick. It's just the circumstances that existed at the time. You can not fault McD...and certainly not Beane. If anything, the cumbersome leadership changes at coach and GM the Pegulas undertook in 2017 set up circumstances that simply weren't conducive to drafting a QB in 2017. In that sense the trade was "good" because the Bills got capital and made productive use of it. They weren't taking a QB period in 2017. The TRADE isn't a bad trade.....it should be viewed entirely separately from the circumstances. so.... 1. The ownership created circumstances that set up the draft where there wasn't going to be a QB taken.....so GIVEN THAT YOU AREN'T going QB....then you are operating with the idea of what is the best thing you can do at 10....and that was to trade back for capital, and still get a good player. The trade is actually and A+ given the conditions it was made under.

....before I address you @Gugny I'd like to address the responses to my post 1. ...I am very clear that my prognostications have been poor, and I specifically mention I have been wrong about Allen. I am not sure any of you read that part...it's the last thing I wrote in my post. 2. I didn't say the Bills had unsustainable defensive metrics. I said the Bears did. I also didn't say Allen would be like Trubisky.....I was pointing out....as at least one other person noticed, that Trubisky, really didn't become a bad QB or regress....his circumstances this year changed...injuries, schedule...not as good a D. Many of you took that completely wrong and seemed to think it meant I think Allen = Trubs.....totally not what I was saying there....just pointing out, circumstances changed from year to year. 3. On that note, someone noted that the up- down - up cycle of young and upcoming teams doesn't always happen....true. 4. Regarding Baker and that Allen/Bills record VS teams with better QB rated quarterbacks....I was using QB rating. If I made an error on Baker...then my bad...It could be that his rating changed since I posted that...or probably I read it wrong. 5. I do understand the Bills and Allen have played some tough D...Ravens, Pats, others.... I am not trying to make a case that Allen sucks. I am trying to make a case that Allen A) still has room for some improvement, but likely not a whole lot more, though it's possible. B)....that even as Allen improves, gains experience etc...the Bills will probably face a better slate of QB/offenses next year, so even if Allen and the team are better, the record might not be. C) AGAIN.....As I said in my other post. My predictions on Allen have been WRONG. He has far exceeded what I thought he would do....wich is why none of you should take what I am saying here and run to a bookie with your life savings. I am making observations and posting them. Feel free to discuss, laugh at me, hate me, that's all fine. Part of the joy of sports is NOT knowing what is actually going to happen. If we did, no one would watch or discuss. I put my thoughts out there to be considered, criticized...etc...I like to think I know what I am talking about...but I probably don't. This is a fun (and humbling) way to get my thoughts on the record. ...I can't state this enough, and most of you don't believe me anyway. I ENJOY WATCHING JOSH ALLEN PLAY. I like watching Bills football. Ok....Gugny asked about my data. ....so, I work a job where I sit for 12 hours at a time and monitor a transportation overlay computer system....it mostly runs smooth but sometimes it doesn't and that's why I have a job....to handle things when it doens't. ......I have a TON of time to try and pass and so the other night at work, I started looking at several random QBs first 16 STARTS in the NFL, then compared that to their career averages to see how much deviation there was. I charted Several. I can post if you'd like. MOST of the guys I looked at...it was remarkable who little deviation there was from the averages of the 1st 16 games, to the averages for the whole of their careers. Joe Flacco for example...you can take his rookie year, and those stats don't deviate much at all from his career averages...he was who he was going to be after 16 games. There were a lot of guys I looked at who had similar showings.....Vinny Testaverde, Chad Pennington, Boomer Esiason, Don Majkowski....and many many more....just didn't deviate all that much from the guy they were in their first 16 games. Jay Cutler....his first 16 starts, were damn near spot on what his career averages ended up being. Pretty much the same for Jake Plummer as well.Most guys tended to improve their Yards Per Game by 30-40 yards over their rookie years....the INT pct surprisingly, for many, went up overall, as they progressed. The Completion PCT didn't vary a whole lot....typically about a 3% incresase over the first 16 games compared to the whole of the career.Some guys that were drastic outliers...Tom Brady...INT pct went way down, YPG went way up. John Elway's completion pct improved only modestly, but he was throwing for many more yards per game later on in his career. Alex Smith might be the biggest improvement from 16 games in, to whole career that I looked at....he was absolute trash 16 games in....if he hadn't been a 1/1, his career would have, and should have ended a very very long time ago....but his later career stats really pick way up....took him a long time to blossom into something decent I guess. Peyton Manning is another one whose first 16 wern't very good..but he improved accross the board substantially after that..His second set of 16 games was much closer to what his career averages would be, with the exception of completion PCT. Manning really got ALOT more accurate as time went on.A few guys got progressively worse from their 16 starts onward.....Rick Mirer one of the better known QB's who came in hot, and then flamed out. People might mis remember Dan Marino a bit....his rookie year was 83, when he started 9 games and was quite good....it was 84 that he had his big record breaker year...so the first 5 games of that, along with is rookie year....Marino was mostly on his career averages when compared to his first 16 games overall. Matt Cassel was another one I looked at....his career trajectory...DOWNWARD....was interesting because his first 15 starts were with the Randy Moss patriots...the team that had gone undefeated in the regular season the year before. Cassel went 11-5 with that group and had decent numbers....never to be repeated. Bubby Brister actually was a little better to start than he ended up being over the course of his career....never posting good numbers..they just got worse over time.While there are exceptions both where guys show out better than their first 16 and some show out worse....A TON of dudes....are who their first 16 starts say they are.

....some unpleasant things to consider.... The Bills have played one of the easier NFL schedules this year. The Bills are 1-5 against teams whose QB has a higher QB rating for the season than Josh Allen. Your lone win against a higher rated QB was in Dallas VS Prescott. The list of QB's that the Bills have defeated this year is a really really bad list. It's not the Bills fault they got to play the QB's and schedule they played, but when they've had a good QB/team on the schedule, they haven't won. The Bears played one of the easier schedules in 2018 and went 12-4 with their 2nd year QB and a dominant D. The D had some really great, unsustainable metrics in 2018 that not surprisingly, they haven't been able to replicate in 2019, and Trubisky, hasn't been able to overcome that and carry the team. I don't really think he's that different than he was last year, just different circumstances. It's not unusual, for a young, ascending team with a young QB, to have a disappointing season, following a season where they jump up and have a good record for the first time in a while. .......something else that should be of concern......MOST, but not all QBs, you can look at their stats for the first16 STARTS of their career, and you can get a real good idea of who they are going to be. Most improve their YPG by 30-40 yards over their careers, and comp % goes up an average of about 3% higher for their career over what they produce in their first 16 starts. INT % tends to stay about the same. It's not certain, but it is probable, the Josh Allen we are seeing now, is the Josh Allen we'll be seeing for as long as he plays, with just minor improvement over time from this point on. Given this, .....(prepares to duck as the stones come hurling toward me) ...The Bills will probably lose their playoff game, and probably will regress a bit in 2020. I do think Allen is a superior QB to Trubisky and his ceiling is higher. He's already defied what I thought he'd be capable of....so take my prognositcation here knowing I've already been wrong about Allen.

I have agreed with this for a long time. I like QBR better, but it is flawed also. I like AYN/A but when you run that stat against QBR and Passer Rating.....the list of guys who are the NFL's "leading passers" doesn't really change much. Mahomes is 1st in the NFL at AYN/A but 5th in QB Rating. Lamar Jackson is 3rd in both. Josh Allen is in the 20's in both. I know QBR tries to take into account the context of game situations...but that is arbitrary to the person doing the scoring.

Need some kind of offense/QB efficiency rating that means more toward a winning (or losing) performance. The current metrics aren't really very good at telling that story.

Ok....first...I must have misunderstood what you were saying with Mahomes....so, let's dismiss that...no one here (besides me) wants to discuss Mahomes. Regarding Allen, I had mentioned elsewhere I think in this long thread, that regarding drops....I have seen Allen throw some passes that you might be grading as catchable that I think are actually really tough to catch....what I mean is that Allen will throw a very high velocity, NON tight sprialed knuckleball from time to time and often, not right on the numbers.....that is a ball that is really hard to catch because it isn't going to cleanly fit into the hands of the reciever and it is very likely going to need to be aided by being brought into the body. When that ball is off the nubmers, it's often off the hands, and into should pads, helmet or just plain through the hands. Someone tried to say guys field punts that are wobbling like this....and that is NOT the same thing at all. Also....I do see you try and make a call on drops, then add those as catches to see what that brings the PCT up to.....1. It's still low. 2. Even teams that drop at a lower rate...if you adjusted everyone, you'll never come close to dressing up Allens completion numbers to something top half of leauge. You kind of negate the idea that adding better targets is going to make Allen an upper echelon QB when it comes to Comp %....your drop pct add on proves that even if you had guys on your team that never dropped anything, Allen isn't completing passes at top half rate. I'm not arguing that Allen can't be a winner (clearly, the Bills are winning in 2019 with Allen) but he is NOT the guy that raises the talent around him...you might even say that at times with his poor ball placement, he negates the talent around him wiht lost YAC etc. .....but makes up for hit with his incredible escapability and running. ......The Bills are 1-5 this year against teams who started a QB with a higher QB rating than Allen.....Dak Prescot was the win.

.....Come on Transplant....they lost that game. After all the work you've done to make the completion % number whatever you want it to mean, you are going to tell me that a 23/36 for 352 4TD and 2 INTS with a 110 passer rating.....is an L BECAUSE of the QB. and one of those INTS was a hail mary attempt at the end of the 1st half. Patrick Mahomes has played the NE defense 3 times in his career. He is 65/107 for 930 Yds, 8 TD passing 3 INTS (one a hail mary at half) NO QB in the Belichick/Brady era has anything remotely close to that per game average against them. Josh Allen has also played the Pats D 3 times in his career. H is 46/95 (under 50%, ton of drops I guess in all 3 games right?) for 578, 3 TD, 5 INTS and 1 rushing TD. Even if you took out the drop% and added those completions...he's under 50% still. 2 of Allens games were this year....when the Pats are slowing down. 2 of Mahomes were last season VS higher level Pats teams.

??? Mahomes put up 40 points in that game and NE had the ball last, kicking the go ahead field goal with no time left to win 43-40.....Mahomes didn't carry his team that day? He was the only reason the team was in it. Sitting here bored at work.......i was wondering how many games do you really need to see before you get a good idea of who the player is. so what I did was started looking at the first 16 STARTS of a QB's career and then compared that to their career averages to see how much deviation there was from those first 16 games to what they produced/became over a career. MOST of the guys I looked at...it was remarkable who little deviation there was from the averages of the 1st 16 games, to the averages for the whole of their careers. Joe Flacco for example...you can take his rookie year, and those stats don't deviate much at all from his career averages...he was who he was going to be after 16 games. There were a lot of guys I looked at who had similar showings.....Vinny Testaverde, Chad Pennington, Boomer Esiason, Don Majkowski....and many many more....just didn't deviate all that much from the guy they were in their first 16 games. Most guys tended to improve their Yards Per Game by 30-40 yards over their rookie years....the INT pct surprisingly, for many, went up overall, as they progressed. The Completion PCT didn't vary a whole lot....typically about a 3% incresase over the first 16 games compared to the whole of the career. Some guys that were drastic outliers...Tom Brady...INT pct went way down, YPG went way up. Elways completion pct improved only modestly, but he was throwing for many more yards per game later on in his career. Alex Smith might be the biggest improvement from 16 games in, to whole career that I looked at....he was absolute trash 16 games in....if he hadn't been a 1/1, his career would have, and should have ended a very very long time ago....but his later career stats really pick way up....took him a long time to blossom into something decent I guess. Peyton Manning is another one whose first 16 wern't very good..but he improved accross the board substantially after that..His second set of 16 games was much closer to what his career averages would be, with the exception of completion PCT. Manning really got ALOT more accurate as time went on. A few guys got progressively worse from their 16 starts onward.....Rick Mirer one of the better known QB's who came in hot, and then flamed out. People might mis remember Dan Marino a bit....his rookie year was 83, when he started 9 games and was quite good....it was 84 that he had his big record breaker year...so the first 5 games of that, along with is rookie year....Marino was mostly on his career averages when compared to his first 16 games overall. Matt Cassel was another one I looked at....his career trajectory...DOWNWARD....was interesting because his first 15 starts were with the Randy Moss patriots...the team that had gone undefeated in the regular season the year before. Cassel went 11-5 with that group and had decent numbers....never to be repeated. Bubby Brister actually was a little better to start than he ended up being over the course of his career....never posting good numbers..they just got worse over time. While there are exceptions both where guys show out better than their first 16 and some show out worse....A TON of dudes....are who their first 16 starts say they are. Just wanted to share this because while there are exceptions....starting to get into the territory of where Josh might be who Josh is gonna be. Tags: None

QBR: Mahomes 77.7 That is 2nd in the NFL Joe Flacco 48.6 Josh Allen 48.5 I am SURE I'd take Allen over Flacco, but the QBR isn't digging Josh.

....I thought today would be the day the Bills would announce their presence as an upper echelon team with a signature win and vanquish a long time foe. I enjoy watching Allen play. I enjoyed watching him play today. He continues to be very entertaining to watch and you can see the toolset on display. At some point, you have to call it what it is...super athletic kid, that can make some big plays, but he is always going to be erratic....that's just the way it is. He's a roller coaster ride from play to play and from game to game. .....I'd like to think the Bills can defeat the Texans, because that's who you've got...that's locked in now. I'll be rooting for Fitzmagic and the dolphins to wreck New Englands first round bye ..... would have been cool if it happened today..Miami has been a thorn in the Pats side many times...maybe they got one left....not counting on it...so...... ....KC will face either the Steelers or Titans at Arrowhead...we will win that...and we will go to NE and finish the job. I'm counting on you Buffalo to handle the Texans and then going into B-more and winning that game. We'll see you at Arrowhead for the AFCCG. GO BILLS! (and Chiefs!)

No. I’ve said Bills are my 2nd team on here a while back

Come on Bills...let's go. I got playoff tickets for whatever home playoff game KC has, and man do I want that to be after a bye VS the Patriots in KC. Hope you guys win everything you possibly can unless it's VS Kc...If KC were to be eliminated etc....The Bills are my 2nd fav.

Not a bad list. I'd alter (as others have suggested) that the Jets have thier guy, and even though we still have games to play, you can pencil in Joe Burrow for the bengals. I think the Titans are going to pay Tannehill. I agree Ben has gas in the tank. One more note....Denver is going to head to 2020 with Drew Lock....that may or may not be a good idea at this point, but they aren't going to be in the QB market....Lock would have to be so incredibly bad these last 2 games....I don't see that...they'll move forward..not unlike Buffalo with Allen. That leaves Chargers. - Rivers is done. NE - Brady is pretty much done, although if he plays again next year...I'd think it would be in NE. Indy - I agree, Brissett isn't a long term answer, but I'd guess he gets another season. Oakland - Because of how it all plays out, I don't think Carr will be replaced this offseason, but he's done being the undisputed starter. Gruden will have guys in to compete and could replace Carr....I don't see the Raiders really in a place to draft a guy this year. The good news for Buffalo is that it appears you have a solid team and even if the QB isn't elite....you can win with him and he can make some plays in the clutch. That gets you places. Should be a good era for a while for you guys. Last....I am rooting like hell for a Bills win this week! KC gets the 2 seed if you all can get it done. (I think you can!) ....and that may lead to us seeing each other in the playoffs....would be fun! Might be the first of many Allen/Mahomes postseason meetings. We'll see!

Queston for Transplant....or anyone else.....I haven't gotten to watch much Bills football this year...I did see a good bit of the game tonight VS PIT. On an Allen INT, I noticed that he threw a high velocity, flutter ball that wasn't that well placed (slightly behind and maybe a bit elevated) on the target. That fluttering hardball would be hard to catch if it was spot on, but it made for what would have been a very hard catch (I think for Brown) and it deflected off him and was picked. ...so my question is....regarding drops....is this due in part because Allen doesn't always uncork a tight spiral? does he throw knucklers at his guys often like that? That kind of throw can't be that easy to grab. Just wondering.

Just going over scenarios....Indy would need an improbable win VS the Saints tommorrow, then a few more things to fall their way.....they are all but done. Cleveland would need to win out (highly unlikely with a game VS the Ravens) or they are done. In reality, the most likely opponent for the Bills is going to be the Texans. Even if Texans L next week but win at Home VS TEN, they get the 4. Unless Buffalo goes WW and NE goes LL, then Buff gets the 5. Seems the most likely matchup is Buff @ Hou. Buffalo could host with the 3 seed if KC goes WW, Buff goes WW and NE goes LL. If you had the 3, you'd almost certainly host TEN or PIT.

Congratulations! Blowing my awful prediction (7-9) out of the water. Maybe see you all at Arrowhead later?

NOOOOOOO!!!!!!