HomeskillitMoorman

I heard Tedy Bruschi talk about this once, and the way he described it is Belichick instills a lot of changes every single offseason, and there's a lot of experimenting that goes on with different personnel and packages early in the season. He says it's not at all that they aren't prepared physically or mentally for the beginning of the season, but the reason they get better as the season goes along is they're mastering the different things that have been incorporated and finding the right players for certain packages and plays. He said some teams don't change that much from one year to the next, and they're usually the ones that don't get better as the season goes along and that some teams that do just don't have a head coach as good as Belichick to smooth out all the wrinkles. In that specific scenario, the Bills D was getting to Brady quite a bit in that game and the Bills had good protection up front and Bledsoe hit some passes that he pretty much didn't for the majority of the rest of that year. I unfortunately have a feeling McDermott, like his long lost Uncle Jauron, is one of those that what you see is pretty much what you get.

I don't think you did play out the worst case scenario though. The worst case scenario to me is we keep McBeane, they continue to fail at building an offense and either keep Daboll or go 0-3 at picking offensive coordinators, and spend a big chunk of cap space on players that aren't very good. I wouldn't keep McDermott. Through 2 different offensive coordinators, we've seen his brand of offense. And it's horrific. I know people love to deflect that from him but he's the head coach, the OC's are an extension of him. Keeping him past this season could set this organization back for years. I don't necessarily mind having a "defensive minded" head coach, but they have to be able to have some kind of handle on the offense and be able to hire the right fits at OC. He's been disgustingly bad at both.

Ugh, please don't be Derek Anderson vs Josh McCown. There is literally no reason whatsoever to watch that.

I doubt this is true. I'd have to see more confirmation on it. I felt bad for Peterman until the run on the Hail Mary. That was one of the most gutless plays I've ever seen. He is bringing a good chunk of the criticism onto himself. There was an extreme where people were blaming him for everything, and now there's an extreme where people are absolving him of everything. The truth, as it is most of the time, is somewhere in the middle. While I don't think that whole throwing food at Peterman thing was real, I do think fans go way too far. I love the debates and everything on here but there are people that actually let this effect their real lives and that's kind of sad. I enjoy my Bills football time every Sunday at one of the Bills bars in Chicago with my crews, even though we're horrible and I think this coaching staff and Beane aren't the right people for this. Most of our fanbase are good people and the camaraderie is awesome.

Not much I can do here if you're unable to comprehend or respond to any of that. You obviously think a rebuild is successful if you're just bad for a while. I guess all of the rebuilds of this century have been successful processes in your eyes.

I have a few times but I can do it again. It's about organizational progress with talent and coaching, development, and instilling systems. 2 years in, nothing is progressing on the offensive side. The talent is horrific, the system is horrific, and the coaching is horrific. Nothing is in place to make this side of the ball successful. This could literally be the worst offense in NFL history. Are we the only team that's gone through a rebuild ever? And this is happening in the era of offense, where the rules have made moving the ball and scoring easier than ever before. You seem to believe that because we're 2-7, the rebuild is working. Not every rebuild is successful, there are plenty of teams that put up a season or 2 of terrible records and their regimes never amount to anything. It's all about what's being done during those rebuilding years. To me, the record doesn't matter, it's about progress on the field. You shouldn't have major deficiencies in all of talent, development, and coaching after 2 years. And really, there's going to be more problems ahead here. A lot of teams have cap space this coming offseason, and those teams need O-line help too. We need 4 legitimate starters on the line still, after this regime has only had the evaluation ability to find 1 in 2 years. We're also going to need skill players at every offensive position, including a WR1. We're also going to need a real offensive coordinator...and nobody with any kind of reputation or other options is going to want to come here if McDermott's still here because he's likely going to be a lame duck next year if he is. For being 2 years in, we are way behind on the most important side of the ball in this game and the outlook to resolve all of these issues isn't pretty. Is that successful to you?

I know what a successful rebuild is. You seem to think that just means you lose, whether you have a direction with football philosophies that are being built and developed along the way or not. I'm guessing if the site let us go back enough, you've had similar defenses and sets of excuses for a bunch of other failed regimes here as well.

The same could have been said about Fisher and Fox with Goff and Trubisky, that they only had 1 year with them. But those organizations could see that those guys had outdated offenses and were not the right guys to develop the young QB's. We're in the same exact boat with McDermott. Yup, it's really a mess with McDermott here. The best thing to do would be to can him and hire a head coach that we can be confident can develop, or at least give Allen the best shot to develop, in a modern offense. There's a difference between being involved and being "intricately" involved in specific play calling. The head coach should have a vision on the style of play that both sides of the ball are going to have. That should be the qualification for a head coach, and the ones who are successful long-term do have that. Successful head coaches are going to go through coaching changes because coordinators are going to get poached from them, but they remain successful because the coordinators are an extension of them. What you're describing is honestly ridiculous, especially the last part. As if the Pegulas should go to McDermott after this year and say, "Hey, don't worry about the offense this year, that's not your primary concern, just keep swinging away at finding an offensive coordinator, maybe 3rd time's the charm. You just do what you do on defense, the offense is on them". The offense does fall directly and primarily on McDermott first. He's the head coach. He needs to know what he wants from the offense and hire the right coach to develop and run it. The fact that he's failed at this twice already and we've lost 2 whole seasons of potential development already is incredibly alarming.

It's because they're failing at the rebuild. Losing doesn't mean you're succeeding at rebuilding. After 2 offseasons, there is absolutely nothing on the offensive side of the ball, the cupboard is completely bare. That is incredibly alarming. The question the organization needs to ask is if these guys are the right guys to trust with the picks and cap space coming up, and most importantly with the development of a young QB. If they're wrong, it could set the organization back for years. The organizational progress is what needs to be looked at during a rebuild, not wins and losses and not any kind of given time frame. You shoudn't just say "well, they deserve 3 years" and then not intricately look at how the rebuild is going along the way. It's that development along the way that will determine whether it's going to be successful or not.

My favorite part of this is the people at the beginning of the thread saying "great move", "upgrade", "shifty and quick". I don't think Isaac McKittrick even exists. Some people will do anything to try to support management.

McDermott scoffs at these "winning" organizations that don't value the faith culture.

What's concerning about that is Beane and McDermott had Benjamin already. They can't even evaluate guys that were on their team.

Quality head coaches understand both sides of the ball and have input everywhere. What you just said just further iterates that he should be a defensive coordinator, not a head coach. And even if you're OK with his only duty for the offensive side of the ball is finding the right person to run it...he's 0-2.

The Bears after 2017 also understood that their head coach and staff obviously weren't good enough to develop the young QB and offense and mold the team into a winner. Will the Bills recognize the same fact about McDermott?

Both the Rams and Bears also identified the fact that their current coaches were failing and weren't the right guys to move forward with developing their young QB's. You very conveniently left that part out.

This guy might be worse than Jauron. Scary stuff.

Great post. And a scary one. Coaching is a big problem that's being excused by many since it's a rebuilding year. A rebuild has to be executed successfully for it to work, and that's all about player and team development. I went into this season saying I didn't care about the record, and I don't. It's all about organizational progression...and we're not seeing any.

I'd rather Peterman play. At least there's an entertainment value there. I don't see what we get at all out of Derek Anderson playing.

I'm not talking about that one play. The o-line is horrendous in general.

Who has he been denied the chance to develop by? This regime. That's really my point here . Was part of step one to get the QB and provide no protection around him for his first year of development? It was either a failure of talent evaluation or being inept in organizational planning. I personally just don't think either bodes well.

I'm not sure how a position can be counted as "addressed" if those players aren't any good. With Allen I'd say they've potentially addressed the QB position, but I agree with your other post that you have to keep drafting and bringing in different QB's every year to see if you can either find a diamond in the rough in case that top pick doesn't pan out or to develop a quality backup. WR I don't agree at all. Benjamin doesn't fight for the ball, I don't see how that would change with better QB play. I don't think he's anywhere close to a WR1, and the way he's played most of this year, not even a WR2. Jones is showing some improvement but not at WR2 level. I think he's a WR3 at best. We need at least one top talent there and another very solid option. TE is a definite need. And we have 1 legit starter on the o-line, we need 4 more. On D we still need a linebacker, an edge rusher, and a corner. And obviously we need depth on both sides of the ball. I can't agree that this is on track after 2 offseasons. That's a lot of holes, and they haven't showed the ability to fill holes with quality, not just literally filling them, at a fast enough pace to think they can even approach all of that in this one coming offseason.

They've been able to find 1 passable starter on the o-line in 2 offseasons...but they're going to find 4 this upcoming one? And they need a whole new set of WR's and TE's. The RB's are OK but Shady and Ivory are probably close to the end and Murphy's OK but not really a starting RB of the future. That's because you're only looking at this from a record standpoint. I don't think that's what a rebuild is all about. To me, it's about development. 2 years in we have absolute zero development on the most important part of a football team in today's league.

I never said 2 years max, in fact multiple times I've said 3 is usually the standard. But even then, it's more about progression. With the way Beane and McDermott accumulated assets to trade up for a franchise QB...they seemed to have some level of understanding of how important that is. And that was the plan for 2 offseasons. But along the way, they decided not to protect that QB or give him anyone to throw to. This is basically going to be a complete year wasted of offensive development because even if Allen does come back, they're just going to continue to run this bland, conservative offense that is not the modern offense that you have to be building towards anyway. THAT'S my problem. This is far and away an offense-first league if you want to be good for an extended period of time...and somehow this regime has put it completely on the backburner. No. The exact opposite.

I don't care at all about 2-6. I'd be happier if we were 0-8 but had some level of decent protection for our rookie QB and at least a couple of weapons and see the development of a real offense. That's where this league is if you want a perennial contender. No team in this league sustains a great defense for a long period of time anymore. It's going to fluctuate. Having a top level QB is the way to become a contender year after year. Nothing being said here is subjective, unless you're arguing that more talent around a rookie QB would somehow be a deterrent. And if you're arguing that, I don't really know what to say.

We're in year 2. How in the world does last season wipe out a year? The job of a new regime when they come aboard is to evaluate and determine the direction of the organization. They did that and decided to rebuild. The team was mediocre, got to 9-7 and with a little luck, made the playoffs. And I gave the regime credit for continuing the rebuild because I agreed that the team was mediocre at best without a high ceiling. There's no point in being mediocre. It was the right thing to do to continue the rebuild. But they haven't amassed the amount of talent they should have after 2 offseasons. We still have the entire offense to go and we need to get younger at a couple of positions on defense. This is at least 2 offseasons of work, maybe more based on the pace that we're on now. In today's NFL, it's a slow pace, and front offices that are slow in this league don't last very long.