DabillsDaBillsDaBills

Division winners with a losing record happens so infrequently I don't have any issue with the current rule. I'll also point out that if you applied a new rule to deny the NFC East winner a playoff berth this season, you'd end up with an extra 9-7 or 8-8 wild card team (Cardinals or Bears). Would having a 7-9 Washington Football Team make the playoffs over an 8-8 Chicago Bears team be some sort of travesty? I doubt even Bears fans would complain.

This might be the worst article I've ever seen written by a "professional" journalist. There are logical inconsistencies riddled through this "article" and he clearly put no thought or effort into it. He puts the Jaguars in the top category with this reasoning: in the case of Jacksonville, the team is sitting on a winning lottery ticket to Trevor Lawrence if it manages to lose two more games after having not won a football game in more than three months. Then he writes this on the Jets (currently in the 2nd category): The Jets have an asterisk and if they get locked into the second overall pick then I suspect they stick with Darnold, rather than select a QB second overall. If they somehow get back to the top spot, then kick them down to category three and slot in Trevor Lawrence here. Does being in a position to draft Trevor Lawrence put a team in the 1st or 3rd category? Spin the wheel and find out.... He might need to look up the definition of "intrigue" given there's absolutely no intrigue for the Bengals, Bills, Browns, Ravens, Rams, and Vikings, yet he puts all those teams in the 2nd category. Goff and Cousins aren't "franchise" guys, but with the contracts they have there's a 0% chance their teams move on from them in 2021. The Rams would eat a 66mil dead cap to cut/trade Goff. The Vikings would eat 41mm dead cap for Cousins. Jackson/Mayfield/Allen all look like "franchise" guys, and all are still on their rookie contracts in 2021. There's no intrigue here at all. Any possible contract extensions wouldn't even kick in until 2022, and are ultimately irrelevant for their teams QB situations in 2021. Burrow had a devastating injury, but I don't think there's any intrigue to the Bengals QB situation. It's Burrow if he's healthy enough to play. If he's not it'll be whatever backup they can sign off the scrap heap. Where's the intrigue ?

I guess I'm in the minority here, but I'm not too concerned with Daboll leaving. This is his 7th year as OC in the NFL, and this is the first time he's had an above average offense (his previous best was 22nd in yards and 20th in points). How much of the offense's success this year can be credited to Daboll? How much of Josh's improvement is due to Daboll? There's no way to answer those questions of course, but if Daboll leaves we may get an idea.

I'm not sure if you're trying to be ironic or not. Complaining about Chiefs fans confidence after "just 1 Super Bowl" and yet you think the Bills will beat KC in the playoffs and the "worst" case the game is a coin flip? What's that based on? Blowing out a pretty bad Broncos team? Allen and Mcdermott have 0 playoff wins. Let's wait a little bit before crowning ourselves... It's pretty clear that Mahomes is the best QB in the league right now. I'd say the 2nd tier is a mix of Allen, Rodgers, Watson, and Wilson (in no particular order). I don't know if anyone other than an extreme Bills homer would rate Allen as the best QB in the league.

Holy premature thread batman! We're 10-3 right now.... You could *maybe* make this thread if we were 12-3 (if you don't care about jinxes). There's still nearly 20% of the season left. We're not "on the cusp" of anything other than a playoff spot at the moment

I think Lamar Jackson would be the perfect example of a team making a "mistake" by drafting a future QB with similar skillset. Jackson is 27-7 as a starter and won league MVP in his 2nd season. I do not think his success will be long term, and I would be shocked if he wins a superbowl. The next example would be Patrick Mahomes. Another QB who won league MVP in his 2nd season (and a SB mvp in 3rd season to go with it). I think his success will be long term, and I'd be surprised if he doesn't win multiple superbowls. He's really the prototype for "mostly unproven college QB from an unusual school with lots of potential". Josh will always be second fiddle to Mahomes unless (until?) he wins league MVPS and superbowl MVPs. TLDR: Allen's success (to this point) will absolutely NOT make other teams make draft mistakes

I believe this would be called a "let down" game not a "trap game" as defined in the article OP linked. There's a number of myths in the NFL world that are absolutely false when you do statistical analysis, but are constantly referenced as gospel: Trap/Let down games QBs need big hands It's tough to beat a team for a 3rd time in 1 season There must be more, but that's all I've off the top of my head

Maybe I'm being pedantic, but I don't see how the Steelers was the most complete game of the season. Our offense had 4 punts, 2 turnovers, and scored 3 points in the first half. It might've been the best defensive effort of the season, but I think the Dolphins, Raiders, Seahawks, and 49ers games were each better overall games.

Not a lot of analysis going on in the OP so I followed those guidelines. To elaborate a bit on my reasoning: The Bills have two basic paths to hosting an AFC Championship game. We can get the #1 seed and win our first playoff game (after week 1 bye). Or we make the playoffs as a lower seed, win two playoff games, AND have all higher seeds than us lose. Given that the Chiefs are 2 games up on us, and also have the tiebreaker it's highly unlikely that we end up with the #1 seed. We'd need to get 3 more wins than the Chiefs do in the final 4 games. We'd also have to pass the Steelers, who we are 2 games back on. That's not as unlikely given that we play them this week and would have the tiebreak and only 1 game back if we win. Even after that we'd still have to win our first playoff game to host the AFCCG. For us to host the Browns, the Browns would need to qualify for the playoffs and then win 2 playoff games. The odds of that are so low it's not worth mentioning. There's a lot of potential paths for the Bills to host the AFCCG as a 2-6 seed, but they all boil down to Bills winning consecutive playoff games, AND to have EVERY higher rated seed lose. Pretty slim odds. My guess of 1% might've been a little pessimistic, but anything over 5% is just a pipe dream. Now if we're talking the chance that the Bills MAKE the championship game? I think that's more like 20%.

It's definitely as crazy as it sounds. While none of your individual scenarios are that ridiculous the idea that all of that would happen is. I'd say there's about a 1% chance that the Bills host the AFC Championship game. And more like 0.01% chance that we'd host the Browns.

I'd put Wentz in the Tannehill/Carr/Stafford/Cousins category of QB. Better than average. Good enough to win a lot of games and make the playoffs with a strong supporting cast. Probably never good enough to win a SB.

Mario Addison played on 67% of snaps? I don't think I noticed him on a single play last night

I loved it. Refs have left so many roughing calls on Josh uncalled this year. If he needs to snap his head back to get a call for a late hit then he needs to start doing that every time. Bit of a tangent... How many times did 49er players spin the ball towards the Bills defenders? We should coach our players to point at the ball and cry for a flag in those situations

It's interesting that Ben has never played very well against the Bills, but is 4-0. Guess it helps to play against JP Losman, Ryan Fitzpatrick, EJ Manuel, and Tyrod Taylor 2007 Ben went 21/34 for 242 Yards 1 TD 1 INT 2010 Ben went 20/33 for 246 Yards 0 TD 0 INT 2013 Ben went 18/30 for 204 Yards 1 TD 1 INT 2016 Ben went 17/31 for 221 Yards 0 TD 3 INT - the worst game I've ever seen from him. Leveon Bell had just shy of 300 yards and carried Steelers to victory The Steelers haven't been playing well for the past few weeks (they just lost to the Football Team), and if that trend continues the Bills should win the game

To expand on your simile, I think this situation would be if the husband went from in shape to 400 pounds, and then the wife goes on TV and says she needs to do a better job preparing healthy foods and putting him in a situation where success is possible. I'll also point out that Gase did not say Darnold is a "failed" QB. In fact, he never said "fail" at all. The reporter used that specific word to describe Gase's comments. If you read Gase's comments I think they are fair. He takes responsibility for how Darnold is playing: "We need to do things well around him, but at the same time, it's on me to get him to play better than what he's played," Gase said. "I haven't done a good enough job." "Yeah, it's frustrating," Gase said of the touchdown drought. "For him personally, I'm sure he's bothered by it, knowing things like that. "I look at it as we've got to do a better job as a staff. We've got to put these guys in the best position possible, and those guys have to go execute. It's on all of us. We have to find a way to do a better job. We have to find a way to put the ball in the end zone."

Not really sure how it's an "irrational rant" to point out that Klein made a big mistake on a play that was his responsibility and it cost the Bills points. There's a difference between making a mistake like Klein vs Bosa who was blown up by blocks on a few plays. Even with the mistake Klein still had a good game. I just think Bosa's game was significantly better.

How could anyone watch the Bills Chargers game and come away thinking that Klein was the defensive player of the week? Bosa was significantly better. I'm still annoyed by this play on the Chargers first TD drive: 3rd & 10 at BUF 22 (8:08 - 1st) (Shotgun) J.Herbert pass short left to A.Ekeler pushed ob at BUF 8 for 14 yards (A.Klein). Klein bit on a screen play and wasn't fast enough to chase down Ekeler. He cost us a probable 4 points on that play.

Klein might not be as bad as I thought, but I still don't think he's a good player. Some of his sacks were scheme based and he was unblocked en route to the QB. Props to Klein for making the sack, but that's the expectation when you get a free run at a QB. How about this play on Chargers first TD drive? 3rd & 10 at BUF 22 (8:08 - 1st) (Shotgun) J.Herbert pass short left to A.Ekeler pushed ob at BUF 8 for 14 yards (A.Klein). Klein took an extra step towards Herbert and didn't have the speed to chase down Ekeler. Cost a probable 4 points that play.

I'll change my mind if the defense plays that well the rest of the year, but for now, "lucky" is definitely the word I would use. Definition of lucky 1: having good luck 2: happening by chance

1) I'd say it's fairly lucky when our below average defense allows only 3 points off of 3 turnovers 2) I made up the 33% number, but the way the Bills played would normally not win a game. <200 yards passing, outgained in total yards, lose the turnover battle -2 (with 3 turnovers in the 4th Q). It was good enough for a win against a mediocre Chargers team that made a lot of mistakes, but (probably) wouldn't be good enough in a playoff game 3) After Allen's INT the Chargers had the ball at their own 44 with 6 minutes left and down by 7. The Bucs scored a TD with 4 minutes left to cut the lead to 3, but never got the ball back after they kicked off. Per ESPN stats the Chargers had a better chance of winning than the Bucs did

I feel like people are writing off the 3 turnovers in 7 plays because the Chargers didn't capitalize and it didn't cost us the game. This thread is about "narratives" and the narrative after the Chiefs/Chargers game was that the Chiefs survived and pulled out a win in a game that they really should have lost. OP was complaining that the narrative after this week is that the Chiefs "dominated" in a 3 point win, while the Bills "struggled" in a 10 point win. Having watched both games I agree with the narrative.

So did this one. Had the Chargers chosen to kick some easy FGs this also would've been a 1 score game. The Bills took their foot off the gas against the Rams, and ended up needing last second heroics (and a borderline DPI call). The Chiefs took their foot off the gas against the Bucs.... and needed to run the clock out on their last possession. The Bills dropped to a 16% chance of winning that game. The Chiefs only dipped down to 84%. Pretty big difference there.

Would you rather play like the Bills did and win by 10? Or play like the Chiefs did and win by 3? Which game was "closer" ? The Chiefs were playing pretty close to flawless football against a pretty good team. They were up 27-10 before taking their foot off the gas and letting the Bucs back into the game. The Bills were playing pretty decent football (up until the 4th Quarter), against a fairly mediocre team (Chargers are talented, but have a bad record). I'm not trying to be too negative here, but we went into the 4th quarter up by 10, and then proceeded to turn the ball over 3 times on 7 offensive plays. We're very lucky the Chargers didn't turn those turnovers into more than 3 points (with all due respect to our defense). The way the Bills played would result in a win maybe 33% of the time. The way the Chiefs played would be a win about 95% of the time.

Aaron Donald from earlier this year? I can't believe the Bills gameplan for Bosa today, we showed him 0 respect. Unblocked more than once, and we had multiple plays where we had a WR or TE try to solo block him. Unbelievably stupid.

Monkey paw curls The Bills beat the Chargers, and then the rest of the season is cancelled due to COVID outbreak.