VW82

I disagree with everyone outright dismissing PFF. On what basis? I agree that grading offensive line play can be tough without knowing everyone's responsibility, but that doesn't mean the exercise isn't worth doing. If Bill Belichick was the one grading would you outright dismiss him too because he didn't 100% know all the pre-snap line responsibilities? If you're going to kill the graders, at least tell us how it is that you know they're not qualified. One of the underrated reasons the line struggled last year is because we downgraded from Taylor to Allen. I suspect Josh's improvement in terms of pre and post snap reads from year one to two will be a big boon for the line. Morse will definitely help with the pre-snap stuff as well. I don't expect there will be a big improvement in run blocking. Morse is just ok in that respect, and none of the other new additions other than maybe Feliciano scream road grader (at least based on their work to date). We'll see. Perhaps our new coach can get everyone on the same page, and they'll at least be a more cohesive unit.

Further to my points above, I would rather find out the guy I'm planning to take has a bit of a rap sheet than that privately he's a bit of a dick. Obviously you don't want someone who's committed serious crimes (or any crimes) but there have been too many studies done on work place environments and the far reaching negative impact of introducing people with chronic attitude problems for it to be worth the risk, regardless of how talented the individual might be. Again, I don't know that Oliver is a dick. I know that it's been reported that he can be difficult. It'll be up to McBeane to figure out how much truth there is to that assuming they do in fact like him as a player.

I think the questions have been more about him having a bad attitude which if true is enough of a reason to stay away. Guys like that can eat away at the culture from the inside, especially if they're high picks with a big contract. Here's an exert from an SI piece back in Nov: Houston DT Ed Oliver’s run-in with coach Major Applewhite wouldn’t be a big deal if Oliver didn’t already carry a bit of rep in this regard. According to scouts, Oliver has been widely seen as high-maintenance, and as a guy who’s gotten things his way a lot (his high school defensive coordinator, A.J. Blum, was hired as his position coach two years ago) since arriving on campus as the first five-star recruit in program history. https://www.si.com/nfl/2018/11/19/2019-draft-ed-oliver-attitude-character-houston-will-grier-chip-kelly-brian-kelly-trevor-lawrence Yeah I went back and looked at it and edited my post to reflect that. There's been some other chatter about Oliver's attitude issues outside of that sideline run in. I don't know that it's true but definitely something McBeane needs to flush out.

I just think this is the wrong way of looking at it. HR 101: selecting the wrong person is much more damaging to an organization than failing to select the right person. I have no idea whether Oliver is a head case or not, but if he is (and even if he's clearly the most talented) then he shouldn't be taken. We'd be better off signing a scrub 3T on a one year and trying again next year to fill the whole than burning a top 10 pick on a guy who might hurt team culture for years to come. Edit: I guess 34fan was speaking more to team need than culture, and you were just responding to that but my point stands.

I don't think they'll be afraid of cutting one of the recent signees in camp if necessary. Other than Morse, the other contracts aren't cap killers. In any event, I hope we pick the player that best fits the culture of the team. Maybe that's Oliver idk, but if he's actually a head case I'd rather not take him even if he's the most talented player available. We went down that road with Whaley (i.e. collecting talent rather than building a team) and it got us no where. Surely there will be someone at nine (or perhaps a trade down target) who's both extremely talented and a high character person.

The main reason the Browns are getting all the publicity is because Baker Mayfield looks like a stud, and now they've surrounded him with weapons. The moment Josh looks like a stud on the field (as appose to just in theory) we'll start to get national attention as well.

I know this a dumb take but I could never get behind the idea of someone with the name Losman becoming a man of wins. He was always destined to lose as far as I was concerned.

What are we trying to prove here? From a talent perspective our 2016 team was much better. Browns are way ahead of us right now, but that can change with some much needed internal development. The problem with the Whaley regime was never about talent though. It was about bad leadership, bad cap management, and an inability to identify a winning QB. In those respects, we're much better off now.

Good thread. All the more reason we should be looking to either trade up or trade our lowers picks this year for slightly better picks next year. I agree with all the cut decisions by OP.

He was a very good deep ball receiver. It was the intermediate stuff where I recall him not living up to expectations as a FRP. The fact that he couldn't stay in the league once he lost a bit of his breakaway speed would seem to support that. He was done by the time he turned 30.

If we do sign him I think that says a lot about the coaching staff's remaining confidence in Murphy. It would also likely mean we probably don't pick up Lawson's fifth year which would be disappointing.

You're right that's not how I remember him. The guy I remember was fast as hell but struggled to get open a lot of the time. He did have a couple of very productive years for us though, and he had Losman throwing to him so...

Isn't kind of what we're getting with John Brown? A legit deep threat with questionable hands and route running skills. Both guys got stuck playing with bad QBs.

This was exactly what I thought of when I saw the signing. Have to wonder how much that influenced the decision to bring him in.

You guys are both wrong. Bills blew it up and it was about money. Think about the motivations of everyone involved. Why did AB go nuclear on us? It was to save face. Even if he was never going to come here, it wasn't in his best interest to say that because we were one of only a few teams with oodles of cap space, the need for a big time WR, and the willingness to also part with draft capital to grease the trade wheels. His agent would have much preferred to leverage us into a better deal with whomever AB wanted to sign with. It would be negligence on a grand scale if Rosenhaus didn't have that exact conversation with AB going into this. Bills made inquiries with the Steelers and Rosenhaus. We were prepared to meet Steelers' asking price but not AB's, so we walked away. When the report got out, AB crapped on Buffalo to save face because they couldn't use us anymore. It's not a coincidence that after all that talk about AB not caring about money because he's made 70M or whatever, that Oakland had to re-do his contract to make him the highest paid wr in the league. It was about money the whole time, as it so often is.

One thing that continues to impress me about McD is type of person he goes after. He often refers to it as Bills DNA. He'll take a driven individual who works his tail off but also knows when to sacrifice over a talented guy who coasts, and he doesn't think twice about it. You can call it high character if you want, but he appears to be building an actual team where the pieces fit together and everything makes sense. Even the RB situation, which seems odd because they're all well past their primes, helps offset some of the inexperience with Josh. I have no doubt we'll whiff on some of these guys because football is hard, but this is the most confidence I've had in a Bills coach/gm situation since the golden era.

Point taken, though I'm not sure it makes sense to rely on past precedent wrt to QB size as much as we used to with the way the rules have changed. You don't have to be a giant, unbreakable human anymore to survive the QB position in the NFL. Also, I don't understand why it's ok that Mayfield went first overall but it's not ok that Murray might. Baker is what, two inches taller and 10 lbs heavier?? They're both undersized pocket QBs who had tremendous success at Oklahoma. Baker did it for two years, but Kyler's track record prior to Oklahoma suggests his Heisman wasn't remotely a fluke. He's practically a deity in Texas.

My post wasn't so much about looking to replace Josh. I agree that he showed enough toward the end of last year to warrant at least this year (and maybe next year too) to see if he can be a franchise guy. It was more about Kyler Murray. I just find him intriguing the same way I did with Baker and Wilson, and Flutie all those years ago. Maybe I just like short QBs who defy the odds. They're fun to cheer for. But again, I think Murray is going to be really good. He's a gamer.

So are QBs who struggle with accuracy, production, and lack of wins at each stage of their development finally learning to do all three at the highest levels of football. It's a risk either way. It doesn't matter though because we won't take him.

I get the knee jerk reaction of wanting to try Edmunds at different spots given how bad he looked at times last year, but given our fairly competent, defensive minded head coach traded up to select Tre to be the QB of the defense, I think everyone involved owes at least one more year to try and make this work.

Not going to lie, I would love to see Bills take Murray if he somehow slipped to us. It’ll never happen for a bunch of reasons but I can’t help thinking that he’ll be a better QB long-term than Allen. I suspect he’ll be better short-term too. Russell Wilson 2.0. All that said, I still like Allen and support him, and all these off season improvements should put him in a better position to succeed this year.

They better be starters. We're paying them like starters. I like the experience though, and Feliciano in particular looks like he could be monster in the run game if he gets his conditioning under control.

I would still like to see us to add a guard who really excels in run blocking. Morse was a nice pick up, but he isn't exactly a menace in the run game. Our line still lacks toughness, and has since Wood and Richie retired. I'm fine with drafting someone if we can't find the right guy in FA.

I'd be more than a little surprised if Zay isn't on the team this year. I can't take issue with any of OP's criticisms, except maybe that Zay seems like a high IQ player and I think he's a pretty good blocker for a WR, but he's still likely to be top 5-6 on the depth chart. If not, show me the six guys who are making the team over Zay. The fact he's a recent high pick of this regime, he's young and cheap, and by all accounts is a good locker room guy, has a strong work ethic, etc.,..I just don't see McBeane moving on from him so quickly.

I'd say there are two possibilities, and they're not mutually exclusive: 1. Paradis's agent was responsible for most of the "chatter" in the so called bidding war, and 2. teams jumped ship when they got hold of his medical info.