WideNine

Probably reading into it, but seems like everyone participating in the pressers this week has been clipped and focused. Perhaps squeaking out wins created a false sense that they were playing better or further along than they actually were and the way they were beat by the Eagles was a wake up call. Allen being oblivious to what team they play after Washington, which seemed genuine, tells me they are very focused on their next opponent. Will be very curious how they respond as a team this week - the defense in particular as they have not had a beat down like that for a while. I know folks have said it was not that bad of a game by the D, but having a team hang more than 30 points on you, rush for over 200 yards, and dominate TOP, is not a great day at the office. The offense I am less worried about oddly enough. Could be wrong, but I think that if McD pulled the reigns a bit on Daboll and provided more input into that game plan, they will come out with more balance using their backs, will lean on what works better, and have a better overall strategy for this game.

I know right? Talk about getting mileage.

Hmmm.... Color rush red - done. Blue on blue - not so much. All whites - tbd.

Yep. He had some injuries he worked through and I do not doubt he was frustrated by some lack of positional coaching. His body language the last few seasons in B-lo said I am done here. I don't have much in the way of sour grapes. They (NE) are a well-coached team with years of consistency as an organization. By comparison the Bills' org was a circus show for decades. Change of scenery was needed and worked for him. Hopefully the Bills will become that stable organization that develops good players who are able to grow and elevate their game.

I think he was just saying that for too many years decisions were made more to sate the fan base that wanted to see some kind of move for movement sake. They were made for the marketing splash and for ticket sales rather than decisions made and action taken that were the result of sober deliberations about what could help the team succeed on the field. I don't think that McD has the hubris to think or say that all their team decisions are right, just that if they do make a move, they want to make it for the right reasons.

Happens when reality does not quite fit a preconceived narrative, and we all fall into it. Without knowing assignments on each play it is tough for us arm-chair coordinators to get it right. We see Jordan bust through with a tackle for a loss and think Star should be shooting a gap and doing the same thing. There was a hail of negative posts that Allen did not lead Brown enough on the one play that Darby (fixed) defended only to have Brown come back and say he ran the wrong route. Queue the face palms. We should be mindful that there could be other possibilities.

I think Horrible Harry was coming on getting that initial step and penetration forcing the double teams and being disruptive. Seemed to be acclimating to McD's scheme and had good showings against Bell and Barkley. Then he got hurt. Oliver and Peco are not there yet and it took two years for Harry to start to come on. Not sure what technique they had him playing, but it was working. Not sure what I think about Star, does not strike me as disruptive in the run game, but would honestly have to look at more plays and games focusing on him and McD says he is doing what he is asked to do in their scheme....

Actually sounded eerily similar to what he said about giving up the runs to Miami the week prior. We are really, really serious this time though

Teams are focusing on those guys who don't trap the ball. Less chance of having passes pop off your pads, better chance at catching contested throws, better at those toe-tapping throws to the boundary, etc... Bills finally are getting a better picture of the kind of receivers they need for success and they have come a long way from the Kelvin Benjamin mold last year.

Never underestimate the persistence of the ignorant. I have tried to correct or just better understand the position of some of the noobs, some are worth it. Other times it is like making that fateful eye-contact with that crazy dude muttering about Satan at the bus stop. You immediately realize your mistake, "Oh crap, now I am going to get sucked into his world!".

I have calmed down a bit so feel I can be a little more objective. I would not want my Bills to throw the baby out with the bathwater. To be fair Daboll has called an excellent red zone offense. Some of his play designs in that area have completely undressed opposing D's. The Bills lead or have led the league in red zone proficiency. It's consistency getting to the red zone that has been an issue and his willingness to call plays that expose Allen to unnecessary hits. I think that Daboll probably is a tough task master with Allen, but marrying the kid with one of the highest wonderlic scores but the most positional development needs with a task master who is sharp, and wants to run a complicated offense is not the worst thing for Allen's development as long as Daboll does not break his new shiny toy. Allen's short to intermediate game, touch on throws, throwing with anticipation, and in-game management is progressing and some of that has to be Daboll. Daboll has gotten a bit pass happy with too many plays developing East West behind the LOS and too few simply designed for quick North South execution. He just needs to think about where this offense and all its new pieces are in regards to developing chemistry and understanding his playbook, the field conditions, on field matchups and who is winning those and adapt. Even if he just forced himself into a more balance approach between pass and run, regardless of field conditions or worrying that the opposing team is good against the run, he would find more sustained success. I have never believed in conceding your run game just because the other team has a good run defense. You make them play pass and run the whole game unless you have to play catch up and take more chances. That way they cannot just pin their ears back rushing your QB, and you never know when you are going to break a long one. Correctable things if he has the willingness to take in the feedback from the coaches and players around him objectively and apply it in a way that helps this offense become more consistent.

Noticed the hard count too. I have been calling for them to be less predictable with their cadence to slow opposing players from jumping the snap and so that Allen could get a better read on pressure/blitz packages. There is one player that seems to be getting the Lion's share of false starts, Lee Smith, and there is no excuse. He just has to clean up his concentration issues. I think he is someone that officials focus on now because of his penalty history. Other pre-snap penalties on others I think may also be a result of how often the Bills have had to juggle their lineup due to injuries.

I do not mind running Allen, but prefer they be prescriptive around designed runs limiting those to the red zone. He is effective as a triple threat where he has options to pass, hand-off, or run it himself. That is a nightmare for defenses to defend especially when we can present some misdirection. This team's proficiency in the red zone is a testament to how difficult that is to defend with the short field. The worse I expect is that Allen has to elect to throw it away, or he gets stopped short, or we turn the ball over and miss out on at least 3 points, but put our defense in a better position. What I objected to yesterday is calling a QB sweep that looked like a QB sweep fooling no one, in the rain, with a struggling o-line, backed up deep in our own zone. So basically being blind to where we were on the field, the field conditions, and the current play of your offensive line - Feliciano (I think) was having a pretty rough day and I think I read that Morse also tripped on that play. I agree that we could use some upgrades, but Singletary was getting over 6 yards per and Gore 4.4, but only were given 12 carries. For the conditions yesterday that was far too few. I would have liked to see more involvement from Kroft - he caught a few, but the Eagles have struggled defending the middle of the field so between that and Allen keeping linebackers close to the box Kroft and Beasley should have been able to find holes just past those shallow zones and targeted more than they were. The Eagles made it a point to try to take away Brown there was a lot of bump and hold going on and the refs seemed to be letting it happen both ways. I prefer it when they let them play and as long as it is being called the same way from both sides its all good - the Bills needed to adjust to having a large part of their offense taken out and lean on others to step up.

This. This org from McBean down has shown that they are willing to move on if their coaches are not grading out well, or if there is someone with a bit more street cred out there. They moved on from their o-line coach last year because of the regression of some of our returning players and what seemed like an inability to coach up the new guys. I think Bobby has been an upgrade, just do not understand why every year we have so many false start penalties regardless of who is at the helm - completely correctable. I think Daboll has done a good job correcting Allen's short game, teaching him to read defenses, getting him to go through his progressions and throw more with anticipation to spots on the field. He has a complex play book and I don't see a confused young QB out there executing it although he has gotten rattled before trying to read disguised coverages while under pressure (NE Game). What I am not confident in is: his ability to adjust his play calling to better align and take advantage of field and game conditions. If you want to limit exposing Allen to hits and that is not just words, and if you do not want to put your defense in a bad spot, do not call a QB sweep against a stacked box, deep in your own zone, on a slippery field with a wet ball. That and other stubborn tendencies where he absolutely drags his feet before turning to the run, just makes me think that he may have a ceiling of what he will be able to provide this team as an OC. I do think that a lot of QBs that have gone on to make it in this league have benefited from being in stable organizations with some offensive continuity, but we will see. I sometimes feel like Daboll is designing a bit of a finesse offense like one you would see on a fast field under a dome, but in New Era you have to be very aware of the weather and field conditions and be able to adapt to them.

I have to stop being superstitious about the unis. If they tossed out every uni my Bills stink up the field wearing they would be out there buck naked.

Good catch as I did not take Allen OR Wentz out of it, but even makes a better case: We only ran Singletary and Gore together a total of 12 times to the Eagles 33 times for their designed runs. Singletary Ave: 6.3 yds/carry Gore: 3.78 yds/carry It was working, but you have to run your running backs more than 12 times, and I am pretty sure we would have had more success keeping it on the ground than all the 3 and outs we had trying to pass in that crap. Plus we would have taken some time off the clock, and perhaps even have given our defense a rest. I am not saying line up in the I formation and sell out that it is a run play, but would prefer we used a base package that Allen could run or pass out of based on the front and leaned more on the run.

It was interesting looking over the stats between teams: The Bills had more passing attempts - Eagles had 24 the Bills attempted 34 Both teams had one turnover but the glaring thing we all noticed who were not looking for something in particular was the rushing attempts Eagles had 41 rushes to the Bills 20 And for McD or anyone to say that we moved away from the run game because the Eagles defense was too successful stopping it: Eagles had 5.3 yards per rush and the Bills had 4.9 - it was a good day to run the ball for either team it is just that the Eagles took advantage of it and we did not. Just a poor job coaching to what was working in the conditions that were on the field and unnecessarily exposing your offense to high-risk/low-reward play calls that took no time off the clock to rest a flagging D. Not sure if I care if it is Gore or Singletary getting more touches as long as our running backs GET more touches and as long as Daboll uses Singletary when he wants to attack the edges - running the stretch plays where he can use his cutback ability and acceleration more effectively than Gore. and... why did it seem like the Bills were the only team slipping out there - almost forgot to throw the equipment guy under the bus while I was venting

Interesting, because I could not track it from the broadcast, but there was an attempted screen in the second half where the announcers mentioned one of the Bills seemed to be completely on the wrong page and took off up field - and the Eagles D seemed to be all over it. Allen threw it at his linemen's feet and I thought that was a silver lining I could take from what looked like one of several broken plays. I don't think Allen played great, but I don't think he played terrible either. I just wish Daboll leaned a bit more on his running game with the field conditions they way they were. Seemed to be the wiser route that the Eagles took. Feels like we conceded victory to their defense stopping the run without really testing it - like passing is what you are supposed to do against a strong run defense when the wind is at your back, but if the winds are blowing and it is raining you have to shift strategy. Feels like Daboll has preconceived notions of what is supposed to be working rather than what is actually working on the field at the time. Enough has been said about our defense, the way the d-line was getting moved off of their spots, which had a trickle-down with guys not being in the right fits - then there were just missed tackles or tackles made after bigger gains. Was not a good game all around, from the game plan, to game-day coaching, to player execution - sometimes you just get beat from top to bottom. Even our special teams were struggling a bit with Hausch-money pushing it to the right when all the flags were showing a stiff left-to-right wind, the blocked extra point. We did get some turnovers, which is a positive, but we have to be able to do more with them. On to Washington...

I thought about this today. There have been folks saying that his game is finally tailing off and we need a pass rushing end earlier this year, but I thought perhaps it was a slow start, but I cannot recall a year where his name was mentioned so infrequently. He had that hustle fumble recovery play last week, but really has not been as much of a factor rushing the QB. May be time to start developing a young DE or shopping for a proven commodity.

This is about the time after my Bills lay a turd that my anger morphs into gallows humor...

Today was a rant-worthy performance. Nuff said.

Well a non-conference game and hopefully something to light a fire under a team that has struggled since their their break. To be fair to Daboll I like how he has Allen progressing. Throwing receivers open, touch on screens and wheel routes, etc...have all been trending the right way. In a game where Allen would normally make a bad situation, by bad meaning where both sides of the ball are struggling, worse - he threw it away several times when I expected the hero ball to emerge. The flip side of this is I am not a fan of the designed QB runs when we are not in the red zone, or sans receiving options. I also think he struggles adjusting his plays to take advantage of personnel and game conditions during games. We will see, we won't hear anything resembling a public beating in Mcd's pressers, but I expect it will be an interesting week at OBD.

Their defense definitely were playing on our side of the line in the first half. Their offensive line was pushing around our D in the 2nd. Yep, that was a beating.

Early in the game I think that was true, but not after the half after they made some adjustments. Gore's few carries were strong evidence it was working. I think McD was giving air support for Daboll, but will disect that game plan in private. I prefer he runs things that way, never seen anything good come from throwing your coaches under the bus in a public forum. Bad teams with bad HCs do that.

I admit, the "winning" part usually gives me the beer-goggles needed to accept any amount of ugly. I mean who among us would scoff at a fugly 1 point victory in a SB?