WideNine

I prefer contracts tied to incentives as too many players completely tail off after getting big $ locked in. Go from performance to doing just barely enough. Oliver was an exception, got his contract and made good on it the year after, too bad about the injuries.

The "D" despite playing mostly rookies and guys that are undersized or old - most should be on the practice squad vs suiting up to start held their own for the most part and kept the offense in the game. This time the offense did nothing but put them in a lot of bad positions with turnovers and poor field position. In a word this team has been "inconsistent". When they do well so many folks here get amnesia about how crappy they played the week before and freak out over any critique, but the chinks and the execution stink is still there following this team around even after a big offensive showing. I felt that in this game it was the OL's turn. They simply did not match the intensity of the Texans who often just rushed 4, sometimes 3 DL players and still whooped up and beat them with effort and beat them getting to their spots to setup blocks. Josh also shares some of the blame as he needs to reset his internal clock when playing a good defense as it has to be 1 one thousand, 2 one thousand, and I am either throwing it to a receiver, or out of bounds, or getting a few yards running forward even if it is not enough to move the chains. There was an alarming lack of effort and focus that has plagued the OL too. Even in Pop Warner we learned to block to the whistle, not block till you feel like stopping. Too many O-Linemen standing around watching Josh get pummeled. That being said, I took no exception to Van Demark taking his guy to the ground. When you are beat that is better than a weaka$$ hold that gets Allen killed and you still get the penalty. Too many play calls coming in late and confusion from that offensive staff. Seemed like Josh was waiting too long for those all night and struggled to hear a bit with the way he was covering the ear holes on his helmet. Also when we fans can see players hurt or clearly gassed, why can't the coaches. Several times guys I saw guys dinged on plays or clearly needing a sub and nada. No substitution and usually a poor play followed. This has been an inconsistent team and certainly not complimentary, but kudos to the ST coach and players that seemed to have decent game plans and the fire to compete the past few games. It's a bright spot, but there needs to be some shakeup from the coaches and core players this season. IMO I would have to see more than one or even 2 game sample of professional execution from players and the coaching staff before I start drinking the Kool aid again. Not just one group here and another group there somehow manages to find a desperate way to overcome another mistake-riddled performance.

Those WR screens are good for like -15 the past few games

We have had more than a few games where we will never know how much Allen and/or Cook could have run up a score With a faster start it would have likely ended up as another game where Allen watches from the bench while Trubuski mopped up.

True - his testing did reveal Testosterone and those are the known dangers. No argument here and will concede that is a preventable thing in an athletes' control.

Traditionally, the Bills have never been very good at stopping the run. We need players that can better anchor at 1-tech. We have Jones, but he isn't getting younger and each season gets dinged...likely a scenario that happens more vs less frequently. Folks are high on Walker, but as Jerry O. has mentioned perception has not quite matched reality. He is a rookie who is not there yet and needs to grow into the role, but shows some promise. They could use another young 1T to add to the rotation and depth whose strength is run stuffing over the penetration qualities they tend to prioritize. LB is an interesting take. Teams either have thumpers and as we have seen with TB they are great at filling gaps and stopping the run, but they cannot skate with TEs and RBs as receivers. The Bills prioritized smaller LBs with some speed, but they get blown up and injured when asked to take on blockers and tackle RBs...especially if your DL cannot anchor and be gap sound. Dorian is more of a thumper that does a great job as a spy mirror or playing downhill near the line. So we have some situational packages that may help hide the warts. Would be great if the Bills could find a unicorn at LB with size and speed and a knack for finding the right gap and finishing tackles. I think Taron's play has tailed off too and that has not helped and we may need an upgrade at nickel if Father time is just catching up to him.

That's our QB. Can't help but feel privileged to be watching NFL history being made, and records broken with our JA17.

The Bills have had more than their share of players that seem to have season tickets to the injury report and make you wonder if they are doing enough to earn that check. I do balance that tired injury-ridden Bills sentiment with accepting the tough breaks like we had with someone like Hoecht who did not want the cart, wanted to cheer the team on, and you could just feel how much he genuinely wanted to be out there.

With them playing 2 rookies on the DL, and Bosa banged up only able to use one hand, that line is really suspect right now. I was wondering why no one was sealing the edges only to learn that they were forced to use Sanders (a 3 tech) as a DE in the rotation. Explains why he looked lost attacking blocks and setting the edge... Looks like we are going to have to outscore folks in a boat race for any real chance against the better teams out there. That is assuming we can get past NE. Like the ghost of bad Christmas past seeing that team arise out of the smoking ashes of what was left after the Belichick and Brady era ended.

They just give us more savvy veterans options out there that can find space or get leverage on DBs. Add Kincaid to the mix and remember that all three of your RBs have good hands, can be part of the answer at receiver, and are lethal in space and they could break this offense out of it's self-imposed phone booth operation. It's not like running 13 personnel is terrible, but we have to be able to open things up more to setup those heavier sets. Also they need Kincaid in the mix and probably Palmer as the X receiver over Coleman.

I am pretty sure I saw Taron take out both Milano and a few others with a pick as he was sucked into some right to left pre-snap motion. He was mirroring left, took out Milano, and then that level was all tangled up as they tried to reverse course when the Bucs ran a sweep down the right side with no one there. Outside of the KC game (not sure who played or rotation then) that 2nd level has been a mess this year with guys being on the same page and I am not sure why. It is like watching keystone cops out there right now.

With how much lack of respect and cover 0 and press man coverage we were drawing with Coleman, Samuel, and Knox playing for Kincaid... And with teams stacking the box with safeties playing low commiting so much to stop the run, the Bills had to make them pay with some deeper downfield play. Amazing how much else opens up when you have someone who can get leverage on DBs deep in Davis and a great route runner like Palmer in the intermediate zones finding space.

His slow release from press coverage last week cost Allen an INT in Miami, but the kid has been on the team for a while and they have to be seeing something from him. Showed it today.

You are not wrong about the some of the head-scratching contracts Beane has handed out. More than a few given way early for his preferred picks and trades that have landed us with too much dead cap and not enough production.

I thought this debate was dead and buried 😁 We do need LBs or a LB that can fill the right gap, shed blocks, and stop the run and that was rarely Edmunds. The Bills do need to reevaluate what they need at LB, but better DL play in front of them would not hurt. Played most of the game on their heels on the wrong side of the LOS. And I have no idea what they were doing on the edges as there were so many plays where the DE went inside and our LBs were so pulled away by motion there was no one sealing the edge to turn plays back inside and the TB RBs were just jogging untouched down the field. It was a bit messy today.

Correcting offensive execution earlier in games is more what I was leaning into. Especially with how shakey our defense is trying to stop the run.

Verbatim from Josh's presser right out of the gate after being asked by Muki how was it out there for you? "After the first quarter it was really fun. Obviously, I want to start better. Bone-headed decision down there, I slid the protection the wrong way..." That's my QB and one of the things I love about Josh. Even if many on this board cannot face ANY critique on play execution from JA 17, he knows when he has a few bad plays and mans-up taking the ownership. He still has that fire to be the best QB he can be. And of course I want to see Allen having fun, seeing the field, hitting his receivers, playing loose, and having a lot of success too.

Yes. It is normal for starting-calibre QBs in the NFL to have good plays and bad plays and no QB is perfect. I agree.

Yes, he had some good plays and he had a string of bad plays. One does not negate the other, both can happen. That is what I call that.

So what do you call several offensive possessions where there is a string of bad QB play? Folks should be able to call bad execution for what it is.

Teams seem to be defending those pretty well. Brady keeps going to Shakir on that bubble screen in really high-leverage down and distance game situations and teams are just pouncing on it. We were fortunate that someone on the Bucs D had a case of the "stup" and grabbed his facemask - completely unnecessary. He was not going anywhere.

I won't try to convince some folks that Allen had a bad first half as for some reason they cannot come to terms with any bad play from 17, but he really came on towards the end of it and then took over in the 2nd half. When Allen gets hot he is a load for teams to handle, there is no contradiction. If the offense had a faster start they may have been able to bury TB and gotten them out of their run-heavy looks earlier. It was a game of polar swings for Allen and the offense - I will continue to call them the way I see them. There have been too many slow starts and with our suspect defense it could very well lead to problems if teams do not turn over the ball, get the lead, and play a run-heavy safe offense like Miami did to us a week ago which led to that "L" and all the soul-searching. My hope is that some of that slow start today was just shifting from so much 13 personnel into more 11 and 12 personnel and shotgun with WRs on our roster that have not had a lot of game reps with Allen this year with Kincaid and Colemen on the field for so many of the snaps. Perhaps it just took some time to get in sync with the new personnel emphasis and pieces. Greatful for the win, Go Bills!

No. He was awful for much of the first half - you can say it - it is not a sin. Being critical of some of Allen's play does not violate some kind of commandment and fans just need to get over the blind devotion. Allen is human and my guess is Allen would probably say the same thing, "I played like crap early and the defense bailed me out a few times..." or something along those lines. I have not listened to the pressers yet.

The way TB handled the end of the 1st half was a bit odd. I was not impressed by either defense and I guess the score board tells that story pretty well. It seemed more like a game where you just wait to see which offense makes the most mistakes taking the opportunities that were in front of them. I also did not see why TB felt forced to throw it in many sitations and they ended up with some costly TOs - particularly with the way they were running it against our D. Say what you want about Brady, but when we are running the ball well he keeps pounding the other team until they can prove they can stop it.

He had a bad 1st half, and if Allen and the offense had not woken up and turned it on in the 2nd half that would have been the game narrative. We should not pretend that first half and slow start did not happen. I am super glad they did wake up and there seems to be more answers for Allen with Coleman out and Palmer and Davis in the lineup. We also should be thankfull for the D limiting the Bucs to 3 when they were on the doorstep early when Allen threw that Int on our own 5 and also glad they got some timely turnovers although they were getting run through most of the game. Not sure how they are going to fix that, maybe some guys getting healthier? I think he and this offense have come out way too flat most of this season outside of a few games where the running game was cooking early allowing them to settle into control of the game. The execution has been poor, OL protection shakey, Allen's timing and passes have been off, and the offense seems stressed when teams have found a way to stuff our running game early. I was encouraged by how many open receivers I saw early even if Allen was not seeing the field very well then. Perhaps Daboll had the right idea to design a few early QB runs and let Allen pop the pads a bit. Used to really help him shake off the rust, quell the "yips", and get his head into the flow of the game. May help the OL wake up too with some read-option or pin and pull type runs where they have to lead block for their boy. A happy comfortable Josh is a much more productive Josh so let him do the things he needs to do early to get rolling.