WideNine

Ugly and not the best ref crew as they really were overly officious and ticky tacky calls disrupted much of what our offense likes to do. Much of those holding calls on our receivers blocking on the perimeter were just weak. Give the Aints some credit as they had more sideline to sideline speed than I gave them credit for and our quasi-bubble screen game and reverses were blown up quickly. The Bills went after their rookie DB Riley and he made plays when they needed them on pretty good Allen throws. We got away from our gap running game a bit I think to try to go up two scores and put a fork in them, but that took us away from Cook and the running game that was working and played into how they were dropping back into coverage and a surprisingly effective pass rush. I thought our pass pro was pretty weak this game and Van Demark had a rough game. There is a drop off from Spencer and for a kid that was coming on strong 2 years ago, you can see why he was getting beat out by Grable before Grable got injured and placed on IR. Defense has been lack-luster, kept the Saints in the game with some poor tackling and effort early. Gave up multiple 3rd downs and still struggle with stops in the red zone. They tightened things up down the stretch but still a long ways to go before they strike fear into any opponent. Allen's angry run seemed to wake the entire team up from what looked like a game they were sleep-walking thru. He is the inspirational leader and soul of this team without question.

Man.... put away the flags already. They are killing this game and you cannot convince me that the Saints are playing that clean. Do these guys have money on the over/under.... calling everything on the Bills false starts on long snappers and on kickoffs. WTH

Allen wakes them up from their "sleep walking"

We certainly did not get the "A" crew.... these are the guys they send to a game that they don't think will mean much to the Bills and not be much of a network draw.

I noticed more than a few of our players slipping the past few home games. Odd, as I would think our equipment folks would be all over that and what works best on that field...

Van Demark is having a bad game, but that is probably lack of reps and knowing Torrence's habits like sticking his right foot way back and having to pull deep enough to avoid it. Was a strange call and Rattler is looking like an all pro against this defense. Bosa is looking gassed out there, but they cannot get off the field and that has been the book on our D.

The "bend and break" defense. We have not had a top-tier defense for several seasons although they have leaned into a lot of investment on that side of the ball. Hard to justify when you have a defensive coach, although I think McDermot is a great overall Team HC who is responsible for building great consistency within the franchise. Gotta look at coaching and player development at some point. They went all in on giving Babich more coaching help and investing in players on that side of the ball... expect it will take time for all that to gel, but understandable that fans are getting tired of mediocrity on the defensive side of this team.

Agreed - it works for the players we have... takes advantage of their best traits, hides some warts we have in pass-pro and it is a winning recipe for this team and keeping Josh clean and the D fresh. It works. If the Bills pickup a world-beater receiver someday that can take the top off of defenses then they can dabble with that deep strike game.

Ticky tacky calls really weak on those WR blocks.

We all know where White's game is struggling and of course he knows why QBs named Rattler are testing his ability to skate with recievers, but that was a good break on the ball and nice veteran read from Tre.

I think they were going for the dagger with those deep tosses and passing plays and got themselves out of the rhythm that was working with the run. Gotta get back to what was working.

Weak officials that sucking the life out of this game.

The need to slow this rush - Brady is calling this game like they are behind and have to throw to catch up. Get back to the north/south run game a bit to slow things down and keep the rush honest - right now they are not playing like they expect run. Crowding the line and dropping guys into coverage.

They definitely cannot leave him on an island and they had a lot of film that should have told them that he needs help bracketing receivers. You don't have to ask where's Waldo when on most of the critical conversions the opposing teams are going after Tre. Love what he did for the team, hate what injuries did to his career and such a great Bills player, but he just cannot hang with a lot of receivers out there. They need to work in one of their rookies and just take the lumps of rookie mistakes and let him learn on the job that way they are in better shape later in the year depth wise. The safe route is predictable, but they must know what they are going to give up game over game.

For all the talk about fundimentals from McDermot, his defenses can be wildly inconsistent with basic tackling. Some games they are on, and some games they are a collection of bad angles and weak arm tackle attempts. Not sure what he needs to do to change this as it has been a bit of a hallmark of our Bills defenses during his tenure. Some games there is the energy, good angles, and sticking the solo tackles and then there are games where it is a clown show of poor tackling. Hopefully they can adjust in game today and get their act together so we don't have to wait till their next game and I am sure remedial coaching and yelling to get them back to tackling.

I knew Hawes could catch the ball, but had him pegged as more the blocking TE who would be a plodding outlet option. I was fine with that and the kid just helping us move the chains occasionally. So of course Brady has the kid running the seam route and Allen rips one to him...good for him. Love it when our players prove me wrong and outperform expectations and now teams have to account for a strong blocker that can also get down field when needed.

Perhaps someone else keyed in on this, but in the Baltimore game the Ravens took advantage of our normal defensive practice of pre-snap defensive movement - where we disguise coverage, simulate pressures or blitz looks, by snapping the ball quickly before our defense was even set. So, some of our defensive confusion was self-inflicted. Just listening to Taron's comments on the Bills presser and he said that Miami caught them a few times with quick snaps as well. It is a copy-cat league, but getting the defense set before the offense is ready to snap the ball seems like the easy button to at least some improvements while we work through coaching changes and the growing pains of some youth on our line.

Interesting - overall a pretty strong unit. I feel like Brown has struggled a bit at RT this season and hoping he is not having back issues again. The rest of the pressures I thought were coming up the middle between McGovern and Torrence, which seem more about exchanges and Torrence getting to the right spots and at the right time. Edwards I have seen put on skates or his backside a few times if he gets caught playing a bit high. Surprised to see Van Pran Granger so low on the published depth chart as folks were pretty high on him, his ceiling, and his work ethic coming out of Georgia and I thought we would see him worked in to take more reps to back up center and guard. If they have a succession plan that involves promoting this kid I would think we would start to see more of him. We will see. I guess he did see some action in mop-up duty against the Jets so maybe they are just taking it slow.

Yeah, remember when the team (probably after consulting our o-line staff) sent Teller to the Browns only for the kid to be a pro bowl or pro bowl alternate multiple times. Sure, we white wash that move with the fact that the picks we got from the browns were packaged for Diggs, but that group of coaches had no clue what they had in Teller. Feel like the staff we have now are better at evaluating and coaching up O-line talent.

Reminds me of one of the keys to the Patriots dynastic run - they kept their amazing O-line coach Scarnecchia. I think he coached for them for 19-20 years and even towards the end when he wanted to leave, they kept begging to stay on their staff. When you get a good one, do the right thing and hold onto the guy.

Agree...the main issues I have with our defense is 3rd down defense and allowing scores in the red zone. It seems a good chunk of those conversions is their decision to keep Tre on an island against better receivers (Miami) and inexperience on the line staying gap sound on short yardage runs. And we just don't match up very well against Baltimore, but we could match up better if we get defensive pieces back and they stay somewhat healthy down the stretch. These are areas they could definitely address more with the player upgrades that are currently sidelined and better managing snap counts for Tre and our rookie DL additions down the road. With the coaching additions nothing beats live game snaps and film to get guys on the same page. I expect execution to improve to.

Have to admit that it is a bit confusing with the way refs have traditionally signaled 1st downs.

Easy enough thing to avoid and I am less concerned about the fines which (as folks have pointed out) do not really have much of an impact on player salary and go to charity, but more concerned about when those end up as 15-yard penalties during a game wiping out long gainers and scores. I recall Kincaid did that gesture last year on a critical 3rd down conversion and I was just cringing waiting for the yellow hanky. Dumb rule or not, it is on the coaches to get players to play within the structure of the rules and to strongly discourage "the dumb" of self-inflicted penalties. Especially ones where the in-game penalty call seem largely at the discretion of whatever referee crew we end up having during a critical game as those calls tend to be the momentum-swinging kind that drive me nuts.

Well the INTs are down and overall I am sure the sacks too as Josh was holding the ball so long under Dorsey, but he took a few uncharacteristic sacks this game. I think those may have a bit more to do with Brady mixing in more under center and shallower drops and occasional pistol formation concepts rather than the usual shotgun. We have had a lot of success with mixing in those formations, but I imagine there is less room if Allen has to go off script and a bit easier for a d-line to have an effective cage rush. Just speculating, but would be an interesting stat for someone to lookup.

Miami defenders get paid too and their leading solo tacklers I believe were Dodson and Rasul Douglas...players the Bills let walk. Maybe they had something to prove being sent to a team of mediocracy and controversy and seeing all the positive coverage for the Bills? How many plays did the Bills have that were just one defender away from breaking it to the house? With key defensive pieces not in our lineup I am taking their current performance with a grain of salt. That being said, Babich leaving Tre on an island with no help against good receivers on critical downs in order to send or drop the extra man is not working... especially in the red zone. Every team will take that lay up.