WideNine

Yeah...the biggest knock on Shelvin has always been the weight, not so much his play.. The Bills would just put him on the Epenesa diet plan and shrinky-dink him down to a stocky TE in a year 😁

I think it is a bit early for Meinerz, but the kid has a lot of upside and I can see him going early even though he's a bit of a project. He did so surprisingly well at the Senior Bowl that he got a lot of press too so there is the "noticed" factor. Still a bit of a reach...

I like Fairburn's Bills articles on the Athletic. They have the depth of someone who actually watches the Bills closely not just parroting what others are saying. I recalled that someone asked this same question about investing in locking up Edmunds a while back in his "mailbag" and thought his response mirrors much of what has been said in our own dialogue on this topic. "Right now, I don’t think I would. Of course, the Bills have another year to decide on that. A lot of this will come down to what Edmunds and his agents want that second contract to look like. I don’t think he’s played well enough to warrant a market-setting contract at linebacker. He’s not a consistent game changer in that way, at least not yet. He could become that type of player, but it’s not what we’ve seen so far. If Edmunds looked like he did in the Ravens game more often, it would be an easy choice to sign him to a second contract. But these negotiations could get complicated when you consider that Edmunds’ potential hasn’t matched up with the reality on the field quite often enough. That’s not to say it can’t happen, but you asked me to make the decision today. I’d spend the money elsewhere." So we are back to where Beane probably is sitting... a key year to evaluate Edmunds and determine if he wants to lock him up long term and if so, for how much?

I like Meinerz and Shelvin. Tough choice as both have the upside to shore up either side of the ball after some development. Took Shelvin as I feel like our oline struggled at times against the better front 4's, but interior defensive line play was a more consistent issue affecting the play of our entire defense. Also if we can get more stops from our defense it can take some of the heat off the offense to have to carry the team when they are struggling to move the ball. Still, I like the Meinerz kid. He will need some technique work, but shows a strong base and leverage. Good material to start with and great olineman name.

Prob most situations as it was a balance between decent pass coverage while keeping an extra man in the box in run support. The defense did get a bit better later in the season at filling gaps and forcing RBs to try to bounce it outside as well as maintaining gap integrity and limiting cut-back opportunities against stretch zone blocking, but stopping the run came at a price. The price was how well play-action worked to freeze or draw in our extra run defenders leaving the middle of the field open to tight ends and shallow crossers... we were easy pickings. Also our better run defenders tended to be gassed by the 3rd qtr and we would give up more runs. Our defense was usually able to slow the better more-balanced teams down, but struggled actually stopping them or getting off the field. Better coached teams also did not mind not having the deep play and milking the play clock the whole game keeping Allen cooling his heels and frustrated.

Taron came on last year in Nickel coverage after I was pretty down on him early. Had no idea he had the wheels he had until I watched him outrun everyone on Baltimore's offense on that 101 yard pick. Still would like to see him stay healthy for a whole year, but he has some dog in him and does not mind sticking guys with a head of steam so there is always a chance he'll get dinged again. Love the toughness and grit, just hope he can hold up.

It's a pass-heavy league. Most teams are in Nickel personnel on most snaps. But leading the league...could mean we gave up more chunk plays for conversion and/or faced less 3rd and short or 3rd and goal situations where we would sub in our bigger package. Or we may have gone less dime in a prevent defending a close lead. Not sure I would read too much into that stat.

Well...there have been a few that the fans spotted early that OBD took their sweet time moving on from. QB Nathan INT-Machine Peterman WRs Zay "stone-hands" Jones of the 0 separation. And Kelvin "Eff-It" Benjamin - lazy routes, poor effort, and alligator-armed catching radius. Now Edmunds is not like these team washouts, but he has been inconsistent and you would like to see iterative improvement year over year. Hence the debate about locking him up long-term or could the Bills find a better fit at the position? Personally, I always want to see the players the team has invested in succeed, but there are times that it is best for the team or player to move on. We will see how this plays out and I sincerely hope Edmunds lights it up and makes me eat plenty of crow.

I believe this to a degree as well. Josh cares almost too much and at times puts too much on his shoulders when the stands are full of Bills fans. I think a year away from that with just crowd-noise pumped in probably helped him to focus on the defensive fronts/coverage, go through his progressions, and leverage the weapons Daboll schemes free. Also it really limited the number of Sugar-High Josh episodes. He may not have been calm (not sure that ever applies to Allen), but he was focused and his joy playing the game was infectious - you could tell they were having fun out there more often than not. After eliminating NE's slim playoff chances the week prior, he delivered a complete 38-9 thumping of NE in Gillette that swept the Patriots finally removing that monkey off our backs. That alone was a huge accomplishment to me. The lack of crowds and his pre-game Sinatra music probably helped cap some of that pre-game adrenaline and helped him take some of the heat off those early throws too. From all reports Allen is just uber-competitive from tiddly winks, ping-pong, horse-shoes, to golf Allen is driven to win. It will likely be a long career before he settles into a more lunch-box approach to leading this team. But I think we can all agree that it is better to have someone that has that fire in his belly than someone that is just going through the motions and collecting his NFL check. As stated in a few replies to the OP, all QB's shared this same empty-stadium advantage and Josh still tore up the league so - meh. Just a fish fan insecure about the prospect of facing a few decades of Allen domination.

I think the Rams run a 3-4 as their base with a NT, but regardless Donald sees a ton of double-teams and it is amazing that he is still such a disruptive force. He is a unique talent. Huge shoes for any defensive lineman to try to fill, but Oliver will be able to shine more if we can get a better NT/1-Tech to draw the double teams.

On every team your SS and MLB normally lead in team tackles. DL are covered by OL, DBs have coverage assignments, FS is your deep insurance. Those positions have the most off the ball flexibilty and opportunities to make or get in on tackles. Once again, what many notice is Edmunds missing his gaps or simply whiffing on tackles on plays coming at him. What Edmund does possess is great sideline to sideline speed and the ability to chase down just about anyone, but that usually means we gave up yards. I am not the only one that sees this and I have zero against the kid. Just not there on investing pro-bowl money on a long-term deal.

Number of tackles is a deceiving stat if taken alone. How many tackles trailing plays?How many tackles for a loss? You miss your gap, or take a bad angle, fail to shed your block, but have the recovery speed and range to chase the play down...AFTER a team makes yards or converts. This is the key difference between reactive and instinctual play from that Mike position. It's not that much of an enigma.

Other than his instincts diagnosing plays, hitting the right gaps, taking the right leverage, defending passes, shedding blocks and tacking he was pretty awesome last season. He is a physical freak and an enigma. The enigma is that for some games he will come out and play smart, sound, and aggressive - I will not take that away from him. He also played through a very painful injury, so I am not going to question his heart. Coaches and most fans see the player he could be, then for multi-game stretches he is a non-factor, or a liability.... I just don't get it, but mostly I think he just struggles with his instincts/diagnosing plays. That would explain being in poor position to beat blocks, taking the wrong gaps, the bad angles, falling for misdirection and fake moves, the late arrivals on the scene and the poor arm tackling. Players that can quickly diagnose plays look more aggressive simply because they anticipate and knock down passes or are slipping around blocks before they are setup and can get in the backfield or they help turn plays back into pursuit or blow them up before they can gain any traction. Tough one - you would think after so many years playing that position for the Bills coupled with the film study that the mental part of the game would kick in for the kid.

I also feel like Daboll had McKenzie on the back-burner a lot and he is in that quick-twitch smaller speedster range. Will adding another guy with similar traits mean more plays designed to use him? I understand the issue around TE and not having that dual pass-catching/blocking threat that limited Knox's role, but Isaiah's limited use was always a head-scratcher for me. Seemed like a playmaker whenever he got the ball.

Also covering TEs was a problem all season and really noticeable against KC. Not sure if was role limitations within the scheme that prevented the Bills from matching up with the right personnel, or the lack of player(s) with that ability. Pressure and coverage.... a corner opposite White and shoring up their 1-tech position would help too. They should be able to address the 1-T position in later rounds, but there is usually a run on good DB's. I give up trying to guess which direction Beane is going to go in the 1st. He has surprised me each year and his penchant for moving around with trades makes it hard to pin his draft position.

True that it is rare to see a team spend 1st round draft capital on an interior OL player, although there was Quinton Nelson and more than a few centers that have gone in the 1st. My focus was more on our future center position and although Feliciano filled in admirably I still have visions of his turnstile play against KC's Jones. The Bills have to be able to match up better against those better 4-man fronts to take the next step. If Eichenberg could back up Dawkins that would be awesome. I avoided posting all those nightmare Dawkins scenarios although they were there in the back of my mind - I am superstitious that way. If Eichenberg has that inside/outside flexibility he would fit the O-line player mold Beane values. Speaking of the Colts and Nelson, reading one of Eichenberg's draft profiles they made a strong case that Indy could take a shot at him. Made some sense pairing him up with Nelson, shoring up their LT position with the loss of Costanzo, and prioritizing protecting the shell-shocked Wentz and easing him into his role with them to see if he can turn his NFL career around.

Normally I agree with this at G, but with Morse one head-slap away from another concussion and nearing the end of his contract coupled with his weaker power scheme blocking, and the Feliciano struggled blocking at the guard position as well against better teams. I think their priority is shoring up the middle starting-caliber players this offseason. Josh's comfort avoiding the rush and extending plays with his legs often hid the less stellar pass-pro at times, but overall I think against MOST teams our pass protection held up although Josh held the ball longer and struggled finding the open man against teams did not need to send the 5th rusher; However our consistently poor run-blocking even against 4-man fronts was an indictment of our line's capabilities and prevented us from forcing some teams out of that alignment. Any team is going to have a drop off if they lose their starting LT, but I think this year we go after that G/C starting caliber player they can ease behind Morse and Feliciano who can start to back them up or take emergency snaps in a pinch with an eye to eventually taking over one of those positions. Ford may come back and prove himself at G, but I do not see a replacement for Morse on our roster although Felliciano was able to fill in on spot duty and did not screw up snapping the ball even out of the shotgun which was a pleasant surprise. Either way, I do not see any of the o-line FA's Beane brought in as anything more than competition, but I thought the same about Williams who recovered much of his past form. We will see...

It IS a weird feeling. So many offseasons on the treadmill of futility. Just wondering what moves our Bills would make to at least try to match up better against the Patriots and pull off their usual average .500 record. I gave up hope that we would make another playoff in my lifetime let alone have an exciting QB and offense.

Yeah..... that does not work well with the crazy, violent folks on the street. Trust me on this - especially if you have young kid(s) with you. I usually would not have even turned around, but I could hear him closing in and like the famous line from Hunter S. Thompson. It is easy to presume a lack of empathy from those that live in the urban areas where this is an issue, but it has more to do with survival experience and knowing that the best way to deescalate the crazy is to not engage it in the first place. I do regularly buy sandwiches and gateraid for a few homeless that hang out near where I live, but they are harmless folks that I have come to recognize. Wrong forum to do a serious dive into the topic so I will leave it there.

I do think Phillips got off his blocks and played the run better down the stretch. I don't see him as that guy that demands the double team that frees up our guys at the 3-tech position. That, and Star is in his last year and the Bills will also have to decide whether they want to pick up Harry's 5th year option next year too. I don't see Beane letting himself get painted into that same corner he did last season when they were counting on Star's return and he opted out. I think he will add some depth and competition at the position this year. We will see - just my take.

Thanks. Thought I had a stalker like that crazy homeless dude that chased my family for a few blocks yesterday armed with a can of beans. The wife's idea of a safe neighborhood to visit with our little girl. Another fun day with the fam.... I am still exhausted today. Had just bought a dozen doughnuts for my elderly neighbors and the place uses hot pink boxes and they are easy to spot. He kept following us and yelling f***ing bi*** give me a doughnut! I told the wife to keep going and turned to confront him. He paced around screaming, then finally decided to chuck his can of beans at me. Good violent throw, but no accuracy:) Where's the po-po when I need them? Kept thinking I was going to have to actually grab this crazy, nasty dude and beat him and likely need some kind of antibiotics and shots later. He finally backed off. Chilling today in my boring suburbs on my nice, safe, quasi-normal Bills site eating most of the doughnuts - the neighbors can fight for their own box.

Nice job gunner. Would be great if we could nab that bookend corner and if that OT can play inside I like it. I feel better about our current tackles than guard and center, and think this draft may be about finding those future replacements for Star and Morse. Appreciate the effort pulling this together.

I remember there were a few folks here arguing that it was an illegal block... there was just no way. Bad call and surprised someone in their officiating org admitted as much - uncharacteristic and water under the bridge. I may be in the minority, but I thought that overall the officiating was a bit better last year. They decided to limit the holding calls on linemen altogether and the games had a bit more continuity rather than drawn out flag fests. I thought that was a win as those subjective calls rarely seemed to fall our way enough with Hughes getting mugged every other play on D and often killing any big play we made on O.

Curious. When you see "unread replies" in red under EVERY post you make is that some TBD stalker you have blocked?

I think he is referring to an article about Beane's drafting strategy that was on the Bills site. "When we want to acquire someone, seeing if there's a guy that I think fits a need and the value, that's probably where some people maybe think I get too aggressive in the draft," said Beane. "But if there's a guy that I think is a real sure fit – If I overpaid a little bit, so be it. It's better than waiting, sitting on my hands and I'm not really fired up about a guy when my pick comes up. That's just my viewpoint, that may not be 31 other GMs but that's how I see it."