CincyBillsFan

Using a combination of the stats and what I've seen watching the rookie QB's here's my take: 1) Baker Mayfield. Clearly leads the pack and passes the eye test. Has enough weapons to show that moxy in throwing the football gets rewarded in the NFL. Solid long term starter for Cleveland. 2) Tied at # 2 are Allen & Darnold. While both these guys have shown flashes of brilliance in their passing games they have also made some very bad throws. Darnold clearly has the edge in play makers so we're able to see his passing upside more clearly then Allen's. An example of this was in the Jet's game against GB. In a posted video you can see a jet TE make a spectacular one handed grab of a poorly thrown Darnold pass at the goal line. if you look closely you'll see a GB DB sitting there waiting for the INT which would have been made had this been a Bills TE. I also think there is a higher risk that both Allen & Darnold will fail then there is with Baker. On the other hand I believe that Darnold & Allen's upside are higher then Mayfield's 3) Jackson. This is a real interesting situation where we MIGHT be seeing a change in what defines effective QB play in the NFL. The key here is whether Jackson can pull this off over the long run. Jackson is also clearly playing on the best team of the rookie QB's and the Ravens have done a brilliant job of fitting the offense to his strengths. Jackson is not being asked to win games in the way that Mayfield, Darnold & Allen are. 4) Rosen. I think it's fair to say that Rosen has gotten off to the worst start of all the rookie QB's. Of course that doesn't mean he'll lose the race but he's undeniably behind. Part of this is clearly on the dumpster fire that is Arizona's offense. But any honest appraisal of the Bills offense would have to conclude that Allen is playing with just as odious a dumpster fire as Rosen. Of all the QB's Rosen has provided the fewest reasons to be optimistic. But it is early in Rosen's career and if the Cards put some weapons around him nobody can rule out that 2 years from now he could be at the top of this list.

But are you confident that with experience and proper coaching he will learn the difference between when to take the check down and when not to? I'm fully confident he will because by all accounts he's a smart guy. Arians also noted that Allen's stubbornness here reminded him of Andrew Luck and it took a full season for Luck to get it. BTW, I don't think Arians would compare a QB to Luck lightly. It's also possible that Allen recognizes at some level that his RB's & TE's are not going to make plays with check down throws. I thought it was interesting that when the Pats finally went into full prevent mode for Buffalo's last drive Allen hit 3 straight check down passes for good gains. Against the soft coverage that was exactly the thing to do and at that point I doubt the Pats were spying on Allen to much. In fact it makes me wonder if some (not all) of Allen's reluctance to check down during the game is that the opposition isn't giving him that choice. I mean when you can blanket a teams receivers with man to man coverage and generate a decent pass rush with 3 guys it leaves you a safety & LB to spy Allen. These guys also reduce the chance to hit the check down receiver as they're lurking about the LOS.

The article didn't convince me in the least. Football is a radically different game then Baseball. The emotional component of football alone IMO significantly diminishes any role that analytics can play. And as jabonas noted above, the gross difference in seasonal sample size make Analytics far less valuable a tool in football then baseball. Sure, analytics can narrowly be applied to some situations like when to go for 2 points or not but as for directing a teams talent acquisition and game planning - i'm not seeing it. And I'm not an old fart resistant to change - I fully recognize the effective use of analytics in a number of fields. I just don't think football is one of them. But I do see the attraction. It allows the average sports writer or commentator to pretend they're smarter then the coaches & GM's. I mean who can argue with numbers! It gives fans and sports writers the illusion of control in whether a player will or will not be successful. So I get that with the analytics folks players like Allen are a nightmare. He's like that power failure that wipes out their data set before they save it!

This post 100%. And note the last paragraph - plenty of tough but FAIR criticism of the bad throws Allen did make. Most of us who thought Allen played better then his stat line have also been very critical of the poor throws/decisions on Sunday. The difference though is we place his performance within the CONTEXT of the game and the fact that Allen is a rookie. To say this was a bad game by Allen is to ignore what actually happened on the field. IMO this was a mixed bag performance by Allen which is typical of rookie QB's with decent upside potential. Sure he made some poor decisions & throws but he also made some outstanding throws that put the ball where an NFL RECEIVER could and should make a play. That at least 3 TD's were left on the field through no fault of Allen's is enough proof to conclude that he did not have a bad day. The reason to be optimistic after this game is because IMO had there been a better cast of skill players on the field with Allen throwing the EXACT SAME PASSES we might have beaten the Pats. This is NOT coulda/woulda/shoulda thinking either. Next year with a season of LEARNING under Allen's belt and an upgraded WR/TE group we are going to sweep the Patriots.

I get that but by using them he's telling me that he buys into them. Look the stat we're interested in seeing IMO are how many catchable balls are not being caught. Sure dropping the ball is the easiest part of that to define but yesterday we saw two examples of VERY catchable balls not being caught for TD's. Throw in Fosters misplay at the goal line on the 4th & 4 throw and we're talking about 3 potential TD's being left on the field. But my biggest problem with a lot of these stats are that they don't do a good job of capturing what is happening on the field. It's like praising a RB for having a 5 YPC average in a game where he carried the ball 16 times for 80 years with one of the plays being an 80 yard run. I just don't think Football lends itself to analytics in the same way that baseball does.

If this is how they keep that stat then it's a completely worthless stat. If the ONLY definition of a drop is a chest high ball that goes off the hands then this is not the NFL but HIGH SCHOOL FOOTBALL. Guys like Rodak fall in love with their metrics while completely ignoring what goes on in the game. So out of curiosity what would you call the Foster sun blinding? Sure it's not a classic drop but come on. Or how is the pass that went right through the hands of Thomas at the goal line NOT a drop? This is why I don't trust analytics in football. They suck in accurately describing what's going on.

Fair points and I don't disagree and BTW thanks for the links because it makes it a hell of a lot easier to read the stories from one location then digging them up and dealing with the various pay walls! I suspect that both the rush to defend AND attack Allen comes from the same emotional stand point for us Bills fans. The last 20 years have sure taken a toll on all of us. Hell, even during the glorious Super Bowl years we never actually won one. But the last 20 years have been especially brutal with the playoff drought. Hell the ONLY reason we made the playoffs last year was a miracle play by Andy Dalton. And let's be honest - if you had to distill all this down to the 2 key factors for why we've struggled for so long it would be COACHING & QB PLAY. That's it in a nutshell and so every year Bills fans tend to cluster into 2 groups with respect to their reaction to the QB & Coach: * The Hate Allen Army (& the Hate MacDermitt Army) are the pessimists who through harsh experience have learned to never trust the new QB or Coach. That in the end they'll be let down. Like a guy who has married multiple times with every marriage ending in bitter divorce they vow to never LOVE again! They focus a microscope on any failings by the QB & Head Coach and desperately look around for their successor who they lavish over the top praise on until they to disappoint them. It becomes an endless cycle of misery leading to such things as drunken table smashing on YouTube! * In contrast the Allen Bunker Brigade are made up mostly of optimists. We want Allen & MacDermitt to succeed because they have to. If they don't we're back to square one and face another couple of years of futility. And when a QB like Allen does flash elite POTENTIAL we seize on that and hope for the best. Because if this time we are right and he is the guy at QB we're back in the playoff hunt which is when the NFL is truly fun to follow. Sure being balanced and open minded and not being to negative or to positive would probably be the best approach to these things. But football is an EMOTIONAL game often fueled by alcohol so you just don't get a lot of moderation in the views about these two critical positions on a football team. Though I think the Allen Bunker Brigade is far more balanced but I digress. I do know that for me it's a lot more fun to root for these guys and be optimistic that yes we have our head coach and QB for years to come then to be looking at every flaw under a microscope. Just like during the Super Bowl years I would have been good with losing 10 of those games as long as we had a chance to play in them. Getting there was always 99% of the FUN!

And lets not forget that drop by Thomas of a perfectly thrown ball at the goal line. Taken together this is way to many drops and missed opportunities by our receivers. As an aside if forced to grade Allen I would say he was between a C+ & B- yesterday. Those 2 INT's were bad and he needs to get that out of his system. So like a lot of us who support Allen on 2BD we are fully aware that he has a lot of work to do. But put just average NFL skill players around Allen and IMO he would have more TD's then INT's this season and he would already have a 300 yard game and the Bills would have 2 - 3 more wins.

Reading these and several other sports writers takes this morning reveals a similar pattern: First they say that Allen had a poor day and a couple of the articles claim he "regressed". Fair enough based on the numbers but not so fair based on actually watching the game. Then at the end of the article they throw out comments about how there were a lot of drops and that Allen's skill players didn't help him out. In one article the writer graded Allen as a C- (I would have given him a grade of C+) and then the writer gave the WR's & TE's an F grade! Now think about that for a moment. Aren't the 2 related? If the receivers were so bad they earned an F doesn't that go a long way towards explaining Allen performance? Take Sal's point in the article above about Allen having a very poor 1st half completing 7/16 passes for 48 yards and a pick. Fair enough because Allen did look shaky in the 1st half (likely due to the Hoodies screwing with him on D) but did it occur to Sal & company that those two early drops had an impact on Allens confidence? He is a rookie. Sal mentions that Allen's stats would have looked better had McKenzie caught his pass and Foster found his - you think! If you add up those two missed plays then Allen has 95 more yards passing and a TD. So his 1st half stats go to 9/16 for 143 yards with 1 TD and 1 IT - not to shabby!

This is my take to. To be clear Allen was not good yesterday but IMO he wasn't bad either. It seemed like a classic rookie QB game in which on one series the QB looks like crap then on the next series he looks like an all pro. The problem was that on those series where Allen was "hot" his receivers were terrible. Taking into account the passes that should have been caught and would have been caught on MOST NFL teams Allen should have ended up throwing 2 - 3 TD's; 2 INT's and close to 300 yards passing. Then we would all be in agreement that he had an up & down day but the positives slightly outweighed the negatives.

That's not fair 26CornerBlitz. There have been plenty of posts from the Allen Bunker Brigade indicating that Allen needs to improve his game and that he made some bad throws today. But when certain posters focus only on those bad throws to claim he's a bust while ignoring the poor WR & TE play what do you expect? I think the Allen Bunker Brigade has a lot more balanced take on the rookie QB then the Hate Allen Army! We fully acknowledge what he's doing poorly while pointing out the good stuff. All I know is that when I watch the NFL's better QB's in action there are times when I think I wish Allen was that smooth or I wish Allen would make that kind of a decision or had that exquisite touch on his passes. But I find that it's not all that often that I feel this way. In contrast I'm constantly thinking "why can't our WR's & TE's get open like that" or "why can't our skill players make tough catches look routine" or "why can't our RB's take that dump off pass and turn a 5 yard gain into a 15 yard gain"?

That's how I saw today's game to. In spite of Allen running hot & cold and having some poor throws he put the ball in or near the hands of his play makers and they didn't make plays. Saying this is not letting Allen off the hook for his poor throws. But damn his stats simply don't reflect all the good throws he makes that end up on the turf because his guys are not making plays.

Perfect quote. But isn't it telling that beyond Foster no other Bill's skill player starts for the Jets? And the Jet's are only average on offense.

I just watched that amazing one handed catch by the Jet's TE and if he doesn't make that catch it's a sure INT at the goal line.

Oh my goodness was that a great catch! And did you notice how if he doesn't grab that thing out of the air with one hand it's probably intercepted at the goal line! So again I ask who among our TE's starts ahead of this guy for the Jets?

I'm not saying they're great but I would again ask who among Buffalo's skill players starts on the Jets? It's Foster and no one else IMO. And given that the Jet's aren't exactly loaded on offense what does that say about our collection of skill players?

This is something I think we all can agree on.

IMO the only Buffalo skill position player that would break into the NY Jet's starting lineup would be Foster and that would be as the #2 or #3 WR. No other Bill would make it on the field. If you think differently I would be curious as to which other Bills skill player would start (or even get significant playing time) on the Jet's offense. And while we're on the topic how many of Buffalo's O-lineman would start for the Jet's? By my count only one would. And if I'm right here and I think I am doesn't that tell you ALL you need to know about the differences between Darnold & Allen's numbers?

I disagree. With decent WR's AND TE's Allen would have better numbers then Darnold. Of the rookie QB's only Mayfield is even remotely accomplished. The rest of them require a lot of work which is entirely expected. And while Allen isn't laboring under quite the dumpster fire that Rosen is in Arizona, it's close. And for sure Jackson has the advantage of QBing a playoff caliber team and Darnold does have more weapons.

I agree with you with one caveat - he doesn't have the check down players that can make that a profitable play over the course of a game. But yea, Arian's was actually pretty funny talking about how Allen was being hard headed in passing up the dump offs and trying to force it downfield. He kept comparing Allen's stubbornness with Andrew Luck's when he first entered the league. But I think this is a relatively easy fix. Allen is a smart guy and the Bill's staff will walk him through EVERY pass play this season and show him how many times he could have dumped it off for 5 yards on 1st or 2nd down and had a much easier 3rd down conversions to make. The other thing is we need to upgrade the TE & RB positions so that the dump offs can be big plays with the right guys getting the ball. Oh what I wouldn't give for a Komarra or McCaffrey type RB!

You won't this year unless the Dolphins mail it in big time. There just aren't the quality play makers on the Bills offense to do it. Hell today's game could have been a barn burner like the Jets game had the Bills play makers actually made some plays. It's not like Allen didn't give them the opportunity.

I would say his game was bi-polar today which is what you see a lot from rookie QB's. On the one hand he had some poor throws and the INT's were bad throws & decisions. But on the other hand he made some terrific throws and he showed decent pocket awareness & good escapability. And while I may be beating a dead horse to death here I think the issues with his WR's & TE's go way beyond not helping him out today. The impact on a game of leaving a couple of TD's on the field and fumbling at the Pats 5 yard line were huge. Just imagine the confidence & momentum that were squandered here. how is this game different if Foster snags that pass for an 82 yard TD? Allen had an average game IMO yet with a little help from his WR's & TE's the Bills may have won this game and Allen might have busted through 300 yards and had 2 - 3 TD passes. I know it's coulda/woulda/shoulda but I'm watching all these other NFL games where TE's & WR's routinely make the plays that the Bill's guys didn't.

I really do believe that even today we saw more good things from Allen then bad things. Some folks have compared this game to the GB game. But I don't see it. Allen was much more composed in the pocket and while his 2 INT's were bad they were no where near as bad as the picks he had against the Packers. And when the Packers game ended I don't recall a half dozen big plays/TD plays being left on the field by our WR's & TE's. Unlike in GB, Allen was getting the ball to his play makers. the problem is they wern't making any plays.

This is such a true comment. Facing press coverage the WR's did not make the plays they needed to downfield. And yes, the more Allen presses the riskier his passes become. And why take the check down pass to a stable of RB's who can't break a tackle or make a defender miss? And they were BRUTAL drops. Because they occurred at critical times in the game. The McKenzie drop and Foster not finding that deep pass happened early in the game when the Bills had a chance to get out front and establish some momentum. Then at several points in the games after the D got a TO and we were moving the ball drops kept us from making it a game and recapturing momentum. Allen has improved since week 1. Sure it's an uneven process but the trajectory is clearly in the right direction.

What a complete crock from Thad Brown. It's not about excuses with most of us. We're more then willing to admit that Allen has plenty of room to improve. We also freely accept that today was an average day for him. The problem is that this sports writer IGNORES all the big plays left on the field by our under-performing WR's & TE's. He calls out the McKenzie drop as the only mistake by these guys that can't be argued? Are you kidding me! The long pass to Foster wasn't a "good deep throw" it was a great read followed by an EXCELLENT deep throw. What does an 82 yard TD pass there do for the offenses & Allen's confidence and the the outcome of this game? 82 dropped a "tough catch"? BS - that was a very catchable ball in the NFL. Sure even had his WR's & TE's made the plays today that they should have Allen would still have thrown some bad balls and he would still have a lot of work to do. He's a rookie for crying out loud. But if his skill players actually made plays today we would have had an exciting game to watch, Allen's stats would have looked a lot better and most importantly we may have beat the Pats!