CincyBillsFan

I am an Ohio State fan and I like Hancock. But right now Bishop is the better option with a higher upside. And I don't understand all the hate directed at Bishop. Sure he's had to many injuries which limited his development last season and this season. And it may turn out he's injury prone which would be a shame as the Bills would have to move on from him. But I thought he was solid and AVAILABLE late last season & during the playoffs. It's not easy playing safety on a team with a poor pass rush.

Correct me if I'm wrong but I don't recall McD declaring Bishop the starter at safety. We all thought that he had the inside angle for the job but did McD ever make it official? So to me there is nothing unusual for him to remind EVERYONE that the competition for that safety spot is still open. Basic football coaching 101. As for Bishop the situation is actually simple: if he stays healthy and is able to fully practice over the next 3 weeks he's got the job.

As for Bishop let's see how the next 3 weeks of practice go. If he's able to practice fully he will be fine for opening day and I suspect you will see that jump in performance the Bills are expecting. If he can't practice fully and misses multiple practices then we have a big problem on our hands. No point in worrying about what might happen until it does happen.

The Bears had multiple reasons to play well. They obviously scripted their opening TD drive after taking the ball on winning the coin flip. There's been a lot of negative noise coming out of the Bears training camp about the QB & new coach not being on the same page. Bottom line is when one team needs to win the game in preseaon it almost always turns into a head scratching blowout of the better team. The best way to describe last nights game was that it looked like how the Bills have played their final preseason game over the last few years. A lot of marginal and likely to be cut players right from the get go. The difference was that unlike previous years Chicago did not reciprocate and played their starters and key back ups the entire first half.

And 2 years ago we were down to the Steelers 27 - 0 going into the 4th quarter of that preseason game. Are the people panicking over this loss thinking that the Patriots are Super Bowl bound with their 2 - 0 PS start? After all they beat a good Washington team 48 - 14 and led 27 - 0 at half. The most interesting thing about last nights game was that since McD became head coach the Bills have always used the 2nd to last preseason game to get the starters 1 - 2 quarters of playing time. Yesterday they completely abandoned that.

He wasn't in long enough to look bad. IMP the TD pass was on Andressan as he didn't drop into coverage leaving the inside move wide open to the Chicago WR. Not sure very many safeties could have stuck with him on that play. Bishop had two decent tackles once jumping a short pass. Given that it was the Bears 1st team O running a regular season scripted opening drive offense against the Bills 2nd & 3rd string D playing pure vanilla coverage I can't see that we learned much about Bishop's play in that one series.

Actually it isn't given how the two teams have approached the game. The Bills have played this game like they typically play their last preseason game. I assume it's a choice and related to changes in how they approach this preseason versus previous preseasons.

Don't forget that when your 2's go against their 1's in the 1st quarter then you get a lot of your 3's going against their 2's in the 2nd quarter. A recipe for 28 - 0 half.

Putting on my tin foil hat seems like the Bills have one of these games each preseason. Maybe McD sets it up so they flounder allowing him to get after guys,

EVERYONE in the Bills secondary has played poorly. So either every Bill in the secondary not named White, Benford, Johnson & Rapp suck,which is not likely, or what we are seeing is meaningless preseason play. Also, Bishop still has a lot to learn as a pass defender but he's light years (IMO) ahead of the other safety's not named Johson & Rapp in run support.

The Pittsburgh game 2 years ago. The Bills were down 21 - 0 at half and 27 - 0 after 3. And they played their starters including Allen for a quarter.

At the end of this season. We have no clue today how Bishop will turn out.

To me the problem wasn't Bishop but Buffalo Joe who didn't drop into coverage. On the TD play I'm not sure any safety would be able to cover a guy that was given that much free space on the inside immediately after he snap.

Ask the Defense. What makes stats like this so impressive are the other QB's on the list.

Blue cheese or ranch.

To be fair Allen had 15 carries for 81 yards and 2 TD's in that game.

There was also enough time left in regulation to go down and win the game on a FG. Bass was hot at the end of the season and in the playoffs.

And he also made great plays in the Thanksgiving game against Dallas which sort of propelled the current Bills run into the national limelight.

Agree. The players know this is a business and Cook is doing what he thinks he has to do. Missing a few OTA's is a non-issue. And as you say if he wants the big dollars he has to have a great season in 2025.

Agree with this take about Cook but 15 million per year is to much. That's what makes this situation so frustrating - both of these positions are right.

I hear you. It's just so frustrating to see how recent Super Bowl winning QB's like Mahomes & Hurts, spend all day in the pocket just slinging the ball around. I mean I've never seen either of them leave the pocket or have success off schedule.

Yes it did and that great defense almost got them to a 2nd consecutive SB. In both those seasons, 2021 & 2022, the Bengal's D and not their O carried the team. But since those seasons Cincy has allowed their D to go to crap, got rid of their brilliant D coach and double-downed on their offensive weapons. Hell, they still haven't fixed their O line. The Bengal's are conducting an interesting experiment - put all your resources into field the best Offensive skill players to surround your elite QB while simultaneously ignoring your D and O line. Only time will tell whether this will work or not. I'm betting against it as Cincy fails to make the playoffs for a 3rd straight year.

First off, that 4th quarter SB lead, in fact the Bengal's 2021 playoff success, was orchestrated by the brilliant play of their defense. Their offense was at best average during that run. Today several of those defensive players are gone as is the defensive coach that seemed to have Mahomes/Reid's number. They are not close to being the same team. In fact the Bengals are a fundamentally different team then the one that made a trip to the SB 4 years ago. Second, your claim that the Bengal's play the Chief's tougher then anyone else is false. The Bills have also played the Chiefs down to the wire their last 3 games.

That's a fair point and also Burrow and the O were often going against late game prevent defenses. That will do more then anything to prop up your stats. Just look at Mahomes stats in the SB against the Eagles up to the point where the birds led 34 - 0 then look at his stats the rest of the game against a prevent/back-up D.