Florida Bills Fanatic

Officiating the play needs to stop the o-linemen from lining up in the neutral zone and stop them from beating the snap to gain their advantage. Violations don't happen all the time but they happen enough to be noticeable. There will be some defensive coach that will encourage players to deliver some head shots to knockout the opposing QB. As much as I hate the idea of that happening, I'm not naive enough to believe that it won't. The fact that the Ravens used Mark Andrews to run the play instead of Lamar, tells me that Harbaugh believes the same thing. Time will tell.

And does anyone think that no girl has ever been smuggled into a dorm room? Really?

How about a blast from the distant past? Roosevelt Leaks

Actually, the only thing he really anchored was a poolside lounge chair at the Transit Valley Country Club.

With next year being projected to be a very good QB draft, it probably makes some sense for them to unload tradeable players to accumulate draft capital. In addition, if this year is going to be a down season, eating some dead cap money might not be that undesirable from their point of view. It will be interesting to watch their roster moves going forward.

Bad franchises have bad ownership that populate their GM and head coaching positions poorly. The Dolphin's problems won't go away with just a new coach and GM. The owner keeps interjecting himself into key football decisions when he should leave them to knowledgeable football people. The most glaring example of this was the Tua vs Herbert draft decision. Living in Florida, I have a great time talking trash to neighbors who are Miami fans. I hope Ross keeps right on screwing up his franchise. It makes my annual excursion to Miami to see the Bills very enjoyable.

What's the over/under on guys going in the second round from this group? I settled in on 2.5

There are people in Florida hyping Kendall Bohler, a corner from Florida A & M. Many of them think he will go around the fifth/sixth rounds. I don't know anything about the guy but maybe he could be the kind of late round flier that Beane occasionally takes. If anyone knows about him, I'm curious to get a legit opinion minus the local Florida bias.

Unfortunately, stupid can't be fixed.

Their guards are also in the neutral zone consistently and move just slightly ahead of the snap. From a friend of mine that works in the NFL (not the Bills or Eagles), teams have complained about these infractions to the league but to no avail.

After watching teams select WR's in round one for many years and watching a significant number of those players not be difference makers, I've concluded that teams greatly overvalue and incorrectly evaluate the skill set of many of these players. Sometimes teams with mediocre QB play, take a chance on receivers hoping to elevate their passing game and compensate for lackluster QB talent. Many day two or day three draft picks work out with the right QB play and good coaching. Nacua and Kupp are two guys that quickly come to mind. I don't care where the Bills draft players, as long as they develop into good players.

And Greg Bell needed to get off his lounge chair by the Transit Valley Country Club pool. Just sayin'

As I watched games last season, I concluded that the important issues were really on the defense. They had one of the best offenses in the league. I never felt like they lacked the players to move the ball and score. On defense, it was obvious to me that they needed an infusion of talent. The pass rush was inconsistent and the front seven performance against the run was poor. The safety play was substandard and Douglas struggled in coverage. Injuries on defense degraded their play as the season moved along because most of the replacements were not good enough. Improving the offense will be great but may not mean as much as making significant improvements to the defense. Apparently many people see things the same way because the mainstream projections for Buffalo are to go heavy defense in the draft. I'm greedy. I want them to find a real field stretcher for the receiver room, a good corner, a big body d-tackle, and an effective pass rusher. But if they can only get three out of the four, I expect Beane to go after the defensive talent first.

For me, the worst part of the free agency period is all the hype spewed forth by media people and clueless fans. Good signings are proclaimed to be championship winning and mediocre signings are proclaimed to be franchise destroying decisions. In most situations, none of these things are true. I try to focus on opinion sources that have a proven track record of being realistically correct (that applies to posters on this site also). I look for the opinions that are based on actual research and data. Fortunately for us, there are several people on this site that do great research and present facts to help keep us well informed. Free agents become available for a number of reasons and not all of them are the result of poor performance, although some are. I think Beane has had to focus mainly on lower cost free agents, to be depth and rotational players. The starters that he does sign as free agents seem to fall into the "value signing" category. I have to admit that this free agency period for the Bills has gone pretty much as I expected. I am neither exuberant nor disappointed about any of the signings but I am hopeful that some of the guys exceed the consensus of expectations.

Obviously, this salary imbalance impacts the rest of their roster. When they re-signed Cody Ford, it told me everything I needed to know. Bad defense and a very poor o-line is not a formula to win championships. They will battle Cleveland and Pittsburgh for fourth place in their division. Ravens fans should feel very comfortable today.