Old Coot

The receivers were wide open because the Bills were playing Prevent defense, as in Prevent your team from being victorius.

I think the key is how the respective OL's perform: Does our OL avoid execution errors & give Josh time to throw? Does their OL give Mahomes time to throw?

Watching the receiver's hands & eyes can tell you alot about where the ball is.

This will be a battle of the offensive lines. Whichever line plays better wins the game. I hope that's the Bills' line. I was struck by how well our line protected the QB and run blocked cmpared to the Cards OL tonight. Give Allen or Mahomes a clean pocket and they'll shred any D. Conversely, pressure on either and they play like mere mortals.

30 years from now 200,000 guys will claim they were at the game

Why don't you guys like Romo?

Un-Bill-leviable. It's a grand larceny theft

The O line should get a game ball for this win. They gave Josh time to work his magic and opened some holes for Motor, to say nothing of those pulling center plays.

You make a good point. Thankfully our O kept us out of 3d & long most of the night.

More details on possible ways to break down Bills' execution: Twists & stunts by DL; blitz/ fake blitz, particularly showing double A gap blitz and then back out or run the blitz. This stresses the Bills' interior OL which is not the beast If NE can confuse our OL as other teams have done we are in for a long day.

I did not say that. It's more complex than that. It all depends on why a strategy did not work. In the second game the Bills out-executed the Pats.

Yes but that doesn't mean its a bad strategy. The Bills responded after each Pats score. You can bet that Belichick will scheme to break down the Bills' execution (assuming we don't do that ourselves). We have the better tean. WE just need to go out & show that.

If I were Belichick here's what I'd do: 1. On Defense: Take away the intermediate to long ball and force the Bills into runs & short completions> The idea is to make the Bills consistently execute the ball down the field. Consistent execution has been a weakness of our offense. Mix in a few well-timed blitzes. Change up coverages every series to confuse Josh. 2. On offense: Establish a running game so Jones can get his play-action passing game working. Mix in a few deep balls to keep the defense honest.

I think the basis of decision-making must be heuristics; that is, relying on rules of thumb based on experience. That said, analytics should inform heuristics. Take for example, the 4th & short decision from your own end of the field. Maybe the analytics say there's an 80% chance of success. But you need to dig deeper. What factors led to the 80% success rate & what factors account for the 20% failure rate. Further, waht is your own team's experience with short yardage pickups. I would not expect the Bills to have an 80% chance of success on 4th & short & I don't think they have. Why? Their OL. My 2 cents

oops. Guess I need new glasses. I didn't see the date on the article

ESPN is reporting that he agreed to a 3 yr $30 mil deal with the Dolphins

The flanker or flankerback was originally a halfback motioned out or set out to the flank of the T formation. He was the receiver off the LOS. On the other side, the end split out to the flank was the "split end." The other end tight to the tackle was the "tight end." Clark Shaughnessy is usually credited with the innovation of motioning out the halfback. Note that Shaughnessy did not invent the concept of man in motion but maximized its effectiveness. Shaughnessy was one of the greatest innovators in the game of football. I'll end with a question: why are offensive tackles called tackles? They don't tackle anyone.

There must be a reason they run shotgun so much. It gives Josh more time to read the D. Under center the QB must turn his back to the D to get to his throwing spot. Also shotgun enables Josh to see a free rusher more easily.

Probably film study by the DB. As far as I can remember when Josh looks to dump off its never a fake so the DB knows that as soon as Josh looks to dump off he can come up on the RB.

That's a difficult play for any LB to make. Edmunds is the MLB and he has no outside help -- the LB on that side Milano blitzes. Looks like the DB who normally would cover the receiver doubles one of the receivers to the other side. The receiver crosses behind Edmunds. At no point does Edmunds have a shot at making the tackle -- he's behind the receiver, who is faster than him. A good play call against our D. The blitz didn't get to Brady in time.

Excellent post. You obviously know your X's & O's. I have a question for you about Josh's ball placement on his dump off passes to RBs. First the content: Josh throws behind the RB forcing him to turn his back to the D to receive the ball. This allows the D to rally to the RB and the result is that the play gains minimal yardage. When I see similar plays executed by other teams the gain often is 5-7 yards. Here's the question: are QBs coached to lace the throw behind the RB or is that just Josh?

This game is reminisent of last year's Superbowl. TB blitzed the daylights out of Mahomes. Same here. The difference? KC was down two starting tackles.

How many other QBs call their own plays? This is not a loaded question; it's purely informational.

This is a difficult question but rests I think on the OL & that's not real repairable at this point in the season -- maybe better O line coaching? Teams take away our long ball and force us to beat them underneath but that requires us to "matriculate" the ball downfield. To do that the team needs consistently to excute and it doesn't do that. It all starts with the OL: penalties, inability consistently to run the ball (which is mostly the fault of the OL -- RBs can't run through holes that aren't there). Inability to run the ball means the DL can focus on rushing the passer which leads to occasional breakdowns in pass protection and that causes our drives to fall short. Lastly I raise a question about Josh's ball placement on his short passes to the flat. He tends to throw behind the receiver who then must turn his back to the D to make the reception. This gives the D more time to recover & limit the yardage. Are QBs taught to throw behind the receiver on these plays or is this just Josh?

I agree that our D played well against the run except on two occasions: 1. The 62 yard TD run 2. The Pats 14 play drive at the end of the 3d quarter. This not only gave them 3 points (at the beginning of the 4th quarter) but denied our offense a chance to play with the wind at the end of the quarter. Both of these lapses were crucial (though not the only significant cause) of our loss.