Arm of Harm

Buffalo716 knows far more about football than me. According to some of his posts the Bills defense is predictable and has been figured out. This past season the defense only had one good performance against a good QB: Justin Herbert. That datum certainly seems to bear out 716’s hypothesis, though I realize there were other factors affecting the defense’s performance besides just coaching. The defensive scheme may need to change, both due to the concerns 716 has raised and the factors you bring up in your post. The road to the Super Bowl goes through Kansas City.

There are times when he seems that way. I remember a game against the Patriots a year or two ago when the Bills defensive plan resulted in a near compete shutdown of Brady and the Patriots offense. On the other hand the defensive game planning against the Chiefs was suspect both games this past year. In the postseason the Chiefs offense cut through the Bills defense like a hot knife through butter. The Chiefs offense was far more successful against the Bills than it was in either of its other two postseason games.

She’s not my type either physically or in terms of personality. As for the latter: hers seems to be a businesswoman personality, or at least that’s how she comes across. By that I mean a woman personality which is logical, confident, and ambitious, but lacking in gentleness, warmth, vulnerability, or nurturing instinct. For someone with a businesswoman personality to seemingly get all choked up over a player’s contract extension does indeed come across as insincere.

I’d argue that Reich is one of the best X’s and O’s coaches in the NFL, and is superior to McDermott in that aspect. Both McDermott and Reich are very good at providing leadership and at creating a winning culture.

You are right, and that’s a problem! The Packers haven’t built a Super Bowl caliber team around Rodgers. If you have arguably the best QB ever, and if he’s 37, there needs to be a serious plan in place to either a) win the Super Bowl now, or b), trade him away and use the picks to build for the future. Instead of either of those choices, the Packers have evidently opted for c) use Rodgers’ greatness to elevate an otherwise mediocre team to be almost, but not quite, good enough to win a Super Bowl. Option c is what the Packers have chosen pretty much Rodgers’ whole career.

I’d add Frank Reich to your list. As the Eagles offensive coordinator he out-coached Bill Belichick in the Super Bowl. He’s done an equally good job as head coach.

I agree with some of this. You'd have to think that there have been more than four first overall picks who've been better football players than Terry Bradshaw. Bradshaw had the benefit of playing on a run-oriented team with a great offensive line and two Hall of Fame WRs. If you'd put Drew Bledsoe on a team like that, he would have accomplished a lot as well. That said, the argument against O.J. is longevity. If you define a "good" season for a RB as rushing for at least 1000 yards while achieving at least 4.0 yards per carry, O.J. had five good seasons. Adjust for the fact that he only played 14 game seasons instead of 16, and it's still just five good seasons. All the players who made their list provided much more than just five good seasons. "Cancel culture" is normally defined as globalist billionaires using money and power to cancel ideological content they don't like. O.J.'s decision to murder his ex-wife and her boyfriend was ideologically neutral. It was not an attempt to contradict the belief system being spread by globalist billionaires.

Posluszny had an 11 year career, and was a starter for the vast majority of that. For his career he has 1085 total tackles, and 753 solo. He went first-contract-and-out with the Bills and went to the Jaguars. The Bills were switching to a 3-4 defense, and he believed he was a better fit in a 4-3. Overall the guy had a solid career. However, the switch to the 3-4 meant the Jaguars derived more benefit from that career than did the Bills. Had he stayed in Buffalo he would have abundantly justified the 2nd round pick used to take him.

20 years from now, there will be a lineman named Ereek Flowers, he will be drafted first overall, and will be one of the biggest busts in NFL history.

That's fair. If they re-sign Edmunds, whatever number they give him will presumably indicate how much they value him. I'd probably give him 6 or 7 million, and your 10 million isn't too far off from that. It will be interesting to see how all this plays out.

Your assessment of Edmunds' play is considerably more optimistic than mine. The question then becomes: how does Beane feel about all this? If he picks up Edmunds' fifth year option, that's strong evidence he agrees with you and disagrees with me. If on the other hand he chooses not to pick up the fifth year, that's evidence he agrees with me. He has until early May to decide one way or the other, so we'll see what he does. As for my specific concerns about Edmunds: we're 19 pages into an Edmunds debate. I have nothing original to contribute on that subject. If you want I can repeat things already voiced by others: he lacks the ability to process information quickly, is easily fooled, takes bad angles, is bad at shedding blocks, is not as good at tackling as one might want. This past season the defense was very vulnerable to TEs, which raises the question as to how much of that was Edmunds' fault.

If by "either DE or CB" you mean "WR all the way!" then I agree 100%. 🙂

If you look at Allen's highlight video from Wyoming, there are times when he throws the ball deep downfield, between two defenders, into a tight window, in the exact perfect spot for the receiver. Big boy throws that most NFL QBs can't make. Also, Allen had a high Wonderlic score--the highest of any of the QBs drafted in the first round that year. Add in his physical traits and his love for football, and Allen was definitely worthy of a first round pick. Losman also had good physical tools. But there was nothing about him which suggested he was an accurate passer, and nothing which would lead one to believe he could process spatial information quickly. If a guy isn't accurate and if he can't process information well, good physical traits alone do not justify drafting him before the 4th round. It was not Losman's fault that the Bills front office lacked the ability to evaluate QB talent. The same incompetence which led the Bills to draft Losman in the first place also led them to put him in a bad situation. (Except in 2006, when things for him were not all that bad.) Some of his problems can be blamed on a bad offensive line or bad coaching. But neither the OL nor the coaches were to blame for his habit of having short throws land at his receivers' feet, or sailing those throws over the receivers' heads. The only football-related coaching I've ever had was a few minutes of my uncle telling me how to throw a football, and I'm able to consistently hit my target near the chest on short to intermediate throws. If Losman is unable to do the same thing, he is not one of the world's 32 best quarterbacks, and should not be a starting QB.

Not really sure the QB coach needs to be an innovator. That's the offensive coordinator's job. The QB coach does need to understand the game of football and the QB position. Also he needs to be a very good teacher. Sam Wyche had a very strong reputation in both those areas.

I read that during Losman's success in 2006, the coaches had simplified the offense, thereby improving Losman's success. If the goal was to give Losman his best chance of success, they should never have fired their offensive coordinator. I'd also point out this: during Drew Bledsoe's last years with the Patriots, that team began moving away from his strengths (such as the deep ball) and towards things he didn't do as well (short passes to moving targets). The Patriots had a vision of the offense as they wanted it, and Bledsoe was not a great fit for that vision. Then he got hurt, and a different quarterback came in and delivered on that vision. In 2007, the Bills did to Losman the exact same thing the Patriots had done to Bledsoe. They implemented an offense predicated on short passes, which as you pointed out was not a fit for what Losman did well. That was also the year they'd drafted Trent Edwards, and it's entirely possible the short passing offense was implemented in an effort to play to Edwards' strengths. Suppose the Bills hadn't fired their offensive coordinator from 2006, suppose they hadn't drafted Trent Edwards, and suppose they'd left in place the offensive scheme they'd used in the second half of the 2006 season. What would Losman's ceiling have been? The comparison quarterback which comes to mind is Tyrod Taylor. Both guys are running quarterbacks with strong arms, neither are good at West Coast offense type throws, neither are good at processing information quickly. I'll grant there are differences: Losman was better at long bombs to Lee Evans than Tyrod would have been; Tyrod is better at avoiding turnovers than Losman. But those two quarterbacks were broadly similar. Losman and Tyrod fell between two stools. Neither was good enough at passing to appeal to an offensive coordinator who wanted a traditional pocket passer. While both QBs were fast, neither was as fast as Lamar Jackson. A guy like Greg Roman is never going to choose Losman-type speed or Tyrod-type speed if he can get Lamar Jackson-type speed.

Losman was drafted in 2004, and spent most of his rookie year injured. Because of the injury he didn't get to practice much as a rookie, though he still had the benefit of film study and mental reps. Then in 2005 he and Holcomb battled for the starting position. The Bills' OL was truly terrible that year. In 2006 Losman was the undisputed starter, and had the best year of his career. In 2007, his fourth in the NFL, Losman again found himself in a QB battle--this time with Trent Edwards. In 2008 Losman served as Trent Edwards' backup. He appeared in 5 games, and had 104 passing attempts. (Roughly 25% of a season's worth of snaps.) In a nutshell, Losman had a rookie year in which to study, + 3 years of being the full-time or part-time starter + 1 year of playing ~25% of the snaps as a backup = 5 years of opportunity. Five years is plenty of time to give to a quarterback, especially one who should never have been drafted in the first round to begin with.

About a month ago I wanted the Bills to use their first round pick on an OG. Ideally the next Ruben Brown. Now, I'm leaning more towards WR. I have three reasons for that: 1) Based on players available, I believe the Bills could probably get a better football player at WR than at OG. 2) The Lamp signing hopefully lessened the need for an OG. 3) Sanders and Beasley are both on the wrong side of 30, and both will be free agents after this season. So, I could see the Bills taking a WR, bringing him along slowly as a rookie, then have him take the place of the departing Sanders. He'd have his whole career in front of him, with which to develop chemistry with Josh Allen.

This past season Orlando Brown allowed 0 sacks and 0 hits on 389 pass attempts. Finding someone who fared well against him could be difficult.

Neither. Imagine that the Bills have just traded away all their defensive players for draft picks. The quantity and quality of picks significantly exceeds expectations. Also imagine the Bills have plenty of cap space. So, the Bills will have plenty of picks over the next 2 - 3 drafts, plus plenty of cap space, with which to build a defense around whichever defensive scheme you choose.

If you could pick just one defensive scheme the Bills have used, which would you choose? Why is your choice better than the other options?

Cody Ford.

I hear you. During the drought years, it was normal for the Bills to use a very high percentage of their first round picks on RBs and DBs. The RBs and DBs thus drafted would almost invariably go first-contract-and-out, regardless of level of play. That's not a way to build a winning football team. In the case of Edmunds, he hasn't lived up to his draft status, but he's still a useful football player. One objection to him is the high level of variability in his play. He could have a great game one week, as he did in the playoff game against Baltimore. Then he could have a stinker the next week, as was the case in the playoff game against the Chiefs. I'd almost rather have a player who was reliably average each and every week, than a guy whose level of play is like a roller coaster ride. I'd like to see the Bills take a MLB in the draft, but I don't want that MLB to come in rounds 1 or 2. Suppose for example they take a MLB in the 4th round. That creates several possibilities. 1) Maybe the 4th rounder is the next Matt Milano. 2) Maybe Edmunds improves. 3) Maybe Edmunds is willing to sign an extension priced at his actual worth, instead of the overpriced 5th year option. Any of those three possibilities would get us out of needing to use an early pick on a MLB in the 2021 draft.

According to Edmunds' critics, he's bad at making reads, bad at shedding blockers, bad at tackling, takes bad angles, is bad in coverage, and doesn't make big plays. According to Edmunds' supporters he's an athletic freak who does a great job of covering a lot of ground, and whose problems are mostly caused by the hole at the 1 tech position, lack of pass rush, the defensive scheme, youth, or the injured shoulder. There are some areas where I agree with his critics, others were I agree with his supporters. If I were in Beane's place, I wouldn't see him as being worth the 5th year option money, but I'd still like to keep him on the roster for the next few years. Best to wait until you've found an upgrade before parting ways with him. And if he improves, or if you find yourself wanting to use draft resources on some other position more than you want to use them on the next MLB, there's nothing wrong with having him stay on as a starter for a number of years--as long as you don't overpay!

I see wppete was unhappy with this post. I wonder if he objects to a Wang (-related joke) being inserted into this thread.

Take the world's greatest swordsman. There are two possible sources of motivation: 1. Maybe what makes him tick is the desire to always win against the word's second-greatest swordsman. 2. Maybe he's motivated by a lifelong pursuit of mastery of swordsmanship. For me personally, I'm mostly a category 1 guy. When I ran cross country, I needed the competition of other runners to be motivated. A category 2 guy is going to be motivated regardless of whether he has competition or not. As you near the finish line in a cross country race, there will sometimes be another runner near you. Under that circumstance, whichever runner comes in ahead of the other will often be determined by strength of will. Being highly competitive gave me an edge in that situation. Trevor Lawrence is obviously a category 2 guy. That's going to give him advantages and disadvantages versus a guy in category 1.