FireChans

Diggs was going on 30 my man. His days were numbered as a great NFL player. Nagging injury that ruins a career or just falling off talent-wise has happened to far better receivers than Diggs around that age. Not only that, he has he come out and said he wanted out prior to the 2023 season. I find it hard to believe Beane had no idea prior to the 2024 offseason. Regardless, the chickens came home to roost. Here is a comment from the 2022 off-season. ”People can disagree but I think this deal ends with 2-3 years left and a lot of dead money” - @BADOLBILZ Diggs was a mercurial player with a history of forcing himself off teams. Was it unreasonable for Beane to expect him to play good solider after getting paid? IMO, no. Is it unreasonable to expect Beane to have a better plan than Mack Hollins if he demanded a trade/fell off/got hurt? IMO, no, as well. I don’t want to harp on the WR topic but it’s near and dear to my heart because I have been banging on the table for the Bills to dedicate serious assets to the position for almost 4 years. So it’s really frustrating to watch at this point.

Your thoughts are very welcome. I only take issue with the “no one could have seen this coming.” It’s just fundamentally untrue and the proof is written all over TBD. That doesn’t mean that Brandon Beane sucks, but he screwed this up and other folks are on record that he was screwing this up. Hopefully Brady is a genius and can make this group greater than the sum of its parts. We shall see on Sunday!

This is factually incorrect. There are lots of folks, myself included, who knew that Davis’ days were certainly numbered and that a replacement for him and Diggs as well needed to be targeted ASAP. The Bills did not do so. i will not cry crocodile tears for a team that had 3 offseason to plan for Davis’ and even Diggs departures, especially when folks like @HappyDays and @GunnerBill and @BADOLBILZ have made several topics spanning years about it.

Exactly. That’s the problem lol. Any plan that starts with “Mack Hollins sees 60% of the snaps” is a bad when Josh Allen is your QB in his prime. When Hollins was playing that much in Atlanta, their offense was awful. They had offensive talent. They have London, Pitts, Bijan. They are not talentless despite a bad QB. That’s why this WR room draws so much ire. They are legitimately missing a player. We all agree that Mack isn’t in the same stratosphere as Shakir or Samuel. Him drawing 60% of the snaps to start the year is a hindrance for the offense being good. That’s why @Kirby Jackson believes that Coleman needed to take those snaps immediately, because those snaps should not be going to a player of Mack Hollins’ caliber. Hypothetically, if the Bills still had Diggs or had signed a Darnell Mooney, and Coleman needed the first half of the year or even longer to develop, it wouldn’t be a big deal. And if he shows out and gets on the field and contributes early, it’s found money. Because again, it’s not really about if Coleman takes the job immediately or not (although we would all hope that he does), its about keeping guys of Mack Hollins quality off the field. The room is missing a boundary player, who is anywhere from WR1-3 in target share, who is not a negative when he steps on the field. They didn’t bring one in. And it’s possible Coleman is not ready to be that week 1 or even week 7. And so they may end up shuffling in an ST JAG to hold down the fort.

Crossman was a hold over, but McD was well within his rights to not retain him. Like he did for a bunch of other coaches. There are a million guys who are available for OC jobs every year. The key is finding good ones. Dennison was never really an OC, he was a Mike Shanahan/Gary Kubiak lackey. They picked the wrong one, he sucked, and they fired him. As much as I think Josh wanted Dorsey, and as much as I don't like partcipating in the "it's either Josh's fault or McD's fault," game, the buck stops with the HC when it comes to picking staff. McD has to wear Crossman, Dorsey and Dennison. They are guys he hired or retained who sucked.

This is true, but how many teams are going in calling their 5th or 6th options "key contributors?" You yourself said that you think Hollins is going to have a bigger role than a normal WR4. I think that's a mistake. Under no circumstances should Hollins be considered anything more than a backup/ST guy. I don't care if he is a better blocker than Curtis Samuel or Khalil Shakir. IMO, Samuel and Shakir are both better than Hollins already. Hollins should take exactly 0% of their snaps outside of injury/rest or the odd run package. I think Coleman has more of an NFL future than Mack Hollins, and ideally should easily clear Hollins on snaps because we are going to hopefully be counting on Coleman's contributions for years in the future. So really, I don't think Hollins should have a real offensive role at all, outside of ST. In Atlanta, Hollins was seeing 60-70% of snaps last year through the first 4 games. That dropped to 20-30%, then a couple inactives, then back to 20%. Obviously, he was terrible from a statistical standpoint (even though he was their 2nd WR in targets and their 5th player overall in targets). He is just not a good player. He is Trent Sherfield 2.0, who also was a guy who did not deserve the 40% of snaps he was getting.

This is a difficult question to answer. Every camp has different levels of talent. Does the fact that Legette couldn't beat out Thielen or Diontae Johnson mean he couldn't beat out Mack Hollins? I don't think so. The big question is, "Is Mack Hollins role on the team a reflection on their opinion of their rookie WR?" I actually agree with you that it may not be. There's two trains of thought. #1 Coleman isn't ready to beat out a mediocre NFL vet today, but the Bills think he will eclipse him long-term. I get this, and IMO, have no problem with the strategy if the vision for Coleman is Davante Adams-lite. In this instance, Mack Hollins' role on the team is a necessary evil while Coleman gets up to speed and refines his game. #2 Independent of Coleman's performance, the Bills had/have a vision of Mack Hollins being a key contributor on the 2024 Bills at the WR position. This is an indefensible position that frankly, along with a previous poor series of WR management, would really call into question the acumen of any and all of their WR decisions, including the decision to trade back and take Coleman. We will never know how they truly feel. So you're right. Maybe Mack was in their plans all along. To me, that's even worse than Coleman not being able to leave him in the dust in camp.

Okay so let's pick week 8 for both. It was Shakir's highest targeted game. Week 8 - Week 18 for both 10 games - Shakir 3.1 catches per game, 53.6 YPG, 0.1 TDPG - prorated over 17 games 52.7 catches for 911 yards and 1.7 TD's 9 games (rested week 18) - Rice 5.8 catches per game, 70 YPG, 0.4 TDPG - prorated over 17 games 98.6 catches for 1190 yards and 6.8 TD's Yeah, I don't see it, jmo.

When was that? I want to compare that stretch with Rice.

huh? You said Hollins is gonna play more than a standard WR4. I'm assuming your WR's 1-3 are Samuel, Shakir and Coleman. If we are predominantly in 11 or 12 personnel like most NFL teams, any snap that Hollins sees is going to take away from one or two of the guys above them. If they aren't on the field, they can't get a target. Who do you expect to see more snaps this season. Hollins or Coleman? Personally, I could see Coleman getting a few more targets and Hollins playing more snaps over the course of the year. But what I think some would prefer is Coleman (and Shakir/Samuel) to keep a known quantity like Hollins on the bench, which is @Kirby Jackson's point.

Fair enough. I just feel like that's a little biased. If Coleman drops 79, 938 and 7 TD's in a larger role in 24 and Worthy has 39 catches 611 yards and 2 TD's, I don't think anyone on TBD is gonna say, "neither player has an edge" lol.

Rashee Rice had more catches, yards and TD’s as a rookie than Shakir has in his career. I don’t think it’s really comparable tbh. Shakir came on last season, but he’s gotta produce to show he’s as good or better than Rice.

I don’t know how you quantify markedly better but go position by position. QB - Chiefs RB - Push? Maybe Bills WR - Chiefs TE - Chiefs OL - Chiefs DL - Chiefs LB - Push with Milano out at best CB - McDuffie would be the best CB on the Bills but the Bills have better depth so push/slightly Bills S - not sure how anyone is confident either side is good K - Chiefs P - Push By my eye, we have some position groups that are close, but imo, the talent gap between both teams hasn’t been wider since 2020.

Jerry Hughes? He had a couple sacks in Indy prior to being moved but was playing opposite to Mathis and went from being a rotational guy to playing 20% of snaps. He was on his way out. The biggest kiss of death for a guy like Cine is that he was waived and PSed. That means he had zero market. Nobody wanted to give a conditional 7th for a reclamation project of a former first rounder, which is honestly bizarre. Isaiah WIlson, the former bust of the Titans, was terrible on and off the field. Played 4 snaps as a rookie. Skipped all kinds of things, got suspended multiple times, demanded a trade on Twitter etc. He was traded for a conditional 7th to the Dolphins. What is so wrong with Cine he can't even muster that?

I do not know a GM in the league that wouldn’t catch flak for extending a player 2 years early, and then trading that player before he played a snap on that extension. Crappy situation but when you double down on a volatile, mercurial WR as your only guy in the room, you can get burned.

I know a guy who might take this bet.

Who did the Chiefs hire outside of echo chambers? Spags? That was 5 years ago. Since then, they kept EB as their OC and when he left, they brought back Matt Nagy who started there. The Niners have again promoted internally on the defensive side since 2017. They didn’t last year and they fired the dude immediately and replaced him with a guy internally. The Eagles built an entire new staff in 2021 because they fired everyone. When Steichen and Gannon got poached, they promoted internally at OC. They hired an outside DC and basically fired him midseason. The Ravens promoted Roman to OC internally. He spent 17-18 as an offensive assistant until he got the OC job. Wink Martindale was the LB coach there for 5 years before he got the DC job which he held for years. After they fired him, they went external. McDonald got poached and they replaced him with their inside LB coach, again, promoting internally. So yeah, most good teams mostly promote internally, just like the Bills.

Like I said, firing a coordinator every two years is pretty stark. other teams in our weight class aren’t really turning over coordinators at that rate, and the ones that do we have a pretty poor outlook on their future (Eagles/Cowboys). im probably considered more of a McD guy than most, but that’s a lot of hiring and firings.

I am really torn on this. i think there’s an argument to take a Keon type WR who you expect to develop over a year or two. The comp is Davante Adams who doesn’t blossom right away. I don’t see it with Keon but if Beane and co do, then there’s some logic behind it not being a big deal. The other issue is that Mack Hollins is high on the depth chart at all, but that’s not necessarily reflective on Keon’s value.

Yeah kinda. you are forgetting that he hired Dennison, Crossman and Dorsey.

Firing a coordinator every other season is pretty stark lol.

Do they? Shanny lost Saleh and promoted Demeco internally. Lost Demeco and hired Wilks externally. Fired Wilks and hired Sorensen internally. His offensive coaching tree is littered with internal promotions. The Pats were very similar. BOB worked his way up to OC when Josh McDaniels left. When McDaniels got fired, he came back immediately. Teams with high staff turnover (read: bad teams) do a lot of external hires. Teams that are not bad don’t really seem to do the same.

Inside the top 50 is a very funny way to describe the 49th best safety in football. That’s, by definition, below average. Putting aside that judging safeties on sacks is on its face pretty bizarre, tied for ninth on the Bills for sacks was 1.5. Aka a half sack less than Boogie Basham. Let’s talk the counting stats that aren’t addressed here: 2022 passes defensed. Hamlin had 2. Tied with Von Miller and Boogie Basham. Less than Elam and Siran Neal. Let’s talk advanced stats. Hamlin was targeted in coverage 35 times on the year. Resulting in 25 completions (71%) 454 (!) yards, a 142 passer rating, and 3 TD’s. It’s cool he had some success on safety blitzes. He blitzed 16 times on the year. He was terrible in coverage and terrible in run defense.

No. Diggs himself said that his thoughts about leaving the team started prior to the season. Anything short of a SB win and he was out. Heck, he didn’t want to win games in Brady’s offense in a lesser role, he may have wanted out regardless.

That's certainly a plausible explanation. I don't know how much Brady would have been a driving force of such a change compared to McD.