FireChans

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Meh, I read a lot about how Sherfield and Harty were upgrades in the WR room. Hope always springs eternal in Bills land when the JAG deck chairs are rearranged.

And won a playoff game with that rag tag group, not lose with 3 pts in Jags land.

Incredible post. We spend so much time playing armchair GM on here, but most folks talk themselves into Harty and Sherfield and the upgraded receiving core, then switch to "we need more weapons" by week 6 like it's a big surprise the JAGs are still JAGs. I personally think Beane has failed to make reasonable upgrades to the WR group (he would probably agree, seeing as he had to call Cole and Smoke Brown off their couch last year in one of the saddest reunions in Bills history), and I believe the coaches have failed to squeeze any production out of the other bums in the room. Which, to your point, would adding a Michael Thomas help if the coaches couldn't, or wouldn't use him? Oh, they investigated! Well then, I guess that's all we can ask. We went from Gabe being asked to be a boundary WR and third option (which he excelled at) to asking Gabe to be the boundary WR, second option, and sprinkle in some Cole Beasley magic too, and it's not a surprise he can't do it all.

Earn that contract young man.

I don't think its as simple as run v pass and more what we have in our offensive arsenal to take advantage of opposing defenses' weaknesses and how good we are at executing it.

I think they would this season

Mahomes runs more than Allen this year. Is that a knock on Mahomes or on his offense this season?

If ranking matters that much, why is the phone not ringing off the hook for Kenny to become an HC? I mean, Daboll oversaw 1 top ranked year and was getting HC buzz. After his second year, he was the talk of the town. Why does no one want Kenny? Is it because folks around the league see him doing less with more when he has a top 3 QB and aren't impressed with whatever the dumb stats say?

absolutely DISGUSTED that this post didn't do numbers.

No dispute on leadership

Disagree

Yes, but he ain't the WR3 in this offense yet. Hopefully he will be eventually.

Gabe Davis being that high in yards and TD/1D and middle of the road in targets goes to show his relatively high end deep threat ability. I will continue to say that most folks want to surround Allen with a safer option from an "always open" perspective. I think the ideal Bills offense is Diggs moving around, Davis deep threat on the boundary, and a slot WR chain mover so we get 3rd and 2 instead of 3rd and 9 on a completion if the first two aren't open. Really, Davis is WR2 AND 3 in this offense, because there is no WR3, and that's where a lot of his critics hit him.

Common knowledge among the NFL is that the first 12-15 plays from scrimmage is "scripted," partly based on what the team thinks the opposing team is going to do on defense and partly based on what was worked on throughout the week. I remember the Bills had a great run of having a solid script. I think we had a streak scoring on the opening possession going at one point. So I decided to do the analysis from the "Josh Allen is elite" era. The script is probably the biggest thing the OC does from a gameplan perspective and is much easier to measure than "adjustments." Let's look at the numbers! 2020: 7/16 games had a TD or FG on opening drive 2021: 11/17 games had a TD or FG on opening drive 2022: 3 straight to open the year, and 4 of our first 6 but ultimately 6/16 on the year. 2023: 2/6 so far So what does this tell us? To me, this is a clear indication that our scripted "easy plays" in film study and gameplan preparation are anything but easy lately. Even more troubling is the steep decline from the first 6 weeks of 2022. I'm sure there's something to be said for tendencies that teams look for and gather info on, so I'm not sure if that is significant or not and may have been partially buoyed by no one knowing what Dorsey liked. This definitely lends credence to how laborous the offense looked through the second half of 2022 into our current season this year. Now, 4/6 was probably unsustainable, but we have really only scored on 4 opening possessions of our last 16 regular season games? With Josh Allen at QB? I'm sure I could have done some better datamining, but I think this is a good start. Daboll's 2021 offense was clearly elite from a script perspective. Dorsey's was even better for the first 6 weeks in 2022 and has fallen off a cliff since. What is the reason?

That's just football baby. They had 9 points when they started their drive. They had 9 points when the clock read zero. That's a stop.

They did stop them.

I think it's hard, because some players just suck. But, for a nice little example, let's look at the defense. Last year they had Tre looking kinda bad post-injury, lost Von, lost Hyde etc. The defense clearly wasn't elite, but were they awful? No way. The defense this year. They lose three of their best players, Tre (who was rounding into form), Milano (probably the best defender currently), Daquan Jones, and Von doesn't look ready. That's FOUR starting positions, with elite pricetags amongst most of them. Meanwhile, we have guys like AJE stepping up, Leonard Floyd taking over games, Terrell Bernard and Dorian Williams filling in. Is our defense perfect? Nope. Is our defense doing pretty good considering the circumstances? Yep. Imagine the offense losing 3 or 4 of their best players (and for sake of the argument, leave out Allen who plays the most important position). Would we be able to get a first down outside of Allen running over linebackers? Is it possible Shakir sucks, Stevensen sucks, McKenzie sucks, Harty sucks, Sherfield sucks, Kincaid sucks, Knox sucks? Yes. Do I think there's a possibility that an actual good coordinator could make them better than they are? Yes. Ray Ray McCloud is a nobody,, a fringe roster dude. Yet somehow, some other teams have been able to wring something out of him. Our OC cannot. What's even more troubling is that most great QB's can make a lot of their players look better than they are. JuJu in KC looked a lot different than he does today. We don't do that either really, which is how you know the coach is a complete dud.

That’s how you know there is a huge disconnect with our offensive personnel acquisitions and how they are used. It’s possible I suppose that Brandon Beane is incapable of acquiring decent players that can fill niche roles. More likely, it’s that our dope of a coordinator can’t use them. Isaiah McKenzie was almost out of the league when the Bills grabbed him, and Daboll wrung every last drop of talent out of him, and got decent production. Dorsey took over and he’s now playing on a vet minimum again. There is not a single offensive player who Dorsey has made better.

There’s 100% no point to adding weapons that Dorsey will certainly not use. the only way I trade for a WR is if Dorsey promises he will see 20-30% of the targets of our offense or he’s fired.

Getting rid of a guy who kinda sucks isn’t a bad move if you replace him with a guy who kinda sucks. It’s just nothing.

No WRs who can get open + no OC who can scheme them open = bad day

Unfortunately I’m getting older. So is Josh and so is Diggs and so is Poyer and so is Hyde and so is Von.

It’s crazy how a good defensive coordinator can take unheralded players and get them to perform above their station. It’s also crazy how an offensive coordinator can’t do so.

Sherfield is not good. Has never been good. Are you his agent?