Billy Claude

TBD has been surprisingly accurate regarding their whipping boys post Rex. Zay Jones, Kelvin Benjamin, Ryan Groy, Russell Bodine, Juan Castillo, Nathan Peterman (post-savior state), Tyrod Taylor, Danny Crossman has all been shaded pretty hard and I don't know think any of these guys have had much success elsewhere yet. Dabol along with Cody Ford are probably the top whipping boys right now. I don't know if Dabol is a good coach but I am pretty sure not simplifying a really complex system for a 2nd year QB with 9 new starters on offense is not a great idea. Of course, Ed Oliver was developing into a whipping boy until he turned it around the second half of the year so the board is not always right.

There was a whole thread about how lucky the Bills were: (1) A historically weak schedule (2) Lots of missed field goals by opponents (3) Very few injuries (4) Played a lot of backup qbs or qbs that were soon to be benched (5) Only four out of 14 of Allen's fumbles were lost -- the expected rate is 45% of qb fumbles are lost. The Bills had a very good season but to say that were not lucky doesn't seem reasonable. Similary Allen showed a lot of improvement and a lot of promise but to say he was as good as Wilson in year 2 doesn't make a lot of sense.

The schedule will be more difficult just from probability. If you randomly pick any team, any season in the last 20 years there is probably about a 95% chance their schedule was harder than the Bills. Otoh, they have 90M on cap space, a full complement of draft choices, and one more year of experience should help Allen and Edwards so the Bills should also be better so they don't have to rely on luck as much.

Wade is 72, so maybe he thinks will be easier path to be dc?

I don't see anything that he should be criticized for. They were losing, he was depressed, a teammate told saw this and told him to buck up and he did. Whats wrong with that?

There was plenty of blame to go around. I hope we don't go back to attack anyone who says anything vaguely critical about Josh Allen mode during the board was during the last off-season.

It's probably because McDermott is given most of the credit for the defense rightly or wrongly. Also as noted by the others, defense is not sexy now.

All true but the difference is the Bills have a lot of cap space and a full set of draft choices that the Bears did not have.

Not sure what this proves. The YPA advantage for Newton (8.0 vs. 6.7) is pretty substantial. To me, that and the INT % (2.0 to 2.5 in favor of Allen) are the most important stats.

They were basically a low level but legitimate playoff team -- not like two years ago when they were probably one of the worse teams ever to make the playoffs. I hope the board learns some lessons from this year. (1) Just because someone in the national media says something critical about the Bills -- it doesn't mean that there is some kind of agenda against Buffalo. Lots of times they are making a perfectly reasonable opinion. Its more likely that you are biased coming in as a fan than the other way around. (2) A win is a win and it doesn't effect your record whether you squeak by a bad team or destroy a good team but it certainly should play a role in judging how good a team is and predictions for the next game. (3) It is not always the OL, WR, OC, HC, or GM's fault. Sometimes it really is Josh Allen's fault. Neither is it always Josh Allen's fault. (4) Josh Allen is showing promise but if almost all the numbers says he is a slightly below average quarterback, right now, that is probably what he is. It doesn't mean he can't improve but plenty of QBs have plateaued at this level. Next year we will know. (5) There is no such thing as field goal an PAT defense unless its a block. Sometimes luck is luck. (6) It is hardly surprising a young team with almost no playoff experience messes up in a critical situation. They have a huge amount of cap space, a very young team, a GM and coach who appears to have a plan. I am hopeful for next year.

Both the Jets and Dolphins have bad o-lines. I wouldn't be surprised if they try to do what Beane did and sign as many mid-level free agents to the o-line as they can and see who sticks. It is a copy cat league. Jets were surprisingly good in the 2nd half of the year especially considering all the injuries they had. Darnold didn't look good against the Bills but he was pretty good the last eight games (6W-2L/ 13 TD/ 4 Int/ 61% completion/ 243 ypg). They might be pretty decent next year unless Gase screws everything up.

I think the main distinction is Tyrod got worse each year and Allen has gotten better each year, at least for his first two years. I would argue that first year Tyrod was better than second year Allen but third year Tyrod was worse than second year Allen.

Dorsey brought in all that talent by using up all the resources that the analytics guys Sashi Brown and Paul DePodesta acquired. He did it without any apparent strategy or regard to fit -- Tyrod for a 3rd rounder wasn't the only bad trade he made. He has totally neglected the offensive line and he hired an absolutely unexperienced head coach to appease a rookie quarterback. I didn't think he would be fired but it was certainly a possibility.

Anyone got the stats for the defense? They seem to be pretty bad on the first drive also.

Anyone in the media ever speculate why he isn't playing? I assume that McDermott has never said anything. I usually ignore all the fan lobbying, i.e., Brandon Reilly, Nate Peterman (at least before his first game), etc. but this one really seems like a mystery since it is clearly a position of need.

I don't think the comparison with Manziel is the best one. Manziel's whole college career was based on running around and throwing pop flies to Mike Evans. I feel Mayfield is much more talented. Also all of Mayfield's incidents are him attacking other people. Johnny Football, on the other hand, did things like dressing up a wig and sneaking off to Las Vegas before a game --which is a whole lot funnier. Someone mentioned before the better comparison is with Ryan Leaf -- I agree and so does Ryan Leaf https://ftw.usatoday.com/2019/10/watch-former-nfl-bust-ryan-leaf-compares-baker-mayfields-career-to-his-own

The guy is incredibly unlikeable. Keeping an enemies list of eveyone who vaguely said anything critical against him =" asshat" (admittedly it appears many posters here do the say thing for Josh Allen) Calling Daniel Jones a loser before ever meeting him = "asshat" Planting the OU flag at OSU = "asshat" Grabbing his nuts against Kansas = "asshat" Swearing at reporters after a lost = "asshat" (I know a whole lot of athletes would like to do this but they have more self-control) Threatening to fight fans at bengals game = "asshat" Blaming referees for a lost after throwing three interceptions = "asshat" Coming in overweight to training camp = "complacent asshat" At least you won't have to worry about him working out with Josh Allen and Sam Darnold this off-season: "I do not need anyone to teach me how to do a three step drop" https://247sports.com/Article/Baker-Mayfield-says-he-does-not-need-quarterback-tutor-Cleveland-Browns-Oklahoma-Sooners-Football-141139689/ I'm not saying he is a bust yet -- base on his history he is going to be working really hard in the off-season and perhaps with competent coaching he will get his game back. However, he is probably the only player I ever hoped would fail.

The lack of these types of rumours coming out of OBD is one of the things that most impresses me about Beane-McDermott. Under. Russ Brandon and Doug Whaley there were always rumors about who was in the doghouse, who was unhappy, who was fighting with who all the time. It seems like everybody is on the same page now.

Maybe but I thought that was what Beasley I'd good at.

I do find the league blitzing Russell Wilson surprising but there is no doubt that you blitz qbs that you don`t think can beat the blitz. That`s why the standard thing one does against rookies is to blitz them and I am pretty sure that's why they blitz Allen.

The #1 in being blitz means that the league does not believe Allen makes decisions quickly enough and would support the negative tone of the original article.

They did throw it something like 20 out of the first 21 plays against the jets so it seems pretty wide open to me.

It seems to me they did try to take the reigns off Allen at the beginning of the year, i.e., the Jets game and we used he wasm`t ready. Hopefully he will be ready next year.

It's great to see two rational comments in a row. Restores ones faith in humanities ability to think rationally.

Returning to the OP, I find it curious that when Allen was putting up meh numbers against historically bad defenses, the narrative was the opponents don`t matter, it's just wins and losses. Now it`s yeh, he's putting up meh numbers but look at the great defenses he`s playing.