Beck Water

No Darnold

I know I'm late to the fair here, but as this report pointed out: Why would the Packers give Rodgers permission to seek a trade, when trading him is gonna cost them a small fortune in dead cap?

We're not going back to a 4-3

Do you think the Bears are going to play a conventional 4/3 with Edmunds outside?

It kind of is a bizarre move. While Roquan Smith's contract sounds huge (5 years, $100,000), it's $45M guaranteed at signing with very moderate cap hits the next 2 years. We'll have to wait for the details, but 4 years, $72M with $50M guaranteed - for that, you'd think they could have kept Smith who IMHO is the better player.

This is Connor McGovern from the Cowboys, not Connor McGovern from the Jets.

That's a possibility. We'll see.

I'm glad to see this. Solid punter, solid holder.

? Overall good catch %, very low drops. I don't watch the Falcons though, what do you see? I like his YAC stats

This is for sure the kind of guy McDermott likes

First of all, Big Props to ya for putting up some great content. Not a fan of signing Mattison. Unless I'm missing something and we improve the OL Big Time, he sounds like Zach Moss Part Deux to me. The problem being, unless the OL massively changes, the Bills need a guy who is fast enough to run outside the tackles to get much out of him. Justin Watson intrigues me, although he had a hard time hanging on to the ball (44% catch %) but I think that was lowered by his willingness to go after balls with his long arms. A fast 27 yr old WR with some growth potential who plays ST to replace a 31 year old WR who plays ST with a bad back and bad ankle (Kumerow) Kaden Ellis is also an intriguing find. He sounds like the kind of guy McDermott loves.

Agree, am haoppy Martin was re-signed I could be wrong, but I don't think anyone is gonna beef if you create a thread for it, especially once the terms are known.

I think this is a case where perception is not reality.

In theory, if the player retires before the end of his current contract, the team can request the repayment of the amortized bonus. However, depending upon the circumstances, teams don't do this, and I'm not sure how it is viewed if the team amortizes the bonus beyond the real length of the contract into "void years", or if the player agrees to help the team's cap by converting salary to bonus - pretty sure that becomes the team's problem. And of course, there's the Eric Wood move where the player doesn't retire but "can no longer be cleared to play football" due to injury (or is cut by the team because they can no longer play) in which case, again, the team eats it. This is an interesting point, but teams routinely get around this by inserting big roster or "option" bonuses that may get converted to signing bonus and amortized further. Pretty sure you know this, just putting the info out there for those who don't.

It works the same way as any other restructure. You can always convert salary to signing bonus, and amortize it over the life of the contract which lowers the current cap hit. The player gets his money up-front instead of paid weekly in 18 installments, so usually the player's finance guy does an NPV calculation and tells the player he doesn't care even though in a state like NY he'll pay more state taxes that way.

He was on the field for 66 plays. I could be wrong, but don't think he was running the same 2 plays on all 66 snaps. He's definitely faster than McKenzie once he gets going.

He certainly started on the Bills as a poor route runner Yeah, he ran a lot of deep crossers last year, mostly as clearing routes - that was what he was asked to do on a lot of plays. I hear that Gabe Davis is a poor route runner who only has 3 routes, also, I don't know.

I could be wrong, but I seem to recall Hines trying a few sweeps and it didn't work out. I think McKenzie has a kind of fast-burst quickness that lends itself, while Hines has an afterburner where once he's going, he can turn it on. Just my impression. Same thing with Shakir - he's fast, but he's not as quick if that makes sense?

I don't disagree in principle, but my first reaction when I read that is "how are they at pass protection?" RBs typically improve in pass pro between year 1 and 2, so Cook may step up. I don't recall Hines being very good at it. Of course, if we had a better OL to start with and a QB more willing to take the short pass option, it could be less of a concern.

McKenzie ran a pretty full route tree. I'm not saying what the Bills do - it depends on who they bring in, surely - but I don't think you look at Hines and McKenzie as equivalent at all. One thing is, McKenzie is owed a roster bonus of $250,000 this Fri, so if they cut him, they likely cut him this week. My guess is that he comes into camp and competes.

Does anyone know exactly how they handled it yet?

I can see your point Two counter points - 1) I think the top skill position players will be hard for the Bills to afford and frankly, I'm a bit under-enthused at the FA WR crop. Meyers? Tik-Tok Boy? Lazard? Slayton (I think the Giants will re-sign him)? Chark? Parris Campbell really interests me, I'll grant. Who you want? 2) Are the Bills good at evaluating OL talent in the draft? Cody Ford near the top of the 2nd round and Spencer Brown near the bottom of the 3rd have me.....concerned. Boogie Basham 2 picks before Creed Humphrey is another big head-shaker. I think we need a combination of FA, where you can usually see how a guy can play, and draft. Maybe Kromer will make a difference, I don't know. There's also the point that's been made that while pricey, a FA guard may be a better bargain than a FA WR or TE, even FA RB.

"one of the Bills top 5 or 6 players this year" #2 offense Allen Diggs Morse Dawkins #2 Defense DaQuan Jones Edmunds Milano Poyer I think you could make an argument for top 10-12 Maybe you meant on defense?

JMO but I think the Bills need both, not either/or. Sign the best guy we can get AND draft one. Morse is no spring chicken and could be lost to a concussion at any time. What the Bills did with Eric Wood where we started him a couple years at guard than moved him to C would work for me Thought KC planned to re-sign him. They gave up a lot in that trade to treat him like a rental

Did you mean under? Allen alone should put us from over to under