PoundingDog

Mmmm I don't know about that statement. There is a QB whose last name rhymes with homes is pretty good. Looking back at Brady's time in NFL, he kind of blocked a lot of "arguably the best QB' from getting to the superbowl. The good thing is I see Allen is continuously improving his game, partly because he has a target in front of him. Last year you see a noticeable improvement. Listening to his interview before the Ravens game, he sounded much more mature (not going for home run, taking short completions to start games). So sounded like he himself knew he was NOT the greatest QB in NFL history in the past few years.

I know you don't get much from McDermott, the prototypical coach speaking guy. But somehow I detect a different tone starting this year's first Wednesday presser. Notice how he repeated the theme of looking to get better as the season goes along. I believe he said it 4 times in this single presser. Not much of the type he typically says like "in order to win, you have to have the fundamentals" blah blah. You can take it two ways. For those looking for positives, you can say McDermott matured in that it really does not matter how you start, it's how you finish, as in playing your best going into the playoff and having injury stuff lining up for you. For those looking for negatives, you may say McDermott is already preparing us for a loss coming Sunday because he's focusing on the big picture of finding the right guys and preparing the young guys, especially rookies that we have to count on, for later in the playoff.

Dane Jackson might be on par with Douglas at this point (which is to be on someone's practice squad).

Paging CB2!

The Bills have faced teams playing single safety near the very top of NFL. Why? Because they don't think the Bills have outside receivers great in beating them 1-on-1. Also it helps playing against run, which is Bills strength now (including Allen). We are going to see what Keon is. Ravens probably will move Humphey into nickel (taking out Shakir). Outside they have their 2024 #1 pick Nate Wiggins who is really good in 2024-- blazing fast (runs in 4.28), but smallish in size (183lb). So Keon should have well over 30lb on Nate. One on one, there is a game to be had between Allen and C oleman over Wiggins. Conversely the Bills played high number of single high safety against the Ravens last year. Why? Derrick Henry! I would expect the same so pass rush and CB plays will be big for the Bills. Now if Lamar is tearing it up against Bills single high, we do have some bigger bodies, albeit rookies to try at DT as a change of strategy.

Player development skills got him to the DC position. What I want to see for him is to add more specific schemes against opponents. That means having more right keys for back 7 players because too many times I see our players fooled by the initial action. Some of it is players, but a great DC will have a keen eye to get a key from at least one of the 11 players to help his players during a week long preparation. And that goes for in-game adjustment too.

This is how I look at it. Brady does not have a signature "gotta-have-play" in a big game. That is not who he is because he generally has a full 60 minutes or close to that so that he almost never get himself into a one gotta-have moment. Mahomes has more gotta-have plays but generally more of a gotta-have series type of guy, especially against complex schemes when he figures later in games in those playoff big games. But Josh Allen is my go-to QB for a single gotta-have play. Against any conditions, expected or unexpected, he figures out a way to give you a reasonable chance.

To be honest, I'm pretty sure McDermott and Babich learned their lessons and won't let Henry beat them. So it is "let's see if Lamar can beat us." To do that, it used to be "contain Lamar, don't let his leg beat you." I'm thinking with our speedy LBs, maybe we should try not letting Lamar beat you by giving him a lot of time to pass the ball. I just can't help noticing Lamar has had unbelievable long time to pass the ball compared to other top QBs.

People assume he's going to be counted on as WR2 and get upset. But as a practice squad player, it is more than justified. He's 26. And you know he CAN have a 4 TD game (in a playoff game, against one of the better defenses) if people don't pay much attention to him.

Not sure I'd count on that. Throughout Josh's career against Ravens (same HC mind you), even throwing away the 2 games before 2020, Harbaugh's Ravens always seemed to be able to contain Allen to a degree, like passing yards barely 200 yards or below. In regular season, completion 55% or below. No huge rushing yards. In the past, the Bills D were able to contain Jackson as well, until last year where the Ravens were able to double the yardage, plays etc. on Bills D compared to Bills offense on their D. The turnovers saved the Bills last year in the playoffs. If I'm a betting man, I expect the Ravens D to do the same against Allen and the offense. Question is can the Bills D rise up to match up like we did prior to last year or getting some fortunate turnovers again.

First game is unpredictable. You ask yourself what has changed? Both teams did not change a great deal. The Ravens add Jaire Alexander, Hopkins (I don't believe he's starter at this point). The Bills swapped Miller for Bosa, added WR2 Palmer. The Ravens had a strong 2024 draft and you should expect CB Wiggins and RT Rosengarten to take another step to be the main starters. The Bills 2024 draft is still to be proved on the field, but yes we do expect Coleman and Bishop to start for the season opener. No big surprises from the Ravens like how a Derrick Henry would impact their offense. Now we Bills fan certainly hope Bosa may give them (and NFL) a surprise on how he will impact our defense. The big thing to me is the Bills coordinators. Both teams had new coordinators last year but I'd say Both Todd Monken and Zachary Orr out coached Brady and Babich respectively. Hopefully a year on the job our young coordinators catching up, especially for Babich - when you don't have a superstar like Allen on your side, you need to come up with ways to prepare your players and be able to adapt fast in game.

Simple defensive positioning has a lot of checks and changes from pre to post snap. The film probably shows only a subset of the checks. The communications between players may change year to year, but formation and checks probably not that much. Another big part is personnel. Each player in a formation has responsibilities. The guys practiced/ran in those plays know who can do well and who cannot do well, or even within the same play but different checks. Those are more valuable to opposing coaches because they can only project what a player could do in a play if THAT player has no film on taking a specific role in a play; but a former player who practiced that play many times with the former teammate knew.

well, if he does not light it up this year, I can see Bean sign another Joey Bosa in Trey

24 hours to cut down time and 5 days after White injury, not a hint of severity on his injury. None of his teammates, agent, family member (especially kids) said anything and no neighbors saw him walk or on clutches. I guess we are not NYC where 100 people would park outside of his drive, fly a drone of some sort to get some news.

Competitive advantage! You don't want Tampa to know if Tre is playing or not tomorrow.

Maybe Josh and Hailee should've asked Terry to use the boat for their rendezvous in Mexico so that no Paparazzi will be near them. Maybe they did now because there is not much news about them any more.

Better now than the 3rd play of the Ravens game.

Mmm watch this video. Cole, as long as he has no setback from injury between now and Sept 7, is going to start. I listened to Babich's interview and what they said is true. Babich said safeties need to be able to play in space and this is the biggest weakness of Hamlin. Can Bishop play in space? We don't know. But we know he has speed to do it. The Bills are going to roll the dice on this one because the stats Dan quoted is true: the Bills disguise since Poyer and Hyde has dropped from the top to the bottom of the league due to our safeties physical traits.

In a broader sense, having a QB like Allen means you have a chance, not what I call or a window. I said earlier, there are other teams with a QB as capable as Allen to have a chance to win it all. I interpret the "window" term to mean a team loading up assets for a push to win it all; it won't let go any assets even though it probably mean better for the team in the long run or effectively "renting a player" (baseball term) for the short term purpose. In Bills case, signing Von Miller to a 6 years 100+ million deal, even at the expected 3 years effective life span of the contract for a 33 year old guy, is not something a team not believing it is about to win it all would do. Conversely jettering Diggs for a 2nd round pick, even though we had no one better than Diggs on the team at the time, is something we believed we were NOT in the window while the Texans believed that they were in the window. There are exceptions, of course, and plenty of them. Brady's 1st superbowl. Chiefs superbowl after trading away Hill etc. Last year Allen's unexpected step forward got us to the door step of a superbowl. The Bills extending all these players this off-season means they believe these guys are good enough to help Allen to get to the superbowl within those extension years, thus the window.

Come on now. We are now way past the drought years when we had no chance because of qb issue. We are now talking about windows among elite teams which have qbs who can lead the respective teams to a Super Bowl. Yes Allen is elite. But when he is facing another team in the playoffs that also has an elite qb, then it matters who has more and better core supporting casts.

When Josh broke out 2020 season, the 1st window for superbowl opened. OBD went ahead added Von to their core players of Allen, Diggs, Knox, Dawkins, Morse, Oliver, Milano, White, Hyde, and Poyer. 3 seasons, 21-23, some bad luck like injuries, inexperience, and aging of a lot of the core guy proved to be not quite good enough. 2024 was supposed to be a reset and reloading year. Almost all of the aging core guys were let go. But Allen took a step ahead into an MVP. As such OBD is setting up the 2nd window for superbowl, identifying and signing up the new core guys. Allen, Oliver, Dawkins, Knox remained; Bernard, Brown, Shakir, Rousseau, Benford and now Cook are given extension to be the new core guys. They really need a few more to step up like Kincaid and Coleman, plus a few defensive side rookies to pan out in the next 3 years, starting from the 2025 campaign. NFL windows are short. 3 years from now, if they don’t get it, a number of these core guys will be out of the door and a new reset is in the order to clear the book. Let’s hope from the coaching stuff to the core guys left from the first window got hardened enough to gives us better results in January.

McDermott strikes me as one of the conservative, somewhat old fashioned coaches. He is not McVay type. He has progressed the last 8 years but you know he probably holds "no practice no play" type of philosophy to heart. Since the Bills never had a hold-out player in practice when McDermott as a HC, just like putting yourself in his position, I'd certain make my stance clear to Mr. Cook in terms of my standard for on field performance related practice habits. Note this is just one side of the job as HC in terms of managing players. There is another side of the job in terms of working with Beane on determining players like who are core, who are base, etc. which I think they have already worked out in the off-season

Well, Sal speaks more of my feel about Cook in this saga. Cook is likely torn between wanting to be a good teamate and getting his money following the advice of his brother and agent. Probably the reason for this unusual "hold-in" stance a week into the training camp, and back to practice today after a heart-to-heart talk with McDermott who probably explained the practice/on-field side of things for his overall own good (leading to more financial leverage). I don't know a contract is forthcoming, and that looks to be a consistent sentiment from all those covered the Bills today at practice. Many of them said they have no idea if Cook is sure to even practise tomorrow, though I would think it would create much worse problem for the coaching staff and fellow players if Cook decides to do that. Coaches and players all have practice plan, like who is in which personnel grouping and plays a specific role in each play; no one likes to have unexpected changes showing up at work.

Read Allen's words carefully: "I'm not going to ask him to do anything he doesn't want to do."

Maybe there is a deal. But ... the reporters asked Cook to speak after the practice and he declined. If a deal is done, I'd think Cook is likely to speak something - it is not like he has to pass a physical, that kind of hurdles. People skills are important, for a HC and GM, even in such a ruthless business where everything is driven by bottom line (win, loss, are you better than the next guy?). Cook and his presentative went the route of "Hold in", if they are smart, they should have an exit plan, with or without a deal. Likewise, Beane and McDermott should have possible paths planned and try to steer it clear of a "dead-end." Best path is a deal both party are comfortable. Short of that, you need to find a respected way for Cook to go, not feeling humiliated - I do not believe Cook is some very stubborn head being unrealistic. Cook has made over $4 million dollars on his rookie contract so far and his 2025 proven performance escalator is bumping his 2025 base salary to over $5.2 million. So we know he's not going to mess up with that money. But he is going to be 26 near the end of sept. So he is looking for his biggest payday the next contract. At this point, it looks more like the guaranteed money in the next contract will be in the $15 - 20 million range. In contrast, the 2025 franchise tag is about $13.5 million (expect 2026 to be up more). So really, however, you look at it, if Beane is offering par market rate, the 2 sides will be "close" by NFL contract standards. The fact they have not come to an agreement so far leads me to believe either Beane wants a "home discount" or Cook's side believe there are "white knight teams" out there willing to over pay, or even worse both of those are true.