jahnyc

Aren't we waiting on cuts and salary reductions as well? I would have thought that information about releases would have happened by now given that the Bills seem like the kind of organization that would want to give cut players the best opportunity to sign elsewhere, which would be before or as the free agency period begins.

I think the league new year begins on March 15th, so only five days away. Need to tender restricted free agents by then and be under the cap.

Milano seems like a no brainer. So would Diggs, unless there really are issues and he wants out. The Bills will have much to consider as to whether to restructure White and Dawkins (especially White). I would not.

I have no idea what his issues are. I hope the coaches and GM do. We need him to be in the right frame of mind and to be the player he has been for his time with Buffalo. We have no replacement on the roster for his production, and it is unlikely we will replace his production with a free agent or a draft choice.

His head still does not seem to be in the right place after the team was bounced out of the playoffs by the Bengals. He can't let it go, has no understanding of what happened and is leaving a trail of bread crumbs about potentially wanting out (or certainly feeling uncomfortable with the current direction of the team). I think this needs to be resolved as soon as possible since there are too many ramifications associated with whether or not we have a number one WR to start the season.

We really don't have any replacements on the current roster for Edmunds or Poyer, which is unfortunate. How much of an impact their loss will have on the defense will depend on the free agents signed or draft picks made that will replace them.

It will be interesting to see the moves made prior to and on March 15th to get under the salary cap. I would expect we will be hearing soon about salary restructures, salary reductions, cuts, restricted free agent tenders and possibly extensions. I think three of the potential restructures raise potential issues. Will DIggs be willing to restructure (assuming it makes it harder to trade him)? Do you restructure Miller and White (both coming off of ACL injuries)? The only easy restructure is Allen. Hard to guess which current players, if any, will be asked to take pay cuts. I expect the Bills to cut McKenzie, but I am not sure of any others. Guessing maybe Hines, Settle and Neal, unless those contracts are restructured. I hope we tender Jackson. A second round tender would be $4.3 million.

If they restructure his contract for more cap space, that will be a good sign of his commitment to the team because it likely will make trading him even more difficult.

Who knows what is really going on, but it is clear that he is not happy about something since the loss to the Bengals, and the public indications of his unhappiness have continued.

Not suggesting that this where things are, but can't a contract be restructured in a way to facilitate a trade (and then the acquiring team makes an adjustment after the trade)?

I don't think we have heard from Frazier yet, have we? Will be interesting when we do, assuming it happens.

I will be bummed if the Bills promote Holcomb, Washington or Babich. Washington was bad as DC in Carolina and Holcomb and Babich do not have enough experience. The last thing we need is another coordinator that has limited or no prior experience as a coordinator. It is unfortunate that this did not surface earlier in the offseason. Not sure it would have mattered since McBeane seem to favor Carolina connections, but it would have been interesting to get a top DC to run the defense.

Hard to be critical when the team goes 13-3 with the injuries, weather related difficulties and the near tragic situation with Hamlin, but misjudgments by McBeane also contributed to our early exit in the playoffs. I think McBeane overestimated the quality of our depth and when Miller, Hyde and D. Jones were injured, the defense struggled. McBeane also counted on improvement and further development from Davis, Brown, Basham and Oliver. It did not happen, and Brown seemed to regress. Regarding free agency, Settle, Crowder and Saffold did not contribute at the hoped for levels.and it wouldn't be unreasonable to have a discussion about whether the money spent on Miller could have been allocated differently to address other team needs. In hindsight, last year's offseason was a bit of a miss and I hope this offseason will prove to be more of a success.

Would we be having this conversation if some of our draft picks for the defense were having more success? Oliver, Espenesa and Basham clearly have underperformed for where they were drafted. If one or two of these players turned out to be red or blue chip type players, our defense would be better and we would be satisfied with the drafting of these players and the point at which they were drafted.

I have been thinking post-Super Bowl that maybe it was a mistake to elevate Dorsey to OC. After last season, the expectation was that we would be a Super Bowl contender this season, possibly even a favorite to get there. In that situation, was the right decision to install a rookie OC to do the play calling for a head coach with a background on defense? Doesn't seem like a wise decision in hindsight. It may have been upsetting to Josh, but the right approach would have been to hire an OC with experience. To be fair, I don't know who was available last offseason and we did have Mike Shula in some kind of a role, but our offense was really uneven this season and not particularly creative.

Makes sense for Edmunds and Poyer since they are free agents at this point and have not re-signed (although I hope they do). Oliver not being in the photo may be more about him not being one of their top players.

KC has great coaches. Reid for the offense and Spags for the defense. Reid is so creative and comes up with great game plans.

Clearly, Diggs is not over the loss to Cincinnati and there do seem to be lingering and unresolved issues between him and Allen and possibly the coaching staff. Diggs is a captain, and he will need to soon start acting more positively about the future and next season with the Bills, or this really will become a distraction or worse. A team can't have one of its top players and a captain showing a lack of confidence about the direction and prospects for the team or indifference (at best) about playing for the team.

He just does not seem positive in any way about the team or the team's future and that was a weird statement about if the team sends him somewhere it wouldn't be KC. Does that interviewer actually work for SI? I don't usually comment about these kinds of things, but she was really bad.

Expectations were really high this season and they were not met. The success that the team has had during the time that McBeane have been in charge is amazing, particularly when compared to the team's performance prior to their arrival, but the team's success also has caused a readjustment of expectations. which I guess was inevitable. Not meeting expectations led to scrutiny, with some legitimate questions raised about coaching and the composition of the team. I think what is causing the current angst and toxicity on the board is the concern that we will not have as much success next year since the coaching staff generally will remain intact and we are limited in our ability to improve player talent, coupled with facing significant free agent losses. It doesn't help to have concerns about Diggs' happiness with the team and Josh. Our fan base is particularly sensitive about star players being unhappy about playing for the Bills, and this is an additional layer of angst that we just don't need. McBeane have a lot of pressure this offseason to keep the players motivated and confident while improving the overall talent. Tough task with the same coaching staff returning and very limited cap space, but let's hope that they can figure out a way to make the moves necessary to get us where we need to be.

I guess we may have a better sense of the situation with Diggs if the Bills don't restructure Diggs' contract this offseason to free up some dollars to sign and re-sign free agents.

Seems like Diggs is doing a lot of interviews. You would think at least one of his interviewers would ask Diggs about his relationship with Allen post loss to the Bengals. I have not heard/seen that.

Listening to Diggs on Dan Patrick was weird. Referred to Josh as his quarterback and not by name. Didn't try to explain it as an in the moment kind of thing or that things were good between them, instead seemed to suggest that there were issues in the second half of the season. Some had suggested that Diggs was trying to get Allen to ignore Dorsey's play calling, but that was not my sense of what was going on between Allen and Diggs in that moment. Appeared to be something between them.

All good points, but the the things you note under "Scheme" are so difficult to understand and need to be figured out if the Bills are going to have future success.

Morse at his current contract is reasonable value. Can't cut Oliver because his compensation for 2023 if fully guaranteed and I doubt he can be traded. Would we restructure Tre? Does the base salary restructure affect our ability to move on from Tre in 2024 or 2025? Tre is one of my favorite players on the Bills, but there must be at least some concern about whether he will return to form for the 2023 season.