jahnyc

We are pretty far away from being competitive and I don't think it can be fixed in one offseason. We can feel better about the team's prospects if Allen and Edmunds show significant progress during the season, but I don't think this year's version of the Bills is as talented as last year's version of the Bears.

McBeane will need to show us that they know how to build a team, not just tear it down, which is the easy part. Their free agent signings this offseason and some of their personnel moves have negatively impacted my confidence in their abilities to re-stock the talent on this team. McBeane will have their opportunity, but the analogy to the Sabres rebuild led by Murray, and the possibility of a similar crummy outcome, does scare me.

The discouraging thing is that we still have one of the oldest rosters and not much young talent. Of course the development of Allen and Edmunds will be key, but other than White and Dawkins, who else do we have to watch develop this season? Seems to be a pipe dream to expect this team to suddenly improve, even next season, without a significant number of up and coming young players, which I don't think we have and another draft will not be enough to solve. Beane has his hands full, and his free agent acquisitions this offseason are not giving me much confidence in his abilities to assemble a quality roster of talented players.

Not really seeing many positives right now. This season is done after two weeks and the team has so many holes to fill next offseason. It shouldn't be about next year or the future at this point in a season, but, unfortunately, it is.

Assuming this is all true, it is kind of astounding how far off the Bills FO and coaching staff were about Peterman's ability to be a starter and the related determination to trade AJ.

They are both safe this year, but if the Bills are well below .500 this year, their trades and free agents signings will be closely scrutinized. The keys will be whether Allen and Edmunds show progress during the season and whether the free agent additions, particularly Star, Davis and Trent Murphy, play to the level of their contracts. Ultimately, it is about the talent, and I think Beane will get more scrutiny than McD. If our free agent additions from this past offseason look as poor as a group as they do after the first game, I think questions about Beane's ability to evaluate and identify talent will be well deserved.

This is legitimately concerning. Of all of the important fixes that were needed this past offseason (and there were many), a strong, creative OC was one of the things at the top of list. Way too early to assess Daboll at this point, but his past experience as OC in the NFL was always disconcerting. Landing with teams with bad offenses (Cleveland and Buffalo) is unfortunate, but he will need to make the team confident in his abilities and schemes this season.

Peterman may have many intangibles but his arm strength seems very weak (weaker than Brees). Is there a starting NFL quarterback with similar arm strength? I am not sure there is.

I thought I read that they were interested in McCown (Jets back-up QB and starter last year) and only turned to AJ when there were no other viable options. Signing McCown would have made sense as part of the overall plan.

I am worried about the poor planning and execution that went into this offseason for things that were under their control. Maybe they thought the fans would give them a mulligan for this season because we unexpectedly made the playoffs last season.

The real question is whether the players can get better as the season progresses, and I don't see it happening. It would be great if Allen shows his talent and improves as the season progresses, but I don't think the o-line will suddenly improve since they are all veterans and many of them were not re-signed by their prior teams (Vlad, Bodine, Newhouse). Miller and Groy are young veterans and they seem to have gotten worse. At other positions, we do not have young, talented players waiting in the wings that just need playing time. For example, at starting CB opposite White, we have Davis or Gaines, neither of whom should be starting with almost no depth behind them and certainly no up and coming young players. What obviously young, talented players do we have at WR, outside LB or DE?

Not trying be be revisionist, but the reality is that we miss the talent they represented, or maybe, more accurately, they are gone and we did not find adequate replacements or upgrades. That some of them became better players after they left likely is more on the Bills in terms of coaching or not surrounding them with same level of talent as their new teams.

I don't think many of us want Whaley, Sammy, Tyrod or Fitz back, but we do miss, at least in some fashion, the talent represented by players like Gilmore, Darby, Brown, Hogan, Woods and Goodwin. All of these players would be upgrades compared to what we have now. Even Dareus would be an upgrade, but not at the salary we were paying him. I get it that we could not afford to keep most of these players if we had wanted to, but that is just part of the poor cap management legacy of the prior front office.

Some thoughts below: 1. The front office and owners of the Bills really will test us this season. This potentially is a historically bad team lacking talent and depth with the prospect of starting a rookie QB because he may be the only real choice. It was great that we broke the playoff drought last year, but to then have the likelihood of an extended rebuilding process immediately following is tough with no guarantees of success. 2. Not sure if I have seen a team with so many units that need to be upgraded. WRs and O-line may only have one or two quality starters between them. No depth at LB or CB and we need a starting quality CB opposite White. Our DEs are non-existent and we have no depth at LB and probably need at least one additional quality starting LB. There are probably eight or nine starters who would not be starters on any other team. 3. As others have noted, it is easier to tear something down than build something strong and durable. I was among those who were very disappointed that we were not able to keep our second round draft picks and the first round of the third round pick. We needed these picks. If you factor in the trade for Glenn which was the equivalent of getting a second round pick, we gave up a lot of value for Allen. Obviously, if Allen is our franchise QB, it will have been worth it. 4. The Bills will have a lot of cap room next offseason, but will they be able to sign free agents? If Allen plays well and there is excitement about this future, then we may be okay. If not, the Bills will be a tough sell for free agents and we will have to overpay to get players here. 5. If today's game is any indication, Beane will have a lot of explaining to do about his free agent acquisitions this offseason. Davis seems to have not recovered from his injury last season, Murphy has new injury issues and our o-line additions are ineffective. Beane needed to find a starting CB opposite White and I don't think Davis or Gaines will be the answer. 6. Beane's player evaluation abilities will be under a microscope. The Coleman trade made no sense since Cleveland likely would have released him. Instead, we are now on the hook for his guaranteed money. The Bills made some good acquisitions last year and I am wondering if the they miss Gaines (who became the GM of the Texans this offseason). 7. I have no idea how we could have gone into this season with this o-line. There was little or no chance that veteran players like Vlad, Bodine, Miller, Groy Mills and Newhouse were going to suddenly improve. I understand that Woods needing to retire was unforeseen, but we needed to devote whatever resources we had into improving the o-line. Bodine and Newhouse are not the answer. 8. I don't think McD is a problem He coached well last season and I think he will be a good coach for the Bills when he has the talent. I hope Daboll will be the right choice for OC. He has not had much success in the NFL as an OC with some bad teams and it will be hard to make judgments here with the lack of talent on offense.

Some other bad moves include signing Davis to be the starting CB opposite from White and being stuck with the guaranteed money from Coleman's contract. Davis has not fully recovered from a significant injury and Coleman likely would have been waived by the Browns. I get it that he was hamstrung by the salary cap and dead money to sign free agents to address needs, but there is real problem on this team with talent and depth that is going to take time to fix.

Either he is not yet fully recovered from his prior injury or he will not be the player he once was, even when healthy. The Bills needed a starting CB in the offseason, and if there was this kind of risk with Davis, I would have hoped that our medical staff would have identified it. If they did, it was borderline reckless to think that Davis would be ready to start the season or hold up during the season. I think we could have done better with the free agent dollars, at least sign a CB that was healthy and would play.

Strange that the Bills seem to lack talent and adequate reserves yet we lose four players to waivers (so far) including a LB, center and guard.

Way too early to make judgments about Beane, but the amount of activity, trades for draft picks/players, moving up in the draft, and player releases, has been incredible. One thing I do believe is that the Bills do not have a talented roster. For a number of reasons, including all of our dead money, we are starting players that should not be starting and we have reserves that would not make most NFL rosters. We will have better resources next year (i.e., cap space) to improve the roster, but this may be a tough year, particularly if we have injuries since we have no quality depth at most positions.

Kind of crazy to have only two QBs on the roster with this o-line. if the Bills were in discussions for Mack, I bet McCarron was part of our proposal.

We will see how Beane does with roster building. Trading away players for picks is easier than drafting well and signing free agents that are effective players for their new team. He has started the process by trading up for and drafting Allen and Edmunds and signing Star and Murphy, among others. We will need time to evaluate the development of Allen and Edmunds over time, but free agent acquisitions this offseason seem weak with Davis possibly losing a step, Murphy being injured and a bunch of guys who may not be deserving of a roster spot (i.e., Newhouse and Bodine).

Daboll will get time because of the poor o-line, below average group of WRs and our QBs, including the possibility of a rookie starting QB. All of these things will allow him to deflect at least some criticism for poor offensive production this year, which I think most people expect in any event. With this group of players on offense, I would be shocked if we are even close to the middle of the pack in scoring or total yards.

The players that McD and Beane have gotten rid of were all players from the prior regime, including Darby and Ragland. That is the explanation. We don't know the reasons. Yes, we could use some of these players now. Darby would look good starting opposite White and Glenn, if healthy, would be a welcome addition to this o-line.

Beane and McD tore down completely what was here before and there was not enough cap space because of the dead money or draft picks to make significant enough additions for this season through free agency or the draft.

I have no optimism that the line play will improve during the season. Miller, Mills, Bodine and Ducasse are all veterans. They are not suddenly going to start getting better. Groy has not looked good today either.

Still a huge fan, but fantasy football has had an odd impact on the my interest in the NFL. I now want to watch multiple games even when the Bills are playing and sometimes I find that am too focused on particular players for other teams at the expense of the attention I should be paying to the Bills game.