Sierra Foothills

A very good player. One year due to an injury to one of our tackles (Demetrus Bell or Erik Pears or one of those stiffs) Levitre started a few games at tackle and it was clear he was the best tackle on the team. He later signed that nice fat free agent contract with Tennessee.

Fair enough. I'll say barring injury he makes the opening day roster.

Okay. It's just odd saying that he's "the odd man out" when he's not even on the roster.. If you said "he's not returning" that would make more sense to me. Whatever. I understand.

In your first post you said "I don't see him making the final roster." I said that he's going to get "regular season playing time" with the Bills. If you don't think he's going to make the final roster this is a pretty easy bet for you to make. BTW I'm not interested in parsing words if that's the direction your heading towards.

Yes, but in years past they weren't collecting players to replace him with... as they are this offseason.

Disagree. He wasn't used this way but Murray is a guy who could line up deep and take the toss and attack the line of scrimmage vertically. 100%. Even at his age he's a lot faster that Singletary and when Murray gets into the open field he gallops. Watching him play last year he has a plenty left in the tank IMO. And he gives the Bills a style of runner that they haven't had. Yeah, they love Murray. It harkens back to the earlier days of the McBeane era where they wanted to have one veteran leader in every position group. Taiwan Jones is a free agent. It seems like either Sherfield, Shorter, or Shaver will take his spot. All 3 have strong track records as gunners. But, Yeldon has not played since 2020 so it's hard to blame the Bills for his non-use. Let me know if you'd like to make a wager that Murray gets regular season playing time with the Bills. Correct. Compared to Knox maybe. How about compared to Beasley or McKenzie? How about compare to Shakir or Diggs? You understand what I'm saying.

As was ALREADY stated upthread, Murray has missed a total of 10 games in 9 NFL seasons as a running back. Good question. What do you think the odds are?

He's consistently had juice. He's a 9 year vet with eight straight seasons of at least 500 yards. Only once has he averaged less than 4.0 per carry. He has power and speed and doesn't fumble the ball. I've always maintained that McDermott (from his comments) is a neanderthal football coach at heart. We pass because we have Josh Allen but McDermott would love to be able to play smash mouth football. I'm getting visions of Ottis Anderson running against us in Super Bowl XXV. This fires me up. Downhill, punishing... excellent vision. It's been about 10 years so people forget that Murray ran a sub 4.4 forty at the combine. This is a big, physical, durable, dependable, running back who can still outrun linebackers. Also he's averaged 10.5 yards per reception... a part of his game that's been underutilized. The Bills can go jumbo with the 2 TE set and teams will be overplaying the run when Murray's in the game.

Also, very few linebackers can overcome poor play by the d-line in front of them. In order for most LBs to have success, they need to be protected from blockers. In the present day linebackers have never been smaller and offensive linemen have never been larger. Regarding LB size, it used to be Chuck Bednarik, Sam Huff, Ray Nietschke, Dick Butkus, Willie Lanier, Tommy Nobis, ad infinitum were as big as the o-linemen who were blocking them. That was back when Lombardi's "Run to Daylight" was the blueprint for NFL success. In today's pass-crazy NFL, Tremaine Edmunds is an outlyer as was Ray Lewis. It's rare to see a 250 lb LB anymore.

It's fair to say that much of what the Bills do defensively is done with Kansas City in mind... more so than Cinci I think.

And then we drafted Nathan Peterman...

I didn't say Mayock was a good talent evaluator. I said I felt sorry for him because what happened with the Raiders is IMO more a reflection of Jon Gruden. I believe this because he was hired by Gruden. As @Kirby Jackson already pointed out, Mahomes was a late riser. I don't recall there being much surprise that he was taken. Maybe I'm wrong but I remember thinking that I'd be good if the Bills took him at #10.

In fairness, Schneider's had some really good drafts too. The last thing I want to do is re-start the Campbell debate. I just want to point out that the two players considered the biggest reaches of round one of this year's draft were taken by the same team. Bruce Irvin was taken 15th overall and has played 12 years in the league including last year. He has 54 career sacks and a Super Bowl win. No All-Pro or Pro Bowls. I feel he was misused both in college and in the pros. I always felt that Janikowski should have been a Buffalo Bill. Mahomes was taken 10th overall. Mitchell Trubisky was taken 2nd and DeShaun Watson 12th. They were the only QBs in that draft considered to be 1st rounders. Being that it was 2017, we had by then reached the point in history where the top rated QBs were not going to slide far. I feel bad for Mayock because there's no question in my mind that it was Gruden pulling the strings.

It may be that they're waiting to sign a bunch to make a single announcement. I think I remember something like that in the past. "Rumblin' Bumblin' Stumblin!!!"

And... Shavers... is the new Shorter?

Either one works for me. Can we put the two together? Kind of like the old "bowling ball with butcher knives?"

The NFL rookie wage scale was implemented during the 2011 negotiations. It took money from 1st rounders such as Sam Bradford ($76 million), Jason Smith ($62 million), JaMarcus Russell $61 million) and reallocated that money towards veteran players who had already proven their value. You have to admit, "Touchdown Jesus" is a pretty cool nickname though. Yes, ST is less important but still important. Ask the 2021 Green Bay Packers who lost 4 games directly to special teams including their NFC Divisional Game loss to SF. "Despite leading 10–3 throughout most of the game, the Packers went on to lose 13–10 to the 49ers. During the game, the special teams received scrutiny after allowing a blocked field goal, a 32-yard kick return by JaMycal Hasty, a 45-yard return by Deebo Samuel, and blocked punt that would tie the game at 10–10 in the 4th quarter."

I've seriously lost the ability to tell when someone on this forum is kidding... there's a few guys here with a very dry sense of humor. Woo is a strange name but I can't imagine someone named "Bumper Pool." And yet: https://arkansasrazorbacks.com/roster/bumper-pool/

"And they're dropping their gloves!!! Here they go!!!"

@SirAndrew Sorry if my grumpiness targeted you. It's a MAJOR pet peeve of mine that people will simply read something and then parrot it without question. But moreso, all of these posts refuting his "poor hands" came BEFORE you posted in this topic: I always admonish people here (whether or not I should) to read more and post less... and to read through topics to avoid posting redundantly, especially when it's bad information. Another example in this topic is that one person mistakenly mentioned that Chad Hall is the Bills WR Coach... and then he's corrected 6 times... Of course the corrections were made with good intentions but still... read first, write second. I realize I should let it go but like everyone else, I'm a work in progress... which is to say, I'm trying.

I have a Vontae jersey and will consider the trade. Mine is actually autographed but strangely he only signed his first name, then rushed off.

Are we sure he's slow? The consensus among most talent evaluators are that his celebration skills are indeed elite. However NFL.com had him 73rd in trash talking for a cornerback so you might want to reconsider that statement. Too often people here assume someone with celebration skills are also great trash talkers. That belief is just an oversimplification by those (and it seems to be a growing number) who view the world through a binary lens and can't differentiate the complexity in our world.