Ed_Formerly_of_Roch

I'm OK with cutting 1,3,5,& 7 Getting rid of that many D lineman will cost you more to replace and not likely to have an overall improvement for the amount of money they'd have to spend. Smith too I'd only get rid of if they replace with another TE who can block well and catch passes. Redo Hyde and Hughes contract to extend and lower cap.

Why does Lee Smith look like he's about 50 YO?

Don't know how we would have made it through this past season without his contribution to the D.

Agree with most of your picks. The one worry I do have about Daryl Williams is he fits the category of a guy playing on a contract year. Will he be this good once he has a long term deal. But McD & Beane should know him pretty good for their Carolina days together so would trust them to decide on that. I'd also cut Brown, Addison, and Jefferson I believe it is. Keep mixing up him and Butler, would cut the one that came from Carolina and keep the one from Seattle. Add in a couple more restructures like Hyde to save some $$ Don't even know who Jordan Devey is?? LOL One name missing from your list is T Jones which brings me to my next point. A mild concern I have with the Bills roster is have they gotten to the point where they have too many special teams only players, thus limiting roster depth. Jones, Roberts, Matakevich are three guys who are exclusive to ST. Obviously on top of that add in the kicker, punter, and long snapper too. Add in Lee Smith who is solely there as a blocking TE, that's seven roster slots. Gilliam does play some offense so am more comfortable with a role like that as does provide some additional functionality to the team. Overall the Bills ST was very good this year, but did it short change other positions. Personally I was apprehensive of activating Williams at RB over Yeldon for the playoffs based on his limited experience, but would have been fine with activating him as a 3rd option, give him a couple plays to see what he could do. But to do that would have needed to sit someone at some other position group. Seem to recall most teams only activate eight D lineman whereas we always had nine active, further limits you in other positions. With all these specialists, kind of limits options. Maybe every team in the league has 3 to 4 roster slots dedicated to ST not counting the true kicking game specialists, if that's the case, then OK my concern goes away. But have the Bills maybe gone a little too far and limiting other slots.

Agree with everything you stated. However with Kroft being a FA they will need to find a #2 TE, ideally if they could find one that is strong blocker and puts a little more fear in the defense than Smith going out on patterns, they could sign someone for that role and let Smith go. Currently two roster spots are taken up for backup TE, one for blocking, one for pass catching if Knox can't play for some reason. Also agree they won't likely spend a lot of money for that role, but could see them going $5 to $6 mil particularly if they can shed Smith $2.2 mil in process.

Miami worries me more as they already have a decent roster. Add Watson, hey could be come very good with few other moves. If the Jets give up a number of good picks to get Watson, they will still be left with holes and no high draft picks to use to get the players. Maybe Houston would be smart and try to trade to NFC team so they to don't need to face him. But not sure what NFC teams have the picks to do it with. Maybe Houston will figure they need more than one year anyway so would take 1sts spread over two years as that would then open up other teams.

Picking the Ravens passing game coordinator for their HC should result in a huge improvement.

I said about a month ago 2021 is the best shot for the Bills to go deep as they have a pretty easy schedule facing the AFC south and NFC south. Excluding AFC East games as play them every year, the only really tough games I see is Indy at home and maybe Pitt, and At Tampa, KC, and Tenn. But one of these years Brady will finally look his age. Forgot to add in Washington at a location to be determined.

#1 Coaching. Could be teams have figured it out, so then up to McD and Frazier to make some more tweaks and/or get some better players. Definitely the D line needs to get better. #3 Not sure which positions specially needs improving, but if they do sign two out of the three as I mentioned, they are then still at least one starter short. If Morse goes likely via being cut (unless retires due to concussions) and they sign Felicinao, they could move him to center, then need a guard. One way or another very likely will need at least one new starter, maybe two. #5 All we've seen of Wade was in meaningless pre-season games and Williams in blow out of Miami when they were running for the bus as they say. So not sure I like either of them for a team trying to go deep into playoffs. Think I was something more solid there. Allens contract isn't likely going to be an issue in 2021 or even 2022 and it's an extension that kicks in after he's completed his rookie contract that will include the 5th year option. Look at Mahomes, he signed extension this past July, but he still had a low cap him this year 2020, and even next year 2021 is reasonable. In 2022 it jumps up over $30 mil. Allen if signing this spring/summer would be one year behind so not a huge issue till the 2023 season. Likely the Bills will have to mortgage the future this year to some degree and extend some people further than they'd ideally like to do to free up enough money to make moves now. KC did it last year. It can bite you in the long run, but the one thing in the Bills favor is many of their star players are still young, so won't out live their contracts. But someone like a Jerry Hughes could.

I agree with most of your observations, but not sure I like your solutions all that much! #1 Defensive Coaching. I agree with the bend but don't break concept is what they are playing allowing them to move the chains. But they've played the same the past two seasons with much better success. This year though they were bending much more and even breaking more frequently was the issue. So think the concept might still be fine, but need better players to reduce the frequency of successful drives by the opponent. #2 Defensive Line is a big issue, but drafting a pass rusher may help the defense in maybe 2023, but not next season. This team is poised next year to make a deep run as IMO next years schedule is more forgiving so this is their chance. For that reason would rather they sign an actual star FA edge rusher. I'm fine with getting rid of Butler and Addison to pay this new guy with. Think I would keep Jefferson though as can play multiple positions and is still only 26 I believe. The Bills have used a fair amount of draft resources on the Dline as they've drafted; Oliver, Johnson, Epinosa, and Phillips, plus as stated Jefferson is only 26 so it's not like they've ignored this position. The Bills philosophy is we're going to wear you down with our depth and keep rotating solid, but not great players out there. In 2018 and 2019 it worked, this year not nearly as well. #3 and #4 Agree with waiting a year on Edmunds and drafting an O-lineman pretty high, 2nd round sounds good. A lot there will also depend on what happens between Morse, Feliciano, and Williams IMO likely only two of the three will be back, which two not certain. Of the three would prefer Morse being the odd man out. #5 Running Back I don't think Christian Wade is the answer as big of a mess as the running game was this year. I think I'd go with Williams ahead of him, but from a fan perspective wouldn't want to count on either being the solution for next season. Obviously the coaches have seen much more of those two, and maybe they think one of them is ready, or they feel the biggest issue was run blocking. Would make me nervous if Wade or even Williams is their best answer. #6 Tight End is like drafting an edge rusher. You could draft a TE who in 4 years will be better than Kerce and Gronk combined, but counting on him as a rookie to look better than Knox is a stretch. TE is one of the harder positions to learn. For those reasons would give Knox another year, though is likely they will want/need at least a #2 TE to replace Kroft, unless they feel Sweeney is ready for that role. But that's risky with the heart condition he had as could just as easily be medically retired.

You bring up a good point! Sort of! One thing I haven't seen much mention of, many Bill's fans here on this message board and other places including myself gave the Bills a real good chance to beat the Chiefs for a couple of reasons: The only team besides the Bills to win their last six regular season games was Green Bay, plus the Bills won 11 of the final 12 which no other team had done. So they were the hottest team in the league. In December they weren't just winning games, they were crushing teams. In that same time frame KC was just squeaking by in their games, not very impressive at all. For these reasons many in the national media, plus local media and certainly Bills fans gave them a good chance to beat KC Also heard some discussion from the national media as to what's wrong with KC? There were a couple of response that nothings wrong , they are just bored. Guess they were the ones that nailed it correctly! Add to that KC sat most of their starters in the last regular season game and lost, then a week bye. By the time they played Cleveland they came out kind of a bit rusty. Unfortunately for the Bills they were ready this week. Also read or heard some report that Mahomes may be getting a little tired of hearing reports that Allen has caught or even passed Mahomes. Recall on the Fox pre-game Bradshaw stated Allen is the best passer in the league or some words similar. All these things may have made the media and Bills fans more confident that the team could beat KC, but may have also helped motivate KC to play their best game in a couple of months.

We do have alot of those types, Roberts, Jones, Matakvich, Gilliam to some extent, though he does at least contribute some on offense Is that only after adding in Allens yards gained rushing? Always felt kind of unfair how QB running yards are measured. If a QB scrambles and gets sacked even as little as one yard behind the LOS it counts as a sack, but as soon as he crosses the LOS it becomes positive rushing yards gained. Seems like the only time a QB gets negative rushing yards in when taking a knee. Would like to see QB running yards tracked differently, once he drops back to pass yards gained or lost is totaled separately, call it yards scrambling

Most of the articles I've read all blame Brown for running a poor route. That he shouldn't have been covered that tight if he had fought thru it. But he didn't and Allen expected him to get open.

Guess I don't understand the difference? Before we scored the TD we were 23 points behind so needed to score 3 TD's and on two of them needed to convert the 2 point conversion to tie. So what difference does it make if we went for and made the 2 pointer on the 1st two TD's or the last two? You could argue going for it on the first two TD's scored makes the most sense as then you know where you are, once they missed they then knew they'd need 2 more TD's plus a FG. If they kick after the first TD, get the two on the 2nd TD, now they come down score another TD with 20 seconds left, go for two and fail, there's no time left to do anything else. The sooner in the game you know what you need to do to come back the better. Here's an except from one article and if you Google, you can find a dozen other articles all basically stating the same, go for it early: Knowledge is power. You need to get a two-point conversion at some point, and knowing whether you’re going to convert is important information. There is no reasonable reason not to go for 2 after your first touchdown. Yes, missing out on the two-point conversion earlier could be demoralizing. But what would you call missing out on a two-point conversion with 5 seconds left when trailing by 2? https://www.footballperspective.com/trailing-by-15-in-the-middle-of-the-4th-quarter-teams-are-foolish-to-not-go-for-2-after-touchdowns/

I agree and I'm saying that in a good way. Based on what we displayed on the 1st 3 downs, it wasn't very likely we would score, so kicking the FG still kept us a little closer so that if we did finally figure things out and could look like the team that played all season, maybe then could get back into it. All the comments about playing scared and didn't learn anything after being aggressive all season, it was a different team all season, a team that couldn't be stopped and likely never would have got to 4th down as would have already scored on 2nd down. But not Sunday, that team couldn't do anything.

Recall one time back in the 90's on a weekend in October; Syracuse played Florida State Sat afternoon, both Saturday and Sunday evening the Atlanta Braves had a playoff game and MNF was the Bills at Chiefs. At that point on Monday my wife said to me, "whats the deal does everyone do this same chant"!

His name is Gabe Davis! I really question this speed thing. I did some calculations a few weeks back. The difference between Davis at 4.52 seconds and Brown 4.3, (assuming he can even still do a 4.3 at his age) results in a 40 yard run about 5 1/2 feet. In other words Brown would beat Davis by that amount. But when throwing a pass, have to factor in Davis being taller, likely longer arms makes up some of that distance. Maybe it's an effective difference of about 1.5 yard. So how many passes are going to be dropped perfectly into that spot that Brown would have caught it and it would have sailed over Davis head? How many passes does a team even throw over 40 yards over the course of the season, and how many are then even completed? Maybe 40 are thrown and 10 completed. Does it really stretch the field all that much more, and if so, how many more yards does it actually gain the team? And then is it worth spending an extra $7 mil for that or better spent elsewhere?

Obviously NOT a math Wizard!

So here's another question for all to explain: How come players seem to root for the team that knocks them out, but fans seem to hate and always root against the team the knocks them out? Never could figure that one out, and not saying I'm not guilty of this myself either!

Agree Allen never looked comfortable all game, throws were often high. He made a few good ones, but more bad ones than we'd seen all season. I just commented in another thread, maybe part of Allen's problem this year was he never really faced much adversity. Other than the Tenn and 1st KC game, were we ever behind by more than one score all year? And those two games Allen supposedly was playing hurt. So now when things weren't going well, makes it harder to know what to do when you've hardly been in that position all season. The entire play of offense took a big step back once playoffs started. Was it due to facing better defenses? Certainly true of Indy and Ravens, but Allen certainly didn't look as rattled and the line gave him time to throw. Not so much in this game as constantly under pressure. Excluding Brown the WR's were pretty healthy all season, but they all caught up at once it seemed. Running game is a complete mess. I do wonder as proficient as the passing game was all season, did they not devote enough practice time to the running game? Just looked up Singletery's stats for the past two seasons. Actually surprised me to see they were pretty close both season dropped from 775 yards to 687 2 TD's each year , 151 t o156 attempts, little better receptions and yards passing in 2020, dropped from 4 fumbles in 2019 to 1 this season. So how come he seemed light years better in 2019??

I remember as a kid they were literally in candy dishes at funeral homes to revive the grieving widow. Know idea if that's still common practice.

Like our #6 WR Roberts, add to that a 3rd RB in T Jones that only plays ST too. I understand the reluctance to play Williams over Yeldon as again all we'd seen of him looking real great was in mock up duty against Miami. But maybe they could have also activated Williams at the expense of Jones. Would think Williams could play some ST? At least then if Williams doesn't doo much still have Yeldon and Singletery to go back to. Could even throw in Matakevich as a LB who does nothing but play ST so are somewhat short in 3 position groupings, but have 9 D lineman and CB typically active. May need to find more Gilliam types that are good ST players, but can still contribute to offense and defense when called upon and more importantly, not to seemingly be afraid to call on them.

Believe it's because he was cut at the beginning, then signed to PS, never under actual contract. This year due to Covid changes, they had this thing every week where you could bring two players up to the 53 and not be subject to Waivers when brought back down, think it also could only happen to any one player two times through the year, so allowed Jackson to actually play in couple of games. Think at the end of the season everyone on the PS is either signed to a futures contract or becomes a FA May depend on what they view of Fromm's development. St this point I'd be kind of nervous having your back up QB's being Fromm and Webb. Maybe over off-season and pre-season, one or both play pretty well and fears are reduced considerably to go with them. Will be very surprised too if they don't also bring in a vet to be ready for backup position if either/both of these guys look shaky. Maybe it will even be Barkley unless they feel they can find a much cheaper but compatible talented option?

Seeing this photo, now it makes much more sense!!!

This was from an article from the Athletic, (need to be a subscriber) Putting this into context, this happened early 2nd quarter right after the Chiefs scored their first TD so score 9-7 Bills. Was in an article chronicling his final game of season. After some brief throws on the sideline, Allen grabbed a packet of smelling salts and took a deep inhale at 7:21. He quickly shook his head back and forth three times and then waited to take the field. My question is does this happen every time he goes onto the field. Did this mean he was actually knocked a bit woozy last possession. Sounds like something common place 30 years ago, in today's NFL would think the league would question the need for or is this a typical practice everyone in the league does??