dave mcbride

Wentz should be fine by that point. The last time Wentz played against Buffalo, he played great. I suspect he regresses to the mean, which means upward movement.

Yo are forgetting Leonard Williams, who always looked great to me when he played against the Bills. The Jets trade him for a song, and he ends up being one of the better DTs in the league last season (11.5 sacks, 30 qb hits from the DT spot). Jets gonna jet. I know it’s PFF, but they have them in their top 100 players of the league list for this season.

I am not going to predict each game, but here is my divisional prediction: Bills: 12-5 - A tougher schedule and a probable split with the Pats, who look to be much better than last season. Genuinely difficult games: both Pats games, Tampa, Pitt (although I think they win this one), TN, Indy, KC, and maybe Washington in the final week. Pats: 11-6 - They appear to be a LOT better than last season. They still have the greatest coach of all time, and their roster is greatly improved. We don’t like it, but they’ll be good and always a tough out. I wouldn’t want to face them in the playoffs. Miami: 9-8 / 8-9 - solid roster with a lot of talent, but I’m not a believer in the QB. If he’s genuinely physically recovered form the hip injury, though, he’ll be better. It really limited him last season. The jury is still out on that, of course. Jets: 5-12 - Still bad, but more competitive than last season given the improved roster and a head coach who simply has to be better than Gase. One of those teams that will probably lose to the Bills twice but might sneak one from them in a close game. They play the Steelers and Ravens twice, so that’s six games, not four. It’s a tough call because the Browns are legit, but I’m picking the Ravens (ever so slightly) to win that division. They have just won too many blowouts in the last couple of seasons to think they’ll win anything less than 11 games.

He has been playing better lately. Still doesn’t look like a baseball player, however! Lots of MLB guys strike out a lot. They just don’t look as bad as Stanton doing it. Overall, while the Yanks are doing it with some smoke and mirrors now (SO many 1-2 run win games), hopefully when they they get everyone back healthy they’ll be able to keep the train rolling and a) get a big game from Cole and the bullpen in the WC game and b) take revenge on the Astros in round one. i don’t want to face the Rays. Big big series vs. the As coming up.

Forget that -- kickoff and punt return TDs only!

For a couple of months starting in late December, red wine tasted like an off-brand version of CranGrape to me. It’s back to normal now.

Agreed. I wasn’t really myself physically for about 5-6 weeks afterward. That’s an extremely common effect. And I didn’t have any breathing problems or anything like that.

Played A & A 1942 this past Saturday, actually! It's pretty "light," but it's a really fun game. For the really serious, there is World in Flames: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_in_Flames. It's a great game, but incredibly complex and a real time commitment. Check out the rule book! https://gamers-hq.de/media/pdf/4a/f9/7c/WiF_CE_RulesBook_8th_Feb_WEB.pdf

Camp, but he was not going to start. It was always Bledsoe's job that year. That was never in doubt.

Losman wasn't handed the job. Bledsoe played all season that year and it wasn't a competition beforehand.

Among other things, I’m a long time Diplomacy player, and that’s a game built upon screwing people over after allying with them. It is truly brutal with the right players.

Settlers first appeared in 1995! It's not as good as Pathfinder!

Agreed about Hayes. But there are others too -- Clay Matthews, Cliff Branch, Ken Riley, Darren Woodson, Joe Jacoby, Jim Marshall -- who absolutely warrant entry given some of the people who have been voted in. I mean, if Lynn Swann is in, how is it that Cliff Branch, a better player, isn't in? People talk about Swann in the postseason, but Branch had 73 catches for 1289 yards in the postseason and has three SB rings. I'm also kinda shocked that Hines Ward isn't in yet. Otis Taylor probably deserves it too, as does Boselli.

Yeah, fair enough, but regardless, Howard was in fact pretty great last season. He not only led the league in INTs, but in passes defensed as well. And PFR evaluated him as having a sky-high approximate value of 19: https://www.pro-football-reference.com/players/H/HowaXa00.htm. (Josh Allen was tied with Aaron Donald for the highest AV in the league with 22.)

Oh, well I completely missed that. Apologies!

I thought you were laughing at the poster for saying that the restructuring of Howard's contract made sense. Howard is a really good player at a key position!

Good post. @Beast, you really should justify your sneering response. CBs are arguably more valuable than DEs in Today’s NFL (at least according to most analytics). Arguably one of the best CBs in the league last season. What’s your empirical argument? https://www.pff.com/news/nfl-cornerback-rankings-the-32-best-outside-cornerbacks-entering-the-2021-nfl-season

Agreed. Bear in mind that it is called the hall of FAME, not the hall of great. Eli’s two comebacks against the Pats in the SB are justly among the most famous events in the annals of NFL history.

He didn't lead the league in Y/R reception last year; he led all rookies. He finished fourth overall behind Valdez-Scantling, Agholor, and DJ Moore: https://www.pro-football-reference.com/years/2020/receiving.htm. One other thing to factor in, and I don't mean to denigrate him: he had 2 catches for 107 yards from Matt Barkley in the deepest depths of garbage time in the season finale vs. Miami. He had his first catch in that game when it was 35-13 in the 4th quarter. He was averaging 14.9 ypr going into that game, which is still good. That said, the fourth quarter of the finale skewed his stats a bit.

Exactly. Has anyone in the media mentioned the fact that the Sabres will never be able to function in Buffalo again if the Bills move? There is NO chance that a Pegula-owned Sabres team could ever survive if the Bills move, and the Pegulas are not moving the Sabres. This is such a non-story.

Cam is looking shaky: https://profootballtalk.nbcsports.com/2021/07/31/cam-newton-works-to-speed-up-his-decision-making-in-the-new-england-offense/

The Cowboys were a LOT better, especially in 1993. That team from 1992-1995 is one of the better ones in league history. The Bills were better than the Giants, and they were outcoached. The Redskins blew them out because they were that much better. They also blew out the Bills in the final game of the 1990 season, and while the stars mostly rested for the Bills, the matchup problems were on display in that game too.

Disagree to an extent about the final one. The Cowboys were FAR superior talent wise to that 1993 Bills team, which wasn't all that great and feasted on a huge turnover differential plus the benefit of absolutely brutal weather at Rich in their two playoff games. Kelly was never the same physically after rupturing his bursar sac in the second half of the 1992 season, and the production numbers bear that out. The Bills, despite being worse, outplayed the Cowboys in the first half and had a better game plan. They collapsed not because of coaching, but because the players played terribly and made mistake after mistake in the second half. Marv didn't miss that block on Leon Lett that led to the crucial fumble, Walt Corey didn't miss what should have been an easy tackle in the backfield on Emmitt Smith on 3rd down from the 15 with the score tied 13-13, and Jim Shofner didn't throw a really bad pick into double coverage (to James Washington, who Kelly should have known to avoid by that point) when the game was still within reach (still 20-13). That's ALL on the players. To be fair to the players, they were an inferior unit to the Cowboys. But the coaches did what they had to do that game. Talent won out in the end. Enjoy: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MpC8Z-oGd4c

This isn't really true. He posted some of the fastest on field times in the league in recent years. https://247sports.com/nfl/minnesota-vikings/Article/Stefon-Diggs-fastest-player-in-NFL-Minnesota-Vikings-48715901/. Disregard his 40 time at the combine - he was coming off an injury and played for a very bad program. He was a 5-star recruit coming out of high school, largely because of his speed and explosiveness. Agreed, but again, he went to a bad program and had injuries in college. I'm sure he got faster once he got better training. As I say above, speed was why he was a five-star recruit.

They ran away from Smith all second half. On the decisive drive that made it 20-13, they ran behind Eric Williams right at Phil Hansen 6 plays in a row. On the crucial third down inside the red zone, Wright broke through the line and had Smith for a loss, but Smith broke the tackle and rumbled in 15 yards for a score. Should have been 4th and 5 from about the 17. But with regard to that game, this is all missing the big picture. After the Bills started the second half with a run of 6 yards and a pass to Brooks for 9 yards, Kent Hull got beaten badly by Leon Lett, who punched the ball out, after which the ball went into the middle of the freaking LOS area. Yet despite being surrounded by a sea of humanity, the ball was not only picked up by James Washington; he ran it in for a score from near midfield. How often does that happen??? After that, the wheels came off on the offense. Kelly played terribly after a mostly crisp first half (in which the Bills had a pretty good game plan against an uber-fast defense) and the line got beaten on play after play after winning at the LOS in the first half (and of course the first two plays of the second half). The offense cost them that game with the turnovers and complete lack of production in the second half. My advice: Watch the first half of that game, declare victory, and get the hell out. That's been my modus operandi regarding that game for 27 years. It works.