dave mcbride

I have unfortunately become a speed guy. Watching Kelvin Benjamin repeatedly will do that to a person. I think he's too slow. Mike Williams (USC) comes to mind. Great college player, however.

Kirby Smart is good. Kirk Ferentz is good. Bill O'Brien is good. And Saban was an assistant to Belichick. He's good. Jalen Hurts, however, is not good. As for the comparison with Kiffin, they averaged 455 yds/game under Kiffin and 444 under Daboll. The difference is negligible. They declined from 38.8 ppg to 37.1, but those numbers are fishy anyway given that the vast majority of the games in both seasons were utter blowouts. If you don't think he stinks, I don't know what to say. Guys like that who are good runners come on the scene and fool teams for a season, but they when other teams that are good (Auburn, Georgia) get a lot of film on that player, he will fall apart. He's a terrible thrower, and he's thinking about transferring. He'll never play in the NFL as a starting QB.

He was a by all accounts a very good position coach in NE, and he did a perfectly good job in Alabama despite the lousy QB (they won the national championship!). And he was certainly right about this: https://www.rollbamaroll.com/2018/1/16/16896212/jumbo-package-daboll-left-after-personnel-frustration-wanted-to-play-tua-sooner

To be fair to Shaq, he has made silk from a sow's ear in one respect: his inability to get to the QB has evidently sunk in with him, and he's bizarrely one of the better shot blockers I've seen in a long time. It's not a bad skill, and it's not that much worse than a sack.

Christ, he was reduced to rolling out Brady Quinn (in two stops!), Chad Henne, Matt Moore, Seneca Wallace, Derek Anderson, and FREAKING LATE-ERA JP LOSMAN!!! Plus a near-death version of Matt Cassell, who sucks. The best QB he ever had was the early career version of Colt McCoy, who also sucked. Keep focusing on the top line numbers, and you miss the real drivers of situations: the players, and in particular the QBs. He has never had a QB who is better than a garden-variety backup, and that is a fact -- inarguable. Um ... because Nick Saban and Bill Belichick keep hiring him?

I know you don't want to hear it, but Daboll has uniformly been in awful situations--insurmountable situations, I'd say. Christ, he was reduced to rolling out Brady Quinn (in two stops!), Chad Henne, Seneca Wallace, and FREAKING LATE-ERA JP LOSMAN!!! Plus a near-death version of Matt Cassell, who sucks. That said, the Bills' offense showed a fair bit of progress late in the season, and I never questioned the playcalling. Not hard, I know; they had nowhere to go but up given how deep in the basement they were. In contrast, Roman oversaw an extremely talented roster in SF.

I dunno. I thought Daboll called good games this season. Talent was the issue.

Nope, not according to the game log. I think you're thinking of the Jets game on Monday night in 2014 when Boobie Dixon blocked a punt. To be fair, his offense in SF was very good.

This is genius!

I agree that that was bizarre, but the offense only put up 24. They got 7 on an INT return.

Sorry - I was referring to your Mahomes/Allen - Marino/Kelly comparison. If Mahomes wins a SB, he's not Marino. That was my point.

I'll rely on Gil Brandt over some rando sportswriter. Brandt ranks him as the 20th greatest LT of all time. http://www.nfl.com/photoessays/0ap3000000816586/gil-brandt's-greatest-nfl-tackles-of-all-time I trust you are aware that Peters' 2013 season is regarded by people in the know as one of the most dominating seasons by an LT this century. But don't take my word for it; listen to a current Bill: https://nflspinzone.com/2014/08/19/lesean-mccoy-calls-jason-peters-best-player-team/. Getting more specific, Peters is an excellent albeit not world beating-level pass blocker. He is, however, a true monster as a run blocker -- possibly the best I have ever watched. As for his career with th Bills, just go to pro-football-reference.com.

I'm not sure of your point. I thought you were talking about his time with the Bills, which was basically injury free. It's a very rare player in the NFL who plays 15 years and doesn't suffer at least one major injury. And many great players have had to retire long before they've played 15 seasons because of injuries (Michael Irvin, Brian Urlacher, Troy Aikman, Marshall Faulk, Tony Boselli, Thurman Thomas--these are guys that immediately leap to mind, but there are of course many more). The bottom line is that Peters is going to get into the HOF with relative ease. He's the best LT of the last decade or so.

In a way, he did, because the Bills clearly saw the 2018 QB draft - much lauded at the time of the 2017 draft as the "real" QB draft - as the one to go fishing for QBs in. Outside of Mayfield, who is already good, it's way too early to tell how good they 2018 QBs will be, but we the results are in regarding Mahomes. He was the best player in the league this season when it comes to value.

I think we should hold off on this sort of analysis until Feb 4. I think the Chiefs have a pretty solid shot at winning the SB. I think they're going be extremely hard to beat at Arrowhead, and they WILL score if they get to the SB. The fewest points they had this season was 26, which is truly remarkable. Even the best offensive teams tend to have at least one dud during the season.

Of course the Bills would make this trade. Mahomes is the most valuable and most dynamic player in the league right now, -- a generational talent. An equally good question to ask: would KC make this trade? The answer is never.

To be fair to C.Biscuit, he was the king of the homers for years. He has admitted that he's the equivalent of an ex-smoker now.

Yes, I'd sign him if I were the Jets. They have to spend that money somehow, and he's a difference maker.

I think Conner, despite his stats, was a huge step down from Bell. Bell is such a better router runner that it's a joke. The Steelers' o-line was the best line in the league this season as per PFF, so it's not hard for any back to look solid on that team in the run game. So the stats don't mean that much to me. However, when you watch Bell vs. Conner in the passing game, the difference becomes immediately clear: Bell is a far better route runner and has way better hands. He's not a catch-the-ball-in-the-flat-guy only, but a guy who can legitimately run receiver routes. He's deadly on wheel routes too, an area where Conner didn't impress. I don't think Conner is a bad player, mind you. He's average but running behind a terrific line. Bell is a difference maker.

I agree that he's in a better position in NY. I also have a hunch they'll get Le'Veon Bell, which will transform them.

Um ... isn't he 23? He's clearly talented. I'm not saying that I want this to happen, mind you, but he's hardly a "declining vet."

Comparing apples to apples, MLB contracts for top-end draftees are significantly smaller than they are for top-end NFL draftees: https://www.cleveland.com/browns/index.ssf/2018/07/browns_baker_mayfield_signs_hi.html https://www.cbssports.com/mlb/news/2018-mlb-draft-tigers-sign-no-1-pick-casey-mize-to-record-7-5-million-bonus/

I think where your logic fails a little bit is that McDermott hasn't had his year 3 yet. It's *always* been about year 3 since he and Beane came on board. Frankly, I think they were shocked to go 9-7 last year with that roster. With regard to Gase, he supposedly finally had the team he wanted this season (he's a "process" guy too, and he dumped a lot of talent), and the team simply failed. They were basically 6-10, but they of course won a game that they had no business winning (vs NE, a game they were completely dominated in). Anyway, don't pass judgment on McDermott/Beane or make comparisons to Gase until after year 3. Because they're fans?

The future is the next two seasons. They will be expected to win next season, and win big. They have $100 million in cap space and a promising qb going into year 2.

I honestly don't know how good he is in either sport. A lot of it depends on that. Just thinking out loud, my guess is that Drew Henson probably thinks he made a terrible decision in retrospect. He was a probable #1 overall NFL pick, but stopped playing football for 3-4 years and never got back in the groove. He of course completely flamed out in baseball. I don't think that would have happened in the NFL if he had remained committed to the sport.