dave mcbride

Depends. Reggie Bush was a first rounder with only 5490 rushing yards, but he had nearly 500 receptions and a lot of TDs. McGahee ran for 8500 yards; Curt Warner had a few truly dominating seasons before his career was cut short by injury. Just because they're not in the top 30, doesn't mean they're in "the rest," metaphorically speaking. My point is that the RB guys who really look like first round picks coming out of college tend to play more like first round picks in the NFL than players at other positions - that's because it's a relatively easy position to project given the desired skills.

I think the Ravens probably get in, but the Bengals are not out of it. They are 5-6 and one game behind the Ravens. They have a talented defense that can shut the Ravens down. I know the Ravens beat them earlier, but prior to this year's loss the Bengals had won 5 of their previous 6 games against Baltimore with more or less the same team as they have now.

Once you start looking at top producers at other positions, RBs do stand out for their high-pick ratio. Of course there are RB busts, just like there are busts at every position. I do think, however, that barring injury (a key caveat), there is no easier position to project than RB. Does the player have speed/power/cut ability/vision? Beyond that, they're not looking for much. Rocket surgery skills aren't a requirement.

Jim Kelly circa early 1993 and mid-late 1996, Thurman Thomas in mid-late 1994, Bruce Smith on numerous occasions (e.g., January 1996), and Andre Reed in 1999 beg to differ. They were all the recipients of a lot of extreme vitriol at various times in their career. Let's not sugarcoat history.

Not sure this has been posted, but I agree with the consensus in favor of Darnold. And I like Rosen! http://www.nfl.com/news/story/0ap3000000877512/article/ask-5-whos-better-nfl-prospect-sam-darnold-or-josh-rosen

Call me crazy, but how is this not a good decision? What is the controversy? The 2-9 Giants, unlike the Bills, are completely out of it and in prime position to get a franchise qb in what I think is a great qb draft. Rallying around the flag late in the season with Eli and ending up 5-11 / 6-10 would be very bad for them. At this point, bottom out and put yourself in a position to trade up from the 2/3 slot to wherever it is you want to be (assuming you want to move up). That's how they got Eli in the first place, after all. Probably not the place for this, but I think Sam Darnold is the most talented thrower in this draft and will become elite as he matures. He has it all, and I think people should look beyond the rough edges.

I was a Webb fan too. He looked like a guy with legit pro potential while at Cal.

Going full Godwin. Wow.

Indy had a great running game - Edgerron James (hof-level production) and for a short period Addai. And marshall faulk for a year too. Polian always valued bell cow backs.

If no late round picks are in the top three dozen, and 75 percent are first rounders, then you have to deduce that they do get that position right. The wild card with the RB position is injury; talent isn't that hard to assess at that position. I maintain to this day that Kijana Carter, who had a brutal injury, would have been a great, but injury derailed it. There are a few first rounders that underperformed (Trent Richardson being the most obvious recent example), but I think that the high picks have a pretty high hit rate. Marshawn has 431 yards to go until 10K too. The Raiders are right back in it, so who knows? Maybe he'll do it this season. He's another high first round pick.

Let's not forget that one of the third rounders was Frank Gore, who was by all accounts a top-five talent before tearing up his knee. The only reason McGahee started that one year was because Gore was out. The other third rounder, Curtis Martin, missed most of his senior season too because of a knee injury (he played two games before going out for the season).

Scroll to the bottom and the embedded video. McVay gives the game balls to Aaron Kromer and Sammy W!

Interestingly, of the 29 rushers with 10K career yards, 23 were first rounders, 4 were second rounders, and 2 were third rounders. Shady (9712) will be #30 soon, and he was a second rounder. Matt Forte (9682) is very close too and was a second rounder. Anyway, just about all of the bell cow backs were first rounders, and the ones who weren't first rounders were pretty high picks too. Looks like that's one position where evaluators have gotten it right, historically.

Reggie Bush. He was a reasonably productive player that season (lots of catches; 400 yards rushing for a 5.6 ypc; 8 TDs). Thurman Thomas was a second rounder. Speaking of which, the second and third rounds seem like the sweet spot for me: Thurman, Leveon Bell, McCoy, Corey Dillon, Ricky Watters, Curtis Martin, Frank Gore, Tiki Barber, Clinton Portis, Matt Forte ... the list goes on. Lots of great value in those rounds.

It seems to me that the NFL has failed to even consider one major solution: trimming the game time from ~3 hours to 2:45. Cut some of the commercial time (painful, I know) and - I hate to say this - get rid of replay review. The fact that they have to cut to a long ad break for a decision that shouldn't take more than 45 seconds MAX is painful to watch. Baseball doesn't cut to ads, and the decisions come in quickly for plays that are no easier to decide on. Unless they fix that, the downside of review - i.e., interminable delays - outweighs the obvious positive. The NFL has to realize that they aren't the only player any more - there are too many other options. They have to get better, and that starts with the viewing experience. Better viewing requires better editing, and as far as I can tell no real editing has occurred since around the time of the Heidi game.

Historically, Brady has absolutely destroyed cover 2 zone defenses that can't get at the QB with 4 rushers. His accuracy takes apart zones. In contrast, Alex Smith's mid- to deep inaccuracy makes him very shaky against cover 2 defenses. Travis Kelce said it best before the Bills game: "until we solve the cover 2, we're going to continue to struggle." I think we're in for a long day.

You clearly didn't watch the Detroit game on Thanksgiving. Stafford, who is very good, was missing all day. This is a straw-man argument for a very simple reason: I'm pretty sure that there isn't a person on this board who doesn't think the Bills should draft a qb very early next draft. Meanwhile, we still have to finish this season with what we have, and Taylor is a lot better than the alternative. Again, though, no one here is advocating Taylor to be the long-term QB.

Dunne is good.

I understood your point right away too. Elway doesn't strike me as the sort of guy who wants Taylor. I expect that he'll simply draft a QB if he has a top-five pick. That's the biggest flaw on that team.

I don't count the Manningham catch as a miracle play: it was a well-thrown ball by a good QB to a pretty good receiver, and it was right on the money--very catchable. It was just a good, well-executed football play; nothing more, nothing less. No one did anything crazy on that play.

Without a doubt. That is the the loss I detest the most in Bills history.

More like 54.7 percent, but I won't niggle about the error.

Matthew Stafford missed a wide open Golden Tate on Thanksgiving with the game on the line and with very little pressure. If he makes that throw, Tate scores and ties the game. He also missed on his final fourth down throw to Marvin Jones. Goff clearly missed an open Watkins twice yesterday; one ended up resulting in a PI and the other in an INT. Among other misses yesterday, Alex Smith badly missed an open Tyreek Hill on the key 4th down play with 2:50 to go. It was a poor throw, but since it wasn't analyzed by Trent Green, no one is talking about it. But it was worse throw by far than Taylor's, which while not perfect was very catchable and certainly within the receiver's catch radius (at his knees, not his ankles).

The other factor is pain threshold. Suffice it to say that the people I know do not have the pain thresholds of NFL players. If I ever took an NFL hit, I'd be in traction for weeks.

This. Also, the 2013 opener, in which the Bills had the lead until the final play.