colin

aside from just perhaps not being talented enough (which would come down to guys being hurt, getting a bit older, and phillips and shak being replaced by lesser and not cheaper nor younger players, *gulp*) i think we have a scheme problem up front. the stunts and games our DL have been playing didn't seem to work and the 3/5s back up linemen on the KC Oline seemed to know where they would be just about every play. to a decent extent being a DC in the NFL is playing rock paper scissors, we showed scissors every single snap, and the O called rock and smashed us. at some point, you HAVE to pull some tricks and make them guess wrongly. we did that pretty well last year.

how did we end up soaking so much of our cap? did we front load the cap hit of some of our big contracts in order to use it up this year, or have we just ended up over paying for crummy old DL guys and carolina LBs?

we've seen the ups and we've seen the downs, so to me it comes to the next 4 games. how we bounce back form these two horrible rescheduled games going into our bye is the story. 2-2, with the afc east games being must wins in that case, we are alive but fighting miami for the division. 3-1 and we are solid, would be lame if one of those losses was vs NE, but we'd still be in decent shape. i can't fathom us losing to the jets and then winning the next three tbh 4-0 and we are ripping it up with the ship righted. 8-2 into the bye puts us comfortably in the running for #1 seed. My expectation is we win the next two games, and have a good shot at the cards game. if for some reason the D turns into what it was last year and our O catches fire i suppose we could beat the hawks, but i doubt it.

if that kelce super catch (that the did a quick snap after to avoid a replay) was ruled incomplete or kecle just didn't magically scoop it, they likely woulda had to punt from deeper and not scored the FG. so his stats were good, but i still don't think mahomes lit it up as much as the boxscore says

keep in mind we basically play a 4-2-5 and the two LB positions are largely interchangeable. this is a schematic flaw in our D at this point, because both LBs have to do so much. if you look at historicly good tampa 2 ds or whatever the hell you call what we run, you see other worldly good MLBs, that one HOF LB in tampa, urlacher in chicago, kueckly and davis in carolina, the list goes on. i suppose the one hope we can have for our D would be the championship run dungy had in indy, where sanders, who is a SS but basically played like an extra LB in the run game, came on late in the season and just started murking fools. if milano and edmunds can magically go super sayin (or whatever that dragon ball thing is) and become human cruise missiles, then maybe we can stop sucking.

i wrote a post that was basically this but using way more words and rambling and ranting.

mcd has obviously done some good things, but there are a few signs that are extremely troubling 1. the horrible record vs top level teams. it's really starting to look like he has built a can crusher. 2. the personal stuff. letting philips and shak walk, to hire in some carolina rejects at bigish contracts who just suck, benching tyrod (i understand why he did it, but that kind of stuff can lead to mutiny) and now benching philips and murphy (which lead to an even worse DL performance). it looks like desperation of a coach who is losing control. 3. no cohesiveness to what the team does. by this i mean, the bills often come out w a script that does well, but if something goes wrong (roberts tapping the ball to Tenn last week, brown letting a ball bounce off his face and hands last night) it takes a lot of the mojo out. in both of the last two games, we had a strong TD drive after a putrid first drive (we even had a lead last night!), which i think is part of the script. once those scripted plays run out, the entire coaching staff has no feel at all for the game. you can't be so so so awful in the 3rd quarter as consistently as the bills are without some kind of coaching error/issue. basically, my theory is the other team adjusts to our script, and we fall flat on our faces. you also see this in the sort of degree of difficulty we have to go through for success. every stop on D is some guy like screaming around the field making some big stop, or a sack, or an individual pass break up. we don't seem to have the whole D smother the O like we see happen to our O so often. on O, we have these insane over the top passes (at least one of which should have been caught last night) or allen dodging free rushers and rolling out to throw a dart to a guy who found a hole in coverage. I think if we had a better coaching staff when it comes to managing the game, we'd make actual adjustments and execute plays that don't require some kind of heroic effort for regular results. someone commented our coaches are great monday to saturday, i think that's 100% it. they can get guys prepared for what they run during the week, but between the D requiring every single guy to be mistake free to work, and dabol playing mad scientist and having just no bread and butter plays or formations (except 4 WRs, which he decided was working to well so he got away from it) so our guys don't have the reps to perfect them.

phillips and shak were big at their positions. shak was able to beat up RTs and make plays vs RBs, phillips was a gap jumper, but all that heft moving around caused problems for the O. i figured we'd be upgrading or flat replacing them. NOPE

moss really blows so far this year. not fast, not a power back. that pick really reminds me of zay jones. this front office is obsessed w like athletic freaks (who are projects) and guys with great all around college careers who have no special ability to be useful in the NFL (ford, zay, moss). i'd say knox, josh, and edmunds are freaks

totally.. dabo is back on his bullsheet. up the gut runs w our slowest to the hole RB (39 year old frank gore in rookie form, what a great pick up that was!) are simply wasted plays. the best we can hope for is 3 yards, and since we run them out of a formation we are not effective passing from, when we run play action (and we did) it really doesn't do jack., we had the flea flicker that came close to getting a deep TD, and the one other shot to the end zone where they threw a flag but picked it up (the kc d was mugging us all night, coulda been more laundry but it wasn't). aside from Dabo simply not putting good structure into the O (he calls the odd funky play that works, but the bread and butter is lacking) we can't run block, have zilch for TE or RB passing threat. this means that unless we have at least 3 and more likely 4 wrs out there (which was effective early in the year, so we stopped it) the game of rock paper scissors just plainly favors the d. weak sauce

so allen kind blew last night, but mahomes was nothing special either. mahomes had a couple ducks absolutely rescued, the one catch on that drive leading to the FG (where kelce caught an almost hit the ground ball) would have looked really different if the refs called it an incomplete on the field, and if josh threw a pass that far behind it would have gotten some real groans here (myself included, i get all spazzy too). the weather and the turf (i don't think we have fixed the slippery turf) was not helping footing at all. my 6 year old daughter who just started cheer last night, after i told her the bills played really well to start but bad the past 2 games, said maybe they had spirit but don't have it right now, and they need to get it back. it was a silly cute thing, but honestly, there is some goofy truth to that. our team either kinda all puts it together or all falls apart. we don't tend to have the spark plays that get the ship righted enough. i think that's a function of a lack of confidence and a lack of leadership. i get the feeling that the players are not trusting the process. on D especially.

the weather and the d strategy worked to help us on that front. the tactics of our d though, the actual play calls and such, left something to be desired more than a few times. the execution by our d line and to a lesser extent our LBs was disgusting. on the other side of the ball, their d played hard and dirty all game, and our guys kinda wilted. i think brown is still hurt and we just can't run the football. lots to work on

good point Opie. also, this makes me think our hot starts were a bigger benefit than they even looked at the time in the first 4 games. we basically need to establish a good O and get a lead to bail out our D some. the rams showed a disciplined quality O can mash us up in a big way, even with a full roster. kc may murder us if they get off to a good start and we stink it up. we will need all cylinders to be firing out the gate.

id take him for a 2nd. an extra talented body upfront and a big dude given a second chance is often a good thing for at least a year or so. it would protect our LBs from blockers and allow them to make some plays.

i agree, our special teams are cheeks. unrealiable punts and coverage, bojack messing up holding the ball, and foolish returns leading to penalties, fumbles, etc. our punt return has been good this year, but they shizzat the bed on tuesday (well, the returner did, maybe not on punts).

you know you are a die hard bills fan and 2bd'er when you have never lived in buffalo but just the first two words on that screen cap made you burst out loud laughing!

does anyone know why he simply does not participate in special teams? like, can he not be coached up to contribute? old man lorax was on ST at least some of the time, certainly AJ doesn't get winded or not have the running range that lorax did.

consistently sucking azz in the 3rd quarter is a coaching issue. we seem to script up solid plans on O to start the game, going back to the houston playoff game, but once the smoke and mirrors wear off we revert to a low mean. on D, aside from injuries it just seems like the scheme is too predictable. there is a game of rock paper scissors in every down, and we just can't seem to win it consistently, especially in the 3rd quarter.

clowney would have been a huge get for this team. that 2nd year late pick (johnson?) and epenesa are basically trash. last night we had too many holes on the roster, lacking at RB, TE, LB, CB and DE. those are too many weak spots vs a balanced and strong team like Ten.

he has bad hands. great athlete with poor college production due to a lethal lack of the most important skill for his position. i could see him bouncing around to other teams and becoming a better player in the future, but not particularly likely

agreed, i was thinking we could replace him, but clearly we have not. we've lost too much impact on the DL, and our LB position is just weak. ironically, our run d is better this year, even with the rams trash game. our pass d has fallen off a cliff.

well, i have to remind myself of the old adage "it's never as good or as bad as you think it is". i agree, we just don't have big and physical players (vs Ten who just rumble all night long) and our back ups and new DL have really sht the bed. with tre white kinda falling off (perhaps been hurt all year) we just don't have difference makers out there. we do have to remind ourselves tho, overall our d has been outstanding over the past 3 years. i do feel like that since the second half of the texans game, it seems like they are always playing desperation, they need to fly to the ball and make big plays to have an impact, but they don't suffocate and choke the O, instead they are kinda like a cowboy holding onto a bull, just trying to make it to 8 seconds. that said, the titans O didn't exactly light the world on fire against us, we lost due to special teams and turnovers (their average start was insane, ours was bad) and just way way too many mistakes. we had them stopped a few times, but a penalty, or just blown assignment let them convert 3rd downs. just a badly prepared unfocused team. i really really hope we get this right vs kc

i'd say he is above average, but you aren't wrong. he's not some stud. honestly, between our scheme on D and the people we have added and drafted lately, we have the reason for why our d fell from near the top in the nfl to horrible. i think our scheme works when all parts are working, but any cracks in the dam and we just fall apart. we aren't anti-fragile!

the injuries and the odd week may have doomed us to a loss the whole way though, but this team was very poorly coached last night. constant mistakes, we had what, 5 or 6 false starts, two or 3 on one of our only good drives? drops, guys on D totally out of position, off sides. these are the mark of an unprepared team. vrabel at this point is simply a better head coach than mcd. i really hope mcd can turn it around, but we were beaten schematically and in terms of preparation. the pats were missing their qb, and were able to play (albeit in losses) very good teams close in high profile games. they are missing talent from last year and still got their guys ready to ball.

Ya, neither are impact players. Being solid starters would make them still good picks but they ain't there, not consistently. Edmunds has been just trash this year. Cheeks