colin

if that's the case, i'd say not boozing and being grown up is 90% of it, 10% is the roids.

sticks and stones will break my bones but words shall never hurt me. richie obviously is a huge jerk and a bully, but people saying mean or racist things isn't that big of a deal in places like an nfl locker room where it's the norm. particularly when fouls that may or not even get called and don't necessarily lead to a player being ejected are often a fully intentional attempt to basically maim someone. like, on any meaningful moral scale, what richie said is way way way less of any kind of sin or problem than when garrett tried to murder rudolph with a helmet to an uncovered head. we are all ready to forgive garrett (i'd love to trade a first and a 2nd for him!!) but in what universe can you be accept that and take a stand on richie bullying his pal (im certain richie thought they were pals), even if how he did it was pretty laughably over the top, but only just words?

so, i'm going to differ from you on one thing (to a degree) roids don't change people, they just supercharge them. canseco was shy as a youth, and out of control as a big time pro, but he's an ego maniac even off the roids (i knew a neighbor of his, really rich area, the neighbor really got a kick out of jose but had stories which amused him about what a total over the top goof he was, and that's years after retiring and at the very least, doing way less roids). foster, canseco, and richie are all jerks/psychos, a holes, basically the stereo type of people who would be locked up if they weren't so good at sports. i also think these guys use a lot of other recreational drugs which do worse things to their minds than roids do, by a lot. now, anyone who is hip to doping, anti doping, and human performance will laugh out loud if you ask them about steroids and peds in the nfl. 1 -- the testing is lax. USADA, the IOC testing, and a couple others are the zenith of testing and they can be defeated and are (usually, the testing changes when a whistleblower comes out with how they were being cheated, they change the testing, and then the cheating happens again while being undetected until the next cycle). how can we know the highest level of testing is defeated? guys (tyson gay for example) get popped, come back, dont' get popped, and perform at the same insane level. anyhow, the NFL testing is way less invasive, they do it less, and the players have lots and lots of wiggle room to get out of being popped. also, certain compounds and low enough amounts of others simply will not be detected. 2 -- the athlete performance is so so high. not just the obvious, giant jacked guys running fast and jumping high, but the less obvious stuff. guys tearing a biceps and being close to world class athletes again in the 5 months at the age of 30+, being able to play that hard and recover and do it again 20 times in a season, the strange combo of endurance, speed, strength, and size. other athletes that can hit three of those can't touch the other (weightlifters, throwers etc, can be as big as nfl linemen, stronger, as fast or faster at least in their specific sport, but cannot handle the volume, the running, the contact, and the grind, and they aren't clean either!) 3 -- the money. i know you were a LEO, if there was a drug that you could take that had some mild to moderate health considerations which let you be way better at your job, get paid better, and more likely to last longer and make it home, would you have taken it? i think most would. that's what PEDs are for nfl athletes. they have such a huge incentive to be even slightly better, and all the money to make it happen, which will make more money. and their job is not for longevity, they get a few years only and want to win. the number of ex OL and DL i see post retirement who basically vanished in terms of muscle mass is crazy. the only one i've seen who is still big (but way leaner) is joe thomas, and that doesnt' mean he isnt' on now and wasn't then, but for example tyler lewan, who had a 100MM contract or close to at one point, top 10 pick and i think made all pro at LT (and he got popped for PEDs at at least one point) is 6'7" and like 245 pounds now. he played north of 300. he did a thing on his podcast benching dumbells (maybe 100s) and benching a 135 bar for reps, and it was good highschool level, not nfl level. he also did a thing throwing footballs in a competition, and you can see his natural athletic ability and football training aren't gone, so it's not like his shoulder is shot or something, he's just way way way less strong than before.

i think cook gets 10-12 pretty easy. 15 is a big stretch, but not miles off. he's not an everydown player, marino points out he's 45% of snaps vs 75% that the top rbs are. if we lose johnson, he might be a 60% guy imo. if he could make his pass blocking very good to great instead of poor, he'd potentially be a near 70% of snaps guy. i think all of that caps his total value, which gets us right back to 10-12 IMO. if he holds out he's cooking (LOL, SO CLEVER) his own career, so i think he shows up at camp and they work something out. if he does hold out i'd be honestly shocked if mcbean played ball.

Im wondering at what age will Josh allen not have the strongest arm in the NFL. then, i'm wondering at what age will he not have a top 4 arm. to me, that's going to have the biggest impact on his game. brett favre was good until new orleans and greg williams scrambled his brains a bit, that was a long career for a run and gun guy. also, this thread reminds me -- i think mahomes is declining and i wonder if he has some habits like his dad that don't support long term success.

that article was awful. so wordy, and like, what info did it give? that martin doesn't want people to think he was bullied, that he just made up stories? it seems like martin wants to get rich in crypto, and being looked at as an oversized wimp who got bullied doesn't work with that, but he's not like revealing meaningful info, incognito still looks like a bully and a total psycho (and he has a rap sheet that could fill a book just from what i've heard about him on podcasts spoken by people who actually like him!), and martin is what, admitting he was being conniving and lied and went along w the bully narrative when it happened? it seems martin and the writer are using corporate strategy to rebrand himself without providing any new information.

at this point i'm convinced they have their guys, and not their guys.

I think a big element that leads our FO to overfitting positions, and possibly their concept of "scheme fit", on high draft picks is how in love they are with particular players we have on the team. cooper was mostly profiled as an ideal fit at nickel back. mcd and beane are in mad love with taron johnson, and they seem quite happy to be barely 1 deep at the position (lewis seems to well in dime but has been a disaster at nickel). I think the same applies for shakir -- i think they love him so much they didn't want to draft ladd at essentially the same position. both ladd and dejean are better than johson and shakir right now. also, it tells me that outside or RB and TE, slot wr is very replaceable in the nfl and shakir shouldn't get a big contract

im pretty sure if he holds out he gets traded quickly. one thing beane has done is chuck picks and cheap FA contracts at RBs, he clearly is not a big buyer of the star back model. if cook was a top pass blocker and played 75% of snaps id pay him that all day. we'd also prolly have a chip.

he fires a coordinator every year? he brings in more senior guys every year?

i think mcd did his best job yet this past season. he got the team closer to chip than he ever has, the team had real talent and injury issues, and even got into a little hole early at 3-2. he's also made moves, special team and defensive coaching changes, and quickly, after the season ended. he's never done anything close to bold before on the coaching front, so this is a bit of a watershed moment for him. he will be accountable for his hand picked GM and his own performance this next season. he's got to get to the bowl, and imo win it all to solidify himself. as posted above in this thread, if he goes two more seasons as hc he's the longest tenured coach to never make a bowl next to marvin lewis. given allen's historic greatness, and the d's total and pitiful collapse time and time again, his list of excuses will simply run out. this isn't any kind of fair or whatever, but it never will be, it's NFL football where ray lewis is celebrated as some kind of moral paragon and frank reich is struggling to get back to his prior level of employment. mcdermott can either be an all timer coach, or a bust off marvin lewis clone who squandered the greatest qb to play the game. it's not fair, it's winner take all.

diggs extension, in season trades for hines and douglas (i'll give a no grade on cooper, injury and he coulda been great!), knox extension, von contract (i supported it with some caution, but age/size/injury was too big a risk). Ford, basham, AJ, elam, and early returns on bishop, coleman, carter, kinkaid. those 13 moves were all misses. if 4 or 5 of those 13 were hits, we have fewer roster holes now and likely have at last one lomardi. somewhat ironically since we have been digging so deep into the draft in this thread, his extension and FA misses have been the real killers (money to diggs, von, combo of money and picks to hines and douglas, cost of knox contract). you can say what you want about drafting great, but free agency (trades as well, for picks) is where you hit the easy mode button and drop a ton of cash and go out and get the proven player you need right now. philly got barclay, baltimore got henry, and the rams have gotten to two chips buying free agents. getting those wrong hurts because instead of elam who you wish were a better player on a rookie contract, you get von nursing his knee on the bench, or diggs not even on the team smoking 15% of your cap. now, beane's misses in the past means he's got to have a crazy hit rate coming up, we need some of elam, kinkaid, coleman, carter to make huge strides and be the players we wanted them to be when they were drafted, our picks this season to be year one positive impact players, and some kind of free agent or trade moves to hit. mcd made his biggest offseason moves in coaching to date blowing out special teams and bringing in senior guys on D, beane has to make hay. i think getting one or two quality starter in the secondary or wr, rotational quality at DT in the draft, some good luck with the four above mentioned young guys having a break out season, and figuring out some kind of contract restructure (allen, von, knox, whoever else) in order to trade some picks for garrett and extend him are his necessary accomplishments to have the A+ offseason he needs to get this team to the promised land.

im happy to see it. he is far and away the most seasoned nfl coach on our squad outside of say kromer and mcd himself, maybe our new d assistant or secondary coach can tie him. either mcd recognized it himself, or or beane/ownership forced his hand, but the total experience level of our coaching staff has shot up a ton since the start of last season. i think this kind of change acts as a wake up call to the players. the only ones who see continuity are the ones on O, and after the season they just had it's not exactly a hard conversation in the room as to why.

job 1 is the biggest impact player we can get. it's pretty clear that player is garrett, or parsons/crosby if they are available or we can't get garrett. job 2 is cb. a guy in the draft (via trade up or whatever), or an FA might have to be how we get a CB. I could see throwing a couple picks early and late at cb perhaps with and eye to getting someone who could also be a FS or nickleback to maximize the chance at burn. I kinda hope our new d coaching on the back end has a plan to get production out of elam. i'm not holding my breath but he played with such poor technique in the afc chip game that he can clearly get better with a more cogent scheme and coaching, but I just don't know if he can get good enough after that, various holes in the team need to be filled. based on cap, our picks, and what it will cost for garrett, i really don't know if there is room to drop fa money at the S position. i kinda think our winning a super bowl more or less requires bishop to to emerge as at least a replacement level NFL safety next season. the near historic awfulness of our secondary this season (less turnovers and our statistical season on D would have been around the worst in team history) coupled with how baltimore was the number one with a gun d last year, then had the worst pass d in the nfl for about 10 weeks, but then turned it all around and were solid again makes me think there are coaching solutions to rapid improvement. philly was similar, going from about the worst d in the nfl last season to the best this season. adding garrett would go a very long way to setting our secondary up for success.

if he were top 12-16 in pass blocking i'd prolly pay him that and have him on the field for like 60-75% of snaps. as a weapon he's a top 3 back and young and efficient and shifty. given he's like 45% of snaps, i think i'd go 12 or so MM a year. 10 was always the number i had in mind and i wouldn't let our best non allen weapon go over 2mm. a franchise tag is that much, so we can just tag him for two years in a row (or transition, which is like 10). as much as any nfl team we are a couple pieces from winning it all and we just blew out the ST coach and made about the biggest changes on D coaching that we've done since mcd took the team over.

not a fan of his catches/targets/yards/touchdown production numbers. we don't need a guy who needs to be kept involved as much as we need a guy who can always be ready for when he's needed. on paper that is amari cooper, but he didn't work out. I think his wrist was toast.

honestly, this is it. tons of value picks/good extensions (bernard kinda, milano, benford, brown, hamlin kinda, our back up o linemen, shakir, dawkins extension, the diggs trade net net was a big positive) home run in josh allen, and a few total absolute misses (kinkaid was not what you'd want, but not a total miss, coleman is off to a weak start, bishop is off to a weak start, carter is off to a weak start, elam looks simply awful, basham was a terrible pick, ford was a terrible pick, aj was a bad pick). just this offseason, samuel and dquan and the other guys we signed in FA all suck, hollins was a value home run. cooper trade didn't work out, but i like the attempt maybe if healthy he'd ball for us, douglas and hines the prior two years were not great (douglas was necessary for the first year, bad his second year). if 3 or 4 of those high picks or FA moves were real hits, i think we'd be champions today. hendrix over miller or something could have put us over (he was a FA out of NO, before cinci, right?). the downside is how bad these picks and signings and some extensions have been, the upside is how close we are with what looks like lots of meat on the bone.

if we can use what we saw on the field as data, we had a horrible downgrade at secondary coaching. our dc was LBs, and the other guy up for the spot was DB coaching. i'm hoping that the new additions for our d coaching staff pay off quickly, but the immediate info tells us mcd promoted the wrong guy.

it was a less pro kc crew than I have seen all year, very much so more than when we visited them 2 weeks back. one thing I have noticed, their OL has such a tight formation, the one RT lines up straight back (lol, how is that allowed), and I think it lets them get away with brief holds and hands to the face because it's a big messy melee and the refs don't always have a clear line of sight. we, on the other hand, get flagged quite a bit for holding, but it's easy mode for the zebras because we have so much motion and movement on our line, not to mention wider gaps. the other thing that really stood out to me is what looked like somewhat delays loops and games by the iggles dline. they all had their initial rush lanes, but after contact they were quick to redirect. i don't think this was just the individuals playing their own way, i really think it was coached and thought out. our dl gets better pressure on games than straight up, but it leaves rush lanes for qbs and sometimes the game is too easy to read up front. either way, the coverage difference, especially for that mid game stretch when we had elam just sticking it up and hamlin holding 87 off the line every time (it generally worked, but he got flagged a few times for it) and slow slow douglas trailing and bishop playing which man is mine was a shocking revelations.

pass rush and corner, that's where we stank vs kc. honorable mention to safety. we've had one elite (or below) corner and one trash corner every playoffs. we had white back when he was all pro, and levi wallace beside him. we had injured white, and then young miracle benford, and then douglas. last playoff and this one benford was hurt, and i think douglas was last year too but played when he wasn't really capable. TJ7 is always getting banged up. when the rams and detroit lit us up (detroit really only the last 20 min of the game) it was the same thing again. our DL was awol vs the rams, they played pretty great vs detroit, but once we had corner and safety injuries, we just bled passing yards to them. beyond whatever schematic changes our new coaching on D will get us, we just need some athletes. perhaps most particularly, we need athletes and a scheme that can work together. elam never getting burn at all means he's got no development. I agree with many that he might just be a total bust and needs to go, but he's shown up before. how is it hamlin was a person we decided could run our d optimally in the offseason? there has got to be a change there, and while i'm a mcd hater, he's made some fairly big coaching moves (new dc, now a new secondary coach and new DL/assistant DC, all in the past 12 months). if you plug in a couple bad holes, even with rookies, fix the schematic issues where we just aren't multiple, and air drop a world beating talent like garrett, this d can get allen the ball a few more times without allowing points. it will also make it hard for opponents to string together first downs (we allowed what, 20+ first downs a game? it's crazy that we won so many) and long drives keeping allen away from the ball. philly would have trucked out d, but my gosh would the bills have put up a better show against them on O. we played kinda bad vs kc and had 4 tubs and a FG. prime time allen mighta just messed around and throw in 5+ scores in the bowl

focusing on process is a trendy thing in business and parenting and such. like almost all new trends tho, new studies have shown that it doesn't necessarily lead to better results. mcd is in many ways a state of the art 2012 guy, the problem is the old time stuff still works, and there are newer improvements on these trendy things from a management and also football stand point. the dude who was GM at the giants was the same way, and he made all the right moves from a process POV -- got a qb, got OL and DL talent, added a play maker on O. the problem was he got soldier on a big contract, becton as a top 5-10 draft pick, the DL did work out, and he got that scrub danny dimes at qb. he also got a terrible WR. he was procedurally great, but his results were dog water because he consistently got the wrong guys. the rams and philly made good procedural moves too, but when they don't work they make adjustments with urgency. in the end results matter, and i really hope that the firing of the ST coach, bringing in a senior guy for D, and a seasoned db coach are signs that mcd might be finding some religion and getting with the program. moves like trading for garrett, drafting actual fast big strong guys, and taking the risks to implement what these new coaches came in to do will be the proof.

looking back, the two best teams in the nfc by the time the playoffs rolled around were the rams and iggles. a snow storm and all kinds of stuff got philly over the rams, the rams were harassing hurts unmerciful but barclay ate them. the ravens, bills, and kc were all the top flight teams in the afc. the bills came down to back end injuries, bad drops, and horrible calls from beating kc in kc. if we look at what the bills O did in domes vs the rams and detroit, i think we can say that allen and co would have balled the eff out in new orleans on O and made it a game.

nah, this doesn't hit the mark. philly had fat andy, someone many think of as one of the best ever. he did great (4 nfc chips in a row, 1 sb, close loss) but not good enough. the canned him and took a swing w chip kelly. had an exciting team, but not good enough, they canned him and got peaderson. he got them a chip, w their 2nd overall qb pick hurt, that's an insane result. the team fell off (they baked the wrong horse at qb) and his butt got canned. they reloaded at qb, rebuild the team, and got to another sb but lost a super close one. so, they rebuilt the D, brought in top flight coordinators, and now just walked to another ring. philly fired two top flight coaches, including one who won them a chip, and are a better team for it. they traded picks to move up, traded picks for players, went out and signed big FAs, and reset their coaches below HC. they saw what wasn't good enough, and made bold moves. we have mcd for at least one more year, that's obvious, but aside from changing scouts and the GM (we have had really bad top round picks and some crippling contracts, i don't think anyone would argue with that), mcd himself has shown us our coaching just isn't good enough. he canned an OC midseason, forced frazier out, and now brought in a seasoned guy to breath down the neck of his DC and also upgraded at secondary coach. as it sits right now, the bills have a hole in vertical passing, and the D basically blows. turnovers and a super charged ball control O (that's a really rare thing) have made them look way better than they actually are. mcd and beane have this season to right that ship (frankly, i think they are on borrowed time at this point). multiple top shelf pass rushers are available for trade or rumored to be available for trade, this is their chance. hamlin and knox and douglas and coleman and injured cooper and softmore slump kinkaid and injury magnets milano and bernard and rapp and bishop aren't scaring anyone. there needs to be an infusion of talent and a cogent strategic change in coaching to maximize whatever roster we end up with in the 2025 season, or else the keys get handed over to someone else. i honestly think mcd knows it and will act accordingly.

if we had a little bit of our defensive back end healthy it would have been a 1-2 point spread and depending on how we played we would have had every chance to beat philly. mahomes has legit dropped off really badly. last year and this year. he shreds our d because fat andy owns mcd's d (i think clappy just figured that out and that's why he's brought in all these new defensive coaches) and it's always a tight game -- when kc was winning their big regular season loss and their close playoff win always came against us. philly has a sick roster, best next to baltimore IMO, but they are not as huge and physical. allen would shred fangio, cook would run all over them. philly has a better pass blocking line, but not as good in run blocking. we'd run on their nickel. on d i think we'd sell out to stop the run and hurts isn't a wizard, he'd have some mistakes and we'd capitalize. we'd sell out to stop the run and philly would pass on us, but they'd make enough mistakes to give us a chance. philly is the one team allen has never beaten and i think that would have super charged JA17. we may well have lost that super bowl, but i say top level allen shows up after sneaking by the chiefs and he balls out like only he can. kc lost because their o did absolutely nothing. allen can make plays no one else can and he woulda done that. If the game was done over and we were in it i'd have bet on the bills and i think we win an all time great game.

Mahomes has really looked washed all season.