colin

morse is better than i thought, probably in large part because of his mental abilities. our back ups are or were practice squad guys tho van roetten and mancz were on practice squads at least once over the past 2 years. i think hart being suspended ended up costing us the game in a sick and twisted way

im hard on mccoach sometimes, and i still think the 13 seconds debacle was on him (the kick and the goofy D vs a team w 3 times outs). im sure coaches below him or players made mistakes, but imo in that kind of situation, he's got to keep the ship on track all that said, he had a mash unit which got worse yesterday ready to play and playing their butts off. the offensive sequence on the 2nd drive, and the coverage/pass rush on the 3rd and 22 as mentioned before were coaching errors, but against that we have some just outstanding set ups and call, and practice squad players playing like their hair was on fire. that's just good to great over all coaching in my book. we lost on the back of a unique mix of chance and player mistakes. there were about 7 things that coulda gone slightly differently and we walk away winners. tough loss, but that's football.

the drop off in our offense, specifically the ability to score TDs, when diggs is handled is kinda shocking. i know we were down a bunch of people and it was hot and the line sucked and so on, but gabe davis is a decent player, but not wildly above a typical nfl #2 WR. iseah mac is a neat gadget guy, but he is obviously limited. knox has not been an impact at all this season, and kumrow (who is far from good) going down had an actual impact in our passing game. the one thing that could change our O the easiest to me is another actual playmaker. getting protection, palycalling, run game, and all of that sorted is a bigger undertaking

further more, how many times have we had our full starting secondary and get burned just enough to lose due to no pass rush, or getting gashed in the run, or, our O put up enough points but the D just faltered enough (tenn last year) or the d was money but the O failed (jax). in otherwords, it really does come down to the whole team effort, can't just expect a hole to cause a total loss

it would be nice if we could run effectively when we wanted to, but we really aren't a good running team. if cook can come along and be what i was thinking he was going to be, then he and motor are a sick 1 2 punch and we have a FB and TE who can both block and be passing threats, so that on paper should make us a good running team. i'll believe it when i see it tho.

banford isn't fast, but he's faster than levi was. he is HUGE and athletic tho. he's legit like a stripped down milano/coverage linebacker body type out there, he'd be a nicely big safety essentially. a couple times he came up and tackled henry or another ball carrier and i saw his number and thought "did one of our lbs get hurt, are we playing w 3 without the announcers telling us?" and then sure enough, it's him.

i wondered about the shot gun all the time on short yardage, but i think it was because tenn was just hell bent on being aggressive up front on D. constantly shooting gaps, daring us to make big plays. the big difference of this bills team this season vs any other, is we look like we can make the big play within the scheme of our O at a high level of efficiency. the number of just 20-40 yard ropes that came out of now where for first downs (mind you, not much YAC) was great. that's my negative, not much YAC.

that's true, but that's where disguising coverage comes in. if you make the qb throw quick but have that covered, you can get a sneaky pic (von miller had one vs brady in the afc chip game prior to denver beating carolina for the chip). also, if the coverage isn't what the qb thought it was pre snap, then when he goes to his first/best read and doesn't see what he wants, he is likely to hesitate and hold the ball a little longer, which gives the pass rush a chance.

i dunno, i think our HC/DC like to do some clever stuff on the back end sometimes and try to confuse opposing qbs. tua has perhaps the best weapons of anyone we will face in the nfl, but i bet he can get a bit rattled trying to read stuff pre snap and then it vanishing in front of him.

tua kinda looks like he sucks most of the time, but passing and td's are team stats. the miami passing attack was monster, but also the ravens d was trash (how many guys hurt?). those two top WRs for miami are a huge problem, im kinda excited to see how we handle them in the secondary. this is the type of match up where the pass rush makes a world of difference.

you are the first person i've read (haven't read em all) who mentioned aj epenesa. he kinda lit up the stat sheet for the red headed step child he's been. obviously von being added is the biggest get, but i think these young guys are improving as well, and phillips is just a monster for us, he loves our d and our d loves him.

it is a concern w injuries and young players learning, but our d is set up to put the backfield into a maximum advantage mode taking away big plays and letting them play aggressively and often going forward. it makes the LBs job harder than most, and more or less requires constant pass rush. given our improvement IMO in pass rush, i think a lot of the drop off w white out will be covered up for the most part.

the bills have overpaid, and i suspect not without understanding that they are overpaying, for a number of guys/contracts. the sad DL we shipped out after last season are all earning much less and frankly show no chance to make an impact in the nfl (maybe phillips excepted). with Poyer, the FO basically either has to let him walk or over pay him, there is no middle ground on this. given the effectiveness of our D (pass d and secondary particularly) that we've managed with some real scrubs at corner last year i HOPE that this was the result of our superior coaching and scheme, and not from our safeties being just kings, cuz then it would really suck to lose any of em. the carolina D that mccoach used to run makes me think its more coaching. norman, the CB, went to DC and looked a JAG. that D was all about the d line causing a ruckus, and being balanced and somewhat savage in pursuit behind a deep line. i think we may finally have that the way sean wanted it here this season, which along w our O being able to actually hand a ball off and gain yards might just get us a chip.

pushing minority coaches to the O because of a micro trend of OCs getting HC jobs is just absolute managerial clown perfection. inevitably the ebb and flow of the nfl will lead to some new D being the cat's pajamas, and more of the HCs will be from the D side of the ball. the door is open for age discrimination now i think. a guy like fraser will be overlooked for younger DCs and OCs, i could see that being a new lawsuit.

part of being a pro fighter is picking who and when you fight.

just from seeing this, im betting he's gonna be a good player. like a denis rodman, making opponents get off their game.

im not even older, i just feel like it!

iirc, josh had some group scrub his social media prior to the draft and they didn't have an issue w anything (or they had some stuff deleted but some of the tweets that got him in trouble weren't on the problem list or some such). the more i see on this kind of stuff the more convinced i am that what is done/said is not as important as what is said/done by who to whom.

the funny thing to me in all of this is how rapid and how forced changes in social mores have been wrt no no words (and much more than that, who can say them and how). if we look at what some currently really woke people did on television or much more frequently posted on social media just a few years ago vs what they themselves get outraged about, it's not hard to imagine things that people are totally ok with now being looked at in just a few years as repugnant. For example, jimmy kimmel and sarah silverman both did sketches for comedic effect where they wore blackface on television. when they did this, it was a bit edgy but no one was getting cancelled over it. in the early days of twitter, lots of currently lefty/woke comedians/activists were posting n bombs and racial/edgy jokes. quoting lyrics from rap (which have heavy profanity, violent sexist homophobic and politically incorrect themes, and are carpeted with n bombs) didn't seem to be a big deal then (i say that meaning that popular people posted this stuff and nothing came of it, at least for some time). this does go beyond race stuff (like when kevin heart got booted from some award show because he tweeted a joke about not being happy if his son was homosexual years before. ironically, he's made many much more insensitive jokes of that nature in his act which has propelled him to super stardom, but i suppose it's too much work to watch his stuff and clip it to cancel him vs a tweet). an example of what happens today which i think might result in some people saying "i was young, that behavior is reprehensible and i've learned from it" and is along the lines of what Josh did -- most of the short videos i see on instagram (many of which originate on tic tok) have rap music played over the video. the videos are often enough of non black people (most of the stuff on my intan feed is fight training and exercise/fitness stuff and it's just full of short videos set to music). Right now, no one has any issue with this, but i could see some woke think piece getting written up about how this is cultural appropriation and racist and exploitative, and then selective witch hunts would come about and cancel people just as they have for the prior posts mentioned above. it's also rich that many people would be totally outraged about a teenage Josh quoting rap lyrics or some PG television show word for word, but think nothing of a same aged kid today posting some video set to the same rap lyrics. whats ironic to me in all of this is that with this newfound moral outrage, we still have worse and worse public behavior. people use more profanity, display more overt sexuality and in general act less civilly -- especially on social media. i look at the world and think i've officially become an old man pining for the old days.

that line up plus how allen's gut looked sitting down (granted he was slumped over and it could all be an optical illusion) made me think our whole team needs a fascist strength coach and a truck load of PEDs.

could be, could be. we must remember power = strength X speed. he's not that strong/big, but has long arms and natural movement ability, and from the stats above, a pretty top notch reaction time. maybe that's what the coaches saw and what motivated them to get him to come off the edge differently. either way, he's short on moves and hasn't gotten many snaps in our rotation.

in terms of raw physical talent, these two guys are pretty comparable. i keep harping on this, but Star was a wonder talent in highschool, college, and coming into the NFL. he's just a guy who will work as hard as driven when driven, and otherwise won't lift a finger. he's not obsessed with football. i can understand his position, how many of us are obsessed w our jobs and being the best ever at them? for most of us, most of the time, we won't see more money or prestige by working harder, certainly not with certainty nor in a short time frame, and that's enough to demotivate even quick successful people. donald, like tom brady, is a creature of very good habits and focused work. not only are these guys willing to work hard every day on exercise and film and such, but they also put work into finding new and better ways of doing things, hiring coaches and trainers, and are just super open to being coached. it isn't necessarily the volume of work, or how hard they work, but it's the systematic focused and most of all consistent application of effort towards effective action. lots of people work hard, and some people work smart, but few combine the two and maintain great habits consistently while still looking for ways to improve. the athlete i think who most embodies this is floyd mayweather jr. he's actually over trained a bit to the point where he's shattered his hands nearly to dust, but aside from that, every moment of his life for as long as can be remembered he's worked daily to be the best at boxing, and to make the most money out of that skill as possible.

i'd make a large wager that both involved parties were in the wrong. this woman aside, could you imagine having TO as your neighbor? i think it would be awful, and i think he does do goofy stuff (and potentially dangerous) for attention. this thread just made me think of what it would be like living near or around (or god forbid with) a social media influencer gone mad. getting popped into a viral video or post could be ruining. the only saving grace seems to be that half of people under 25 put everything they can on social media so at least the zone might get flooded enough to wash out your exposure. if the social media influencer is an IRL celebrity like TO tho, it might be special enough to last!

AJ was a 5 star, and was very productive at iowa. I wonder if he's naturally gifted but low motivation (like star, who had just shocking talent coming out of college) or is just missing a few pieces of the puzzle. either way, i think some of the DL who were brought in were brought in largely to push him and other young linemen towards improving, which makes me think there are motivation and focus issues at least to some extent. i think aj has a 30% chance to work out, moss 20% and ford 5%

bit of click bait, but some good points made. the bills really did coast a bit last season, weren't we 7-6 at one point w a loss to the jags and a blowout loss to indy? i think there are fair concerns about the team, but to me, this year isn't going to be a let down. they had their let downs last year, and managed to overcome. this season there is more hunger and focus, and i honestly think the OL set up and a more balanced approach on O is going to set the team up to avoid losses like the pittz and jags games. reverse those two and we walk to the first seed last season.