Albany,n.y.

I've already seen King's January 2020 column, I'll give you a teaser with one of the lines: On two straight Sundays the Buffalo Bills won playoff games.

Their list was #1 Allen, #2 Darnold, #3 Mayfield, #4 Rosen, #5 Rudolph, #6 Lauletta (from the alleged photo of the Bills draft board). They were looking to trade into 5 with Denver, but only for one of their top 3.

All those people who penciled in a loss at Pittsburgh on 12/15 should turn that pencil around and use the eraser.

That's going to be my strategy for a while. I have 2 plays in a 298 person pool. I had NE & Houston this past week-Thanks Doug! If Marrone doesn't go for 2 I might be down to 1 entry today.

I went out & bought his jersey a day or 2 after that game because I was going to the next Bills home game (2 weeks later) & wanted to wear it to the game. That game vs Tennessee, was the only Bills game I went to in Orchard Park last year. Allen had a game ending winning drive that game. I went to both games in NJ this season. The Bills are 3-0 when I'm at the game wearing the Josh Allen jersey. Then 70, then 75 etc. They wouldn't be happy with a 99% completion percentage. I was in the stands & I said to Petrino "He's giving Josh the business."

See NY Jets, a team that had some kicking problems, finally settled it, finding a Pro Bowl kicker, then decided that they didn't need to pay him market value and let him leave via free agency. This is in sharp contrast to the Buffalo Bills who signed one of the league's best kickers to a 3 year contract 2 years ago and had the foresight to extend him 2 more years rather than risk being the NY Jets. Don't be the NY Jets

Show me one NFL QB who doesn't miss on some throws. Go back and watch the HOF QBs- they all miss throws. Imagine if your QB threw 3 INTs on the 1st 3 series of a game. Well that's what Jim Kelly did one Monday night vs Cincinnati, but he sucked it up, the D played great & the Bills won the game easily. Remember when Jim Kelly went to Pittsburgh & KC for what seemed like his yearly butt kicking by the opposing D. The same guy who was a 1st ballot HOF QB! 'You're nitpicking 2 winning performances.

This is the difference between a stat sheet & film. The Bills had Allen rated the top QB in the draft last year (remember the leaked draft board I posted last week & others did before me) because they studied him on film, talked intensely with him & didn't worry what was on a piece of paper or a computer screen when they had a pretty good idea that his stats didn't tell the story professional scouting did. It's pretty obvious that Allen was going top 10 in the draft because there were other professionals who also saw the same things the Bills did. There was direct competition for Allen by Arizona (We Won!) and who knows what other teams were lurking if the Bills didn't have the best trade up ammo. Also, anyone who watched the Bills last year knew how dreadful the players were around Allen. A terrible O-line, a weak group of receivers (especially at the start of the season prior to Foster & McKenzie providing a little better options in the 2nd half of the season, a bad group of TEs & outside of an aging McCoy, who couldn't do anything last year, a bad group of RBs. So with a revamped offense, now Allen actually has some players to work with. Anyone (Especially YOU clown Mike Francesa) who didn't watch any Bills games and then went on the air proclaiming Allen an inaccurate joke based on his 2018 completion % should be begging anyone from Bills Mafia to the Pegulas to accept their humble apology. (Yes I know it's only 2 games but I'm not coming down off this cloud this week)

Sec 342 Row 14

Brees wasn't released. His contract was up & he was franchised. Then right before his contract was up again he got injured and the Chargers let him leave via free agency & New Orleans took a chance he'd fully recover & signed him to a big free agent contract. That's not getting released, it's being allowed to go to free agency, the same way Mitch Morse got to the Bills. KC didn't release Morse & the Chargers didn't release Brees.

I'm surprised the writer never mentioned how Eli Manning was thrown in during the 2004 season. The Giants started the season with Kurt Warner, lost their opener then won 4 in a row. They opened the season 5-2, then lost 2 games in a row to go to 5-4 & Coughlin switched to Manning, who started the last 7 games. Manning was pretty awful his 1st 4 games as the starter then on a nationally televised game vs Pittsburgh something clicked. He was better that day even though the Giants lost 33-30. They lost the next week at Cincinnati by a point, 23-22 then won the season finale vs Dallas 28-24. If anything, the Giants should follow the same model they did with Manning-go to Jones the 2nd half of the season & stick with him no matter how bad he looks once they put him in.

BOOM

Yes. The narrative around NY is that Josh Allen is too inaccurate and not to be taken seriously. There's a lot more NY money than Buffalo money, although I still think as the game gets closer the smart money will pour in on Buffalo. The casual fans who don't know how totally changed the Bills O is from last year haven't caught up with the team yet. They look at what they think was a fluke win or a Jets choke last week without realizing the fluke was the turnovers and the Bills, outside of the scoreboard until the 4th quarter, were the better team throughout the game. The Bills had a ton more yards both passing & running than the Jets. Without the fluke turnovers the Bills dominate the Jets game. When the line came out I rushed to the casino to get the Bills at -2.5 because I wanted to bet it below the break point of a field goal even though I think the Bills will win easily. If I'm right the extra point that the line moved won't matter.

They might be a Mono-Mary cheerleader on the Jets Flight Crew who really got around this weekend.

Best line I heard from WFAN today "Even Joe Namath never got mono, or if he did he played anyway."

OK. I didn't see it was Ieatcrayonz who started this. I wasn't about to read 10 pages. Sorry I didn't get the joke.

I get it completely. If you have the same records tie breakers can go to conference records. But it never helps to lose a game. If a team wins that out of conference game there is no tie breaker-You and your math challenged friends are the ones not getting it.

If you can't figure out 10-6 is better than 9-7 you need to retake math. His replies indicate he really believes this & isn't joking.

Are you really that math challenged ? A 10-6 team involved in a tie breaker with a 9-7 team wins the tie breaker 100% of the time because THERE IS NO TIE BREAKER. The only time the 9-7 gets a playoff spot over a 10-6 team is when they are in different divisions and the tie breakers get the 9-7 team a division title. In that case the 9-7 team is breaking a tie with another 9-7 team in their division, not with the 10-6 team. The 10-6 team still wins any tie breaker with the remaining 9-7 team. It's NEVER better to get into a tie breaker scenario if you can win another game & not be involved in a tie breaker. Come On Man!

Your math doesn't add up. If you don't lose the game there is no tie breaker. WAKE UP! It's pretty simple. A 10-6 team gets in over a 9-7 team EVERY TIME unless you're talking about a team that wins a weaker division & in that case there is no out of division tie breaker.

I just hope he didn't get too close to Josh when they got together at the end of Sunday's game. There's also hope he spread it through the whole Jets locker room.

Here's why that statement is ridiculous: If they had won the out of conference game that they lost, the team in this example wouldn't have needed a tie breaker. Can an out of conference loss hurt you less than an in conference &/or in division loss? Yes, but a loss is a loss when computing W-L records, and the team with more wins & fewer losses is going to be ahead in the standings over teams with fewer wins & more losses regardless of who they beat & lost to. The answer-Limit your losses to fewer than the next best team in your conference & you won't have to worry about tie breakers. A loss by itself NEVER helps your playoff chances or position. You can tank a game & get rid of a rival, by having the team that you let beat you leapfrog a tougher rival, but that can only happen if you've already secured your playoff position. No loss can ever help your own team's playoff spot.

But I have the Bills -2.5, so it's not the same as a 1 point win. I need a FG win or better.

There are still paper tickets, but they are rare. You can go to the ticket office if you're having problems or don't have a cell phone & get a printed ticket, or a season ticket holder can get them printed in advance, as another poster has mentioned. For a scalper to get paper tickets he'd have to go to the ticket office with an explanation as to why he needs multiple tickets in different locations printed. I doubt it would go well. I think some teams still have paper tickets for single game ticket buyers, but not many. I know Buffalo & the 2 NJ teams are using mobile tickets. Last year I went to opening day in Baltimore. I bought the ticket from the Ravens through Ticketmaster the day the schedule came out & the Ravens immediately put the tickets for sale that night. They mailed me a paper ticket & I used it at the game. I don't know if they switched to all mobile yet or still use paper tickets for single game buyers. I went to NJ for the Jets game this week & two people came in late in the row in front of me & had paper tickets. I had mine on my phone.

Here's the problem: There are virtually no paper tickets anymore. Therefore if you want to get a ticket outside the stadium, you have to find someone who is going to transfer their ticket from a phone they have to your phone. I'm guessing this has cut scalping to a minimum because if the league or team is monitoring cellphone transfers they're going to find the scalpers real fast & put them out of business. So finding street scalpers will be rare. The best solution for you is to find someone you know or someone on a site like this who has an extra ticket or 2 & buy it in a small private transaction days before the game. Like it or not, the best way is still a site like Ticketmaster, StubHub!, Vivid etc. The NFL wants to get in on the fees from scalping & wants their share of the take & that's why Ticket Exchange exists & why they figured a way to negate the small street scalper & make scalping a business where they get some of the money.