MDH

Is the OP really stating that Benford got "market value?" Ok. Dude is a top 7-10 CB and is getting paid like the 20th. You should be ecstatic about this contract. I keep seeing people rip Beane for "almost losing Cook." You're ripping him for getting a high end RB for $11M a year? Shouldn't you be happy that he got him on a lower per year deal? Wait till you see what Gibbs and Robinson get. Groot is getting paid like the 16th best DE and that's without a some young guys who are better getting theirs yet. This is probably market value, maybe a tad high. Nothing worth complaining about. If you want good edge play you have to pay for it. Groot is good - not great. Most fans don't know what they're looking at when they rip Rousseau. Shakir - he probably got about the right amount, maybe a little high. He's getting severely misused in this offense. It's as if Brady thinks he can only catch screens. Bernard- I'm not happy with that contract. He can't stay healthy. He's never available in the playoffs. I would have passed on him. Best way to salvage it is to move him to outside backer and hope his smaller frame can hold up better there. Palmer- I liked the signing at the time but the missed time is frustrating. If he could stay healthy I like what he can bring to the O and he'd develop a better rapport with Josh...but that's a big IF. He's had some injury issues his entire career so this isn't exactly surprising. Samuel- I hated the signing at the time because of his widely known and discussed injury issues. That's come to pass. The Hoecht signing was awesome. He was going to be a wrecking ball in this D. It's unfortunate what happened but that can't be placed on Beane. Stuff happens sometimes, it's not always someone's fault. Overall I think what fans are most frustrated about is the injuries which end up producing uneven play week to week. The team gets decimated every single year by them. That's part D philosophy (wanting small DTs and LBs), part bad luck and part signing guys who have injury histories. Beane isn't blameless for the faults of the team but he's done a pretty good job overall. Despite what fans want to believe, Allen isn't carrying this team to division titles and playoff wins every year by himself. The team is solid...just a little snakebit.

Watching that vid I can't imagine he's going to play this week. Dude just can't stay healthy.

I believe the main culprit in this is McDermott. He wants pressure coming from the middle and the DEs to compress the pocket so QBs can't escape. As such, we get a bunch of big, compressions style DEs and lots of penetrating 3 tech DTs. It's how McD wants to play. He wants the DTs to penetrate and cause havoc in the backfield, not the DEs. The problem is, this rarely happens so we get gashed with the run and very little pass rush from anywhere. The DEs are tasked with maintaining their lanes more so than getting after the QB. That's their 1/11th. If they can get to the QB great, but it's not their number 1 job. It's to compress. Just look at Bosa, dude was getting pressure in the first half of the season, but he was abdicating his other responsibilities to do it. Consequently we were getting gashed by outside runs, read options and QB scrambles to his side of the field. It was maddening because he was freelancing and nobody was prepared to pick up his missed assignment. Did he get pressure? Yep. Was he an overall positive to the D? No, because the D isn't set up to do what he was doing. Thankfully he's been much better doing his job in the past few games - probably due to his injury limiting him. I'm fairly certain if Groot just freelanced to get pressure he could do the same or similar. His pressure numbers during his career aren't bad considering what he's tasked with doing. I'm also fairly certain Groot is one of the defenders McD is happiest with because dude does his job more consistently than just about anybody else. He's not flashy, but he's where he's supposed to be, doing what he's supposed to do on most plays. Now, I do think Groot can be a better pass rusher even tasked with doing it in this very specific way. He doesn't use his length to disengage as well as you'd hope. If I had to rank him as an overall DE I'd put him around 15th-20th. He's not nearly as bad as frustrated Bills' fans make him out to be. They're targeting their frustrations at the wrong thing, it's the D philosophy mixed with the inability to get players to make that philosophy work that's maddening.

They haven’t made the playoffs since 2022. Burrow was healthy last year and they didn’t make the playoffs…and the D is worse this year. If Burrow had been healthy all year they’re not a legit playoff team (granted, with that division, they might have made it.)

This is what my (likely bad) predictions came up with. I’d take this in a heartbeat. The AFC WCs could all conceivably win and the Bills could potentially host both the division round and AFFCG

I’m not 100% but pretty sure the Bills can put him on “Did Not Report/Reserve” and he doesn’t take a roster spot…and they don’t have to cut him. Not sure they’ll be that petty, but I believe it’s an option.

Interesting considering outside CB is pretty deep and Slay was upset he was no longer a starter. He's going to move from CB3 on the Steelers to CB4 for the Bills.

That KC offense was 15th in scoring in each of the last two years (2023 and 2024). How about EPA? 11th both years. So Mahomes and Andy Reid made a bunch of average talent look...err, average. Those KC teams were carried by their defense in '23 and '24. Meanwhile, this Bills' offense that we're routinely disappointed in was 2nd in scoring last year and 5th this year (2nd in EPA last year and 4th this year.) What we have here is a grass is always greener scenario. We're disappointed in the offense this year but if they'd get the turnovers down to a tolerable level it would be far less frustrating. Josh hasn't played his best ball this year but it says something that he's "off" and they're still 5th in scoring and 4th in EPA. Imagine what happens if he gets back to playing the ball we all know he's capable of?

Indy vs. Jax - Root for Indy because it hurts the Chiefs. Chiefs have a win over Indy and a loss to Jax. They don’t want to be in a WC fight with the Jags as they lose the tiebreaker.

I keep seeing reactions to the game like this. Do you really expect the Bills to play well every drive and win 40-0 each game and, if not, complain that they didn’t “play well?” Does it make people feel better if they split the bad drives up equally between halves? Or suck in the 2nd half? I guess psychologically it makes sense, you feel better looking at a 26-7 score the entire game but the drive to drive results are the exact same. Bottom line, Bills win on the road 26-7 against a 6-5 team…I’ll take it every time. The D has improved drastically over the last 3 games. They’ve gone from allowing 5.4ypp to 4.8ypp. My biggest issue is the turnovers on O. They went from a team that never lost the TO battle to one that can’t win it. Clean that up and they can get back to their winning streak days. No, Pats just have to lose 2. One to the Bills and another (gulp) to an AFC East team. That’s IF the Bills win out. Very doubtful that both those things happen but that’s why they play the games.

Yeah, that’s kinda my thought as well. Chiefs might be the best hope for the Bills hosting a playoffs game.

Andy Reid isn’t going to allow a tackle with a hurt shoulder and another with a concussion to be put alone on islands with the Texans DEs.

We’ll know the result of the Bills’ game when the Chiefs and Texans play. If the Bills win, root for the Texans. If they lose, don’t root for anyone…but secretly hope the Chiefs win.

2023 offense averaged 26.5ppg. This years offense is similar to most other years. 2020 and last year were the stand out ppg years. 2020 31.3 2021 28.4 2022 28.4 2023 26.5 2024 30.9 2025 28.1 What makes this year feel different for me is how bad the D has been and the O’s inability to be consistent without Kinkaid on the field. Im crossing my fingers that Shaq can continue help stabilize the run D and that the coaching staff keeps him in there once Bernard is healthy.

In the past 5 years the team has usually been in a place - record wise- very similar to this year. They tend to go on late season runs which makes us all feel better going into the playoffs. Record after 12 games (final record) 2020 9-3 (13-3) 2021 7-5 (11-6) 2022 9-3 (13-3) 2023 6-6 (11-6) 2024 10-2 (13-4) 2025 8-4