People should be worried about our Depth

[Happy]

35 minutes ago, Shaw66 said:

Ii agree that all teams are looking for depth.  I disagree that it's about player selection.  

 

Bench players are by definition marginal NFL players. Only occasionally does a team have a starter caliber guy on the bench.  

 

Teams that have good depth have good coaches who know how to get good play out of marginal players. 

 

Great couple of posts on depth, Shaw.  Good, and probably correct, way of looking at it.  I'd add that any starter caliber guys on the bench soon become starters; either for their current team or another team.  At some point in the season, pretty much all teams have a depth guy(s) in the starting lineup, and as you point out their success is attributed to good coaching.

[Shaw66]

1 hour ago, Happy Gilmore said:

 

Great couple of posts on depth, Shaw.  Good, and probably correct, way of looking at it.  I'd add that any starter caliber guys on the bench soon become starters; either for their current team or another team.  At some point in the season, pretty much all teams have a depth guy(s) in the starting lineup, and as you point out their success is attributed to good coaching.

Milano is a good example.  Probably at his best he's still only a marginal starter in the league.  McDermott made him useful. 

[Fadingpain]

On May 29, 2018 at 10:46 PM, Jauronimo said:

I can't believe no one is talking about our width.  Football is a two dimensional game.  Expand your minds!

Not to mention our length.

 

Winners think in 3D.

 

 

[HalftimeAdjustment]

6 minutes ago, Fadingpain said:

Not to mention our length.

 

Winners think in 3D.

 

 

 

But, if we pin down our depth, width, and length, will we be uncertain about our momentum?

[Shaw66]

9 minutes ago, HalftimeAdjustment said:

 

But, if we pin down our depth, width, and length, will we be uncertain about our momentum?

On to the fifth dimension of pro football analysis!

[GoBills808]

14 minutes ago, HalftimeAdjustment said:

 

But, if we pin down our depth, width, and length, will we be uncertain about our momentum?

Winning football games is hard.

[RocCityRoller]

On 5/30/2018 at 8:47 AM, machine gun kelly said:

I think we should talk to the Jets about Bridgewater as I don’t buy that Peterman will work out and he would be an upgrade for depth, but I seriously doubt the Jets would shop him to a division rival.

 

He could if they did go for it would be an upgrade and compete with McCarren for the starting role.  If he gets hurt again we can always move Peterman back up from the practice squad.  He still new enough would qualify for the practice squad.

 

lets face it Allen needs to sit for a year.

 

While agree with you, not rushing Allen into the starting role is probably wise, why would you want to go sign a poor man's Tyrod Taylor?

[Rochesterfan]

On 5/30/2018 at 12:44 AM, BillsfaninSB said:

 

I more concerned about our height.  This a 3D league now. 

 

 

Come on on we need to be concerned about time/space - this is a 4D league and we should be playing 4D chess against 2D checkers by this time.

 

?

[boater]

Off topic to OP: nice use of tags.

 

The optimal use of tags seems to escape many posters.

[atlbillsfan1975]

Aren’t the Patriots due for an injury at QB? It’s been what, 8 or 9 years since Brady’s knee?

[BigDingus]

I tried to reiterate this several times in my original post, but it seems some people want to just ignore that & generalize by saying "all teams have poor depth blah blah."

That's not true at all, and that's not the main point of contention.

We don't need starters behind starters behind starters, but many people are ignoring obvious problems... first off, how limited we are at entire starting positions in general, followed by the massive drop off behind them,

Teams have 2 starting WR's...with the 3rd guy getting significant reps. Kelvin Benjamin is already a risky player to be your #1, but the guys at #2 and #3? Holy hell they are depth players on other rosters, not starters. So who's behind them? An even more steep drop off. If Benjamin gets injured (which is very, very likely), there goes the whole WR corp which our also inexperienced QB's are throwing to.... 

And the O-line? Did nobody else see the drop off last year when we still had a couple good guys on the team? We complained every week about the starters outside of Incognito & Wood, as they were pitiful. Now guys worse than them are starters, and the guys behind them are nobodies. We aren't just "thin," we are barren. And again, we have unknown & inexperienced QB's throwing to a paper thin WR corp while being "protected" by these guys...yet we're supposed to act like it's ok?

Every year injuries happen, and every year people go into the season only mentioning how great we look on paper. A couple weeks in and you can rip that paper up, but usually there are guys you can be confident in sitting behind the starters. Guys who have experience, are solid role players or rotation players, and guys who contribute in between reps of our starters. We don't have that this year.

And defensively, guys...you see how it's a rotation based on packages and what the offense is doing. DB's get subbed in & out, DT's get subbed in and out, even LB's get subbed in & out (Brandon Spikes anyone?)...those guys see play time. They don't just ride the bench until someone's injured. These non-starters DO play week to week, they just aren't heavily relied on. This year, those guys on our roster are likely going to have to be major contributors, and if anyone goes down (which they always do), be the main focus. That's not good.

Edited June 1, 2018 by BigDingus

[Doc Brown]

10 minutes ago, BigDingus said:

I tried to reiterate this several times in my original post, but it seems some people want to just ignore that & generalize by saying "all teams have poor depth blah blah."

That's not true at all, and that's not the main point of contention.

We don't need starters behind starters behind starters, but many people are ignoring obvious problems... first off, how limited we are at entire starting positions in general, followed by the massive drop off behind them,

Teams have 2 starting WR's...with the 3rd guy getting significant reps. Kelvin Benjamin is already a risky player to be your #1, but the guys at #2 and #3? Holy hell they are depth players on other rosters, not starters. So who's behind them? An even more steep drop off. If Benjamin gets injured (which is very, very likely), there goes the whole WR corp which our also inexperienced QB's are throwing to.... 

And the O-line? Did nobody else see the drop off last year when we still had a couple good guys on the team? We complained every week about the starters outside of Incognito & Wood, as they were pitiful. Now guys worse than them are starters, and the guys behind them are nobodies. We aren't just "thin," we are barren. And again, we have unknown & inexperienced QB's throwing to a paper thin WR corp while being "protected" by these guys...yet we're supposed to act like it's ok?

Every year injuries happen, and every year people go into the season only mentioning how great we look on paper. A couple weeks in and you can rip that paper up, but usually there are guys you can be confident in sitting behind the starters. Guys who have experience, are solid role players or rotation players, and guys who contribute in between reps of our starters. We don't have that this year.

And defensively, guys...you see how it's a rotation based on packages and what the offense is doing. DB's get subbed in & out, DT's get subbed in and out, even LB's get subbed in & out (Brandon Spikes anyone?)...those guys see play time. They don't just ride the bench until someone's injured. These non-starters DO play week to week, they just aren't heavily relied on. This year, those guys on our roster are likely going to have to be major contributors, and if anyone goes down (which they always do), be the main focus. That's not good.

Agreed on the offensive side of the ball.  This good be an all time bad offense if our o-line under performs and/or catches the injury bug.  Same with our WR core.  If Jones doesn't improve and Benjamin gets hurt we're in some serious trouble.  You also have the QB situation where not one guy has done much of anything in the NFL.  There's still hope that we address o-line and WR as training camp approaches, but we may be in for a painful season offensively if things go sour.

[GunnerBill]

19 hours ago, Shaw66 said:

Ii agree that all teams are looking for depth.  I disagree that it's about player selection.  

 

Bench players are by definition marginal NFL players. Only occasionally does a team have a starter caliber guy on the bench.  

 

Teams that have good depth have good coaches who know how to get good play out of marginal players. 

 

And good scouts able to spot a marginal guy not having much impact somewhere else and say "he is an effective fit for what we do here and will perform at a higher level in our scheme."

[Shaw66]

1 hour ago, GunnerBill said:

 

And good scouts able to spot a marginal guy not having much impact somewhere else and say "he is an effective fit for what we do here and will perform at a higher level in our scheme."

Right.   And it's clear that especially with the marginal guys like that, the Bills are looking for character - competitiveness, full-time commitment, team mentality.   Overachievers.   

3 hours ago, BigDingus said:

I tried to reiterate this several times in my original post, but it seems some people want to just ignore that & generalize by saying "all teams have poor depth blah blah."

That's not true at all, and that's not the main point of contention.

We don't need starters behind starters behind starters, but many people are ignoring obvious problems... first off, how limited we are at entire starting positions in general, followed by the massive drop off behind them,

Teams have 2 starting WR's...with the 3rd guy getting significant reps. Kelvin Benjamin is already a risky player to be your #1, but the guys at #2 and #3? Holy hell they are depth players on other rosters, not starters. So who's behind them? An even more steep drop off. If Benjamin gets injured (which is very, very likely), there goes the whole WR corp which our also inexperienced QB's are throwing to.... 

And the O-line? Did nobody else see the drop off last year when we still had a couple good guys on the team? We complained every week about the starters outside of Incognito & Wood, as they were pitiful. Now guys worse than them are starters, and the guys behind them are nobodies. We aren't just "thin," we are barren. And again, we have unknown & inexperienced QB's throwing to a paper thin WR corp while being "protected" by these guys...yet we're supposed to act like it's ok?

Every year injuries happen, and every year people go into the season only mentioning how great we look on paper. A couple weeks in and you can rip that paper up, but usually there are guys you can be confident in sitting behind the starters. Guys who have experience, are solid role players or rotation players, and guys who contribute in between reps of our starters. We don't have that this year.

And defensively, guys...you see how it's a rotation based on packages and what the offense is doing. DB's get subbed in & out, DT's get subbed in and out, even LB's get subbed in & out (Brandon Spikes anyone?)...those guys see play time. They don't just ride the bench until someone's injured. These non-starters DO play week to week, they just aren't heavily relied on. This year, those guys on our roster are likely going to have to be major contributors, and if anyone goes down (which they always do), be the main focus. That's not good.

Dingus -

 

People aren't saying depth isn't a concern.   Some are saying it's a concern everywhere.   You can try to say otherwise, but I guarantee you that if you could talk candidly to 32 head coaches, all 32 would tell you about the positions across his roster where he'd like to have a better player on the bench.   Most positions.

 

What I and others are saying is the answer isn't better players, because better players aren't out there.   The players are the players.   The answer is coaching - getting marginal but committed players, and then getting them ready to play.   

 

I agree, the Bills need depth almost everywhere.   They're going to get it, or not, from names you don't recognize, and I don't either, because they're going to prepare them to play.   

 

As an example, when Hyde and Poyer went out last season, there wasn't a huge drop off in the quality of the defense.   The subs weren't making big players, but they weren't liabilities on the field.   As I said, Milano is another example.   

 

If you have players committed to excellence, learning and practice, every day, you can manage your depth.