McBeane's Gambit

[Billsflyer12]

13 minutes ago, Clemfield2622 said:

 

i agree. especially when our team has been so god awful at drafting, you need as many chances as you can get.

 

i will ask again, who was the last late round/UDFA player who really developed into something for us?

 

 

Maybe a better question is who really developed on teams that actually consistently win. EIGHT Patriot starters just on the Offense alone were drafted rounds 4-7 or signed FA.

Edited September 10, 2018 by Billsflyer12

[Foreigner]

How can anyone in there right mind defend the product on the field Sunday. That is unbelievable.

 

Forget about  2019. We are talking about a GM and HC who have now put on the field Nathan(pic 6)

Peterman again who does not belong in the NFL. This management team wouldn't know talent when it hits them

in the face when they are escorted out the front door.  Stop with the excuses. It has to get a little better

because no nfl team can lose 16 games by 40-3 EVERY WEEK. If Baltimore didn't pull the plug on

Flacco and company early in the 3rd, it would have been 60 or 70 to 3.No excuses guys. These are players

the HC and GM put on the field Sunday. Stop with the excuses. You can't justify the result. This a results

business today and this year. Wake up.

[Shaw66]

OP is a nice assessment of what they did.   It probably was necessary, as it was unlikely they could win with Taylor, Dareus and Watkins as their core.  

 

They will be judged on how they used their draft picks - betting the ranch on a QB and MLB, instead of building a line and taking the QB who fell to them.  

 

I like it.   Allen and Edmunds haven't disappointed - they look like they can grow into real winners, and if they do, Beane will have filled the two most important decisions in one season.   

 

Next season he drafts and signs linemen and receivers, and the Bills may be in business. 

 

And 2018 isn't over yet.  

[Tcali]

nobody 60 or over is gonna see a bills championship at this pace. its always back to ground zero for the silly bills.

 

the good news is edmunds and tre and josh....and.....im thinking im thinking...the PUNTER!!..and the FG kicker(maybe the best in football)

[RochesterRob]

46 minutes ago, TaskersGhost said:

Here's the thing, with this draft this year McBeane had a once-in-what (20-year?) opportunity to build the core of their team.  '

 

They originally had 6 draft picks in the first three rounds, the 96th of which (last pick in the 3rd) on Phillips.  

 

That means that the other five picks, mid-1st to 3rd/65th (1st pick in the 3rd) that they used on Allen & Edmunds.  Edmunds could have been gotten with the 12th pick meaning that in essence Allen cost the organization the other four picks.  

 

Regardless of what thinks of Allen, or whether he does/doesn't work out, building a team in that way signifies a GM/HC that are novice/kid-in-a-candy-shop/OJT.  

 

They could have built the OL in order to build a foundation, for any QB.  Any.  Instead, they opted for the far riskier "their guy" option.  Well this just in, they could have Rodgers back there and he'd be operating at a fraction of what he's capable of due to the lack of a quality team around him.  Does McBeane really need to have this explained to them?  I don't know, maybe they do.  

 

It's not the method that I would have chosen and not a method from whence championship play/teams comes from.  But it's what they chose which IMO speaks volumes.  

 

Some are talking about 10 picks in next year's draft, but the team only has one pick each in rounds 1-3.  Teams aren't built oni 4th-7th rounders in that way.  The opportunity to have lain a foundation in spades was this Draft, and they opted not to.  

 

They aren't going to have 5 or 6 seasons to prove that they've OJT'd themselves into competence.  They're going to sink or swim now on Allen.  I'm not sure I'd want my future career hinging on a QB that has no OL, no WRs, a RB with one foot out-the-door, an overrated defense, and no reasonably possible way to build all of that within two more seasons given how they squandered their opportunity this year.  

 

Their "gambit" is Allen.  But only a fool would wager everything on a QB w/o really any of the core pieces in place otherwise in order to build a winning team.  

 

The on top of that, signing players like Lotolelei to enormous contract when not one metrics site had him rated as anything other than below-average, and why, because McBeane come from Carolina and they know better than everyone else?  

 

Fumigating the place from Whaley is necessary, but the moves they're making are hardly career-endorsing moves.  Like all GMs/HCs, they'll have three seasons to "prove themselves."  I have absolutely no idea how putting the pieces in place, particularly with the bar of a playoff "appearance" now being the backdrop, is even possible.  

 

The fans and media are already getting impatient as the buffoonery continues.  This isn't going to end well for them despite how well Allen turns out.  And frankly, it's fine that Allen's "their guy," but unless he turns out to be everything they claim he is, then given their other moves, they're not good coach & GM, because the rest of their moves collectively are below-average.  

  The fans would have been in open revolt over not taking a QB early if it did not happen.  I don't think that NFL front offices bend to the wishes of the fans to any degree of frequency but I do think that happened in this instance with Allen.  I myself would have preferred doing what you said with building the rest of the team for this past offseason and maybe that might have made a difference with someone like McCarron.  A guy who can't carry the team on his shoulders but with enough supporting cast can put out a reasonable performance week after week.

 

  Yes, your best chance of finding starters in the same year you draft them is in the first two rounds but players can be found that can develop in the lower rounds.  At the same time even though we had a number of picks in the first three rounds it is never a 100 percent success rate in terms of all picks hitting.  Most likely at least two of those post Glenn trade 6 picks in the first three rounds would have busted so I doubt the job would have been completed with this draft.

[corta765]

1 hour ago, donbb said:

Are we going to trust the regime that has signed FA duds such as Bodine, Star, Murphy, Davis, Gaines, Newhouse, and Kerley to spend all that FA money? That's a scary thought to me. 

 

In fairness he did sign last season Poyer, Hyde, DiMarco, & Hauschka for lower $ deals like this and they all had a good addition to the team. BUT you can't gamble that every $ signing that is budget consensus like the one's you listed above would work out also. Would the Bills really have been worse off with $10 million less in capspace but a better OL and WR or CB? Sometimes I think GM's get too fancy of themselves that everything they touch is gold. If you look at even the Darby trade who would be for sure our #2 CB we went from Darby to Gaines to Davis. We basically gained a draft pick and older CB who is worse then the two CBs we let go. Not the best asset mgmt and had they kept Darby perhaps the money on Davis is used on OL or WR. I get its all semantics, but their is validity into asking some tough questions at this GM especially right now.

[KD in CA]

34 minutes ago, RochesterRob said:

  The Bills have had a fair number of championship windows but Ralph was too tight with money to finish the building process.  The reason that Saban (the second time) and Knox got fed up and left.  The mid-1970's teams and the early 1980's teams could have been SB contenders with just a few more pieces added.  Ralph never quite got the hang of the salary cap era.

 

I meant the current/recent teams;  not ever.

 

It's the early '80s teams that get me.  They had all the pieces for a couple years.  

[C.Biscuit97]

Haha, they are going to milk this “trust the process” for years and some fans are just going to eat it up.  They “rebuilt” a team that averaged 8 wins before them.  What heroes!  Some fans questioned how our passing offense could be worse without Dennison and Tyrod but this regime somehow made it worse!!!

 

keep making excuses for them.  They drafted like 5 dbs and a bunch of average college slot wrs.  It’s like they hate offense.  Jauronball 2.0.

[RochesterRob]

3 minutes ago, KD in CA said:

 

I meant the current/recent teams;  not ever.

 

It's the early '80s teams that get me.  They had all the pieces for a couple years.  

  I don't know about the early 1980's teams being complete.  They could have used upgrades at WR, DE, and LB to go along with guys like Jerry Butler, etc.

[Bockeye]

Great post OP. Hats off to those hat have been saying this is a total rebuild - it is. 

[BringBackFergy]

Well done OP. Well done. 

[Batman1876]

I feel like a lot of people miss the fact that the team could not keep their talent they had. The cap would not allow it. If we had kept Cordy, tyrod and Darius we would have had about 21 million less to spend in free agency. Sign Sammy for 16 million and that’s 37 million in cap for those 4 guys.  Now let’s look at the guys we signed Star gets 6.7, Trent 4.5, Davis 4.3, bodine 2.1 for a total of 17.6 million, 20 million less than we would have spent on the players we let go of add in Kelvin’s 8.5 and we still would have to find 11.5 million dollars, which means you have to sign league minimum guys to fill out your roster or cut other guys. Talent had to go, they opted to trade it over 12 months rather than let it trickle out the door over 2or 3years. 

[Buffalo Ballin]

1 hour ago, gridrick said:

this regime is toast.  Love the Allen draft pick though.  Now get them outta here. 

No.

[HappyDays]

59 minutes ago, Foreigner said:

How can anyone in there right mind defend the product on the field Sunday.

 

Zero people are defending the product on the field. Some of us just understand it isn't the final product. Embrace the tank. When you have $50 million in dead cap there's no sense in selling out to win. From the moment they traded Watkins and Darby this has been a 3 year plan. And the thing that gives me hope is they've drafted well in the first 3 rounds. The only outright bust so far is Zay Jones. But Milano in the 5th makes up for it. Of course it's still too early to say for sure but all their high draft picks outside of Zay look like they belong on the field at least.

[BrooklynBills]

1 hour ago, donbb said:

Are we going to trust the regime that has signed FA duds such as Bodine, Star, Murphy, Davis, Gaines, Newhouse, and Kerley to spend all that FA money? That's a scary thought to me. 

Bodine - basically a 1 yr deal

Murphy - basically a two year deal but they can get out easy after this year if they want

Davis - 1 year deal

Gaines - 1 year deal

Newhouse - 1 year deal

Kerley - 1 year deal

 

Don't see how they are worth complaining about.

 

I have problems with some of what these guys have done but so far cap management is not one of them.

 

The plan is pretty clear IMO. They went scorched Earth with cap and used attitude and not buying in as an excuse. 

 

The are going to use the cap rollover loophole to build perpetual cap space moving forward just like the jags have recently done to build most of my their defense and OL. It is what the 49ers are currently doing.

 

[Chicken Boo]

They have shown no signs that they possess the ability to evaluate talent on the offensive side of the ball.  NONE!

[gobills1212]

Why this is so difficult to comprehend is beyond me. I genuinely dont understand how anyone who frequents a Bills message board and isnt trolling doesnt get this. Now, I get folks will be unhappy and thats fine. But some of the things people are thinking let alone posting publicly are just bonkers. I used to take pride in coming here and reading intelligent posts such as this and thinking how nice it was to be a part of a smart and knowledgeable fan base....

Now im not sure whats worse, this, or reading (for example) Gang Green and seeing how Jets fans have convinced themselves Darnold is the best QB of the class just bc he is the only one starting out of the gate. Different topic, but idea is the same. It amazes me they have no context and dont acknowledge other teams curcumstances and plans teams have in place. Speaking in absolutes about unknowns is just silly. 

 

[LSHMEAB]

2 hours ago, Kwai San said:

 

Dunno about you but Murph seems like a good pick up.....I say a wee bit early to make a decision on most of the others....more than one blowout game is needed before I scream bust.

 

 

"Murph" was possibly the worst pickup of all. Good ole "Murph" strikes me as the kind of guy who'd like to have a beer with the opposing QB after the game to chat about interest rates. If you're not sure about the QB situation, you damn well better have edge rushers because no defense can excel without them. Gotta be a top priority going forward.

[HappyDays]

1 hour ago, C.Biscuit97 said:

They “rebuilt” a team that averaged 8 wins before them

 

Do you understand that a team up against the cap should have a franchise QB and average more than 8 wins? We had bloated contracts to underperforming players that were impossible to get out of without major dead money.

[stony]

3 hours ago, KD in CA said:

 

The real question is, what is the commitment to that group beyond 2018?   

IDK, but it would seem there would be some serious dead money implications.  Not saying that's stopped Beane over the past year...

2 hours ago, Shaw66 said:

OP is a nice assessment of what they did.   It probably was necessary, as it was unlikely they could win with Taylor, Dareus and Watkins as their core.  

 

They will be judged on how they used their draft picks - betting the ranch on a QB and MLB, instead of building a line and taking the QB who fell to them.  

 

I like it.   Allen and Edmunds haven't disappointed - they look like they can grow into real winners, and if they do, Beane will have filled the two most important decisions in one season.   

 

Next season he drafts and signs linemen and receivers, and the Bills may be in business. 

 

And 2018 isn't over yet.  

And truth be told, none of their "wheeling and dealing" or draft capital will matter if Allen isn't good.  If he's legit, lets roll.  If he's not, they get fired.  Just the reality of the NFL.