Locked on Bills Podcast: A Case for Tremaine Edmunds

[TC in St. Louis]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DjyNXYJVBJY

 

Joe Marino gets into some depth about Edmunds.  If you don't listen to "Locked on Bills," you should give it a try.  

[NewEra]

This needed its own thread 💯 

[TC in St. Louis]

7 minutes ago, NewEra said:

This needed its own thread 💯 

You know what?  This podcast does need its own thread.  Rather than having to sift through 200 posts written 2 months ago, why not point out some current analysis by Joe Marino?  I'm calling attention to him, not me.

 

So if you want to learn some in depth reality about Edmunds,  listen to the podcast or watch it on youtube.  I don't care what you do.  Just sharing information that I find informative and helpful.  

[SCBills]

I listened to it yesterday while driving out of town.  Really informative podcast, with some analysis/comparison that I wasn’t aware of. 
 

That said, it’s all about money.  We can pay everyone as long as they are worth getting creative and backloading contracts. 
 

They better be worth it though.. because Beane has done a great job building a team that is a Super Bowl favorite without mortgaging the future.   Start handing out massive contracts to guys who don’t live up to the “down the road” cap space hit, and you start closing that window.   
 

He does a good job addressing the contract money at the end, in terms of who Edmunds compares to and what options we have.  
 

Definitely a must listen for Bills fans on, probably, our most divisive player.  

[RocCityRoller]

21 minutes ago, TC in St. Louis said:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DjyNXYJVBJY

 

Joe Marino gets into some depth about Edmunds.  If you don't listen to "Locked on Bills," you should give it a try.  

 

thanks, was this the podcast referred to by LeGOATski in the other thread?

 

 

 

[Coach Tuesday]

EDMUNDS THREAD TRIGGER ALERT

[Shaw66]

Thanks.  We'll end up in the other thread sooner or later, but thanks for pointing this out. It's an excellent discussion.   I assume it's correct, and it's what I've guessed was true about Edmunds.  

 

As someone said, it's about the money.  If Edmunds explodes this season, yes, he'll get top money.   If he doesn't, then the question is tougher to analyze.   If you believe what Marino says about Edmunds, if you're Beane and you understand what Marino says, then Edmunds is the best linebacker in the league, because he changes the game in a way that no other linebacker does.   He makes every player around him better - he makes the entire defensive backfield better, and he makes Milano better, because he reduces the amount of open space each of those players has to defend.  He probably does that better than any middle linebacker in the league, and that alone may make him the most valuable linebacker in the league.  

 

How much is that ability worth?   Well, that's really the question.  The Bills and Edmunds might see that differently, and none of us knows the answer to that question.  If Edmunds really changes the defense in that way, that he IS irreplaceable.  When you lose him, six or eight guys on your team have to get better to make up for the loss.  If that's true, Beane will find a way to drop a big number on Edmunds.  Some people here will howl, but if Beane does that, it will mean that Marino was exactly right about Edmunds' impact.  

[Ridgewaycynic2013]

17 minutes ago, Coach Tuesday said:

EDMUNDS THREAD TRIGGER ALERT

[Don Otreply]

Good info, and “well rounded to boot”  Edmunds is the player that Joe Marino says he is, the TE detractors seem to not see the big picture or recognize that  all of us ALREADY know what he needs to improve on” and that their repeated tunnel vision posts have now become a running joke on this board…, 

 

GO BILLS!!!

[SCBills]

12 minutes ago, Don Otreply said:

Good info, and “well rounded to boot”  Edmunds is the player that Joe Marino says he is, the TE detractors seem to not see the big picture or recognize that  all of us ALREADY know what he needs to improve on” and that their repeated tunnel vision posts have now become a running joke on this board…, 

 

GO BILLS!!!

I think most people here see the big picture.   
 

Marino also points out that Edmunds, right now, is not on the level of the highest paid Linebackers.  
 

If he doesn’t make a jump this year, behind a potentially elite DL, it’s going to be hard to swallow a Darius Leonard contract.

 

Furthermore, if you overpay by 5M AAV for a guy who never becomes elite, that is how you start putting yourself in cap jail.  
 

So far, Beane has been spot on with his big contracts, which is how you build a contender that doesn’t mortgage the future.  
 

Also, we can likely keep Edmunds, Poyer, Knox, Oliver etc., if we really want to.. but it also means no Roger Saffold, DaQuan Jones type signings anymore.

 

Easier pill to swallow if Edmunds is paid in the 13-15M range or earns the 19M, and we finally start devoting RD1 picks to the Offense. 
 

Edited July 2, 2022 by SCBills

[Dr.Sack]

Edmunds isn’t perfect but he’s the best we have at his position. 

[HappyDays]

If the Bills really thought Edmunds was that important they would have paid him already. Since Beane took over they have paid their core players early. Allen, White, Diggs, Hyde, Poyer, Dawkins - these players all got new contracts a year before it was necessary. With Edmunds they exercised the 5th year option and are seemingly set to let him play it out this season and decide from there. So Beane and the coaches can say whatever they want in their press conferences. Their actions tell us otherwise.

[Brand J]

The Saleh quote is often used, but for all its glory, I’m waiting for Edmunds to play as good as we’re all told he is against the better offenses in the league. Make a big play, Tremaine, please.

[The Wiz]

1 minute ago, JayBaller10 said:

The Saleh quote is often used, but for all its glory, I’m waiting for Edmunds to play as good as we’re all told he is against the better offenses in the league. Make a big play, Tremaine, please.

I think that will always be the biggest knock on him.

 

He does all the little things right but when you need something big from him he usually comes up empty. 

 

He's a solid player but needs to get that play or two every game that makes him that much more important to the defense. 

[Shaw66]

1 minute ago, HappyDays said:

If the Bills really thought Edmunds was that important they would have paid him already. Since Beane took over they have paid their core players early. Allen, White, Diggs, Hyde, Poyer, Dawkins - these players all got new contracts a year before it was necessary. With Edmunds they exercised the 5th year option and are seemingly set to let him play it out this season and decide from there. So Beane and the coaches can say whatever they want in their press conferences. Their actions tell us otherwise.

Well, I've of two minds about this.   First, I'd say you're correct.   If his impact is as great as Marino suggests, then he IS as valuable as the highest paid linebackers, just in a different way.   If he's a unicorn who affects the game as he say, yes, you pay him. 

 

However, Beane may have decided to pay him already, but in their overall cap-strategy it may have been better to wait a year to pay him.  I don't capology, so I can't really say, but it certainly may be the case.  Maybe they were going to extend Edmunds until it became possible to get Miller, and that may have forced the Bills to wait a year on Edmunds.   I don't think we can know the answer to that. 

[Draconator]

Can I start a new Ertz thread?

[Shaw66]

4 minutes ago, JayBaller10 said:

The Saleh quote is often used, but for all its glory, I’m waiting for Edmunds to play as good as we’re all told he is against the better offenses in the league. Make a big play, Tremaine, please.

But I think you have to look at the bigger picture, the picture we can't see very well.   If it's true that Edmunds' presence in the middle of the defense allows Milano and five defense backs ALL to play their positions better than they could with any other MLB, how much is that worth?   If the guy makes NO splash plays but makes six players better, do I really care about splash plays?

2 minutes ago, Draconator said:

Can I start a new Ertz thread?

Absolutely!   Ertz to middle linebacker.  Go for it. 

[HappyDays]

5 minutes ago, Shaw66 said:

However, Beane may have decided to pay him already, but in their overall cap-strategy it may have been better to wait a year to pay him.  I don't capology, so I can't really say, but it certainly may be the case.

 

It's possible, but historically when Beane has extended his core players he's done it in a way that lowers their cap hit for the first year and then escalates. If the Bills wanted to commit to Edmunds they could do it right now. I think it's more likely that the simple answer is correct - they haven't committed to him yet because they aren't committed to him yet.

[SCBills]

9 minutes ago, Shaw66 said:

But I think you have to look at the bigger picture, the picture we can't see very well.   If it's true that Edmunds' presence in the middle of the defense allows Milano and five defense backs ALL to play their positions better than they could with any other MLB, how much is that worth?   If the guy makes NO splash plays but makes six players better, do I really care about splash plays?

Absolutely!   Ertz to middle linebacker.  Go for it. 

That view may be correct, but it’s also a hard sell for some of us when we’re also looking at a back 7 where we are debating a new contract for Poyer, pay Hyde decently well, have a top flight CB in Tre White, paid our slot corner, paid our other LB and drafted a RD1 CB a few months ago.  
 

It’s hard for some of us to accept, and it may he absolutely true, that Edmunds is a key cog that’s indispensable for us having an elite defense BUT we also have all these other top of the line, well paid Back 7 players AND a DL consisting of Von Miller, multiple recent RD1 and RD2 picks, plus decent money for a space eating DT etc., 

[Brand J]

16 minutes ago, Shaw66 said:

But I think you have to look at the bigger picture, the picture we can't see very well.   If it's true that Edmunds' presence in the middle of the defense allows Milano and five defense backs ALL to play their positions better than they could with any other MLB, how much is that worth?   If the guy makes NO splash plays but makes six players better, do I really care about splash plays?

Absolutely!   Ertz to middle linebacker.  Go for it. 

I’m all for the big picture, but against the better offenses I’ve never felt the MLB was making all that much of a difference. Those better offenses dictated to the Bills D more than the other way around. And I get it, no defense in the league consistently stops top offenses, that’s not what Roger Goodell wants, but if that’s also true, then how much value would Edmunds have if he truly was a unicorn and took away the middle/got his hands on tons of passes? His value would be through the roof, not the $13-$15M some are speculating as a 2nd or 3rd tier LB. Something’s not adding up.