Sad as it may seem, this is three years too late

[Trogdor]

1 hour ago, Einstein said:

This has been bugging me. 

Why would Terry not do this LAST year, when Ben Johnson was available? Or the previous year when Harbaugh was available?

He does it now ... to get Klint Kubiak!?

I honestly put a lot of stock in the Tim Graham article. I think Beane has had so much time alone with Pegula that he was able to save his job by throwing McD under the bus. Personally I think they both should've been gone before this. Beane still being here is not a good look and the PR is really bad. 

[Trogdor]

54 minutes ago, Ed_Formerly_of_Roch said:

 

Think the difference may be Pegula is more old school where you take a job and stay there for 40 years.  Obviously different in sports, but same concept just instead of 40 it may be4 or 9.   Wilson seemed to have a short fuse and more impulsive.    Think that's easier to be that way as he inherited daddy's money where Pegula was more self made, he made himself rich so often people like that has more old fashioned values.

Lol what? Both the Sabres and Bills have had multiple changes under Terry. Impulsive like overriding your GM and hiring Rex Ryan because you liked him on your yacht? Giving Kevyn Adams the keys with no experience. Hiring a soccer coach? 

[Da webster guy]

2 hours ago, SoonerBillsFan said:

Wow, that was a lot.

 

If I owned the Bills, he would have been fired the day after 13 seconds

Me too.   Leslie Fraser was the scapegoat then.  Hard to believe neither guy thought to have the team hold every receiver and burn six seconds to give up five stinking yards.  Now its 8 seconds and no timeouts.  My high school coach knew that.

 

McD is to coaching like Fitz is to the QB position, very good but not elite which means you can keep them around for longer than is healthy because they win enough to make you think maybe they'll improve just a little more.

[Sharky7337]

Better late then never 

[colin]

1 hour ago, JMM said:

I hadn't seen anything about Kubiak having  any ties to Pegula or the front office. Can you elaborate? Thanks!

Betting markets show it, Jeremy White on get got a message ripping the firing early and it mentioned kubiak, I've heard rich incognito and a guy in ESPN who was a gm before say there were links and they expect kubiak to be the hc

[GroteStreet]

2 hours ago, GG said:

The move was years in the making, is three years too late, but the firing optics are so bad that they’re leading to distortions of epic proportions to rehabilitate an average coach.

 

For the youngsters in this crowd, the TLDR version of this post is: Sean McDermott is Dick Jauron, but who was fortunate that he lucked out on coaching Josh Allen instead of Trent Edwards, and during a time when the rest of AFC East was in the gutter.

 

Sometimes, recency bias clouds what should have been a fairly straightforward decision, albeit three years too late.  It’s usually good practice to wait 24 hours to process the situation and come to a conclusion after more facts are known.  In this case, what would have been the reaction if McDermott was fired if Bills lost to Jax, or if he had been fired after yet another loss vs KC last year?   My guess is there would be much less consternation than now.   Which hints that people are more upset in the way he was fired than the rationale for the firing.  All of that is discussed in other threads and WGR calls.

 

But, if you take the clumsy firing and emotion out of it, the move had to be made for the team.

 

At the end of the day, McDermott is a fantastic person and a great leader of men, but is at best an average NFL coach.   I challenge anyone to prove that he’s a better coach than Dick Jauron, or at least argue that it was McDermott’s coaching mastery that guided 11-12 win seasons with Allen and Diggs, versus Jauron’s mediocrity with Losman and Trentative consistently winning 7 games in a division with peak Brady.   I’ll wait.

 

To be fair, there is a lot to commend the admiral job McDermott did to wash the stench that his predecessors left at One Bills Drive.  He brought discipline and accountability to the roster.  His team culture-building cannot be ignored in how the team rallied and battled through tough times.   His resilience and guidance after Damar’s near-death should be in every leadership textbook for decades.  His style and personality just meshed with Western New York, who adopted him as if he were their own. Nobody can and should take that away from him.

 

However, that’s not what he is here for.  He was here to bring a championship to the beleaguered city and franchise.  And on that front, he failed miserably. 

 

The real time to part ways was after 13 seconds.  That call was all on him.  It was his decision to kick deep and not squib.  It is his defense that has failed to make the critical stop in each excruciating playoff loss.   It’s not as simple as to point out his teams’ 0’fer in overtimes, it’s to ask why those games ended up in overtime in the first place.

 

In simplest terms, to win in football you need to have a stellar scheme and have players to execute the scheme to win consistently and bring home a championship. To me, if you have to sacrifice one of the two, I will always take the scheme, because it’s nearly impossible to always have the ideal players.  That’s why Wade Phillips was a defensive genius, because he adjusted the defense to the players he had.

 

Not so much with McDermott, whose scheme always needed a Chris Jones, or a healthy Star-type pivot in the front from which all other positions flow.   If you do not have an otherworldly DT who commands all the attention, the scheme falls apart and the defense gives up plays at most critical points.  So when you can’t field all stars in those positions, you call out the GM for the lack of talent in the positions.

 

By all means, it’s not a defense that sucks.  Quite the opposite, the complexity of the defense is great against dumb quarterbacks who will always make a mistake and turn it over.  That strategy is great to get you 9-10 easy wins, but tends to fail in the playoffs where you don’t see a lot of dumb quarterbacks.

 

McDermott’s defenses feast on turnovers, but has been dreadful when it needed a simple stop after 3-4 downs.  That’s been a consistent flavor in each playoff outing.  Even in the wins, how many were with a defensive stop vs a turnover?  How many times did the Bills beat the spread in a playoff game?   Only two wins in McDermott’s career were not nailbiters.  The team almost lost at home to friggin Skylar Thompson.  Is that championship caliber?

 

The biggest issue has been the defensive line, and we’ve all seen the sad statistic of the last sack by a DE in a playoff loss.  Sure, having All-Pros on the DL will add to the sacks, but scheme matters.  How many DL coaches has McDermott cycled through, with equally horrible results?  Maybe it’s not the players and coaches, but the scheme?   Why have free agent DL statistics nose dive when they hit Orchard Park?  Look up Poona Ford’s stats in his career vs one sorry year in a Bills uniform.  Are you telling me that a guy who’s a key player on a Superbowl contender couldn’t get a game day jersey in McDermott’s scheme?  Why do we need explanations that Greg Rousseau’s role is to contain rushing edge rather than rush the passer?  Which is more important?

 

McDermott’s defense never passed the eye test and has never been as dominant as the statistics showed.  He has a far greater grasp of secondary play than he does of the other positions that are also important.  That’s why it doesn’t matter who rotates in the front seven, but if there’s a hiccup among the back four – look out.

 

Compare that with what Kromer did with the OL that’s acknowledged as “elite.”    The elite stature may be a stretch, but they are very good, despite fielding two virtual castoffs from other teams.   Did the line collapse against a stout Steelers’ defense when two backups started?  Imagine the excuses we’d hear if the DL lost two stars for a game?

 

The other question to ask is why have the Bills never had the number one seed in the AFC during this playoff run?   We know why.  It’s always due to the inexplicable losses each October.  Yet, those are always washed away by the surging December wins.  The late season games’ record is undoubtedly a vindication of McDermott’s influence on the team to rise up to adversity.   And that’s wonderful if the October games didn’t count in the standings.  But they do, and you cannot wish away dumb losses to bad Atlanta, Miami, Denver, etc teams to lose the top spot.  Winning teams manage to get over the hump.

 

Maybe it’s just me nitpicking on the defense.  But that weakness is obvious to all inside and outside the team, and that’s why we need Superman Allen to come to the rescue. 

 

Think about it for a second.  Do you think there’s a little voice in Josh’s head that says, “Hey kid, you have to get a touchdown on this drive because you know the other team will just drive down the field and score.”  How many times has a good team NOT drive down the field and scored unless their stupid QB did not throw a pick?  Not too often.

 

Having that little voice in the back of your head matters.

 

So that’s that.  I love Sean McDermott as a man and as a coach and what he did for the franchise.  I also was a big Dick Jauron supporter because he was an awesome human being.   I just didn’t think he was the guy to bring a championship to the city.

Excellent.  True.

[Ed_Formerly_of_Roch]

1 hour ago, NeverOutNick said:

My take is still there’s a problem with evaluating WRs. Whatever metrics they use for evaluation needs to be scrapped. Use your eyes at any point in their careers and you knew Palmer and Samuel weren’t worth that contract. Picking players like Justin shorter because of his RAS and how he looks good in shorts is just pathetic when you have actual real WRs like Nakua going same round or not trading up for Flowers because he has short arms. I pray they fix their scouting on WRs or else it’s just going to be more of the same with Beane leading the charge, regardless of McD being gone. 

 

That's kind of my point, maybe it was McD saying to draft Shorter because of his RAS score.  McD didn't report to Beane, had equal say in everything, could explain why Beane wanted more control to not have to go through this again.

[NeverOutNick]

1 minute ago, Ed_Formerly_of_Roch said:

 

That's kind of my point, maybe it was McD saying to draft Shorter because of his RAS score.  McD didn't report to Beane, had equal say in everything, could explain why Beane wanted more control to not have to go through this again.

I can give you the defensive side of the ball but no way I concede that McD was evaluating 5th round WRs and telling Beane who to take lol

[Ed_Formerly_of_Roch]

7 minutes ago, NeverOutNick said:

I can give you the defensive side of the ball but no way I concede that McD was evaluating 5th round WRs and telling Beane who to take lol

 

There are two articles being talked about a fair amount on this board, one in the Athletic kind of blaming Pegula another in the Buff News blaming McD.  Personally I think they both have some truths, but after reading everything and this point I'm kind of leaning more toward the issues were McD and not sure how much of the bad picks on offensive side aren't also at least somewhat McD's doing.  As far as 5th and lower round draft picks, they tend to be a crap shoot anyway.

[Niagara Dude]

3 hours ago, Gugny said:

Three???

 

13 Seconds should have been the end of this shitshow. 
 

 

No question that it should have happened after 13 secs,  there is no one that can explain and excuse the biggest collapse in NFL playoff history. It also showed who McDermott was,  he is not a leader because rather accept as the HC he should accept the blame,  instead he threw his kicker and ST'S assistant under the bus. Look at the crying he was doing after the Denver loss,  kept saying he was standing up for Buffalo,  when really he was looking to protect and present excuses for yet another defensive collapse right after the Bills had kicked a FG and had a 4 point lead. That 3rd and 11 was a perfect example of his whimpy coaching ,  can you imagine what Sprags from KC would have sent after Nix on that 3rd and 11 with just over 2 mins left up 4 points. Just glad it's over and we will finally see a new defensive scheme after 9 years of watching soft zones and playing not to lose in crunch time

[bills11]

I agree op..while McDermott is a great leader and by all accounts a kind man..

 

When defence is your side of the ball and the players you handpick and get beane to draft for your scheme don't perform year after year it's a huge issue...all the draft capital spent on defence.. 1 sack in 6 playoff runs is an indictment of mediocrity.

 

 

[Jay_Fixit]

5 hours ago, Gugny said:

Three???

 

13 Seconds should have been the end of this shitshow. 
 

 

100%

[steven50]

One thing you have to say about Pegula is, he is not Ralph. We knew all the good gossip when Ralph owned the team. Pegula runs a tighter ship and very little leaks out of One Bills Drive now.

[Buffalo716]

2 minutes ago, steven50 said:

One thing you have to say about Pegula is, he is not Ralph. We knew all the good gossip when Ralph owned the team. Pegula runs a tighter ship and very little leaks out of One Bills Drive now.

Nothing leaks out of it 

 

Which is why you know all the gossip hits, and stories , are nothing but it

 

They only leak out what they want to leak out.. like the diggs frustration etc

[Boatdrinks]

4 hours ago, Trogdor said:

I honestly put a lot of stock in the Tim Graham article. I think Beane has had so much time alone with Pegula that he was able to save his job by throwing McD under the bus. Personally I think they both should've been gone before this. Beane still being here is not a good look and the PR is really bad. 

I put zero stock in anything written by Tim Graham. 

[Dan Darragh]

7 hours ago, GG said:

The real time to part ways was after 13 seconds.  That call was all on him. 

I've been saying here for years (most of you haven't noticed but the others are probably sick of me writing it) that 13 seconds was all on the coaching staff and was a fireable offense.  The failure of the HC to explain it and take responsibility put a pallor over the team and particularly the fan base.

 

Last Saturday when the Bills D took the field late in the game with a chance to seal the win, I was shouting at the TV "Please, please, just this once, get a stop!"  But I knew in my heart that the Mc-D wouldn't.

 

So I agree with the OP that McD was a fine coach here for a while but the time to move along was a few years ago, specifically after 13 seconds.

 

We'll see who gets hired now and maybe it will be a great hire, but maybe we'll always wonder if winning the JAX game cost us an opportunity to get Harbaugh.  John, you couldn't have waited a few days to sign until after the Divisional round?

[H2o]

8 hours ago, Einstein said:

 

 

Allen/Cook>>>>>>Darnold/Walker/Charbonet

[Bill from NYC]

9 hours ago, GG said:

The move was years in the making, is three years too late, but the firing optics are so bad that they’re leading to distortions of epic proportions to rehabilitate an average coach.

 

For the youngsters in this crowd, the TLDR version of this post is: Sean McDermott is Dick Jauron, but who was fortunate that he lucked out on coaching Josh Allen instead of Trent Edwards, and during a time when the rest of AFC East was in the gutter.

 

Sometimes, recency bias clouds what should have been a fairly straightforward decision, albeit three years too late.  It’s usually good practice to wait 24 hours to process the situation and come to a conclusion after more facts are known.  In this case, what would have been the reaction if McDermott was fired if Bills lost to Jax, or if he had been fired after yet another loss vs KC last year?   My guess is there would be much less consternation than now.   Which hints that people are more upset in the way he was fired than the rationale for the firing.  All of that is discussed in other threads and WGR calls.

 

But, if you take the clumsy firing and emotion out of it, the move had to be made for the team.

 

At the end of the day, McDermott is a fantastic person and a great leader of men, but is at best an average NFL coach.   I challenge anyone to prove that he’s a better coach than Dick Jauron, or at least argue that it was McDermott’s coaching mastery that guided 11-12 win seasons with Allen and Diggs, versus Jauron’s mediocrity with Losman and Trentative consistently winning 7 games in a division with peak Brady.   I’ll wait.

 

To be fair, there is a lot to commend the admiral job McDermott did to wash the stench that his predecessors left at One Bills Drive.  He brought discipline and accountability to the roster.  His team culture-building cannot be ignored in how the team rallied and battled through tough times.   His resilience and guidance after Damar’s near-death should be in every leadership textbook for decades.  His style and personality just meshed with Western New York, who adopted him as if he were their own. Nobody can and should take that away from him.

 

However, that’s not what he is here for.  He was here to bring a championship to the beleaguered city and franchise.  And on that front, he failed miserably. 

 

The real time to part ways was after 13 seconds.  That call was all on him.  It was his decision to kick deep and not squib.  It is his defense that has failed to make the critical stop in each excruciating playoff loss.   It’s not as simple as to point out his teams’ 0’fer in overtimes, it’s to ask why those games ended up in overtime in the first place.

 

In simplest terms, to win in football you need to have a stellar scheme and have players to execute the scheme to win consistently and bring home a championship. To me, if you have to sacrifice one of the two, I will always take the scheme, because it’s nearly impossible to always have the ideal players.  That’s why Wade Phillips was a defensive genius, because he adjusted the defense to the players he had.

 

Not so much with McDermott, whose scheme always needed a Chris Jones, or a healthy Star-type pivot in the front from which all other positions flow.   If you do not have an otherworldly DT who commands all the attention, the scheme falls apart and the defense gives up plays at most critical points.  So when you can’t field all stars in those positions, you call out the GM for the lack of talent in the positions.

 

By all means, it’s not a defense that sucks.  Quite the opposite, the complexity of the defense is great against dumb quarterbacks who will always make a mistake and turn it over.  That strategy is great to get you 9-10 easy wins, but tends to fail in the playoffs where you don’t see a lot of dumb quarterbacks.

 

McDermott’s defenses feast on turnovers, but has been dreadful when it needed a simple stop after 3-4 downs.  That’s been a consistent flavor in each playoff outing.  Even in the wins, how many were with a defensive stop vs a turnover?  How many times did the Bills beat the spread in a playoff game?   Only two wins in McDermott’s career were not nailbiters.  The team almost lost at home to friggin Skylar Thompson.  Is that championship caliber?

 

The biggest issue has been the defensive line, and we’ve all seen the sad statistic of the last sack by a DE in a playoff loss.  Sure, having All-Pros on the DL will add to the sacks, but scheme matters.  How many DL coaches has McDermott cycled through, with equally horrible results?  Maybe it’s not the players and coaches, but the scheme?   Why have free agent DL statistics nose dive when they hit Orchard Park?  Look up Poona Ford’s stats in his career vs one sorry year in a Bills uniform.  Are you telling me that a guy who’s a key player on a Superbowl contender couldn’t get a game day jersey in McDermott’s scheme?  Why do we need explanations that Greg Rousseau’s role is to contain rushing edge rather than rush the passer?  Which is more important?

 

McDermott’s defense never passed the eye test and has never been as dominant as the statistics showed.  He has a far greater grasp of secondary play than he does of the other positions that are also important.  That’s why it doesn’t matter who rotates in the front seven, but if there’s a hiccup among the back four – look out.

 

Compare that with what Kromer did with the OL that’s acknowledged as “elite.”    The elite stature may be a stretch, but they are very good, despite fielding two virtual castoffs from other teams.   Did the line collapse against a stout Steelers’ defense when two backups started?  Imagine the excuses we’d hear if the DL lost two stars for a game?

 

The other question to ask is why have the Bills never had the number one seed in the AFC during this playoff run?   We know why.  It’s always due to the inexplicable losses each October.  Yet, those are always washed away by the surging December wins.  The late season games’ record is undoubtedly a vindication of McDermott’s influence on the team to rise up to adversity.   And that’s wonderful if the October games didn’t count in the standings.  But they do, and you cannot wish away dumb losses to bad Atlanta, Miami, Denver, etc teams to lose the top spot.  Winning teams manage to get over the hump.

 

Maybe it’s just me nitpicking on the defense.  But that weakness is obvious to all inside and outside the team, and that’s why we need Superman Allen to come to the rescue. 

 

Think about it for a second.  Do you think there’s a little voice in Josh’s head that says, “Hey kid, you have to get a touchdown on this drive because you know the other team will just drive down the field and score.”  How many times has a good team NOT drive down the field and scored unless their stupid QB did not throw a pick?  Not too often.

 

Having that little voice in the back of your head matters.

 

So that’s that.  I love Sean McDermott as a man and as a coach and what he did for the franchise.  I also was a big Dick Jauron supporter because he was an awesome human being.   I just didn’t think he was the guy to bring a championship to the city.

Thank you for one of the all time great posts on TSW, and I go back a while.

[twoandfourteen]

8 hours ago, Ed_Formerly_of_Roch said:

 

That's kind of my point, maybe it was McD saying to draft Shorter because of his RAS score.  McD didn't report to Beane, had equal say in everything, could explain why Beane wanted more control to not have to go through this again.

 

“Run Blocking” appeared to be the most important metric for a WR to Sean McDermott. 

[Southern McButterpants]

11 hours ago, Mike in Horseheads said:

The crazy thing about this last week is before Monday this place was pry 80-20 to fire McD. Now its like 20-80 we should have kept him , we even had a will he maybe come back thread. I mean WTF...

Yeah, where are all the McDummy & McClappy people? The drum beat was endless - crickets now. 

 

If Beane's title had remained the same, i think that there would be less hand wringing.

 

I'm coming around to it. granted, Beane has to NAIL this coaching hire, or he will be gone in two more years too.

 

The defense failures in the playoffs are just too much to overcome.  33 points to Bo Nix? 🤮