The Numbers Don’t Lie: WRs Die in This Scheme

[T.E.]

23 minutes ago, JakeFrommStateFarm said:

I'll go one further.

 

I think Keon Colemans development was completely mishandled by Brady and McDermott.

 

He was never this bad at FSU

It was so obvious that his niche is clearly catching jump balls in the endzone, so they tried it once in Seattle last season, it worked great, and they never did it again.

[boyst]

10 minutes ago, Kirby Jackson said:

This was his chart at FSU. 

I am with you to a degree. I think we’d all agree the two best WRs in football this year were Puka and JSN. They’re still playing. You can’t just have an elite WR and nothing else like the Jefferson situation. On the Bills though that guy is a force multiplier. He makes Cook better. He makes Kincaid better and Shakir and Cooks. 

Exactly, maybe I could have continued our more of my thoughts but I'm supposed to be working from home and just started watching Yellowstone and was eating Reese's cups.

 

The force multiplier is huge. Josh can run best when WRs are downfield (though I believe his best running days are behind him). This year we saw coverage always underneath and always able to pull off to contain Josh in the flat.  Man coverage by CBs and a cover 3 shut us down too easily with only 3 guys going into coverage.  

 

The domino effect of having to slide a safety to a downfield target pulls coversge. The coverage then falls off the under stuff and gets Shakir open, stretches the lbs sideline to sideline instead of hash to hash. The DEs have to be more disciplined to contain the edge and the STs can't over penetrate the pocket. 

 

Those are the basic concepts. That's the basic truth of a number 1 WR. That was never Samuel or Palmer, not yet Coleman if ever, and Shakir is no where near the WR to do more than chunk yards or slip a bad coverage for a big gain. 

[BillytheKid]

It’s brutal on Allen’s passing numbers also. With Daboll, Allen averaged about 270 passing yards per game. 
 

The last two years with Brady it has been around 217 yards per game. Big drop off. 

Edited January 22 by BillytheKid

[streetkings01]

13 minutes ago, NeverOutNick said:

I know it’s not the right quote but I couldn’t find it. But do you remember in this scene when Julian states attitude reflects leadership? That’s how I feel about Brady and Beane. Scheme reflects incompetence. Give Brady better WRs and I bet the scheme would evolve. 

Diggs regressed in his scheme. Diggs is coming off an 85-1013-4 season after tearing an ACL. How much proof do you need?

[Big Turk]

50 minutes ago, streetkings01 said:

 

I know it’s easy to blame Beane for not bringing in enough WR talent, but I actually put most of the blame on McDermott and Brady. The truth is, Brady’s system is brutal for wide receiver production. I’m 99.9% sure that if we traded for someone like Jaylen Waddle, we’d still be having the same “not enough WR talent” conversation — and I don’t think that was ever entirely true.

 

Just look at the numbers before Brady vs. with Brady:

 

2023

Diggs – Pre-Brady (10 games): 73 rec, 868 yds, 7 TDs

With Brady (7 games): 34 rec, 315 yds, 1 TD

 

Gabe Davis – Pre-Brady (10 games): 33 rec, 490 yds, 5 TDs

With Brady (7 games): 12 rec, 256 yds, 2 TDs

 

Curtis Samuel – 31 receptions in 2024… after 64 and 62 the previous two seasons.

 

Amari Cooper – 20 receptions in 2024… after 72 and 78 the previous two seasons.

 

Elijah Moore – 9 receptions in 2025… after 61 and 59 the previous two seasons.

 

Palmer – 22 receptions… after 39, 38, and 72 the previous three seasons.

 

At some point it’s not the players — it’s the scheme. No receiver seems to survive in it.

 

Yeah I've been saying this for a while now...the offense is essentially designed to be inside out in terms of TEs being the most important part of the passing game, then RBs, then WRs.

Edited January 22 by Big Turk

[NeverOutNick]

3 minutes ago, streetkings01 said:

Diggs regressed in his scheme. Diggs is coming off an 85-1013-4 season after tearing an ACL. How much proof do you need?

Diggs is still pretty awesome but he also has Boutte and Douglas to open things up. 

[gobills404]

27 minutes ago, BeyondTheProcess said:

 

and they are both primarily slots.  plus both teams work the TEs heavily.  Offense has changed to attack between the numbers.   Lightning fast outside wideouts have been taken away by corners who are much faster and athletic than in the past.  Sucks to watch, but DCs have largely taken away the 11 formation stuff. 

They have inside/outside versatility but both those guys play out wide more than in the slot.

[Luka]

35 minutes ago, streetkings01 said:

How were they PS receivers on most team coming off 60+ catch seasons? My issue is we got absolutely 0 from most of those guys while I’ve seen Daboll get production out of Zay Jones and Robert Foster with a rookie Josh Allen and a bad offensive line!

He cooked up LSU!

 

#FearTheSpear

 

1 good game, FSU fans have low expectations. 

[streetkings01]

6 minutes ago, Luka said:

 

1 good game, FSU fans have low expectations. 

He actually had a good season 

[JakeFrommStateFarm]

45 minutes ago, BillytheKid said:

It’s brutal on Allen’s passing numbers also. With Daboll, Allen averaged about 270 passing yards per game. 
 

The last two years with Brady it has been around 217 yards per game. Big drop off. 

I remember when Josh was a superstar and he put up 400 yards a game with 3 TDs passing and 1 running.

 

Now he passes for 130 yards.

 

Brady must GO !!!!

[wppete]

Joe Brady needs to go away and stay away from this team.

[Seventeen]

1 hour ago, boyst said:

The NFL going forward is going to be gadget and role WRs more so than ever. The expense of someone like Jefferson or Chase is just too much to put it all on - they're not QBs. You can miss a star WR and win a lot of games - you don't need all stars. Look at the Bucs with Evans, Goodwin, and Embugka; as a sum they're worth more than all of their parts but only of value with a QB who can utilize them.

 

All 3 of those guys the Bucs had are better than guys on our roster. If Coleman would have worked out, if Samuel could have stayed healthy, if Palmer could have caught on, and if Gabe Davis was fully healthy we would have had a good lineup with Shakir. It didn't happen. 

 

Going forward a #1 WR doesn't have to be Jefferson, Chase, or Megatron. But we need better than what we have now in a lineup that builds a unit over just a player. 

 

All 3 of those guys are downfield threats which we had none for most of the season. 

[CincyBillsFan]

1 hour ago, streetkings01 said:

 

I know it’s easy to blame Beane for not bringing in enough WR talent, but I actually put most of the blame on McDermott and Brady. The truth is, Brady’s system is brutal for wide receiver production. I’m 99.9% sure that if we traded for someone like Jaylen Waddle, we’d still be having the same “not enough WR talent” conversation — and I don’t think that was ever entirely true.

 

Just look at the numbers before Brady vs. with Brady:

 

2023

Diggs – Pre-Brady (10 games): 73 rec, 868 yds, 7 TDs

With Brady (7 games): 34 rec, 315 yds, 1 TD

 

Gabe Davis – Pre-Brady (10 games): 33 rec, 490 yds, 5 TDs

With Brady (7 games): 12 rec, 256 yds, 2 TDs

 

Curtis Samuel – 31 receptions in 2024… after 64 and 62 the previous two seasons.

 

Amari Cooper – 20 receptions in 2024… after 72 and 78 the previous two seasons.

 

Elijah Moore – 9 receptions in 2025… after 61 and 59 the previous two seasons.

 

Palmer – 22 receptions… after 39, 38, and 72 the previous three seasons.

 

At some point it’s not the players — it’s the scheme. No receiver seems to survive in it.

So the million dollar question is whose scheme was this?  Was it Brady's or McD's?  If Brady was carrying out McD's instructions on what kind of O best complimented his defense then he did a good job in squeezing out as much juice as he did from the scheme.  

 

 

[Playoffs?]

Yikes… this was depressing to read. 

[boyst]

7 minutes ago, Seventeen said:

 

All 3 of those guys are downfield threats which we had none for most of the season. 

We had but didn't use. Palmer was hurt or didn't see the field. Dj moore was #6 but couldn't get on the field for spots like this. Samuel wasn't sent deep. Only cooks was sent deep. Davis didn't have a chance to slip coverage and got injured. 

[mjt328]

I would be open to a lot of different options at Head Coach.

 

I would be severely depressed if Joe Brady is still here in any capacity next season.

[machine gun kelly]

1 hour ago, streetkings01 said:

 

I know it’s easy to blame Beane for not bringing in enough WR talent, but I actually put most of the blame on McDermott and Brady. The truth is, Brady’s system is brutal for wide receiver production. I’m 99.9% sure that if we traded for someone like Jaylen Waddle, we’d still be having the same “not enough WR talent” conversation — and I don’t think that was ever entirely true.

 

Just look at the numbers before Brady vs. with Brady:

 

2023

Diggs – Pre-Brady (10 games): 73 rec, 868 yds, 7 TDs

With Brady (7 games): 34 rec, 315 yds, 1 TD

 

Gabe Davis – Pre-Brady (10 games): 33 rec, 490 yds, 5 TDs

With Brady (7 games): 12 rec, 256 yds, 2 TDs

 

Curtis Samuel – 31 receptions in 2024… after 64 and 62 the previous two seasons.

 

Amari Cooper – 20 receptions in 2024… after 72 and 78 the previous two seasons.

 

Elijah Moore – 9 receptions in 2025… after 61 and 59 the previous two seasons.

 

Palmer – 22 receptions… after 39, 38, and 72 the previous three seasons.

 

At some point it’s not the players — it’s the scheme. No receiver seems to survive in it.

Sure, because they are all crap, over the hill or bottom feeder WRs, minus Diggs, but he was tailing off at the end.

[sven233]

It's not surprising that WRs disappear in this this scheme.  When Brady took over, there were many features done where his offense was explained and it was perfectly clear that this scheme prioritized TEs and RBs in the pass game and a lot of the WRs were responsible for clearing out space for them.  While nice in a lot of ways, I think this offense is better used with a game manager type of QB and not someone like Josh Allen.  But, it's our scheme until Brady's no longer here.....

[BeyondTheProcess]

1 hour ago, gobills404 said:

They have inside/outside versatility but both those guys play out wide more than in the slot.

nacua 45% slot; JSN 25% slot... so yes that is true, but a couple of years ago the slot % was lower.    Heck, Even Chase is 1/3 in the slot now.  He would be outside ~100% in the old days.  

 

Things have changed.   You rarely see 11 or empty personnel anymore.  DCs will not allow it.   Need to run it at them and run big TEs into that coverage .  

[Jalan81]

2 hours ago, DapperCam said:

Assuming Brady isn’t hired as HC, it isn’t the scheme anymore. So I’m not sure there is a point in beating a dead horse (I’m assuming new HC will bring their own coordinators).

The point is Brady could very well could be the coach and then you will see a grown man cry.