SB Nation User Blog: kaisertown

Notre Dame decides to not play in a Bowl

kaisertown — Sat, 05 Dec 2009 01:46:08 -0000

Notre Dame decides to not play in a Bowl

If I were the Bills and found out in an interview that a Notre Dame "team leader" prefered not playing in the Bowl, I'd knock him down some in my rankings. I think you finish the season regardless of the circumstances. No Bowl game is below you and the seniors who won't get to play in the pros end up losing a chance to play one last game. Charlie Weis got fired, get over it. If some players didn't want to play and some coaches didn't want to coach, send them packing and let the kids who did want to play another game go out and represent their school as best they can.

some thoughts

kaisertown — Mon, 23 Nov 2009 21:32:36 -0000

Bills fans should be cheering for these things:

The Oakland Raiders - They'd probably make a stupid pick, but Oakland is a potential obstacle to a QB or OT in the first round.

Brady Quinn - As bad as the Bills are, the Browns aren't catching them in the standings. Some more Brady Quinn TD passes puts the Bills that much closer to being able to select the guy who succeeded him at Notre Dame.

The Jets .... to lose - I hate those guys and I think it's funny that they could wind up with another high pick. They aren't a threat to go after a QB and probably won't take an OT either. And I like that they might find themselves in cap trouble soon. I'd love to watch them collapse their way into another big rookie salary.

The Redskins and Seahawks - Another couple teams tied with Buffalo who might be looking QB or OT.

The Chargers and Cowboys to keep on winning - Those teams can keep their mediocre coaches and let Buffalo find a good one.

A new collective bargaining agreement - It's not so much that a capless league is one that Ralph Wilson and Buffalo can't compete in. I'm more worried about the potential free agent pool and the lack of roster turnover that could follow. No cap = fewer changes to this roster.

The Buffalo Bills! - I know it hurts where we could pick in the draft, but let's go Bills!

Other thoughts:

Brian Brohm is not playing this season and it's for a variety of reasons. It takes a 24 year old QB a bit longer than a month of scout team practices to learn a playbook. Putting him in the lineup is a recipe for him to fail. It doesn't help Brohm or tell the Bills what they have in him in any way. Fewell and the Bills are still trying to win games, Brohm is not the way to do that. The Bills gave him a two year contract for a reason and that is because they wanted to bring him into camp next year and see what happens. I saw some people post some crazy rationale behind signing Brohm, but couldn't the simplest reason be the most likely? That reason being the Bills saw an opportunity to get a 24 year old QB, who they recently scouted and probably thought a lot of, for nothing.

And on Brohm, he's a flier. He's got a good shot to win the 3rd QB job, but I'd consider him a huge longshot to end up climbing any higher than that on the depth chart. He might have a good future, but that future doesn't come to fruition next year. Over two preseason's worth of fourth quarter action, Brohm is 58 of 104 for 455 yards (4.4 yards per attempt), zero TDs and four INTs. He's been sacked nine times, fumbled four times and lost three of those fumbles. He's been a disaster in the preseason and lost his backup gig to a late rounder and ended up on a practice squad. He's nowhere near ready to make a contribution to this team.

On the QB vs. OT debate. I still havn't recieved an answer or reason as to why Buffalo can't do both this offseason. If Buffalo passes on QB because there aren't any good ones, then that's fine, but I find the logic that the OL isn't good enough to draft a QB to be very flawed. If the OL isn't good enough to draft a QB, then sign a free agent or two. Draft somebody in the 2nd round, or trade back up into the first if you have to. QB sould be Buffalo's top priority and if the situation isn't right for a QB, then fix that quick, because not getting the franchise QB this offseason is just pushing the rebuild back one more season. This team will never compete without a QB unless they can build a historic defense like Baltimore.

I want to point out how different it is to hire Shanahan as the HC/GM and to hire Shanahan and let him pick some pushover GM to work with. HC/GM is a terrible idea. While a HC with all the authority, but a GM to work with isn't my favorite option, it isn't a bad one either. For me the difference is in the workload of the head coach. A HC/GM may not have much more authority, but if he has a GM, he doesn't have to organize the scouts, design a system for setting up a draft board and set up the entire structure of the front office. At the very least we need a GM to manage the front office, even if he isn't the one making any personel decisions.

I'd have no problem grabbing a DT in the first round if it was a BPA situation, but I find it annoying to read mock drafts that say Buffalo needs a DT because the run D stinks. As if no other position matters in run defense and the crappy LBs and safeties aren't the majority of the problem. Stroud and Williams are rock solid. Even with their injuries, Stroud and Williams rank 2nd and 5th amongst DTs in tackles.

How impressive is it that this defense, with all the injuries, TOP issues and terrible offense is 19th in points allowed per game?

Bill Cowher isn't leaving the booth for Buffalo. Not that he has been a huge topic of discussion, but we should put him on the Gruden list of guys to not bother talking about. Dungy isn't coming back into the league either, especially for Buffalo.

Fairly factual thoughts

kaisertown — Wed, 14 Oct 2009 05:20:30 -0000

It can be tough to judge arm strength while watching/scouting QBs. The trick is to see how much air gets under the ball. It's yet another example of science being our friend. The harder a QB throws the ball, the straighter of a line it can travel on. And remember, arm strength isn't about how hard a player is capable of throwing, it's about how hard a player is comfortable throwing and how much they can put on passes without losing touch and accuracy. So it's ok when a QB lofts one in there over a LB or on a fly route, but if there's a good amount of arc on 10-15 yard outs and comebacks, he doesn't have a strong arm.

I know that people don't need more evidence of how bad Jauron and the inner circle have been, but here's some anyways. There's been a lot of mention of mention of Donahoe lately as the possibility of a new GM is discussed and it got me to thinking about how many Donahoe players are still here. Think back to the end of last season, three years into Jauron's tenure and just 9 or 10 months ago. Who were the best players on the roster? If I had to pick the twelve (I choose 12 after making the list because I think it's where there's a bit of a talent drop off) best players who were on last year's team, they would be:

Lee Evans, Jason Peters, Marcus Stroud, Terrence McGee, Marhsawn Lynch, Fred Jackson, Poz, Jabari Greer, Aaron Schobel, Brian Moorman, Kawika Mitchell, Donte Whitner. All I can say is, what the hell? Only half of them were Jauron additions ... in three years! And some of those guys were average Kawika Mitchell, top 10 dissapointment Whitner and a middle of the first round RB who has been good, but isn't exactly a special player.

I keep thinking that Buffalo has a lot of good players and a good young core, but has only been missing some star power and that if Edwards stepped up at QB and a couple young guys made some strides, this roster could be a good one. But where has the development of these young players been? Whitner was showing some this year, Poz is good when he's healthy, but he was a polished prospect. Fred Jackson has come a long way and Marshawn has always been solid here, but this roster is so desperate for great players and Jauron simply hasn't been able to find or develop enough of them.

I've also realized that the way the Donahoe era went is a complete shame. He made some really great moves. We had a defense with Schobel, Pat Williams, Sam Adams, Spikes, Fletcher, McGee, Clements and Lawyer Milloy. That's a ridiculous group and those top five defenses were no fluke. It's a shame because Donahoe could never put together a solid offensive line and made some serious gaffes (JP Losman, Mike Williams). It's also a shame that those teams were the closest we've come to championship calibre since the mid nineties.

Dwight: I am going to begin this process with a simple test of intelligence and mental dexterity. What is the best color?
Andy: White, because it contains all other colors.
Dwight: Wrong. Black. It is the most dominant. How do you make a table?
Andy: You make a chair, but you don't sit on it.
Dwight: What is the capital of Maine?
Andy: The capital of Maine is Montpelier, Vermont, which is near Ithaca, New York, where I went to Cornell.
Dwight: Okay, also, moratorium on Cornell talk. Don't wanna hear about it. Forget your personal history, and learn the history of this company.
Andy: Should not be a problem. I minored in history in the Ivy League school which I attended.
Dwight: You're not off to a very good start, Bernard.
Andy: I agree. But in another way, I am off to a very good start, wouldn't you say?

What would Edwards have to do from here on out for the Bills to not draft a QB in the first two rounds of the 2010 draft? How realistic is it that he does that?

How the hell does Cedric Benson have the most rushing yards in the league?

Would anybody have a problem with the Bills starting the same three LBs next year as they planned to this season (Mitchell, Poz, Ellison) if they do a good job taking care of other needs (QB, OT, DL)?

How many tradable players do the Bills really have? And who is the most likely player to be traded before the deadline and over the offseason? Which player do you think the Bills should trade away next offseason?

Pennington out for week four?

kaisertown — Mon, 28 Sep 2009 03:09:44 -0000

Pennington out for week four?

"Miami's prospects of salvaging this young season have taken a hit in that starting quarterback Chad Pennington left the game in the third quarter with a right shoulder injury. The extent of the injury is not known right now, but it didn't look good. Pennington could be out a while."

A little bit of good news for Bills fans?

kry style dump - it seems to be the cool thing to do

kaisertown — Fri, 25 Sep 2009 01:56:09 -0000

A couple thoughts on the Saints: Their offense was really, really, really good last year too. They scored 1.5 points per game more than any team in the league. They still went 2-6 on the road and those wins were in Detroit and Kansas City. I know they destroyed Philly, but their offense only averaged 23.75 points per game on the road last year and that included a 42 point drubbing of Detroit (so they actually scored 21 points per game on the road against teams other than Detroit). Brees threw for 5,000 yards, so I'm not sure how much better that offense is really going to get.

Yes, Drew Brees is incredible, but let's not make him out to be this unbeatable player. Did I miss when ESPN decided that Brees is the best player in the league or something? I feel like people are more afraid of him than they were Tom Brady or would be if we were playing Peyton Manning on Sunday. Why is that? Brees had a handful of mediocre or worse performances last year, especially on the road. He had 33 passes for 216 yards and two picks in Washington, 39 attempts for 231 yards and threw a pick in Carolina, threw three INTs in Atlanta, 6.3 yards per pass attempt and three picks in Tampa and 232 yards on 43 attempts (only 5.4 per) and three picks in Chicago last year. Take him out of that dome and he was mediocre more often than great last year. The three road teams that Brees did play like the legend of Drew Brees against were Detroit, Denver and Kansas City. Even Trent ripped up two of those teams and actually did just as well as Brees did in those stadiums. If it's windy on Sunday, expect the weak armed Brees to throw a couple INTs.

Even this year, has their offense been that unstoppable? Sure, they came out and spanked Detroit with 4 first half TDs. They also punted twice, had a FG blocked and Brees threw a pick. Can I point out again that it was Detroit? Two of those TD drives started at the 50 yard line and the others started at their 35 and 40 yard line. They also started inside their own 20 four times and came away with zero points on those possesions. Against Philly, they had 17 first half points including a great TD drive to open the game. After that score, they went three and out, had a drive start at their own 47 which ended in a FG, and had another drive start at thier 20 and end in a Brees INT. The INT was followed by another 3 and out and they finished the half with a ridiculous two play drive where both plays netted 25+ yards and ended with a TD. They started the 2nd half by scoring a pair of TDs, but they did it with two drives that started inside the Philly 30 yard line and the game was pretty much over after that. It's a great offense, but any chance we are overestimating this team at all?

And I mentioned this in the article with the Canal Street Chronicles guys answering some of Brian's questions, but their defense actually played better against crappy, inexperienced QBs than they have in the first two weeks this season. They dominated JaMarcus Russell, Kyle Orton and Dan Orlovsky more than almost every other defense those guys faced. Kolb was an INT machine in his limited playing time before NO and ~~Drew~~ Matt Stafford was playing his first game as a pro. I'm not going to consider that defense better than average until they play a real QB. I don't see why Trent can't have a game like he did against our first two opponents or why we can't run on New Orleans.

How about a random useless mock Bills draft? How about two?

Here's a mock for the Bills winning the SB and resigning almost all of their FAs, but not making any moves on unrestricted players from other teams:

1 - Derrick Morgan - DE - Georgia Tech - A pass rusher at LE? About time. Arthur Jones, Sean Weatherspoon, and any other LDE were other options.

2 - Jason Fox - OT - Miami - Decent chance that Bell can be upgraded, Butler doesn't come back the same or Butler wasn't that good of a RT to begin with too. Buffalo could certainly use better quality of depth along the OL too.

3 - Greg Jones - MLB - Michigan St. - the only reason that Jones might be available this late is his size and the depth of this draft class. Jones either passes Buggs and Digi on the depth chart as backup MLB/special teamer or competes with Ellison to start outside.

4 - Michael Hoomanawanui - TE - Illinois - Forgive me for a lack of faith in any of our TEs to become every down players. I think that even Nelson will need to be paired with a blocker (which could be Fine). A blocking force like Hoomanawanui could be a weapon for this team if used correctly.

5 - Brandon James - RB - Florida - nothing against Xavier Omon, but why not a homerun hitter and punt returner?

6 - Jim Cordle - OL - Ohio St. - very versatile player. An interior lineman in the middle rounds or FA seems like a lock. I probably shouldn't have waited this long.

7 - Shelley Smith - OG - Colorado St. - It worked with Lankster, might as well load up on interior offensive lineman and hope one works out. Plus if Steve Fairchild coached him, how can he not be good?

And here's a draft for Buffalo going 5-11, picking around 3rd-5th and a new coach trying to gut the roster, let the FAs walk and spend a year rebuilding some:

1 - Gerald McCoy - DT - Oklahoma - I might end up liking Suh better, but I think McCoy is a better fit in our rotation. not that Suh can't get after the QB, but I think McCoy could be a 6-8 sack per season guy and those are really tough to come by at DT. Also, I'm not in love with the idea of taking a DT, I just don't like any of the QBs enough, don't want to grab a safety or LT and think the top two DTs this year are total studs.

2 - Everson Griffin - DE - USC - the pass rush is a huge priority and a great place for a coach to start a rebuild, especially with Trent Edwards allowing the team to not find an immediate new starter at QB.

3 - Tony Pike - QB - Cincinatti - A new coach will grab a QB at some point. Pike in the early third might be a little optimistic. He seems to really be shooting up draft boards.

4 - Mardy Gilyard - WR - Cincinatti - another availability stretch, but I thought pairing Pike and Gilyard was a good idea, Mardy is a good returner and could fill Reed/Parrish's slot role and be a backup plan for Johnson and Hardy.

5 - Larry Asante - S - Nebraska - Scott and Wilson are both FAs. Asante is versatile, one of the few strong safeties in this draft and is likely a good special teamer.

6 - Ryan Reynolds - MLB - Oklahoma - has had serious injury issues, but is a solid player with some upside. I think Keith Ellison is an FA too.

7 - Dennis Landolt - OL - Penn St. - versatile player and Buffalo could use the depth.

The biggest thing that stood out to me while doing those mocks is how few needs this team could have with a good season and holding onto the coach and how many needs they will probably have with a new coaching staff.

Rumblers, You're gonna LOVE this mock!

kaisertown — Fri, 18 Sep 2009 06:26:33 -0000

Rumblers, You're gonna LOVE this mock!

Mike Harmon (who got fired by Yahoo a few years back for being the single worst fantasy prognosticator you could imagine), does an early mock. Apparently, Buffalo has the first pick!

1. BUF — Jimmy Clausen, QB, Notre Dame

The Bills get this pick because of the problems on both sides of the ball, and because history will tell you that since 1995 the team with a 1st overall pick finished the year before 7-9, and picked 11th more often than not. The bills have had the 11th pick twice in a row now, and had a 7-9 record in 2008. Sam Bradford is out 2-4 weeks, and might not be great again for half a year. Jevan Snead may be a little bit overrated for this 1st pick because of some major flaws he has had, and Jimmy Clausen is red hot. Clausen might be a reach this early into his junior season, but he looks like the most elite pro-style QB right now. Left tackle is one of the many options here, but a 1st overall pick likely means a new coach and "their QB" or it means Dick Juron needs a huge change.

2. BUF — Sam Young, OT, Notre Dame

It should be noted that I hate this pick completely, but if the Bill do draft a QB with the first overall pick, they had better be looking for a tackle to block him. I think that with all of the tackles that are left here, Sam Young is maybe the 3rd best, but he would come with a ton of chemistry for Clausen. I figure Clausen is a big prediction already, so why not take Young too.

A few things Bills fans might be surprised to learn

kaisertown — Thu, 03 Sep 2009 21:16:54 -0000

In a kaisertown first, I might actually be posting a short fanpost .... and I just refered to myself in the third person. I've had a couple posts in which I essentially argue against myself on whether or not Copeland Bryan is any good. I still don't have an answer, but the fact that Bryan is already 26 years old and is now in his 4th NFL season (if you count PS time) had me looking at the ages of other Bills. I feel like I was a fairly pessimistic poster during the offseason, but now that the tone of the blog is starting to head south, the optimist in me feels obligated to balance things out with an upper of a post. Looking for players who could surprise this year, I think ideal candidates are players with very little experience in the league, but are older in life experince. Younger veterans are also primed for a breakout. Here are some breakout candidates based on age:

The most obvious one has to be Donte Whitner. Whitner just turned 24 in July. He does deserve some of the criticism that has been thrown his way, but for anybody who has given up on Donte, consider this: Whitner is 5 weeks older than Leodis McKelvin who just had his 24th birthday a couple of days ago on Sep. 1st (since some Buffalo Bills apparently read the blog, happy B-Day Leo). Shawn Nelson is barely two months younger than Whitner is. The potential is there for a breakout season.

Another player who I've often been critical of is Reggie Corner and part of the reason I have never liked the draft pick is because of how old he is. 24 year old players don't pose much upside in the draft, but they do tend to come as fairly polished athletes. Corner, who turns 26 this season, could be ahead of the curve compared to other 2nd year players. I've never been a believer in him, but I understand why so many of you are. Corner is only a couple weeks younger than Ko Simpson and just a couple months younger than Brad Butler.

And my final candidate to surprise is one who might be a shocker. I've never been a fan of his, but I don't think anybody is going to see these age differences coming. Derek Schouman. There, I said it. I'll get straight to the point, Schouman is almost a year younger than Demetrius Bell. He's six months younger than preseason legend Jonathon Stupar and almost 20 months younger than Derek Fine. Shawn Nelson, in all of his infinite potential is only 7 months younger than the 3rd year player from Boise St. Schouman turns 25 in March. Also, the younger and more experienced of the Dereks is from Eagle, Idaho. That has to count for something. USA!, USA!, USA!

my thoughts and a little film study

kaisertown — Sun, 16 Aug 2009 04:57:53 -0000

The first thing that needs to be discussed is how terrible Langston Walker was. He was awful. I think both of Trent's sacks were on him and for every pass play that he didn't screw up, there was one he did. He gave up a little early on a handful of plays, got beat by speed rushers, inside moves, bull rushes, a stunt and anything the D decided to throw his way. I don't think I can describe how bad he was without actually putting the tape up and making people rewatch each play. I'm hoping Ron will do a play by play OL review like he usually does. I actually thought the OL as a whole was pretty solid, but Walker was just dreadful.

So I did a little film study on the Bills' pass rush hoping I could track QB pressures. I won't be able to tally them up over the course of a season and I'm not ambitious enough to attempt to grade players, but I'll do a little play by play of Cutler's pass attempts. He threw the ball 10 times.

Pass one - No real pressure, but the front four as a group gave Cutler a small pocket to work with and Cutler settled for a short completion to Hester. McGee was covering.

Pass two - Both DEs got great pressure ..... but it was a screen pass.

Pass three - At first I thought this was a blown assignment. Schobel lined up way outside the TE, blew by the OL unblocked and an RB went low on him. Cutler had to get a throw out and it was the short 3rd down attempt to Hester where Hester never really made a play on the ball and McKelvin broke it up.

Pass four - Zero pressure. Completion to Hester, McKelvin was covering, but there wasn't much he could do.

pass five - Kelsay lines up outside the TE, isn't blocked by an offensive lineman, an RB goes low and Cutler gets the ball out quick. This was the play where Cutler overthrew a perfectly covered Hester down the sideline. McGee covered and Whitner would have been there in time too had the ball not been (intentionally?) overthrown.

pass six - No pressure, but the DL shrunk the pocket in every direction and Cutler forced that ugly throw to Hester which lead to the gorgeous INT by McKelvin.

pass seven - Poor pass rush, Corner drops the INT.

pass eight - Good bull rush by Schobel as the DL doesn't pose a real threat to sack the QB, but doesn't give Cutler any space to work with. Cutler had a great completion to Desmond Clark after Harris passed him off in zone coverage to a nowhere to be found Ko Simpson.

pass nine - George Wilson essentially lines up as a defensive lineman over the TE. Chris Ellis is lined up way outside the TE and again, nobody on the OL blocks the player coming from that spot. Buggs blitzes up the middle and is easily picked up. Chicago was in a two back set and both went low on Ellis whose presence still provided enough pressure to force a quick out to Earl Bennet.

pass ten - Buffalo was going to blitz heavily, but Chicago called a last second timeout. Somebody from the right defensive end position (looked like number 95, but didn't look like Kyle Williams, I'm guessing C. Bryan) came in unblocked as an RB predictably went low, but Bryan/mystery defender still provided enough pressure for Cutler to force a throw to the back of the end zone. This was the play where Harris got a hand on it, Florence was in place to maybe break up the pass and Ko Simpson laughibly came in two or three seconds after the ball would have arrived and tackled his own teammate.

Overall, Buffalo provided very little pass rush when Chicago chose to block them with their offensive line. I thought Schobel looked quick and healthy, but wasn't much of a factor. It was interesting watching Buffalo line up a DE outside of the TE and Chicago consistently give that rusher a free pass by the OT.

Other thoughts:

Buffalo only blitzed once and would have blitzed twice if it weren't for the time out. I think Buffalo blitzed too often and too predictably last year. Kawika Mitchell (who now has an awesome mustache by the way) is a player that needs to be used as a blitzer. It's probably his best asset as a player (aside from the fact that he could play a Mexican drug dealer in a movie now). But Buffalo rushed five far too often last year. I'd like to see them blitz 20% of the time (down from 32%) or less this year, but rush 6 or 7 way more often than they have under DJ.

That Edwards strike to Evans down the sideline was a thing of beauty. Rookie safety Al Afalava was starting at SS and was creeping up into the box. Trent read that Kevin Payne was going to back in a cover 1 playcall, stared down Derek Schouman forcing Payne to leave Evans one on one with Nathan Vasher. Vasher's a good CB, but that isn't a battle many CBs are going to win. It was easily the most encouraging play of the night. Great decision, poise and throw by Edwards.

Trent only made two throws that weren't great passes. He had a short throw to Fine that was low and while he caught it, Fine didn't have a chance to do anything afterwards. There was also one play where Urlacher (who I thought had a great game) showed blitz and backed into coverage. It was the slant to Evans and Urlacher read Trent, broke on the route and came pretty close to getting a hand on the ball or even picking it off. It was a no harm, no foul play and it wasn't a bad decision to throw by Trent, altough it was a bit of a close call. When those are the only not great plays your QB made, then he had a great, great night. Trent was forced to check down a lot, but I didn't think any were due to him hesitating or something like that. Walker and the Bears pass rushers forced the ball out of Trent's hands a few times.

That bootleg was an awesome playcall. Any chance we go from being really worried about Schonert a year ago, to a great no huddle offense, good playcalling and an offensive coordinator that we start viewing as a prefect hire by DJ? Maybe it's time we gave the coaching a break, or at least we gave the coordinators a break.

Some quick hitters:

Spencer Johnson had nice night.

Ko Simpson didn't have a nice night and is firmly on the bubble. After tonight, he may be on the outside looking in, I thought George Wilson was a better defender and if that's the case then Simpson is a goner.

I thought those 2nd team LBs looked really quick. They read and reacted to run plays very quickly, especially Buggs. They make our starting LBs look really, really slow. Ellison is probably still our third best LB, but we can't get him off the field quick enough.

Fred Jackson doesn't have much of a burst. I can see why he wasn't drafted and took a couple training camps to catch on. It's incredible how elusive and strong of a runner he is despite such average athletic tools. It makes me like him even more.

Dominic Rhodes is a reliable, versatile player. He's also not better than Lynch or Jackson at pretty much anything. With McIntyre not being a complete disaster tonight, will Rhodes be active once Lynch comes back?

Buffalo had 6 different RBs with 5+ carries. None of them had a run longer than McIntyre's 7 yard adventure and none of them averaged more than Lynch's 3.2 yards per attempt. It's time to officially put the run game on the list of things to be concerned about.

One positive thing about the run game is that after being shut down by a Haynesworth-less Titans D last week, Tampa Bay got shut down by that D too. Derrick Ward and Earnest Graham combined for 10 yards on 8 carries. So maybe Buffalo's run struggles are just the result of great run defenses. Chicago gave up the third fewest ypc in the league last year at 3.4. ypc.

On the flip side, what I thought was a poor TB run defense had a better performance than we did against Johnson and White. Chris Johnson had just 7 yards on 7 carries and White had 6 yards on 3 carries. I've now got my eye on those two for the rest of the preseason for fantasy purposes.

numbers for the optimists

kaisertown — Tue, 30 Jun 2009 00:10:23 -0000

Buffalo scored 30 offensive touchdowns last year. It was a strong 24th best in the league. Rian Lindell hit 78.9% of his field goals and Buffalo finished an even stronger 28th in that category. We also had a 1.25 to 1 ratio of attempted field goals to offensive touchdowns. That was the 27th best in the league. And my personal favorite, our Bills turned the ball over 29 times. The team also had 9 turnovers on downs and their 38 total turnovers tied Houston for the 3rd most. That Dick Jauron style offense never really happened last year and only four teams turned the ball over more times than Buffalo did. Now, this may look like I'm doing my usual talk people down from their unrealistic expectations routine, but considering that Buffalo had a decent year despite all that (insert soft schedule comments here) actually has me thinking that a little growth from Trent, a new center giving this team a fighting chance on 3rd and 1 and that TO character really could push this offense into the top 10-15 in the league.

The first thing to discuss is whether Buffalo's 38 FG attempts from last year (4th most, behind only NE, PHI and NYG) is a good thing or a bad thing. Obviously it's a negative when your thinking about how the season went last year, but if your using that number to try and forecast how the Bills' offense is going to do this season, then I think it's a good thing. The fact that Buffalo had that many drives resulting in a chance to score is a positive. Add in Buffalo's 30 TDs and their 68 drives that resulted in a TD or FG attempt was the 16th most in the league. Not great, but not terrible either.

Here's a positive stat: Buffalo only punted 53 times last year. It was tied with Indy and Houston for the 4th fewest in the league. Want to know why Chicago traded for Jay Cutler? Here's one reason, Denver only punted 46 times last year. It was 4 fewer than NE who punted the 2nd fewest. San Diego was the other team to finish ahead of Buffalo. Chicago on the other hand punted 96 times, the second most in the league.

The obvious thing to factor in is JP Losman's ineptitude. In just 3.5 games (AZ, MIA, NYJ, half of SF), Losman turned the ball over 9 times. The Bills also managed to have 4 drives end on downs with Losman at QB. Talk about clutch. They only turned the ball over on downs 5 times in Trent's 12.5 games. So including downs, the Bills turned the ball over 25 times with Edwards at QB. Let's also subtract Robert Royal's two fumbles because I doubt that whoever takes over his role is going to fumble once per every 15 touches or whatever Royal averaged. So that's 23 turnovers and if you extrapolate that out to 16 games then it's 29.5 turnovers. If you include the turnovers on downs for each team, then Edwards' extrapolated turnovers would have been the 13th fewest in the league. Not too shabby.

Losman also struggled to put this team in a position to score points. Buffalo had 11 drives with Losman at the helm that ended in either a TD or FG attempt. As a team, Buffalo had 68 of those drives, so Trent had 57 of them. Extrapolate that out and it's a hair short of 73. Believe or not, but that would have tied Arizona and Green Bay for the 8th most in the league.

So with Edwards at QB, Buffalo didn't turn the ball over too often. They punted far less often than your average team and had more drives into scoring territory than all but the best offensive teams. Rian Lindell should bounce back this year considering that he hit 88.9% of his FGs in 2007 and 92% in 2006. So it all comes down to those 38 attempted FGs to 30 offensive TDs ratio. Things really might be as simple as finishing off drives with TDs instead of field goals for this offense to take off. I know that's a tall task, but it's the kind of thing that a little improvement from Trent, a few more third and short conversions and some guy named TO might be able to pull off.

Poll

Where is Buffalo's offense going to finish in points per game?

Top 5 - look out New England!

9 votes

6 - 10 - TO and Evans are really, really good

36 votes

11 - 15 - Too many weapons to not be pretty good

81 votes

16 - 20 - Offense won't stink, but Trent's gotta prove it

24 votes

21 - 25 - This team finished 23rd last year for a reason

2 votes

Bottom of the barrel - This is the year Trent goes on IR early

2 votes

154 votes | Poll has closed

Some thoughts

kaisertown — Fri, 12 Jun 2009 01:13:27 -0000

I'll start with something I found by accident. I'm not sure if people have ever seen this, but pro-football reference has a list of the Bills' starters by year and also gives their record each season. It goes way back and looks accurate. It's worth a quick glance for amusement and stashing in your favorites for later reference.

http://www.pro-football-reference.com/teams/buf/lineups.htm

So I was thinking about the sack numbers that Mark Gaughan writes about in a Buffalo News article that you can read HERE that Kurupt discussed in a fanpost HERE. In the article, Gaughan claims that the Bills blitzed on 32% of pass plays and that 17 of their 24 sacks came on plays where they blitzed. So if you figure that the Bills opponents threw the ball 516 times (and that doesn't include plays where a QB felt the pressure and took off) and Buffalo blitzed on 32% of those plays, then there were 350 plays where the opponent threw the ball and Buffalo didn't blitz. 7 sacks on 350 plays is exactly 2%. When Buffalo rushed 4 players, they got a sack one out of every 50 pass attempts. Maybin is a fine start to rebuilding the defensive line, but don't expect me to stop asking for more help anytime soon.

And more on the pass rush, I really like the duo of Stroud and Williams, Johnson is decent and I feel like I'm one of the few who has never completely given up on McCargo, but don't expect the Bills' DTs to be part of the solution to a better pass rush. Stroud and Williams are both good for a few sacks a season which is very respectable for 310ish pounders who are better run stoppers than pass rushers. I was hoping that Spencer Johnson would be able to come in and provide a few sacks situationally, but that doesn't seem likely after watching him play last year. McCargo wasn't a good pass rusher in college and probably profiles better as a two gap player than he does in this defense. That is why I wanted Buffalo to draft a pass rushing DT and would have taken Jarron Gilbert with the 42nd pick. Buffalo should have done everything they could to improve the pass rush. They didn't and it's going to show again this season.

I have every intention on doing some some film study of Buffalo's defense this year. My intentions are more about compiling numbers then analyzing who is doing good and who isn't. I'm trying to keep it as objective as possible and don't feel expert enough to do grades like Ron does. I'm thinking about trying to keep notes on: How often the team blitzes, how many players they blitz and what players do the blitzing. How many yards the opposing team gains when we blitz vs. when we don't blitz. Who is getting double teamed on pass and run plays. Which CBs and safeties generally cover which players and who gives up the completions and maybe how bad the coverage was. Where players record tackles (something like close to line, 4 or more yards away from line and way down field). Anyone have other ideas? I can only do so much so what do people want to see the most? Anyone planning anything similiar?

Part of being a fan is being optimistic and getting excited. One unfortunate result of that is that players regularly don't live up to the expectations of the fans. I'm getting worried that TO is going to be one of those players that dissapoints. I think he'll have a really good season here, but he's not the top 10 WR that he has been for his entire career. The fanpost about Steve Johnson supplanting Reed in the slot got me thinking about this. If Reed's drops are still fresh in peoples' memories, then what are they going to do when TO starts dropping a ball every other week? Here is a stat for you: TO has dropped 35 passes over the last three seasons. It's easy to rip on someone like Braylon Edwards for his struggles last year, but he only dropped a few more passes last year than TO drops every season.

And to continue on TO, what kind of production are people really expecting? Dallas threw the ball at TO 140 times last year. It was the 8th most of any WR. For the sake of camparison, Buffalo threw at Evans 102 times. TO caught 69 passes which is actually a pretty pathetic 50% catch rate. That basically means that dropping 10 passes per season is bad news and that Dallas forced some balls at Owens. The WR with the next most catches to also have a rate lower than 50% was Braylon Edwards and his 55 catches. What are the odds that TO goes the whole season without complaining about not getting the ball enough? My guess is somewhere around 1 in 4.

I don't want to sound pessimistic about TO because I thought the signing was the perfect decision. So I'll throw out some things to be excited about: Lee Evans is the obvious one. Teams are going to have to play a lot of two deep zone or else they are really going to be relying on the FS to cover more ground than most guys can handle. As long as Trent can read those safeties and is willing to trust his instinct and take some shots downfield, Evans could have more big plays than ever. The next thing to be excited about is that Terrell Owens has the single greatest middle name ever. I'll give you 1,000 guesses ..... Nope it's Eldorado. How awesome is that? And the best thing about TO is TDs. TO can beat you on every route in the playbook and his big physical frame and style make him the perfect addition for a team that has really struggled in the red zone.

I know it's early for fantasy football, but after looking at Yahoo's rankings, I'm already worried about how to rank the top 25 or so players this year. I'm in a very deep, very competitive money league with some friends. It's a touchdown league and we start 2 QBs, so they go really fast. When you figure that there are 7 QBs who should go really high in my league (Brees, Manning, Brady, Romo, Warner, Rivers, Rodgers), 4 STUD WRs (Fitz, Moss, A.Johnson, C.Johnson) and 15 or so RBs that could be put in a million different orders, I'm already sweating out the first few rounds of the draft. Is Tomlinson in the top 3 or out of the top 10? Is Peterson really worth the number one pick? DeAngelo Williams had 20 TDs last year? What about time share guys like Chris Johnson? Can Steve Slaton or Jones-Drew hold up to a full season at their size? These rankings might literally push me over the edge into insanity.

The trend for hiring head coaches has been to go with the hot coordinator. But so many teams have done that, there aren't many names left out there. I'm sure we will see some former HCs get some jobs next offseason, but I'll throw Leslie Frazier's name out there as my guess as to who the Bills will hire if Jauron can't do better than 7-9 again.

Alright Rumblers, there's a lot in there and I know you've all got some thoughts. We've got little else to talk about for the next few weeks, so let's hear what you're thinking.