Pats Week Preview

All right, welcome back to the Buffalo Bread podcast. This is our week seven preview against the New England Patriots. I used to say they hated New England Patriots, but I think it's it's safe, you know, lacking six championships or seven championships to overcome them. I still feel pretty comfortable calling them the pitied New England Patriots because they

look pretty pitiful right now. And and as much as I want to get excited for this match, I am very afraid because the bills have looked kind of trash the last two weeks. How are you feeling, Dan? I was just I was just going to say, are you trying to hex us with this? Like I don't hate the Patriots. They're playing bad. I'm a pitiful watch the Giants game any given Sunday, my friend, any given Sunday. Dear God, I'm glad you came in with a different take than I thought you were.

I'm I'm feeling good. I like remotes. I'm I am right now non plus. I've recovered from the Giants game. I think I think on our last pot, it was very therapeutic for me. And I think I'm ready to talk rationally about the Patriots. I think the Giants game looms large over this game because this is another sub sub part of our team that like the Giants has some pieces that could make life difficult for the bills.

And this is a team that recent history aside has been an absolute nightmare for this franchise to deal with. That being said, other than one weird weather game where Mac Jones was allowed to throw the ball once three years ago, the bills have gotten the better of a post Brady Patriots team. And I'm expecting the same this Sunday, but I don't necessarily think it's going to be an easy one. So I'm very excited to talk about this, JJ. Where would you like to start?

Because I have I have numbers to set the context, but I don't know which side of the ball you want to start on offense or defense. Let's start on the Patriots offense versus the bills defense because I think that's the easier matchup of the two for the bills to really to really own. I agree, because you know, this this Patriots offense is pretty woefully underperforming.

I think they're you know, like 29th in the league in yards for play, expected points added added per play 31st points per game 31st, TDs per game 1.3 only 30th, you know, the only then weirdly the only, you know, offensive statistic they're really good at is 70% of the time they score when they're in the red zone. And that's a kind of a BS stat because it's it's just that the one the times they have been the red zone they scored touchdowns, but they've scored the least touchdowns in the league.

So it just happens that the few times they've gotten there, they've actually punched it. I was going to say, and they never get there at all. No, this is the team that is 29th in the league and overall DVOA. And in the past game, they are 32 out of 32 teams. And this is these are rankings that include the Steelers, the Raiders, the Carolina Panthers, 32 out of 32 in EPA for the passing game. I mean, this is not a good offense, JJ.

But it is an offense that is going to try to run the ball on the bills. And we know defensively the weak spot for this defense, especially with Jones and Milano out for the foreseeable future. It's for sure in run defense. Yeah. So I if I were to summarize, because I like to do that, what my take on this matchup is the bills defense versus the the Patriots offense is you got to make Mac Jones beat you.

I mean, the bill of check is going to want to come out and he is going to want to establish the run. This is a team that's been embarrassed its last few home games. But this is also a team. I think we got to keep in mind a couple of things. They have played the 11th heart of schedule by DVOA out of anybody in the league. So close to a top 10 schedule when it comes to to to overall strength of schedule. They have played some very good teams very closely.

It's only been in recent weeks where we have seen really the regression of Mac Jones equal the regression of this offense. This is an offense that even without Matt Patricia at the helm is still penalized at one of the highest clips in the league, and this is a team that is among the league leaders and drops. Now, for a lot of people that could lend itself to confirmation bias. Well, we knew the talent on the outside wasn't good enough. We know Mac can't throw to the to the boundaries anyway.

So this is a team that that these these are kind of a Rorschach test. And this tells us that this team is who they thought they were. But if this unit can get Stevenson going in the run game, it'll open up a lot of what they want to do in the passing game with Jones. They don't want Mac Jones throwing to the boundaries.

They want Dorian Williams and they want Terrell Bernard playing close to the line of scrimmage to defend the run to open up the middle of the field for Jones to dink and dunk across. That's what they want to do. And the bill's defensive, if it is susceptible anywhere is susceptible to those things. Add to the fact that they really don't people keep saying they do not have a true burner to take the top off the defense on the New England Patriots.

But they've got Devonte Parker on the other side of the field and he's been dropping the ball this season. But in the very limited and I mean limited amount of times that Mac Jones goes 15 yards or more down the field. He's targeting Parker. And we talked last part about the problems of Kyler Elam and his overall defensive capabilities at J.J. and I really do think if the Patriots are going to exploit their advantages in this game, they're going to have to set up Stevenson with the run.

Mac Jones is going to have to get comfortable throwing across the middle of the field when it is open. And then when the limited amount of time they choose to take their shots, it's going to be Parker on Elam. And if any combination of those things work at a better than 60% success rate, this could very well be a very close game. It really could be. And I think it definitely could. You know that that Patriots offense, it's surprising because they pass sixth most in the league.

For a team that you know many describe as not having any real weapons in the past game and definitely not having a quarterback that can get those weapons, the ball, they pass 68% of the time. And it's largely because I think their offensive line has not been able to get a good push in most of their games. They have not been able to control the line of scrimmage and they've not been able to establish the run. Remandry Stevenson looks slow for some reason.

I don't think he's coming off of an injury or anything, but he doesn't look to be running like he was at the end of last season when he was a force. And I wonder what's going there. Something that's different about the way he runs. Maybe it's just his confidence in his offensive line. I think that, you know, the greatest loss in the Patriots offensive line over the past three or four years was when Dante Skarnakia decided to retire.

Their offensive line cut retired and all of a sudden they needed elite talents. They couldn't make it work with a bunch of scrubs and, you know, they have not drafted or signed free agents as well as they have in the past. They got Cold Strange. I don't know what you're talking about. They got Cold Strange, man. They got a, you know, consolidated opinion of the NFL fourth or fifth rounder in the first round. So that's what they did.

Yeah. And I think part of the issue compounding that lack of run game is that teams are shutting or they are playing for the run because no one is afraid of Mac Jones beating them. No one at all. I mean, the Philadelphia Eagles granted they've got their vulnerabilities up the spine of their defense with all the defensive churn and personnel they've seen, but they were perfectly happy to let Jones beat them across the middle of the field in short yardage situations in Dink and Dunk.

And they were just shutting down everything else. They were shutting down any ability for Parker to get outside. They were shutting down the run game and it was really just Jones. I think he threw like 30, 31 pass attempts in that game. It was a decent game. He had multiple touchdowns in that game. It was, but I mean, ultimately didn't do much because these were not explosive plays. These were not high point differential different difference making plays.

These were just like what the Eagles wanted him to do. So and that's another issue this offense runs into is that even when Mac Jones is playing his absolute best, he is so limited with where and how he can hurt you that Mac Jones at his best is still a very beatable quarterback. If everything else on this offense is not going perfectly, if he doesn't have a perfect pocket to throw from because we know he can't throw off script.

We've seen those wobblers that he throws when he's trying to throw on the run. If the run game is not balancing out the quick game, which seems to be the only thing he can do. No, teams are perfectly happy to perfectly happy to allow Mac to play outside of his comfort zone because they know he is not a QB that can play outside of the system. Whatever the system is that the Patriots are trying to run it somehow this offense JJ looks worse than it did under Patricia. It's unbelievable.

It's done it. Right. Well, and I think that was the big thing was I think, you know, many Bill's fans, if you pay attention to the league in the game, you saw Patricia Lee, Bill O'Brien come in and you probably had the same reaction Dan and I had, which is like, Oh, this this, you know, Patriots offense, even with talent deficiency, could you see the average? Yeah, it could look a little bit better.

They could have a really nice run game that could be really good with power and gap, which is what kind of Bill O'Brien brings to the table, mix it in with some wide zone and have really good running with Romondesh Stevenson some play action, which Mac Jones is pretty good at. Boom, bam, like we have a competitive team. It's a division again. Well, I thought that but then this happened and I agree with you that you have to kind of adjust for the competition.

They've had a really tough slate of games to start the season. But even with a tough slate of games, a competitive team that's capable of making a playoff run would not look as pitiful as they've looked against these opponents. They've just, I mean, they've what, three points in the past three weeks. Yeah, I mean, it has not been, it has not been great. It has not been good. It's not it is just not been good. I mean, this is a team that is anemic on offense.

But and you know, I keep looking at this team and I keep looking at the personnel and I fully acknowledge I'm probably on an island with this and I'm the numbers guy. I look at the spreadsheets. I look at the stat packages. All of the numbers say that this is a bad offense.

But I look at that personnel and I keep trying to fool myself into believing that, well, if they just cleaned up the penalties and if they just get a couple more guys healthy and back into the rotation on the offensive line, maybe this offense can do what it is that it wants to do.

And I think again, the vulnerability here for the bills is what this Patriots offense wants to do is probably the one thing that this bills defense is the is it is the worst it's stopping, which is the establishment of that power run game through the gap. We saw the Giants exploit it to great effect. McDermott to his credit made some really nice adjustments by shifting Bernard into some of those gaps. And Bernard Bernard and William sitting those gaps as linebackers were great.

But then again, like you said, if you've got teams believing that you can do it with efficacy, it opens up the play action game, which is what I think this Bill O'Brien scheme is designed to do. And they just haven't gotten there yet. But it's it doesn't feel like it's because other teams are shutting them down. It feels like they're getting in their own way. Does that make sense? Like this is very vibes for me.

But it feels like this is an offense that if it got out of its way, could be average. Could do some things.

Well, and I think that you're and I think that, you know, if you're a Bill's fan listening to this, you probably really relate to that completely because this is what we've seen from the last two weeks from the bills and when they've struggled and how they played against the Jets earlier in the season is when the offense is committing penalties when they're making stupid errors and they're not going anywhere, you could clearly say,

well, this is they're not being beat by the defense, they're just underperforming and not executing. I think you're seeing underperforming and not executing executing from the Patriots right now. The only difference between the two teams, I think is that if you look at the bills, it's like a Ferrari with the thrown spark plug. And if you look at, you know, the Patriots, it's like a, you know, Nissan Altima with with no engine. Yeah, with no engine, right?

Like there's quite a difference in the cinder blocks on the side of the road. The capacity. Yeah. The capacity of speed is different. Probably, but both are just non-functioning at their capacity. And I think that's a great way to put it because the capacity or ceiling, if you will, for this Patriots offense, I feel like is a lot lower. But I don't think the floor should not be this low. It really shouldn't. And it's not for lack of effort for the Patriots trying to address the offensive line.

They've tried in free agency. They've tried in the draft. And JJ, I think this brings me to my larger point about this team. It's the it's the roster management and it's the personnel build, particularly on the offensive side of the ball. You've got to point the finger squarely. I think it bellichick the GM for where this team stands right now. We knew after last season that Patricia was 90% of the problem, but not the only problem.

This team needed to add depth and it needed to add talent on offense. And when you see all these organizations bending over backwards to try to accommodate the development of their young QBs, I mean, look at look at the division. Just look at where the division is. Look at what the bills have done for Josh Allen. Look at what Miami has done for two a tongue of a low up. And listen, I think to it is a is a great QB. I have fully come over on the side of that.

But Stephen Ruiz, Stephen Ruiz, who's maybe my favorite QB analyst, he works at the ringer. He calls to his progressions performative progression because to is not actually going through progressions. He knows where he wants to throw the ball and he is hellbound to determine to throw the ball in that direction no matter what. So he pretends to look. He looks he looks one way for like a split second. And you know, that's the trickery of the eyes that the media says he is so adept at now.

And he throws it in the place that he was predetermined. He was going to throw it no matter what. No matter what. Yeah. So but he has the ability to do that because he's got maybe the fastest roster in the league backing him up and getting to the windows where he is going to throw it. So so all of that. And even when you look at excuse me. Oh my god.

Even when you look around the league, the Jacksonville Jaguars and what they've built around Trevor Lawrence, the Chicago Bears, there's a lot of things you can say about the organization, but they have built around Justin Fields this season and they've invested in that team around him. The Houston Texans with some of these rookie draft picks. I mean, all of these teams, the list is the list is endless. The list is endless.

And when you look at the Patriots, you could make an argument they have done the least to support their developing QB. That's either a testament that goes one of two ways. Mac Jones should not have been the pick and Belichick is aware of it and is just trying to bide his time potentially until he can move on from Jones reasonably, or it is a complete failure or ambivalence to changing with the times.

Other than Randy Moss, can you think of any do you think of any massive addition that Bill Belichick made to help Tom Brady? Yeah, we know Gronk. We know the story of Gronk got drafted in the latter rounds by by New England and got developed. Edelman, West Welker, Edelman and Welker. You could make the arguments though that it was a Brady that made them into the weapons that they were and not because they went elsewhere and didn't come. They went elsewhere and were not the same players.

So other than Randy Moss, what did Belichick ever do from a free agency standpoint that really helped Tom Brady the QB? So it's either a failure in talent evaluation at the QB position or it is a stubbornness and commitment to this is the way we've always done it. I gave Tom Brady jack shit. Why do I need to give Mac Jones anything? Why can't he just be Brady? Tom Brady was a fifth round picker, sixth round picker winner. When you said that, what's sad was the first thing that came to my mind.

You already took Randy Moss off the table in my mind by saying other than Randy Moss, right? The first thing I thought of was Vince Wolkbork. Like Vince Wolkbork? Yeah, I know, right? Like, you know, it was nose tackle, like building a defense that gets the ball back to Brady was really what Belichick focused on.

But that's also another perfect case in point because all those, that 20 year run that these two guys were on, you're telling me in 20 draft classes, Gronk, Edelman and Welker, that's it? That's it? Well, Edelman and Welker, both picks of the Patriots. Welker for sure was. Welker I don't think was. Did Welker start in Denver? Yeah, he came over from Denver. Did he come over from Denver? I think I thought it was the other way around. Or did he go to Denver from, yeah.

Because I know, I know he played with Peyton Manning too in Denver. He did. I can't remember. I think it might have been the other way around. I think, I think Welker, I think Welker was drafted by New England, then went to Denver. Okay. Yeah. Let me. Yeah. Well, you Google that. But anyway, I'm going to Google it. I'm going to Google that. So yeah, so, but even if Welker was a free agent, right, Randy Moss and Wes Welker, that's what you did for Tom Brady.

This feels, this feels like, well, Belichick is still a great defensive coach. It feels like the game and the way you build rosters in the standage has passed Belichick the GM by, you got it. Do you have an answer? I do. He started in Miami. Oh, that's right. So he was, he was picked up. He was drafted by the first year. That's right. I think he might have been even undrafted. So he showed up in Miami. He played for San Diego as well.

And then he played for Miami for two years and then came to New England in 2007. So he came in the league in 04, went to New England in 07. So two free agent pass catchers in 20 years and two draft pick pass catchers and Edelman and Gronk. That's it. That's the track record. You know what I mean? I mean, and that's a big reason why Brady left at the end. He's like, there's just not enough around me. There's just not, not enough guys. There's not enough talent on this roster.

And Belichick has almost doubled down on that in the years since. Like Nikhil Harry. I mean, that's whatever. That was a huge failure. Right. And AJ Brown was sitting there. Now listen, there are stories like that with every team. But it just seems like with, it seems like, we're going to chase Creed to the end of this earth. He's the one that got away. Hey, what if we were to give Creed a friendship bracelet at a Taylor Swift concert that says come play with the bills? How about that?

Maybe that's what we do. That's, I think that's what we should do. The next Taylor Swift concert, let's go. Get the restraining orders ready, local authorities. That's right. We're coming to a Taylor Swift concert near you. Meet Creed Humphrey. To meet Creed Humphrey. We don't even care about the concert. Right. But I care. I know. I know. I would actually kind of care for me and my daughter are very, me and my daughter are Swifties. I'm taking her to see the concert, the era's movie this week.

The movie of the concert. The movie of, because I can't. It's about my price range too. I know. It's way more than my price range. I cannot afford to take her to that concert. But we're off track. So again, in summary, if the Patriots offense is going to do anything, it's got to get out of its own way and it doesn't have to do anything special.

It's just got to do kind of what the floor of this offense dictates that it would, which is run the football, open up the middle of the field for Mac, get some design play action going, and then exploit what has become a weakness of this bill's defense, which is the ability of of Kyre Elum to guard anybody deep and see if you can get Devontae Parker going and really change the levels that this defense needs to defend because right now teams are just defending the run.

They don't feel like they need to defend a relivell of the field against this new England offense. If those things happen, it's going to be a long day for the Buffalo Bills defense for sure. Yeah, absolutely. I think that there are some risks there. I think for the bills to win, they need to pressure Mac Jones. They need to get in his face. If it's Mac Jones, if it's not Malik Cunningham or Bailey Zappi or something, like they benched Mac Jones a couple of times this year.

So we'll see, but yeah, if they get up on him quick and make him uncomfortable, I think that you know, that is that is the key to victory in this game. And hopefully we see Von Miller come back. I think he's looked he's looked like he's playing in quicksand a little bit, which is to be expected. Somebody coming off an ACL. He hasn't had the same kind of quickness or speed to power that he's shown in his illustrious career. And hopefully that just comes with time.

I think we saw the same with Tridabius White last year. He took him handful of games to look like he was kind of getting back into game speed. So hopefully that recovers and we start see flashes of it. And that's part of the process of shutting down Mac Jones, making him uncomfortable, getting in his face, maybe getting him on the ground a few times. Do you want to talk about the bills offense versus Patriots defense? I do because I feel like there's more meat on this bone.

I mean, I'm not going to lie. We just did what I thought was a great 19 minutes on the New England offense. But I mean, listen, man, that whatever it is, whatever it is, but that's a strain for me. But I think I think this defense is a lot meatier and a lot juicier to get into. Like the defensive roster, even without Judan and even without Gonzalez is still pretty good.

And this is a team EPA per rush defense is top five in the league, the New England Patriots, it's stopping the run, even without Judan and the lineup. The Buffalo Bills, if we have talked about, if you can shut them down on their first few run attempts, they tend to turtle, go away from the run and then turn into the pumpkin that was the 2022 offense, run a bunch of run a bunch of 11 personnel out there and play right into the defensive scheme that you want them to.

So I think the match up here, we talked about New England needing to run the ball on Buffalo. I think Buffalo establishing the run game against this defense is going to be paramount as well. Yeah, absolutely. And I think that really, that's that's the story of this game. And just like you said, with the 2022 offense, it never had a true identity as a rushing team.

And this this year's team, when it has an identity in a game, when they make their presence known to physicality in the run game, and really to kind of take it to an opposing defense, then it opens up the play action pass. Then Josh Allen starts cooking because he's more comfortable. He's staying ahead of the sticks. He's in manageable down in distance.

How many times have we as Bills fans seen, seen Josh Allen throw, you know, a 40 yard touchdown strike on third and two, because that is a great down for that type of attack. It's, it's saying, you know, you expect us to hit something short, you're covering short zones, you're trying to cover the flats. Well guess what, Stefan Diggs does a double move, and somebody bites hard on the inside expecting him to do a quick crosser for that first down. Nope, we're going for the whole thing.

Boom, like that, I think that that rushing attack is so critical. So I'm going to agree 100% with you that the Bills absolutely need to get it started. And they need to get it started under center, letting James Cook approach the line with a full head of steam, because that's when he does his best. Correct. I mean, that's even the case for Latavius Murray, I know that you had a problem with Murray starting the game over Cook this past week against the Giants.

But I do think that he still has a lot of juice he's shown really well when they've given him opportunities. And so mixing them thunder and lightning throughout the course of this game, and doing some under center power zone, power gap control running, and keep hit that hit that Dion Dawkins tackle gap power right over the guard slot, because that thing, it worked against the Giants like four or five times. They tried to adjust to it.

And even with their adjustments, the Bills were somewhat reliably still getting four or five yards per snap. So hit that till they can stop it. And that's going to set you up for a lot more things. I think too that there's Dalton Cacade fully cleared back in practice full bore. So he's out of the concussion protocol. It's going to be a good opportunity for him, I think, but they just really need to get him started.

He's got a decent amount of yards after catch, but he's been targeted in such a short zone area that I would like to see more out of Dalton Cacade this game. Like I've said, every yeah, like we have said very consistently, we want to see Cook get 19 over under 19 and a half touches per game. We want to see Cacade get some red zone looks and some red zone touchdowns. I just want to I want to see the guy that was advertised.

I want to see the guy who can find the soft spot in the zone and then turn and burn for a little bit of yak. Take a seven yard catch into a 17 yard catch. I want to see that. I want to see Dick Beasley. Exactly. That's what I was sold. That's the bill of goods I was sold. Small Beasley. Yes. We want to see Small Beasley. Is what I heard about in training camp and in the preseason. And what we've seen instead is a slightly taller.

Who's the running back that they got from the Panthers that was terrible that we all hated? Oh, God. McDermott's first year. I can't remember. Are you was this was it a running? Are you talking about Kelvin Benjamin? No, it was a running back. It was running back. He's a really slow running back from the Panthers and he was a culture guy that did make their broad end anyway.

All I remember is that he was always the kind of player that, you know, Tyrone Taylor would check the ball down to and he would literally fall forward for a half yard from where he caught it. And I'm going to go third and four. You continue your story. Yes. This person he would catch the ball where he caught it on like a third and four check down and get one yard and they'd have to put in. I oh my gosh, why can I not Jonathan?

No. It wasn't Jonathan Stewart that was the other running back that was good for them. Anyway, there was a big thick running back from the Panthers who came and played with the bills for one or two years was pretty massive disappointment. That's what I see when I watch Dalton Kincade catch the ball so far and it's just wildly under, you know, my expectations for that player when they use the first round pick on him.

And I'm sorry that he was hurt, but he really needs to come back and show us something to get this offense going. You're still searching. That's okay. I don't know who I don't know who you're talking about. I'm in pro football reference right now. I'm looking at the 2017 and 2018 roster. I cannot identify a specific person is a free agent signing from Carolina in 2017. They still had LaShawn McCoy on the roster. Let's see. And then let me see here. They've got Joe Banyard.

Nope. And then they've got, I mean, Calvin Benjamin who notably came for the Carolina Panthers. He was terrible. Yeah. Brutal, not a running back, but still brutal. And then the only other running back on the 2017 roster that I can see is Taiwan Jones. Wow. Okay. Yeah. What am I thinking of? What are you thinking of? I'm so curious. I'm so curious what you're thinking of. Let me see. Yeah. Because it says right here draft time and year on pro football reference.

And the only person that's got a Carolina Panthers draft pedigree on the 17 roster is Benjamin. It might have been. Who was terrible. Yeah. All right. Who was also terrible for sure. So yeah. But anyway, your point taken, right? The analogy still plays out. Underperforming catch and run capabilities is really what I'm talking about. Really New England. They play a lot of man. Yep. They've got JC Jackson back on the roster.

Basically the little brother of Stefan Diggs when it comes to Diggs owning that matchup. But they've got a really interesting roster of tweeners, which is something we said about them at the beginning of the season. There is a world JJ where Belichick just gets weird with it. When you've got this 12 personnel matchup that the bills are going to be throwing out there, I could see a world where Belichick rolls out like four safeties.

He's got like peppers, hip checking, digs at the line and using his physicality there before passing him off to Jackson in the backfield. Duggar playing in the box. You've got Phillips who can play all over the field. I could see Belichick getting really weird with a lot of these matchups pressing some of these bills wide receivers at the line of scrimmage. And then using some of these tweener pieces that he's got to really confuse where pressure and coverage are coming from.

That is something that the Jaguars did with good efficacy for their entire game. The Giants did it for strong portions of their game where they would show a lot of blitz, drop a surprising amount of guys into coverage, and that confused Josh for a couple of quarters. If there is a team built to replicate that scheme and slow down this offense, it's the Patriots to me. Yeah, absolutely.

Well, and I think that that's, I, while you were talking about the Patriots defense and how they shut things down, I found him. His Michael, it's Mike Tolbert. Oh, Tolbert. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, such a, such a non-factor. Such a niche, yeah, player. But that's what I remember about Mike Tolbert is he brought him in. He's like, this guy's going to teach them the culture. And Mike Tolbert got, you know, like, maybe 20 or 30 touches the whole year and every single one of them was a complete waste.

You're so, you're so. I mean, he literally, I'm not looking at his stats. He touched the ball 19 times that year, but it resonated as so offensive for you that you committed. It was. It was because I was like, this, every one of them is a lost snap. So yeah, no, I think you're right. I think that the New England Patriots are going to do, they're going to do some of the things that frustrate the Bills the most.

They've proven throughout, throughout, you know, the many seasons that Belichick will look at what other teams have done successfully to shut down an offense and replicate them. I think that that's going to be true. So this is going to be a true test for Dorsey and for Josh Allen, honestly, is, is can they come up with a yet another counter punch in order to, you know, fix some of the problems that have caused them to be so slow the last few weeks, specifically a slow start.

Like you should have your scripted plays at the beginning of a, of a game really, you know, cooking before the defense has a chance to adjust to you. And the last two weeks, they have looked super sluggish so weak. The opening script has been so weak. It's been weak. And to be honest, I don't think you can totally, you know, just I don't think you can wash away the whole London effect.

11 of 11 teams that did not choose to take their bi-week after they came back from playing in London have been trailing in the fourth quarter of the game that they played the week after. It's 11 of 11. Interesting. Wow. Since they started, since they started playing London games and they, you know, the teams always have a choice. Do you want to take your bi- after you come back from London to adjust the bills chose not to because they didn't want to buy this early in the season.

They wanted it later and I respect that choice. I think that's a smart choice. But 11 times out of 11 opportunities, the team that played the week after a London game was most of the time and the most of the time they lost the game, but every single time they lost, 100% of the times they were trailing in the fourth quarter. Interesting because both the Jags and the bills played this week.

And where the Jags trailing in the fourth quarter of their game against the Colts, I know the game was closer than it was supposed to be, but I know the Jags pulled away eventually. That's an interesting stat. That's fascinating. I saw that on what I'm still going to call Twitter forever. The Jags were not trailing in the fourth, so maybe it's now 11 of 12. Maybe it could be. Yeah, because they were 21 to six at the half. Yeah, but that team, that doesn't count.

London is literally their home field at this point. So yeah. But no, interesting. I mean, very interesting. So there could be some of those effects, but I don't know, man. We talked about this in the post-game analysis with the Giants. I mean, this offense, and again, I don't want to lay all the blame at Dorsey's feet, but I want the right amount of accountability. The dude just reverts in turtles when the opening.

I've never seen someone be so quick to deviate from an opening script in my life, as I've seen with Dorsey. He just kowtows so quickly to what other opposing defenses are doing. And he put, I know Josh's comfort zone is not to be under signer. He wants to be in shotgun, but he reverts to so much of that comfort food so quickly, it just makes this offense more predictable.

I want to see this team stick with a balanced approach because it might not work right away, but it'll work like novocaine, especially against a team like Dwinglin that they've got a little bit of speed on the outside, but this is still not the fastest defensive unit that you're going to see, especially with Gonzalez out. So I think you can wear that unit down and then take advantage of some of the innate speed you've got on your offensive roster.

I want to see consistent adherence to what the installed offense looks like. And dude, they've got to get other pieces involved. You know, as good as Diggs is, is getting open. You know, Diggs is going to be double teamed for most of the game, especially because J.C. Jackson has proven he can't guard Diggs one-on-one. You know, you absolutely know that they're going to try to take away Gabe Davis as well.

When Josh Allen this season throws to a player that is not Stefan Diggs or Gabe Davis, his QB rating goes from 96 to 57. But here's the thing, unlike last season, there's actual depth and actual weapons at the pass catcher position that we didn't have last year. I loved how Hardy looked in his limited reps against the Giants. He is a crisp route runner that plays with a lot of speed. He looks like what we thought Isaiah Mackenzie was going to look like last year.

You've got this riddle in Dalton Kincaid, this guy that you drafted to have this immediate impact that you could go. I say if the Patriots are going to give you someone other than Diggs and Davis, I feel good about the options that they're going to be leaving open in their scheme. I just want to see Dorsey exploit it because again, we know that if Josh can play point guard, get the ball out in under 2.7 seconds and distribute to seven or more players, that is a recipe for a Buffalo Bills win.

Absolutely. That's one of my predictions whenever we get to those. They have to be able to beat the New England Patriots and what they're not good at on defense. On defense, the places where New England has struggled is they give up points because they give up some explosives. They're really good when the team that they're playing is being forced to propagate the ball down the field, dink and dunk and execute efficiently, but they have given up some explosive plays.

I think that that's a big spot for the Bills. Like you mentioned, the Patriots defense is almost top of the league in terms of yards per rush, but they tend to over the course of the game continue to get worn down because opponents are almost bottom of the league in number of times that opponents are rushing on them. And then rush yards per game is middle. People are averaging over 100 yards per game on them. So there's some opportunities here and I think you're right.

I think that's a good place to start. And I think also that's really important for Dorsey to stick to a script and not abandon his values at the first sign of trouble. Yeah, good news is it looks like Kinkade who has cleared concussion protocol and is back to practicing, it looks like he is going to play in this game, which means 12 personnel, which the Bills like to run at a very high clip is going to be back in the playbook. And it just it wasn't in that Giants game.

They used it or usage rated that was single digits where usually they use it or clip just over 30%. Yeah. Well, and I think too, it's also interesting to me that the Bills run better out of 11 personnel with a single back and one tight end and they pass better out of 12 personnel with two tight ends, which is opposite from your usual expectation. Right. But look at who they can run out there and 11 personnel like digs is almost always going to be out there.

Gabe Davis is an excellent run blocking wide receiver. Sure. Sure. It is excellent. And Khalil Shakir has become one of the better run blocking receivers in the league. I remember scrappier. I remember last year in that Tennessee game in week two when Shakir when Shakir finally got on the field. And I remember watching the replay because it was a run play was like his first professional snap and he got absolutely blown up at the point of contact. I remember that too.

And I was like, oh, dude, this kid's got a lot of work to do in the run blocking game. And he has gotten so good at it, which is why he is taking so much snap share away from Surefield. So they've got out of 11 personnel, you could argue three of the better blocking wide receivers in the league. So out of 11 personnel, they can be great at running the football.

And then in 12 personnel, where the idea is you're forcing a lot of teams into base, you can get wildly and you can pass out of that when you've got digs, gave it Davis and Kincaid, who are all there three potential route trees that you can throw to it. And that dude, that's the dream, right? That is the dream for the bills to be multiple and unpredictable. And it just hasn't happened over the past couple of weeks.

Well, and I think, yeah, their efficiency in running out of 11 and passing out of 12 makes you believe that if they become super efficient and that teams will start, you know, loading the box in 11 and then all of a sudden the pass out of 11 is so much more lethal. Or they'll start dropping more players into coverage and 12, and then you have a empty box that you're running against out of 12. And that becomes, you know, big time plays. Yeah. And yeah, I agree.

I think that there's so many different ways that they can play, but it seems like a deficiency of Ken Dorsey is that he doesn't have a plan B when his plan plan a falls apart. When the alignments and the different players he's rolling out in his packages are failing to execute the way he wants them to play, he tends to kind of scramble, go into scramble mode. He's a little bit like Josh Allen on any pass player, right?

Like he stays within the script of the play for as long as he feels comfortable. The moment he doesn't feel comfortable, it's scramble drill. That's maybe why he and Dorsey get together, get along so well is that they both have the same kind of fight or flight response to initial action or reaction.

Right. And listen, I think we're going to see teams continue to blitz Josh early in the game because they want to create discomfort with Josh lining up under center and they want to take away what the bills have so successfully installed, which is this play action ability of Josh when he lines up under center. They want him to feel unsafe lining up under center though and turning his back to the line when he's got to simulate play action. They want to take that away.

And Dorsey has allowed teams to do that over and over and over again over the past few weeks. And I think this week is going to be no different. JJ to summarize, if I were to expect anything from this New England Patriots team, because it's so hard to say like this is how they're going to scheme because it's really a week to week scheme. Like say what you want about Bill the GM, Bill the coach still does a great job of making very specific game plans for very specific teams.

I think the Patriots are probably going to blitz early on. I think they're going to play a lot of man coverage. They're going to want the bills to second guess their use of their use of 12 personnel or I'm sorry of play action, Josh under center. And they're going to want to shut down the run. They're going to want to try.

They're going to want to pull some of these early levers that other teams have pulled against this Buffalo Bill's offense and force them to revert to their 2022 selves, which is line up an 11 personnel and let Josh figure it the hell out. And up an 11 and force feed digs until he throws tips and interceptions. Exactly. I mean, that's really it. That's really it. So you want to do some prediction sure to go wrong. Yeah, let's let's get this. Let's get this thing buttoned up.

I've got I've got I'll start with the score and the win. I think the bills do win. I think that it's a much tighter affair than any of us would like it to be because this is an excellent Patriots defense. Been missing some key pieces. I think the bills put up 23 points. I think Tyler Bass has six field goals or four field goals because I do think that the Red Zone defense for the Patriots intimidates me.

I think that even if the bills are able to move it around between the 20s, I think they're going to experience some difficulties down close in the red area. And so I see Tyler Bass maybe having a redemption game and getting a number of field goals, 2317 bills. How about you? I think Tyler Bass revenge game incoming. I I'm going to go 28. I'm going to go 28 13 bills. So the spread on this game is eight and a half, right? It's interesting.

This line opened at nine and a half, which tells you that there's some money going on the Patriots for the line to move a little bit closer to them. So there is at least a belief out there that the Patriots have shown enough over the past couple of weeks that maybe this is a get right game for them. Or that could be a testament to some of the betting public and some of the sharps that Buffalo is just inconsistent. They listen, they play to the level of their competition.

They make good teams look bad. Think about that dolphins game. But then they just don't show up against bad teams. It's crazy. It's look amazing. It's absolutely crazy. The New York Jets literally have life because the Buffalo bills pissed that first game away. So this is a team that better or worse plays to its competition. That being said, the problems are so clearly identifiable and everyone at one bill's drive knows what those problems are.

It is hard for me to believe that this coaching staff is going to let the same thing beat them week to week to week. I believe this is an adjustment game. These division games, they tend to be a little wonky and a little bit weird. And other than that, Weather Game, McDermott and Allen have absolutely owned New England. And I think this is still going to be a bill's walk away win. So I'm going to go 28, 13 Buffalo bills.

I think they so we'll hit the under on this because the over is 41 and a half. So this will just be under, but the bills will cover the spread. Yeah, I've got them going under as well. And I do have them not covering. My first prop is that Greg Rousseau, one and a half sacks and I think over. And last time I took under against Rousseau, he had one and a half sacks. Exactly. Oh, do I push? No, I'm not going to push. You can't push on this.

I am going to go under only because I think Von Miller is going to have a good game. I think Von is is on his way back. I think they're ramping up his snap count. And I just think listen that that New York Giants offensive line was non existent. But I think this New England Patriots offensive line, if they get some pieces back, it could be different. But it's not just that it's bad. It's also dysfunctional. Like this is still one of the most penalized offensive line units out there.

And I just think it's going to be a good day for some of these ad rushers for the Buffalo bills. I think they're going to go under only because I think there's going to be a lot of guys making hay in the backfield against Jones. I like this. I hope so. Yep. Okay. Do you say that you say then Von Miller is going to get one or get a half? Yeah. I'm going to put it at half and I'm going to say Von Miller gets his first sack of the season. Cool. Yep. So yeah, I've got another one for you.

You ready for this? I am. Chair Elam over, over, under, half an interception. I'm going over. He's going to, I'm saying he's going to get a pick. Yeah. I'm going to say under because I don't believe in him at all. Chair Elam revenge game loading. That's what I am saying. All right. Listen, they're going to pick on him. He's going to have opportunities. He's going to have opportunities. That's for sure.

And everyone in that building, both organizations know that Elam is probably going to get targeted like 20 times in that game. If he wants to send a message early on, he's got it. If he wants to protect himself, he's got a pick on all in this. Listen, we forget how well he played at the end of last season. The Buffalo Bills do not beat the Miami Dolphins in the playoffs. That's true. Without Chair Elam. And so an interception. Playing at high level. So listen, I still have faith in this kid.

I think this is a game where they're going to test him. And I think this is a QB who has shown that he is incapable of testing opposing DB's. Chair Elam is going to get his first pick this game. I like it. I like it. I hope for it. I hope for it. Honestly, I don't think it will happen. I think he's going to get roasted and we're going to be sad about it. But I'd really love for that to come true. I would love for that to come true too. I've got six or more pass catchers.

Have three or more receptions is just a statement I'm going to put out there in the universe. That's an interesting one. The bill, because that didn't happen against Jacksonville. They had they had eight different pass catchers, but four of them only caught one pass. And then I'm looking at the stats from the Giants game. One, one, one, one. Only four players again had more than one catch. It was basically the diggers and Davis show. That's a really good one. You came prepared for this.

God. Well, I want that so bad because I think that that's a recipe that's great. That's a recipe for the bills to win every game. Obviously, like if I just feel like that's a thing if six bills, players receive three or more receptions, bills win. We should do a deep dive on the statistics and see. Well, yeah. Yeah. I mean, that means every level of the field is working. That means Cook is involved in the passing game and the check down game. That means Diggs is doing his thing.

Davis is doing his thing. Can Cade is involved? Nox is involved. It's a symptom of efficiency. That's what that is. A symptom of efficiency. Yeah. You're using all the tools in your tool belt, which we have been begging the bills to do all season because again, this is a talented group of pass catchers. It really is. Oh, man. Yeah. I like that. Is that an over under? Is that just a this is a thing that needs to happen? That's just the thing this is the thing that I would love to see that happen.

Yeah. I would love to see that happen. Dan and JJ both vote for this. I would. I cosine. I cosine that one. That's a good one. All right. Cool. I'm good. I'm all out of props because the more of these things I put out into the universe, the worse the less like for me. The less like this. I'm good too. Excellent. And I'm excited for this weekend. I think it's, you know, I always get excited for Bill's games.

I hope they come back and they have a strong showing and kind of sell it some of the doubters and, you know, make Bill's fans feel a lot better. I don't need a blowout win. But heck what I wouldn't give for one where they just control it from start to start to finish. Amen, dude. Amen. I would like a, I'd like a relatively stress fury viewing experience where the Buffalo Bills do not ruin a weekend with my children for me. So absolutely. Well, hopefully we'll get it, sir.

And hopefully everyone listening at home has gotten what they have desired out of this pod. For those of you listening at home, like, share and subscribe wherever you get your podcasts, Google, Apple, Spotify. And as always, go Bill's. Go Bill's. Go Bill's.