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I can’t imagine how much Sammy Watkins enjoyed the breakout game he had vs the Dolphins. After a bye week in which a) fans went in on him for taking a team-sanctioned vacation and b) the fan/media reaction to him calling out a few of the less qualified fans (mouth breathers), he had to have been foaming at the mouth. 168 yards and a touchdown later (oh – and a Bills 33-17 win), all is well. Until Thursday, then the cycle will be in Jets/Rex overdrive. So with that being said, here are my thoughts on the game with a few tweet-bag questions to round us out. Join me:
- The run game left very little “meat on the bone”: Between McCoy and Williams (with Tyrod adding 44 yards himself), the Bills exploded to the tune of 266 rushing yards, which also in turn led to an 12 attempt day for Taylor passing. Tyrod completed 11 of said passes. This is the recipe that Rex referred to (often) in the off-season as “ground and pound”.
- Jerry Hughes is a heck of a drug: Right when I thought that Hughes was going to hit for the cycle with his penalties and get ejected from contact with a ref, he goes and gets a sack and a sack-fumble-recovery and changes the tide of the game. The Bills will ride this crazy unicorn as far as they can, but Rex needs to get into Jerry’s head that some penalties are borne of working hard, others are borne of just doing dumb things. Don’t do dumb things Jer. Just…don’t.
- Defense needs to pick up the slack: The construction of the Bills defense is something that bears watching through the season and into the off-season. Throughout the game, despite fan, media (and some player) dissatisfaction 55 and 94 (and I.K.) dropped a few times in the game. Mario played 3 technique. Hughes played over the backer in a 9 almost. Dareus played a little of everything. This is Rex’s deal and I’m fine with it. However, when you’re showing 6, dropping 3 and still leaving a receiver one on one (as it was with the 40+ yard reception on Leodis) I can’t find fault with the corner on that. You have to send that pressure or have Duke get over the top or that’s going to happen and end in touchdowns, as it did for the Bills vs Grimes. The other side’s talented too – and will continue to be so the next 8 games.
- Welcome back Leo: Coming back to play a role he’s never played before, Leo I think did well. His work as corner in the game was not the best, but I attribute that to rust and being thrown into the fire suddenly after the injury to Darby for a play or two. I’m not worried about him season wise, but I can see that come 2016 we might not have my favorite player from Waycross, Georgia on the squad and that gives me the sads.
- Be careful of throwing stones from NFL Houses: In our quest to rightfully call out the NFL and the Dallas Cowboys, some have been more than willing to ignore the case Karlos had of domestic abuse, that also had photos, but didn’t receive as much national media attention. I was conflicted watching Karlos run roughshod over the Dolphins, but being the idiot that remembers this stuff, it was…dirty? Can I say dirty? I want to believe in the capacity for people to change, but how much do we know about players outside of their sound bytes? This is probably a deeper conversation than a bullet, but it’s something that bears a thought or two.
Speaking of deep thoughts forced into tight spaces, let’s dive into the Tweet-Bag, where I try to get to the heart of what bugs the fanbase….
@RDotDeuce@BuffaloWins Please help me with the love for Ryan Tannehill? What am I missing? His team doesn’t win.
— JG_1611 (@JG_1611) November 8, 2015
I think that Tannehill is in a bit of a bad spot. I loved him coming out of Texas A&M, so I still have a soft spot for him. I consider Ryan to be bizarro Matt Ryan: whereas Matt Ryan was placed on a team that was built primarily to not let him screw up, Tannehill’s been placed on a Dolphins team that has been spotty at best from the top down. Also, he is in the Patriots fueled meat grinder that is the AFC East. I think if he were in say the AFC South, we’d have parades for him. Instead, he’s just kinda a big ole ball of ‘meh’. Heck, look at his stat line for today; it looks fine – but when you see how bad Grimes was torched, or how bad that snap for the safety was, you get a little nuance. I don’t think that’ll change your mind, but I think that’s why he’s the cat’s pajamas in some circles.
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@RDotDeuce@BuffaloWins what isn’t a flag in the @NFL anymore. Thanks. #illhangupandlisten
— .K.E.N. (@TeachMeToWhaley) November 8, 2015
Ken, I don’t know to be honest. So many things I see and think are flags aren’t thrown; then a flag will arbitrarily show up almost 10 seconds after a play ends. If I had hair I’d pull it, but since I like my beard I’ll leave it be. One of the biggest issues I’d like to see rectified
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@RDotDeuce@BuffaloWins is it unrealistic to think they can go 7-2 the rest of the way?
— Bob Scott (@bobFNscott) November 8, 2015
Bob, my main man! I would love 7-2 because that gets them to 11-5 with a loss in the playoffs. But wait, I won’t like that as much. Hmm. Going forward, I see two guaranteed losses (Dallas and New England) with the Bills have a chance to beat the Jets (twice), Eagles, Texans, Washington and Kansas City. Out of that group I’d call it (in Survivor Series Naming fun) the J-O-B Squad (Texans, Washington and KC) and the Hard Work Bobby Walker Memorial Squad (Jets x 2, Eagles). They lost to the Jags, so I cannot give them a guarantee to beat any of the Job Squad; and the Hard Work guys could beat them as easy as the Bills could beat them. Right now I’d say out of the 8 games they go 5-3, and that’s with the win giving me a little rosier outlook than the post-Jags 8-8 prediction I made to my buddies.
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@RDotDeuce@BuffaloWins why does 55 commit a personal foul every week?
— Mike McKenzie (@mack10zie) November 8, 2015
Jerry’s gonna Jerry. That’s all I got. Jerry right now is that significant other you love with all your heart, but you know, at some point they’re going to call and say someone cut them off and that was the last straw (and long story short they’re on bail). Actually, scratch that – Jerry is Marty McFly before Doc stopped him from drag racing. The second someone would say “chicken” – off he went. We need Emmett Brown is what I’m saying.
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That’s it for this week. I’ll be back Friday with a review of the Jets game, which hopefully is a win. Be good.
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