Rank our team strengths and weaknesses

[ArcticWildMan]

Top 5 strengths:

1. QB (do I really need to explain this one?)
2. LB (ditto)
3. DT (I can't believe I'm saying that after last year)
4. CB (we are stacked!!!)
5. OT (Big Mike! Big Mike!!)



Top 5 weaknesses:

1. Safety (could be a strength by seasons end)
2. Rcvr (will be a weakness till Josh proves himself)
3. DE (no impact player yet)
4. Kick/punt returner (losing Rogers hurt)
5. TE (need a pass catching TE)

[HenryRules]

AWM, I agree with most of your choices.

Strengths:
RB - assuming we get Gary or another capable backup
QB - another pro bowl coming up
K/P - Moorman will challenge for another pro bowl, Lindell is going be in the top half
LB - Fletch and Spikes will be pro bowl finalists or better, hope Posey wasn't a flash-in-the-pan (I don't think he was)
DT - 700 pounds of muscle/flab in the middle should intimidate most offensive co-ordinators

Weaknesses:
Special Teams Units - I don't think its a personnel matter, but a coaching matter. But our coverage/return units still suck.
DE - until Jones/McKenzie take a snap in the regular season and look good, this is a ?
WR - there's still time for this to be a strength, and it will only take one more signing, but I don't think we're there yet
Interior OL - no depth at all and have to hope that RB doesn't start to break down and MS continues to develop
DB - Winfield, Clements, Wire, and Reese/Prioleau are good when we go with 4, but when we go to a nickle or want our FS playing more of a traditional FS role, I don't have faith in our DB's

[Schobel94]

We really dont have any weaknesses... the only one I see is DE, which isnt too bad. Just some places to add more depth. It's hard when we are so good at everything!

[don137]

I am going to break it down to three categoroes: strengths, weaknesses and question marks.
Strengths:
Leadership- We got great leaders (Moulds, Bledsoe, Ruben, Spikes, etc.)
TD and Modrak- Reallly knows talent and the salary cap. Shrewd but very effective.
RB- With Henry and Gash to lead block I forsee a great groud game this year
Bledsoe- Since teams fear his arms they don't cheat in the box which can only help the running game. He can deep at any time.
LB & DT= This positions were the achilles heel of the team last year and now they are a strength

Weaknesses-
- Safety- While Wire got better as the year went on he was burned on pass coverage a few times. FS was a weakness of the team and their has not been a major upgrade. (Reese may be an upgrade)
- Henry's inability to hold on to the ball.
- Tough division- To play in a tough division can really hurt them. Very doubtful they win homefield advantage because their are no cakewalks in the division.
-Special Teams- More specifically coverage and kickoff returns

Question marks-
-chemistry- with so many additions to the defense can they gel by week 1?
-DE- Denney has a year expierence under his belt, Jones and Mckenzie might be effective but still not sure
-WR- While I am confiedent in Moulds, Reed and Shaw until they prove it it will remain a question mark
-Posey- Only started 9 games last year so needs to prove he can put pressure on the QB consistantly
-coaching- have seen some bad decisions but given the benefit of the doubt the last two years because of inferior tealent. No excuses this year
-can they stop NE short passing game- Did Buffalo not have the players or does NE just match up well aginst Buffalo? NE's offense should not put fear in anyone but they seem to be quite effective against Buffalo
-Bledsoe in big games- Can he stop forcing things too much in big games? He seems to be his own worse enemy in big games

[RedEyE]

Strengths:

1) LB ( Just solid )
2) OT ( Plenty of capable and able bodies to fill the tackle slot )
3) RB/FB ( I am very happy with this current roster )
4) CB ( The new addition sprung this position into the strengths )
5) QB ( Drew is the man, AVP has really aged, T. Brown hasn't shown me much - we could use another back up / or train a future QB begining next season. )

Weaknesses

1) KR ( Lack of an able body makes this a priority. Fortunately, it can be easily filled. )
2) FS ( Seems we have a few SS. Adding a FS would help the secondary out immensly. )
3) OG/C/LS ( Just one able body could fill the void here. )
4) TE ( I agree with AWM. It's pertinent to sign a receiving TE. The more targets on O the better. )
5) WR ( Hard to tell at this time. I want to say that the position is full, but it's difficult to assess the 2nd year rook (Reed) until he plays the postion all 4 qrtrs, and Shaw is a new addition. )

[WG]

I still don't know how a QB who puts up 18 TOs in 7 of 8 losses while only playing well essentially against teams 6-10 or worse is better than average. If Drew plays like he did in the last 10 games last year there will be no pro bowl appearance forthcoming!

Over the last 10 games he averaged exactly and only
1 TD/game,
1 INT/game,
1.3 TOs/game,
6.5 YPA,
234 passing yards/game,
58% completions,
and the team averaged 18.5 PPG including defensive TDs.

I don't know about everyone else, but that doesn't really excite me too much. Contrast that with the first 6 games:

2.3 TD/game,
.8 INT/game,
1 TOs/game,
8 YPA,
336 passing yards/game,
67% completions,
and the team averaged 32.3 PPG including defensive TDs.

First 6 to last 10 deltas:

- 1.3 TDs/game
+ .3 TOs/game
- 1.5 YPA
-102 passing yards/game
- 9% Compl. %
-14.8 PPG

There's an enormous discrepancy there that needs to be accounted for. I have difficulty giving a QB a nod for the probowl when his accolades came from only 35% of his games. I realize that many offer up excuse after excuse as to why that happened, but those excuses won't float this year. People argue about his big-play ability with his arm, but as I see it, for every one of those, teams know that they can rattle and pressure him into making equally huge, if not even moreso, negative big-plays going the other way. Yet, those are discounted almost entirely.

Actually, I would think that his better games would have been later on as it would have taken him time to get used to the team/system/coaching etc. The fact that it did not, coupled with our preponderance of throwing the ball, suggests to me that the reason for the early season success was primarily lack of familiarity with the Bill's O on the part of opponents. Once we played N.E., the cat was outta the bag and we couldn't stuff it back in.

As such, I wouldn't call Drew a strength at all. Especially since he crapped the bed in all the most important games personally.

Strengths:

OL Starting
RB/FB: Henry, Crosby, Gash
WRs starting: Moulds, Reed (will vye for best tandem in league)
Secondary (inclg. Safetys): Last year was a terrible year to evaluate secondary play w/ such a crappy DL. That will change and the secondary will respond!
Linebacking Corps: Spikes alone adds intensity and will help spread the wealth.

Adequate:

QB: If Drew picks up where he left off last season, there're gonna be an awful lot of disappointed Bills fans! Drew as much as anyone on this team has something(s) to prove this year.
TE
DL: Pending the draft. Adams remains questionable as does Jones; pending the draft for another DE.
Coaching: This year will tell.

Weaknesses:

OL depth: Could be a huge issue w/ injuries unless we add some depth
WR depth: Shaw, Johnson?
STs: Kicking is probably set, but our STs have been far short of special over the past two seasons.

[Schobel94]

He had a tough run at the end, but you cannot put all the blame on him. You make it sound like all his ints cost us games, when actually most of the time the losing of the game caused all the ints. Look at where most of his ints fall: 5 against NE in horrible games that he tried to win single handedly (2nd one he did quite poorly), 3 against Oakland 2 of which came when we had already lost, Defense let us down, 4 against NYJ, in the first game the D did ok but ST let us down, second game again the D sucked it up (so did the O). Then just 3 more against GB and KC. My point is that a lot of his ints and poor plays came at points in the game where we were losing badly or had already lost. Poor offensive production can also be attributed to the play calling by Glbride. He was so predictible that by the end of the year every1 had 2 deep safeties and they took away the big play. We didn't have balance, once we can achieve balance, in both run vs. pass plays and where the ball is thrown to (use more TE and FB) then he will be very very dangerous.

Not to excuse some of his mistakes cuz he had plenty of awful plays, but it is very easy to blame the QB for bad performence and over poor offense becuase he is the leader, but there are other factors as well that can be huge. Bledsoe is an excellent QB who just needs to have more patience. With upgrades in the O and D, his play will only increase.

[Schobel94]

Just to add on, he can't be great every single game, you just can't ask that much of him. And whenever he falters we cannot start yelling and screaming at him. When he's hot every1 is on his side but as soon as he comes down every1 criticizes him. Is there any QB that has never had a bad stretch, a bad season? Jim Kelly had some poor games, just look at the last couple SB's, but that did not warrant him being cut becuase even when he had some bad games we knew he was a great QB and would bounce back. So my point is you just gotta have confidence that Drew will bounceback cuz he's a great QB. If his numbers form the second half of 2002 persist all throughout 2003, then something is wrong but until then, you just have to have confidence and faith.

[SoCalBillsFan]

Originally posted by Wys Guy


Over the last 10 games he averaged exactly and only
1 TD/game,
1 INT/game,
1.3 TOs/game,
6.5 YPA,
234 passing yards/game,
58% completions,
and the team averaged 18.5 PPG including defensive TDs.

I don't know about everyone else, but that doesn't really excite me too much. Contrast that with the first 6 games:



THese numbers are not that bad. I don't think we need drew to be superman for us to win this year. He just needs to be solid. a slight improvement over these numbers would be ok. If he passes for 234 a game, thats good enough. 58 percent is not bad. Of course, I'd like to see 2 TD and 1 or fewer INTs a game.

Wys, you are right, these are not pro bowl numbers, but I don't think Drew needs to be a pro bowler for us to win.

[BillsMan80]

Strengths...

DT-Very deep at DT right now.
CB-Great starters, solid depth.
LB-What can you say but that we have a dominating LB core.
OL-Young and Improving
QB-Set for a few years at QB.

Weaknesses...
RB-Absolutely no depth. Henry and nothing.
WR-Need 1 more target for Drew.
TE-No real threat as a pass catcher out of the crew.
Return Game-Need a threat to go the distance.

The Biggest Weakness I think is a lack of depth at RB. At every other position we at least have someone who can pick up the slack in a fill-in role for an extended period of time. Not so at Running Back. We have Travis Henry and NOTHING else. No, Sammy Morris is not capable of stepping in should Henry go down. No matter who believes it, he hasn't shown that he has the capability to be a go-to back in that situation. I wouldn't be comfortable with Morris as my #1 back at least. We need some RB who can take the load off Henry. That would be my #1 priority because we have nothing right now.

[Pride]

Personally, I would be happy if Drew had these kind of stats this year.

TD - 1-2 / game
Int - 1 / game
Yards - 200

If we are winning, that means that TH is running the ball, with the occasional deep pass to soften the defense! Before Drew got here, we all knew he was a risk taker (a la Kelly). You have to expect the INT's with Drew, more often than not though, it pays off.

[Earthquake Enyart]

The #1 weakness is coaching / playcalling.

Special teams coaching is horrible. Gilbride is too fascinated with the pass to establish a consistant, dominant running game that we should be able to have. Grey consistantly puts average or weak players in positions where they are certain to fail (how many times was Watson on the other team's #1 WR???).

Offense is solid, however depth would be a concern. Jury is still out on the DL. Starting 4 DB's are solid, but nickle and dime backs are a concern. I like Spikes and Fletcher, but the jury is still out on Posey in my mind.

[WG]

Originally posted by SoCalBillsFan


THese numbers are not that bad. I don't think we need drew to be superman for us to win this year. He just needs to be solid. a slight improvement over these numbers would be ok. If he passes for 234 a game, thats good enough. 58 percent is not bad. Of course, I'd like to see 2 TD and 1 or fewer INTs a game.

Wys, you are right, these are not pro bowl numbers, but I don't think Drew needs to be a pro bowler for us to win.

Those numbers over the course of a season are 16 TDs, 16 INTs. That wouldn't be good. I don't want to get into all this again.

Schobel,

Again, what you said is not true. We were put out of games because of Drew's INTs and TOs. We were in all of them for the most part. Look at the Raiders game if you want proof.

We should have run Henry more but didn't. Now we say we will, so let's hope we do. I agree w/ Pride, I'd rather see Drew have 16 TDs and 8 INTs on an average of 200 YPG. I don't see that happening w/ Gilbride as O.C. however. No matter what we are told, I won't believe that we aren't going to pass too much until I actually see it this season.

This thread asked what our strengths were. To me, a strength is something you win the game on. I don't see Drew as a strength in that regard. He's never been able to win the big games. As to us having become predictable, he was extremely predictable in N.E., so I say that's gonna be more the rule than the exception for as long as he's playing in the NFL.

Either way, we'll see. His level of play will determine how good he is. There are no excuses this season, just go review your own thread. So I'm fully expecting Drew to play more like he did over the first 6 than over the last 10. I'm also expecting him not to have 18 TOs on 15 INTs in 7 losses. If that happens, then no one will be able to argue these silly arguments anymore.

I sure hope it doesn't happen, however, those who have followed Drew for one reason or another, know that the odds are that it will. Drew is a big-play, deep-armed QB. He doesn't have strengths in many more areas. He's decent at play-action. But overall, he's got plenty of shortcomings. The problem lies in that when your strength is the big play like that, that you had better not make many mistakes such as he does, b/c those mistakes overcome any positives that big plays do. Witness the 1 TD for over 230 yards passing that Drew had in the last ten games.

We'll see what happens, but I just don't consider Drew a strength. When we won last year, it wasn't b/c of Drew. It was more b/c of Henry and the D in several games. When we lost, the worst performer on the field for the offense was Drew. That may very well have been b/c we didn't run Henry enough, and we didn't. But that was by choice mostly. See the K.C. and S.D. games. We didn't have to throw, but we did anyway.

So, we'll see. But there is zero room for excuses this season if there are issues.

[SoCalBillsFan]

Originally posted by Wys Guy


Those numbers over the course of a season are 16 TDs, 16 INTs. That wouldn't be good. I don't want to get into all this again.

I agree w/ Pride, I'd rather see Drew have 16 TDs and 8 INTs on an average of 200 YPG.

Wys, did you read my post?

I didn't say the numbers were good enough, I said they weren't that bad and needed only slight improvement. 16 TDs and 8 INTs would be great. My point is simply that he doesnt have to put up pro bowl numbers.

[Earthquake Enyart]

It's been a while since he bashed Drew. He can't see straight.

[Schobel94]

Gilbride has already stated a change in his philosiphy for 2003, so has everyone else. They all know that the way we ran the O in 2002 will not work. It was different last year becuase we really relied on the big play becuse we were so deficient in other areas. This year, however, we wont need those big plays to win games. Not to say there wont be any, but there will be a reduced emphasis on the longball, and more on controlled passing and power running. You also have to have variety, you have to switch it up so you wont become predictible like we did last year. The key word is balance, if we achieve that then no coach can make a game plan to shut down our O becuase we will be too good in different areras, that is what will make a good O into a SB O.

[justasportsfan]

ST coach IMO is still a question mark. Charlie Rodgers was supposedly one of the best KR in the league when we got him. Is Shaw one of the better players as well? Who's to say it isn't the player but the coach?

[WG]

Originally posted by Schobel94
Gilbride has already stated a change in his philosiphy for 2003, so has everyone else. They all know that the way we ran the O in 2002 will not work. It was different last year becuase we really relied on the big play becuse we were so deficient in other areas. This year, however, we wont need those big plays to win games. Not to say there wont be any, but there will be a reduced emphasis on the longball, and more on controlled passing and power running. You also have to have variety, you have to switch it up so you wont become predictible like we did last year. The key word is balance, if we achieve that then no coach can make a game plan to shut down our O becuase we will be too good in different areras, that is what will make a good O into a SB O.

Yeah, "IF"!

We'll see. Common sense all but kicked Gilbride in the stones last season and he continued to pass as if he was due a $1M bonus at games end if the Bills could win by passing. It was quite incredulous! I'll believe it fully when I see it.

[Stewie]

Give Gilbride a chance to work two years straight with a QB who isn't Ryan Leaf.

Give Bledsoe 2 or 3 years straight without a new OC.

Most importantly, give Travis Henry the ball 450 times and go deep 2 out of 3 pass plays. Thats winning football, Madden style :)

[WG]

Forget going deep 2/3 of the time. You must be kidding, eh... :scratch:

I'll give Drew this season. His performances have been on the books for 10 seasons now and little has changed. I'll give him this season and if he puts up 12-15 INTs against Philly, Tennessee, Miami twice, and N.E. twice again while leading the team to 1-5 or 2-4 in those games, then I'm going to strongtly suggest we don't extend his contract beyond '04.