Way Too Early Observations From Sat. & Sun. Practice

[Night Train]

- QB's were getting lots of reps with only 3. Taylor had his moments hitting some long passes and being introduced to slant patterns. Not bad. Yates throws a nice ball in drills but seems to morph into Trentative when the 11 on 11 drills bring pressure. Lots of dump passes. Peterman threw some really nice balls and had a couple passes tipped resulting in INT's but didn't look bad at all. He has a way to go and did get some 2nd team reps.

- OL was the same 5 starters. Ducasse rotated in a couple times to spell Miller and Incognito. Henderson got some RT 1st team reps. Dawkins with the 2nd unit. They had their moments .

- O'Leary had some nice catches at TE. Clay was held out Sunday and they seem to be taking it easy with his trick knee. I did see Logan Thomas make a couple nice grabs. The rest were up and down

- McCoy has never looked better. Best player out there. O'Neal and Williams had some good runs. D is trying hard to strip them. They held on. Mike Tolbert laid some thunder on would be tacklers several times. He is a load. FB's were just blocking. DiMarco can block well.

- WR's - Sammy and Zay Jones are the best 2 out there by far. Rod Streater made a few spectacular catches but dropped a couple. Holmes is tall and looked OK. Dez Lewis had a couple great catches. The rest dropped too many but it's early.

- D showed 4-3 and 4-2-5 looks so the pre-season will show what they favor more. Shaq Lawson stood out. He looks very quick off the end and explodes into the backfield. Lineman looked solid but Dareus was out. The LB I liked was the 5th round pick Milano. He made several good plays anticipating the call and closed fast. Broke up a couple passes and had an INT. Alexander looked good.

- DB's- White is getting tested a ton. Had to cover Sammy and Jones in many 1 on 1 drills. He got beat sometimes and knock down several good passes. Kid has talent. Seymour and Leonard Johnson got lots of work. Safeties didn't jump out but it was the drills.

Punters kicked a lot on Sunday. Rehkow gets good hang time and just killed some punts. He also shanked a couple. Schmidt had some good ones and some shanks. To be continued. Hauschka has a live leg. Sitting on side, so couldn't see his accuracy. Looked fine.

Pace of practice is swift. HC does not just stand there and delegate. He's right out there doing individual coaching with the D. Played alot of Springsteen ( Born to Run, of course) and James Brown music loudly for effect. Perfect weather.

Summary - Way too early but it was good. My early thought is keep the FB DiMarco in there and use just Sammy and Jones at WR most of the time. Jones is more than ready. He separates with ease and runs razor sharp routes. Looks like a bargain in round 2. McCoy should be hidden in pre-season, ala Thurman. Let him wear a ball cap until the opener. Sammy looks completely healthy and fast. Ditto for Sammy. Hide him.
It's up to the fake games to show us more. The draft is looking better after what I saw this weekend. All have talent.

[BillsImpossible]

Slant patterns! Tyrod threw the ball on a rope today to a receiver over the middle. Twitter melted down.

That made my Sunday. Great post, Night Train.

What a difference. 4 practices and everything compared to many years past has drastically changed.

Sounds like McDermott was Born To Lead, not run.

[swiper]

Thanks for the post.

Regarding your comment on White. Remember when the Bills signed Darby? They did the same thing to him in camp. Went right at him. He looked shaky in camp, then great in real games. Hope the same for White.

I recall Jones standing out Senior Bowl week. Agree on the steal thought.

[Night Train]

My one thought while re-capping what we saw with my friend was WR depth.

After Sammy and Zay Jones, the next best WR may have been Dez Lewis, who had been promising at one time and then forgotten. Holmes dropped passes. Philly Brown dropped passes. Rod Streater made a few incredible catches, then dropped a couple. Walt Powell looked good but is suspended.

Keep Sammy and Jones healthy.

[YardRat]

Thanks for the report NT.

[Scumbag College]

To anyone that has attended TC in person so far:

Has Ryan Groy seen any time being tried at RT? I thought he came in and played great last year in subbing in on the interior. It sounds like Dawkins is still looking like a rookie and Henderson and Mills are who they are. Groy played a bit of tackle in college but he's been inside most of his time in the NFL. The guy is listed at 6'5" 320 so he has decent enough size for the position. It would be an attempt to get the best 5 players on the field for OL and it sounds like RT has been the weak link so far.

[YardRat]

IMO Groy could end up being our best offensive lineman, but not at a tackle spot.

[OpIv37]

Good write up. It's always tough to evaluate this time of year.

Let's say the DL is consistently beating the OL. Well, is it cuz the OL is bad or cuz the DL is good? Now, with this particular team, we know Kyle, Dareus and Hughes have excelled in the 4-3 in the past, and Shaq hasn't been tested in an NFL 4-3 but has a lot of potential, and D's tend to be ahead of O's this early. So, it's not an immediate red flag. But it creates an unanswerable question: Is this hypothetical OL sufficient against most DL's and will only struggle against the very best ones, or are they just not that good?

[jamze132]

Tyrod will make the O-line look better than what they are.

[Night Train]

Good write up. It's always tough to evaluate this time of year.

Let's say the DL is consistently beating the OL. Well, is it cuz the OL is bad or cuz the DL is good? Now, with this particular team, we know Kyle, Dareus and Hughes have excelled in the 4-3 in the past, and Shaq hasn't been tested in an NFL 4-3 but has a lot of potential, and D's tend to be ahead of O's this early. So, it's not an immediate red flag. But it creates an unanswerable question: Is this hypothetical OL sufficient against most DL's and will only struggle against the very best ones, or are they just not that good?

Don't know about that. On running plays, McCoy went through some big holes for large gains. That resulted in some of the D coaches yelling loudly at the D in the next huddle. They will run and run often, I'm guessing.

D did have it's moments in the pass rush and the OL also did some nice work keeping a pocket for an acceptable amount of time. The fake games will show far more. Worrying about anything now is premature.

[DraftBoy]

Nice write-up, the only thing I disagree with is hiding Sammy. He needs the reps to build confidence in the foot and to build an understanding of how this offense will function in game situations. I'm not worried about McCoy.

[Night Train]

Nice write-up, the only thing I disagree with is hiding Sammy. He needs the reps to build confidence in the foot and to build an understanding of how this offense will function in game situations. I'm not worried about McCoy.

They won't hide him but depth concerns at WR makes another setback a major worry.

[SpikedLemonade]

......
- OL was the same 5 starters. Ducasse rotated in a couple times to spell Miller and Incognito. Henderson got some RT 1st team reps. Dawkins with the 2nd unit. They had their moments....

Still my #1 concern heading into this season.

[elroy16]

Slant patterns! Tyrod threw the ball on a rope today to a receiver over the middle. Twitter melted down.

That made my Sunday. Great post, Night Train.

What a difference. 4 practices and everything compared to many years past has drastically changed.

Sounds like McDermott was Born To Lead, not run.

https://twitter.com/PFF/status/892094301685067778


A WCO could be just what Tyrod needs. That type of offense fits Sammy and Zay as well. The zone blocking fits Shady too.


Imagine, running an offense that fits the players strengths? Craziness...



Edit:

I didn't mean for the picture to be so huge, apologies.