Welcome to this week’s Bills Mailbag. The calendar has flipped to July, meaning the start of training camp is on the horizon. Let’s get right to your questions …
Kyle Renner asks: Recently, The Athletic graded and ranked all of the NHL owners and gave Terry Pegula an F grade, good for last in the league. How would you grade him as an NFL owner, and roughly where would he fall in a ranking of NFL owners?
Jay: Good question. He has to get an ‘A’ grade as an NFL owner, doesn’t he? The Bills are getting a new stadium built. Yes, he is getting some public money for that, but Pegula is paying for a good portion of it himself. The investment in the team’s weight room and training facilities has been a good one. He has a stable front office and coaching staff, led by Brandon Beane and Sean McDermott. The team’s business operation appears sound.
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Bills owner Terry Pegula has committed to more than $500 million in cost overruns toward construction of the team's new Highmark Stadium in Orchard Park. Joshua Bessex/Buffalo News
It is looking more and more as though Pegula will never again speak to the media, which is a great shame for fans, but the only thing we ever hear from members of the Bills is how committed he is as an owner. By all accounts, things are running about as smooth as they can with the Bills. Now, as for the Sabres …
Sam Ruggiero asks: Everyone is handing the Bills the AFC East title even before the season begins. Some crazy folks even say we’re the front-runner for a Super Bowl! There’s no doubt we are the most talented team in our division, but have the New England Patriots caught up to us? With respected coach and former Patriot Mike Vrabel, and the upstart quarterback Drake Maye possibly having an even better year with an improved offensive line and receivers, do you think they may be a team to keep an eye on? How close have they gotten to our Bills?
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Jay: The Patriots will be improved, but even if they double their win total from a season ago, that still gets them to only eight wins. To me, their ceiling is as a 10-win team that competes for a wild-card berth. That would be a fantastic first season under Mike Vrabel. The Bills’ ceiling, of course, is much higher than that. So, I don’t think the Patriots are going to catch the Bills, but I do think they can take a run at the No. 2 spot in the AFC East.
New England’s offensive line was awful last year. Drafting LSU’s Will Campbell No. 4 overall will help, but he is not going to fix everything up front by himself. The addition of Stefon Diggs has proven to be, well, interesting, after the video of him partying on a boat went viral. Vrabel surely didn’t love that distraction.
The Patriots spent big money in free agency, but that was expected because they had the most cap space in the league. It will take some time for all the pieces to come together in New England.
Stephen Caldwell asks: Regarding the new kickoff rules, the offense gets a huge boost with touchbacks at the 35-yard line. There is no incentive to bring it out. If the goal is to have more returns, why not force the receiving team to return it or the kicking team gets a point? Or you get the 20-yard line no matter what?
Jay: You’re right that there is no incentive for the receiving team to bring the ball out of the end zone. The challenge, then, is on the kicking team. The kicker needs to place the ball short of the end zone, forcing a return. That’s what the league wants – to make it a football play again.
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I don’t love the idea of giving the kicking team a point. That feels like a gimmick to me. Imagine losing the AFC championship game because your returner took a knee in the end zone on a kickoff. I appreciate the thought, though. I’ll be interested to see how the rule change impacts the game. By bringing touchbacks out to the 35-yard line, teams will want to kick the ball short of the goal line to force a tackle short of the 35. I could even see that being a factor in deciding the last few spots on a 53-man roster. It will be imperative to have players who are good at covering kicks on the roster.
Ken T. asks: The "weakest link" tends to be the cause of failure vs. victory, especially in close games. It all starts with Brandon Beane's staff. Your recent answer to a question regarding the Amari Cooper trade in retrospect (now supported by 32 team consensus) suggests the Bills’ pro scouting team could be our weakest link – particularly when it comes to evaluating receivers. Do you know if this has been addressed?
Jay: If by addressed, you mean has it changed, the answer is no. Among the team’s promotions and additions to their personnel and analytics staffs announced in late May, there were no moves made to the pro personnel department, unless you count the promotion of Terrance Gray to assistant general manager.
It’s true that we can classify the trade for Cooper as a “miss,” but the Bills have had some hits when adding wide receivers, too. Cole Beasley and John Brown are two good examples of that as veteran free agent signings. I would argue that the weakest link for the Bills over the past, say, five seasons has been the defense’s inability to get consistent stops in the playoffs when it needs them. That is why we’ve seen such a focus on rebuilding the defensive line and overhauling the secondary this offseason.
Ed Helinski asks: In looking at the Bills’ schedule, which road games are you looking forward to, and which ones are meh trips? Better yet, why?
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Jay: They come back-to-back on the schedule. A time-honored tradition of Bills writers is hoping for a late-season trip to Miami. The reason is obvious: Escape the cold here and get some South Beach sun. We hadn’t had much luck with that recently, but the schedule-makers came through this year with a trip to Miami on Nov. 9. Given that I’m not checking any new cities off my list this year (I’ve got just Denver and San Francisco left), that’s the trip I’m most looking forward to.
The Bills’ next road game, at Houston on Nov. 20, falls into the “meh” category for me. It’s a Thursday night game, and the Texans have a retractable roof, which they never open, which is odd. The road schedule, in general, this year is not all that exciting for fans. Two of the final three road games – at Pittsburgh and at Cleveland – are drives, so that is a plus.
Mark in Buffalo asks: Hi Jay, love your column. A bit of a screwball question during the "quiet period" of the NFL: Who is the slowest player in the NFL? I've always believed that even the slowest NFL player (probably a lineman) would be faster than those of us who consider ourselves "Weekend Warriors.”
Jay: There is no “perfect” way to measure this. The best tool we have is the website Pro Football Reference, which is invaluable to us sportswriters. The website has all NFL scouting combine results going back to 2000. At the combine, prospects run the 40-yard dash. Well, at least some of them do. Prospects can opt out of certain drills, so that’s why I say there is no perfect measurement.
The slowest 40 time since 2000 was run by Arizona State guard Regis Crawford in 2004 – at 6.05 seconds. Crawford, however, didn’t get drafted and never played an NFL game, so we have to dig deeper to find our answer. In 2018, Oklahoma offensive tackle Orlando Brown ran a 5.85-second 40-yard dash. That’s the slowest in the past 10 years among those who have run at the combine. Brown was a third-round pick of the Ravens who is a four-time Pro Bowl selection. He’s currently with the Bengals. He’s my pick for the slowest current player in the NFL – not that it has held him back.
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Anthony Breckner asks: What are your thoughts on an NFL quarterback and the middle linebacker wearing an Apple watch during a game? For example, rather than quarterbacks wearing a plastic play card on their arm, they would wear an Apple watch for communication. Defensive coordinators could also communicate with linebackers using the same technology. Don't laugh, other areas of the country are already experimenting with this technology.
Jay: My initial concern is that the watch would inevitably break. If that happens, then what? We’re right back to the old-school way of calling in plays. Given all of the violent collisions that occur during a football game, I can’t see an Apple watch – especially one worn by a middle linebacker – making it through four quarters. I also don’t see the advantage. The old way of calling in plays has seemed to work just fine for a long time now.
Interestingly enough, back in 2019, Steelers quarterback Ben Roethlisberger was fined $5,000 for wearing an Apple watch on the sideline. Roethlisberger was out of the lineup with an elbow injury, but was still fined for an NFL uniform violation, as league rules at the time banned electronic devices that transmit messaging. With gambling ever more prevalent in professional sports, I would also worry about an increased use of electronic devices on the sideline, or even on the field of play.
Clayton asks: Of all the non-football questions you have been asked over the years (e.g. your favorite Backstreet Boy) beside this question, what has been your favorite question?
Jay: I had one guy – shout-out, Louis! – who used to ask me to power-rank something. That’s why I had to include the Backstreet Boy question recently. It was a trip down Memory Lane of sorts. But everything doesn’t have to be so serious. It’s hard to think of the hundreds of questions I’ve been asked, so I’ll take the sentimental route and say that any question that allows me to brag about my son, Elliott, is my favorite. I’m immensely proud of him.
P. asks: What happens next: Your son hits another hole-in-one or a James Cook signing?
Jay: We’ve got a big tournament in Canada on Monday and Tuesday, so fingers crossed that it will be the first choice.
I’ll be on vacation next week, but you can still submit questions to jskurski@buffnews.com or on X to @JaySkurski.
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