ESPN is WRONG About The Buffalo Bills ‘Fatal Flaw’
Credit: Mark Konezny-Imagn Images
As the season heads towards Thanksgiving and the football gets serious, the NFL’s contenders begin to separate themselves. On ESPN’s Get Up, the panel took to identifying each of the top AFC contenders’ fatal flaw. When it was the Buffalo Bills turn, Jeff Saturday laid out his case.
“Which wide receiver is going to be the go-to.” Saturday proclaimed. “I mean Coleman’s been injured, I like him, I like the way he was kind of coming along. Obviously Cooper’s been the addition, we got to see how he continues to develop. Shakir is a speedy guy. But it’s when it gets to these big time moments who’s going to be the guy? That’s that’s the concern that I have.”
Well, you’re wrong.
This is exact line of thinking that kept previous Buffalo teams playing a style of offense that, we now know, was clearly worse for Josh Allen. Yes, Stefon Diggs is amazing, but having a go to receiver who needed the ball and dominated the targets isn’t what’s best for this team.
The national media’s obsession with “number 1 receivers” often blinds them from the totality of an offense.
Josh Allen has 7 receivers in double digits for catches already this season and has thrown touchdowns to 11 different players! Through the bye week, Allen has a 98.2 quarterback rating with a 68.7 completion percentage and an 18-to-5 TD-to-INT ratio. Per PFF, he has the most Big Time Throws this season with 26. No other QB has more than 21. IT’S WORKING.
Beyond that the idea that there isn’t a big moment receiver in the receivers room is just silly. I’m more than happy to put my money on Amari Cooper in a big time playoff moment. Cooper is perhaps the most underrated receiver of his time. Despite playing for bad teams he has been a rock in the passing game and is just 160 yards short of 10,000 for his career.
And just because he’s young doesn’t mean Khalil Shakir isn’t ready to seize the moment. Among 67 NFL WRs with at least 25 catches in 2024, Shakir is No. 1 in both YAC per reception with 8.46 Yards and yards after contact per reception with 3.25 all while posting 0 drops. It’s very reasonable that a year or two from now people look back at the youngster and realize he was a star in the making.
Joe Brady has built the best offense in the league, outside of Detroit, and he’s doing it by letting an elite quarterback elevate a good surrounding cast instead of marrying him to a great singular receiver.
“The Josh Allen experience, with this magnitude — it’s been phenomenal, man,” Amari Cooper said when asked what it was like to be alongside Allen after a win. “Like I said before, he’s a great player. The old adage, big-time players make big-time plays in big-time situations, and that’s exactly what he did.”
Perhaps, instead of worrying about who will be the lead receiver, we should instead focus on listening to the receivers telling us that the quarterback is capable of leading the whole thing.
Up Next