Buffalo Bills Win Amari Cooper Trade and Some Game
The losers were the New York Jets and the sport. The Buffalo Bills won by default. If you like football, I hope you spent Monday night seeing autumn leaves in the dark when the vivid colors are less distracting. If you hate it, the muddy affair on a clean field made your case. It took discipline to watch the most undisciplined game. The shameful teams tied for penalties with 11 each in the statistic that most reflects play.
Rivalries should be more fun. Two teams who hated each other made everyone hate their matchup. It’s a special evening in its way when the coach who technically won could get fired without uproar.
Many could make the case for impressing the least. Damar Hamlin offers the inspirational story of a bad football player. Someone can come back to life and still not be worthy of starting. Topping the depth chart as a marginal reserve is not what makes his tale stirring. Hamlin employs a different style of underperforming at safety than Taylor Rapp, who spent much of the game trying to make up for not using his giant Mark Kelso helmet to knock down the easiest pass to defend.
The Bills should be encouraging the defense to watch television. It’s not merely a noble pastime: they missed the missed the recap of Aaron Rodgers’s Hail Marys that ran right before he completed yet another one. They should’ve known what was coming as part of their job even without the binge.
Enabling Rodgers is unwise whether it’s letting him serve as de facto general manager or letting him throw over half the field’s length with ease. The Bills sending a grand total of two players to pressure a quarterback renowned for a rather impressive arm would’ve worked if one of the nine guys in coverage could’ve knocked down a pass that was in the air for about half an hour.
A win usually doesn’t prompt calls for a roster and coaching overhaul, so enjoy the unique experience. You don’t need to thank the team. The Jets won the Davante Adams trade race after losing the game, Please accept Amari Cooper as a consolation prize. The fellow disgruntled receiver may emerge as the happier of the two. That was the sort of win where management feels compelled to trade for someone on the verge of gaining 10,000 yards to address what went wrong.
The line better be better at blocking to make the most of getting Cooper. A season is surely trending upward if fans are debating which player’s performance was most shameful. Standard overreactions usually follow a brutal loss. But this was the sort of aggravating outing where it’d be tough to choose the most disappointing offensive lineman. Spencer Brown’s lack of self-control ruined a promising drive, but Dion Dawkins mistakenly thought he could conceal being unsportsmanlike with the lights off. Flip a coin.
Any franchise serious about winning would’ve left Tyler Bass in the swamp. They can’t rely on someone unreliable. In his defense, he was only the evening’s second-most atrocious player at his position. Buffalo’s cunning plan to have a less awful kicker was befitting of a contemptible game where both teams tried their hardest to make those watching despise football.
Keon Coleman gets less funny by the game. It’s hard to accept his soft efforts in what’s now a recurring story. Trying to undo the negative impression he makes earlier in the game has become a tendency. The new Kelvin Benjamin has to convince us he’s not. He’s certainly not Cooper, which means his chances to prove he’s not hovering near bust territory are about to decrease.
Only the Bills could be called for an illegal block on defense. A formation penalty from a team that doesn’t know how to line up would’ve been mortifying during the preseason.
The officials deserved to be flagged, too. Egregious mistakes are bound to happen during a game where throwing them is a reflex. The most bogus roughing the passer call on A.J. Epenesa resulted from finishing a tackle on a quarterback. You know a penalty’s unjust when even the alleged victim condemns it.
Receivers running shoddy routes and falling in circumstances where they traditionally stand will surely make Rodgers less cranky. The notoriously pleasant future Hall of Famer is surely pleased at getting stuck in a toxic waste spill. His first full year in New Jersey was supposed to be different. But this is the franchise that might trade someone for whom they traded to try to break even. Haason Reddick isn’t helping his present ostensible team. And they didn’t help themselves by dealing for someone who wanted a longterm deal without negotiating one first. It’s the most Jets deal ever.
The difference came down to Josh Allen embarrassing a defender. It often does. Of course, he’s also the difference between the Bills and Sabres. His 100th NFL game showed why he emerged during the first 99. With Cooper around, Allen hopefully will return to doing less.
Negative people were relieved by the excuse provided during victory. We know the Bills weren’t trying to blow it. But they could’ve tried harder to be convincing. A win that felt like a loss prompted an evaluation that may lead to more satisfying future results. After taking control of the AFC East, fans are nonetheless worried that outlasting a more dysfunctional club disguises faults.
Trading for Cooper is a promising sign that the Bills won’t avoid needed repairs just because they managed to not spazz out as much as their historically exasperating divisional pal. The broader win comes in demoting Mack Hollins.
