NFL
By: Charlie Gross
When examining Josh Allen and the Buffalo Bills 2021 season, I saw offensively a lot of meat left on the bone. Any fan who watched their first 12 games last season saw a team who sputtered sometimes. When examining PFF’s player grades, many of the individual grades were average or slightly above. Questions started to swirl in my head. What would the stats for the skill position players look like if the Bills and Josh Allen didn’t stutter and stumble out of the gate? The following is my admittedly VERY AGGRESSIVE statistical projection for Josh Allen and the Buffalo Bills offense. I acknowledge that this projection is possible but not the most likely outcome. However, I believe that the following stats are achievable.
Josh Allen
Before we can move on to the stats for the running backs, wide receivers, tight ends, and fullbacks, we have to figure out our statistical projection for the guy throwing them the ball. I’m on record multiple times this offseason with a projection of 5300 passing yards and 53 passing TDs to go along with 700 rushing yards and 7 rushing TDs for Josh Allen. Obviously, the number we need to distribute to the skill position players is 5300 yards and 53 TDs. Before that happens, we have one more step. We have to figure out how many passing attempts and completions would be required to hit these numbers based on previous seasons’ production from Allen himself.
If I Project Allen’s yards per attempt to be in between 2020 and 2021, at 7.5, it will take 707 passing attempts to reach 5300 yards. The completion percentage is next. Again, let’s pick a number between Josh Allen’s output from the 2020 and 2021 seasons. If we pick 66.3%, that would be 464 completions out of 707 attempts. Now that we have this information, we can move on to the skill position players.
Wide Receivers
Wide Receiver is the position group that Josh Allen targets most often, accounting for 71.1% (443 out of 623) of the targets in 2021. I expect that percentage to go down but I’m going to leave the raw number at 443 since I’m projecting the number of total targets to hit 707, a rise of 84 over 2021. These extra 84 targets will go to the other skill positions. Stefon Diggs, Gabe Davis, Isaiah McKenzie, and Kahlil Shakir seem to be the top four wideouts for the Bills so let’s start there.
Any Buffalo Bills Wide Receiver stat projection has to start with Stefon Diggs. This is the first year he won’t have another proven veteran wide receiver on the field with him, so I think his targets will go up slightly. I’ll put Diggs at 174 targets, 119 catches, 1439.9 yards (12.1 yds/rec), and 10 touchdowns. Next up is Gabe Davis. Many Bills fans are expecting a big jump in statistics from Gabe as their last memories of him from 2021 are big play touchdowns. I’m going to with a stat line that many people will find a bit conservative. 105 targets, 63 catches, 988 yards (15.2 yds/rec), and 11 touchdowns.
Isaiah McKenzie won the starting slot wide receiver role and this is going to be another hard projection. Over the last two years, the Buffalo Bills slot receiver has been the second most targeted player on the team and has played about 65% of the offensive snaps. Both of these benchmarks are way above anything Isaiah McKenzie has experienced to this point in his career. I’ll forecast McKenzie’s potential glow-up as 65 targets, 44 catches, 400.4 yards (9.1 yds/rec), and 6 touchdowns. My best guess is that rookie Kahlil Shakir is WR4 and while he’s shown great promise in the preseason, he’s still a rookie. Let’s also remember that Shakir seems to be the Bills primary punt returner and the coaching staff may want him on a bit of a pitch count this year so he doesn’t hit the “rookie wall” too hard. I”ll slot Shakir in for 54 targets, 35 catches, 315 yards (9 yds/rec), and 3 touchdowns.
This leaves us with “everyone else”. Jamison Crowder, Jake Kumerow, and if the Bills do keep a 7th wide receiver either Marquez Stevenson or Isaiah Hodgins looks to be the 7th man. I have 49 targets left to distribute to this group. I’ll project 30 catches, 294 yards (9.4 yds/rec), and 3 touchdowns.
Tight Ends
Dawson Knox, Tommy Sweeney, and Quintin Morris comprise the Tight End room for the Bills. Dawson Knox is the obvious star and starter here. After a breakout season in 2021, I expect Knox will be “pass catcher 2” for the Bills this season. I’m projecting 111 targets, 78 catches, 1014 yards (13 yds/rec), and 11 touchdowns. While it’s pretty common knowledge that the Bills want to run more “12 personnel”, I’m not sure that will translate to more statistical production for Sweeney and Morris. I think part of the reason for 12 personnel is to free up Knox from blocking responsibilities so he can be more involved in the passing game. My projection for the Sweeney and Morris combined is 31 targets, 22 catches, 184.8 yards (8.4 yards/rec), and 2 touchdowns.
Running Backs
For the purposes of this article, I’m including Reggie Gilliam in this group along with Devin Singletary, James Cook, Zack Moss, and Taiwan Jones. The real unknown here is James Cook. Brandon Beane has stated that he views Cook almost as a slot receiver so there’s a reasonable path to predicting him to have numbers similar to or better than McKenzie or Shakir. However, let’s start with Singletary. It seems like his opportunities in the passing game will dip a bit with the addition of Cook. I have Singletary projected to have 40 targets, 26 catches, 213.2 yards (8.2 yds/rec), and 2 touchdowns.
Now, back to James Cook. The Bills obviously envision a fairly big role for a pass-catching back, given their pursuit of J.D. McKissic this off-season. 51 targets, 34 catches, 343.4 yards (10.1 yds/rec), and 4 touchdowns seem reasonable for Cook in his rookie season. This leaves us with 27 targets, 13 catches, 107.9 yards, and 1 touchdown for Zack Moss, Reggie Gilliam, and Taiwan Jones.
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