Buffalo Bills Takes: Will James Cook Lose His Starting Job To Ray Davis in 2024? | ARH

Buffalo Bills Takes: Will James Cook Lose His Starting Job To Ray Davis in 2024? | ARH

[Music] so I want to talk about the expectations for the running back room and right now it’s James Cook it’s Ray Davis and it’s Ty Johnson I’m actually gonna take Ty Johnson sort of out of the equation here and I’m just gonna I just want to have a conversation about James Cook and Ray Davis because I think Ty Johnson will be more of the RB three in this offense but who knows maybe I’m wrong and he does have uh more of a role in the regular season but James Cook Ray Davis do you think it’s going to be rb1 James Cook rb2 Ray Davis or do you think it’s going to be more of a 1A 1B situation like we saw in years previous with single ter cook single ter Moss Etc I I I don’t think it’s going to be a 1A 1B at least initially I think it’s going to be at least skewed more towards the splits we’ve saw last year with James Cook getting in that he had 237 rushing attempts last year I think you’re going to see him in that 225 to 250 range again last uh this year latavius Murray had 79 rushing attempts last year I think a bulk of those would go to Ray Davis 80 rushing attempts for him maybe 80 maybe closer pushing closer to a 100 potentially for him so it to me it’s still going to be a at least a two to1 maybe even closer to 3:1 ratio as far as attempts are concerned between James Cook and a guy like Ray Davis so I would say no not a 1 a 1B scenario as I’m predicting right now I think it’ll be a similar split to how we saw the running back split last year with maybe a little bit of an uptick for Ray Davis yeah I I I’m sort of with you I think it’s going to be one two to start I think where you’re going to see Ray Davis the most is short yarded situations goal line situations and as risky as it seems because he’s a rookie I think that Ray DAV is a considerably better pass protector than the two other guys in the room it’s one of the things that Brandon Bean pointed out in his post-draft press conference he literally sat there and applauded Ray Davis’s ability to pass block latavius Murray was the best pass blocker last year it got him on the field even when fans really didn’t want him on the field Ty Johnson does an admirable job James Cook struggles in pass Pro so really obvious passing Downs you could see a lot more ra Davis maybe than you expect and by season’s end if we do reemphasize the running game and run the ball more than we did last year I honestly think maybe you could see a 1A 1B develop between the two of these guys by midseason as the bills sort of make their playoff push into the back half of the year as the weather gets colder as the conditions change it would not Shock me if at the end of the season we’re like whoa the the biggest Difference Maker on this offense this year was Ray Davis like he put put us over the top he was the cherry on top it really would not surprise me if by season’s end that was a talking point I mean I think if you’re a Bills fan you kind of are are hopeful that that could happen right because it’s not anything that you want to take away from James Cook but if you have two guys that you can consistently rely upon that is a nice thing to have right I mean latavius Murray had his moments last year where he looked okay but then kind of faded down the stretch the bills went with the Leonard foret experiment a little bit didn’t that didn’t work Tai Johnson had good reps but clearly the bills didn’t expect Ty Johnson to be a true like number two right and that’s why they drafted Ray Davis so yes by mid-season by season’s end if he’s kind of elevated his game he’s contributing like not taking away anything from James Cook because I expect him to be kind of right in the same range of numbers that he had last year we’ll talk about that in a second but it will be a nice outcome for the bills if Ray Davis does contribute meaningfully offensively right and not just for pass protection speaking of the number of carries James Cook 237 carries in 2023 do you expect that number to go up or down for James Cook from 237 I expect it to be right in that range again in my notes I said between 225 and 250 I think that’s a sweet spot for him you know if 237 he was only 13 carries away from 250 carries right I mean 250 carries I don’t think is an unreasonable expectation but but it’s not going to shock maybe’s slightly below that number so I’d say like I don’t think you want to give him a ton more than 250 maybe 260 carries if you really want to push it but I think that you know that 230 to 250 range is is a solid range for him and that’s probably where I would project him again this year if I were in charge that’s how many carries I would give him but I’m actually going to say lower and I’m going to explain my reasoning here he had 117 carries in seven games under Joe Brady so over extrapolated over 17 games that’s 284 carries that’s like way way way too many carries I think the Buffalo Bills looked at their run backup running backs this past season who averaged 8.5 carries per game in all of 2023 and they’re like man that’s just really not good enough they’re not taking the pressure off James Cook the way we’d like to take the pressure off James Cook I think that’s why you saw Ray Davis drafted relatively high and you also have Curtis Samuel who can come in and take some carries as well so my expectation is more of like 200 to 215 I think it’ll be down but not down too much I think the Buffalo Bills are going to want to keep James Cook more fresh this season Joe Marino did a great podcast I think it was the day that Stefon Diggs was traded so he’s mentioned a couple of times in um some of those podcast afterwards hey a lot of people didn’t hear my breakdown of James Cook because Stefon digs got traded that day go back and listen and in that podcast I’m not going to read off the statistics for btim because he is the one who went out and did that research you can go listen to that podcast but to summarize what Joe uncovered was that sort of after that big Dallas game and after the game after that sort of James Cook kind of hit a wall and his yards per contact was down his yards per carry were down James Cook struggled into the playoffs for the Buffalo Bills and he saw his averages decline significantly so I think the Buffalo Bills want to take pressure off of James Cook just so he can be more explosive like he could have more yards rushing with less carries this year because he can be more explosive he can have more allpurpose yards this year because if you take pressure off him in the Run game you know he can go and he can catch the ball more so I still think James Cook is going to be a major factor in this Buffalo Bills offense even if his carries are down by 15 or 20 because he can contribute more in the passing game if he’s fresher and you can maybe see some more explosives when he’s running the ball because he’s got fresher legs so I think Ray Davis is the key to unlocking an even more explosive James Cook I like that take and then we got a super chat here from Justin again says just don’t fumble r or James Cook did famously so hey and you know new Ravis the good news for Ray Davis is there’s not as much competitions that I think James Cook had in that Buffalo Bills backfield from a couple of years ago the the salary cap has left the options a little bit more limited this segment is from the air raid Hour podcast the full show is live every Monday at 900 p.m. eastern time on the cover one YouTube channel don’t miss out

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Best of The Air Raid Hour: Judge & Tilt break down the expectations for Buffalo Bills RB Room in 2024. Will James Cook build off of his 2023 season? Will Ray Davis be an impactful rookie? We discuss that and more.
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