Archives for May 2012

‘Coach Chan Gailey calls it unlikely for Johnson to be fully cleared until training camp in July. He provided the timetable Tuesday after the Bills held their first voluntary minicamp practice.’

‘OTA’s opened Tuesday in Orchard Park and Fitzpatrick is being taught how to throw the ball by his new quarterbacks coach David Lee, “He’s great, he stays in my ear the whole time in terms of challenging me. In terms of the completion, it isn’t good enough, it’s the ball location, even six inches off so he’s the guy that’s going to stay on me, challenge me.”‘

‘”I’ve really kind of I guess gone to another level I guess with my training the last couple three weeks or so,” he said. “I go from running to light change of directions, and the last couple of weeks really been doing some hard change direction stuff. It felt good. We kind of talked about it this morning, did some individual, felt really good and hopefully we’re on an uphill climb and we’re just going to continue to get better and better, keep going up.”‘

‘”I don’t know exactly when I’m going to be back,” Johnson said. “It’s just whenever this little pain goes away. Right now I feel good, but I don’t want to step out there and go hard and then something snaps and I have to get back further on the schedule we were on. So I’m just doing whatever they’re telling me to and getting stronger so I can be ready.”‘

‘”A lot of energy. A lot of quickness,” said Gailey. “We felt bigger on the field and it felt bigger on the field. It felt quick on the field. We’ve got a lot of work to do, but initial observations were good.”‘

‘On if he’s seen a leadership quality from Mario Williams: His work ethic has been outstanding. He comes to work every day whether it’s just lifting weights or running, whether it’s practicing out here. He’s done a good job not only fitting in but taking a little bit of leadership role. I think we’re going to be a little fortunate in that we have quite a few guys who have leadership ability.’

‘All players on the roster are allowed to participate, but offseason workouts aren’t mandatory for players until the team’s minicamp in late June.’

‘"As solid a player and more important, as solid an individual, as they make," Hall of Fame guard Billy Shaw, who played the guard spot opposite Kalsu with the Bills in ’68, once noted. "He would have been a great player, believe me, and not just because he was a great athlete. He just wanted to be good, that’s all. And he wanted it so badly, that would have been enough. He wasn’t the kind of guy who was going to just settle. He wanted to be special."’

‘”I was totally into football. I used to go to camp early. I loved playing. I was addicted to it. Now I won’t let my grandchildren play it. I have five grandsons, and I tell my daughters, ‘Don’t even think about it. Over my dead body those kids will play football until they clean it up.'”‘

‘”When we played, they didn’t call it a concussion. They said, ‘You got dinged,’ ” DeLamielleure said. “And when you felt a little better, you went back in the game.”‘

‘It’s hard to not think about the Buffalo Bills when you drive down 490 and see the plowed field the Bills will practice on this summer almost ready to go.’

‘”The whole year was just brutal,” said Troup. “The Jets game on the road was the point where I couldn’t take it anymore. I fought through it the best I could all the way through the season up until that Jets game. Coach Gailey came up to me in the locker room and said, ‘Don’t worry about it. We know you’ve been fighting all year and we know you are resilient so if you can’t go we know there’s something wrong. You should stay back here and lay down and relax.’ It was definitely heartbreaking not being able to finish the season with my teammates was horrible.”‘

‘"No, he’s not a guard," Nix said. "He started 50 games, the last 16 at left tackle. We put it out there, we tried to spread the rumor that he was a guard and hoped somebody wouldn’t take him."’

‘"You try to see the effort that a guy gives. You want to see if a guy is a lazy guy or if he is a worker. You’re trying to figure that out," he said. "You try to figure out does a guy retain what you teach him? Can he hold his own from day one to day two? Those are the two main things. They’re talented guys or they wouldn’t be here to start with. So they’ve got talent. It’s a matter of trying to evaluate right off the bat. What level of talent a little bit, but really work ethic and retention."’

‘The Bills have signed all but one of their nine draft picks. Third-rounder T.J. Graham, a wide receiver out of North Carolina State, was the only rookie not under contract as of May 24. It’s not entirely surprising. Under the NFL’s rookie wage scale adopted last year after the lockout, first- and second-round picks are guaranteed to receive strong contracts but deals for the fourth- through seventh-rounders aren’t so lucrative and not really worth their slot value. Third rounders are left in the middle between good deals and bad ones so negotiations between agents and team bean counters are taking time. Linebacker Kelvin Sheppard, a third-rounder, was the last to sign with Buffalo last year.’