Archives for December 2016

'"It's pretty obvious we have to win the rest of them to even have a chance, so we'll see what happens," coach Rex Ryan said. "Thank goodness we have the next three at home. We have to win every one of them and we understand that."'

'"It was one of those situations where everything they did went right and we just couldn't make a play," safety Corey Graham said. "I've never really been in a situation like that where everything went wrong, just like you couldn't make a play, and then those guys went on a roll and it was like everything they did turned to gold."'

'"Sometimes you feel that momentum shift, and it just snowballed on us," Bills coach Rex Ryan said. "Sometimes I think we lose confidence. You can't ever have that happen to you. To their credit now, (Oakland) has done this a bunch. This is a heck of an offense."'

'The Bills will return to the friendly confines of New Era Field to take on the Pittsburgh Steelers next Sunday. The Bills will need to win out and get some help from others around the NFL in order to have any legitimate chance at making the playoffs.'

'Going into the season, conventional wisdom was, “get to ten wins and see what happens.” That’s often good enough to get into the postseason. Well, here we sit, four games left, and now needing them all to get to that double-digit win total this organization hasn’t seen since 1999. And with the way the AFC looks right now, there’s a solid possibility ten wins won’t even be enough to get the job done and put them in.'

'Buffalo's current 16-year postseason drought is the longest in the NFL.'

'Taylor’s inability to help bring a level of calmness to the team is where he failed as the man playing the most important position in the game.'

'Rex Ryan’s boys were on a roll. And then faster than you could say Kenny Stabler their defense and their offense disappeared into a black hole, never to be heard from again.'

'The Bills came ready to play and shockingly opened up a big lead in the 2nd half. Unfortunately there was too much time left on the clock and the final 25 minutes of the game resembled so many late season West Coast games as the Bills wilted down the stretch. The Bills haven't won a big road game against a good team in 12 years. Just when it looked like it might happen on this day the Bills remembered who they were and got rolled over for a very depressing loss that likely clinches the playoff drought going to an unbelievable 17 years.'

'Grade D: It's is becoming crystal clear he's not a franchise quarterback. The search continues.'

'Buffalo’s game plan was working well. They were running the ball effectively and held the Raiders high-powered passing attack in check to successfully build a 15-point lead midway through the third quarter (24-9). Then the Oakland attack woke up scoring 29 unanswered points in a span of just over 15 minutes of game clock to take a lead they would never relinquish in a 38-24 come from behind victory.'

'The NFL’s number one rushing attack couldn’t be stopped until the Bills fell behind in the fourth quarter. McCoy had 17 carries for 130 yards. Gillislee added 49 yards and two touchdowns on eight carries.'

'“It (stinks), man, it really does. There are some plays I missed today that I wish I had back. It was a weird game because I felt like we did everything we could do early in the game. In the second half they came out firing. We were in zebra personnel, which is a passing [formation" target="_blank"> and they had their big guys in trying to stop us from running the ball. We had some success and then we just collapsed. We couldn’t move the ball, we couldn’t do anything right. We stalled on a few drives and had the turnover. It was a super snowball effect. As a team, we can’t win like that – especially on offense.”'

'On Saturday Buffalo called TE Gerald Christian up from the practice squad as insurance in the event that Clay was unavailable. Christian, who has been on the active roster once before this season, has a greater working knowledge of the offense than Logan Thomas, who just signed this week. Thomas is also inactive today.'

'How does Kevon Seymour hold up on the outside? The rookie cornerback from Southern California is in line to make his second career start, but the first came in the slot. This time, Seymour will be on the outside, in place of the injured Ronald Darby. In Amari Cooper and Michael Crabtree, the Raiders have a pair of solid outside receivers. Bills coach Rex Ryan asks a lot of his cornerbacks in terms of being able to play man coverage, so it will be interesting to see how Seymour holds up in that role.'