Two Bills Drive

'"Jim, do you have any idea how much money you’d be making today?" the president said Saturday. "They’d hit Jim, it was like tackling a linebacker. They’d hit Jim, four guys, five guys that weighed 320, and they’d just keep going down the field. He was much more than a quarterback. He had tremendous heart, and he knew how to win.'

'The resumes of Botterill and Beane are interchangeable, two men who worked their way up the sports business food chain starting as coffee-fetching interns. Where many traditional GMs travel the hard-scrabble road of scouting, Botterill and Beane came up in the world of contract negotiations, salary cap management, budgets and logistics, all the office stuff scouts can’t stand once they become GMs.'

'Prognosticators should run away from Buffalo's dysfunction, not to it. With the Pegulas firing Doug Whaley, it's apparently first-year head coach Sean McDermott's club for the time being. His move to take the ping-pong tables out of the locker room sounds good until you realize the Falcons went to the Super Bowl with three tables in their locker room last year. And the Bills don't seem to like or appreciate their above-average quarterback. Prepare for a step back in 2017.'

'After winning the program's Most Improved Offensive Player award in the spring of 2015, Denman took over as the starting right tackle and kept the job until late in his redshirt senior season, when Rutgers turned to redshirt freshman converted defensive lineman Kamaal Seymour as part of a youth movement in a 2-10 season.'

'Jones writes in his piece McDermott’s "move to take the ping-pong tables out of the locker room sounds good until you realize the falcons went to the super bowl with three tables in their locker room last year."'

'" I'd like to recognize a friend, who is here with us today…who can serve as an inspiration. Someone who doesn't know the meaning of the word quit, a real champion," Trump said to a large crowd of family members and students in Lynchburg, Virginia.'

'I don't think the plan going forward is for McDermott to do it all himself. I think he is smart enough to know that when you hire someone you trust (i.e. Leslie Frazier as the Defensive Coordinator) you let the person do the job. Maybe it is just semantics, but I think this organization will finally be more about influence and less about power. I think the plan is for McDermott to bring in people like Beane that have his respect and his trust, and then to watch them go to work.'

'Many of the Buffalo faithful are excited to see what Jones can bring to the Bills offense this season. But the storyline of the first practice was the matchup of Jones and the Bills first round draft pick, Tre’Davious White a corner out of LSU. The Bills coaching staff decided to match the two up against each other to see how they would fair against strong competition.'

'“I’m a competitor, so I want to go against the best guys that are out there,” White said. “We matched up every rep and both of us got better. If we continue to do that the next couple of days we’ll be ready to roll once the vets get here.”'

'Asked about the future of Bills senior vice president of football administration Jim Overdorf, something Pegula said would be up to Beane to decide, the new GM said, "I'm coming in eyes wide open on everybody." Beane said he knew Overdorf, but would get to know him better as they work together.'

'"The long-term vision is to build a consistent winner here," Beane said Friday during his introductory news conference. "I didn’t just achieve a goal or Sean and I didn’t achieve a goal if we make the playoffs once and then we’re out of it two or three years in a row. Sustained success. Year after year, we’re contending to win the division. That’s the first thing we have to do.'

'"When we started this process, we — Kim, myself, Russ was involved, and others — we put together four or five lists of potential candidates, cross-referenced them, and, you know, Sean was one of the individuals," Terry Pegula said. "Brandon's name showed up on most of the lists, if not all of them. So from that, and from discussions with people outside the organization, we picked the candidates we wanted to interview. But Sean's involvement was no more than writing a name on a piece of paper, which he wrote seven or eight names."'

'"He's a great route runner, and I'm a guy that can pretty much cover," White said. "If I'm going against the best guy each and every rep, once I get thrown in the fire when the vets get here, I think I'll be pretty much up to speed enough to keep up with those guys."'

'Will they get the Bills turned around? I have no idea. Nobody knows for sure if Beane can find the right players or whether McDermott can make the best use of them. But oppressed Bills fans can take comfort knowing that they trust one another. And that's also a shift from previous front offices.'

'Now that he has people he trusts in place, he can get back to the business of getting out of the way and allowing the people he hired to do their jobs. It's the best part of owning a professional franchise or, in this case, two franchises. If they ever start winning on a regular basis, he'll be able to enjoy them.'