San Jose Bills Fan

Like I said, be careful what you wish for (not you personally). I'm thinking DeHaven was far from a bad special teams coach. I'd have been fine had he stayed.

Like I said in my post (bolded), many of these players are steered away from quarterbacking in high school and college. They're seen as too short or such good athletes that the coaches would rather play them at another position. There are probably guys that were never given the chance to become a Russell Wilson-type quarterback due to prejudices associated with measurables. I think it's a shame. As for Wilson it's a known fact that some pro scouts said he would have been a Top 5 pick had he been a few inches taller. Hopefully Wilson's success paves the way for a bit more open-mindedness.

They missed Mathieu but Tharold Simon was named Honey Badger for this year's squad and he did a pretty darn good job.

Well Kelly, I'm more sick of atypical players being routinely passed over in pro sports because they don't fit the prototype. There is tons of patronage, nepotism, and politics involved in sports at all levels. I've seen it and I've heard and read about it. There are terms like "passing the eyeball test" "looking the part" and "having good face" (from Moneyball) which indicate to me at least that a lot of personnel evaluators and decision makers lack the courage or independence of thought to give a fair shake to players who don't fit the prototype. We have no way of knowing but my belief is that there are more short quarterbacks that never got a chance as opposed to your suggestion that they were cut when "they proved they couldn't play." Also, there's a difference between bringing someone into camp and actually giving them a legitimate chance to compete for a job. As we all know, there are a lot of supposed "competitions" which are anything but. And this doesn't even address how many short quarterbacks or non-prototypical players are steered away from positions in college or high school, before they are not given the chance to compete in the pros. JMO.

Good point in post 27. The reason the Bills special teams under Levy were good were for two reasons: He was a former special teams coach and placed a greater emphasis on it than many other coaches AND he had a very talented roster. These are probably the two biggest factors in special teams success. 1) How much time the head coach gives the special teams coach for practices and meetings and 2) how many starters are allowed to play special teams and how many players are on the roster because of their special teams prowess. Probably no one who's posted on this have any idea how good a coach Crossman is, or for that matter DeHaven or April. In a recent thread, lots of people were calling for DeHaven's head. This in spite of the fact that no one seemed to have any idea how his teams actually stack up statistically. I made the comment at the time that the Dallas Morning News' special teams rankings (measuring 22 different areas) are typically published this time of year. Funny how what some percieve as a bad hire has some people wishing the Bills had maintained the status quo. I betcha some of these people wanted to see DeHaven move on. Be careful what you wish for I guess. As for April, it's been posted before but not in this thread: He was passed over for interim coach and passed over to succeed Jauron. There's a possibility if not a probability that he had zero interest in returning to Buffalo. The guy I would have liked to see the Bills at least interview is Alan Lowry who has a long history of above average special teams at Tennessee. He is the author of "Home Run Throwback" and was fired last week by the Titans.

Moon was probably not given much of a chance because back in 1978 when he was a rookie, NFL teams didn't give many if any opportunities to black quarterbacks. Moon was not a short player. Good post though. I think lots of players are never even given a fair shake because of their less-than-ideal measurables.

The one thing you'll notice the more you watch Wilson is how aware he is of everyone on the field. He has eyes in the back of his head and is rarely surprised by a defender. Besides that he has great self-preservation instincts and rarely puts himself in harms way… counter-intuitive when you talk about a quarterback who can run for yardage and to extend plays. My prediction for Wilson is for a long and fairly injury-free career.

It was well known in these parts among regular readers that Wilson's O-line at Wisconsin average OVER 6'6" tall. Also, it was well known that he had very few passes batted down. Fewer than most quarterbacks. I think Wilson will have a great career.

6-2 vs the spread so far. Better than usual. edit: Actually 5-3. Didn't realize Seattle had come back to make it a game.

Your post in incoherent. What are you talking about?

Or like saying because the Bills have spent so much money on QBs recently with significant contracts to Fitz, Brad Smith, and Thigpen that we can't draft a first round quarterback. The fact that we've spent money at the position doesn't mean squat if we're still weak there. I agree with Marc Miller. Pass rusher at #8. To JTSP, it might be a month or more before I have a feel for the draftable QBs but it will be interesting to see who we all choose as our favorites.

Yeah this was just a "first glance" analysis without any depth. I was just brainstorming successful coaches who had sub 500 playoff records. Knox had an aging John Hadl, Jim Harris, a rookie Ron Jaworski, a rookie Pat Haden, Joe Ferguson, Jim Zorn, and Dave Kreig as his QBs. Like Mora and Marty (excepting an aging Montana), he never had a great QB.

Between Denver's excellent pass rush and Flacco's tendency to lose composure, I think this game could get out of hand. I'll take Denver -9 Aaron Rodgers seems to have righted the ship. I like how he's brought Jermichael Finley into the offense and he's playing very well. But there are still problems in Green Bay on the defense and I think San Fran is gonna try to physical them out of the stadium. Also while Rodgers has been sharp, the Niners defense is excellent and the home field is gonna be big. My only concern with this game is how effective Justin Smith will be. If he can't play, it will have a big effect on the outcome. I'll take the Niners -3 Atlanta has to have a huge chip on their shoulders at this point with the national media hammering on them all season that they're "not legit." This is dangerous territory for the visiting Seahawks who've been good on the road lately after being terrible earlier in the season. Atlanta's offense is formidable and the Seahawks have lost their best pass rusher, Chris Clemons to an ACL tear. Home field is gonna be big of course and a rookie QB in Wilson might be a bit wide-eyed. This is a tough call in my eyes and I'm gonna go with the Falcons -2.5 The last time the Texans traveled to Foxboro they debuted their new "varsity jackets" in week 14 and got their asses kicked 42-14 on national TV. That's a lot of motivation. Also as has been pointed out this week, New England hammered the Jets 45-3 in week 13 of the 2010 season and then lost to the Jets in the divisional round. However I just don't think Houston matches up well with the Cheatriots***. New England's defense is better than some think and I doubt Schaub will be able to exploit them at all. Houston will have to rely on the run and will fall behind early. I'll take the Cheatriots*** -9.5

Good point. Jim Mora also had a sterling regular season record and brought the Saints their first postseason appearances. But he was 0-6 in the playoffs (PLAYOFFS?!?!) Apparently Knox was 7-11 in the playoffs. And Schottenheimer was 5-13 in the playoffs.

Well there's 32 teams in the NFL and only 12 make the playoffs making 20 coaches, failures each year. It seems like the majority of NFL coaches are ultimately "failures." Spurrier had a short NFL playing career and then never coached in the NFL in any capacity until he was made HC of the Redskins. It would take an in-depth study to draw conclusions for sure. Yeah Marrone has 9 years as a player/coach in the NFL. He's more NFL-experienced than most of the coaches on the above lists.

The playoffs were expanded to 12 teams (from 10) in 1990. Seems like any study should go back no farther than that year. I'm not gonna dig up the link but there was a recent study which showed that there was a pattern of 5 new playoff teams each year. Okay. I dug it up: http://profootballta...ayoff-turnover/ "In every year since 1996, at least five of the teams that made the playoffs the prior year ended up on the outside looking in."

Alright. Baltimore at Denver -9 Green Bay at San Francisco -3 Seattle at Atlanta -2.5 Houston at New England -9.5 All the home teams are favorites. Who do you like?

:lol: :lol:

BTW, dyslexia isn't a communicable disease, is it?

LOL

/reaching for his bottle of fluoxetine/

Thanks. I was starting to feel sorry for the guy. It's one thing to have too many G's in your first name but this?

They have similar builds. And yet, where is Hardy now? Or the third tall receiver of that group, Malcolm Kelly? Donnie Avery and Eddie Royal have also had excellent NFL seasons. At the beginning, it was the smaller receivers of that class who were the best. Seemed like there were a lot of receiver needy teams but very few good receivers that year.

Holy crap! Is this real?