San Jose Bills Fan

Yes, but Green Bay would have faced a 4th and long but for a bad pass interference call.

Interesting stat: Seattle has committed 11 penalties for 90 yards, resulting in 4 Green Bay first downs. And again, run, run, pass, punt for Seattle. They don't appear to want to pass the ball on early downs. Apparently Carroll does not yet trust Russell Wilson. But I think Seattle's overly-conservative playcalling has hurt them. Terrible pass interference call.

Well the Packers made some nice (if obvious) adjustments trying to balance out the offense. It'll be interesting to see what Seattle comes up with offensively. In theory, having given up only 7 points, the Packers don't have to change anything on defense. There are a lot of Packers fans in that crowd and they're loud. How many illegal procedures has Seattle had? In their own stadium to boot. Kudos to the Packers fans.

First Green Bay play of the second half, Cedric Benson. Second play, Cedric Benson. Apparently they've figured out that they can't pass on every play. Yep. And 7 points ain't gonna do it.

Also I didn't understand Green Bay's signing of Cedric Benson. He's best as a power back on running downs. With an offense like theirs, you'd want a back proficient at pass protection, but also at going into the pattern and hurting the defense as a receiver. I wanted the Bills to get Benson as a late game hammer but he seems miscast as a primary back in the Packers offense.

And physically punish the man lined up opposite him.

Almost all the players are unproven or over the hill. Like most great QBs Rodgers has always made them look better than they are but they are solidly average. And they've not recently been a good running team either. Yep. No way of keeping the defense honest. Meanwhile on Seattle's TD, it was a deep pass off a play-action fake and the Packers still had 8 men in the box at the moment Wilson let it go.

And the other top tackle of that class, Trent Williams has also been a bit of a disappointment so far… partly due to injuries. Nix said that there were two tackles in that draft whom he liked but both (Williams and Okung) were gone by the time the Bills took CJ Spiller.

Especially at home. And the Cardinals defense looks very formidable too. The Bills are gonna have to master the art of physical play to do well against this division.

I believe red zone TD percentage is an important metric too. So far the Bills have done very well in this area.

And BTW, the NFC West suddenly doesn't look like such a walk in the park… and that unfortunately impacts the Bills. We're at SF and Arizona on consecutive October weekends and I think we "host' Seattle in Toronto. The Packers rushed five guys again. Seattle has to start throwing on first down. Their run, run, pass approach looks too predictable. Can't stand Gruden.

I wonder if Seattle will continue to try to pound Lynch… body punching. It seems like the Green Bay defense can play close to the line and dare Wilson to throw the ball… at once playing the run and being in a position to send pressure from everywhere. Both teams have done a real nice job defensively.

I more or less agree although the number of touches like you say is dynamic. The funny thing is, Spiller carried quite a workload at Clemson although on the other hand, Clemson is not the NFL.

They need the money to pay those overpriced replacement officials… oh wait…

And many people here wanted us to take Bulaga in the first round instead of CJ Spiller… and virtually no one here even believed that Bruce Irvin would be taken in the first round... That's what happens when you trust implicitly the opinions of the so-called "draft experts." And btw, Bulaga is a real good, solid, right tackle, but not the kind of player you take at #9.

Good. I'll admit it feels very odd for me to be picking a Russell Wilson quarterbacked team over an Aaron Rodgers quarterbacked team. Bruce Irvin undresses Bryan Bulaga again.

Agreed. Some of us remember the toughness and violence that Carwell Gardner and Butch Rolle brought to the Super Bowl teams… both from scrimmage and on special teams. That sort of presence is underrated IMO.

Should be a good one. The spread is Packers minus 3 but I'm taking Seahawks to win outright. Seattle enjoys a good home field advantage and are a very talented and physical football team. I believe their strengths can negate the Packers strengths and that their physicality on offense will exploit the Packers questionable defense. As I've said before, I don't like Pete Carroll as a person but I think he's done a very good job in Seattle. Also, two of my favorite rookies, Russell Wilson and Bruce Irvin will be featured in this game. Packers sending extra rushers after the passer. Looks like the game plan is to really pressure Wilson. They'll have to contain his scrambling ability though or he'll really hurt them with his legs.

The oddest thing was that there was no deep safety on that side of the field. It was like Gilmore was playing corner and safety all by himself. Usually at least there is a safety with inside-out leverage and the corner is more responsible for the sideline, outside-in leverage. It looked to me like a busted coverage and bad play by Gilmore as well. While the Bills have not relapsed into vanilla to the degree they were against the Jets, I believe that the Bills have been holding back a lot of blitzes and stunts to "save them" for the Cheatriots***. I think with some more pressure schemes that the Bills (with the home crowd noise advantage) will be able to pressure Brady pretty consistently. That said, this will of course be a stern challenge for the defense. Keep in mind though that the Ravens are missing AFC Defensive Player of the Year, Terrell Suggs. The Ravens defense is considerably more porous than they were last year so the points the Cheatriots*** put up last week are a bit misleading.

Well for me, Sheppard played so epically poorly in the preseason that I was beginning to think he was headed down bust alley. I'm a bit amazed that he has been able to raise the level of his game as much as he has because he looked completely lost in the preseason… physically overmatched and mentally confused. I'm trying to remember the last time I saw such a dramatic turnaround in a player in such a short time.

Much more excited about Danario Alexander than Donte Stallworth.

So can we all pretty much agree that we don't want to see the Bills over-use CJ Spiller? Regardless of listed height/weight, he has a slight frame for a running back. I think that if you give him the ball too much that you very quickly run into the law of diminishing returns.

Thankfully the D & C is a rag and a mediocre one at that so I won't miss their coverage. This allows many to actually skirt the issue at hand. As pointed out, the issue becomes more problematic when the Buffalo News follows suit which will happen shortly. I used to climb power poles to pirate cable when I was younger… but I doubt if I'll attempt to pirate the Buffalo News content. I might just end up paying as it's the right thing to do. I really enjoy the Press Coverage blog of which Tim Graham and Mark Gaughan are the primary contributors. We will all do what we will all do. The subscription is cheap. If the value is there you should pay for it but to each his/her own.

The NBA's "Mad Bomber" and for a few seasons, one of the NBA's best 6th Men… before they had that award. He was primarily Jim McMillian and Garfield Heard's backup. When he was on Dr. Jack Ramsey's Buffalo Braves team, Marin averaged about 14 PPG off the bench and Ramsey actually taught him to shoot his ball with a bit more loft. Also, Darragh went to The College of William and Mary… you can't really compare him to most of the other players. He is a pretty smart guy. Because ALL players made/make "millions and millions" of dollars? Did you know pension is commensurate with years of service? How much do you actually know about the NFL's pension system? You don't think someone deserves a pension after playing in the NFL?

Hairston seemed to play at least half the snaps at ROT. They actually need to start getting him some more reps at LOT just for insurance purposes.