WhitewalkerInPhilly

People have, rightfully, pointed out that we thought that Wanny was going to be our savior on defense last year. I thought so, at the time. But out of curiosity, who can remember Wanny having anywhere even close to the energy Pettine has shown?Pettine isn't even that energetic, and I still think he beats Wanny. The man seems to have a grim determination at all times. Of course, it's way too early to say for certain but...well, come on we're going to do it anyway.

Dammnit Kraft...do you know hard it is for me to say "well done" to Putin? And for the record, the ring truly belongs to the shadowy mastermind of an organization that has succeeded with surveillance on visitors to their territory and questionable calls by sports officials...wait, you don't think...has anyone ever Vladimir Putin and Bill Belicheck in the room together at the same time?

You mean a group of 20-something males might want to pick up some video games for when they're in training camp? Hey, the more they're playing those games, the fewer DUI's they're likely to rack up.

This comes off as really, really odd, especially seeing how the defensive scheme has played out here recently. But maybe the answer is rather simple: Pettine has a different group of players, with talent frontloaded at different positions. The Jets had Revis, and whether you like him or not, he's a very talented CB, and they had a pair of very talented Safeties (Landry and Bell). Their talent was in their secondary, so it could be possible that Pettine felt he was trying to fit a square peg in a round hole, which would explain why he would be willing to move to Buffalo where he could use Kyle and Mario Williams and Dareus. You mean the Bills avoided signing a group of linebackers on the wrong side of 30 and a safety who got paid much more than he was worth? I'm happier with who we got.

That's true about Kolb being injured. I mean, I hate to look at a guy and say "Yeah, he's going to be injured", but let's look at Stevie and Wood? Is it crazy to say that neither will be injured for any length of time this season? But it might actually work alright if Manuel has gotten a few weeks to get used to the pace, hold a clipboard and then get his chance to shine.

You know, going over some of those highlights, I have to say that Kolb is looking really good. I know people want Manuel to start, but if Kolb looks really good in training camp and starts winning, would we really object to him starting?

Apparently. See what happens when he works out in the offseason?

This just came over at Buffalo Rumblings and hadn't seen it yet: http://http://www.buffalorumblings.com/2013/6/13/4427056/buffalo-bills-stevie-johnson-had-fractured-back-per-report It's good to see him practicing now, but I guess it should silence some complaints about him being slow to get back into camp.

I've heard of him. Get 'er done Buddy...I mean Whaley. Man, that doesn't work quite as well. We need something new. But seriously, I don't really see anything here that would be really groundbreaking. Maybe Dallas Clark on the cheap to help fill in if Chandler has to start on PUP. I too would be waiting for camp cuts, since at that point the Bills might be able to peel off a few promising young players other teams let go.

Does it stream games as they're happening? If that's the case, I don't care about paying an extra $10 a month onto another expense I'm already paying as opposed to spending a couple hundred to get Sunday Ticket since I'm living out of town.

Good deal! It introduced a little extra competition at the position. I'd like to hear what the salary is.

It might make sense for Hackett's offense then, since they might be going for people who are smaller and faster and can keep up with the pace of their attack. Seriously, I would be happy with this. I've still been a little shaky about guard, and this would do a lot to make me feel better.

You could have just said "no". Nice to hear!

I think it's Marrone trying to make a statement more than it being that Da'Rick made a huge mistake. It's OTA's, and I remember stories of camp fights breaking out every so often by more than one team. I think this is Marrone's way of saying 1) "You're still on probation Da'Rick" and 2) "This is my team. This is my standard. I'm letting everyone on the field know this." To me, it sounds like good, if tough, coaching.

Of course it's early...and we were saying similar things about Tank Carder last year. But I do think it's worth noting that even then, no one was thinking that Carder would be a Week 1 starter. With Kiko, the man is already being placed to start at the Mike. He's the playcaller for the front 7, and considering that the coaching staff seems to be in no rush to push EJ or Woods into the lineup, he's looking like a promising candidate.

Can we keep things in perspective? I think everyone, and I mean everyone who was talking about EJ Manuel before the draft had the same line: "He's easily the most physically gifted out there, but he needs refinement." Why are we getting upset about having two very reasonable people ahead of him get first shot while he gets more time to work on mechanics, master the playbook and get used to the speed of the game like Colin Kaepernick did in San Fran?

This does seem to make a lot of sense, especially if the focus is going to have both Darues and Kyle Williams charging the 1-gap areas. If Carrington can be a solid DE (which seems to have a lot of promise for him in these OTA's) It looks like we can get decent pressure rushing the gaps. When you add on Mario and Anderson rushing from the LB spots, we might actually get a pass rush this year. That does seem to be the case. In spite of my "I only want EJ when he's ready" mantra, I think everyone was kind of hoping that he would be ready to take the first snap this year. But what I care about more than having a playoff run this year, would be having another period of dominance like we had in the 80's and 90's and that the Patriots have had for the last decade. If waiting gives us that, I'm willing to do so.

Dareus is indeed looking kind of slow. I know there's plenty of time, but it is still disconcerting to see.

It's really nice to hear. I know, we're supposed to be saying "show me the baby" but after the past few years of soporific coaching interviews you see some life. In one of the earlier roundups they talked about how Marrone steps onto the field to personally help with drills because he feels like he isn't doing anything otherwise and gets bored. Hackett and Pettine seem to have definite plans,and have an energy about it. Of course, come the season we won't care, but while Chan grounded us after freefall (which we needed) suddenly it seems like we have a spark again for the first time since those heady days of Fitz's 5-2 start...

It certainly would be a unique personnel grouping. The Bills were already gifted with two highly talented running backs, I would love to see this scenario. I think the operative word there is "as". Teams will be spending the entire offseason looking to beat it, and everybody is almost assured to try it. The only thing that will be different is on how you tailor it to the skills of your people. In the Bills case, they may have the advantage of being able to work with three dyamnic players. The read option can also be used as a quick play action fake, determined at the line. So while everyone is on run blocking, suddenly there is a mismatch for our WR's. Also, you can let Spiller and Freddy run, then do a quick screen to Spiller with Freddy out in front to block. There are a lot of ways it can be used, and as long as new wrinkles can be put in to force opponents to pick their poison between Spiller, Freddy and EJ, it could be deadly. Of course, this relies heavily on EJ being able to read a defense correctly.

It's kind of weird hearing that Hackett's offense is simpler than FSU's...and a touch worrisome. Unless Hackett is purposely putting in a simplified offense so that Manuel can learn and then slowly making it more complex (like they did with Wilson in Seattle), I'm suddenly going back to the "Pop Warner playbook" days that was Jauron's last season.

With some of the deep bombs we've seen from Manuel and Kolb, that seems a lot more likely this year. Of course, you need to get the timing down, but there's no solution for that other than to practice, practice, practice.

Well, if we have him maybe we can get a bit of production. If anything, he's depth we could use, but I'm not going to be singing the Hosannahs anytime soon.

Never would have seen that coming. *reaches for earpiece* Wait, I'm getting word now that every single member of this board, the local media and anyone who has paid the slightest bit of attention saw that coming. I just wonder what took so long.

I don't know about anyone else, but I liked seeing Marrone getting involved in the O-line drills. He flat out states that he loves doing it, and getting hands on, because otherwise he feel detached and goes all in. I feel like Gailey was necessary to rebuild our fundamentals, and now Marrone gets to do something special with the talent we've cultivated.