NewHampshireBillsFan

I think so too. The trouble is we might have to go 4-12 with loud booing in the stands for the last half of the season for RW to make it happen. Personally, I could never root for the Bills to lose even a single game. But in any case we have a lot of losing teams on our schedule and we are more likely to sneak back to 7-9, especially as our injured players return and the rookies get experience. At 7-9 RW retains DJ with the excuse that the injuries and young players made it tough to win and NEXT year will be different with DJ at the helm. Brutal, brutal thing to be a Bills fan for 36 years. And it is getting worse by the game.

I don't think Walker asked for his release in that he had a high contract that no team would match or exceed. Once the Bills cut him he didn't get paid anymore so there is no good reason to lose all that money. The thing is it would be hard for the Bills to go back now and try to bring him back in since he would know it would only be until the other players healed. Is it worth it to him to make a few weeks salary at this point in his life?

To use the word conspiracy is to dismiss the entire notion that the Pats* get favorable treatment. In the 70's and 80's Shula's Dolphins got clearly favorable treatment from the refs and opposing players would openly state that Marino was protected more than any other QB. So we have seen this thing before in the NFL. In the case of NE* the officials fear making a bad call against Belicheat* and Kraft much more than against say Jauron and Wilson. They fear Brady getting injured a lot more than Losman or Edwards. Officials are human and not robots and they think a lot more about which team they are calling a penalty against or spotting the ball, etc. than some might think. But whatever the explanation NE* clearly benefits much more from the calls of officials than most other teams and in games against teams like Buffalo it can be particularly pronounced, year after year. One bad call against NE* here and there does not mitigate the basic facts that are plain to see for any objective viewer. I would hate to have to defend NE* and the refs on this because instead of looking like a crybaby the way we are characterized by some NE* fans, the NE* fans look like people who can't even objectively acknowledge what is happening on the field, but look for silly loopholes to the clear truth.

I agree with you on why does RW own the team if he doesn't want to win a SB before he goes. But the fact is he never has been that worried about winning a SB all his life. Why let Polian go just because he was abrasive towards RW's daughter and some others if you really want to win a SB. Why let AJ Smith go and say well he is just a personnel guy. If RW keeps the team profitable with low salaries, etc. it may be worth another $100 million to his heirs when the team is sold and that seems to be his motivation at this point. He wants $800 million for his heirs instead of $700 million. Also, RW may realize (as we all should) that this team is years away from making a serious SB run and he might not be around that long anyway. Actually none of us may be around long enough to see the Bills win a SB.

I became an avid Bills fan in 1973 and went for decades without ever leaving the stadium early or turning off a game on TV or radio until the last whistle. I would be insane (or more insane) if I did that now. I turned off the internet feed when the score hit 24-3 before the middle of the 3rd quarter. I told my daughter it would probably not improve and we would probably lose about 31-10. It was worse than that even. For the NO game I turned it off shortly after DJ punted. At least I keep some measure of sanity this way.

We didn't let him go, he elected to accept the DC position under Cowher instead of the DC position under Mularkey. As you can see there is no way we could have kept him and he has now won 2 SBs in the process and the Bills haven't made the playoffs in 10 straight years (yes, I'll include this year). As far as Jason Peters is concerned had we signed him he would now be injured and Bell would now be playing (since he wouldn't have been injured since Peters would have had to get injured first). So I regret not seeing Bell on the field at this point because we didn't sign JP.

Ralph doesn't need to move the team to make money. He can't sell the team because of tax consequences. He has to leave this world owning the team to avoid paying all the capital gain taxes since 1960 (nearly a billion dollars worth of capital gains). The best understanding would be that he wants to minimize costs to maximize yearly profits and also set up his heirs to make a bigger profit on the sale of the team based on the profitability of the team at the time of sale. The truth of the matter is that RW is one of the most successful men of our times, financially, in that he started with a fairly small amount and will end up leaving his heirs a billion. Not many people have been able to do that. From a football point of view RW is one of the most unsuccessful owners in sports history, owning a team for 50 years and never winning a world championship in the nearly 4 and 1/2 decades that the SB has determined the champion. We, as fans, don't share in his financial success (but helped him get it), but take the brunt of the football misery part.

You got to let Parrish return kicks. He doesn't usually fumble and the main value he brings to the team is returning kicks.

I like Woody Hayes. If he thought TO was dogging it on some plays he would punch him when he got to the sidelines. The media would love it. Actually Woody might punch some of the media, and I would love that.

TO's attitude when he comes up to the LOS does seem to give the play away. To me it looks so bad that if I was Belicheat* I wouldn't even bother to cheat to get our play calls. But we could use this to our advantage. On the biggest play of the game TO should just pretend he doesn't care and then suddenly burn everyone deep!

No way DJ is fired if they lose to Miami on the road. Some people who may have picked us to finish as high as 9-7 might have also felt we could be only 1-3 after the first 4 games based on the schedule. And no way we lose to the Browns at home. We have way more talent than they do and it will be TB all over again, maybe even more one sided than that. DJ is a pretty good coach against horrible teams (KC last year). He just is horrid against good teams and mediocre against average teams.

I agree about all of us needing to stand before Christ, but you did not address the issue that I brought up. I never said that Dungy was faking it as a Christian, etc. I just said when the Belicheat* scandal came up Dungy, when asked, downplayed Belcheat*'s cheating and helped thereby for the league to cover it up as much as possible. If Dungy had stood up then he might well have lost the opportunity to get paid big bucks to be a broadcaster. Dungy helped power triumph over truth and justice. Now when he has absolutely nothing to lose (and some to gain) he suddenly is the TO basher, making it seem like TO lacks character. Belicheat* lacks a lot more character than TO but Dungy wasn't willing to throw his Christian and moral stature against Belicheat* but he is willing against TO. That doesn't mean Dungy is a phony as a Christian. What it does mean is that he wasn't willing to put his Christianity on the line when the stakes were high during the horrible Belicheat* scandal.

I respect people who are Christians and bring their faith into action in their careers. But I think Dungy and other Christians in the media lost all creditability in the way they handled the Belicheat* scandal. Here was someone whose cheating clearly helped him to win games (because Belicheat* is not stupid enough to cheat for no important reason), the league clearly wanted to hush things up and Dungy and other Christians helped with the cover up. That is totally opposed to everything Christianity teaches about how justice should triumph even when the guilty are powerful. Dungy, himself, totally minimized Belicheat's* cheating when asked. Now you have TO trying to make the best out of a horribly difficult situation and Dungy plays this moral leader kind of role. Hey pal, where was the moral leader role when Belicheat* was the issue. Power (NFL image, Belicheat*) triumphed over justice then and you were helping with it.

The sad thing is Buffalo is no one's main rival anymore. We have been insignificant so long no team feels some great thrill if they beat us in a game. But NE* and Belicheat* are such low lifes that I wish bad things to come to them more than to any other team and I want the Bills to beat them more than any other team.

Its amazing how much a good QB correlates to winning in the NFL. Its also amazing that in 50 years the Bills have been led by only 3 great QBs: Kemp, Ferguson, and Kelly. (You could throw Lamonica in there because he and Kemp worked in tandem, but Lamonica had bigger success after he left). And only during the eras of those 3 QBs did the Bill win big, or usually have even winning seasons. I don't think you could call Flutie a great QB even though he was a great leader and gutsy character and did lead us to the playoffs. Anyway, the Bills do seem kind of clueless about selecting QBs or even putting a priority on them. TE came in the 3rd round. What about all those selections in the top 15 picks we have had in the last decade? What if we had selected one less DB along the way and went with a QB. Anyway, the Bills get what they pay for in QBs based on the draft priority they give the position. And giving up a 1st for Bledsoe was just plain dumb.

DJ loses to nearly all teams that finish above .500 but still finishes 7-9 every year. What does that tell us? He generally beats the pitiful teams. It would be extremely unlikely the Bills would lose to the Browns the same way we did not lose to TB. And after the Browns win the spin will be it looks like the offense if finally coming together, etc. So DJ is not likely to get fired during this season unless at say 4-6 the thinking is we cannot reach the playoffs and he should go. My take is RW will at least milk the rest of this season out of DJ even if he heads for another 7-9. If Bobby April or someone is promoted interim HC they probably would have to pay him more right away.

This is the key point I think. The wind is usually a factor for home games. Having the wind in the 4th quarter is very important. On the road the crowd can be really revved up at the start of a game and fire up a defense if the visiting team has the ball. Of course it can also fire up the home offense if they have the ball.

I disagree with Tim Graham strongly on what TO owes the media. TO is not involved well in the offense and that is certainly trying to him as it would be to any of us in that situation. TO should not be asked what is wrong with the Bills offense because he is not in charge of designing the offense or calling the plays. All he can say without throwing the coaches and TE under the bus is that he is just running the plays being called. What else could he possibly say? I think TO is trying to handle a difficult situation well and doing the best he can with it. I wish Tim Graham could have had the same tenacity with Belicheat* during public interviews during a legitimate scandal involving a major coach as he does with TO. I never heard him try to egg Belicheat* in any way to say something controversial.

It may be true that converting the 4th down would not have meant anything but we also might have at least moved into FG range to pull to within one score with some decent time left on the clock. Also, I would not have been critical of DJ for trying it and failing because it was what needed to be tried at that point, with the amount of time left. The other thing to remember is that just because the Saints get the ball on our 28 doesn't mean a sure TD. If they get a FG we still only need to scores, just as before.

Sometimes I think DJ is coaching for his next job, DC for a respected team, maybe NE*. He wants to be able to show his defense played well, esp. the secondary, and that he was a level headed coach who didn't make extreme decisions, probably what you want out of a good DC. He doesn't want to get a rep. saying that his last year he became desperate and started taking risky chances because then his next potential employer would think the strain of being a HC made him start to make unsound decisions. That wouldn't look good for him. For a DC position no one will care if he was over careful on offense here. Its either all that or he just does really not have a feel for a game and know when you have to take a small risk. Small, because 90% chance you get a half yard on a QB sneak. Also small, because if you don't make it still a great chance to hold NO to a field goal and keep a lot of time on the clock for the needed two scores by the Bills.

It seemed that AVP was really somewhat innovative with the play calling the first two weeks and this week there was none of that and it seemed much more conservative. What happened to plays like the end around or reverse to TO. Or more screens passes.

I think the same thing all the time. But I blame Tom Donahoe that his level of incompetence was so high that he could not assess that Rusty Jones was brilliant--the best in the game. He wanted to bring in a former Pittsburgh chum. In respect to things like Rusty Jones I think Brandon is a much better GM than Donahoe, in spite of not having the football background.

Exactly right. Also QB sneak probably easily gets first down.

I think any sane football fan would agree with Gannon. That being said when someone is a broadcaster who was a former player only a few years ago, it is a somewhat awkward situation. I don't know if he can as a former player just state his frustrations with management in an extreme way and then go into a broadcast booth and be a color analyst for a game of the same team. For that reason few broadcasters who are former players make extremely negative statements about their former teams. Anyway, just imagine if we had someone publicly commented that the Bills will never win a SB as long as Wilson is the owner and then go into a booth and broadcast a Bills game (not be a network commentator, but an at game broadcaster). I'm not sure we would not find that annoying as Bills fans even if we agreed with the statement.

The one thing we would miss with Whitner is that he is one of the few team leaders we have. In that sense Marv make a good pick. What I don't really understand is why all the emphasis on character doesn't also get us a lot of leadership from other players. Leadership is part of character. We have a bunch of high quality character players that are kind of quiet models for other players. TO may not be what one would associate with high character but he is a leader in that he intensely wants to win (and look good himself doing it) and people like TE are afraid to let him down. The most important thing about character in a football sense is that you are a person that other people are afraid to let down. Whitner has made other players accountable but he needs to step up his play to be able to do it long term.