Sisyphean Bills

That's because Modrak had no input into the process until the 7th round and later. To the OP: where does it say he is starting?!?

I understood you perfectly. I just don't think it's a given and thus don't agree with your comment: By the way, my original retort was to this post: http://forums.twobillsdrive.com/topic/133850-insider-nix-hasnt-addressed-bills-greatest-needs/page__view__findpost__p__2230633 Which may have been a joke or not, but there was certainly nothing of a debate as quoted.

They both lost more games than they won.

Well, you might think I have never posted any reasons why I have an opinion, but you'd be wrong again. That's OK, though. We don't have to agree. (Though, I have agreed with some of your posts in the past.) As I already posted in this thread, I think Nix hasn't done much to address the OL. This is not a unique assessment on my part. Many talking heads in the media and, yes, even some NFL insiders agree with this assessment. Recapping: The o-line hasn't been very good since it was totally dismantled the last year Jauron was here and Nix has brought in little help for it since. Wang might just be cut and Hairston is a rookie and depth. This year, Hangartner is on the bench, Wood is at a new position, the coaches aren't sure if Levitre or Reinhart should be starting, or Bell or Levitre, it a given there is a new starter at RG (vacated by Wood), and also at RT. That is a lot of change since 12 months ago and change doesn't equal improvement. Have you ever played o-line? It's a team within a team. It's a gestalt that takes time to develop. It's not a microwave bake of the 5 biggest guys. As far as the health kick: let's take Bell for an example. He may be healthy now, but he's been struggling to keep his job. One might call that definitely better or improvement, but others might see it quite differently.

The big question is if all the handicaps he has are self-imposed or being imposed on him. It's rather hard to build exclusively through the draft when you lose as many as you get every year. It's the treadmill to nowhere. Dareus looks like the real deal. Hopefully, he can stay healthy and develop into a stud. The d-line needed help and got some with that pick. I have to agree on the o-line. The Buddy era hasn't done much. Maybe Hairston is a player, but the 2 picks last year don't look so hot. It's going to take time there and they're behind the 8-ball with the lock-out. Expecting the right side of your line to be manned by cast-offs ("extra draft picks") is a big gamble. Kelsay is as bad as it gets as an OLB, but I hope they'll play him more at DE where he doesn't play clueless. Merriman is a risk -- a risk worth taking -- and hopefully some of the kids can come along and provide depth. The roster looks scary thin and not ready to compete with the juggernauts yet. But Buddy knows that, I think. His plan is multi-year and "pain and patience" is the motto.

Indeed. You aren't the King of building arguments from negative premises for nothing. (Don't worry you weren't the only one that thought Trent Edwards looked great last pre-season.) But, I see that you actually did put a thought down to support your claim that the OL is definitely better later in the thread. My bad on that. Unfortunately, the less injured means better thing only lasts as long as the line suffers no injuries, which given the recent past has been fleeting.

By its vacuous nature of argument.

Do you think we could get a 5th rounder for him?!?

Seems like he can see where he is throwing the ball now.

There is a difference between cash on hand and how much under the cap the team is. Ask Littmann.

If he had to raise a little cash on hand by dealing the 30+ Evans all in order to re-sign an All-Pro in Kyle, then that's the way it goes...

Our coaches light them on fire ... ah, I mean, they light a fire under 'em. Yeah, that's it.

Yep. In today's market, WRs and RBs are commodity positions and thus their value has a lower ceiling. Teams tend to find productive players at these positions later in the draft and even off the street every year. (As often posted, some find it quite frustrating that the Bills have spent so many 1st and 2nd round picks at these positions.)

Just thought this was interesting: There is no smaller market in professional sports than Green Bay. It does not exist. And, Indianapolis is not considered a huge market either. Still, the Bills are well-known to cry "small market" any and every time some sort of expenses come up. (e.g., Littmann's comment on the "small-market handicap: http://football.ballparks.com/NFL/BuffaloBills/index.htm ) OTOH, what has stopped the Bills? http://sports.yahoo.com/nfl/news?slug=ms-ownersrankingspartone072208 The NFL made special provisions for them to regionalize the brand to include the huge area of southern Ontario including Toronto. The trouble is that the Bills are not competitive, so simply getting crushed in Toronto in an irrelevant game annually is probably not all that effective a marketing ploy to win over new, young fans. (There seemed to be more Dolphins fans at that Toronto game than Bills fans.)

Nix has provided varying explanations on the Evans trade. I think we'll have to agree to disagree. If you allow JW's comments outside of the article (which you do not apparently), he made the inference pretty plain. Maybe you should take it up with him.

So, is your position to stick with the Evans demanded the trade position? The deception is patently obvious. Nix talked to JW, and JW came away from that conversation connecting the dots that this trade happened with less than perfect agreement between the front office types. If there was not such disagreement and the trade happened because Lee Evans demanded it or because it was Nix' idea in total, then JW was deceived into explaining the circumstances in an entirely different (and unflattering) light altogether. Not to mention that the motivation for such deception would be to protect the image of a former player and that outweighing perhaps portraying the Bills FO as dysfunctional from a guy well known to be very direct, sometimes even apolitically -- "even the Raiders get calls." It's not a stretch at all to believe the business side of the Bills acted on this. It's happened before. It's far more likely than the "my dog ate my homework" sort of explanations.

I'm willing to give Rex the credit for the Bengals #76's "Ole! block" and being comically stiff and slow.

There is something pretty funny about someone focusing on the leaves on trees in the background of a picture of a scantily clad woman.

Yes, excellent point. He wrote that Nix tried to distance himself from the situation and that Overdorf does the trades, but did not say who the source of the latter information was. It could even have been multiple sources. Thanks for making that clear. Still, that doesn't alter my argument that the way this is written does not lead one to reason that Nix decided to trade Evans and then left Overdorf to handle all the details. However it was that JW learned of Overdorf's involvement, the juxtaposition of these paragraphs is not purely accidental. Furthermore, as I wrote above, this sort of thing has been leaked in the past from others who worked within the organization and that have commented the football operation has ridden in the rumble seat of the organization...

Nevertheless, the thing Nix let slip wasn't that Evans wanted out, but to draw into the conversation a long-time Ralph inner circle member. Indeed, Nix is anything but deceptive in his character.

Yours is not the more reasonable explanation from the context of what John Wawrow actually wrote. And, I don't think JW wrote what he wrote casually, without thought, or to deliberately mislead his readers. From the context of the article, JW wrote: A few days later, Nix attempted to put the trade behind him by telling The Associated Press that there were a lot of things that went into the deal that he couldn't elaborate on publicly. Nix didn't handle trade talks, leaving that job with Jim Overdorf, the team's salary cap specialist and senior vice president of football administration. So Nix was trying to distance himself from the situation and [edit: it was] divulged that Jim Overdorf handles trade talks within the structure of the Buffalo Bills front office. Why even say "there are things I can't go on record about" if you actually made the call on the trade and could articulate all the logical, football reasons that led you to make such a decision, if it were yours? Frankly, you simply wouldn't. Nix tried to paint a smile on, but ended up revealing it wasn't his call, just as other football people in his position over the last 50 years have done as well.

When The System leaves no cash on hand for the business, one has to free up money by cutting expenses first.

Coverage skills are so overrated anyway...

It's just part of the Plan.