Sisyphean Bills

Well, the balls were underinflated. Nobody can deny that. No one can deny that there is a rule about this aspect of the game. No one can deny that the NFL has a process to specifically measure the pressure in footballs before each and every game. That's not following the rules. That's the definition of cheating: "to break a rule or law". Arguing about how much of a competitive advantage it provides, etc. is purely posturing. I heard some woman on NFL radio going off that "all the teams underinflate their balls" so the Patriots are just being persecuted for being her team...

Meh. I'd rather prep my team to recognize the formation. Since the Patriots are intentionally lining up with a RB playing "OT" and split many yards too wide to be involved in the play in any way whatsoever (other than purely as a decoy), it's an invitation to totally crush Tom "Softballs" Brady.

Judged after only 6 quarters.

He's a grand master at telekinesis?

There's always some degree of throwing people under the bus. Its just another falling domino. Whaley continues to replace the people Buddy Nix brought in just as Buddy had replaced the staff Donahoe and Modrak had assembled.

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http://www.cbsnews.com/news/new-england-patriots-scandals-from-spies-to-snowplows/ There seems to be a lot of coincidence swirling around Foxboro. And the above article doesn't mention "Block-gate": http://www.boston.com/sports/football/patriots/extra_points/2014/12/report_dolphins_believe_patriots_used_illegal_form.html

This is true. Paul Brown (the ultimate hands-on owner) set his team up this way because he felt strongly that coaches (which meant himself) needed to do their own scouting. Mike Brown runs things the way his dad did. (BTW, Bill Belichick believes this as well, although he has people trained to do some of the legwork for him.) As for Lewis, Brown also believed in continuity. The Bengals have only had 9 head coaches in their history. The Bills, by comparison, have had 8 head coaches since Marv Levy retired (the first time).

They have to be careful not to lap themselves.

Terry Bledsoe was worse.

To clear a contract.

I hope it doesn't work in a way where people are off building their fiefdoms. When Whaley built a roster and Marrone, for whatever reason, was unable (or unwilling) to use the parts he packaged up for him on offense, we got an anemic product. That's no way to Build a Bully. If you use Parcells' analogy, it is important that Whaley shops for the right ingredients for his chef. If Rex sets the menu to serve steaks, then Whaley can't go off, see a sale price on chicken, call the CPA to see how much money the restaurant will save with chicken, and show up with a flock of frozen chicken. Everyone has to face the same goal post. If Rex wants steak, I expect Whaley to put each steak off the butcher's table through his fancy little microscope and know exactly which one will work for Rex and make the customers smile their butts off.

Think they can run a read option in braille?

I mean like big boxes. And needs a forklift sort of deal.

Pepper, Schwartz, etc. might not come right out and say. "That guy was a total putz." But you know somewhere inside their heads they are thinking: "That guy was a total putz."

Hopefully, he'll have plenty of Lombardi Trophies in his box when he leaves.

Speaking of which, he isn't in a real great position to hire assistants after torpedoing his Bills staff. Pissed off voice: "What the hello?!" DM: "Is this The Schwartz?" <click> DM: "Hunh. Better dial that one again." phone: "Sorry, this party is no longer accepting calls from this number."

He said that? The answer is obvious. Pegula makes the decision.

The Jags do need a culture change.

DW said any time you have a guy with a limited resume, you're going to drop his grade based on the lack of work. They are just harder to scout and there is a lot of extra work to be done. (Completely true.) OTOH, that doesn't mean C Jones can't blow the scouts away with his workouts, football IQ, etc. Someone compared him to the Cam Newton situation, and there are a lot of parallels. All it takes is one GM to fall in love with the guy...

He has always been a guy who is much more productive when you get him in open space. Marrone/Hackett's experiment to make him a between the tackles runner and take him out of the passing game failed—his production went down across the board. So, you ask the perfect question here. If they want to bring CJ back as a change of pace runner to their ground and pound game, then how much of the cap do they want to allocate for that? It's been a common refrain with Bills picks in the past, and it applies in this case as well. It's not CJ's fault he is what he is or that Buddy took him as high as he did. But the Bills can't expect him to be Adrian Peterson based on where he was drafted either; his film doesn't support that.

Whaley's comment sort of undermines the thread that he was going to ram EJM down the new coach's throat. About all Rex would say is that EJM would be evaluated and get his chance. He acknowledged EJM had some skills, but the tenor compared to last off-season's "we're expecting big things" sorts of comments was certainly muted, even by DW.

Hiya Hope, I confused you with my rambling. By little investment as possible, I was referring to a certain front office philosophy that the Bills don't want to spend any coin on the unsexy (unmarketable) guys up front and instead seek out rookies, retreads and multiple time failures under the assumption that their elite coaching staff is crack enough to turn the busts into a butterfly. Marrone failed big time at this as did Jauron's offensive staff. Gailey was able to hide his OL behind a "get the ball out" short passing game. Buddy Nix wanted a big 1990s Hogs or Cowboys style OL, but in this era the trend is towards guys that are athletic and can get out on the second level as well as pass protect. You don't see Nate Newton guys with 3 or 4 spare tires on their guts running around these days in the spread offenses, etc.

No, that was the point. Who wants to see EJM running the offense out of an empty backfield?

It will be very telling if Rex wears a visor. Seriously, I will be interested to see if the Bills continue to go down the road of using the "hulking, lurching behemoths" strategy to build an NFL line with as little investment as possible. Like the dittoheads keep saying in the Cowboys games, those OL picks aren't the "sexy" picks on draft day, but they paid off.