Sisyphean Bills

I meant 25% of the DL as in he's only 1 guy out of 4. If the other 3 suck (not saying they do btw), it doesn't really matter if Stroud comes back as All World or not. And if he is All World and they spin him in and out of a lineup that has little else going for it, is that really a good thing? That's all. Yeah, I suspect Johnson will come in on passing downs. While it is sort of the rage in the NFL now to flop down a pass rushing DE to DT, the Bills may actually flip Johnson out to DE. The other thing about that is that Johnson and McCargo are more 3s. Are they going to put Stroud there and keep Williams at the 1?

But, but, having some depth is overrated and a waste of cap money! So I've read here, anyway. (I thought 22 seemed fairly generous, considering. Afterall, Stroud is only 25% of the DL, assuming he plays every snap.) Bingo! If a coach has a Bryant Young at DT and is trotting him off the field every other play, he is either outsmarting himself or he doesn't really have a Bryant Young. Part of the reason Spencer Johnson is a rather unknown quantity is precisely because the Vikings coaches left the Williams monsters on the field -- because the Williams guys are fuggin good players.

Your logic is flawed, because you're assuming that the only way to get a RB at all is through the draft. That's not true. There are plenty of veteran RBs that become available each season. RB is also the easiest position to scout, to replace, and for someone to come in and play. Put it this way, would you rather pick up a veteran RB (and you'd know what to expect) and/or a mix of lower rounders and draft a franchise LT or pass rusher to anchor your line for 10 years -OR- would you want to pick a RB in the 1st round for (hopefully, he's not a bust) 3-5 years and fill your lines with whatever you can find in FA and lower rounders? Hint: take a glance at New England.

This is a good argument for why drafting a RB high in the 1st round is a long-range loser's decision.

Fair enough. Continuous improvement is a sign of good young players and good coaching working in concert. Edwards did have a decent year statistically speaking last year. * (I'm ignoring qualifiers like "for a 3rd round rookie".) He was truly dismal in the 4th quarter of games (rating of 34.2) and generally wore down over the course of games. He also struggled more the more he played. So, it is not unfathomable that he'll regress as defenses have more on him. A lot also depends on Turk Schonert's undemonstrated and unknown ability to change up the offense to make it passably effective but not so much it becomes a different variant of cluster. Yeah, who knows about Stroud at this point. The Bills have put their 2008 marbles in his jar; but, that doesn't address why the Jaguars were perfectly content to part company with the big guy on what superficial seemed like pretty affable terms for the Bills. We need a lot more than a Tony Boselli damaged goods type or a Dana Stubblefield overrated system and surroundings player. * This comment was strictly looking at passer rating. Looking at other numbers, such as his adjusted net yards per attempt, show that Edwards (and Losman for that matter) had little success in moving the offense through the air. That statistic is downright bad for both Bills QBs and in the company of Kyle Boller, Cleo Lemon and David Carr.

OK, but this is a circular definition, eh? If you believe the talent level is extremely low, then any sort of marginal success is not performing below that talent level and that implies the poor (as measured against successful teams) play has little/nothing to do with the coach. In fact, it seems far more challenging for a team with lousy talent to consistently perform below minimal expectations -- even blind squirrels find nuts once in a while.

Wait. You're using an internet poll as a basis for argument? If you want to go for the jugular, you could say "RJ would have won that game."

I'm not convinced. What are your arguments to support this claim? Indeed, it's rather easier to believe that Jauron, even if he was given a roster with several Pro Bowlers, would find a way to play rope-a-dope. The argument that Jauron knows what to do with great offensive players seems highly fantastic. Out of curiosity, what would it take for you to change your mind about Jauron and believe that he is a marginal head coach rather than that all of his problems are simply "lack of talent"?

I think it is simpler than that. Jauron just doesn't win football games. Walsh revolutionized the game of football and had one of the most pervasive and extensive impacts on the game of football as anyone has ever had. Jauron is a grain of sand compared to that mountain.

The price will only go up and up as the cap goes along its exponential curve. The Bills need their "chiefs" and core leaders. Pissing off their best players isn't putting a good foot forward. Sometimes, I wonder if the "loose purse strings" of the Butler regime has scarred this franchise so deeply, they are incapable of making decisions that lead to success.

I'm not sure that I have much problem with it either. People that do their jobs exceptionally well are rare. They deserve to be paid well and kept happy. Good management does that. If this were only true. Continuity on the lines is definitely a good thing. Shuffling personnel in the trenches constantly is never good. However, continuity alone does not guarantee positive results. In the Ostroski Era of Buffalo lines, the Bills had very good continuity, and that line was a huge tease every year. They'd play themselves into being an effective line in December and look like a group of school girls the following September annually. I rather think that a line is only as strong as its weakest link. If you field a 3 or 4 stud offensive line, the defense is going to attack the 1 or 2 duds.

Building the core through the draft is the key. It is exactly how the Chargers, Colts, and Patriots were built. (Although the Patriots do a good job of adding spare parts in FA, typically, as well.) Oh, and I'll toss in the Giants as well. This emphasizes several things. A) The FO must have a viable blueprint for what they want to build in the first place. Just playing spin the wheel each off-season and trying to score marketing flash isn't a blueprint or a plan. B) A team needs a core. A core is a group of players that are the leaders of the team. "The navy is run by its chiefs." C) The draft is the best way to go. Its not about pinching the pennies and winning the battle for "team with the most cap space" -- it's about drafting, developing, and retaining talent so that your franchise doesn't go through 10 year droughts of losing, ineptness, and chasing butterflies. Every team whiffs on draft picks, but successful teams don't make a habit of wasting their picks with nothing to show for it year in and year out. It's like that commercial where the guy buys a painting in an auction house and before he sits back down he wants to sell it. That's not building for the future or investing in your people. That's being a fool.

Why is it extreme? It's a different sort of competition with different rules and goals, but it is still a competition between different teams of people, no? I think the point is smack on. An opportunity is just handing a guy a job. No amazing management skills are needed to do that. Creating an environment of success is a vastly different thing. It's simple to say, "I hired you to build this interstate highway!" But it is profoundly unrealistic to expect success if you banish the guy on a desert island with nothing but a coconut tree, a nachwurst, and an empty beer bottle. "I'll send a hula girl next year, dude." Building our highway...

The Cowboys game is a real case study. The Cowboys are a very talented team -- many think the most talented team in the NFC, in fact. And the half-fullians could use the fact that it took a miracle finish for the Cowboys to knock off the Bills as positive evidence that the Bills are blossoming into an upper echelon team, ready for the playoffs. On the other hand, one could ask: how often does a team that is +6 in turnover margin in an NFL game lose? The odds are extremely long; it is profoundly rare. Because, in order to accomplish this amazing feat, the other team has to be superior in all phases of the game: they have to mentally tougher, better prepared to deal with adversity and adjust on the fly -- making up a gameplan in real time; they have to have a defense that can shut it down on a short field; they have to have special teams that can keep the TOs from hurting them too badly on field position; and, they have to have an offense that is so superior that 6 major mistakes can be overcome with more than 6 major positive plays.

The year before was, IIRC, 48-3 on the playoff exit. The point is that just squeaking into the playoffs from a weak division or on a weak schedule doesn't necessarily disguise a team's true weaknesses quite as well as being near 0.500 and "almost playoff eligible" does. Because when they go up against the more complete, more talented teams in the playoffs, they get crushed. Apparently, the possibility of watching the Patriots/Chargers/Colts score a touchdown every time they get the ball in a nationally televised playoff game doesn't get me as jacked up as others.

What was Peters 2nd contract for? Aren't the Bills significantly below the cap? If I was JP's agent, I'm not sure I'd be thrilled with the Bills. The secret is out. Peters is an elite player. Yes, the Bills extended him and gave him a raise over his absolute bargain basement UDFA contract. But, then they went out and threw money at two veteran OL players, neither one of which is in Peters class, and paid them more (I assume it is more). And Peters plays the money position on the line!

I wonder: are people really going to be thrilled to back into the playoffs and get destroyed? I seem to recall a 62-7 playoff game that left a coach in the ditch once upon a time.

I don't disagree that having a teammate go down like that was probably a big shock. My only quibble there is that it happened during the game and did not impact the entire week leading up to the game, game preparations, planning, coaching, and the whole mood of the organization like Taylor's death impacted the Redskins (in fact, the entire NFL). That's really sums it up. There are no guarantees that adding Marcus is going to vault a pathetic defense into the top half of the NFL, etc., etc., etc. We can certainly hope so and only time will tell for sure.

Just curious, but you mentioned in another post that the "1 quality target" wasn't really a complete WR. Evans had 55 catches (45th in the NFL) for 849 yards (32nd in the NFL), a 3.7 YAC last year (below the top 50), and 5 TDs (36th in the NFL). What is the definition of "quality"? Note that Steve Smith, who is a similar player, had superior stats in every one of these categories and he had no help, was on a bad offense, and his QB situation was a total train wreck.

Actually, the list of Jauron's Bills Pro Bowlers is only and Brian Moorman. Slim Pickens would be proud.

Which obviously sets him apart from other head coaching failures.

No offense intended, but I credited the Bills with winning that game. It was their only win all season against a better than garbage opponent, in fact. That game and the Cowboys game would be the two games to use as springboards of hope, in fact. I mentioned the Taylor murder because it was obviously a huge disruption and distraction for the Redskins in that game. Taylor was the leader of that team and an All-Pro. He wasn't just hurt badly, he's dead. Football players get hurt all the time; but, teams don't expect their leaders -- a better comparison would be Jim Kelly or Bruce Smith -- to turn up dead in the middle of the season. The murder (as well as some solid play by their backup QB) actually turned into a rallying cry to propel them into the playoffs; but, the team was still in shock when the Bills came calling. I don't disagree, totally; but, I do have a minor semantics quibble. The Bills have attempted to address some of the major weaknesses of 07. It has not been proven that they have actually fixed the problems. Indeed, even if they have fixed some problems, it is quite probable that other issues will come to the fore. Yep. I agree that the schedule this year is soft on paper and that is a good argument for being optimistic for 08. OTOH, while we Bills fans are hoping it is the Bills turn, the opposition is also trying to address their weaknesses and the fickle fates haven't cast their dice just yet as to which moves pan out and which tank.

Indeed. Sort of tarnishes the claim that a good defense can be had with scrub corners, eh?

The problem isn't so much having a 1st round CB. The problem is being a farm team that drafts 1st round CBs, developing them from a college player to a quality NFL starter, and then letting them walk out of the building because the team won't pay the going freight. In short, it's not the player that is the problem, it is the revolving door that just keeps on twirling away.

He's one of the biggest draws in sports. Pack management is insane.