Sisyphean Bills

The days part is a typo, right?

Well, he was a stiff.

True. The draft had a marked emphasis on FINE special teams players...

Well, that last sums it up rather nicely as to exactly why it's fantastically remote that Favre would be a Buffalo Bill. Maybe if Hollywood were still dictating the pilot house -- this sort of thing would be right in his Big Media Splash wheel house, enough so he'd give up a ton to make it happen. But, not now with the plodding snooze-and-lose regime bunking behind the nautical wheel.

It's just a matter of perspective.

On the bright side, the only way to go is up.

Can't disagree with that. BTW, if (a big if) there is any truth at all to that rumor that he trotted JP Losman out there in his rookie year, just after he got his cast off, to "teach him a lesson" and because he knew JPL wasn't prepared then that is just plain a miserable excuse for coaching. What does that tell the other 52 guys on the team? OTOH, I think that rumor is a total crock. But then, so was Mularkey.

OK, truce accepted then. I think the FO has been behind him the whole way in Buffalo. It's not news that he and Jerry Angelo did not get along, but DJ was hired in Chicago in 1999 and Angelo didn't arrive until 2001. I'm not sure why you think the FO was against him in 1999 or 2000. Maybe you just mean the Bears FO is a cluster? But on that note, how stable and successful has the current FO been in Buffalo? There are many of the same guys that Tom Donahoe brought in when he swept out the FO still here. Do you think the Bears team that went to the Super Bowl in 06 had any talent? There are many players that were on that team that were on the 03 squad that Jauron coached. Let's set up a scenario then. Let's say Trent Edwards gets injured week 4 and misses 8 weeks of the season and the Bills do not go 8-8. Is that enough to save Jauron? What if we add Schobel or Walker or McGee? What if Stroud's ankle isn't sound and he only takes 25% of the defensive snaps? Is there really no scenario where you would say Jauron has enough excuses and regardless of final record, he should stay? FWIW, I think that if the wheels come off in 08, Ralph will step in and go on a rampage and we'll start over. All I'm saying is that "narrowly missing the playoffs" (just like last year) is not necessarily a hanging offense, especially if there are ample excuses to trot out. Sure. I hope the FO gets their credit too. Especially if we believe Jauron has nothing to do with stocking the roster. Sure. I think though that the injury argument is overblown in the sense that it is a ready-made excuse for every problem. The fact is that every NFL team has injuries every year and many are far more crippling to the team than the loss of Aaron Merz, Copeland Bryan, or Matt Murphy. Injuries are disruptive, but they are a part of the game and must be dealt with as part of the game. Injuries alone should not be a foundation for pardoning poor play and losing. Great and even good coaches find ways to manage their teams to wins in spite of injuries. Bill Belichick and Tom Coughlin come immediately to mind as examples.

Please, just stop quoting this 17 statistic like some magic talisman. I know it, you know it, I know you know it, we all know it. The point is that it isn't the magnitude of the number that is important, it is the player and who the backup is that is important. Losing Rolle, McAllister, Ogden, McNair, Pryce, and Heap is a major talent drain for any team. (But the Dolphins are happy about it, saved them from 0-16.) Losing Copeland Bryan, Jason Whittle, Aaron Merz, Kevin Everett, Kevin Harrison, Matt Murphy, Coy Wire, Anthony Thomas, Kiwaukee Thomas, Jason Webster, Peerless Price, Al Wallace, George Wilson, Ryan Denney, Paul Posluszny, Ko Simpson, and Derek Schouman is disruptive, yes, but it is hardly a list of All Pros or Hall of Famers and in many cases these players were outperformed by their understudy anyway.

I understand that postmortem evaluation of the 07 season and how the changes made this off-season, assuming they pan out, can lend themselves to optimism. The 7-9 and 17 on IR stat lines support that take and that's all good. On the other hand and just to brief the other view slightly, the Bills went 0-3 to close out the season and their offense was horrible. They went 3-5 in the second half of the season with 2 of those wins against a deflated, demoralized, and disastrous Dolphins punching bag. That leaves 1 win in the last half of the season against a quality opponent. The only win against a playoff team came on a last second kick against a Redskins team that had had their best player murdered that week. Then there were the brutal blowouts against quality opponents that just bent the Bills over on both sides of the ball and simply had their way with them. Then there were the games where the strategic philosophy backfired with Denver and Dallas winning the game in the last minute. Sure there was a game against the Bengals and the Dolphins (teams with pathetic defenses and internal squabbling) where the Bills gave the impression of being a more complete team; but, the point is that the progression just wasn't there. Over the course of the season, the Bills kept showing up for games but the same mistakes kept getting made too. There are a lot of questions and a lot of the answers have yet to show up on the playing field. PS: It's fine to say that Trent Edwards had a lot of poise and looked like a promising rookie in 07. On the other hand, it is also true that the Bills offense sucked hard, sucked in a record-setting bad way. Any aspirations of a quality playoff season in 08 are linked in no small part to Mr. Edwards and his development. So, yes, setting aside the hype (I listen to NFL radio and hear all the backslapping on how Edwards took the NFL by storm last year too, but that doesn't jive completely with stats like points and watching the games), to be a playoff team, the Bills will need a ton more production out of the QB position than Edwards gave them last year. While we can be hopeful, I don't see how anyone can say it is a given with a straight face at this point. PPS: And so as not to be QB and offense myopic, I'll mention that the defense has to improve greatly to be a quality playoff contending team. They sucked against the run. I can't remember how many times receivers were totally wide open in the secondary with no defender within 10 yards, or the missed tackles, or being pancaked, or being totally out of position, or taking terrible pursuit angles... They couldn't generate much/any QB pressure most of the time. Not saying there were no excuses, but clearly the defense must get much, much better to compete with the big boys ... or even the average boys with a little meat on their bones.

That is a decent level headed response, except for the last paragraph where you again presume to know what I think. Your dogging defense of Jauron by ad hominem attacks against me do nothing to change my view that Jauron is, at his very best, a very average NFL head coach. He has his good qualities: he's stand up; he's a good teacher; he goes to bat for his players; he doesn't overreact; he gets along very well with the people he works with both up and down the ladder. But he has some serious deficiencies: his teams don't win enough (which should be a major part of any evaluation in this business); he can't beat quality competition (call it sarcasm, but it is a fact -- 0.189 lifetime against playoff teams); he's not a good game day coach; his strategy is simple and unimaginative, amounting to taking the air out of the ball; he's an imitator not an innovator; he has never shown he can build a team (whether you believe he is just a bystander or not); his coaching hires, particularly on offense, have been atrocious (which begs the question, is it really the OCs that are always 100% at fault or is there some other common thread?); he also can't seem to ever keep his teams very healthy (maybe it is also just coincidence, of course, but his Bears teams had plenty of injury stories too -- although having Chris Chandler run a QB sneak had to be one of the top 10 dumbest coaching decisions that I've ever seen). But, to answer you honestly: I think Dick Jauron is an average NFL head coach. Nothing more and nothing less. I do see that he has his good qualities, just like most everyone brings some good qualities to their vocation. I hope that he can learn on the job and correct some of his other deficiencies, but this off-season smacked an awful lot to me of business-as-usual for the same old Buffalo Bills. So, yes, Dick Jauron has a thing or two to prove. Further, I'm not really convinced that he has just one more season to prove himself at this point. A ton of things could happen that would allow him to eel off any metaphorical hook and given that the GM position has been done away with, it would require the 4-headed hydra GM to agree that Dick was not performing and that a change had to happen after only 3 years in. As far as 08, I don't expect the Bills to make the playoffs. The AFC has too many excellent teams for the Bills to crack the top 6. It could happen if all the bounces go their way, but that seems like betting against the odds. The Bills will have their problems in 08, whatever those issues turn out to be. I expect more of the same, with some players not stepping up while other players improve. Frankly, nothing would surprise me. I could see the wheels falling off and this team going 3-13. I could also see a lot of things going the Bills way and they make the 6th seed in the playoffs to get hammered by a more talented team. So, I fundamentally agree that neither high nor low expectations are necessarily completely wrong and grounds to call other fans morons and idiots.

Steve McNair. Todd Heap. Their starting corners. Nobody special. Actually, there is no problem at all. I agree and can see the Ravens turning it around quickly again. Unlike other franchises, the hiring of a new head coach didn't necessarily mean that most of the core veterans got thrown overboard.

The durability thing is more than a tad ironic.

Agreed.

The Ravens were 13-3 in 06. Again, the Bills were not the only team to have injuries in 07. Also, how consistent is it to argue that the Bills rookie OC will obviously make hay while the Ravens rookie HC will obviously be a bust?

First off, it's not a good question. Not everybody had the same expectations going into the 07 season (say in July of 07) and not everybody evaluates or weighs what happened in 07 the same way. "Did they overperform, underperform, or perform about as you expected?" The answer is all of the above. Jabari Greer and John DiGiorgio performed above expectations in no small part because who exactly was expected them to play most of the season? Jason Peters exceeded expectations, which were high, by showing he could continue to improve and become an elite player. Dockery was sold as a monster in the running game, billed to be a huge road grader and would upgrade the running game -- never happened, despite the huge outlay given him. Disappointed? Happy that we gave up fewer sacks? Both? Robert Royal and Larry Tripplett stunk it up again, which is underachieving, but that may have been expected by more than a few. Then there is the QB position, where "all of the above" applies in spades. JP Losman's regression and benching was underachieving in a truly huge way. Of course, he had help, but he didn't get it done either. Then there is Trent Edwards and opinions vary on him across the spectrum. The fact is the QB position is unsettled and the Bills are still looking for a QB to settle in and establish a winning tradition in Buffalo. Even if one is high on Trent Edward's potential, saying that he performed better than expectations is both true and not answering the original question -- nobody expected him to be the starting QB going into the 07 season, so focusing on Edwards being a surprise is 20-20 hindsight and glossing over the regression and aborted development of Losman. (Are the Bills so sure fire sold on Edwards? Why'd they keep Losman when they can cut him and bring in a veteran like Culpepper, a guy that actually played at a high level in this league and might truly be a mentor to a young stud QB? Or is it simply that Losman comes cheap? How expensive are other young backup QBs anyway?) One can fixate on injuries with the defense and be amazed that the Bills were able to plug young unknown (but not necessarily devoid of any talent to run to the ball whatsoever) players into their vanilla defense and say the defense over achieved. Or one can recall a defense that couldn't stop the run or the pass or get off the field. A defense that was routinely gashed and had its safeties make 234 tackles on the season. Not that the wrong stats mean anything. It's only the right stats, like 7-9, that have meaning. Because 7-9 was what the Bills did in 06, too; but, in 07, they went 7-9 which should naturally exceed anyone's expectations from last July because they got a rookie QB out on the field, had ample injuries, and the players love Dick. Unfortunately, 2 of the 3 are simply hindsight and the 3rd, while known, is little more than a subjective platform to dismiss uncomfortable criticism. Yet hope springs eternal. In July 08, high expectations are abundant. A rookie OC and WR are going to cure everything that was wrong with the Bills dumbed down and punchless offense. The addition of a veteran, drug-suspended, bad-ankled DT who lost his job and became expendable because of the platoon play of an 11 year grizzled veteran and a rookie; the addition of a couple of other free agents (after all, the brain trust's recent track record in FA has been so strong, right?); and, not to mention the return of a handful of guys coming out of rehab: these are all reasons why we should have high expectations -- why, in fact, we should know with near absolute certainty -- of marked, major improvement in the 08 defense. After all, it can't get any worse? Right? On the bright side, the Bills have a schedule that features several Sisters of the Poor. Beating the bottom feeders is what our coach has excelled at in his career.

Wade is a good teacher and can flat out put a very competitive 3-4 defense together. He's done it over and over again. As a head coach, he hasn't really done much that one might classify as "special". He was a caretaker in Denver between Reeves and Shanahan and his choices in staff and systems were suspect. Elway openly ridiculed his lack of leadership and organization saying he let the team become a self-organizing circus. In Buffalo, he again stepped in to an organization that had been stable and had considerable talent. He didn't immediately drive the plane into the ground, but it has been suggested that the team that lost the Music City Miracle due to a lack of focus was perhaps the most talented and deep in the NFL at the time. Replay number three in Dallas, where Wade again saunters in to a custom made situation where Parcells had assembled a strong and deep roster. At least Jerry Jones didn't trust Wade to hire his own OC. On the other hand, a guy like Pacman on a team with a "player's coach" sort of seems like smoking next to the gas tank...

What? He writes about the Rams injury situation but fails to mention that the Bills secondary had a number of injuries?

Going 0-3 down the stretch isn't folding? In fact, if it wasn't for having the even more crappy Dolphins twice and a home invasion and murder/fluke win, the Bills finished the last half of the season in rather pathetic fashion, suffering some embarrassing offensive and defensive futility. Unsurprisingly, this fits the statistical standings of utter ineptness and does so much more than hope fueled claims that the Bills finished 07 "strong and on an upswing." Don't stop the "they love to play hard for Dick" slogans, though. Yes, the future is so bright I wear my shades at night.

Actually, that was exactly my point. Darwin Walker's 1st and only year in a "Tampa 2" defense (one with more talent than Buffalo's last year), he was hugely ineffective, benched and ultimately cut. It's hard to see how not having him in Buffalo was a major reason for the Bills Tampa 2 lack of success when he did nothing in the same system in Chicago. Sure, he had some good years for a DT with the Eagles, who run a different system and are routinely in the top 10 in the NFL in sack totals. On the other hand, DTs that are primarily "sack machines" are also notoriously weak in other areas of their games -- like stopping the run. (Then again, maybe we don't care about stopping the run.) Not having Darwin Walker as a starting DT is more comparable to the "huge loss" of having Jason "Toast" Webster go down to yet another season ending injury.

This pure fluff piece that is all over the map. Jerry Reese ranked 27th with a comment that there is not enough data to evaluate him (1 year) but Tannenbaum is 2nd? WTF? Pass the crack pipe, Dan.

Well, Schobel was the best player in the Bills front 7 last year. So, it wouldn't require Sherlock Holmes to figure out that opponents wanted to neutralize him. And, since his stat line took a hard nose dive compared to 2006 and 2005, they were clearly succeeding. He was more active in the running game in 2007 than 2006 but about on par with 2005. BTW, getting invites to the Pro Bowl has a large component called reputation. Darwin Walker a "sack machine"? I guess so. He was tied for 229th best sack machine last year with only 120 other players, one of whom is named Larry Tripplett. http://www.nfl.com/stats/categorystats;jse...mp;d-447263-p=7

I hope you mean in terms of game changing plays and not injuries.

One player in the top 50? We're on our way!