Sisyphean Bills

Maybe he was winded?

Bill fell asleep at the wheel.

Dave Wannstedt.

*tap* *tap* I think my sarcasmeter just went off.

The irony will be that once he is gone and playing somewhere else, some will go from ardent supporters to vocal critics.

Do you think Brandon happily stepped aside for Nix? Events (which contradicted the posturing) in this past off-season would strongly suggest otherwise.

There were a few press activities last spring where Buddy Nix stated that there were daily meetings to discuss personnel (as well as other things) and they were attended by Doug Marrone, Russ Brandon, and himself.

These two sentences are contradictory. Jeffrey Littmann is still CFO. But, yes, time will tell if it is premature to crown Brandon as one of the best CEOs in all of sports or not.

The problem with your logic is that he could have made Ralph even more money by building a championship caliber organization and building a nationally-backed brand. Not talking about doing it. Actually doing it. If you assume that the Bills just simply have to suck by definition, be the farm team that plays the patsy year-in and year-out, then, yes, bleeding every stone and forwarding the cash to Detroit has been a hugely successful strategy. But, I doubt Brandon himself fails to see the defeatism.

It would be prudent to keep shopping. Even if EJ does turn out to be a success, which is far from an automatic at this point, the team as a whole doesn't lose anything to increase competition at the QB position. Bringing in fringe NFL guys with multiple failures, cold product, on cheap contracts is a passive, even dreamy approach. Still, this very much depends on how "in love" Marrone and Whaley are with their decisions last year. It is a question of whether they see themselves as bigger than a single decision and having the fortitude to impose their leadership over cheerleadership.

It's good to get this cleared up. Some were under the impression that he sucks.

I'm not sure it is pure stupidity either; there are many dumb athletes. With CJ, my suspicion is that he likes the fame more than the actual game.

No.

His bringing Hackett along with him from Syracuse was his biggest mistake. Too much inexperience in the roles from himself down to Manuel. PS: Heck though, everyone is a "rookie" in their current jobs from the CEO to the QB.

Not one of the guys the Seahawks picked up had a record of failure and injury like Kevin Kolb, and before Kolb the Bills had spent 2+ years effectively sitting on their hands (who can seriously think Vince Young was ever pushing for the starting job?) because they knew they could turn Fitzpatrick, another career loser, into a winner. More ironically, some think Kevin Kolb was destined to be the Bills starter this year, if not for his soft melon. PS: Is it really kudos and back-slaps worthy to have traded for TJax? Despite a career stat line that is not all that much different than Fitzpatrick, TJax never even wore the Bills uniform to a game.

Wait. I thought that was 100% on Chan Gailey. PS: Though I was never sure how Chan got his high school and Clemson coaches on board with the plan.

Have to wonder what holes they will create -- "he wasn't a Marrone sort of guy" -- in the off-season as well.

Which, sadly, does not support the oft suggested notion that Manuel will automatically be better next year.

Well, one might say, "up and down like a yo-yo," but even a yo-yo is up half the time...

I'm not sure that Whaley really has that much of a GM track record to call him either capable or incapable. He's an unknown who was Buddy's sidekick for a few years. It's kind of like saying Robin is "capable" after watching Batman lose more fights than he won. Buddy's record as a GM is far from perfect.

I know calling it a crap shoot is your thing CB, but what Hazed implied is true. There are teams that are statistically better than average at finding truly productive players[*] in the draft and there are teams, like the Bills, that are worse. [*] Not meant to imply the drafting of short-term roster backfillers.

Well, I was trying to understand the nobody believes GMs anyway comments. Did that mean Donahoe didn't even believe what he said at the time? That he was just showing gamesmanship and spewing nonsense as GMs often typically due before a draft? That doesn't really fit the facts because Donahoe didn't come back the next year and draft a QB, so who did he fool? On the other hand, even if "nobody" were truly inclusive of everyone on the planet except Donahoe, then it is simply irrelevant because Donahoe was calling all the shots in the 2004 and 2005 drafts for the Bills. Looking beyond what Tom Donahoe thought is simple mystification of the issues on the ground at the time. In short, it doesn't really matter if you or I or other posters here thought he may be lying if he believed it himself. And, no matter how truthful he was or wasn't, his actions are open and observable and do not suggest he didn't believe in Losman. In fact, they suggest he believed very much in Losman and it was part of what cost him his job ultimately.

Why wouldn't Donahoe defend his actions? Do you think he actually felt Mike Williams was going to be a crappy OT and that Gregg Williams was the worst coach available? What evidence is there that he was trying to torpedo the Bills organization from the inside? Sounds like a great conspiracy theory, but... I really see no reason to think that Donahoe did not believe Losman was better than any QB he saw in the next draft at the time. With the perspective of hindsight, we know with 100% certainty that he and Modrak blew that talent evaluation completely and totally. But that doesn't change the facts on the ground at the time: Donahoe said he thought Losman was a better talent than anybody in the next draft and he aggressively took actions that back that statement to the hilt. But, yes, in retrospect, with Aaron Rodgers flirting with a Hall-of-Fame sort of career, his comments at the time seem absurd, stupid, and foolish. If he didn't even believe himself and was lying to hide ulterior motives, well the joke was on him; he paid the price with his NFL career.

They were living in the past, thinking they had all the time in the world to slowly stockpile talent across the board. The 1970s Cowboys and Steelers model. In the modern era of free agency and 3-and-out regimes, it was fantastic and doomed to failure. If the Bills could've had the back that Lynch has transformed into in Seattle, he is hands-down more valuable to a younger QB than is Spiller. Still, even if one felt Spiller was a no-brainer sort of upgrade and had to get rid of Lynch because of his off-field issues, why wait until October to do something about it? As soon as the Bills sprinted to the podium to draft Spiller, barely letting a few seconds tick off the draft clock, their phone absolutely lit up with other teams wanting to talk about Lynch. Again, no sense of urgency. Rather than strike, on the glut at "runners" they fed themselves into, when the iron was hot, possibly putting themselves into position to address holes on the roster, the Nix-Gailey duo kicked back, took a nap, and drafted for a 3-4 defense that never actually materialized. They hit the ground asleep at the wheel. Yes, the personnel management was a flusterduck. They set themselves up to get off to an 0-8 start before barely squeaking by the Lions.

Actually, Donahoe said it himself. He thought Losman was better than any QB in the next draft, so he made the trade. He was very clearly wrong in retrospect.