Sisyphean Bills

Hunh? This is a public relations issue. Who handles a public relations issue for their business by doing a one-on-one in a break-out room?

Really? Like who? Why would a guy with a high IQ want to work for this organization in a position that looks exactly like the latest in a long line of fall-guys?

Looks like you got it crooked. 1. The media reported an alleged leak that Rex would be fired. 2. No one from within the organization has come forward and denied this leak. 3. Sullivan called this amateur hour antics by a group of amateurs. FWIW, in Management 101, they teach one to get out in front of rumors and not let them fester and boil over across your entire organization. Good management wants Johnny Worker B. focusing on building widgets, not hanging out by the water cooler talking about the next pink slip parade and how much the company sucks.

The Chan hiring was the year that the Seahawks gave total control to Pete Carroll and the Redskins courted Mike Shanahan. Buddy Nix stood in front of a mic and offered us one of his whoppers, he was receiving 15 calls a day for weeks (say, was Marv Levy still interested?), and bloopers, "Oakland gets a lot of calls. Don't say I said that." But before Nix was on the prowl answering his buzzy cellphone, we had Russ Brandon turning over rocks. Ralph agreed to have Russ fly out to Colorado and pitch the Bills via Powerpoint to Shanahan. Shanahan was later invited to come to Washington by Snyder, which he did and was hired there.

OK, say the Bills go that way. Jettison all/part of the defensive coaching staff and promote Lynn to HC. Here's a question: what do we know about Lynn and his ability to create an NFL offense that can operate a proficient passing game? Even if they went out and drafted the next Tom Brady, the bread crumbs out there on what that passing offense might look like are, well, not exactly clear. (And yes, the inaccurate TT and his posse of street receivers do have something to do with that picture, no doubt.)

Shame on the BN for not being shills for the team. It would be pretty impressive to blow sunshine up everyone's arseholes for 17 straight non-playoff seasons and sell it such that fans actually felt it was dripping sincerity. And to do it with no end in sight. It's mind boggling. What a challenge that would be. Holy !@#$. Actually, maybe it's good that they shoot the fish in the barrel. It gives a focal point for Bills fans' frustration, even if it is ad homenim.

The "8 other personnel guys" isn't the strongest argument, obviously. It's just a sample. But when you combine that the Bills are starting later in the process than some teams, actually do draft underclassmen, have the lowest retention of their own draft picks in the NFL, and they have the longest playoff drought, it's not unreasonable to wonder if the tradition of always laying things at the feet of the coaching staff, bad luck at finding a QB at their spots in the draft, and injuries isn't dodging responsibility. Graham has hit that particular point two weeks in a row on the org's modus operandi.

No. I think it's fair to be critical of the Browns player evaluation and management. More than fair. It's worse there than here. It is also fair to wonder who the 8 were and adjust your position based on that fact. That is critical thought. What is not critical thought is to take some list and use it as a hunting license. And you know that if one of the names was Bill Belichick, some people would make a point of mentioning all the mistakes he's made, etc. despite his clear dominance over the Buffalo Bills. 3 out of 4 of the people he talked to scout underclassmen before they declare. That's interesting. Or not. But Tim's article also covered a lot more ground than that one nugget.

What does it matter anyway? The people who want the sources named seem to be (mostly) the people that didn't like the article. Say that Graham had named them. Kermit The Frog, The Truth Fairy, Bozo The Clown, Mickey The Mouse, Oscar The Grouch, The Homer Simpson, Batman, and Elvis. Does that change anyone's mind one iota? No. Not even close. All it does is open a crack to start the effort of character assassination against those sources. Classic post-truth era stuff, but vacuous as far as critical thinking.

Don't fall for the straw-man. No one said the 2014 defense was bad. No one said Schwartz's D wasn't better than Rex's. On the other hand, arguing that Schwartz's D would continue to be right at the top—what? forever?—is impossible to support conjecture. I think the D probably wouldn't have slipped as much as it did, but I do think it would've slipped. An out-of-gas Mario Williams wasn't going to be the motor to make that train go much farther.

No stone left unturned ... until, well, you find what you think is a shiny stone ... though it might just be glitter on the curb.

Roll a die to decide. The only given is that with every rearrangement of the deck chairs Russ will get his promotion.

Because, it's clear that Mario Williams didn't hit a wall.

So the Browns game is a must-win?

Pegs said himself that he didn't know what he was doing. He leaned on the experts he employs, and their advice was: "You'll know him when you see him." If hiring Rex was a big mistake, at least Pegs can keep the same gaggle that served the above vapidity to him on that last trip down the slide.

In a way, it would spoil their season.

OK. Link? Because you can keep claiming it was Levy, and Levy may have had his own thoughts about re-taking the HC job or whatever, but the only guy who had a vote was Wilson, and he emphatically said Marv wasn't going to coach. So that "threat" or "neutering" was, quite simply, a mirage at best. On the other hand, at that point in time, immediately after Donahoe was fired, there were two people that stepped into the vacuum. Ralph Wilson made himself President to replace Donahoe. He hired Marv in what was initially an unspecified role and later gave him the title of GM of Football. Frankly, it makes more sense to me that Mularkey quit when he realized that Wilson, as President, wasn't helping him build a winning organization. Wilson often told his HCs to fire staff members. Mularkey was stuck in that scenario. If Wilson ordered him to fire staff, he had to. But Wilson had few connections to people in the coaching ranks of the NFL. Levy was coming out of retirement. Who were the better options Mularkey was supposed to turn to after he gutted his staff per the owner? With Donahoe, he had a partner who had connections and could help guide the newly minted HC. Like MM said straight out, it is hard to see that scenario as constructive and enabling him to build the team or take it in the direction he had wanted to. So yeah, he was thrown under the bus, neutered if you want, but not by a nefarious Levy, but by a rudderless organization treading water.

I think it was a Forbes article, but it may have been published elsewhere. What it claimed was that Wilson was consistently one of the top 5 owners in the NFL in terms of his personal take from his franchise. For Wilson, unlike the Pegulas, his business "empire" consisted primarily of the Buffalo Bills franchise. He clearly viewed it as a business and his family's nest egg. The Pegulas aren't in the same economic position. None of that however changes the fact that the NFL has a salary cap, and that rule covers player bonuses.

In soccer, it's called relegation.

It's unconnected if you want to replace fact-checked reporting by "bad, terrible reporters" with on-line rumors that support your original position more conveniently. The consistent picture, and we will see how Pegula decides to run things—it is too early to say in my opinion, is of an organization that is built upon appeasement and placating its fans to the point that it will throw coaches under the bus rather than support them. It's a picture that not only former coaches have presented, but former GMs, and Presidents. The missing piece is obvious. Winning. If this organization had the ability to put together a winner on the field, then neither the scapegoats nor those doing the scapegoating have to expend so much energy on defending or scapegoating. Is everyone the Bills hire on the football side "thin skinned"? Is that a box on the application form?

http://www.espn.com/nfl/news/story?id=2291078 http://www.espn.com/nfl/story/_/id/13978933/how-doug-marrone-went-buffalo-bills-coach-jacksonville-jaguars-offensive-line-coach

Curious. So which players are on your short list? Who are the homegrown talents that the Pegulas have awarded the big-time contracts to keep?

Marrone had an opportunity to see what new ownership was going to do from the inside. He had his 3 day opt-out window and pulled the eject lever. That's irrefutable regardless of anyone's beliefs and emotions. The idea that Marrone walked away because of the culture, and the people that make up that culture, is plausible. More plausible than the argument: "He's just a ninny."

Which means what exactly? Do you think the salary cap went away when the team was sold?

Did you run out of pivots?