
Utah John
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Pro Bowl Player Poll--Worst City to Travel To
Utah John replied to Lurker's topic in The Stadium Wall Archives
Really, who cares what those players say? They don't know very much about any of the cities they go to. -
Pro Bowl Player Poll--Worst City to Travel To
Utah John replied to Lurker's topic in The Stadium Wall Archives
New Orleans is a pretty special case. The Superdome is within walking distance of the French Quarter, really just across the street, and across the city there are great things to do. Most cities have stadiums away from the fun part of downtown. If the teams stay near the stadium, they don't have much to do wherever they are. -
Pro Bowl Player Poll--Worst City to Travel To
Utah John replied to Lurker's topic in The Stadium Wall Archives
I wonder if visiting teams usually stay in hotels downtown, or near the airport, or near the stadium. Some of them would probably rather stay in Toronto and take a bus ride to OP on Sunday morning. -
New Orleans Saints in Court
Utah John replied to Mike in Horseheads's topic in The Stadium Wall Archives
I am having trouble imagining what help a football team could possibly be, in dealing with these crimes. Football teams are businesses which are really good at public relations, but not when it comes to covering up crimes. If a priest or someone else in the Church committed a sexual offense, that's a crime, not a public relations challenge. -
Chris Brown article on Bills Draft Needs
Utah John replied to Hapless Bills Fan's topic in The Stadium Wall Archives
We just spent a second round pick on a guy who's right now our backup right guard, because he's not a good right tackle and because our starting right guard is a beast. That's not a bust but isn't what you want from a second round pick. Will the Bills invest even more high picks on an area that played well last year? I would rather see them re-sign Spain and get an upgrade at right tackle in FA. The reason Kittle and Kelce are important is a numbers game. Defenses can account for just so many threats, and they give less attention to others, including TEs. When you have a dominant TE, suddenly there's always someone open because the defense has to do more than it was designed to do. But, great TEs appear to be even rarer than great QBs. The guys with the size and physique to play TE are playing strong forward instead. One thing I like about this past season is that there is a wide variety of what works. The Ravens play three tight ends with a power game. The Titans use a power game to overcome weaknesses in their roster. 180 degrees away you have the Chiefs with their wide-open attack. This is just great, really. Coaches are drafting and acquiring players to fit a certain style, and then adjusting their coaching to fit the players. The good coaches, at least. The Bills are doing that too. -
Another tragedy hits Jeremy White
Utah John replied to Arkady Renko's topic in The Stadium Wall Archives
Tragic events like this put less important things like a playoff game in a much clearer perspective. Tell your loved ones you love them. -
The Bills (Whaley) made a huge mistake giving Dareus that contract. The only choices the Bills had were to allow him to stick around, continue eating cap space every year (and from the looks of it, all the pizza and wings in WNY) -- or to release him and absorb a huge hit in that year -- or to trade him and no one wanted a lazy, fat, complacent, opinionated wise guy at an incredibly high salary. Option 1 was out since he clearly didn't get a seat on McDermott's bus. Option 2 was very unattractive since the Bills were trying to rebuild. Option 3 was a tough sell but apparently a good one, since the Bills found a sucker willing to take a flier on Dareus.
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Should season ticket holders protest?
Utah John replied to Rocbillsfan1's topic in The Stadium Wall Archives
In the history of Bills clutch losses, most of them were a combination of them getting screwed, and them screwing up. No Goal wouldn't have been a thing for the referees and league to get wrong if the Sabre had body checked Hull instead of trying to poke check him. The Tennessee miracle throwback forward lateral wouldn't have worked if the Bills' cover team had stayed in its lanes. The Bills lost their first SB all on their own, due to partying and drinking in the week leading up to the game. The loss to the Texans was keyed up by the officials failing to enforce the clear, written rules in effect. But the Bills still got outplayed in the second half. If the score had been 20-0 who knows whether the Texans would have been able to come back. -
Pay Ngakoue and Henry. Re-sign Spain. That is all we need to do in FA. We can get by without Jordan Phillips with Horrible Harry returning and Ed Oliver progressing. It's a good draft year for WRs so take what the market is offering. Put Henry and Singletary in the backfield together -- what do defenses do? Commit to the run and open the middle of the field to Kroft and Beasley. The Bills got very lucky in FA last year, upgrading their O line with only Morse being expensive. They don't need an upgrade on the O line as much as they need upgrades elsewhere.
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Eli Manning: Will He Get Into Canton?
Utah John replied to Gugny's topic in The Stadium Wall Archives
It's become the Hall of Fame-ous. Players people have heard of get in, and truly great players get left out. Thurman Thomas didn't get in on the first ballot, for crying out loud, and he led the league in scrimmage yards for at least four years. Thomas was a dominant player for several years, and was really the key to the Bill's great offense. If TT couldn't get in on the first ballot, a nice guy decent player like Eli sure should not. -
We have a pretty good band but they keep playing the same old songs and they don't sound so good anymore. We could actually use a new PK and P. LS is fine -- I don't remember the last bad long snap. We have a Pro Bowl returner. It's the coverage and return teams I wonder about. We'll lose Lorax and probably Perry from this year's teams. Next year we'll have rookies as upgrades in many reserve positions, the very people who get put on STs. These will all be guys who were position starters in college and don't know how to tackle yet. This part is always a roll of the dice.
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Dean Pees on Titans after retirement
Utah John replied to HOUSE's topic in The Stadium Wall Archives
Oh my God. I can't even finish reading the boredpanda link, I was laughing so hard my sides hurt. -
There were half a dozen good candidates. I was very impressed with the way Brian Flores got his team to improve over the course of the year. No tanking there. They started out historically bad and finished by beating NE in NE in a game NE needed desperately. McDermott has been performing at a high level and his team is beginning to reflect that. The Bills are a very good team but not quite elite. Yet. Mike Tomlin might have done the best job of all, making Pittsburgh a very tough team to play despite losing Roethlisberger, Bell, and Brown since a couple of years ago. I'm not sure Harbaugh deserves this award as much as Roman does. I'm glad to see them both recognized. I thought Roman was a good OC while he was in Buffalo but he didn't have the freedom to innovate like Harbaugh gave him. Also he didn't have Lamar Jackson. Matt LaFleur and Pete Carroll also had excellent years, getting more out of their teams than people thought possible considering some glaring areas of weakness. So fine. Good for the guys who won the awards. They should all keep in mind though that Gerard Gallant of the Vegas Golden Knights was coach of the year in the NHL just two years ago, and he got canned this week. What have you done for me lately.
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Roberts fits the McDermott style perfectly. An above average talent, who seldom makes mistakes, and gives a solid result every play. That's exactly what the Bills are doing right. They have only one star (White, not Lotuleilei) on a defense that's third in the league. That's OK -- their defense was responsible for most or all of their wins this year, stars or not.
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So sad for us fans not to have him on the field. What a great player.
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Does Josh live in Buffalo or WNY in the offseason?
Utah John replied to Another Fan's topic in The Stadium Wall Archives
Allen is going to make the team next year, of course. A lot of guys can't be sure they will. Those are the guys the CBA protects/limits by denying them the opportunity to interact with coaches. If I'm one of four guys on the bubble for a position, and I know two of the others are training and talking to coaches every day, then I have to do it too to protect my interests. On the flip side, a player who could benefit from a coach's guidance during the offseason can't get that assistance. My view is, these guys don't have to go back home and get regular jobs in the offseason the way players back in the 60s did. There were stories about some of the championship Bills working in hardware stores or selling carpets in the offseason, just to make ends meet. So, since players today make so much money, why not let this be a full-time job, with year-round access to coaches and trainers. -
Wait till the LSU WRs have to go up against NFL CBs. Wait till the LSU WRs have to recognize NFL defenses in the blink of an eye, and make route adjustments. I'm not saying they can't do that, I'm saying that until they show what they can do against NFL competition, this is a silly comparison.
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Things that will be hard to repeat in 2020
Utah John replied to Over 29 years of fanhood's topic in The Stadium Wall Archives
The Bills 2020 schedule will go against the AFCW and NFCW. The worst part of that for the Bills is all the travel to West Coast or at least distant cities -- the Bills have never traveled well consistently. It's hard to see which teams will improve or degrade from year to year. I don't worry so much about playing powerhouses -- it's the teams that get better all of a sudden are the problem. Finally, the Bills aren't the only AFCE team playing the two western divisions. All the AFCE teams play the two western divisions. That stuff evens out. It might be hard for the AFCE to have a Wild Card team next year, so the obvious solution is to win the division. 9-7 will probably do it. With Miami developing a culture of performance this year -- incredible job by their HC -- and Darnold not getting mono next year, both the Jets and Dolphins will be tough foes. I think the Bills go 4-2 in the division (sweeping NE) and 5-5 outside. -
Romo is great. He watches the games as a QB, figuring out the defense and talking about what would work and what won't. Most color announcers are just repeating the same old information about the players that everyone knows. If ESPN got Romo and replaced Tessitore their MNF ratings would go way up. The salary cost would be budget dust for ESPN.
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Sammy Watkins: New Teams, Same Bad Attitude
Utah John replied to DrDawkinstein's topic in The Stadium Wall Archives
If Watkins was signed by Buffalo, he'd come back here and not know anyone or even recognize the facilities. It would a new team for him -- a new QB, new coaches, new everything. Whatever happened before, happened. Professional move on.