Utah John

First, Fred Jackson had no INPUT into the decision Marrone made, or in the Ryan hiring. He has an OPINION after the fact. Big difference. Get that f....ing straight, Pagac. Second, Marrone was as much or as little "under the gun" as any other coach. He had another year on his contract, and he had failed to motivate his team to beat the Raiders, eliminating them from the playoffs. Why does that entitle him to an extension, beyond the year he already had to go? That's not "under the gun", it's the nature of the coaching business.

I think Chan will do well initially at putting Percy Harvin, and probably CJ Spiller, to good use, but that the DCs in the league will figure out toot sweet what he's up to, and that will be the end of that. The Jets have some talent. I think Chris Ivory is a really good player, a lot like Fred Jackson. Harvin is a talented head case. Nick Mangold is a very good O lineman. If they get a decent QB (Mariota?) Gailey could elevate them from trash to mediocrity in less than a year.

The Jets announced today that Chan Gailey is their new OC. Chan was a pretty good OC for the Bills, masquerading as a HC, and will probably do well for the Jets for half a season until the league figures out what he's doing and puts in defenses to stop it. The key for the Bills is that CJ Spiller had his only productive season under Chan, and may feel that moving to the Jets as a FA is his ticket to a longer career. Also Percy Harvin might benefit from Chan's ideas.

Lynch was not playing to his full ability. I don't know why not. He's an eccentric person and perhaps didn't want to be in Buffalo. Neither did OJ at first of course but then the Bills got a great O line and OJ could reach his potential. Maybe Lynch didn't see that happening and just figured he'd wait out his rookie contract and move on. If the free agent rules now in effect were in effect in the late 60s and early 70s, it could be OJ would have walked before discovering his greatness.

Very few players can thrive in a bad situation. Fred Jackson can still produce behind a bad O line, but Spiller can't. Behind a great O line, Spiller would be a much more dangerous RB than Fred. A guy's got to be in the right spot for things to work out. Another difference between Fred and CJ is the ability to play hurt. Spiller is fantastic when everything is right, when his wheels work, but his capability falls off quickly when something isn't right. Fred and most other backs find a way to keep their performance pretty high even when nicked. And guess what, most players are nicked most of the time. If Spiller leaves, look for him to go to a situation where he can be productive, and then watch as he rips a couple of dazzling runs a game, gets 1200 yards for a season. That doesn't mean the Bills make a mistake if they let him go. They aren't going to have a great O line for at least a couple of years, and by that time CJ will be too old to have the acceleration that made him special in 2012. And unfortunately I think Fred will be retired by the time that great O line shows up. I am so sorry for Fred that when he had his chance to really excel a couple of years ago, he got hurt and missed that chance. I think it's clear that (a) he's still pretty effective but (b) not as much as 2 or 3 years ago.

East Rutherford, New Jersey. Time to REALLY regionalize the Bills, and make Rex feel at home at the same time.

I prefer the white helmets, but considering the reason to switch to red back in the day was to help our QB (Fergie) not throw to the wrong guys, I wonder if we should consider having our offensive players wear red helmets to stand out, and have the defensive players wear white, to blend in.

Utah is Broncos country. People are in mourning here and couldn't care less about the Bills.

There's the business end of things, where SJF has great facilities and the workouts and tryouts are very convenient. Then there's the team-building end of things, where Fredonia with more bars per resident than any city in the country (or used to anyway) provided MUCH better opportunities for the players, and coaches, to bond with each other after practice. I never bought into the regionalization concept. Seriously, will more people from Rochester buy tickets because the Bills have training camp near them? I just don't buy it.

When things go well, the guy in charge usually gets more credit than he deserves, and the people who worked for him get less than they should. Based on team performance, I can't imagine any assistant on the Bills D or ST not grading out high. I understand Ryan wanting his own guys, which is pretty normal when HC changes happen, but it's really sad for me to think of the great D and ST staff members being kicked to the curb. I'm sure they didn't see this coming, and had plans and expectations to carry on next year where they left off this year.

I've always wanted to see the 1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1. Total confusion for the O line since there's only one guy in position to block, and all the other guys just run to the ball.

I hope Marrone and his family can stretch that 4 mil a loooooong way. No other big paychecks coming his way. Ask yourself, what other team would want to hire a coach who left like that? OK, so he had a clause that LET him do it, but that didn't mean he NEEDED to do it. The clause was there in case the new ownership was difficult to work with, which clearly wasn't the case with the Pegulas. Ask yourself, what GM would want to hire a coach who blasted the Bills' FO on the way out of town? Ask yourself, what candidates for coordinator positions and other coaching assistants would want to pull up stakes and move somewhere to work for a guy who shafted his Bills coaches so badly?

Kiko would probably make a great TE, now that you mention it. It worked for JJ Watt, and Alonso also has the height and agility to be effective. This of course is an additional duty for him, in addition to his LB job. I think Chuck Wagon's perspective is absolutely correct. The Bills were going to take Ebron with their original pick, after all the griping about Chandler. So would you trade Watkins for Ebron plus Detroit's #1 this year? I would NOT. The only real shame is that the 2013 Bills weren't just a little crappier, so they could have had the draft slot that Cleveland did, and we could have gotten Watkins with our own pick.

It's normal for NFL players to have injuries. What I liked about this past year was that so many guys were able to get back on the field quickly. Major injuries like McKelvin's knee obviously don't apply, but a lot of players were fit enough and strong enough and flexible enough that the dings didn't sideline them for long.

You know, stopthepain, I'm really not sure that EJ ain't gonna be the guy. Or at least the Bills might try again to see if he can be the guy. I think he's had lousy coaching and played behind a lousy O line, and had a couple of knee injuries his rookie year which may have affected his thinking. What can a good coach do to help him? Probably a lot. I am not an EJ lover or convinced he's the guy, but I wouldn't be surprised if the Bills give him another big chance. Of course there will be at least one additional QB brought in. Even if EJ wins the starting job, Tuel is not the answer as the backup.

Well, even against the Raiders, Mario Williams and Kyle Williams each had half a sack. Keep that up all year, and 8 sacks apiece isn't shabby.

I hope someone walked up to Rex at TBT and welcomed him to New York State. About his projected weight gain -- I think he lost all that weight from stomach band surgery or whatever it's called. It's probably nearly impossible to gain a lot of weight afterward. But, considering Buffalo wings, pizza, and hot dogs, I can see Rex giving it a good try.

I'm keeping my fingers crossed that what happens to Marrone is what happened to Ted Nolan -- frozen out by all the teams in the league after being HC for a Buffalo team -- although Nolan did not deserve that situation. But Marrone does deserve it. What team wants a guy with such a poor sense of loyalty? What coaching assistants and coordinators will sign up to work for a guy who shafted his staff in Buffalo so badly? Also, Nolan was canned after great success, Coach of the Year if I'm not mistaken. Marrone, not so much. Wasted a great defense by his offensive incompetence.

The biggest reason not to bring Manning here -- our O line. He'd get murdered.

I remember asking my brother if he knew what 1234567890 was. The answer of course was a sideline picture of Jim Kelly, Thurman Thomas, Darryl Talley, Bruce Smith, and Phil Hansen.

What about the Electric Company? Joe D is already on the Wall, but what about Reggie McKenzie, Mike Montler, Donnie Green, Dave Foley, and Paul Seymour? Going farther back, Butch Byrd and Tom Day.

These are valid points, but there is still the issue of personnel. Granted going to a 3-4 would allow Spikes to stay when Kiko returns. But who on the line will play where? Mario Williams is a great DE, and Dareus and Kyle Williams are great DTs. We have no NTs, and might not keep Jerry Hughes. Do we have Kyle play DE? He's not built for that. My biggest fear is a new guy comes in a blows up a great ensemble, and the Bills great D this year collapses in a couple of years.

I hope Schwartz stays and Ryan lets him keep on doing his thing. This definitely ain't broke and don't need fixin'. But just wait till something goes wrong. Rex and Jim in a room = more Ego Per Unit Volume than any situation outside Congress.

The Bills have had problems with taunting penalties in the past. Better get control of this ASAP since Rexism will lead to more behavior of that type.

Article of Faith #1: There are no good wings outside of WNY. Especially in Delray, wherever that is. Welcome to New York State, Mr Ryan, and to real wings.