Utah John

The Pats are already throwing in the towel on this season, and you can't blame them. They are clearly the fourth place out of four teams in the division. So Judon was an asset, and a good player, but the Pats think they're better served with the draft pick they got in return. The Bills tried working things this way for years, and it didn't really work until they got lucky with in-team leadership (Kyle Williams and Lorax) and an amazing draft with Allen and Edmunds. No FAs wanted to come here except for overpayment, and the Bills lost many good players after their rookie contracts ran out. The Pats are trying to dig out of a hole by tossing out more dirt and hoping they get a ladder in return.

Zach Wilson has landed at the Broncos, where he's the #3 QB behind Bo Nix and Jarrett Stidham. There's talk that the Broncos will keep only two QBs so Wilson might be available. I always thought Wilson had a very good arm but he was caught in a lousy Jets system, and now he's in a lousy Broncos system. He might end up a career backup but in the right situation he might turn out to be a decent starter, if he gets the chance. (Not being able to beat out Stidham is not a promising indicator.) The Bills did exactly that with Jake Fromm. Well, the fifth round, not the 3rd or 4th. He's turned out to be a mediocre journeyman backup, recently signed by the Lions.

Trubisky is the unAllen. Trubisky started out great for Chicago, and then became very unproductive. I can only figure that defensive coordinators in his division analyzed his game and figured out how to stop him. He's been very mediocre since. Josh Allen started out as a raw, inaccurate passer, but he worked his butt off to become a very accurate passer and of course has always been a strong runner and a great leader. He's continued to improve season after season, although his biggest improvements came in his second and third seasons. (Not much room to get better when you're as good as he is now.)

Unfortunately, not so tough. The Bills will end up with some players on the roster who wouldn't usually have made the team. Some of the players who don't make the team wouldn't even sniff training camp a few years ago. From the comments here it sounds like Hamler has been cut. Is that right? But also the Bills had a full set of players, up to the limit for the roster for training camp. How are they bringing on board Byrd and DiNucci?

The Eagles GM should be arrested for grand larceny. Getting a third for a guy who won't play.

Same impression I had before. Not enough talent, not enough depth. The D was missing Milano, Miller, Oliver so the starters will get better when everyone plays. No O line openings for runners -- not sure we're actually better with this configuration, or if we'd be better with the rookie with too many names at center and move the center back to LG. Traditional Bills preseason penalty fest. The team fell apart when second or third string players were on the field -- and that's what we'll be seeing if a couple of starters get hurt. It was the first preseason game for the Bills against the Bears second game, so the poor results don't have me terribly concerned. I was hoping for reasons for optimism but I guess we'll just put it all on hold until the regular season.

He's a very good kicker and it's not surprising he's well-paid. (But Justin Tucker is better.) I realize Butker's political views were controversial but I couldn't care less about some athlete's political views anyway. If he's not encouraging actual violence, I figure it's best to let him talk, and just ignore him.

Believe it or not, there has been at least one tornado reported in every state. Even Hawaii and Alaska. Maine can get severe weather too. But the odds of a destructive tornado in the Midwest or Midsouth are much higher than other places. BTW, that's not a dust devil. Dust devils are driven by surface heating, not convective storms. I think calling it a baby tornado is the best description. Where do you live, amprov56? We're in Memphis.

When James got hurt, Lou Saban v2 came out on the field, and I'll never forget the look on his face. He had a promising team but he knew the loss of James was a shot to the heart. Next man up, sure, but the next guy isn't as good, or he'd already be playing.

Don't feel bad. We get a good QB every couple of decades, so there will be something to look forward to.

CBs get paid a lot more than safeties. There's no way Douglas would agree to that switch. The only time CBs switch to safety is when they slow down a bit as they age. Douglas is not at that point.

Ghosts are faster.

Back when the best pass rushers lined up on the right side of the defensive line, and teams almost always put the tight end on the right side of the offensive line, the standard thinking was running teams were right handed, generally exploiting the power of an extra TE blocker and a powerful road grader right tackle. Left tackles were quicker and more athletic, not always as good at run blocking. Blocking schemes were designed to utilize these different strengths. Even right guards and left guards had different priorities. So teams started putting their best pass rusher on the left side of the defensive line (Reggie White). These defenders had to account for a more massive tackle, but they could use speed, quickness, and deception, as well as power, to be effective. This counter-trend changed the job description for right tackles. Now they still need to be massive road graders (Spencer Brown) but also good pass blockers (Spencer Brown, last year, finally). And defensive lines doing stunts and rotations can confuse a non-athletic tackle if he's not paying attention. This whole blind side thing is a little overdone. Sure, if you have a right-handed pocket passer QB who doesn't move much, the blind side issue matters, but most QBs are pretty mobile (or very mobile) and they have their eyes everywhere. Statues get broken, but moving targets survive. And sacks come from everywhere. Finally, the dominant shift in the NFL the past 15 years or so, is the ascendancy of the passing game. Pass blocking is now the most important capability an O lineman can have. Even right tackles.

The surprising thing that's often forgotten is that the Bills traded Cookie away after the 1964 season. I've read that Lou Saban had just had all he could stand of Cookie's independence. In 1965, when the Bills won their second AFL championship, the Bills had a different fullback-type runner, Billy Joe, whom they obtained from the Broncos in a trade for Cookie. Billy Joe had been the AFL rookie of the year in 1963 for Denver, and he was no slouch, but for some reason he played only one season in Buffalo. Cookie and Billy Joe both bounced around the AFL/AFC for a couple of years in the late 60s. Cookie was traded from Buffalo to Denver after the 1964 season. The Bills D up to about 1965 was tremendous as you said, but it got old and became ineffective. Also the idiotic John Rauch traded Ron McDole away years before McDole was actually finished.

Kemp's role in the boycott of the 1965 AFL All-Star game which was supposed to be in New Orleans, can't be overlooked. Initially the white players wanted to play the game but the black players wouldn't go along. Kemp saw Cookie Gilchrist's insistence on not playing, and he turned to the while players and got them to agree not to play. He was very widely respected as a player and a man. My Kemp story happened in 1972 or 73. Our high school band (West Seneca East) had a band exchange program with a school in Maryland, which meant we had a day free in Washington DC. A group of 5 or 7 of us boys found Kemp's House of Representatives office, and we asked to see him. He said sure, come in for a few minutes. I was as much a football fan as the rest of the boys (I remember a photo of Kemp in his office of him releasing a pass, and an enormous defensive lineman, Ernie Ladd I believe, in the air above him, about to crush him), but I wanted to talk politics with Kemp. I remember I told him I thought that the Chinese people, who were starting to improve their lives as their economy shifted, were doing very well under the Communist government. Conservative Republican Kemp was, well, he disagreed, let's put it that way. This conservative was most interested in the human rights of the people of China, who were then and are now under the thumb of their government. Our short meeting went 45 minutes as we argued back and forth, very respectfully. I will never forget the courtesy and engagement that man showed to us as a group, and me in particular.

Very strong arm, very smart, good leadership. You can't compare stats between eras, and the mid-60s were not a great time for QBs. But Kemp could make all the throws. If he were playing today, he'd be very effective. But those of us old enough to remember know he wasn't good enough to put much daylight between him and Lamonica, leading to all sorts of chatter about which QB should play. The Bills ended up keeping Kemp of course. Lamonica went to a different type of team and thrived. Put Kemp on that Raiders team and he would have thrived, too. The Raiders were really good. So the question of which QB was better hasn't and can't be answered, IMO. The QB who reminds me the most of Kemp, is Ryan Fitzpatrick.

People point out, correctly, that Love has had just one season as a starter. But we should remember that the Packers have been watching him develop for several years. They know what they've got.

Even that KC miss was a very difficult play, with the KC defender disrupting the path of the ball. That dropped pass got a lot of attention because the Chiefs had been doubling Diggs all game, and then finally the Bills had a chance to get him free for a killer TD.

He's been a key part of the core of the Bills STs, and they'll miss him. I think McBeane figured they can get good replacement value from a cheaper player, probably a rookie. The vet minimum or even the amount vets expect to get paid, are going to get a lot of players released when they still have gas in the tank. Anyway, I wish him well with his new team except of course when they play the Bills. A team's culture is a fragile thing. The Bills have cut or traded so many key veterans this year that I am a little concerned about keeping the winning culture going. Each cut or trade was made for a different good reason, but the overall impact is going to be tricky to overcome. The one I'm most worried about losing is Morse, but losing Hyde and Poyer is also a real loss.

That's correct, that game checks are taxed according to the tax rates where the work is performed. I have never questioned that before, but now that you've brought it up, I wonder why this doesn't apply to everyone who travels for their job. If I live in a no-tax state and my company is based there, but I spend half my time on the road in other states that do have state taxes, why am I not taxed for those days according to the local laws? Or vice versa, of course. Or if I work remotely from my company, and I live in a no-tax state but my company is in a state with taxes, do I avoid all state taxes even if I travel to the company HQ a week out of every month? I'm just asking here, not advocating any changes. But it does seem that sports are taxed differently than other businesses.

I've been suggesting that the salary cap for all teams should be adjusted upward to compensate for state income taxes, where they apply. This would allow all the teams the same actual dollars available to pay players. Players and agents know that playing in a state with, say, a 5% state income tax, means their paycheck is 5% lower right off the bat than they could get in a no-tax state. Why should a sports team in a state with income taxes be at a disadvantage? The whole idea of parity is that all the teams have the same resources to compete, and that's not the case now. If this was sone as I suggested, the total amount of the salary cap would be greater than it is now. And the poor miserly NFL (/s) and the actually poor NHL would have to come up with more money overall. So the solution is to figure out what the total would be with the sales tax plus-up, then proportionally reduce the amount going to across the board so the total remains the same.

Allen played great in that game, but the Bills plus the weather beat the Patriots. When Hyde picked off that pass, and Allen's throwaway toward Knox turned into a TD pass, and the temperature was some absurdly low number, the Pats lost heart. They knew they were beat by the end of the first quarter, and the players on the field spend the rest of the game looking longingly at the parkas and heaters on the sidelines. This isn't to take anything away from Allen. The Bills all knew they could do whatever they wanted and so they proceeded to do just that. Allen was the death rider on the lead horse, but there was a whole herd right behind him. Whoever said the Bills broke the Pats that day had it right. The Pats lost their mojo completely and have never recovered.

It's not just the closing speed. It's that Hyde took the exactly perfect angle to anticipate where the pass would go.

I'll go further and say the Jets have been built specifically to slow down Allen. That's a very logical thing to do. The biggest gamble they've made is pinning their offense's hopes on Rodgers. Even if he's fully recovered from his Achilles injury he's still up against aging. His play was deteriorating in his last couple of years in Green Bay, and of course we never got a chance to see how he'll do in New Jersey. I'm thinking he'll try to keep doing what he used to do, and it won't work. He could turn out to be the third best QB in the AFCE, in other words the second-worst.

Just watching the game now, the announcers only gave you a small taste of what was going on. A guy pissing to put out a fire? That's gotta be some kind of record for a non-soccer sporting event.