Ronin

Funny statement. Conincidentally the team is once again pretty unwatchable. For those that think that it's going to change, good luck with that. It's pretty clear that the fans have been screwed once again. Hackett blows and clearly is clueless at this level. Pettine's D is worse than last season's D, particularly the front-4 where our money is. Meanwhile, the team he just left has seen a defensive resurgence without adding anything significant. Marrone of course is the one that hired both of them and he too already has seen his swagger posture transform into a head slumped forward and shoulders drooped posture. He's in over his head too and now learning on the fly. Yeah, just what we wanted. Great job Russ. Is there hope? I suppose we can say that there's always hope, but other than that, no, there isn't. These guys clearly don't know enough now to make them successful next season. Not to restate what should be the obvious, but you know the forum, don't you? What are you expecting? What do you think it's going to be like in December when we're 3-10? It'll be the typical psycho ward in here. lol Chan for head coach, Levy for GM, Jauron as OC, and Curtis Modkins as the DC.

Even that play wasn't good, if you'll recall he should have been tackled for no gain or a loss even but the tackler blew it. So technically even that wasn't a good running play. We can't say that it was a well designed play and good timing to use it simply because the D make a massive error. Same for Manuel's throwing, he'd have one TD this season if it weren't for broken coverages and broken defensive plays.

You missed the point altogether.

From the article: “I don’t think it’s just with the team; it’s with everyone in the organization,” Marrone said. “I know that Russ Brandon has worked hard on that. We all have. It’s kind of like the, ‘Woe is me, here we go again’ situation. That’s not what we want.” When your hiring practices in the front office, which spill over to coaching, aren't getting the job done it's because of the lack of talent, plain and simple. This notion that somehow the team has to believe in itself is part of the core problem. This isn't about BILL-ieving, it's about assembling the talent, both player wise as well as staff wise in the recruitment and coaching departments, to be able to get the job done. So the front office perpetually fails, and what happens, every three or four years they trim off someone that's on the cusp of retirement anyway, probably because they're so involve personally at the top that they're not even capable of making sound hiring/firing decisions anymore. It's really simple, when they have the talent, both coaching as well as players, then they'll win, period. In the meantime, the very first thing that must be critically assessed and looked at is who keeps doing the hiring. Get rid of them, hire someone that doesn't have the personal ties to all of the people with roots that are within a few hours of Buffalo, and things will change. Until then, ....

LOL I'm tellin ya. 89 plays by the NE D, nearly 40 minutes ToP for them too. Only 61 plays for us. And with Brady as their crown jewel throwing to Edelman, Amendola who wasn't even 100%, and Thompkins, an undrafted rookie, and the D still made them look good. ... oh, and I didn't see CJ throw-up. I guess that they decided that if they kept giving him the ball that the fans would throw up. So much for that 2K season. Maybe Spiller can now focus on just playing like a starting RB when he's the bell cow instead of mouthin' off about what a great season he'll have. A very disappointing first game. I've never seen NE play worse with Brady under center. In any other division they don't have a chance to win it.

Brady's cadre of receivers has never been worse. NE is once again lucky that they'll be in the worst division in the NFL.

Call a person a troll or people in general trolls is not an argument. It's what ruins forums tho and limits intelligent discussion. You may as well just say that you're right and everyone else is wrong and that that's the end of the debate. That would at least make more sense. Troll: An overused term by people that have nothing to contribute.

Everyone's been talking about how much better Doug Whaley's going to be than his predecessors, but no one seems to be mentioning except in passing that one of the biggest front office blunders in modern Bills' history can be lain right at his feet. This whole Jairus Byrd thing is on Whaley. He was the GM for two months before the deadline for being able to sign Byrd long-term expired and he pretty much didn't do a thing to reach out to Byrd and his agent. So why has he gotten a pass? That's a pretty big thing to overlook while declaring how good he's going to be or is.

Size doesn't matter.

LMAO So soon, usually that doesn't happen until Thanksgiving or so. Have they begun calling for FO personnel and coaching staff to be violently run out of NYS yet? VIOLATION! VIOLATION! VIOLATION! in sektor 4!!! All security personnel respond to an infusion of logic! RESPOND RESPOND RESPOND!!!

The first team D has played poorly throughout the preseason. We'll see if that changes overnight once the regular season gets here, but it was hardly limited to yesterday's game. The first team O playing against first team Ds hasn't fared much better.

I don't know about that, he's always been more versatile than Spiller was last year. I think at 32, and despite his "low mileage," age has crept up to him and slowed him down some. Agree tho that he's a better UTM/short-yardage option than Spiller, and Choice may be too. We can't count on Jackson this year tho for much more than the short-yardage stuff. Spiller's the better outside edge RB. Agreed You raise a good point too about Spiller's durability. We shall see. Yeah, when Grossman and White can tear your 1st-team D a new one, that is beyond concerning. What caught my eye in watching the game was that the D players seemed to be really dejected and downtrodden about midway thru the 2nd Q. Marrone cannot afford to lose these guys that way. If the first six games of the season start equal to or worse than last season's horrible D, then I have a hunch that's exactly what's going to happen and if it does, that really won't be good for Marrone or his tenure here.

Again, when he did "run him 'til he puked," i.e., in games where he had 20+ carries, his average dipped from 6.9 ypc to 4.2 ypc. I think that's very relevant. Who cares if he pukes, if he's only averaging 4.2 ypc without any UTM skills, that's below average. Anyone can prematurely deny that that's going to happen but the simple fact is that we have no idea how he's going to play under the circumstances of regularly getting near or greater than 20 carries/game, much less with opposing DC's now fully aware of his capability from last season with a season's worth of tape to study too. It would hardly be the first time that a QB or RB had such a good season but then failed to follow it up with anything even close. The D sucking last year had little to do with Fitz. It had a lot more to do with a vacuous LB corps, that may be even less capable this season, underachievement from Dareus and Mario the reasons for which are irrelevant, and only one decent CB. While Manuel's numbers are good for a rookie, he's hardly played any first team Ds and when he did he didn't play well, his good numbers came more against 2nd-teams. I'm hopeful too, but we won't know for a bit. But right now it's safe to say that the team is playing worse on both sides of the ball.

Spiller cannot do what he did last season, average 6.0 ypg, while getting full-time touches. If he does then he'll be considered one of history's best NFL RBs, but his past suggests that won't happen. Who knows how he'll play this season, but in the few games last year in which he had 20+ runs, he averaged only 4.2 ypc, a very average number. I expect that he'll be closer to that than to the the 6.0. This preseason he's essentially had two decent runs of 17 and 19 but not done much else and we know he's not great in short yardage situations. So I think we're simply seeing what happens when teams focus on Spiller primarily. We haven't even faced any of last year's top 10 Ds this preaseason. Indy and Washington were bad last year on D and Minnesota very average. Not trying to rain on anyone's parade, but that is a strong possibility and needs to be considered. Me sitting here and insisting that Spiller's gonna get his 2K yards and 20 TDs won't change one lick of that although if it were to happen I'd be tickled pink. Given this team's track record my hopes are much more conservatively rooted. As well, as I said this coaching staff can't even seem to figure out the simplest of things regarding how their no-huddle hurry-up offense will impact a D that wasn't good last year. Is that to be respected and praised? I dont' think so, I think it deserves to be criticized and pointed out. Agreed. Also should have paid Byrd. But you know better, we don't pay players like that that kind of money, that's reserved for Fitzpatrick (whose contract Whaley had nothing to do with as Nix's top asst. apparently), Mario, and Dockery. Still, he was a Guard, not at Tackle, and the loss should be able to be dealt with, particularly since Spiller's not an UTM runner. Well, we've all pretty much said or at least thought that it can't possibly get any worse, so if it does then we have to begin to think that this is yet another deja vu situation regarding Marrone and his staff. We'll know soon enough.

By the way, it's hardly rational to preordain a coaching staff as being better much less even great without any evidence at all and with what limited evidence has already come in suggesting that perhaps they too won't be what we hope. Irrational is to have these hopes, defend those that made those decisions, and then call for their heads if and after things don't work out as such. Those defending the hire of Marrone are no better or more rational than those making the decision if they too fail here. I gotta say, who on earth is unimpressed with the play of a 1st-team D that has allowed the equivalent of well over 400 net yards per game during the limited time that they've been on the field and largely to backup QBs and no-name RBs? Are hopes for a D playing better during the regular season rational? I don't think so, so why try to turn the rationality or irrationality of things on its head? And why is it irrational to simply discuss real issues with a significant basis underlying them? I don't get it. Rationality says that a team that has never won anymore than a wild-card game against a divisional rival outside the Polian era isn't likely to do it given the current circumstances and that the burden of proof is on the team and coaches to prove differently, not for us to once again buy into their decisions without questioning them and rendering support for what could very well be yet the next in a long string of failures. If that's so, then why is it all but anathema to discuss those things? Food for thought. Did you actually read and try to comprehend what I wrote? It doesn't seem so. So what, you can't discuss the team's issues without emotionally caving like a woman, or what? Seriously, I'm not trying to incite you here, but what, really, you are incapable of discussing real demonstrable issues with the play of the team to the extent that you deem it rational only to stick your head in the sand to ignore them with absolutely nothing more than simple hopes that they're unfounded? Is that it, do I understand you correctly? Not sure where you work, but when a significant issue arises do you tell your seniors and all of your co-workers not to worry about it because negativity breeds more negativity? Or do you take it for what it is after discussion and rational intellectual treatment and deal with it straight on? How about your homelife? Speaking generically, what, someone's spouse comes to them with a significant issue and they say not to worry about it because thinking about it in that way will only breed more negativity? So ignorance is bliss in essence, would it be fair to sum your position up as such? If all we're going to do here is dicuss the pie-in-the-sky aspects of the team, meaning largely promises made but hardly on track to be kept, while disallowing real discussion of anything else, what's the point of having a forum?

OK, now for that dose of reality. Who are the ones being rational? Irrational? Seems to me that anyone that believes that this team will have anymore than 4/5 wins is not being rational. But here's the thing, the team's units, forget W's/L's, needs to perform better than the units of the last loser of a coach we had, and for whom some of us here, the "irrational ones" apparently, called a spade a spade and said that Gailey wasn't a good coach and winner when he was hired. Yet, he had even better credentials, college or NFL, than the current cast. But again, here's the thing, there is in fact cause for alarm if Marrone/Hackett/Pettine don't have things running better than they were last year, on both sides as well as on special teams. We've all been treated and "educated" by the "rational" types here as to how nothing could possibly be as bad as it was under the last loser. So what would it mean if it is, and if preseason has any meaning whatsoever in terms of 1st-team play, it very well could be? We can't say that they need time because they have more talent than the team had last season with a Draft having produced all of these budding superstars that Whaley's responsible for. Our only relevant loss was one OG, not even a OT. Spiller's in his second season after his first good one and that experience under his belt which also makes for better talent. Manuel really can't be as bad or futile as Fitzpatrick even if he struggles, or so we've been told. Either way, on paper this team is better. The "rational" people here have all preached how Marrone & Co. are better too, which if true shouldn't take a lot of time to prove. And IF the coaching staff really knows what it's doing and can get production from mere "schemes" and systems rather than actual talent as everyone here seems to believe that they can simply because they've said so. Not that the more "irrational" of us recollects ever having been sold a bill-of-goods as Bills fans or anything. Otherwise, with this D which right now seemngly isn't even playing close to how last season's D was, even if Manuel has a great rookie season they'll be lucky to win 8 games against the schedule that they have. Again, rationality suggests maybe 6 wins tops. The point should be to determine whether we finally have a good coaching staff and as the "rational" ones here insist is true for that reason, or whether once again we've all been sold a bill-of-goods by the FO, because once again people that will say anything to get us all hooked have insisted that "this time it's different." I've enjoyed watching high school football games more than I have the Bills in recent seasons. I've enjoyed watching NFL teams that I'm not a fan of more simply appreciative of good solid fundamental football, something we haven't seen in years in Buffalo. It's difficult to enjoy watching the Bills play football the way that they've played over the last bunch of years. If they play the way that they have this preseason they'll be lucky to win 4 games and will be entirely unenjoyable to watch. Why any such discussion is precluded from the arena of "rationality" is odd. We'll see how much different the regular season is than the preseason, but if one thing should automatically have been upgraded it's the D which enters with no less talent after having lost only Barnett, whom all but everyone here says wasn't any significant loss, and Wilson, even more so, but with the gain of the new and improved replacements, Alonso and Lawson. If that D is worse, then it's far from too soon to begin the criticism of this coaching staff. Let's not forget, it's the "rational" ones lecturing us all on how any stooge could get more from this D and how badly Gailey and a formerly completely unknown and still unqualified Defensive Coordinator ran it. As a part of that rationale, if this crew cannot do better, immediately given Pettine's experience, then I dare say Houston, we have a problem. As I've always said, the outcome of preseason games is meaningless, but what is not meaningless is the invidiual play of all but entirely proven players of which this team has few. Me being "irrational" of course. I'm just wondering at what point the more "rational" among us will be calling a spade a spade if that's the way it manifests itself and otherwise for how long they'll defend the indefensible. Surely the more "irrational" among us will admit success if it comes. We'll have no choice and that's what we all want anyway despite lectures from the more "rational" ones. There's nothing worse than realizing that once again you've been sold a bill-of-goods and that you've got at least three more seasons to deal with it, if you're lucky that is.

Bills fans that I know keep saying that the D can't be worse than it was last season, but after three preseason games the first team D has been flat out awful and made backup QBs Hasselbeck, Grossman, and now Pat White look like seasoned starting QBs in their primes. I don't know what's going to change between now and the regular season, I'm sure that many here will tell us that this has been the plan all along in playing possum or some nonsense, but at this point, and I have no idea how it's possible either, but the D could very well be worse than last year's D. Manuel in a hurry-up offense ain't gonna help that either. I also don't see the speed on D that's supposed to be the hallmark of Marrone's and Pettine's coaching. Looks relatively slow to me.

LOL Restated, what, if the 6th time's the charm ... ? You hopeful of that? You seem to give it a realistic chance. Others would have said that he's had his time to prove that he can play well at CB.

LOL Thanks for telling me what I think. You, with posts like that, are in fact the troll here in this case. I've incited no one, I've said absolutely nothing offensive, except to the mentally or emotionally weak or impaired perhaps, I've broken no terms of service. I've not prejudged anyone on the team with only a few exceptions, like Goodwin. Posts like yours reflect your intellect. Nothing but high level nonsense and frustration because you know that the points I raise are good ones. Then you react like a child. At least, and unlike you, I offer something that everyone doesn't say routinely in varying forums around the country on a daily basis, nothing but emotionally charged buzz words and oversimplified statements of greatness and the like.

To your first point, WRs are not kept on to block. Plain and simple. He either turns into a bona fide WR or he does not and is limited to STs where frankly, we really didn't need a major boost. There's not much to argue with there, I think we can agree. To your second point, I didn't say in the preseason games, I said according to what Marrone & Co. have said. Now they could all be lying to us I suppose. As to the games, you raise a very good point. Thus far it's really been very similar to what we've had in the past few seasons. The success of the first teams has been marginal at best against other first teams. But it's been a short-passing fest. So what's going to happen when the season starts? Deep passing game all of a sudden? If you think so, what do you think will happen? Will the offense be prolific, or will it result in stalled drives and poor time-of-possession? These are things that should be on any good coaching staff's minds. If they're not thinking about this then we have good cause for concern so early in their tenure. I'm not suggesting one way or the other, just stating that if they can't get past that fundamental thing, how will they succeed in the NFL. As to the deep passing game being successful, on what would anyone predicate that right now? What, Goodwin catching deep passes, which has happened several times in camp according to reports, one with Hackett acting like a giddy school girl in racing down to embrace Goodwin, over players that won't even be on the team in ten days? Is that a good basis for hoping that it works for real in the NFL's regular season? I dont' think so. Did you see yesterday's game? Steelers at Skins? Did you notice the rabid blitzing that the Steelers were doing? We haven't faced that in the preseason but will face it numerous times during the regular season. If that happens, Manuel's going to be overwhelmed the way that the team has currently played. IMO Marrone & Co. are in for a little bit of a rude awakening in September. I hope not, but my hopes are meaningless. I truly did not know what to think when they got here as a staff, but these trivial oversimplifications are tremendous cause for concern to me. Either way, this staff is going to realize in a few short weeks that they won't be going up against the 40-75 players on the roster currently and will be going up against starting NFL D's playing for keeps. I see Goodwin being of little utility as a WR when that happens, partly because that just doesn't happen like that in the NFL where a receiver routinely runs past his coverage and catches TDs. If it did, then NFL history would be replete with it, but it isn't, far from it in fact. Also, Manuel (or whichever QB) is going to first have the time to set up and throw the ball that deep, and secondly, have to put it on the money. We'll see if he's better than our returners have been in recent years, but I don't see how you improve on 1st and there's little room for improvement on finishing 4th too. The problem with this approach, is that if it does fail, then it's at least somewhat back to the drawing board with one of your receivers having little to no proven value otherwise.

And just think how many people here wanted him in Buffalo. Next year's class of QBs ('14) is going to be rich. I hope that Manuel works out or we'll have preempted ourselves from getting one of those QBs. What do you mean by that? I'm curious. LMAO Except here, where half of everyone thought that the team was going to take him and undergo a similar "turnaround" that SU had. Forget that doing so meant little more than beating a handful of I-AAs and Big East competition.

We'll see here shortly, won't we. As you say, you think. My entire point is that there's absolutely no basis for it,either historically or even particularly to Goodwin. I'll go with the odds and historical trends on this one not thinking that I'm smarter than what history has clearly shown us. Coaches would come across as smarter too and have much greater chances of success if they did not plan for such risky things being so pivotal to what they're trying to do. Historically it's never happened with any receiver, and his stats at Texas also suggest something different, leaving this to have been a project for some coach to attempt to translate pure/raw speed to use in the NFL in a receiving role. We can ignore the fact that it's been tried over and over again by varying teams and coaches but never worked that way. If Goodwin does have receiving skills, then they didn't net him much at Texas. As the Wendy's commercial used to go, "Where's the Beef?" Like I said, this whole overemphasis on speed has me highly concerned for this young coaching staff. It's hardly a novel approach, but it is an oft-failed one. Gailey even said he was going to implement something similar. I know, Gailey was a moron. Unfortunately Marrone & Co. haven't proven that they're geniuses yet though either. \ So are you agreeing with me then that his blocking is not going to be a significant factor this season?

Well, we'll see how it goes "for real" here in a few weeks. I don't recall seeing too much of Goodwin on offense in either preseason game. Woods has been more active and I'm sure that he'll be fine at WR, despite his lack of blazing speed. I'm not convinced that he's going to be a perennial 1,000 yard receiver yet, but it wouldn't surprise me if he ends up being one. So as to Goodwin's blocking and hustle, I think we need to see a little bit more than what goes on in camp. I know that Goodwin's caught some deep balls in camp to which there's been a massive overreaction IMO in terms of the optimism re: translating that to the season. I've noticed that it's never over Gilmore. So who is he catching these things over such that we should all translate it to success during the regular season? The rest of the roster at CB/DB is weak, inexperienced, and not of starting caliber in the NFL. So I'm not sure I share the optimism simply because Goodwin can outrun someone that's going to be on the waiver wire in less than two weeks. Not trying to rain on anyone's parade here, just trying to logically discuss why the optimism for the highly unlikely and quite frankly, unprecedented. The team needs to have a solid plan-B in place for this speed kick that they're on. If this ends up in a lenghty list of 3-and-outs it's going to reflect in time of possession miserably. Factor in that they're talking about a hurry up O, well you'd better be able to sustain drives with that kind of philosophy or your D is going to be winded in the mid-3rd. Has anyone on the coaching staff thought that far? Or do those things now not matter anymore in Buffalo in 2013. Someone there had better consider that or it could derail everything that they're trying to do thereby threatening the same-old same-old, again. None of us wants that. We all want to see success, but these things are highly concerning. Sure, they sound good, even great, in print. But when September hits the words are going to have to come off the paper and spring to life on grass. To say that he's anymore than that right now is unjustifiably optimistic. There's no basis for the notion that he's ever going to be anything more than a role-playing 5th WR. Again, he's so blazing fast which is why he averaged 11.4 yards-per-catch at Texas. OK. There's no basis for him being a WR that's going to make the kind of impact that you are suggesting. If he turns out to be another also-ran WR, who cares. We don't need those.

I agree on Graham, IMO he'll be cut. Goodwin's just like him but slightly faster. They don't need him on returns and didn't use him last year there so he's entirely expendable now. Goodwin will make the roster but primarily as a returner. I doubt he'll ever see much time, and little significant time, at WR. Obviously the team will keep Johnson and Woods. I'd guess Smith and Hogan too, and Easley due to the lack of other options. Goodwin will be listed at WR but he'll be STs and purely a limited use role player as a WR. Johnson's hammy had better heal up or it's gonna be a long season for the QBs Hammy injuries tend to nag all season long, let's hope that's not the case here.

Thanks!!! I thought that Darrell Green may have been a track star too. Jim Thorpe (1920-1928) Bob Hayes (1965-1975) Willie Gault (1983-1993) Ron Brown (1984-1991) Herschel Walker (1986-1997) James Jett (1993-2002) Jeff Demps (2012 - ?) Those only account for 1 Hall of Famer, 6 Pro Bowls, and 4 All-Pros. Gault, Brown, Jett, and Demps have nothing. I'm not sure that's who the article was referring to. I'm guessing that Darrell Green was in there. Either way, there are no modern examples to my knowledge whereby a player that is "so blazing fast that no one catch him" one on one, that had almost no receiving credentials in college, that excelled in the NFL as a WR. Plenty have gone on to become great returners, but not receivers. That's the problem here, everyone's expecting the unprecedented to occur. Why? These things don't happen for a reason. The fact that this coaching staff thinks that they're different than the wad of other coaching staffs that tried the same yet failed should be concerning, particularly since it seems to be such a relevant part of their stated game plan. I was neutral on Marrone & Co. entering the season, but it's stuff like that that really makes me scratch my head. Do they not understand NFL history in that way? Do they not understand that the single biggest transition from the NCAA to NFL, as stated by everyone in the game, is the speed of the game and how incredibly faster it is? They're just questions. Yeah, he's a special teamer. Did we really need to expend a 3rd round pick on a special teams player? Don't you think that we had much greater needs? What, we were a special teams player away from winning the division or something? Again, we finished 4th last season in KR avg. and 1st in PR avg. They didn't draft Goodwin to be a STs blocker. I get it, finally. It's all about the individual players. Got it. I have no trouble "rooting for the guy," but you know what, I'd rather root for the team. Unfortunately far too many people don't get the fact that just because you have a handful of good players, and even the Bills have had them, that that doesn't necessarily make the team good. I'd rather see the team in the playoffs because the FO and staff recognized their biggest weaknesses and drafted accordingly. Not drafting players to replace others that were their biggest strengths. Sorry, just a different philosophy I guess. Then again, for me it's all about the team winning, not about having individual players on the team putting up good stats.