PDaDdy

Sorry to use you as the example but you are one of the guys that just doesn't get it. Marshawn has 854yds and 8 TDs this year while learning a new offense on a team worse than ours. He is a good RB. What people REALLY don't get is that if we kept the guy we didn't need to blow the #9 pick overall in the 2009 draft for another RB. Do you get it now? We keep Marshawn and that #9 over all pick becomes a difference maker at another position. End result? The TEAM is better. As always we like to keep making the same holes over and over again and burn resources to refill them. This is how bad teams stay bad. Please get off the "thug" thing too. It's offensive and pretty tired. The whiney Buffalo fans blew that all out of proportion. Thug noun 1.a cruel or vicious ruffian, robber, or murderer. 2.( sometimes initial capital letter ) one of a former group of professional robbers and murderers in India who strangled their victims.

People are idiots for wanting to get rid of SJ. Ya, I said it. Hus juvenile antics and untimely drops are annoying as hell but he can clean those up by focusing and maturing as a young man and player. Unlike most of our games Fitz held on to the ball to wait for WRs to get open. The replays of Johnson on Revis tell us all we need to know. Stevie was putting on some serious multiple moves and basket ball style jukes on Revis. If you have enough time to throw enough fakes any defender will eventually buy one. Getting off the line clean is important as well. I truly believe that part of the whole Revis island thing is that he is so incredibly physical with WRs often to the point of illegal contact but the refs buy into him being the best so they let him get away with it.

Easley can't stay healthy either. He has everything you want. Size, height, speed. If you aren't healthy and you can't play. Troup has been nothing but injury problems since he has been here. I feel for the kid but if you aren't healthy you can't play and you can't help us win. I don't know how we have ended up with all of these brittle players the last 5 years or so.

Yes I have. It sucks. I DO feel bad for the kid but sympathy doesn't a NT make. I don't mean to sound harsh because injuries are the worst thing that can happen to any athlete. Unfortunately that doesn't help us win games.

Man I really don't want to consider the idea of moving back to a 4 - 3. It's not like we will all of a sudden become any better by changing scheme on defense. I would actually be worried that we would get worse. Change takes time as we are seeing in our second year of the 3 - 4. If our scheme is constantly in flux we won't be good for another few years. I do agree with some 4 - 3 looks however. A 3-4, 4-3 hybrid could be the best of both worlds and some defenses will employ both although being predominately one or the other. Other than KW and Dareus we don't have any other DTs to speak of that I can think of. Troup is terrible at NT and I don't know that he would be any better at DT which leaves Heard. We would have to spend draft picks and or acquire free agents to go back to the 4 - 3. This doesn't even take into consideration how it may impact defenders we just drafted and picked up in free agency to play the 3 - 4 over the last 2 years. At the 4-3 DE position however we have a bunch of guys that could get the job done.

You stated that much more succinctly than I did but I agree 100%. Problem is you can't get that many difference makers in the draft. If we are lucky 1 or 2 of those guys might already be on the roster but haven't developed. If we are lucky we may be able to get 1 or 2 of those guys in the draft. If we get off our ass and sign and PAY some free agents we could get a few more and make our own luck.

Or stated another way. Winning teams keep their good players and fill their holes with new talent. Losing teams make new holes by letting their good players leave and keep filling the same ones over and over and over and over.

PERSONNEL #1 OFFENSIVE LINE - Stop trying to get by on the cheap. Get a GOD DAMN LT that can stay healthy and block his man 1 on 1 without constant chip blocking from the RB or TE double teams. Woods is really good but he has unfortunately had really bad luck with injuries. Collectively as a unit they need to be able to PASS block for 3+ seconds so we don't have to rely on Fitz getting rid of the ball in 2 seconds. We made Maybin look like a star last Sunday drawing holding penalties and racking up two freaking sacks! Guess he earned some of that money. #2 PASS RUSHER - Maybin was not an every down player but we jumped out of the frying pan and into the fire by letting him go. His 5 sacks would look pretty damn good added to our crappy team total this year. The Shawn "Good Gamble" Merriman experiment should be over. AT BEST he should be our situational pass rusher next year if he can stay off crutches and out of a boot. #3 PASS RUSHER - Yes another one! I won't trash Kelsay. He is a lunch pail journeyman who isn't bad but we need someone better at getting after the QB who can also defend the run. #4 WR - We looked pretty damn good until as usual we got hit hard and deep by injuries at ONE position as we always seem to have happen every year. Believe it or not Parrish was a big factor in confusing opposing defenses but he can't stay healthy. Neither can Easley. Remind SJ of his dropped passes at critical times and stupid antics that cost the team when he is trying to negotiate his #1 super star contract. #5 DE/NT - Troup can't stay healthy and sucks when he is. Two options; 1) Kick Kyle out to DE, let him bull rush up field all day and get a 350 fat bastard who can anchor the middle and even push the pile like most every other good 3 - 4 defense. 2) Get another DE who can make plays, beat one on one match ups and generate pressure. #6 CB - Leodis can't cover in the NFL. He gets lost if the play lasts for more than 3 seconds which due to our lack of QB pressure seems to happen quite frequently. He is horrible playing the ball and gives up catches that he should swat away but his feet are all tangled up and he lacks body control. Although perhaps our best corner when healthy, McGee as always, is another injury waiting to happen. We need a 6' CB that can play against our division rivals. #7 DEPTH - We don't spend a lot of money and we know it. In a magical world where everyone stayed healthy we might be fine as we have SOME damn good to pretty decent starters. Perhaps the real area where our lack of spending shows up is our lack of depth at some positions. We lose some guys due to injury and it all starts to go to hell. I have no idea but I wonder if other teams rotate their starters more to keep them healthy where as we seem to work ours to death or IR as it were. Could totally be wrong on this one. SCHEME AND COACHING With better personnel I think this takes care of itself BUT: Running Offense - Split the load. We can't keep beating the crap out of Freddie by not letting our other guys get involved enough. He is going to be north of 30 and no RB under 230 lbs and over 27 should take that kind of pounding. Passing Offense - With an improved offensive line we can take more shots down the field. We take a few shots down field a game. Good teams seem to take a few shots downfield a drive. You don't have to hit on every one of them but it makes the defense cover the whole field instead of press coverage on our WRs at the line who generally have trouble beating it. Yes, losing all of our 4.3 speed WRs this year was a BIG factor. The bunch formation worked. I imagine the only reasons we stopped is because we didn't have enough WRs left to run it. Rush Defense - More beef in the middle as mentioned above should help the results. I'm not sure it is a scheme problem. Pass Defense - With better covering corners and an improved pass rush due to personnel we would be effective in generating sacks, thrown away balls and interceptions. PLEASE PLEASE for the love of god come up with something creative on defense. When we attempt to blitz it's almost worse than staying in our regular coverage. Sending an extra man doesn't generate any more pressure it only creates weaker coverage. Try some exotic blitzing! Bring pressure from different areas. Over load one side or the other. Unexpectedly drop guys back into coverage. DO SOMETHING!

Maybe we SHOULD get some offensive line players. They line single-handedly attempted to scuttle every drive in the first quarter it's amazing we were able to score at all.

Cream can't rise over cream There might not be a RB in the NFL that could rise over Freddie.

Fred obviously looked even better. Hard to get playing time behind the best RB in the NFL right now.

SURE give him one game. That should CERTAINLY be a large enough sample size to make an assessment on a guy that gets 2 touches a game. Let's trade him away for a bag of chips and a soda. [insert standard insult about posters intelligence]

DAMN IT! I was worried we were running Freddie into the ground by not giving Spiller enough carries. Now with Choice that crowds the backfield. I hope they give CJ a lot of carries. We need to see what this kid can do.

I would be curious to know how many plays we ran in those games vs lately. I haven't run the numbers but I bet that Jackson's carries as a percentage of all plays is quite possibly about the same. That being said even just 20 carries a game would put Jackson at 320 carries on the year. That is not sustainable for a 30 year old RB under 230+ lbs.

CJ was getting about 2 carries per game and the occasional pass target. A better ball from Fitz a couple weeks ago and he would have had a huge gainer if not a TD. Sometimes RBs DO take a couple years to develop and it usually has to do with blitz pickups and learning complicated schemes and reading NFL defenses to pick the best running lanes. He has an abundance of natural talent. Now Gailey has no choice but to play the kid and see what he's got. That is perhaps the ONLY thing good about this situation. I hate hiding guys, especially high draft picks, on the bench and not giving them a chance because the incumbent is THE GUY. He's not a QB where you only use one guy as long as he is healthy. Speaking of QB's how about Fitz vs Edwards? We were told that Trent was the better QB especially in practice. Well, how did that work out? Fitz has had his recent struggles in large part due to the injuries to our WR core and O-line but he is worlds better than Edwards in my opinion. The guy never got a chance until Edwards absolutely 100%, without question or room for discussion proved he WASN'T the guy. Sadly a Fred Jackson extended injury is possibly the only scenario where CJ was going to get enough playing time to get adjusted to LIVE nfl games that count. It's sickening to me that people are labeling him a bust already when all he has done is put up good numbers in the INCREDIBLY limited time he has been given in game situations. He is not no show Maybi-not who has even found a role in NY. How about we see the kid perform before we slap that on him? I've been to the games. I've heard the crap this kid has to listen too. All he is trying to do like any of the players is to play football. He was catching hell from day 1 from people before he ever took a snap instead getting support from fans of the team that drafted HIM! Let's see what depth we have to work with. GO BILLS!! Thank you for the dose of reality! Some of these jokers have turned on him so fast it's a shame. We had crap for WR's when the season started and the only ones with any speed, 4.3 are on injured reserve. Stevie has been nursing injuries and has been having trouble with double coverage. When we were running legit 4 and 5 WR sets he was only getting single coverage which he was pretty good against. 10 dropped passes by the 3rd quarter last week doesn't help the offensive flow and provide continuity. We know Fitz was able to do it when he had the targets out there getting open earlier in the year. What changed? WR's started dropping like flies and the ones left started dropping balls.

It sucks that Freddie is hurt but this is what I was worried about. He may have gotten injured if this was his first or 170th carry regardless but we have first round pick, #9 overall RB sitting on the bench. It is LONG past the time to get this guy some carries to get him in GAME not practice situations to see what he's got. Jackson is the man no doubt but we shouldn't have been riding him into the ground. Who knows how many games Jackson will be out but hopefully we see some flashes of that Clemson talent in NFL situations. CJ's yards per carry is right there with Jackson and he was almost a yard better per carry prior to the Miami game. Hopefully the kid shows enough that we can use the both of them to keep Freddie fresh for a play off run next year!

Why do that when we can run an offense designed to get the ball out of the QBs hands in 2 sec to multiple low talent WRs who can't beat single coverage? Good teams generally don't have good offensive lines do they?

As much as I would LOVE to take another shot at the Lee Evans haters/Stevie Johnson supporters I can't. Stevie is good talent. We need to keep him. We don't need to pay him $10 million a year but we need to keep talent not let it walk. That's how bad teams get better. Ever wonder why we have RARELY ever had more than one good WR on the team at the same time? As soon as the #2 starts to become a contributor we run the #1 out of town. For some idiotic reason Bills fans are always running a starter out of town in favor of their pet players. I was in favor of keeping Marshawn AND Freddie. Instead....we spend the #9 overall pick in last years draft on ANOTHER rb. See how that works? You can't use your high draft picks to improve areas of weakness if you keep turning areas of strength into weaknesses by trading or releasing good players. Keep the good ones! Replace the bad ones! Pretty freaking simple but for some reason the idiots who have been running the show for the last 10 - 15 years don't get it.

Uh....because he sucks?

Since we screwed ourselves on WR we apparently aren't running the bunch formation anymore which was really successful for us. May as well try to pound the rock. At least Fitz doesn't need to survey the defense after fielding snaps from the center at his ankles.

Just my opinion but you couldn't be more wrong. If Aaron Rodgers were in Buffalo with our line and our WR core that has been depleted due to a trade and injuries he would look pretty average. Better than what we have...eh sure but he is the run away MVP of the league with the talent he has around him for crying out loud. Why do people constantly due that in these forums. "If player X on pace to have the best season ever in the NFL was on our team we would be a lot better." Comparing good serviceable talent to hall of famers or record setters is idiotic and unfair. There aren't too many of those guys lying around at the discount store where we shop for talent. Everyone bashed the crap out of Lee Evans and said we would be fine. Stevie Johnson the fan choice is our #1 and we are left with a whole slew of #4 worthy WRs. Our offensive line as I bitched and moaned about for years is proven to be WAY worse now than when we had Peters and Walker and our best offensive lineman Eric Wood is out for the year. We can't even snap the god damn ball to the QB properly so he has a chance to survey the field before the dogs are on him in under 3 seconds. Our O-line and WRs are pathetic. You get what you pay for which in our case isn't much. Don't even get me started on the defense!!!!!

...and exactly what WRs will this franchise QB throw the ball to? TEN dropped passes by the 3rd quarter. Not even the best QB in the universe can catch the ball for the WR. He can only hit them in the hands or in the numbers.

Don't you know that Spiller is a bust and Freddy Jackson is god? Seriously though I don't know why he is not used more. He has a great average per carry but he averages 2 carries an entire game. We need to use our run game more and not beat the crap out of Freddy every week. If we are going to get on track and attempt to get into the playoffs for the first time in YEARS we need Freddy to be fresh at the end of the year by using our other options in the run game. Everyone forgot how depleted our WR core was due to injury and trades at the beginning of the season because we were putting up points. Opposing defenses are figuring out how to slow down our passing game. For some reason we aren't running those bunched formations that were working so well for us. It might be time to lean on the run game and go a little deeper. Freddy should still be getting almost 20 touches per game including the run and the pass but Spiller should be getting 7 or so total touches.

I have had this discussion before. I have always been a Lee Evans supporter and said that despite his production numbers due to play calling and QB incompetence he was a #1. If he wasn't in the "#1 WR" category then there weren't more than 15 or so in the league. His critics "coincidentally", typically used to think that Trent Edwards was a #1 QB and his lack of production was because Lee wasn't a #1 WR. We obviously know the story about Trent. It remains to be seen what Lee can do if he ever gets healthy and plays. Flacco is a pretty decent QB who at least has a big arm. Pretty much...and it goes on and on and on.

Honestly I don't think teams figured out how to counter it. When I saw it used....IT WORKED. I don't recall seeing it for at least a few weeks.