flopagamo

+1 Professor Nerdlinger from Harvard will be a good tutor to a young talent. And worst case, he can get out there and run for his life behind this O-line.

Yards are a good indicator, but let's look at Points vs Time of Possession (rounded to nearest minute). Game 1 (Dolphins): 10 points, 23 minutes with the ball (.43 points per minute of TOP) Game 2 (Packers): 7 points, 29 minutes (.24 points per minute) Game 3 (Pats*): 30 points, 28 minutes (1.07 points per minute) Game 4 (Jets): 14 points, 20 minutes (.7 points per minute) Game 5 (Jags): 26 points, 26 minutes (1 point per minute) Yes you should consider the quality of opposing defense, the 1 KR TD, and the smattering of garbage-time points... But it is true that the offense is doing more with the time it has the ball, in recent weeks without Trent. The most pressing problem is that the defense is not getting stops, not getting the offense the ball. The Jags went the whole game without punting in week 5.

Maybe Ryan Leaf is free too.

We should pin this thread. Diehard, can you and your former mates keep em comin? You already have a great book title (thread subject!).

I'm also in the mid-atlantic area, and I work with folks from all over the country... and I find that most of my coworkers genuinely feel bad for me. No ribbing, no hard time, just genuine sympathy (except for the lone Jets fan who went to school in Buffalo in the early 90s, who delights in our misery). A Giants fan I work with told me recently, "It's really not funny. It's awful to see a team that bad. It's not fun for anyone." I also happen to pull for the Washington Nationals... when Strasburg went down with his injury this summer, this same guy said to me, "Please do not start rooting for the Giants or Yankees." I still sport my throwback Bills hat. I will not stop doing that, especially because it looks sooo good. It's tough to watch a few of my sons root for other teams though. The only condition I place on them is this: if you root for the Dolphins, you sleep outside.

Marv simply wasn't a real GM. Good man, great coach, excellent leader of men. Not a GM - never should have had the job.

or this: BTW kudos on starting this thread. There's some therapy in this.

Obscure Aussie chick band:

I don't think that's really provable without being in the huddle or on the sideline. He doesn't seem to get his number called on crossing routes often though... can't really hang that on Lee. He's also not a very big target (which is advantageous on crossing routes).

You gotta earn your way onto the field, and Maybin hasn't.

I keep thinking... but all I hear is this:

Amen. Incentives drive behavior. The #1 incentive for the people running the show is a healthy balance sheet, not wins and losses. <deep sigh> Here's the thing, though: the day will come (upon the passing or RW) when Russ Brandon & Tom Modrak will be unemployable in the NFL. You would think that a young fella like Russ Brandon would want more success on his resume.

...IF Jones-Drew is held under 100 yards and 2 TDs. Which he won't be.

A handheld screen, some headphones... maybe they can show highlights of the early 90s to get some cheers going.

Exactly. No need to add to the stink of losing that we have to deal with already.

Egggzactly. Market value is a fluid thing. Randy Moss was a 1st rounder too.

Definitely. http://www.databasefootball.com/draft/draftteam.htm?tm=BSP&lg=nfl You can see that NE has looked to pile up numerous picks in rounds 1-4, even back into the 90s (with a handful of seasons in there where they had normal or fewer). This works well if you have good talent evaluators, of course.

Just like Mom always taught us... if you don't have anything nice to say, find an internet message board.

I'm not yet optimistic, but it's at least nice to see them doing SOMETHING. Getting 2 picks for Lynch isn't bad. We need to learn from successful front offices. For example, look at this from the espn article on Moss-to-Minnesota: THIS is how it is done. It helps to have a stout O Line & franchise QB already in place, of course... Man I hate them.

this

exactly. This is what good teams do.

We'd still lose a lot of games, but we would have the shiniest turds in the league by a wide margin.

I was going to argue at first, but then I went here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Super_Bowl_champions The teams that won the Super Bowl without a 'top shelf' QB, over the past 20 years: 1990 Giants (superior defense) 1991 Redskins (with Mark Rypien, who was rarely touched by a defender that whole year) 2000 Ravens (superior defense) 2002 Bucs (superior defense) And this includes calling Eli Manning a top shelf QB, which might be a stretch. So yeah, that's 16 of the last 20 Super Bowls won with a big time QB. It is a rare championship team that has it's heart-and-soul leader in a position other than QB.

That's right... we run to movie stars for that kind of deep thinking.

Great post! Both Detroit and Cleveland have made meaningful investments in their O lines and D lines, which means they're on better footing that the Bills right now.