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Mango

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Posts posted by Mango

  1. Anyone else think that this is a strategic move by the coaching staff? It is strange that Marrone didn't name Kolb the week 1 starter. I'm not necessarily saying that the team is making up a fake injury, but maybe it isn't serious at all and the organization made the decision to shut him down in the preseason. The organization could have said we know what he have in Manuel and lets work with him behind closed doors. I mention this for several reasons:

     

    1. EJ is clearly a better option then Kolb so EJ is our week 1 starter

    2. We play N.E. week one, against one of the best gameplanners in NFL history, lets not give the Pats any more tape on this guy

    3. Lets see if its worth keeping Kolb around or Tuel has what it takes in this league to be a viable backup

    4. Along the lines of 2, our offense looks terrible with Kolb in there, lets have N.E. think its just the same old Bills (Im not saying we aren't yet!)

     

    That's just my 2 cents. Maybe we actually have a coach now that can compete strategically with the best organizations in the NFL in stategy and game planning. Let's hope

     

    I cannot put my finger on it, but the announcement seems out of the blue, so I am hesitant to trust it, or am, at the very least having trouble defending it. I generally always thought the smoke screen talk about or Bills for the past few years where reaches. Buddy and Co. where always honest, which I liked. This coaching staff and FO is much different, which I also like for different reasons. They play everything close to the vest, and give us no real information. I want to say there is something else at play here.

  2. The issue a lot of the time is the O-Line. I was there today, and I commend EJ for the way he hung in the pocket really strong as it collapsed.

     

    He made some poor decisions. The int to Gilmore on the bomb down the side line was a heart breaker. Didn't air the ball out too much today. There where a ton of times where a defender was in the backfield uncontested.

     

    The defense dominated, and EJ showed tremendous physical talent an poise, while not a ton of vision. I rarely saw him look off a defender.

     

    Tuel looked pretty bad today.

  3. When my parents first started dating, my Mom worked at the Aud, and used to sneak my father into games and concerts. My dad met Jimbo at a Sabres game at the urinal, and told him "nice game on Sunday". Jim told him to "Eff off dick head" and to mind his own business. My dad zipped up, poured his beer on Jimbo's head, then had to have my mom sneak him out the service entrance.

     

    According to my mother Thurman, Jimbo, and Bruce spent the entire night looking for him.

  4.  

     

    ill agree here. hopefully they dont pull a rabbit out of their hats and turn amendola into welker and all of a sudden us a camp fodder cut from some team as some magical weapon like they have in the past.

     

    they took risks, they got rewards, and they face consequences. theyve handled losing talent before, but typically with a bit more warning and ability to plan for it. itll be interesting to see what direction they go. it seems they werent altogether ignoring the risks with gronk and AH though, as every year we have talked about how many TEs can they possibly sign... but itll be tough (impossible) to fully replace that talent at this point.

     

    Donald Jones?

  5. I've been a season ticket holder for coming up on 26 years, and I've never once brought a bag into a game. Blankets? Sure. Extra clothes? Yep. Duffel bag? Not once.

     

    Another change that doesn't affect me at all...guess I'll keep going to games.

     

    I am not a season ticket holder but go to 2-4 games per year. I always bring a bag for xt clothes, rain gear, or blankets. Sometimes just so I can keep track of clothing if I get too hot. Not to mention the pockets in my original Zubaz are terrible so it holds my wallet and phone

     

    This rule I think discourages attendance at cold weather and/or late games

  6. I'd love to see them open it up more, especially with CJ and Fred. Chan totally mis-used those guys.

     

    I've long thought that when Chan used to claim that CJ was either winded or that it was just Fred's turn to run the ball, it was just him trying not throw CJ under the bus. CJ is a HUGE LIABILITY on passing plays where he is asked to pick up a rusher. It explains 3rd downs and red zone defenses that have their ears pinned back and CJ is on the bench. Fitz also had the freedom to call plays at the line, CJ on the field would be a liability.

     

    I could be wrong but we will find out this year.

     

     

    http://audio.wgr550....t-kc-joyner.htm

     

    KC Joyner, the football scientist, says you are wrong in terms of Levitre. In fact, he says the Bills were the #1 "good blocking" line in the league last, year, and, as such, they will not miss Levtire as much as you suggest. "Moving from 1 to 3 is no big deal".

     

     

    However, with the inclusion of the grain of salt above, it appears Joyner has responded to the criticism, and, he has not only refined his methods, but also put in the work and the thinking(the most important ingredients), and derived new methods, and metrics, to produce intelligence that some of his critics said was "impossible" to create. Incidentally, they were idiots as well.

     

    Specifically, and responding to one of my chief complaints(I am sure not mine, personally :rolleyes:, and his response to my others remains to be seen), he has accounted for offensive line play, on every single play for the entire season. Not using the dopey, subjective, and often irrelevant individual lineman averages he used before.

     

    He's done this by creating an objective standard: "good" vs. "bad" blocking. This is defined in terms of whether the line achieved the desired outcome via the play's design, not necessarily whether each lineman's technical play was perfect. This is a sound standard, because it is both easy to measure, and, consistent because it doesn't have too many moving parts that will introduce false dependencies, error, or too much variance to be predictive and/or reliable.

     

    I would think you Bill, of all people, would recognize the line as a unit first, individuals, second.

     

    I see this as a reasonable metric, because while it is possible, and useful, to measure an individual lineman's technical execution, when we are comparing lineman to lineman, it is useless when we are trying to compare one RB to another. The context changes, because the O line, as a unit, is what affects the RB, WR, QB etc. It is a dependent variable, but this time: properly defined. The RB's play is affected based on whether the play is being executed by the line, by design, as a whole. Put simply: it largely doesn't matter what the RT does on off tackle run to the left, but, it does matter if the line produces "bad blocking" on every play to the left.

     

    Trying to link the individual lineman to the RB was a problem in Joyner's earlier work. Now, it is not.

     

    As such, the Bills are the #1 "good blocking" team in the league. It's interesting, given the fact that we haven't drafted LT in round 1 every year. This suggests that O line play, or drafting RBs and DBs, has little causation WRT to our record.

     

    My thought is, couldn't you combine the two? I understand the concept, but say the goal of the play is to complete a pass for a first down, and that happens, and this system is binary, good and bad. The oline did a good job? What I the QB hangs in a collapsing pocket and takes a shot to the chin, still a plus? This way of measurement seems to account for other positions moreso then it does the OLine

  7.  

    Actually radio stations can get in HUGE trouble for broadcasting prank phone calls. In fact it's illegal to record any phone call without letting someone know BEFORE you start.

     

    Yes stations do get away punking people, then letting them in on the joke later and getting permission to air the call. But it is illegal to do that. There must be prior consent.

     

    PTR

     

    I have heard FWIW that in NYS one or more of the recorded parties involved need to be made aware, making prank calls nothing more than harassment and this illegal recording.

     

    Again that is hearsay

  8. Flacco made a crazy gamble and it turned out in his favor. He doesn't turn in an amazing post season and his deal isn't close to what it is now.

     

    Newsome made a wise move. The QB is the one player you can afford to pay and inflated price to if you lose the gamble. Newsome lost the gamble and won a superbowl.

     

    About to post something similar. If the ravens lost the Super Bowl or don't make it, he does not get anywhere near that contract...ie the Ray Lewis effect.

     

    You could make the same arguement about AFC championship game last year with Lee Evans. Good players win the games that matter.

     

    This past Super Bowl was a battle of the best defense and the best defensive players emotion, and Ray Lewis won. In a different game against a different balanced team things may be different.

     

    All in all Ozzie made the right decision and so did Flacco. Good for the Ravens in if ding their guy, and good for Flacco for really grabbing ahold of his team.

     

    I will say if he doesn't meet the standard expect a restructure soon

  9. Was talking with a Raiders fan the other day and he raised an interesting idea regards the draft.

    Why not introduce a reward to the team the drafts well, say either a pick or some coin or other dispensation- maybe a Veteran salary reduction. Something.

    So you drafted a 1st rd that was an All-pro still with your team, maybe you could get a reduction on his salary against the cap as a veteran so he could remain at the club at his career end.

    Or you drafted a 7th rd who came to be a Probowler you'd get an extra pick, not sure what value in the draft.

    Reward a good draft rather than rewarding mediocrity giving them the earliest draft pick.

    And remember, this is from a Raiders fan!

     

    Isn't the reward drafting well?

     

    Say you draft somebody who turns out to be be a Pro-Bowler or Hall of Famer...the reward is having a Pro-Bowler or Hall of Famer on the roster, not a back up corner in the 5th.

     

    Not to mention the draft is a reflection on the season, and the season the draft.

  10.  

     

    Bill Polian also adamantly endorsed the Bills hiring of Dick Jauron. I believe he once said that if he hadn't hired Tony Dungy to replace Jim Mora that Dick Jauron would have been the choice. Polian was a very successful GM and by virtue of making the right choice between Peyton Manning and Ryan Leaf and not trading the rights to Jim Kelly(though I am told he wanted to) he will someday be in the HOF.........but he was ultra-stubborn and had a weakness for malleable coaches and that's why his resume includes just one Lombardi trophy.

     

    Polian had the timing as a football GM that Phil Jackson had as an NBA head coach......but Polian wasn't a finisher. Being told that the Bills needed to improve a position seemed to strengthen his resolve to not make improvements to that position. Hence the reason the Bills had a 260 pound nose tackle named Jeff Wright and the great gazoo at free safety...but otherwise the best roster in the NFL. He botched the window between SB XXV and XXVII and it never opened up that big again. Perhaps if he had known that free agency was looming he would have felt a greater sense of urgency and swung a trade or two the way he had done earlier in the Bills development when they acquired Leonard Smith. But he didn't, and Dallas and Washington used the veteran route to bolster their rosters and ultimately beat the Bills in the SB. A prime example being Dallas acquiring Charles Haley. That put them over the hump. The Bills weren't really willing to take that chance once they had reached the SB once. The Bills of the early 1990's were a lot like the Oakland A's of the early 1970's in that there really was no immediate end in sight to their winning until free agency unraveled them.

     

    I think his eye for talent was better than most but he was very stubborn and it's hard to hold yourself accountable when you aren't willing to accept that you make mistakes and work to improve them.

     

    Marrone doesn't seem like a Polian hire at all. His track record doesn't really include hard nosed outspoken characters. Polian likes guys he can control not guys that have their own sense system and plans.

  11. I also never really understood the "failure" of Saban in the NFL. He took a 4-12 team and made them a 9-7 team. Then had a decision to make, take Culpepper a QB off a knee injury, or Brees a QB off of a shoulder injury. At the time Culpepper seemed like the logical choice. For God's sake, the guy started Joey Harrington and Cleo Lemon and still won 6 games. Had they pulled the trigger on Brees instead, I am sure his story would be much different.

     

    If I where an NFL GM I would roll the dice with Saban again, assuming he doesn't bail on you again.

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