ThurmasThoman

for the first time in a long time, all the starters are essentially fleshed out heading into the preseason, and the games can be used to suss out some of the finer points of the offense, and get a solid depth chart established with regards to our backups. this is the best preseason i can remember since... well... i dont remember any preseasons from when we were good... because... THEYRE SO MEANINGLESS. but halfway through and no injuries? my god, i feel like we've won the superbowl already. but i suppose some fans wont be happy until chan spends his winters and springs making game plans for these scrimmage opponents, devoting OTAs and mini camps to full pad practices to prep for games like last night against the vikings, and we hit the ground running in the preseason. i wish i could go back in time, bring twobillsdrive with me, and see how people felt about camp marv.

i'm expecting the bills to come out and engineer situations on both offense and defense to see how specific players react in certain situations, to narrow down some of the fringe positional battles. i'm expecting chan to run the same, very basic offensive sets with vince and thigpen, that utilize 4-5 wideouts, to have film on how they're going through their progressions. i'm expecting the starters to play 20 plays, the backups to get the majority of the action. as you can see, i'm expecting (like every preseason game in the history of the national football league,) that the coaches will have stopped looking at the scoreboard sometime between when potter tees the ball up for opening kick off, and when potter actually makes contact with the ball, sending it into the night, and beginning the game. and lastly, despite my last expectation, i'm expecting to not enjoy coming to twobillsdrive.com again until the middle of next week, when the reactionary threads about the RESULT of this scrimmage have fallen to the bottom of the page, and there are good discussions about positional battles going on again. because this is what happens every. single. preseason. scrimmage.

forget the wildcat, i want gailey to develop a new wrinkle to the offense. if we have vince and brad smith in the backfield, you could have any of the following combos in play qb/qb qb/rb rb/rb qb/wr rb/wr that's not even mentioning spiller who also has dual roles as wideout and running back. coupled with the amount of screens we run, and short passes... my god. talk about confusing a defense.

you know what? i used to think the exact same thing. and i don't know YOU personally, but im guessing we would be grouped in the same demographic with regards to race, gender, and age - give or take a few years. my point being, i (like you,) like to think of myself as having my life pretty well in order, with a good head on my shoulders. without getting into details, i came into a large sum of money about half a decade back--nothing nefarious, or illegal, just nothing i particularly feel like discussing. a few things: a) seeing that money every morning in my bank account was one of the most amazing feelings i have ever, or probably will ever have. being twenty-something, and waking up every morning without a financial care in the world was incredible. the sun shined brighter, the music sounded better, food tasted better. anyone who says money can't buy happiness is lying. b) the money was gone and i was in crippling debt in under a year. i can't even remember how it happened, to be honest. death by a thousand paper cuts. 500$ here, 500$ there. i wasn't "making it rain," i was just making decisions with no basis in fiscal reality. no kids, no cars, no nothing - i just lost it all. c) if i ever come into money again, ill know what to do the second time around. maybe. d) never, EVER, be too hard on these athletes for blowing their money. it would be even EASIER for them--i was dealing with a sum we can all come to terms with on a practical level... but millions? come on man, thats an unimaginable sum. people are always saying "i'd save my money." well, if the offseason came around, you were a buffalo bill with 2 million in the bank, and stevie johnson says "hey, we rented a villa on the southern coast of italy for june. its right next to the sports illustrated swim suit photo shoot hotel. about 10 of us are going. 25,000$ for the month, you in?" you still saving that money? of course not. youre booking your plane ticket. first class, of course.

me? take it easy? i dont even want this game discussed! did fred jackson and/or cj spiller even see the field? i mean... they ARE our offense! them not touching the ball... who cares what our offense looked like! i hope our starters continue to only play 15 snaps. the only... i repeat.. the ONLY thing i am checking in the box score is injuries. quick - what was the giants record last preseason? exactly. i know this is a bills message board, i know were all passionate about the bills... but my god. these games (for the first time in a very long time,) are MEANINGLESS. enjoy that feeling. we have arrived as a franchise. we actually have positional battles that need to be settled, but aside from that, i could care less if fitz throws for 500 yards and 6 tds, or no yards and 6 picks. you think gailey is installing an offense to beat the redskins this week?

this is the first year in about 15 years where our preseason is 100% meaningless. this is all about backup positional battles. please please please just enjoy the games, get ready for the season, and hope no one gets injured. you think gailey is going to roll out a gameplan that we would use in the regular season? vanilla vanilla vanilla. it's about putting players on the cusp of making the team, in vanilla situations, to compare how they do against their competition. to be honest, im surprised fitz threw 14 passes. thats about 4 too many. no injuries tonight? then we WON. this is just awful. i came on here hoping there would be nothing like this. but here it is.

ehhhh i'm glad we passed on him. jones was a great #2 last year until he got hurt. our offense was humming right along those first 5 weeks. wideout and qb... the only positions in the NFL where pure physical talent won't guarantee success. it's all timing, and knowing when to break off a route (IE, knowing the playbook front to back.) it takes an immense amount of dedication and discipline to be an all-world wide out. an 18 year old kid that can't stay in shape, has a dui, run ins with the law, and according to his all-world team mate, needs to push himself more in training camp? come on. the real NFL is not Madden. this guy has bust written all over him. would he even fit in with our offense? how many 50 yard go-routes are we gonna be running the second half of the season, when the wind is whipping at the ralph? on the road in foxboro? the meadowlands? build your team to win your division, not to make madden players happy.

he never experienced winning here, what do you expect? jimbo is out there still tailgating to this day, and wants to be part of ownership. win, and youre a god. lose, and its a small city with nothing to do. who cares. the current bills love buffalo, and buffalo loves them. a 12-4 season and a divisional round appearance, and buffalo will be the NFL's golden boys again. In the HD era, our stadium, in a blizzard, for a night playoff game? you can't sell the image of the NFL any better than that. our fans are crazy, our stadium is the last of the "built for the fans, not the suits," type, the weather is unpredictable, and the bills in the playoffs just has a certain magic to it - because win or lose, we WILL make it interesting. and were a story, like the 04 red sox. the media attention this season is going to be overwhelming, i absolutely can't wait. I live out of market - and let me tell you: this league has GROWN since the bills last made the playoffs. man... just wait until you see the national attention we get this year. wow. the way that this thread went 6 pages? you guys aren't ready...

holy sh*t. this is too funny to use an "LOL." this thread man... i don't want to sound like an a hole, but i get front row at most events I go to. get there early, keep your eyes on about 10 groups of seats in the front where you want to be. as the event starts, obviously 9 out of those 10 will fill up. one wont. when the action picks up in the second quarter, go grab a beer, and walk down to that seat like you f*cking own it. walk right past the ushers tat direct you to your seat. people that stop there and look around for a seat always get sent back up to the nose bleeds. don't talk to the person next to you when you sit down, don't say anything. once in a great while an usher will come up and ask to see your ticket - be nice, but "ahh tossed that up at concession man, sorry." occassionally, the owner of the seats will show up, if so, take your loss and get out of there. 2 things about this: 1) like trying to bring girls home from the bar - you have to be prepared to lose, because it's going to happen, so don't be "conflict-averse." michael jordan missed half of his shots during his career too. 2) the first 10 times you do it, you're going to be so focused on doing it, you wont even notice the game/concert, so it wont seem like its worth it. but it is. cant remember the last event i didn't see from the front row though. actually, so broke right now, cant remember the last event i went to, lol. got drumsticks from tre cool (green day drummer) at lolapalooza in 2010 though - freaking awesome being front row in front of like, 200,000 people, ill tell you that much.

as a 30 year old white guy - awkward and embarrassing to watch. but still cant believe someone that cool resigned with the bills, lol.

i would take him as our backup, with VY as second stringer in a heart beat. move brad smith to the 5th receiver/3rd running back role. imagine the options on offense? lol, it's kinda crazy to think about. picture any scenario over the course of the season where we HAVE to get a first down, or even a quick TD, and we bring out onto the field: mcnabb under center, vince young and fred jackson in the backfield, cj spiller in the slot, brad smith lined up wide. lol - would any defense have the slightest idea what play we were going to run? and the amount of options that exist in that formation alone? we could run 25-30 plays out of that one formation. 2 a game all season long, and no one would ever know what's coming. are you telling me that thigpen on the roster is a BETTER choice than that? or whoever our 5th wideout is now? come on man!

great thread. here's another gem. at the time, no one agreed with me, but seeing the responses in here, tell me it doesn't seem that far fetched. http://forums.twobillsdrive.com/topic/145299-guarantee-if-no-playoffs-in-2012-marty-ball-coming-in-2013/

fair enough. i guess its hard to put into words, without using a bill-simmons-grantland-like 20,000 word piece, but my feelings on this team are completely different than any I have had for the bills in 15 years. I dont CARE if we start the regular season 0-3 as players get acclimated to one another. This team has talent, and we WILL get a wild card spot. Last year, the 6 seed went to cincinnati: a 9-7 bengals team that if we had beaten (should have beaten) in week 4, would have finished 8-8, while we finished 7-9. The line between playoffs and non-playoffs is not the chasm that buffalo fans have made it out to be in their mind. WE ARE A PLAYOFF TEAM. hell, we were a playoff team, we just caught some bad breaks. thats the way of it. So with that in mind, i just cant get excited for the preseason. Usually, to me, the preseason is a chance to sell me on the bills-realistically, I would know that we were going to be about a 6 win team... if we were lights out in the preseason, I would allow myself to hope that we could get a fortuitous bounce here and there, finish with 9 wins, and sneak into the playoffs through a backdoor tie breaker. But now - I dont need the preseason to get me hyped. Im not thinking... "yeah, stevie COULD be a good wideout, lets see how he does in preseason." "our d-line MIGHT be good, lets see them on the field." "cj and freddie have legs, but lets see if they can get to the corner and pick up 7 when it looked like they were going to lose 3." No. I know all that. We are a talented team, much better than 2 of the teams that made the playoffs last year. I just hope the snap count for our guys this preseason isn't even enough to break a sweat.

I do NOT want the preseason to get here... I just want it to be over with. During the Kelly years, the game just seemed "different." Although the prospect of someone blowing out a knee was always there (see sehorn, jason) preseason games were nothing to be scared of. Maybe it was because guys didnt treat the game as a 24/7, 365 religion like it is now--I could see Jimbo spending more time on...other... activities during the offseason, besides conditioning and mechanics. During the decade and a half that followed, the game changed. 24 hour news cycles, internet bloggers, internet message boards, unrestricted fan access to the team, the players, the game... it's made it transparent, and it has turned into a national obsession. The days of the Bills losing 4 super bowls in a row are over - not because no team could make 4 super bowls in a row anymore, but the sh*t those boys were doing down in tampa in the week leading up to the game would be all over TMZ, and it would be a PR disaster for the organization. So here we are now, after the longest playoff drought in the NFL, on the verge of a playoff season, and I just want the damn preseason to be over. It just feels like so much can/could/WILL go wrong. Injuries, speculation, controversy, injuries, national attention, egos, did i mention injuries. Guys are going all out trying to make a squad, on EVERY snap of the preseason. I KNOW our d-line is going to be nasty. I dont need to see them prove it in a meaningless game against the redskins in august. So if you're wondering if the Bills make the playoffs this year - the answer is yes. Because this ball of anxiety in my stomach for our 4 game slate in august has never existed before!

Very simple poll, but I wanted to see how the rest of the board is feeling about this question. While reading this, http://www.cbssports.com/nfl/story/19393469/twobillsdrive , it struck me by about the third sentence that there is not one iota of my being that feels that this guy is going to make it through the season. I mean, I'd be pleasantly surprised if he made the 53-man roster. I'd be genuinely surprised if he saw significant playing action week 1. And I'll be downright amazed if he makes it past the bye week. But, is there anyone out there in Bills nation that feels like Merriman is going to be shutting the lights off whichever qb leads their team into the Ralph for the divisional round of the playoffs? edit - I had a place to vote, but it disappeared when i posted this. worst. thread. ever.

falcons and bills are the only ones on that list that have the chance to do it this coming season. offense offense offense. everyone else on that list doesnt have an O that can put up points non stop. we do. 2 premier running backs, a star wide out, an athletic line, a smart qb who can make quick reads and the throws that our offense is predicated on? were set up for success in the CURRENT STATE OF THE NATIONAL FOOTBALL LEAGUE. the defense is icing on the cake-- but remember, giants and pats were both in the bottom 3 of defense last year. but yes, i think we will be contending for a super bowl this season. i thought that before free agency, i thought that before the draft, i think that now. its anyones game once you make the playoffs, and FINALLY, we are going to make the playoffs.

too early for me to make sense of this. what do you mean? also, what site gave you 85-1 on the super bowl?

im glad to see this has generated such good conversation. and while we can all make jokes and laugh about grammatical errors, sentence structures ive used in my post, and various other word play devices, here's another fun game for you losers to engage in: vince young 31-19, fitzpatrick 17-31. i think people have been absolutely blinded by the proficiency by which our offense put points on the board for the first half of 2011, and 2010. HOWEVER. the fact remains: those clubs yielded LESS wins than jaurons clubs, and, (more importantly) less wins than wade phillips clubs (read: the last bills team to make the playoffs.) so, until the league amends the rules to include teams that "try hard, put some points on the board, and generally put on a better show for their fans than the previous season" in the playoffs - were better off with vince young as a starter. sorry to start a quarter back controversy, but the last time we had a quarterback controversy, we were a forward lateral away from making the divisional round of the playoffs. funny how competition is good for every spot on the roster except quarterback.

I absolutely fail to see how you guys CANT imagine a scenario where vince young takes over the starting job, POSSIBLY before the season even kicks off. the fisher-suicide thing is so overblown its ridiculous. facts: bud adams wanted to draft vince young - not jeff fisher. bud adams wanted vince young to start - not jeff fisher. jeff fisher called the police on vince young to report him missing. bud adams fired jeff fisher. the whole scenario was a power struggle. a rookie qb comes into the league and has to deal with that? imagine if your first job out of college, and your boss hated you and wanted you fired? every day? oh right - im sorry. pro athletes are robots, not humans. vince young can feel no emotion, he should have just manned up and dealt with it, because he's a millionaire. right. and as for comparing him to fitz? whats vy's record as a starter? 31-17 or something? with some playoff trips? and fitz has won us 4 and 6 games in his 2 years as starter? look - i am fitzys BIGGEST fan. i want to win with him. i want our super bowl winning qb to be the harvard guy that plays sim city and has bbqs with his east aurora neighbors every weekend. BUT. vince young is a FOOTBALL PLAYER. just like super mario. just like stevie. just like freddie. i LOVE fitz. but forget about the question "can vince young challenge fitz." cause im telling you right now, this alread is a quarterback controversy, and allow me to be the first to say: vince should start week 1. thesis statement: if chan can turn 7th round draft pick ryan fitzpatrick into a competent NFL qb, imagine what he can do with a qb of vy's caliber? as an aside - remember slash?...

i think sometimes skip takes the complete OPPOSITE view of what would be considered "racist," so he can be seen as "down" by his cohosts, like steven a., or scoop jackson. he has just always struck me as the kind of guy that would sit there at a cocktail party with a smug look on his face, and be quick to point out that he "has several black friends who feel this way." with that being said, yes, vince young will resurrect his career in buffalo, and will replace fitz as the starter coming out of our bye week. he is not an elite quarterback (neither is fitz,) but his ceiling is MUCH higher than fitzy, AND he has a winning record as a starter, and will have a qb guru working with him all offseason. how anyone thinks vince wont be starting by the end of the season, i dont know.

heh, as much as i hate welker, he looks like hes having the time of his life in that picture. cant hate on him for that. brady is a modern day james bond, im jealous as hell, also cant hate on that. go bills.

This. This times infinity. This is the key to our season, right here. The fact of the matter is, we play in a stadium that is a wind tunnel. We play in a cold-weather, blustery, outdoor, FOOTBALL stadium. We need to run the football. Personally, I think Gailey is a good coach, (despite winning 4 and 6 games in his first 2 seasons,) but now he has been gifted with a) a MONSTER d line, with a young fast secondary that likes to hit (so the analysts say), meaning our D is going to be predicated on collapsing the pocket and snuffing out screens to pansy welker that used to go for 30 yards on us. b) we have TWO all-pro half backs. c) the second half of our schedule - when the winds start howling and the snow starts accumulating - is, for the most part, at home. this season has clock control/grind it out written all over it. I started another thread a week ago, and I stand by it - if we dont make the playoffs this year, marty is coming here next year. this team is BUILT for marty ball (run/run/run/punt.)

I HATE HATE HATE HATE HATE HATE HATE this line of thinking. why? because people can say "oh, its not that big of a deal, i doubt it did much, everyone does it, yadda yadda" which is all well and good. but someone disagrees with you. THE FREAKING COMMISSIONER OF THE NATIONAL FOOTBALL LEAGUE. he. punished. the. patriots. for. cheating. this isnt arena football. this isnt college football. hes not going to vacate their wins. remember one thing: im sure it was in everyones best interest to downplay it, especially with baseball going through the whole steroid scandal, the nba going through the donaghy scandal, and people questioning whether any of their records were legit. goodell didnt want that scrutiny, didnt want that questioning, didnt want the fans and (more importantly) advertisers having that seed planted. but he fined a coach the most a coach had ever been fined in the history of the league, and took away picks. spygate was is and will forever be a big deal. the patriots havent won a title since. people think of them as some sort of "dynasty" based on what happened a decade ago when they were cheating. THE PITTSBURGH STEELERS HAVE WON 2 SUPER BOWLS SINCE THEN. cant FREAKING wait to finish better than the pats this year.

as bad as we were on defense last year, we were still 5 spots AHEAD of the magical, unable to beat a team with a winning record except for the ravens, split with and almost got swept by the buffalo bills, 35 year old quarterbacked new england patriots. and then we signed mario williams. and then we signed away their best defensive lineman. and then the patriots drafted a defensive end who's brother fights in the UFC so he got some publicity, even though he only managed 10 sacks in 3 years at syracuse (which is what mark anderson had last year in the actual NFL, not the big east, but, you know, silly facts...) So, clearly they are the best run franchise in the history of sports even though they havent won a championship since they got busted for CHEATING, havent had a top 10 or even top 15 defense since pioli left for kansas city, and aside from lee evans dropping a game winning touchdown against them, havent beaten an above .500 team since 2010. some of you guys should be patriots fans, you could take this absolute awe of an aura that doesnt exist, and turn it into genuine fandom. lets talk about being scared of pittsburgh. the team that has won 2 superbowls and played in 3 since new england last won one.

analogous relations. a month ago, we had the cheapest owner in the league. today, we have the highest paid defensive player in league history. 3 years ago, marty didn't want to work for the bills because ralph micro manages. after another losing season: _____________________