Mickey

Sure there was illegal contact but I don't see that as evidence of JP's coming greatness anymore than I see that pick he almost threw as reason enough to cancel my season tickets. I think its holding if it occurs before the ball is thrown and if the contact happens while it is in the air, it is PI. This occurred while the ball was in the air so my understanding is that it would be PI unless it was uncatchable or contact that was "incidental" though I think they have moved away from that "incidental" distinction in recent years.

I don't put much store in that kind of soupy, abstract observation. He had "presence"???? He wasn't fazed by screaming fans? He has played many years now in front of screaming fans, I wouldn't have expected him to be "fazed". "Presence" is one of those meaningless, trite phrases that sportswriters and broadcaster like to gush about. I saw one play where he clearly looked the defense right off of Moulds helping him to get wideopen and then he hit him between the numbers. I also saw him stare at a reciever for 4-5 seconds and then throwing to him anyway. It would have been a quick six for GB but the defender dropped the ball. Those are the kind of observations I wish we would hear more of from the writers and broadcasters, not a bunch of garbage about having "presence". That is the kind of thing you come up with when you want to say something positive but don't have much to work with in terms of what actually happened. JP looked good here and there and also had a few goofs. That is, I would think, just about what everyone expected. No reason to call Kevorkian and no reason to schedule a parade either.

I have no idea if that would have been completed or not had Evans not been held. I could not possibly tell from watching it on TV what would have happened. You could also pose the question: if the defender had held on to that pick JP threw and went the distance as clearly he would have but for the drop, would the evening have been a disaster for JP? Back to the Evans play, there were referees there and the hold looked obvious and yet was not called. Why? Two possibilities: 1. They flat out missed the call. 2. The ball was so badly overthrown that the ref, rightly or wrongly, determined it to be "uncatchable". From my vantage point on the couch, I couldn't tell. I can't see alternative realities very well either so I can't say the pass would have been on the money, short, high, left, right or dropped. I do know the hold wasn't dramatic, just the typical back arm around the waist. Lee wasn't even able to get a hand on the ball. Does that mean it was way off? Don't know but by the same token, there is just as little evidence that the pass would have been completed but for the hold. The fate of that play, I'm afraid, will remain a riddle wrapped in a mystery inside an enigma. He had a decent outing, nothing to rave about or to weep about. It was neither the best of times, nor the worst of times.

Okay, I see Kelly and Bennett but who are the rest? Is that Tasker on the tank? Conlan? Is that Smerlas?

I don't think the reverse call was all that significant besides establishing what we already knew, MM and TC like reverses. We ran at least one a game last year with DB as our QB and usually had success with them. We had a lot of speed at WR last year and we have even more this year so again, I think we are going to see plenty of reverses just as we did last year. Why do they like reverses? Because it slows a defense down just like most misdrection plays do. It gives CB's pause which can slow them down in their run support duties. It also slows down DE's whose job it is to prevent a reverse from getting outside. While they are taking a direct angle to the QB, the WR suddenly appears with the ball getting outside the DE whose rush at the QB has taken him out of position. Reverses have their drawbacks though, they can get seriously blown for a large loss if the defense smells it out. As for JP, he showed some good, some bad. About what I expected. I see no reasons to gush with praise or to predict doomsday over his first scrimmage. There was enough there to be excited to see chapter two of his development next week and enough mistakes to refrain from declaring him a saviour.

I like Roscoe well enough but I still find it difficult to accept that it was more important at that point to get a better 3rd receiver than it was to get at least one guy who can play LT. No one is really talking about it much but I thought Gandy did okay last night and that was just as important as how well JP did.

I thought it was a mixed result for JP as well. He did some good things but had plenty of goof ups. Not unexpected at this point. He threw a completion to Moulds where he clearly looked off the defenders helping Moulds to get wide open underneath. Later, he stared at a receiver on the right the side in the flat and almost had his pass picked off for a TD. The defender dropped the ball. He was staring at that reciever for so long that I said "uh-oh" when he threw it that way, knowing their had to be trouble after all that staring. There was a major foul up on a snap in the shotgun where JP stepped away from his spot to say something to a receiver in motion and Teague snapped it with no one there. I am not sure if JP lifted his foot for the snap and then got distracted by somebody being in motion who wasn't supposed to be or if Teague just had a mental lapse. There just wasn't enough going on last night to really get an idea on how he is progressing. I am not one to be comforted by trite phrases like "he played with confidence" or "he showed poise", "he had a presence in the huddle" and all that mumbo jumbo. For the most part, he made a few plays and missed a few more. He showed his arm strength, foot speed and inexperience. I can't wait to see him next week and compare.

You had us at "Hi". Welcome aboard. Ever come up to Buffalo for a game?

Bingo in the fireside room.

It is way too late for me to get on his good side. I know because the last time I prayed he interrupted me and said, "I'm going to save us a lot of time here, don't bother." It seems that when I jokingly said "I'd sell my soul if we could come back and beat these @#$!@$@#$'s" during half time of the play off game against Houston so many years ago, somebody heard me.

They aren't that smart.

I'm sorry, nothing personal. I didn't mean to be politically incorrect or disrespectful. My faith carries no prohibition against such an utterance which, given the standards of the board, is neither obscene nor racist. Since "libertard" and "Ass Clown" is perfectly acceptable around here, I don't see why "Jesus freaking Christ" would be a problem. Maybe these things aren't so yukkity yuk funny when it is your ox being gored, or in this case, disrespected. Maybe someone would explain to me why calling all liberals retarded or a reference to sodomy is not offensive but "Jesus freaking Christ" is? I'm in the mood for some inspiringly tortured sophistry today.

I thought the question was, what did Bill Clinton do for the environment? I am not sure a scientist in a lab is going to have a good grip on Clinton's policies, executive orders, speeches, etc, etc. with regard to he environment. The Sierra Club and other organizations who closely track these things, would have a pretty good handle on that kind of informaton. Whether or not his policies were effective, a good idea or whatever, is not the question I was addressing. The study I linked contains exhaustive information on what he did, what he tried to do and what he was not able to do with regard to the environment over the course of his whole Presidency. It is basically a list of achievments and failures. The information contained in the study as to the effect of those policies is a whole different issue. What bothers me about credits is that it sounds like a free ride. We can solve pollution problems and it won't cost us a cent economically through the magic of credits. Besides, overall pollution in the country isn't what matters, pollution where people live is what matters. If you have unbreathable air in Chicago, I don't think it will do us much good to average their garbage with the lack of it in Death Valley and then conclude that the average pollution is acceptable. You can spread credits around but you can't spread the actual pollution, it lands where it is dumped. It just seems gimmicky to me. Are you talking about Cantor Fitzgerald the bond traders? I thought you wanted to listen to scientists? Wouldn't Cantor be involved in and profiting from emissions credit trading? I can see why they love the idea of pollution credits.

Thanks for the insight Bib. For what it is worth, I am trying to read all I can on security and terrorism from a variety of sources to try and understand what I can without turning it into a career. This will sound kind of kooky but I have attended a geek-a-thon convention involving fairly complex gaming and simulations. Please don't ask for the geeky details, it is really just for fun. One simulation is patterned after the Roman Republic. Each person represents a Senate faction vying for power hoping to eventually produce a Caesar, a Pro-Consul for Life. The constant struggle is balancing the interests of your faction with that of the Republic. If the factions spend too much time and energy fighting eachother, they don't have the resources to fend off barbarian attacks and Rome falls in which case, all the players lose as barbarians conquer the Republic. Sound familiar?

Do you know of any nuclear weapons that will stop its killing exactly in line with the Iraq border?

Exactly, why that's almost as despicable as, 35 years after the fact, trashing the service record of a combat vet. Almost. Kerry Bad, Bush Good, remember? Really, on a board where comments like "libertard" are yukked about, even after thousands of repetitions (even my dog gets tired of the same food day after day), it cracks me up when you guys make complaints like this. Does it ever dawn on you the hypocrisy of a political faction that snaps up books claiming that every non-conservative in the country is a traitor guilty of treason really has no place complaining about "[fill in the blank]=bad" thinking? I have no problem with mocking the idea that anything Bush must be bad but please, on a board where anything democratic, liberal, progressive, femminist, environmentalist, pacifist, etc. etc. etc is knee jerk bad, doesn't "Bush Bad" fit right in?

bingo in the fireside room

Oh please, it wasn't anything Carville said. Jesus freaking Christ, this is Robert Novak, he has been on TV shouting insults back and forth with other pundits for 20 years. That isn't what bothered him. What got him to turn tail and run could have been the copy of "Who's Who" sitting right there on the desk during the exchange. He was about to be asked to look up Valerie Plame's name in that book to prove the truth of his assertion with regard to where he got her maiden name, that he "could" have got it just by looking her or her husband up in "Who's who". Either that or the fact that a thick skinned, firey commentator who has spent decades trading insults with other talking heads suddenly just happened to storm off a show after a very low key jab is just a crazy coinkydink and has nothing to do with the fact that he is at the center of a growing criminal investigation, has made the assertion that he did about Who's Who, saw the book on the table and was told before the interview that he was going to be asked about his role in the Plame outing.

Right, getting environmental information from environmentalists, how stupid is that? Was the information provided demonstrably inaccurate or do you just assume it must be based on the source? What source would you consider to be accurate? I doubt that either you or stuckincincy really cares but for what it is worth, here is a comprehensive study of Environmental Policy under President Bill Clinton: National Environmental Policy ...of course, since the study was done by Harvard, it must be wrong.

God bless that little boy and his family

Have you ever watched Sam Adams huffing and puffing as he runs on and off the field when we start subbing him in and out on the same series? I think he is losing more energy than he would simply staying on the field. I never understood how making a 350 pounder run two 40 yard wind sprints in the middle of a game with only a few plays inbetween keeps them "fresh".

That is a lot of sacks for a DT.

I think it is clearly Gandy's job to lose and I am just as worried as anyone as to whether he has the right stuff to get it done. Basically, I have lots of faith in McNally but none in Gandy so we will just have to see. Assuming that by the second game of the season or so that Gandy is getting killed out there, the question is what is plan B? I am going to go out on a limb and say that McFarland could end up a starter. Interestingly, he was a three sport star in HS lettering in track and basketball as well as football. He graduated college with a 3.6 GPA and made the conference all-academic squad. He was the valedictorian of his HS class. He is smart and a good athlete. the very kind of overachiever that McNally has had so much luck with in the past. Maybe MW moves to the left and Dylan goes in on the right or maybe Dylan gets the LT spot, I don't know. I am not saying it is a likely event, just that it wouldn't shock me at all.

Brilliant! This would free us up to move Ron Edwards to the offense to play LT. The only question is, why didn't we see this coming? Oy vey.