Mickey

When I was on the crew team in high school, I once drew four aces at four card burn during a bus trip to Poughkeepsie. So it happens.

A more complete refutation of the post that started this woeful thread could not be written though I think it could be slightly improved by ending it with a "Good Day Sir!"

Skip the NCAA? I'm sorry but I don't think that is remotely comparable to attending needless private workouts. The athletes have medical coverage, free tuition, free room and board, not to mention an education and a chance at a professional career. I do think that its a borderline criminal that the athletes get so little of the mountains of cash they create but that is a problem for another day. I don't think they are really "free" to refuse since the expectation and tradition is that they will participate. If they don't, there will be tons of press about how they aren't team players, or are selfish, have a bad attitude, etc. Yes they can refuse, but it will cost them. What would change that is if their agents and the NFLPA got together and put a stop to it. As for the combine, I agree, its a waste of time.

Whether teams "need" these workouts or not is irrelevant. They shouldn't be performing and risking their livelihoods for free. Apart from the effect on their career, who pays the medical bills? I don't think agents are doing their jobs if they are exposing their clients to potential injuries that could delay or even end their careers with no safeguards against disaster in place. You wouldn't pull a brand new Honda CRV out of the driveway without insurance. Ridiculous. Zero is a smaller number.

Fox News is reporting that DNA testing, now routine for NFL prospects, has revealed that Kyle Lauletta is actually Nate Peterman's long lost twin. Apparently, they were separated at birth due to a monumental maternity ward snafu.

Yes, that is the lie I tell myself so that I can sleep at night.

The scariest thought that dare not speak its name? The guys making the decision on when, where and how to get a QB in this draft are the same ones who thought it was a brilliant move to start Nate Peterman in the middle of a playoff run, on the road and against a fierce pass rush.

Whoa, who stepped on your jelly beans?

Lurking in the dense fog of verbiage that is this post are some worthwhile issues that could have been discussed that were not. There are factors that can have an effect on what sports a High School offers and which sports attract the best athletes that seem to me to be of far more importance than the factors this poster appears to raise though honestly, I am not sure what he was trying to say. Issues like resegregation, shrinking budgets, school secession and unequal school resources play a part. Its infinitely cheaper to field a basketball team than a football team. Poorer schools in rural areas and in cities are often going to struggle to keep decent football programs afloat. Not so with basketball. The result is going to be fewer good football players from that school but plenty of good basketball players. Here in Syracuse, the best HS football team is almost invariably CBA, a private school whose tuition rivals that of most colleges. As a catholic school, they can recruit kids from any school district and offer them scholarships to attend CBA for free. Their facilities, coaches and equipment are all top notch. Liverpool is also a powerhouse as they have the largest population and tax base. They have excellent coaches, training facilities and other equipment. At one time they had two freshman and two JV teams feeding the varsity roster. Many of the city schools which used to dominate in years past are struggling just to keep a team on the field. And its not just a HS problem, the peewee and pop warner teams in the city have all but evaporated for want of funding. I was an assistant coach for one of them and it was a major challenge just figuring out how to get the kids to practice as so many of their parents were working 2 and 3 jobs. The problem isn't limited to just football. City schools in Syracuse used to field excellent girls soccer teams. Not anymore. They have had to resort to fielding a combined team that draws players from the entire district. Even so, they play on a field with no bleachers, no restrooms, no loudspeaker and more rocks and broken glass than grass. Part of their problem is the fallout from the football teams. These schools increasingly have to reduce the budgets for anything that isn't football to keep their football programs lurching along. Thus they siphon funds from the soccer teams, the swim teams, the lacrosse teams, etc in a losing effort to remain competitive in football. We will never know how many great athletes are lost along the way to poverty. There are loads of small rural schools in CNY who don't have the numbers or the money to filed a football program. I don't really care how any of this effects the NFL, I do care about the effect it has on middle school and HS athletes of all sports.

The ones that have us taking Josh Allen are my favorite but only because of the reaction on the Board which range from maniacal rage to suicidal threats. The anguish, the madness, the foaming at the mouth delirium. I find it amusing. As Little Finger once said, "Chaos is a ladder".

I agree, pass catching TE's are way better than pass dropping TE's. Pretty tired of those.

Good ol' Rufus, passed away 3 years ago at the age of 12, pretty good for a Berner. I now have a 2 year old Berner, we named her Mazie because it rhymes with crazy.

Because we live in a culture besotted with Marvel and DC hero worship, perhaps we can better understand GQD'18 (the Great Quarterback Debate of 2018) if we were to determine which superhero each QB is most like. Besides its Friday and I have run out of work to do. There are only so many people you can sue in one day. Josh Rosen: Aquaman, because, yeah he looks good and all but summoning fish? Really? How you going to save the world with fish? Josh Allen: Hulk, because he has unreal strength that is uncontrolled and too often employed to little or no effect. Throws some of the most powerful incompletions in the game. Ever. Sam Darnold: Wolverine because he is fierce but has trouble holding on to the ball, those knuckle sword blades interfere with his grip. Baker Mayfield: Spiderman, the shortest of the superheroes and because he does so much with so little. So you can spin webs, big deal. Yet the stuff he can do with those webs, wow! Lamar Jackson: Flash, because he is fast but no one knows just how fast. Mason Rudolph: Batman, because he has a lot of tools but not much talent.

I like this but only because, now that all the pre draft analysis is starting to come to an end, I have decided that I like Baker Mayfield for the Bills at 6, possibly a bit lower. It just seems like betting against this guy is a mistake. He is highly, highly motivated to prove all the naysayers wrong. I don't necessarily disagree with those who find numerous faults and weaknesses in his game. I just don't think they matter all that much compared to what he brings to the table in terms of being absolutely consumed and obsessed with winning football games.

Mother Goose is all in on Baker Mayfield: Pat-a-cake, pat-a-cake, Baker's my man, Bake me a cake, as fast as you can; Pat it, prick it, and mark it with QB, Put it in the huddle for baby and me.

All the "upgrades" in the world won't win a championship or even a perennial contender without a good QB. The NFL isn't for feint hearted, penny pinching small timers. Go big or go home. Better to take a shot and miss then to never have the guts to go for it. But, if 6-10-ish seasons float your boat, then by all means, hang on to that 3rd round pick like it is the secret to immortality.

ummm....we don't have the 33rd pick

Yep, absolutely, we should invest in mediocrity, that has worked wonders for 17 years so lets keep it up. We should never, ever sacrifice picks for a QB unless and until we get a crystal ball insuring us that the QB will be a hall of famer. Plan B is to sit around and wait until we finish with the worst record in football and don't have to package picks to get the top guy. The draft is a gamble, always has been and always will be. If you don't have the stomach for it, play the nickel slots.

I wish you were right but Eli's days are numbered. He was bad enough to be benched last year. There is no guaranty he is going to be around or even serviceable in 2018 let alone 2019. This is also not a team on the verge of winning a championship that just needs a few pieces to make a legit run at a title. They are the second worst team in football at the moment, the very definition of a team that is in full rebuild mode whether they admit it or not. If you have an opportunity to get a franchise QB, you take it, you don't soldier on in the belief that when you really, really need one, fate will provide. As Bills fans, we are in dire need of the Giants passing on a QB because if they don't, it is one less trading partner. Consequently, we convince ourselves that sure, the Giants will pass on a franchise QB because that happens all the time. I'd love to believe it but if I was a NYG fan and they gave away an opportunity to lock up their next great QB for a chance to go from 3-13 to 6-10, I'd be furious.

With an aging, soon to be retired QB, they would be foolish to turn down an opportunity to get a franchise QB. Those opportunities are so rare, you have to take it while you can. Its really the type of thinking that has kept teams like the Bills locked in mediocrity for so long because its just always too expensive to pull the trigger on a big trade. If you don't have the guts for gambling, get out of the casino.

Ummm....if there were an obvious hall of famer, we wouldn't have a prayer of drafting him given that we have the 12th pick. The uncertainty of which you speak is a problem for all picks, not just QB's. Your logic would lead to the Bills never picking a QB high in the draft unless they are either "lucky" enough to have been the worst team in football the same year that an "obvious" future legend was available in the draft or they had a reasonably high pick in a year with multiple "premier guys" populating the draft. Waiting around hoping for lightning to strike is not a strategy. No one can read the future but your notion that the draft is "so clearly unknown" overstates the matter. The draft is and always has been a gamble, a casino where you bet on the future. The odds might not be great at the craps table or black jack but they are a lot better than the slots. And if you don't like gambling, then maybe football isn't your game. But if you do, leave the slots to grandpa and put your money down, take your shot and stop whining about the lack of a crystal ball.

These choices are loaded with the prejudices of the poster. Lamar is "electrifying" and "played in our system" while trading up would "basically give away 2 drafts for 1 guy" while Mayfield and Allen "have questions". Staying put would "build the team" and trading for an extra first next year would be a patient "2 year plan". Totally fair poll. Trading up would not "basically give away 2 drafts for one guy" and even if it was, I would rather spend 2 drafts on a 10 year starter then 1 draft on the next mediocrity we end up shipping to Oakland for a 5th round pick. Lamar is electrifying if by electrifying you mean exciting rehabs after the many torn tendons surely in his future. We have been "building the team" without bothering to get a top QB for the last 17 years. Getting a QB is part of building a team. Building a team without a real QB? It does. Not. Work. We haven't been in position to get a decent QB in a long time and if we miss this opportunity, we have no way of knowing if or when we will get another chance. My vote goes for a choice you didn't include: Make the best trade you can to get Mayfield, Rosen, Darnold or Allen.

Mayfield needs his own slot rather than being lumped with Rudolph and Jackson, he is miles ahead of both of them. At least that is what I think today. Probably change tomorrow. Yeah, I just read that too, pretty sound argument that Mayfield may be the best of the lot here. Apart from all that and his tape and all, I just think Baker Mayfield is way more of a "Buffalo" guy than the rest. He is the kind of guy that everybody consistently undervalues, looks over and puts down. A walk on who ends up the starting QB at a major football factory school? How often does that happen?

This is exactly the kind of thinking that gets you a 17 year playoff drought. Investing in mediocrity is no way to live your life son.

In the end, all our debate here is over which of us is better at predicting the future. And if any of us could do that accurately, we would live in Vegas.