Mickey

I'm with you man. I really can't understand the selfish devotion these players have to their own best interests when they could be bettering your life by sacrificing the best opportunity they will ever have at financial security. It just plain doesn't make any sense.

He has already disintegrated and his arm is about as accurate as my tax return.

I don't think its fair to call it "lying". We have no right to that kind of inside information and no organization could survive regularly disclosing every internal disagreement. A flat refusal to answer such questions would be met with an uproar of accusations about the franchise not being accessible or respectful to the press and fans. "Ask me no questions, I'll tell you no lies" is the old saying that comes to mind here. It never ceases to amaze me how seriously people take the public comments of players and coaches. Other teams are listening. A coach simply can't run his mouth off about their draft plans, their game plans, their personnel assessments, etc. etc. What we got from Rex was his version of "coach speak" which is to use a combination of bravado, charm and more bravado while avoiding the questions everyone wants answered. He committed to nothing. He gave us no inside information of any relevance. We don't know who the QB is going to be. We don't know what kind of offense he is going to run (he said we were going to ground and pound but he also said we were going to throw it). If we end up winging the ball all over the place, are we going to call Rex a liar for telling us we were going to ground and pound? We don't know if we are going to run a 3-4 or 4-3, etc. I am not complaining, he did what he is supposed to do in that situation, commit to nothing, share nothing of value but get everyone excited with some tough talk and loads of charm. He is a great motivator and we saw that in his press conference but he didn't give us anything beyond that, and rightfully so. And beyond the X's and O's, there is a lot to be said about the power of inspiration. We needed it, the team needed it and we got it.

The guy is one of the greatest to ever play the game. I hate that he is in our division and yeah, he can be a real twerp sometimes but you can't deny that he is as good as it gets. That having been said, I think the NFL has no other option here, a mandatory life time suspension is clearly called for if the league is to survive this scandal. My God, the children! We must think of the children!

Well said. If a head coach could simply decide "not to allow" a facet of the team he coaches to be "anything but outstanding", the NFL would be overrun with outstanding franchises. And our defense wasn't great last year, it generated a lot of turn overs but it gave up a lot of big plays, especially on the ground. Schwartz did a lot less gambling and generated pressure with out having to send numbers so often. In the end, I think that Schwartz is as good or better a coach of this defense than Ryan so I have to ask, where did we gain? We had a really good defense this year and we didn't make the play offs. Ryan's success will be determined by what he does with the offense and on that score, I don't see much evidence that Ryan will make a difference. Under Ryan, the longer he was there, the worse they got. Yes, their offensive personnel was weak but I don't buy that the head coach had zero input on player acquisitions for 6 years so part of the blame for the weak personnel is his. Ryan is colorful and a good motivator. He is also a good defensive coach with as good a record of making life difficult for Tom Brady as any coach in the league. He also doesn't shy away from making difficult decisions. But he often appeared to be the top clown in a franchise that was more of a circus than a model of competence. The current hyperbolic worship of Ryan will eventually wear off and then we'll see if he is as good at winning games as he is at trash talking and making us laugh. As is, this team is only a game or two from getting to the post season. It's not like Ryan has to pull off a miracle. He just needs to make an already good team a little bit better. If he can't do that, then all the amusing press conferences in the world shouldn't save him.

This is nonsensical, born of a desire to balance the respect universally held for Polian and the current outrage at Marrone. Tim Graham is the guy who reported the story. He wrote that "...according to a well placed source....Marrone convinced Polian the job wasn't worth the effort.." And your theory is that somehow, Polian believed Marrone enough to change his mind and not take the job but was so outraged at Marrone that he reported that info to the press?? So Polian relies on the information he got from Marrone but is so angry at the guy for warning him off a bad job that he rewards him by leaking info that hurts Marrone's ability to get another job??? Yeah, that makes perfect sense. In the same story Graham writes "that Polian had an affinity for Marrone was no secret..." and confirms that one of the main reasons he didn't take the job was because Marrone left. Graham characterized the conversation as "firebombing the organization" but Adam Begnini described the conversation with a little less hype stating only that "I'm told that communication with Marrone was likely key in Polian's final decision not to come." Out of all that you bake up a theory that Polian tries to burn the career of the guy whose advice on the Bills he just took, the guy he recently said should be coach of the year and the guy whose absence is why he decided to stick with ESPN. I know, its weird. You love Polian and you hate, hate, hate Marrone. But Polian likes Marrone, so how do you put those two conflicting thoughts in your head without it boiling over? Come up with a crack pot bowl of nonsense that says good old Billy P. burned the career of Mr. Obviously. Marrone is a jerk, granted, but Polian liked him and would have taken the job if Marrone hadn't made the crazy, dastardly, cowardly, morally bankrupt but mathematically sound decision that $4Million and a new job was a better deal for him than no $4Million and only one more year of job security.

Sammy had the best year of any rookie WR in the history of a 54 year old franchise. Pretty good for not being "featured" on a team with horrific OL and QB problems. If the OC calls a play where Sammy is the primary target and Orton decides that he is covered and goes to another guy or if Orton doesn't have time for Sammy to finish his route and has to dump it off, how would we know that Sammy wasn't "targeted" or "featured" on that play? Should the coaches have instructed Orton to throw it to Sammy no matter what the defense is, regardless of the pass protection situation and even if someone else is wide open?

I strongly disagree. It's not amusing, it's terrifying. Remember the pick he threw to Kyle Williams? That is vintage Cutler. I would rather stick my hand in a blender and hit "puree" than to go through a season watching Cutler as our QB. We'd be better off trading a 6th round pick to Oakland for Matt Schaub.

None of those quarterbacks are at all likely to lead anyone to the play offs, that is why they are available. Another complication is that the same team that was looking to replace Galey with Polian or, at the least, to have Polian look over his shoulder, is now having Galey interview the coaching candidates. Not many coaches survive after the GM who hired him gets fired. Add in the lack of a first round pick and you can see why a coach with another option might take a pass on the Bills.

"Very similar" does not mean exactly the same. And as hard as it would be to trade up from 19, trading up from the middle of the second round is going to be even harder. By trading down, we would have added a pick somewhere and who knows what could have been done with that? Wouldn't that 19th pick be useful if they want to take a shot with Hundley, or Mannion? Lastly, my point was that in hindsight we would have been better trading down and keeping our 2015 first round pick and even if we couldn't use that pick for a top 5 QB, and you are likely right about that, it would still be a great pick to have. The only downside is that we would have had to draft a WR other than Sammy and as it turns out, that wouldn't have been a problem. In hindsight, it would have been better if we did that than if we didn't, even if it didn't solve the QB problem.

The game didn't matter, no matter who they played. How likely is it that the staff devoted the entire week to a game plan to beat the Bills rather than prepping their game plans for their post season opponents? In the second half, several key starters didn't play. Apart from all that, it would have been one game and one game only. If that was enough to tell us anything meaningful about EJ we would already know all we need to about him. Besides all that, the notion that Marrone has been conspiring against the success of his own team in the middle of a play off run in a misguided and unlikely to be successful attempt to make Whaley look bad is nonsense.

With the 19th pick in the first round, it would be possible to trade up high enough to get one of the few QB's worth taking in this draft. It would in fact be a trade very similar to what we did for Watkins. Its all hindsight at this point any way. I don't have a problem with them taking Watkins but if we knew then what we know now, we would have been better off trading down and picking up one of the other receivers in that draft. But no one knew then that it was going to be such a rich draft for WR's.

I don't think we would have learned anything about EJ's progress by playing him in such a meaningless game. As for Brown, he has ball security issues and is awful in pass protection which is why Dixon, also acquired by Whaley, was given so much playing time. Given the problems on our line, it was critical to have someone in the backfield who could handle themselves in pass pro. Marrone clearly gave up on Goodwin which I think was unfair but at the same time, Orton's inability to throw an accurate deep ball lessened the need for deep threats like Goodwin who, to be fair, is a one trick pony. I don't get why he handled Williams the way he did. Woods was really playing well so I can see why Williams wasn't going to get many reps but still, being inactive was a bit much. As for Koundijo, there hasn't been a single positive report about his performance going all the way back to training camp. Other than sheer desperation, I don't know of any reason to try him at G. If there was some shred of evidence that his awful play from camp forward had improved dramatically, than maybe I'd agree that it wouldn't hurt to give him a shot but that is simply not the case. In fact, the same WGR guys who ripped him apart during camp are the same guys complaining that Marrone didn't gamble on putting him in at guard in the middle of our fight for a playoff spot. Marrone played plenty of guys that were acquired by Whaley such as Corey Graham and Dixon. He even started a rookie 7th rounder at right tackle. Not only that, he benched EJ and started Orton, a FA signed by Whaley. I think that maybe people are so angry with Marrone that they are now looking back at every thing he did or didn't do and finding some sinister motive lurking behind every shadow.

The story doesn't say that he didn't know, just that he strongly disagreed and they did it anyway which isn't at all hard to believe.

Given that Pegula was hoping to bring Polian in, I'd say he isn't terribly happy with Whaley. The way things worked out, whether he likes him or not, Pegula might be stuck with Whaley for now. From Whaley's point of view, the team tried to bring in an older, more experienced GM who also happens to be on his way to the hall of fame so he has to be aware that he is on borrowed time.

I think the last thing an owner should ever do is make a public statement of what his strategy for the franchise is going to be beyond the typical banal and meaningless stuff owners of franchises always say. The franchise is in competition for coaching talent, business talent and player talent against all the other franchises. A good way to lose that competition is to publicly burble your strategy in the same way you would lose at poker if you made a habit of showing your cards to the other players.

Or it could be construed as the way all players conduct themselves during a hold out and protracted negotiations situation. If you want to talk to them, call his agent. That's the way it works. Brandon made a big deal of that in public to get the fans riled up against Peters to distract them from noticing that a team in desperate need of talent was frittering away the most talented player they had. It clearly worked very well with you. You're more angry at the hall of fame talent that got away than you are at the empty suit who has run this franchise so far into obscurity and mediocrity that its best QB in years is Kyle-freaking-Orton.

That's how I remember it. I also remember that neither he nor his agent said anything bad about the organization during the negotiations and I remember how Russ Brandon publicly went after him in a press conference just as training camp began. Not his finest hour. In the end, it worked out very well for Peters. Not so good for us.

Who here would give away $4 million without receiving something of value in exchange for it such as a promotion (increased authority) or security (contract extension)? What players are on the roster who would forego free agency and a big pay day for the sake of the team? Marrone didn't quit on anyone or anything, he made a career decision that frankly, was a no brainer. Grow up folks, NFL franchises are not "teams" and they are not "family", they are businesses. Big, big businesses. Love Marrone or hate him, worship him or despise him, rejoice at his departure or go into mourning as you see fit but don't pretend that he did anything different than you would have done in the same position. By leaving, he will have more money and a new job with additional security and every one of us would do the same.

I worry that Schwartz is as good as gone. Given how well he did with our defense this year, he is certainly going to be considered for a HC job and I don't see why he would want to be here when the coach who hired him just left and there is no QB solution in sight. If we hire someone else to be the HC, they might have their own guy in mind for the DC job. Only way he stays might be if the Pegula's offer him the HC job but odds are he'll get a better offer.

The admiration and affection people have for Frank as a person is the only reason they would like to see him as our next HC. He doesn't have the resume yet to be a HC and if it weren't for how much we all like him, nobody would be advocating for him as our next HC experiment.

He'll leave to be a head coach, just like Pettine did. Schwartz's performance this year was even better than Pettine's so if Pettine got a HC spot, why wouldn't Schwartz get an offer to? Why wouldn't Schwartz leave for a HC job elsewhere? Seems to me he would jump at the chance and the job he did this year with our defense certainly warrants him getting another shot at being a head coach.

Yeah, who would want a head coach who rebuilt a college program that was in shambles and had the NFL's biggest losers over the last 10+ years within a game of the playoffs with Karl freaking-Orton at QB? Gawd, they'd have to be crazy to want a guy like that.

Why is our DC doing such a great job while a lynch mob is forming for our OC? In addition to whatever level of competence or lack thereof you assign to either of them, you can't ignore the differing talent levels between the two squads. Defense: Marion Williams - first overall in 2006 draft, 4 pro bowls Marcel Dareus - 3rd pick, first round 2011. 1 pro bowl Stephon Gilmore - 10th pick first rd. 2012. L.McKelvin - 11th pick, first rd. 2008. J.Hughes - 31st pick, first rd. 2013. Kyle Williams - 1st pick, 5th rd. 2006, 3 pro bowls. Aaron Williams - 34th pick, 2nd rd. 2011 Brandon Spikes - 2nd rd. 2010 D.Searcy - 100th pick, 4th rd. 2011 Preston Brown, 9th pick, 3rd rd. 2014 N. Bradham - 10th pick, 4th rd. 2012 C. Graham - 5th rd, 2007 1 pro bowl Nickell Robey - UDFA 2013 Manny Lawson - 22nd pick, 1st rd 2006 Thats 6 first rounders, 2 second rounders, 1 third, 2 fourths, two fifths and 1 UDFA. Bear in mind that one of those 5th rounders, Kyle Williams is in his third pro bowl this year and clearly is a first round quality player. Graham, also taken in the fifth, has made a pro bowl and been one of the best nickel's in the league. Now lets compare that quality with the offensive personnel. Kyle Orton - 4th rd, 106 overall, 2005 Eric Wood - 28th pick, 1st rd. 2009 Kraig Urbik - 79th overall, 3rd rd, 2008 Eric Pears - UDFA 2005 Cordy Glenn - 41st overall, 2nd rd, 2012 S. Henderson - 237th overall, 7th rd 2014 Fred Jackson - UDFA, signed 2006 S.Watkins - 4th pick, 1st rd. 2014 R.Woods - 41st overall, 2nd rd, 2013 S. Chandler - 129th overall, 4th rd. 2007 Chris Hogan - UDFA 2011 Chris Williams - 14th pick, 1st rd. 2008 - played only three games before going on IR CJ Spiller - 9th pick, 1st rd. 2010 All told that is 4 first rounders and of those, one is a rookie, one played 3 games before going on IR and another missed half the season. Despite their first round status, not one of them has ever made the pro bowl. Granted, the line up is a more talented than would appear based solely on how they got into the league because of guys like Fred Jackson and Chris Hogan but its glaringly clear that there is a severe shortage of talent on this offense, most notably at both guard spots and at QB. Henderson did okay for a rookie but he is still not where an average NFL starter should be, though there is hope for him. I am not saying that Hackett is excused from blame for this woeful offense but with a lack of talent like this, I don't see how you can put all the blame on play calling and design. No matter what you call, you have to block people at some point. You just have to. Firing Hackett won't fix that problem.

They have not been average, not even close. The services that rate these guys on every play all season make it clear that this bunch was well below average. But you don't need a service to tell you that, just watch the all-22 tapes and you'll see that they fail to protect Orton long enough for the WR's to get far enough into their routes for Orton to deliver the ball. That is why he so often has to dump it off to a receiver whose running a short, quick route that, on third and 6 or 7+ is not long enough to pick up the first down. I don't know why this is even a debate. We all knew the line was a liability going into the off season last year and that the odds of a serious improvement with a handful of rookies and the often injured Williams were pretty long. Turns out our fears were justified.