Mickey

Hopefully the team learned a lesson from the Peters fiasco that they should keep their mouths shut about these negotiations which are hard enough without getting the fans involved and taking sides.

Do you have anything to base that screeching on at all? Is this all your speculation on what is going on behind closed doors or do you actually have a fact or two to justify your slandering this guy?

What on earth does this have to do with character??? He is negotiating a contract for his services, not donating a kidney. I think a guy who ignores the financial needs of his family has character issues. The Bills are trying to win a championship, they are not researching a cure for cancer or planning to invade Iran. Did you ever put a purchase offer in on a house? Did you negotiate the best price you could get? If you did, you are a greedy, characterless, morally bankrupt bastard; based on your logic anyway. And here is another flash Mrs. Cravitz, Maybin's financial affairs are none of your business.

The bottom line is we don't know a freaking thing so there is no point in getting all riled up at the front office or at Maybin. Not that a lack of information ever stopped anyone around here from playing Mussolini from the blacony. Its frustrating, that is the one thing we know for certain. Typical Bills luck though isn't it? The guy we most need to be in camp is the one guy who isn't at camp. If there was ever a first round pick that needed plenty of learning time, its Maybin. Started only one year, came out early and is undersized. Sheeesh.

Yeah, that always works.

I was at the night practice last week in the VIP area (thanks Sis), and I stayed after the practice was over to watch Hardy run routes with Baker throwing and a few DB's who volunteered to be token obstacles. I also saw him on the field behind the tents working out on his own. He was also nice enough to pose for quick photo with my sister when he was jogging between the fields to start his post practice workout. All I can say is that this guy has unreal talent. I have never seen a guy with strides that long that were also quick. When he accelerates, he covers so much ground so quickly that I don't think there are many DB's who can stay with him out of his breaks. Once his route running is sharpened and he knows the playbook well enough to play without the hesitation that comes with "...the pale cast of thought...", he is going to be as good as he wants to be. He just needs to stay healthy and he needs to want it and want it bad. For the team's part, they just need to be patient. Remember, it took Moulds a few years to amount to anything. And another thing, he should not be relegated to jump balls in the back of the endzone. He has the speed to do a lot more than that. A gazelle with an attitude. His speed, flat out, may not be all that much faster than other WR's but his acceleration is something else. Post patterns where he can turn on the jets when he breaks inside and drag routes across the field should be on his dance card for sure. As most of you know, I am pretty pessimistic about this team so I am not prone to easy compliments. If Hardy stays healthy and out of trouble off the field, the sky is the limit. The one concern I have for him are his hands. Haven't seen enough of him to make that judgment yet.

I am not sure which was the most overblown, complaining about a QB who goes 10 for 10 or the savage, "we must destroy you" response. Trent had a very good night but it isn't exactly going out on a limb to suggest that there is some concern that he is a bit quick to the checkdown. I don't think either point merits a gathering of angry villagers and their pitchforks.

I am as pessimistic as most around here about this year but whoa, it really was just a preseason game. It sounds to me like being a fan is putting way too much stress on you so it might not be such a bad idea to find a new hobby. Cya.

I beleive those were downs we were playing run first, with the SS cheating up so the CB's don't have as much help deep. So they don't play press coverage, quite the opposite. They keep the WR in front of them and hope to close in time. What bothered me about the defense that game, and last year for that matter, is how often we have lineman covering a back or a TE. I know why they try it now and then as it is nothing new but I think this kind of thing isn't as successful in the current game as it was back in the day.

Job well done.

Well fortunatly we have a seasoned all pro veteran at the top of his game protecting Trent .... oh, wait... Uh-oh.

Isn't that kind of like saying "the patient was doing well right up until he died" ? I think he is just saying that the Bills are looking for a QB to replace Fitz, not Trent. I think if they actually signed Vick, my head would explode from the inner conflict of it all. Great player, abominable human.

No objections here and if we had done it, the board would be raving about it en masse. Nothing worse than whining when you get beat. It was a nicely executed piece of flim-flammery and I am just glad it happened in preseason when it doesn't really matter.

If we had done it, it would have been brilliant. It would have worried teams all year when they saw it on films, got the teams fire raging from the git-go, etc., etc. Whining about it is just sour grapes. We got beat, fair and square.

You need to back off of this, I am sorry but you clearly don't know what you are talking about. Peters was on everyone's "sleeper" list and projected to be a project OT by many pre-draft and as an awesome blocking TE by others. He had his pick of teams to go to, a classic case of when it is better to be a UDFA than a 7th rounder. The notion that the Bills generously plucked him from obscurity is crap. Go back and read the scouting reports for that draft before you spout off about what you don't know. He ran a 4.9 40 at the combine at around 320-340 pounds. That got him noticed big time. He was only a junior though and was a TE for a running team and as good a blocker as he was, he was playing TE. Despite being projected to go in the 4th and being listed on almost every mock as among the top 5 or 6 TE's, he was not drafted. Here is his scouting report from SI: POSITIVES: Large, athletic tight end that stands out on the field. Blocks with leverage, strength and turns defenders from the play. Annihilates linebackers on the second level, gets movement from run blocks and effective when he stays with the action. Fluid releasing off the line into pass routes, runs well and displays soft hands. Gets vertical for the reception and makes the difficult catch in contorted positions. ANALYSIS: A physical specimen with great natural gifts, Peters has the skills to be a dominant and complete tight end if not a very athletic left tackle. Will have trouble playing a position at 320 pounds and must shed weight but a prospect with a large upside. And this from a Steeler draft guru on what picks they should make: "Tackles aren't sexy enough, so in the third we'll take the acrobatic star of the Rose Bowl, wide receiver Keary Colbert. We can make a tackle out of 340-pound tight end Jason Peters in the fourth..." Here is a mock that had him going in the fourth round to the Jags and it lists him at TE/OT: Peters to the Jags? As for not contacting the team for months, thats is BS but all that his extraneous history anyway and hardly worth debating anymore. He is gone, good or bad, its over. The point here is that you are arguing that Peters is lazy and has no work ethic despite his having clawed his way from a UDFA to the pro bowl over several years in this league while you fawn and go weak at the knees over the work ethic of a rookie who was late to his first camp and handed a starting job in less than week. Complain all you want about Peters' last year if you have to but don't pretend that the guy has no work ethic. You don't get to be a starting LT in this league by sitting on your ass. He worked for it, for many, many years. He missed one camp, one his whole foorball life and that was to get a new contract (which he got by the way), not to avoid the rigors of camp. You might disagree with the wisdom of the hold out from a business sense but implying that it was because he was lazy is either stupidity, dishonesty or something far worse. And comparing Wood to Peters is just plain dumb but in light of the rest of what you had to say, it doesn't really stand out much.

I take it that is the scouting report on our Head Coach?

Let me be the first: "Et tu, Etukaren?" I can't beleive it, two pages in and no one went for that knuckle ball? This board is slipping. Look alive people, opening day is just around the corner, time to step up your game.

I'm jealous. "The Senator" doesn't call me anymore. How I miss his moronic overtures, his thinly veiled hatreds, his vitriolic tirades, his limitless capacity to mangle the English language, his overtaxed brain cells groping for insults and, most of all, his insistence on turning every friendly discussion about the Bills into an opportunity for him to vent the deep frustrations which so clearly beset him in the real world....ahhhh, good times, good times. Oh to hear his furtive screeches so like the death throes of a rabid squirrel, just once more. *sniffle* You are so lucky and you don't even know it you glorious bastard.

Yeah, Peters just sat on his butt and stumbled into a pro contract after going undrafted and then stumbled on to the practice squad and then stumbled on to the opening day roster then stumbled on to special teams and then stumbled on to starting at RT and then stumbled on to starting at LT and then stumbled on to the pro bowl. All that despite having no work ethic whatsoever. No matter what your opinion of Peters is now, you can't rewrite his history to erase the good parts because you hate him now. And comparing him to Wood is not "safe" its actually ludicrous and unfair to both players. One is a veteran, one is a rookie. One wasn't drafted, one was drafted in the first round and is being paid like it as a rookie. One is a Left Tackle, the other is a Guard. One worked his way from nothing to starter over a period of years, the other was named a starter one week in to his first camp. One made it to the pro bowl, twice and the other hasn't even played a down of preseason football yet. They do have one thing in common though, they both held out of camp.

I don't read Murra's posts. Does that solve this fascinating mystery for the two of you?

Please identify for us what exactly Maybin has actually done that you think constitutes him acting as if he were the MVP of the league.

You and your fancy "facts" and "logic". Go away, we don't need your kind around here.

It was inevitable, now that the "hate Peters express" has lost its kick, we are moving on to a new scapegoat. Are you always this easily pissed? Somewhere there is a village of people who worship overreacting...and you are their God.

If anyone was arguing that, I would agree but I don't know anyone who is. For example, I don't think they should have given Schobel a new deal a year after he signed what was the biggest in team history. Arguing that they should have paid Peters is not the same as advocating that the always renegotiate. Rational people can disagree on whether Peters was ultimately worth it. Respectfully though, this notion of opening the flood gates is tired and false. Peters wasn't "every player", he was our only pro bowler. Overall, I just don't see a team getting better by losing the best players on their roster. Seems like a simple notion to me. But by "getting better", I am talking about wins and losses, not the salary cap or the team's balance sheet.

What is with all the talk about Bell?? Is there some proof out there, apart from our collective hopes, that the team projects him as an eventual starter at LT?