disco

Will be really interesting to see if Ralph or Mike Brown actually comment on this.

I can assure you he's not a Bills hater. Why in the world would anybody pick the Bills outside of last or second to last?

I don't know, I wouldn't really doubt Cinncy playing games here. Carson can always show up and just get free money more or less. But, if he does so it probably is at the cost of his brother's QB spot. I still say Carson shows up and makes Mike Brown pay him.

Just so you know DirecTV will offer Sunday Ticket to non-subscribers via computer or android device starting September 1st. They're just keeping this quiet for the time being to sell PS3s I suppose.

http://www.footballguys.com/10tefertiller_gailey.php

So I began looking into ordering Sunday Ticket without having DirecTV and ran into some strange issues. First, they used to have information on how to do this here: http://www.directv.com/DTVAPP/content/nflstonline/overview This now redirects to the basic subscribe landing page w/o information on Sunday Ticket only. However on the Google cached version you can see the details: http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:bd9Ju-RSAyMJ:www.directv.com/DTVAPP/content/nflstonline/overview+directv.com/NFLSTOnline&cd=1&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=us&source=www.google.com Next, the FAQs reference the ability to sign up for Sunday Ticket w/o DirecTV here: http://support.directv.com/app/answers/detail/a_id/2902/related/1 Which references a new landing page: http://www.directv.com/NFLSTOnline This now redirects to the standard subscribe page. I called their customer support and spoke to a rep and manager - both claimed this wasn't possible. I'm basically going to guess it's just not ready yet for the upcoming season, but it is strange that it's nearly removed from their site entirely.

an actual lol on this.

The greatest thing about the cancellation of the NHL season was the NHL's need to try harder to get fans back. The only thing is...will the NFL really need to try harder? As much as I've soured, I don't think they will. It's just too popular.

One of the better recent hockey draft stories was along these lines. In the NHL, a player must be 18 by September 15th of that year's draft. This came into play with Ovechkin who turned 18 on September 17th, 2003. This was 2 days late for the 2003 draft. However, the Florida Panthers actually tried to draft him in FOUR different rounds in that 2003 draft. The Panthers GM Rick Dudley tried to argue that during his lifetime, Ovechkin had lived through 4 leap years. A leap year, obviously, has an extra day making those years 366 days rather than 365. By living those 4 extra days, they reasoned he was actually eligible on September 13th, 2003. They kept trying to draft him until the NHL final let them submit his name in the 9th round. He was later ruled ineligible. http://www.post-gazette.com/penguins/20030629nhlnot0629p5.asp I like the creativity.

This is correct. JW may be correct in a national sense, but nobody in Buffalo is going there to buy a car. If a Buffalo area car dealership fired someone for a Dolphins tie, there would be no backlash in Buffalo. Furthermore I don't believe there is a clear cut public opinion on whether their decision was inappropriate.

Either McD is an idiot and believes this nonsense, or a total genius stoking the fires to keep the thread going this long. I so badly want to think it's the latter...because it would be an award worthy effort.

I posted this months ago, but here again are figures about 1st round QBs: 677 QBs have been drafted in the NFL. 1st Rnd: 136 have been drafted. 64 of them have started at least 1 playoff game (47%) 15 started at least 10 playoff games (11%) 2nd Rnd-Undrafted: 541 drafted/unsigned. 131 have started at least 1 playoff game (24%) 12 started at least 10 playoff games (2%) Statistically: You have roughly a 1 in 2 chance of making at least one playoff game with a QB drafted in the first round. You have roughly a 1 in 4 chance of making at least one playoff game with a QB drafted outside the first round. You have a roughly 1 in 10 chance of making 10 playoff games with a QB drafted in the first round. You have roughly a 1 in 50 chance of making 10 playoff games with a QB drafted/signed otherwise.

Anybody know if Wilson has commented on Fitz since he deemed QB as the #1 draft priority to Wawrow? http://sports.yahoo.com/nfl/news?slug=ap-bills-wilson (This was after the team was 0-5)

I'm willing to be less vague about this. If the bills do anything but lose sunday I will be greatly disappointed. My hope is to see the bills win a superbowl, not beat the jets in a meaningless game for both teams in the last week of the year. As someone else pointed out a top 3 pick provides flexibility and the greatest chance to get the player you want. But mostly, I'm tired of watching the bills pick ~10. You know when the Bills last had a top 3 pick? 1985! 25 years ago! And they took Bruce Smith of course. As bad as we've been for a decade...let's get a top pick for once. I like Gailey. I want him to have the best opportunity to continue on the positives from this year. Top 3 pick will do that more than a win will. And I hope it's a top 2.

Your examples of QBs are from the 70's and 80's prove the point that football has changed. And it did change. You can point a finger directly at 2003's Pats Colts Championship game and subsequent illegal contact on WRs rule change. Since then? Kurt Warner, Tom Brady, and Matt Hasselbeck are the only QBs to play, win or lose, not drafted in the top 32 picks. Warner and Brady are clear HOFers. The only random to make it to the Super Bowl is Hasselbeck. If you want to further see proof, just look at this year's playoffs if they started today. EVERY NFC team would be lead by a top 32 pick QB (Rodgers, Vick, Brees, Bradford, Ryan, Cutler) and four of six AFC teams (with HOF Brady and Matt Cassel being the exceptions) 10 of 12 teams. 83%. It's not the NFL of Dan Fouts. Today's NFL needs an elite QB. And those QBs are coming in the first round of the draft.

This is an interesting thread because I understand people wanting to flame anyone saying they'd prefer a loss. However, I'm also a little tired of picking 9/10/11th every year. At the beginning of the year I believed the bills would have 6 wins; maybe 5 if things went really poorly. When it got to 0-8 losing 2x in OT and close to Chicago..it seemed pretty clear that was going to be tough to do. But - I really thought it was the best possible scenario. The team was hanging with top teams in Bal and KC. They were gaining something despite the loss. As nice as the win might have been, I was pretty glad they lost specifically for the draft pick. I mean really, what does beating Baltimore in overtime really do for us? We were able to gain the benefit of some confidence in a loss! What a perfect scenario. However, at some point I think you need a few Ws to help keep a team together. 0-16 is going to have some significant negative impact. Looking down the schedule, we've got a pretty tough road ahead. Pitt, Minn, Cle, Mia, NE, NYJ. That's a tough schedule for any team. We might not win any. We'd be lucky to win maybe one or two. So I think the win today was a good one. We're actually in a pretty great position. At this point, we get killed down the stretch and get that top 5 or top 3 pick. If somehow we end up with 6 wins - well hell that means something great happened and there will be more excitement around the team than that draft pick would provide. What I'm more concerned about is Fitz showing in the next 6 weeks exactly who he is. It's been mentioned here that Fitz has proven QB isn't the biggest problem right now on the team. That's a step in the right direction. However, he hasn't shown us whether we need another QB or not. Even today he gave fans and detractors reasons why he definitely is/isn't the guy. It would be nice if he didn't throw 3 horrendous INTs AND 4 fantastic TDs in the same GAME. Come on. Give us some real insight! If you believe the first pick of the draft generally goes to the worst team the prior year...don't count on us having it. We're certainly not the worst.

It's not the link I had an issue with; it's the actual error in the story itself.

Look at this quote from ESPN's lead article regarding the release of Edwards: To take Edwards' roster spot, the Bills plan to re-sign offensive tackle Levi Brown, whom they released this summer, a league source told Schefter. Levi Brown's name is linked to a bio of an Arizona Cardinal. http://sports.espn.go.com/nfl/news/story?id=5621888 Nice effort ESPN.

Sure. They were in a horrendous situation. They were on their own inch line with the wind blowing in their face. You punt the ball, and there's a great chance Miami is going to start their possession on your side of the field. In fact, they could even start within field goal range. ADD on the fact that you are going to run time off the clock: - Punting the ball - During the return - During a field goal attempt. By taking the safety instead and choosing the free kick, you get these advantages: - Save valuable seconds on the clock (which actually worked given we got the ball back with 30 seconds to go) - Opportunity for a bobble on the free kick attempt (though they should have kicked it away from Marshall - good call by Dolphins to see where Moorman was going on the timeout call) - Start the Dolphins deeper in their own end so it would force a punt (and give Roscoe a chance who probably had a better chance to move the ball than the offense) The Dolphins kicking the ball to the inch line was a killer. 4th and 10 at your own goal line is pretty much a lose lose situation. If the decision is NOT to go for it on 4th and 10, taking the safety wasn't a bad option. It was a severe desperation move when he was forced to make one.

Whoah relax one game. I remember after the first preseason game against the Skins we had this same thread and then same sllence after the next few games. Gailey tried a lot of different looks, called a nice no huddle series, fought for a desperate low % field goal (which I like the effort), showed off the wild cat, got Roscoe in the game...and got his first real look at how terrible Trent is when the pressure is on. If you watched him in KC with Thigpen it took him a few games to adjust the offense to him. But he did, and did it well. You can't fire a guy after one game. You just can't.

Really i haven't seen ANYBODY predict playoffs. I have predicted they will be within a game of 7 wins, and still stand by it, I could see 5-11, but I do not believe we are a 2 or 3 win team.

McKelvin needs to be added to the good.

Sorry, I'm just going to troll in her with some stats to help the debate. Over the last 10 years (before this year) the Bills had drafted 32 6th or 7th rounders. Number to play at least one NFL game? 29. TWENTY NINE! That's a 91% rate of making the roster. And it's #1 in the NFL. You might say that's because we suck. Perhaps it is. But of course the number 2 team in the NFL at survival rate is the Colts - 26 drafted, 22 started a game....and the Lions are the worst with just a 65% rate of making the roster. We could argue what it means, but at a basic level I'd say it says we aren't often 'wasting' 7th rounders. In Levi's case, I almost wonder if it's not what someone pointed out earlier - he didn't take advantage of the opportunity. I'm sure it's been mentioned, but his tweet about being 'pissed' that he wasn't on the roster or PS makes me wonder if he really understood he needed to earn it.

Haha

I can't appropriately respond to this on my phone, but how do I nominate this for best post of the month? Loved reading it - great insight into the complex nature of drafting QBs and nicely articulated. The problem is you are refusing to understand that risk is present in every round and the risk is much greater after round 1. In my prior example of 40% of playoff starting QBs come from the first round...not any other single round is even in double digits. In fact undrafted QBs come in second at 9%. However I don't think many teams are going to count on finding an undrafted QB. The easiest math is 1 in 10 first round QBs will have 10 playoff appearances as opposed to 1 in 50 from any other signing. If someone was going to pay you $100 to try and guess a number between 1 and 10 OR a number between 1 and 50 which bet would you take?