AKC

Jesus- you Easterners need to chill out. I got just over 7 feet of snow at my house in Southern California over the past 3 weeks and I didn't even hire any kids to help me shovel out the driveway (and I'm an old timer based on TSW standards). But it did hit 55 today so I'll probably do some sunning tomorrow ;-)

Your conclusion is one that’s reasonably arrived at considering the faults Bledsoe has always had in the short game added to the seeming likelihood that his skills are declining or the speed of the game has passed up the pocket passer. There are a number of very knowledgeable long time posters here who have reached the same conclusion based upon the same logic. I’m not one who buys the “inevitable decline of the pocket passer” since the media has been burying them for 50 years yet they continue to hold far and away the most championships over the course of time. The modern pocket passer is a live and well behind very good offensive lines, lines that appear today to be more susceptible to clever scheming to break them down, viv a vis the Indy line trouble in their game last week. The susceptibilities of clever scheming seem on paper to be there- and the NFL has had at least 20 coaching “geniuses” over the course of my fanhood, each of whom was granted the throne of being a timeless victor only to find answers to their strategies and having the same “geniuses” become little more than frustrate has-beens within a few years of the declaration. Even the one’s with sustained success over many years found the game catching up to them- Bill Walsh comes to mind. The thing is history seems to bring everything back in cycles, and that cycle ALWAYS returns to he big passer who makes his living in the pocket. As far as Bledsoe is concerned, he looked to me to have taken some of the off-season coaching lessons and tried to apply them, but unfortunately asking him to throw the type of screen passes we should be killing people with considering the balance of our personnel he clearly doesn’t have the feel or the accuracy to manage these throws. At the same time when we do go up top in play action he is still one of the most dangerous in football because he plays with so much more field than the average NFL QB that he can fully take advantage of the threat of play action. In NE he relied on TEs to complement his long ball and poor accuracy on the short game, and TE has hardly been a position of strength on the Bills offenses he’s run. I’m more inclined to think he’s not suffering from “rapidly declining” skills as much as he’s just the same QB he’s always been and he’s just not gotten better. He’s still a deadly big ball guy but without the intermediate game he becomes absolutely one-dimensional and a one-dimensional pocket passer is a sitting duck in the NFL. We’ve seen a little of JP Losman and IMO we’d have finished about 5-11 under him this season while he learned to play in the NFL. Yeah he’d have a year under his belt but the NFL is about winning and we won as many as we could. If this team moves into the ’05 campaign with the same garbage at TE we have after Campbell then I see no chance of improvement under Bledsoe. At the same time if we were to bring in a Bubba Franks and perhaps a vet LG I’d rather hold the line on the QB spot instead of conceding a season to the learning curve. I don’t see anything unreasonable about either of our positions, it’s possible to reach either of these or a hundred others. What’s unreasonable is to look at every game this year and find that Drew Bledsoe, more than any other element of our team, “threw the season away” because of his awful skills, terrible leadership and inability to move his feet. The evidence contradicts these things, and in turn it contradicts those with no ability to grasp the dynamic nature of the game of football. You don’t strike me as having any problem understanding that and applying it to your process of analysis.

The cue for you to ignore this string was "INTELLIGENT thread about the QB position"- I'll give you a heads up when there's a "OBSESSIVE thread about the QB position".

You can't rewrite history that simply. The argument we've been force fed for two season with regards to Bledsoe includes: He's inept at reading defenses (while the record shows he was the first QB in history to hit 5 differerent receivers for over 50 grabs each in a season). He's unable to win big games (He's been on two Super Bowl Teams, one as the starter) He's not a leader (Never on any team he' s played with has he lost the guys who play with him- one of the primary measures of leadership) He's immobile (while he's hardly a mobile QB, when he's offered SOME amount of pocket, which he had for part of this season, he makes the footwork adjustments necessary to make plays. The fact is in 2003 he had no pocket, had no time, and was playing with a unit that would have made any QB in the league- with the exception of a Vick type- inneffective) He can't play without a Pro-Bowl TE (He finished '04 with what I'd call the worst TE options in the NFL). The list continues on over adn over and over droning on and on withthe same tired whining. The broad stroke of the Bledose Haters includes a complete ignorance of the strengths of his game (he's still one of the 5 or 6 best long ball tossers in the league), a complete disregard of his historical accomplishments and a complete lack of understanding the benefits of a QBs track record and experience. Is he washed up? That's an argument you can only make if you first acknowledge he was a superior talent of historical proportion in this league. And that's something your boys in the Bledsoe Haters Club refuse to recognize. Without recognizing that, it's impossible to participate in intelligent discussion about his value to the team.

This will be a little over your head, but I'll provide the facts anyway- Only 6 QBs in the century of NFL football history have more pass completions than the Buffalo Bill you love to denigrate: Official NFL Most Productive Passers in NFL History Your agenda forces you to ignore the objective and obvious: You might argue that a QB among the top 7 passers of all time WAS good but his skills have deteriorated, but making a claim of "not good" makes you nothing more than a fool. The fact that you can't bring yourself to recognize that it takes a "good QB" to reach these historic milestones exposes your utter inability to offer objective discourse on the subject of our starting QB.

I appear to have incited the simpleton call to arms! BTW- If you honestly don't believe that EVERY QB among the top 10 most productive passers in history were/are "good", you are a simply a fool and it would discredit simpletons to place you among them.

We're in total agreement on one point- that football is simple to the simpleton! The fact that you find "original football thoughts" oxymoronic explains much about the content vacuum in your posts. I'm surprised you bother to read mine, in which I frequently attempt to bring in new concepts and ideas that by the way I didn't hear on the Jim Rome show or read in the Democrat and Chronicle. But don't let that interfere with your little system!

Funny how you can lose perspective to such a degree that you lose any ability to accurately recollect that which you suggest you have reviewed.

I've got a better option- regardless of the outcome of the games Sunday you are forced to post an original thought about the game of football on TSW for the first time in history............................................................................................................................................ We'll miss you!

You're excused 'til morning to process all of that.

You don't know me very well- Bart carried the stash for that crew.

I was a year old when Morten Anderson was conceived.

It's tough to bet on a subjective proposition- I've suggested that if the Pittsburgh Steelers come out flat as they did last week there's little chance of them winning Sunday, yet if the history of their head coach- a guy who's arguable strength is in getting the team up emotionally for games on many occasions- proves Sunday to be a week Cowher accomplished exactly that, the Pat's will get their butts handed to them. In the interest of your propostion though, I'd take a "bet" on it if we allowed a measure, such as a fan who watches the Steelers most Sundays, to judge whether the Steelers had their adrenaline in order as I've suggested or whether they come out like they're visiting their mother-in-law for New Year's Eve- like they did last week.

I'm no Cowher fan but there's some serious precedent for a Steeler's win this weekend based upon Cowher's teams of the past. While Bill Belichick is the analytical coach who trains his fighters to play smart and play together- buying their mental emotion in the vast majority of circumstances, Cowher is a guy who has many times bought his fighter's adrenaline with toughness instead of smarts. As sporting as it is to watch the smart fighter beat the tough guy in many circumstances, this time we have a coach who lives on predicting the other team's tendencies and confusing the opposition. It's proven effective in the immediate past. On Sunday the outcome will come down to this: If Bill Cowher found himself in a physical confrontation with the analytical Bill Belichick the fighting would end with Belichick on the floor with his hands covering his face screaming STOP! STOP! SOMEONE STOP HIM! Cowher would knock the stuffing out of Belichick mainly because his fight would be from a deeper emotion, a more basic instinct than logic, one fed by adrenalin and coaxed on by a hunger that logic is unable to compete with. Cowher's trick Sunday will be exploiting the same thing- to bring out the animal element of his players to consume the logical coach, logical QB and logical defensive strategy the Pats will no doubt unveil as the game unfolds. Twice this season the logical QB of the Pats faced pressure, and twice this season that same logical QB folded like a Galloping Gourmet episode filmed at a girl's school. Over the course of the Cowher career he's displayed plenty of reasons to assume he'll fall to a far more intellectual strategy. There's plenty of reason to believe the same will happen Sunday, hence the Vegas line on the game. But the one element the Vegas line can miss, a line established by cold logic and analysis, is the same element of emotion that Cowher has successfully called out at times in the past. It won't take long to determine whether there'll be a game Sunday in Pitt- Belichick will no doubt have his troops arrive with the emotion of logic ready to win a road game- the key is the Steelers. Do they show up with the look of a guy whose wife just told him about an affair and he's got an address he wants to visit or do they come out flat like they did against the Jets? I'd be less inclined to buy the logical Vegas line since the Jet's game appeared to be a "looked past" Sunday. The Steeler tone will be obvious early- they come out to play or they simply don't have it. It's tough to bet that their coach can't find another week of emotion out of a talented group who must realize just how emotionless they played last week.

Our local premium sports programming in Los Angeles is on Fox Sports Net West. FSN appears to be by far the largest overall network with affiliates in at least 17 areas of the U.S.

You're in for a treat- Clark is way under the radar in this episode, and like some of the classics it's not the regulars who carry the hour- it's the guest roles. I'd rate two of the guest roles from this episode as good as any I ever recall seeing.

Actually, in '03 he led all NFL running backs with over 300 carries in fumbles to carry ratio. The simple fact is he doesn't hold the football well and has shown no sign that he ever will.

Of course Rita had her new blonde sidekick bust the cousin for an overnighter to keep her from being part of the Atlantic City setup. Chances of this not being part of a continuing storyline? 0%- Which means word gets back to the squad about it-

I've never watched much of Cleeland's blocking, what I have seen he didn't strike me as a reliable every down TE. He's a big kid for sure, but his receiving numbers have declined evey year he's been in the league. Becht strikes me as a workhorse guy who fell out of their offense this past season- based on his big season in '03 he could arguably fill both skills. For some reason though he's never struck me as a difference maker and being a FA out of NY he may get a bigger payday than he's due. On the other hand, if he comes in at half of the Bubba Franks FA deal he might be a better choice for us. The intrigue about Franks though is that he is a true double threat and he has better than average skills after the catch for a big man. Bubba is the type of guy contemplated in the saying that "all the great TEs are playing power forward in the NBA".

Williams benefitted greatly by having Chris Villarial at his side- his game went south against Pitt the moment Villarial left the field (although no one should have to suffer covering for Mike Pucillo's sorry ass). Williams probably ended the season in about the shape he should have entered camp. Hopefully his unfortunate '04 offseason will be nothing more than a curve in his maturity process and he gives us a far better season next year- I expect him to. On TEs wouldn't I love to see Bubba Franks in a Bills uni next year ;-) Even a player like Ken Dilger would be a big positive on our roster assuming Campbell is back and healthy. Campbell IMO doesn't get anywhere near enough credit for his HUGELY improved blocking skills before the injury.

I agree with you there's a chance to get a 2nd for him also, he has value to teams who can don't need a receiving option as a primary skill of their #1 RB and where reliability holding onto the ball isn't paramount. I've been saying since the middle of the '04 season that Denny Green in Arizona was one of the three or four best fits for Travis in the NFL, and a #2 from them is not out of the question. What we can hope for is that they salivate over the yardage stats and ignore the intangibles, something Denny Green has a LONG track record of doing. And as far as Martin is concerned, Larry Holmes once made a comment about Rocky Marciano that is more applicable in the Martin/Henry comparison than it was in the original.

Absolutely. I thing I'll be more surprised to see Jennings stay versus leaving simply because his value in a pure passing offense is so much higher than his value to us in the play action passing scheme we ran this past year. Jonas has maybe as fine a slide as there is in football, a huge asset in a pass first O, but he plays to high in the run game and that makes it tough for him to clear running space for his RBs. If Williams can keep all his marbles in one jar this off-season (read that come into camp in shape), it seems a logical scenario would be moving the LT-paid Williams to that side and finding a much better value in a RT FA or draft pick, allowing some more of the wealth to be spread at positions like TE where we don't have an NFL quality depth chart, in fact after #1 we have for all intents and purposes no depth at all and our #1 is no lock to come back 100%.

>>1) He cannot/will not block. ...not a factor for a team without a statue QB Right, other teams in the NFL don't even bother blocking pass rushers from positions other than the OLine because their QBs are so fleet of foot! >>2) He cant even figure out simple pass patterns. ...he's a runningback Oh yeah, I forgot that other teams don't bother throwing the ball to anyone who doesn't wear a jersey in the 80s. >>3) He has been known to cough up the football. ...that was now 3 years ago And of course other teams don't mind that Henry has the CAREER worst fumbles to touches ratio among all active feature backs, about one fumble every 37 carries, putting him "ahead" of even the Ahman Greens and Tiki Barbers. FYI- the great backs like Curtis Martin lose the ball at a rate more like every 75 carries.

And I'd add that at least in Ogden's case he was the "most important player" on the Raven's offense, the single most responsible for their ability to compete due to his owning the opposition's best athlete on most Sundays and virtually never requiring help, allowing the Ravens to focus the balance of their offensive line on stopping 3 or 4 defenders in pass coverage while giving them a reliable place to punch out the running game over Ogden's back. Ogden was/is the real deal at OT, a guy who plays both the run and pass with equal excellence. Pace is tilted towards excellent pass blocking while offering less in the running game, not unlike our own Jonas Jennings, a superior pass blocker with far more limited skills in the run game.

I was errant in excluding the context of the Chevy Chase/Bochco interview- Chase said there was "no longer any television programming of redeeming value" when Bochco brought up the Chase record.