SoTier

NASCAR doesn't allow numbers to be retired. The teams "own" their numbers as long as they actively use them, but if they don't use them on a car for a specified period of time, it goes back into the hopper to be used by another team. After Richard Petty retired in 1992, his many fans wanted NASCAR to retire his #43 but Petty Motorsports had to put it on another team in order to keep it. Historic #43 is currently driven by rookie Darrell "Bubba" Wallace, Jr, who finished second in last week's Daytona 500.

I think this was the plan at the draft that got derailed by Glenn's injury. The Bills haven't had a good pair of bookends at OT in forever ... it's why the Bills need to keep Glenn if he's healthy however tempting it might be to trade him. Unless they need to use him to move up to get the QB they want, I wouldn't like that they traded him. I agree except for the OTs. See my thoughts above. Glenn's foot is either going to be fixed by surgery or it's not; for an OLer, it can't really be allowed to be a chronic condition. So, if Glenn comes back healthy, his health isn't a factor. Neither is his age since most OTs can play into their mid/late thirties these days. More importantly, while Dawkins played well as a rookie, he didn't play LT as well as Glenn does when healthy. He may also be physically better suited to play RT than LT (since he was originally drafted to play the right side). I think the entire OL except Ducasse struggled adjusting to Dennison's blocking scheme, which suggests that none of them are particularly physically well suited to it, so they would probably all benefit from a switch. Resurrecting Miller would be a major win for the Bills because they could then concentrate on adding youngsters at guard/center to eventually replace Incognito and Groy. Ducasse was a bust as a second round pick of the Jests, and has bounced around the league since as a backup guard. He didn't suddenly improve because he moved to WNY. He improved because his linemates struggled. Killing starlings, house sparrows, and monk parrots (all non-native species) is okay. Others, no ... although you may feel differently if a family of crows decide to nest in your neighborhood. You got that backasswards, sir. Having a good OL makes all but the most incompetent QBs better, and it can make a good QB more successful than a great one.

Well, what if the Bills only like one QB, and they can't trade up high enough to grab him because he went #1? Are you one of those who just wants a first round QB and any of the ones the pundits like will do?

Well, it seems to me that you're claiming the right to do what you want to do but you are denying the OP that same right. As somebody else said, if you don't like the topic, then don't bother with it. Sheesh!

You are not being realistic. The Bills don't have the cap space to sign Cousins without creating more holes that they wouldn't be able to fill except through the draft, so signing him would preclude the team improving over last season except at QB. You simply cannot count on hitting on all your Day 1 and Day 2 draft picks, especially when you're drafting in the bottom of each round. Minnesota isn't going to let both Keenum and Bradford leave in FA and keep Bridgewater whose knee may or may not hold up to playing full time. More than likely, they'll pay Keenum and either let both Bradford and Bridgewater leave or keep Bridgewater. In either case, neither QB is a good candidate for a "bridge QB" because of their bad wheels. However much you don't like it, none of the other available FA vet QBs are as good as Taylor has been when he's had a decent OC and some targets. That includes both McCown and Fitzpatrick. A team cannot assume that any first round rookie QB will be good enough to start immediately ... or at all during his first season. That means that a team needs to have a competent QB who can start for anything from none to all the games. That's not the likes of Trevor Siemian and most of the cheap FA vets. Keenum might but I don't believe he leaves Minnesota. I would think the rest of the FA vets would struggle to get the Bills to even 8 wins, primarily because they tend to produce significantly more TOs and NONE of them are any more "clutch" than Taylor. I feel the exact same way about Bradford which is why I don't want the Bills to waste resources on him. The ONLY reason Bradford hits the FA market at all is his knees.

the start time for the NASCAR race has now been moved up to 12:30.

Excellent post. In a previous life, I was a middle school science teacher for a few years, so I like all science (well, astrophysics is pretty hard for me to get my brain around), and paleontology and evolutionary biology are the most fascinating for me.

BINGO. People are free to believe whatever stupid manure they want to believe. As long as they don't try to pass this crap off as history (moon landing) or science (flat earth) and/or teach it in schools, I have no problem with them proving to the world that they're stupider than your average bovine.

Heads up, NASCAR fans: The NASCAR Monster Energy race at Atlanta Motor Speedway today has been moved up to 1 pm EST from 2:15 pm because of the threat of rain. The race is on FOX.

Because I do know how the media was run 40 or 50 years ago and much earlier, why I wrote what I wrote. The media has never presented news that is "pure" going back to the beginning of the republic. Remember learning (hearing about?) the Alien and Sedition Acts passed in the 1790s? Well, the Sedition Act was an attempt by the federal government to control anti-government propaganda masquerading as news. William Randolph Hearst built a newspaper empire in the late 19th and early 20th centuries based on sensationalized -- and not all that rarely -- "manufactured" -- news. Hearst's "yellow journalism" helped push the US into declaring war on Spain in 1898 and helped sabotaged American participation in the League of Nations after WW I. Prior to 1970s, especially during the height of the Cold War, the print and broadcast media practiced "self-censorship" in which it did not publish or broadcast news that it deemed "detrimental" to the national interest. Consequently, the American public was kept ignorant of the fact that JFK had staffers bring prostitutes into the White House or that more and more young Americans were being sent to fight and die in the jungles of SE Asia or that blacks in most of the Deep South lived under a reign of terror. Those weren't things that the media didn't know about; they were things that the media didn't report. Sometimes news suppression happened because of government pressure but it often happened because media outlets voluntarily suppressed stories that were deemed "inappropriate", primarily because of their political consequences. So much for the "pure" media of the past.

Pot meet kettle. Blaming "the mainstream media" for not "simply reporting facts" is the perpetual whine of those who don't a know the difference between fact and opinion and don't like to hear facts that don't fit their own agendas ... but carry on.

Other than Cousins, what realistic options do they have? A rookie is going to take a year or two to come up to speed ... if he's any good at all, and by then the window's already closing. No other FA is as good as Bortles was last season. IMO, it's taking the devil they know rather than gambling on the one they don't... they liked the improvement that Bortles made last season enough to want to see more of him, but they aren't quite convinced he's the real deal, so they worked out a deal that gives both of them a reasonable deal for 3 more years. They're weren't willing to cut Bortles loose but they also weren't willing to give a fat contract without having more confidence that Bortles' turn around is for real.

So, what are some "native" Canadian food -- ie, developed in Canada, not imported with immigration settlers? The only thing I can think of is poutine.

That's the Jews who are still waiting for the Messiah.

Muslims consider parts of the Old Testament and the Gospels as Holy Scripture ... and not all Christians, including the billions who adhere to the Roman Catholic Church, believe in the literal interpretation of the Bible and/or disavow evolution. The Catholic Church reconciled its doctrine on creation with the theory of evolution in the 1890s.

^^^ How is this any stupider than millions of Americans believing that the Earth was created exactly according to the Old Testament and that evolution is a lie?

A correction on the women's curling gold medal match. It's on NBCSN at 7pm tonight. South Korea vs Sweden.

If you cut Incognito, who's your LG? Another career backup like Ducasse impersonating a starter?

The curling match was great! For those who want to watch the replay at a more normal time, I won't give any details on how the US won. All I will say is that it was worth staying up all night to watch. If you want to read about it: US Men Win Curling Gold! Women's bronze medal curling game (Japan vs Britain) is today, and women's gold medal match (South Korea vs Sweden) is tomorrow.

Drew Brees is only 6' and Russell Wilson isn't even 6'. OTOH, Brock Osweiler is like 6'7".

Aside from a few years in Arizona when he was behind Kurt Warner, McCown has played on qb needy teams as bad or worse than the Bills have been since they sent Flutie packing.

Unless the Bills sign Cousins or maybe Keenum, I don't think Peterman will be with the Bills when the season starts unless he's still eligible for the practice squad. Whether the Bills keep Tyrod or sign another bridge QB, they'll have a first or second round rookie QB as their backup. There's no way that they will go with a rookie and Peterman.

Well, they didn't take Brees or Brady in 2000, and they let Jay Cutler get away in 2006, not to mention Joe Flacco in 2008 and Andy Dalton in 2011. Of course, they also passed on such gems as Matt Leinart, Josh Freeman, Tim Tebow, Brandon Weeden, Brock Osweiler, Colin Kaepernick, Geno Smith so it pretty much balances out IMO. The only two QBs I'm po'd about the Bills screwing up with were giving up the 2005 first to trade back to take Losman, thus missing out on a shot at Aaron Rodgers, and passing on Russell Wilson for TJ Graham!

Hindsight is always 20-20. IIRC most of TBD was on board with the trade back because they figured the Bills would win 4-5 games and KC would take a major nose dive, too, so the Bills would have 2 picks in the top dozen in 2018. I guess their crystal balls were a bit defective, huh?

One of the benies of being retired is that I can stay up late and watch live. If the US wins (and maybe if it doesn't), NBC should have the highlights of the game on later tomorrow.