The Senator

I know what you mean about Fitz at clutch time - he seemed to throw the INT or fumble at just the most critical moments last season. But he also displayed signs of a guy who can lead us from behind to a victory - if only God would stop making Stevie Johnson drop Fitz's perfectly thrown passes. I am very intrigued at the prospect of going into this season with Fitz as starting QB, and with Gailey & Co. operating under that knowledge going into OTAs and training camp. I think his progress this season will be phenomenal, and will amaze not only the doubters on this board, but the rest of the football world as well. Say no to Kim Newton. JMO. GO BILLSSS!!!! Reverse the Curse!!!!! .

I don't mean to keep raining on your non-stop rain, but I guess you're not aware that NFL teams are pretty much prohibited from having contact with underclassmen with remaining NCAA eligibility until they declare for the draft, which cannot happen until January 15th - and, no matter how unhappy it makes you, the Bills are just as prohibited from interviewing them as every other NFL team. (That's not to say that teams can't scout underclassmen; they can - AND THE BILLS HAVE, EXTENSIVELY!!! I'm not at all clear what it is that compels you to think the Bills have not done so. )

Not to rain on your rain, but the Bills are actually ahead of most teams in the interviewing game by virtue of having met with about 100 prospects during Senior Bowl Week, and having coached a few dozen of them as well... Buffalo had an extended period of time to talk to over 100 senior prospects at the Senior Bowl in late January with Chan Gailey and his staff coaching the South team all week in Mobile. (Link - Combine interview list set) Also, regarding interviewing juniors at the combine (from same article), it seems that the Bills are doing pretty much what the rest of the other 31 teams are doing (except, of course, that they have more time to focus on underclassmen because they've already interviewed so many seniors)... Bills VP of College Scouting Tom Modrak and his staff were finalizing their player interview list for the NFL Combine which gets started on Feb. 23rd. NFL clubs have to submit an interview list to the league so they can coordinate the timing of all the interviews among the 32 clubs...“Right now we’re setting up interviews for the Combine and we’re doing a lot of juniors in those interviews,” said Modrak. ”We’ll go back into the schools and visit with them there too. We make sure there will be ways that we get what we need from all of them in the allotted amount of time prior to the draft.” (same link) Some will crap the Bills front office at every chance, for anything and everything, justified or not. I'd give this new regime a chance impress us with this draft, now that they've been in place for a full year.

I hope, with all my heart, that that is indeed the case. Last I knew, RW still signs everyone's paycheck, Nix & Gailey included. Hard for me to agree or disagree - since no one has yet seen Fitz as a starting QB for a season, beginning in the off-season OTAs.

Sounds like a great time - are the 'Young Dubliners' related in any way to the 'auld' Dubliners?

I'll assume that Mr Wilson liked Rob Johnson, JP Losman, and Trent Edwards - if that helps you at all when considering his ability to judge QBs. Fitz is going to be the starter this season - whether or not we draft a QB in round one, or at all. Given a full season with Fitz as Bills starting QB, beginning with OTAs and continuing thru camp and preseason, Wilson (and all of us) may very well be singing Fitzpatrick's praise a year from now. I certainly expect we will be. 19 and 0 baby!!! GO BILLSSS!!!! Reverse the Curse!!!!!

I am never thrilled with the 'trade-down' concept, but there's no one that I'm absolutely drooling over at #3 - we have plenty of positional and there are good picks available at any of those positions later in the first round (and throughout the first 5 rounds, really), so I'd be very interested should a scenario unfold that allows us to gain more picks AND still fill a crucial positional need. QB, IMHO, is not the most critical need, as Fitz will be just fine this season - certainly far better than any of the QBs available in this draft will be able to perform this year or in the foreseeable future. If anything, grab Ponder in round 3, if he's there. (If not, don't sweat it - everyone will be fawning over Luck, Darron Thomas, and Landry Jones in next year's draft anyway.) If you look at the first 3 rounds, as of today the Bills hold picks #3, 34, & 68. NE* has picks #17, 28, 33, 60, 74, & 92. Which team has the best chance to improve? Trade down, Buddy. .

The pathological obsession on this board with drafting whichever ' QB du jour ' the draftniks are fawning over at any given moment is comical. Just 4 weeks ago on TSW, Andrew Luck was the ONLY qb worth drafting this high. Now that he's gone, it's Kim Newton. If Newton got hit by a bus tomorrow, it'd be 'we gotta draft Gabe Blabbert' before the day ended. Last season is was Clausen. Fitz is the QB for this season, the next 2 seasons after that, and maybe even longer. Fix the D. Strengthen both lines. If Ponder is there in round 3, grab him. But don't waste the #3-overall pick on Newton, or any other QB in this draft. GO BILLSSS!!!! Reverse the Curse!!!!!

I think that 59-year-old Chan Gailey is too much of an ' elderly gent ' to sock you in the nose - he'd get his ' elderly ' 59-year-old pal Dave Wannstache to do it for him! Otherwise, aside from just learning that in seven short years I'll be considered ' elderly ' myself, I agree with and enjoyed your comments... 19 and 0 baby!!! GO BILLSSS!!!! Fear the (elderly) 'stache!!!!!

Never thought Ralph/Buddy had it in 'em - this has gotta be the biggest smokescreen I ever saw from the Bills' front office! There's NO WAY Buffalo takes a QB on day one - maybe on day 2, in round 3, if at all (probably Christian Ponder). JMO. GO BILLSSS!!!! Fear the 'stache!!!!!

I don't get it. If they want to sell more computers, why don't they just network a few hundred of their fastest, highest-power super-servers and a few zettabytes of storage, throw several thousand K-LoC's at the mess, and buy three days of Jeopardy shows?

Snowballs??? I remember it being D-Cells I would love to hate them that much again

Didn't want to get beat by a girl, I guess! (At that age - and being from Iowa - he probably doesn't know yet that 'wresting' with the gals can be lots o' fun )

OK, I take it back. But NFL Draft Scout has him pegged at the #2 QB in the 2013 draft, right behind Andrew Luck (link) - whom we know is declaring for the 2012 draft (as will Jones, I think, and possibly Thomas as well).

Given Newton's obvious lust for $$$$ (coming out early, the whole 'Team Newton' crap, the Under Armour contract, stealing laptops, his dad's greed, etc., etc.), he's gonna want a sh_tload of money, and the Bills are gonna want to know they're not dealing with a half-a-season holdout before they draft a guy that high. I have no idea what rookie salary cap aggreement will come out of the next CBA, but I do know there's no freakin' way RW will give a Kim Newton $50M contract. Ain't gonna happen. Period. Hic Finis Est. (Besides that, I don't think he's 'the guy' for Buffalo - at #3, or at all. JMO.) .

Or Christian Ponder. Or Ryan Mallett. Or, since we have to wait " 2 or 3 years ", maybe Landry Jones in 2012. Or Darron Thomas. Or... (I'm just gonna wait until April 30 to find out what we did.) .

Vince Wilfolf? I don't like the poll either - reason being is that I have to accept one of your choices for each round, and I don't like your second round options. For instance, I like JJ Watt in round one (even better in round two) but none of your choices at #3-opverall - so I'd select 'trade down'. I like Ponder, but in round 3 - not round 2. If force to accept one of your round 2 choices, I could live with Stephen Paea - but the Tongan DT I'd rather draft is Stanford's Sione Fua in rounds 4 or 5. Given the constraints of your choices, I'd say 1-trade down (which I'm against doing) and grab JJ Watt 2-Paea (except you do know that he tore up his knee during Senior Bowl week, yes?) 3-Ponder He's the Vince Wilfolf of this draft

Apparently differentiating Canada and the US is not the only thing that ' confuses ' poor Watston - I was watching the Nova special where he also had difficulty discerning between male and female, identifying as Richard Nixon the ' former First Lady born Thelma Catherine Ryan in 1912 ' Regarding the whole buzzer thing, and cheating in general - IBM has always had the reputation of being somewhat underhanded and for pushing overpriced, technologically inferior products on less-than-enthused IT groups by using the veiled threat that, "No one ever lost their job for buying IBM," while leveraging their CFO/CEO level relationships to intimidate lower-level systems analysts who would otherwise buy less expensive and technologically superior products. " tangentially " ??? I would love to know how much IBM paid the producers of Jeopardy for that 3-day long infomercial! .

What we really should have done is gene-spliced Jack Thompson 20 years ago.

Monty Stickles always disagreed - he actually said to me, "Dobler? S--t, I was WAY dirtier than Dobler!"

I don't know all the value/points stuff involved, but 49ers may be looking for a corner if Clements doesn't agree to a pay cut - wonder if they'd be willing to trade-up to grab Peterson, and in Von Miller would still be there at #7 ???

You guys must be in love with Wisconsin native and Badgers' LT Gabe Carimi then?

Yes they did, because they didn't want Western reporters covering their primitive, brutal repression and base misogyny. .

I'm sure the IBM'ers could throw in a few KLoCs to give him a very nice bedside manner too, but I assume ' Watson ' could screw-up just as badly on a life-or-death medical query, or make an equally catastrophic financial decision should it be similarly ' confused ' ?

Ahmad Rashād was a pretty good one.