Wraith

A big part of that is the wind. They knew damn well they're not throwing deep into the wind so they are jumping routes, confident there is no double move.

First off, you insult peoples intelligence here by rambling about statistical significance, implying (or 'outright saying) they do not understand it. Of course, you make absolutely no effort show how significant your own arguments are, so basically you are full of bull s&@#. Prove it to us, oh wise one, that percentage of seats filled is more significant, statistically, than actual number of bodies in the seats. There are many people here who understand statistics and practice it for a living. Forgive us for not taking your word for it. Both metrics are imperfect, because both can be manipulated. I could easily sell out to 100% a 30,000 seat NFL stadium in pretty much every city in the United States. Does that mean my fans are more loyal? The only true way to measure the size of the fan base would be to have every NFL stadium be obscenely large, to the point where they never sell out, and then compare attendance figures. Secondly, you act like the Bills are the only NFL team to be supported by a REGION, instead of a city. Hello, New England is supported by 6 STATES, including the city of Boston that has MANY more people than Buffalo and Rochester combined. Seattle is the only NFL team for nearly a thousand miles in any direction, and draws from Seattle, Portland, and Vancouver, each with over 2.5 million in population. Every team is supported by a region, whether you choose to recognize it or not.

I think the key to stopping this play is the fact that LT is not a quarterback. Seriously. Stop laughing. As soon as LT touches the ball, Gates goes from a receiver to a blocker. He's fair game. Every time LT touches the ball, someone has to knock Gates on his butt. Easier said than done, I know, but it could be as simple as cut blocking him. That would take Gates out at least momentarily, disrupt the timing of the play, and still leave the defender in reasonable position to help defend the run.

This statement is ludicrous. Buffalo is 12th in the entire league in average attendance per game despite playing in one of the smallest markets. We are just barely below our average attendance for last year (2% below, in fact). We are 3% above our average in 2002 (the Bledsoe Year One) and 12% above our average in 2001. These doom and gloom posts are more idiotic than anything I've seen in any Losman/Holcomb/Nall debate. Please. Not that long ago blackouts were a regular occurance. Less than 2% shift year over year is NOTHING. We still outdraw New England, a team supported by the large city of Boston and the entire region of New England, after winning 3 Super Bowls in the last 5 years and building a new stadium. These blackouts are simply a function of having a stadium too large for the region, NOTHING MORE.

As far as I'm concerned, the only acceptable place to stand up throughout a game is in the student section of a college basketball or football game.

What does that have to do with the present? You don't have to look hard to see that he is mentally capable of succeeding as an NFL QB. The only question that remains is if he can CONSISTENTLY apply those mental abilities. That is an important if. He's got all the tools, mentally and physically.

Dude.

Losman is listed as having a second fumble according to NFL.com. I assume this was a botched exchange between Losman and Fowler. Is that true? Either way it's funny. If a columnist remarks that Losman made a lot of mistakes and cites the interception and two fumbles, it is annoying but at least understandable because that person is clearly just reading off the stat sheet. However, it's ludicrous that the announcer of the game, who in a perfect world is actually WATCHING the game, makes a similar comment. Just plain idiotic, really.

Glad you mentioned the fumbles. I am in Rochester, and only saw the last few minutes on CBS. I listened to the rest of the game via the radio broadcast but missed the first 20 minutes because I was running errands with my fiance. One of the first plays I heard was "interception." Anyway, can you elaborate on the fumbles?

Nope. Definitely Burger King creepy.

I think a big part of the "problem" is that the Bills offense, as a unit, seems to get really conservative in the middle quarters. That is just a gut feeling though.

Before today's game: QTR COMP% YPA TD INT RATING 1 68.5 11.59 3 1 118.3 2 55.4 5.12 1 3 55.5 3 60.6 5.14 2 3 65.2 4 66.2 7.01 4 0 103.8

Here's the thing: You actually managed, somehow, to start an interesting topic, about the "Grass is always greener Syndrome" and how people always more heavily scrutinize their own young players than they do other team's young players. Then you go and muck it up and lessen your credibility with comments like this.

I can't speak for Gordio, but I know that alot of people in the Buffalo area and elsewhere are familiar with Miami of Ohio because they play in the same conference as UB (the MAC). Being a UB alum myself, I got to see Big Ben play twice in person, a few more times on ESPN2, and followed their exploits closely because he was definitely an NFL prospect at the time.

My point is that passer rating is not a useless stat, as you are trying to indicate with your references to QBs with worse ratings than Losman who are likely to go to the playoffs. You have listed two teams with spectacular defenses and quarterbacks who have been marginal (Plummer has been consistently worse than Losman, Grossman has been either spectacular or horrible). You also listed a team that was going nowhere until they got rid of the 30th rated QB and replaced him with a guy who is now the 2nd rated QB. Finally, you listed the defending SB Champions who are now 4 - 6 largely because their quarterback has only two decent quarters this season.

Drew's team is going to the playoffs with the second rated passer in the league, Tony Romo, at 100.0. Grossman gets away with a lot of bad decisions because of his talented defense, but it shows in his rating. Big Ben's team would have a much greater chance (than slim...) if Roethlisberger were performing better. Eli is Eli, we'll see how the rest of the season play's out.

Yup I agree with your basic premise. If the QB can hit a receiver as fast as Evans in stride on a fly pattern (or some variant thereof...) there's not a damn thing a defense can do about it except: A) Play the free safety ridiculously deep and guarantee 15 yard completions all day, or B) Find a way to get to the QB faster.

I know what you meant but I think you have flip-flopped Clements and Johnson in your mind. Clements was much deeper than Johnson when the ball was thrown and Clements had to nearly come to a stop and wait for the ball to come down while Johnson caught up and had a chance at the ball.

Um, rewatch that play, Kelly. Johnson was not behind Clements. In fact, Clements was WAY behind Johnson and had time to camp out under that throw. The only reason Johnson even had a shot at it was that there was so much air under the ball that he almost had a chance to run underneath it while all Clements could do was wait for it to come down and fight for it.

Yup, Hollis bounced it off the crossbar. That was a wild game. I just don't like how people in the media and to a lesser extent in this thread are trying to use this reference to demonstrate how the Bills have no heart. The fact of the matter is this reference misses the OT games, any game that the Bills scored late in to pull away (Such as Green Bay two weeks ago) and could possibly reward a team for partially collapsing and squandering a big lead only to pull it out in the end (such as what almost happened against Minnesota).

This is kind of a worthless statistic/reference. I can think of three games off the top of my head that the Bills won in OT (against Minnesota, Chicago, and Cincinatti) during the Bledsoe Era by scoring a touchdown. Would anyone here try to say that: A) Those weren't close games and B) It would be a more impressive victory had the Bills kicked field goals instead? I doubt it...

I think the part that people are taking exception with is the part about "shooting themselves in the foot" trying to remove credit from Losman and the Bills where credit is clearly due.

Those were three of the most perfectly thrown footballs I have ever seen. I'm talkin' laser...rockets....in exactly the right spot. The fact that one came as he was falling over and about to get pummeled, and another won the game with 9 seconds left and no time outs, makes it that much sweeter.

It really had nothing to do with inspired quarterback play, pretty good pass protection, or an amazing receiving effort. It was definitely the uniforms.

J.P. Flanders.