jahnyc

What is Karlos trying to tell us? I am concerned about his health, but I also was planning to start him this week on my fantasy team.

Not sure about Henderson and Kujo does not seem to be developing at the rate you would expect for a second round pick. Too early to tell for Miller. I really like Wood but his play seems to have regressed. O-line continues to be a significant need.

I think I was trying to say something like this in my post, but you stated it much more clearly. Good post.

The dynamic among Whaley, Brandon, Ryan and ownership is odd. I am sure that Ryan has significant input in personnel matters, and I assume that he pushed hard for Clay and Harvin, plus some of his former coaching colleagues. I have no idea how much power or say Whaley really has, other than maybe with regard to the draft. Not sure about Whaley's decision making overall. The spending spree in the offseason and trading up for Watkins may have been misguided, although I think the most recent draft may help Whaley, with Darby and Williams playing very well, unless the team misses the playoffs again. In that case, I could see the Bills hiring a more senior level executive above Whaley or Whaley being in a bit of trouble.

Some thoughts below: 1. The o-line underperformed today. Other than Incognito, the overall unit is weak, and there were no running lanes for Williams. CK may never have starting ability. The o-line still needs upgrading. 2. Not having Watkins and McCoy hurt. McCoy has not been 100%, but teams respect his abilities, including catching the football. Williams was used in a fairly one-dimensional way (other than his one catch), and I do not think the Giants defense was particularly concerned about Williams making plays in the passing game. 3. I think Carpenter will be cut, particularly since Rex seemed to have issues with him in preseason and keeping a kick-off specialist on the roster. 4. I think that Taylor's ankle may be bothering him more than we know. 5. Rex and the defense need to regroup and figure out how to defend the quick, short passing game. This is the blue print for beating the Bills' defense. Brady is exceptional and Eli can be highly accurate. Not all QBs will be able to execute this game plan, but the defense needs to be prepared for it since it has been neutralizing our pass rush and overall aggressiveness. 6. The penalties are beyond aggravating. There are no excuses. I thought the Giants defense should have been flagged for a couple of late hits on Taylor. Oh well. 7. Miami and Indy may be pretty weak teams. Hard to judge our team based on those victories. Have to say that we were out-coached by the Pats and the Giants. 8. I think there is talent on the team, but the question is whether the team has been built in a smart way. Not sure we will know the answer until later this season. 9. Special teams coverage and returns have been noticeably worse than last year. No idea why since the coach and the players are the same. 10. Really tough to be a Bills fan sometimes. Today was one of those days. I was excited for the game and I had high expectations. Losing two out of three at home is bad. Now I am not sure what we have here.

Agree about Schwartz. No adjustments and no pressure. Pathetic defensive performance.

Fair point.

Still cannot believe we traded Lynch to Seattle for fourth round and fifth round picks (Hairston and Tank Carder).

I was really impressed with Gilmore. He had a great game. O-line run blocking was concerning. They will need to be better going forward. I thought Roman had a strong game plan. He is a huge upgrade over Hackett.

Kind of interesting that the Pegulas were ready to put Polian at the top of the front office. Not sure whether this was a reflection on Whaley's performance up until that point, but having gone through the sales process, they must have identified some matters that needed to be addressed with operations of the team and the front office.

I am still having trouble figuring out whether we should be giving Whaley credit or criticism for the period before he became GM. If you look at the current roster, many of the top players were drafted or signed as free agents by Nix, but Nix also made some bad mistakes (TJ Graham). I think that Nix made the call on EJ, not Whaley, although Whaley seemed to strongly support the pick. Nix seems to get no love here, but his draft picks and signings form the core of the team. If we focus on Whaley's two years as GM, he has made some bad trades, including the trades for Williams, Brown, and Cassel. Does he get credit for trading for Hughes? Who knows, but it did not happen during his tenure as GM. I also believe that he overpaid significantly for Watkins and his drafting has been very hit or miss. Seems like big misses on CK, Richardson and Cockrell, and some very good picks with P. Brown and Henderson. Free agency has been a mixed bag for Whaley. He failed to adequately address the guard situation last year, which hurt, but he also signed Cory Graham, who played very well last season. Overall, I think it is way too early to assess Whaley. Some good things and some not so good things. I personally think many here are overrating what he has done, but we will see in the coming years.

Puts all the pressure on Taylor. I still do not think that EJ is a starting caliber QB. Not a great plan to go into the season in this way. The front office had time to make a better effort at trying to fix our QB issue. Hopefully, Taylor can be the guy.

Richardson and Cockrell were both really bad picks in the draft. Cockrell has already been cut, and I think Richardson is not far behind.

Injuries suck.. The season is relatively short, and I hate seeing good players out. All of the ACL injuries during the preseason throughout the league have been terrible. Only wish Kiko the best and good health.

Hasn't Whaley only been in charge of the last two drafts? It seems to get complicated if we try to give him credit or ding him for any drafts or specific draft picks before the last two. I cannot give Whaley all that much credit for the Watkins pick since Watkins was viewed as the top WR in the draft going into that draft and the Bills gave up a first and fourth to get him. My view is that a GM shows drafting expertise when a player far exceeds expectations based on where he was picked or the GM bypasses more highly rated players at a specific position and drafts a player with a lower rating who turns out to be the superior player.

Not sure why so many posters get defensive about our draft grades if they are poor. A lot of our drafts have been average or worse over that last 12 plus years, and many times the draft experts have been right about their assessments of our drafts and our drafting. The Bills seem to have good talent at a number of positions now. Is that primarily the result of good drafting or solid free agent pick-ups? It would be interesting to see statistics that show for each team the percentage of starters that are draft picks versus free agent acquisitions, and for a deeper dive, the quality of our drafted starters versus other teams.

I agree that character and leadership are critical. I think there are some on the board who would argue that our lack of success over the last number of years is due to in part to not taking risks on character. i do not think this is the case. Rather, our poor record in the last 12-plus years has been the result of average or worse drafting and not enough resources devoted to coaching and free agency.

Not sure why people are so dismissive of Polian and his views of our QB situation. I think most football people share his assessment and the QB position has been a disaster for the Bills since Kelly retired. I understand how difficult it is to find a quality starting QB in the NFL, but I am in the camp of drafting a QB every year until you fine a quality one.

Another guy on the NFL Network had the Bills on his "worried" list for our draft because we reached on every pick. I do think we have had more weird drafts than most teams over the last 10 years.

Good that murder is a non-starter.

Is McCoy obvious at the amount we will be paying him, his age, running style and trading Kiko? Would it have been better to draft a RB in a draft with good RB prospects or try to get Murray at a better price and without having to trade Kiko? I believed that we would try to sign another starting guard, so the signing of Incognito made some sense as a second guard acquisition even if he had not played in a couple years, assuming he would not be a distraction or hurt us in free agency. The signing of Cassel is fine, but is it much of an upgrade from Orton? He passed his physical, but will his foot be fully healed and not cause him trouble? Are you okay with EJ at QB? I agree that Clay is obvious and I hope it happens, but should we have waited to cut him until we signed a new TE, particularly after losing Smith as well? The biggest needs going in to free agency were the o-line and TE. O-line still needs to be addressed. If we can get another starting caliber guard and tackle through free agency or trade, it will all make more sense, at least in the short term (i.e., next season). I have no idea about Harvin. If Roman can figure out how to utilize him in a consistent way and Harvin has success with kick-off returns he may be a worthwhile signing. Ultimately, you cannot look at each individual signing in a vacuum. Do all of these pieces fit together and did we make best use of the cap space available? Those will be two of the most important questions going forward.

I thought we needed an end zone threat (a big WR and/or TE). If we had that, then Harvin as a luxury pick-up would be fine.

I don't think we are getting Clay at this point, but we will see.

I do not understand all of our moves so far. I get it that it is still very early and a lot can happen before training camp and the start of the season, but I have to think that free agency did not go as expected by the front office. I like the re-signing of Hughes, the extension for Williams and the signing of Felton, but not much else makes sense to me. McCoy is a significant upgrade, but he is not a north/south runner (i.e., ground and pound) and we gave up Kiko. Plus we extended McCoy for big money. Harvin seems like a luxury, will take up $6 million in cap space on a one-year deal and has had locker room issues in his past. We all know Incognito's history and he has been out of football for a couple of years. At QB, have we really upgraded? Clearly the front office intended to upgrade the o-line, but it has not happened, and it was horrible last year. At tight end, the pursuit of Clay made sense, but it does not seem like we will get him and we cut Chandler. Who will play at TE? We have not re-signed Spikes, but in Ryan's defensive scheme, do we need more linebackers with Kiko traded, Rivers cut and if Spikes does not return? Searcy signed with the Titans, will he be missed? A splashy start to free agency, but is it a solid start?

Great trade for Hughes, but Whaley has overpaid or under received in all of his other trades. I think his lack of experience shows in a number of ways and the Bills could have benefitted greatly from a football czar.