jahnyc

Secondary and linebackers looked really bad.

If there is no chance that he will re-sign with the Bills after the season (since they can't negotiate a new contract now), then he should be traded when he will generate the most interest and trade value.

Before the end of last season, I would have voted to wait to consider extending Wood to see if gets through this season injury free. Given his past injuries, it also is a fair question as to whether his overall effectiveness will be negatively impacted over the next number of years. Now, with the loss of Levitre and likely Byrd, plus more than $20 million in salary cap space available this year, I would try to sign him well before before he hits free agency.

I don't think any of us know enough to figure out who to blame for the situation with Byrd. It may well be about businesss if Byrd wants to be the highest paid safety in the NFL. If this is the case, not sure I understand why there would be bad blood and I certainly would not blame the Bills for a broken relationship. The real question to me is whether Byrd wants to be here. Would he be willing to take less from a playoff caliber team? Is he asking to be highest paid (if true) only because it is the Bills? The Bills did pick two safteties in the last draft. They must have had some inkling as to where this was going.

This will not end well. If these reports are correct, seems like the relationship is broken. I am sure a lot of teams like Byrd, and some may be willing to pay him what he is looking for, but few of these teams also would want to give up a high draft choice to get him. Really can't lose Levitre and Byrd, two of the best players we have drafted in the last five years.

This is really unfortunate. EJ needed the practice reps and to play in preseason games.

This is interesting. While not bad compared to the numbers for other teams, our debt to value percentage is higher than I would have expected. I was not aware that the Bills had any debt. Maybe they have loans in connection with the renovations to the RWS? The operating income number is worrisome, considering that the Bills have a relative low debt to value percentage. If the team gets sold and our debt service increases, it will be difficult to generate positive operating income based on these numbers.

Maybe the long-term plan is to find a LT and move Glenn over to LG. If this is the case, it may be tough to watch the left side of the o-line this year. I do not understand going into the season with Brown and Legursky as the possible starters. While it can be argued that signing Levitre to the contract he received from the Titans would have been a mistake, you would think that signing a mid-tier LG would have made sense considering the Bills have more than $20 million in cap space. The o-line may need considerable revamping in the future, particularly with Wood being a free agent next year. I really don't agree with the posters who claim that finding guards is easy. I remember what we had after Ruben and before Levitre, and it was not pretty.

I am still confused about all of this, but I have a feeling long-term that Glenn ends up being a left guard. I am surprised that we did not draft an OT in the last draft. It was a good group and fairly deep.

Another example of really poor planning by the front office. They could not have been surprised by the offers that Levitre received in free agency and they had plenty of time to reach a deal with Levitre well before he became a free agent. Most importantly, the front office lkely knew that Levitre would leave. They also knew that there was not an adequate replacement on the roster, so they needed to find a free agent replacement or select a guard in the draft. Signing a back-up guard from the Steelers is not addressing the situation, and the o-line will suffer this year as a result. There really is no excuse for this. The Bills are more than $20 million under the salary cap and they had time to prepare for and address this situation. I also do not buy into the theory that Bills did not try to re-sign Levitre because they know they would need to re-sign other pending free agents, including Byrd. Looks like there is a good chance we will lose Byrd in the next year or two as well.

I had the sense that Levitre wanted to stay, but it seemed that the Bills were not interested in keeping him, at least at the dollars that Levitre was looking for. I have always thought that Byrd did not want to be here. Could be wrong, maybe it is only about the money the Bills are offering, but Parker will force a divorce. I would have re-signed Levitre and I would press to re-sign Byrd. I do agree that we need to see that Wood can be healthy for a season before re-signing him. He has had two very tough injuries and I do have concerns about this ability to play over the long term. We will see about Spiller. We really should not be losing homegrown talent with the cap space that we have and our poor record with signing free agents.

No one in the Bills front office deserves the benefit of the doubt. Brandon has been a part of the decision making team for too long to escape responsibility for the state of the Bills over the last ten years. Even Whaley has a lot to prove given his prior roles with the Bills. Doug Marrone and his staff have a clean slate. Let us all hope that they are excellent coaches to help overcome some of the front office and personnel decision making deficiencies.

I think we need to be careful about our assessments of the potential contributions of Hughes and Lawson. Indy did not want Hughes and he has underperformed as a first round pick. Lawson was a part time player last year for the Bengals. Hopefully, they will produce for the Bills, but we should be realistic about the chances of both being quality players for the Bills. I am more excited about seeing more of Carrington. He seemed to make strides last year and he made some plays. Maybe he will blossom this year.

Fair comments to my original post, but I don't remember there being a lot of interest in Anderson from other teams and the Patriots were not aggressive in trying to re-sign him. Also, a $3 million cap hit next year is not insignficant and it never looks good, particularly to players, when you sign a guy and then release him after one season.

Signing Anderson was one of many bad decisions by Nix. It will be interesting to see whether Doug Whaley is an improvement over Nix, but I was really hoping for a clean break from Nix and his staff.

Didn't we see the Dallas draft board a few years ago and Troup had a 4th round grade?

I am happy that there is a new defensive coordinator. I think our defensive play calling and scheme cost us last year in a big way. I also like Woods. I was hoping the Bills would draft him. He appears to be NFL ready. The Bills will miss Levitre and possibly Gailey's offensive scheme. Not sure if the Bills have improved overall in terms of talent, but the key will be whether EJ can develop into a franchise QB. I hope the Bills will be competitive this year. If EJ shows promise and improvement, that would go a long way to creating some optimism about the team's future.

So who are our DEs in this defense? Does Dareus get moved to DE? K. Williams?

1. It will be interesting to see how the safety position plays out. Two safeties drafted, so there are now five drafted safeties on the roster (Byrd, Williams, Searcy and the two draft picks). I assume the Bills are preparing for the possibility that they will not be able to re-sign Byrd. The Bills must be confident that he will sign his tender since I expect that they would have traded him before/during the draft if they thought otherwise. I am starting think he plays for the Bills one more year and then is traded. 2. No offensive or defensive linemen were drafted by the Bills in this draft. I think we are okay at DT (with the addition of Branch), but no so sure about DE. I don't think that Anderson is an every down player. For the o-line, I am surprised that the Bills did not draft a guard. I think the loss of Levitre will be felt even more now. I wonder if the Bills believe that they will be able to re-sign Woods. If not, I would have thought that they would have drafted a guard/center prospect. 3. As others have noted, seemed like in this draft (and even with undrafted free agents) the Bills were willing to take/sign players with character concerns. 4. The Bills continue to draft players higher than they are expected to be drafted. (2010--Troup, 2011--Sheppard, and 2012--Graham). This year, EJ, Alonso and Meeks all were drafted by the Bills earlier than anticipated by most draft "experts." I would say the Bills misfired with Troup and Sheppard. We will see about Graham and this year's group. 5. Not sure I understand that Goodwin pick with Graham already on the roster. Seem like very similar players. It will be interesting to see what happens with Brad Smith. Very professional and well liked, but not sure how he fits at this point. Really liked the Woods pick. I think he will provide the most immediate contribution of this class of picks. 6. Still have some big holes. Very surprised that no CB was taken. Same with LG and TE (at least until the seventh round, and he is more of an H-back).

I really do not get this thread. It was great that the Bills picked up another second round pick in a draft in which the top 15 was considered weak compared to previous years. It also is a good sign that the pick by the Bills was not telegraphed. Maybe the front office learned something after the emabarassment of the taping of Buddy's call with the Tampa Bay GM. As to the pick itself, who knows if EJ will become a quality QB. The experts who did not like the pick will only be embarassed if EJ actually develops. If they are upset because the Bills were giving misinformation as to who they were interested in, that is just plain stupid. Every team does this prior to the draft. What I don't understand is why people are so angry with the experts. Many of them don't like the pick, and their grades are some of the worst I can remember for a first round pick by the Bills. The front office and EJ need to prove them wrong. I have no confidence in this front office, so I have my doubts. Maybe it is appropriate to ignore guys like McShay, but I did not like the reaction to the pick by Polian and others who have significant experience in the NFL assessing talent.

I have a feeling it will be a WR and then a CB. Woods and then Banks or Taylor. TE in the third round.

Love the Bills and glad that we traded down, but I really do not like this pick. Always trying to be smarter than the other teams and the experts. It never works.

For our first pick, the top talent does not match our needs particularly well. I would rather take Warmack or Cooper (guard is a need) in the first round, players that have a higner probability of being very good players, versus a QB, who may have less than a 50-50 chance of developing into a starting caliber QB.

It seems like there are mixed reactions to this, but this seems kind of negative to me. Either he is trying to use whatever leverage he has to push the Bills to give him a long-term deal (which would not be bad news) or he wants out.

Not sure what I am missing here, but if you look at Buddy's drafting for the offense over the three years he has been the GM, the only starters from his picks are Spiller and Glenn (at least so far), right? Not very good.