Mark Long Beach

I'd like a younger Garcia. He's 39 and on the edge if not already over the cliff. He may be better than what we got right now, but probably not much and also carries a big injury risk. We're better off trusting what we've got rather than picking up scraps and really sending out the panic vibe within the team.

It's easy to bash Jauron from his results. His record is poor. To paraphrase Bill Parcells, He is what his record says he is. An under .500 coach who can get his players to play hard for him and beat most of the really bad teams in the league and can generally play tough but not win versus the rest. Jauron's teams play hard. He hasn't figured out how to get the most out of his players as a team though. I do not think that he's soft, nor does he coddle people, nor does he guarantee jobs to people. Heck we've cut a lot of people during his term including our starting left tackle just before the season. He's had his chance to bring out the best but now it's time for a new coach to see if they can bring out the best in a team.

Lunatic Al laughs at everything. Especially death. I live out here in LA and we still get deluged with Raider stuff. You do not want Al. Ralphy-boy has his issues but Al is way, way worse.

Patrick Willis was not available when we drafted. Period. Guessing what we would have/could have done based on public comments about our draft is moronic. Nobody will EVER tell the truth immediately after their draft. Teams will support the guy they drafted and whoever they drafted was the guy they wanted all along. Which is what they SHOULD do. There are lots of faults with our coaching and drafting staff, but blaming them for something that they "wouldn't do" in a hypothetical situation is moronic.

I thought Houston first as well. Having lived in Cleveland for a few years the fans there certainly have some of the same pessimism that's been dominating our fan base lately. Although I think that the sense of doom is stronger there because it's hit in ALL of their sports: football as mentioned, NBA with Jordan crushing the quite-good Cav's, MLB with the Indians getting to the World Series a few times including a 1 run lead in Game 7 in the bottom of the 9th and still losing. They really feel cursed there. They also seem to REALLY suck much more often. The Bills are just mediocre/bad. They generally beat the really crappy teams and generally lose to the good teams. They seem fundamentally flawed and they just can't seem to crawl out of that hole.

Because it's the smart move. Besides the game isn't won or lost on the first drive.

I wouldn't go as far as saying they gave up, but they definitely lost hope. We went downhill pretty dramatically after that. Also we lost Whitner & McAnkle (but he wasn't a big loss as Drayton played well) Even so, it was a good game to watch. I really enjoyed the D stepping up. I haven't seen them that good in a long time. I like Trent but I'm starting to lose a little faith because he refuses to throw to his outside receivers. It's all slot, slot slot or backfield. Capt Checkdown really seems an appropriate nickname. CINCY: It wasn't so bad to watch if you like defensive football. We took some punches early but really came back swinging. The game was there for us to take. We didn't take it.

I gotta admit, I like Fisher. That's some pretty funny stuff.

Funny. While I definitely thought that Fitz was rusty/not ready, which is definitely not a surprise for his first action with a new team on an early preseason game, I thought Hamden was horrible. It's his 4th year here and I think I'd rather have Jeff George with his cane than Hamden. He's flat out not an NFL caliber QB. I expect Fitz to improve over preseason. Considering what a weak class of backup QB's there were out there this offseason, I thought he was a decent choice.

I also enjoyed it. Although I didn't like how successful it was! Football is still fun! I also liked how it ends up being a reward for the backup punter who isn't going to make the team. Now he's got a good memory to take with him, and it's a showcase for him to help him get a future job. As others have pointed out, it's also a good teaching tool for us, as well as a warning to future opponents of the Titans to be on guard (and maybe make them slower on the rush). No problem at all with that call, and I enjoyed watching it even at the expense of our team.

But it's not the regular season. What better way to get the o-line & everyone else on the same page but to run it nonstop during the preseason? We'll have a much better sense of how good/reliable it is by the time the regular season starts. Plus, if we NEED to run it, we'll be that much more practiced at it and are less likely to make a penalty at the end of a quarter.

Nice article. Thanks for passing it along. Very long, but well worth the read. I also really enjoyed the fantasy implication paragraphs even though I have no desire to play FF with that level of detail.

Easy, the Chin. ...But I think he wants stability and a lot of money. With RW on deathwatch (for those panicky fans) and the fact he will have a lot of suitors for his services will probably drive the price too high for RW to pay for.

and if we're REALLY lucky, we'll know in a year.

Nice!

I admit that I wasn't thrilled about his agent mouthing off. ...Of course to the huge population of chicken little's on the board it was Armageddon du jour.

Likewise! But another part of the news is that he doesn't sound bitter or PO'd. That's also good.

True that. Although I think we've got the best deep cornerback crew of any Bills team that I can remember. I'm not sure about the best top two (Winfield & Clements were pretty nice) although I hope McKelvin grows up to elite status this year. I really like McGee McKelvin Youboty (I watched this guy struggle for so long but last year I was stunned by his performance. I hope he can stay healthy) Corner Drayton - Who knows, he may flourish now that he's back inside. May get cut. I don't expect much out of the rookies, but maybe someone sticks.

He's not evaluating just how they would project to OLB. he's looking at pash rushing ability for both DE & 3-4 OLB. Both similar positions with pass rushing as a significant part of their job description. We would be using him as a DE obviously. This guy's stats say's he'll bust. He spells out his rationale fairly well.

I've not seen much on him before, so I've started to look around also. I'm also going to keep an eye on the guy. Wonder if he'll turn out to be a 2nd round steal. It's interesting that he uses Schoebel as his example of 2nd round pass-rushers that do quite well. Just goes to show you don't NEED to have a high first rounder as the only way to get some sack production. Of course we also have Kelsey & Denney as 2nd rounders, both okay DEs but not much use in terms of sack production.

Haven't seen this site before. Yes we all know what opinions are like (and the web allows us all to view them in great detail)... But, I really enjoyed his work: http://thegoodbyeladiesdraftreport.blogspot.com/ Seems to rely a lot on statistics and combine measurements to project forward, I'm not sure he does any direct visual scouting. Interesting none-the-less. Some tidbits: Top 2 round picks with projected sacks over 7 years: Maybin (46) Arakpo (37) English (33) Johnson (26.5) Sidbury(19) Brown(18) Ayers(9) ...and: Barwin(49)!! He's really curious about how Barwin is going to do as he's only projected in the 2nd round, yet seems to have the right kind of stats to project as a successful pass rusher.

I think it's the $20 million guaranteed that makes me cringe the most.

Crimany this board is infested with whiners and little negative nancy's. I know not being a playoff team has been hard but this is getting ridiculous. Look, if you can't do anything but complain about an obviously good move such as cutting Dockery, go root for Philadelphia and boo everybody. As for the original question, I had real high hopes for the o-line last year and was profoundly disappointed. Peters came in out-of-shape and out-of-sync and his play was poor throughout the year. Quite a regression from the previous years. Fowler was horrible and Dockery was also not good. I thought Butler played decent to decent-good and was pleased with Walker. We paid Walker a lot more than I thought he was worth when we signed him, but he's more than lived up to his contract. I don't know what to make of our line this year. It's too early to tell. We still have a draft and another round of free agency. It also looks like we're expecting some of our youngsters from previous drafts to step up and deliver such as Bell. Rare is the rookie that comes in and competes at the highest level. It often takes a year or so. It took Peters a couple, it took Moulds a couple, it'll take others a couple. What we had was clearly not good enough. So we have to look for others who can play better.

Not a bad comparison. Didn't see him while he was at Vandy, but I've not wanted him from all I've seen in Denver. His whole whiny girl breakup meltdown has made me like him even less.

Woot! We're so behind the times that we're back to being on the cutting edge!