Tipster19

I'd be satisfied with giving up the chance to get DE Derrick Harvey for WR James Hardy and CB Lito Sheppard. In the 2nd rd we could get TE John Carlson and with our 3rd rder we could go with another Fightin' Irish player in C John Sullivan. That would be a strong draft.

I don't think that we give them anything. Swapping our picks and Sheppard, that's it, deal done. That would put a value on Sheppard in the area of a 2nd rder.

There are more valid WRs early (rds 1-3) than there is DL. We can always trade up in the 1st and 2nd rds for a #2 WR. I do agree that a WR is important for us this to make our offense more effective but at the same time I don't picture us throwing the ball all over the place. I personally would like to see us get back to being a dominant defense again.

I'd be very happy if we got Hardy. He's the type of WR that Buffalo is looking for. What makes prospects more productive than others in their early years is if they are better suited for the schemes. We need a big body WR and Hardy is just that. We would probably have to trade back into the late 1st rd to have a chance to get him though. San Diego at #27 might be a good trade parnter, they don't have a 2nd, 3rd and 4th rd picks this year.

It's a last minute visit and Mike Florio of ProFootballTalk.com is speculating that this might be a ploy to make the Bills use the #11 pick on him. http://www.profootballtalk.com/category/rumor-mill/

I don't want to come off as if I'm arguing but I would like to explain my reasoning. I feel that Lee Evans is our star WR and to pay this kind of money to what would be our current #2 WR doesn't seem feasible. I'd rather re-sign Evans to a worthy market adjusted contract. Having two star WRs would be great but not if we have to sacrifice to what I would hope could be our next Bruce Smith type DE.

No offense taken. Look at Freeney and Allen's contracts. We can get a great DE for a fraction of the money. Dwight Freeney signed a six-year, $72 million contract. The deal included a $15 million signing bonus. 2008: $750,000 (+ $15 million option bonus), 2009: $6.22 million, 2010: $8.825 million, 2011: $11.42 million, 2012: $14.035 million, 2013: Free Agent. Cap charges: $5.75 million (2008), $11.22 million (2009), $13.825 million (2010), $16.642 million (2011), $19.035 million (2012). Jared Allen signed a six-year, $73.26 million contract. The deal contains $31 million guaranteed, including a $15.5 million signing bonus. $38.4 million is available in the first three years. 2008: $750,000, 2009: $7.75 million, 2010: $6.38 million (+ $8 million guaranteed-for-injury roster bonus), 2011: $8,979,438, 2012: $11,619,850, 2013: $14,280,612, 2014: Free Agent. Using Patrick Willis' contract as a benchmark plus adding 5% makes Harvey a very inexpensive DE. The kicker would be that he would be signed thru the possible uncapped year (2011).

When you see the likes of a Jared Allen and Dwight Freeney signing contracts in excess of $30+ million in guaranteed money then it makes you think that signing a potential star DE with the #11 pick for less than half of that then economics helps influences this selection also. Last year the #11 pick, LB Patrick Willis, signed a five-year, $16.655 million contract. The deal includes $12 million in guarantees. 2008: $370,000, 2009: $500,000, 2010: $760,000, 2011: $900,000, 2012: $900,000 (Voidable Year), 2013: Free Agent. Keeping in mind that there might be an uncapped year during our #11 pick's contract then it makes it even more lucrative to solidify our DL at this time. Two of our DEs were re-signed to the following contracts. Aaron Schobel signed a seven-year, $50.5 million contract. The deal contains $21 million in guarantees, including Schobel's first four base salaries. 2008: $1.5 million, 2009: $3.5 million, 2010: $6.025 million, 2011-2012: $6.5 million, 2013: $8.5 million, 2014: Free Agent. He'll be 34 years old when we kick-off the 2011 season. Chris Kelsay signed a four-year, $23 million contract. The deal included an $8 million signing bonus and an initial roster bonus of $3 million. 2008: $1.4 million, 2009: $3 million, 2010: $3.7 million, 2011: Free Agent. If Derrick Harvey is still available when we pick at 11 then this should be a slamdunk choice.

I'm expecting them to address the RB position but who knows what will happen with the likes of Shaun Alexander on the market.

This might open up the 28th pick for a trade now that they addressed the secondary.

If the Rams were to draft defense then I doubt if they would take Dorsey. They need a pass rushing DE more than anything else now that Jake Long is off the board. They already have Adam Carriker from last year's draft playing in the interior of their defense and he doesn't project as a pass rusher which is what they would need. Ghoulston or Chris Long would be more suited for their defense.

I was listening to Sirius radio today and they had interviews with two Notre Dame players, C John Sullivan and TE John Carlson (two good names for the Fightin' Irish). Carlson was asked about what teams were he visited and he said Buffalo was one of them and he shook hands with just about everyone in the organization. Based on the impression I got from this interview, I'm going to move the TE position up in my draft priority and have the Bills taking Carlson. I also noticed in someone's thread today about Gil Brandt's top 100 prospects. I have been a big advocate of us taking DE Derrick Harvey with our first pick at #11 and I'm sticking with it, especially after seeing Brandt having him rated so highly. I also expect another trade up for the Bills this year but with them having significant needs I don't see them using too many valuable picks to do it. Instead of them doing it to move back into the late 1st/early 2nd rd, I think that the late 2nd rd is where the best value will be. If Buffalo is able to trade their 4th rder (#114) and Losman for Green Bay's 2nd rder (#60) then this trade could work for both teams. The compensation would be equivalent to about an early 3rd rd value for Losman while the Packers would still retain a decent draft pick in return. Here's what I'd like to see thru the first 5 rds. 1st rd (#11)- DE Derrick Harvey 2nd rd (#41)- CB Tracy Porter 2nd rd (#60 from Green Bay)- WR Jordy Nelson 3rd rd (#72)- TE John Carlson 4th rd (#132 compensatory pick)- C John Sullivan 5th rd (#147)- QB Kevin O'Connell

Devin Thomas, not at the #11 pick anyways.

I expect Buffalo to look to trade up in the 2nd, 3rd or 4th rds. This is where there is some good players available and the cost of moving up into these rds wouldn't be too costly. I don't think that Buffalo is looking to gather extra picks because as of now we have plenty and getting more picks only increases our payroll. I believe Buffalo is looking for a few quality players and if packaging a couple of our picks gets them in the right position to fortify some of our needs then we should be a pretty solid squad IMO.

I suppose if Buffalo were looking to move up into the 2nd or 3rd rd again we could probably work something feasible out with Seattle.

I don't know if this could concern Buffalo at all but I thought that I'd pass it along. http://www.thenewstribune.com/sports/seaha...ory/339285.html

Donte Whitner. Having a healthier squad around him will allow him to hit his full stride.

It looks to be more and more of a real possibility. http://www.delcotimes.com/WebApp/appmanage...t_Story_1920875

It's no coincidence that Tuna & Co are taking their time in locking up the their top choice. I expect this to be stretched to the last minute. I don't believe that they want the top pick at all and that they are hoping for a team to trade with them. I also believe that they deliberately haven't made mention of wanting Matt Ryan because it's their best bargaining chip at this time. If they can get one of the teams who may want him to get nervous about his availability then this may prompt one of these teams to trade with them. Speaking of a team trading up, the more I think about it QB is Baltimore's biggest need and there's no way they can risk losing out on the Matt Ryan sweepstakes. They are not too far out of range to be able to obtain him, this is their best chance to secure a franchise QB. Buffalo having so many picks (10) in this draft leads me to think that we can expect another trade up in this year's draft. There could be two very good reasons for this. The first is because of need and quality of a earlier prospect. The second is that there is a salary cap for draft picks and having so many early picks carries a higher cost factor. Condensing a couple of these earlier picks for better quality players would save them some money. Instead of trading back into the 1st rd I think that they will either move up earlier in the 3rd rd or into the back of the 2nd rd. I suppose they still could move up earlier in the 2nd rd but this would cost us too much of our resources of draft picks and we do have other needs to address still. Atlant would be a great trade partner for Buffalo, in the 2nd rd. They have three 2nd rders and if we were looking to get back into the 2nd rd then their pick at #48 (Jordy Nelson or Early Doucet?) should be a reasonable cost to us. It appears like Green Bay can't retire Farve's jersey fast enough. Since the new regime took over, Ted Thompson, Mike McCarthy etc, they never seemed to embrace Brett. I got the feeling that there was resistence on adding more offensive help for him with Moss being the biggest example. I remember Farve was pushing hard for him, saying that he was either 99 or 100% sure that they were going to get him and then when Moss came in for a visit they were pretty abrupt with him, not exactly rolling out the red carpet. I wonder if this helped accelerate Brett's decision. It was good to see the Giants play their hearts out at the end of the regular season in what was supposed to be a meaningless game against the Patriots. It obviously propelled them thru the play-offs and I hope that the rest of the league took notice. If Buffalo is fortunate enough to be in this kind of position this year I hope they play it full force and I believe they would. Although San Diego is limited in the draft with earlier picks, keep an eye on AJ Smith, the guy sure knows how to navigate a draft. If he doesn't trade his 1st rder for more picks then it wouldn't surprise me to see him take a RB (Jonathan Steward?). Having no Michael Turner and LT being 30 years old, drafting a future potential replacement for LT would be a great move. I'd be worried if the Jets land up with Darren McFadden. We sure don't need to see them having McFadden snapping off home runs against us. They had a great off season in free agency but our saving grace might be their QBs. I'm not too intimidated with either of them but them having a great ground game would definitely make a difference for them. While that I'm on the subject of our division, does anyone have any idea what to expect from the Patriots in this draft? They sure are a big pain in our @$$. It's nice to see that Baltimore should be struggling this year and Cincinnati has their hands full. I guess that this division should come down to Pittsburgh and Cleveland. Although Cleveland has alot of pieces in place and were very active in free agency, they are limited on draft picks. Outside of San Diego, the AFC West has their hands full too. If Jacksonville and Indianapolis can nuetralize each other, than the post season would be limited on heavyweights in the AFC. If we can find a way then I like our chances on making some noise in the post season.

That is why I asked if we should do it. I believe that Hamdan would be part of the equation because I feel that if they didn't have confidence in him than the Bills wouldn't risk banking on a unnamed FA veteran. I also believe that Baltimore wouldn't just flat out give us their 2nd rder, we would have to give something back (6th rder?) and I should have clarified that more.

http://www.vidilife.com/video_play_290199_Sweetness.htm http://www.evtv1.com/player.aspx?itemnum=11089 http://www.vidilife.com/video_play_137598_Walter_Payton.htm http://www.metacafe.com/watch/369601/walter_payton/ Sweetness, you're still remembered. Thank you.

If we had to give back a late rder so be it.

I would think that now McNair has retired that the Ravens would want to address their QB in this draft. I suppose that they could draft one with their 2nd rder but the learning curve for that should be considerable versus trading for a veteran. Ryan would be a franchise QB and picking at #8 would not be too far back to trade up with Miami. I figure that their 1st and 2nd rder might get it done. If they don't trade up with Miami then that is taking a big risk waiting on Ryan sliding to them with Atlanta, KC, and Jets being in front of them. They don't have a 3rd rder due to the MaGahee trade so the significant pick with value is their 2nd rder. Would they trade that for Losman and if so, should we accept it? If they were to do this, it would allow them to keep their 1st rder for a blue chip player.

Yeah, ridiculous. Here's some stats from last season. Wilford-45 rec for 518 yds/averages 11.5 yds per catch/32.4 per game/35 yds-longest/3 TDs/5 catches over 20+ yds/0 over 40+ yds/35 1st downs/1st down % 77.8/0 fumbles. Martin-16 rec for 242 yds/averages 15.1 yds per catch/16.1 per game/36 yds-longest/4 TDs/3 catches over 20+ yds/0 over 40+ yds/15 1st downs/1st down % 93.8/1 fumble. Wilford is not retained after he was used as a primary target and Martin is re-signed after being seldom used. A 5th rder would be fair compensation.

I'm not looking to get into an argument but I like the way you skew the numbers. By presenting Wilford's numbers from his rookie year separately and then averaging his last three years he picks up over 100 yds per season. The truth be told he had 1994 yds total for his four year pro career (498.5 yds per season) with 14 TDs total with half of them (7) coming in his second year. Not bad for a #2 WR but the problem here is he was mostly used as a #1 WR. In his third year is when the Jaguars found out that they couldn't count on Matt Jones and Reggie Williams but they must have felt the same way about Wilford too because they overhauled the receivers this off season. I'm curious why the Packers re-signed Martin. They have plenty of receivers, even drafted the last couple of ones but they're hanging on to Martin. Hmm, interesting. I don't know why people expect Buffalo to come up with some big name receiver in a trade or prospect in the draft. The only one who ever made a big splash with big name players in the last few years was Donahoe. This administration, outside of having a few big contracts signed, haven't ever grabbed nothing but low, fly-under-the-radar type players. Buffalo has accumalated blue collar guys that they feel best suits their scheme. Even Stroud wasn't the biggest name at DT, especially when some question his effectiveness since his surgery. Buffalo looks for deals, period. All I said was there is some interesting prospects out there. If there were to be a trade for a WR this is the type of player I expect them to go after. Heck, they didn't even get a real shot at Wilford. Has anyone ever thought that?