Fake-Fat Sunny

From my perspective you start Losman when he is ready to start and it helps develop him as our QB of the future. Bench Bledsoe or don't bench Bledsoe matters in terms of short-term benefit of not having to bear watching Bledsoe struggle. However, as a Bills fan, the long-term future of my team and the development of our QB of the future is so much more important than my not wanting to watch Bledsoe as a fan it isn't even close. I really doubt you start Losman next week because it seems more like the Todd Collins development stratery of handling him rather than the Chad Pennington/Michael Vick development strategies successfully used by NYJ and ATL. JP is a different player than either Vick (less talented than Vick) or Pennington (about the same level of talent) so the Bills should not follow in lockstep the approach taken with another player. However, though subbing in Foxboro as a mop-up is not a true showing of Losman's talents, i think his play tonight gives some indication that he needs a bit more work to be ready to maximize his learning in game situations. These are among the items I would consider before starting JP: 1. It was great to see him tonight because this was a true sign that he has recovere from his injury. However, as JP himself said in interviews that the leg still hurt him more than he wanted but the adrenalin of playing in the game made him not feel or worry about the pain. The docs get the first call in my mind as to wether JP should start even if the braintrust judges that to be the best thing for him to do. If the injury site swells in any significant manner, if his range of motion is limited by pain after playing tonight, Isit him next week. I'm still interested in getting him some time in mop-up duty if Bledsoe goes south again (or heck if we somehow blow-out STL) but if his recovery raises any questions I am more interested in playing Shane Matthews than playing JP if I want to sit Bledsoe. 2. How did his reads look to Wyche- One of the problems for all rookie QBs is making pro reads of NFL defenses. Losman obviously had some issues doing this as seen by the INT. If he expresses any confusion in debriefing what he saw or the players who played with him report any confusion or lack of communication with them then back to the drawing board and do not start him. 3. Look at his mechanics in detail- One of the better things about having this be his first game is that running for his life against NE should provide some good examples of any bad mechanics which have survived moving from Tulane to the pros. Assessment needs to be done as to whether he profits more from time on the practice field and repetitively throwing the ball the same way to work on his mechanics or whether he profits more from game conditions. All in all, I doubt JP is ready and if anything it will take a couple of days to see how the break responds to seeing game action and to assess his performance and how best to continue his development. They never should have reinked a deal with Bledsoe or should have gotten a more seasoned back-up for him once they did. however, this is all hindsight now and it must all be about whether JP develops better on the bench or playing/ This question is far from the straight-forward easy answer folks seem to want to give as JP has a lot more to learn than simply playing will give him and actually playing before he is ready can do his developmemt more harm than good.

I think it is fairly meaningless to assign some % of the blame to a particular player in a blow-out such as this because several players performed badly enough (including Bledsoe) to deserve a mathematically impossible more than 100% of the blame. I agree with Campy that attempting to assign the majority of the blame to Bledsoe (some number over 50%) is false as simply replacing the QB even with a QB who performed well would not change the outcome of this game in my view. Even though I would not seek to assign some bizarre % of the blame to Bledsoe, this is misguided in my view because it would not influence my decision as to who to start next week at all. You bench Bledsoe if you judge starting Losman helps his development, You start Bledsoe if you think Losman develops better by working to improve his game before you start him. For now, I don't think Losman's play as a sudden mop-up reserve in the house of one of the best team's in the league is not a true indicator of his talent level. However, i did not see anything in his game tonight that indicates starting him before he is ready will be a positive for his future play and there were a lot of indications tonight from his play he probably isn't ready. Bench Bledsoe or don't bench Bledsoe it doesn't drive me as a Bills fan. What's best for developing our QB of the future should be the driver and looking at that I really doubt you start Losman next week.

I think our best chance of winning is to stick with the run and run again. Their starting CBs being out does not simply mean that they are now vulnerable to the pass, it means that the player who generally has outside run containment (and often sole outside run containment as when McGee blew his role and the Cards FB strolled into the endzone around his end) is out. I hope we resist the temptation to get pass happy ans simply send WM around end. The key plays may not be Evans stretching the field or circus catches by Moulds but seal blocks by Jennings, Williams or the TE which cut off pursuit from the inside and leave WM one on one with a back-up CB.

Brevity? What's that?

Thanks for researching the 3rd and 2 or less point. I also found it hard to believe, but this conventional wisdom (CW?) became so accepted that it seemed to have some truth to it as no one was challenging this point as it would take some basic but time consuming research to do it and it appears you have done that. The thing which has made me willing to accept it as truth was actually a running play on 3rd and 2 or less that the Bills "finally" ran after I heard this stat and Travis Henry (of all people) busted it for what may have been the longest run of his career getting over 40 yards. I can see where there may be some wiggle room in your research as someone pointed out that 30+ in a row can be found by looking at 3rd and 3 or less. He correctly points out that 3 yards is seen by most teams as a passing down so not running is not insane. Nevertheless, what would be insane is doing this 30 times in a row on 3 yards or less, because this stat would strongly imply running a double digit number of times in a row on 2 and less (even if the 30+ number is not true for 2 and less) and it would imply the team never ran even once a change-up against their tendency run at 3 and less. I will probably stop using this stat until further data is produced. However, do you have your collected results. Even mentioning anecdotely a few plays where the Bills ran on 3rd and 2 or a few change-ups where Killdrive ran on 3rd and 3 would put the conventional wisdom to rest.

I'm starting this as a separate thread because it is on a different issue than my earlier post expressing my disappointment with Bobby April using military names for the ST units activities as this thread is not about the substance pro or con of reactions to that opinion, but instead abouy what I see as a separate issue raised as to why I chose to post it. First, let me say that I was plesantly surprised when I came back to TSW late tonight by the 2 pages of comments that it engendered. As with many posts on TSW I enjoyed reading the posts which both agreed and disagreed with my thoughts (I actually enjoy reading disagreeing posts more as this is where I learn things as folks raise points I hadn't thought about or look at the issue from a different perspective than I do). As is typical with my speed, lack of proofreading (which my wife often needles me about) and my inarticulation I did give some folks the wrong impression as to what drove me to post myramblings on the topic. These are a few comments which attempt to respond to some of those posts. 1. The advice to lighten up- Actually I think this is a point which should be taken into account by me and in fact most of us. I think the world would be a better place if we all weren't so gosh darn serious and quick to take offense at a lot of life. I think I did go a bit over the top by commenting on this esoteric point, but only state that my rational for being more serious about this one is because I think the horror and man's inhumanity to man embodied in 9/11 and what I see as the necessary military response to it in Afghanistan is as serious as life gets. I find fault in the glib use of military terminology abut football to be an inappropriate usage which i find myself falling into out of habit often and the disappointment I expressed about April's usage is a disappointment I often feel about my own inappropriate borrowing of military language and applying it to the triviality of football. 9/11 reminded me to be thankful for our military which is willing to pay the ultimate sacrifice to protect me, mine and our rights and has forced me to be more thoughtful and not glib about using military language for this pretend military game. I also think it would be useful for Internet readers to lighten up a bit as my post was meant not as a slam on April but to express disappointment. Perhaps I would have better expressed how I felt if i used the word "miffed" because I am not angered at all by his usage I just find it unfortunate. 2. Not reading the article- Some posts stated it was obvious I hadn't read the article. Well it should have been because I said I didn't read the article. I think I was inarticulate in describing the article as "sickening" me because actually it didn't provoke that response. If anything I probably harumphed when I read the teaser oparagraph or maybe rolled my eyes, my apologies for being over the top in describing why i didn't read it. Perhaps another reason I didn't read it and said so in my post was to not have the "facts" of the article cloud the opinions I was expressing. What i mean by this is that I was actually flagging the sense I have that we use these analogies cavalierly without giving proper thought to the amazing sacrific our armed forces make for us civilians. I'm glad I didn't read the article because some folks were nice enought to share Booby April's thoughts on this issue that he means his aping of military terminology to be a tribute to the sacrifices of the troops. I am actually quite pleased that the issue of the appropriateness of these analogies is on April's mind (I wish they were on Winslow's mind when he made even more inappropriate comments using military analogies for football play). I am also pleased I did not read the article as reading April's intents and disclaimers probably would have headed off my posting on this topic and I am glad the topic is out there and drew a good number of responses. 3. My motivations. It was actually amusing to me and certainly not my intention to merely find something to B word about as I find the Internet a fairly meaningless place to B word about anything. I don't even believe everything I see (studies show that even eyewitness court testimony can be ssurprisingly unreliable as people make assumptions to fill in gaps about events they see and it is amazing how we all simply make up memories of having seen things we didn't see) and I believe even far less of what I read. I am particularly skeptical of everything I read on the internet. That being said, why did I post my mild disappointment with April. 1. As I said its part of the penance I have decided to pay for my own inappropriate analogies and use of military terminolgy for activities where the "sacrifice" involved does not even remotely compare to the potential sacrifice of our troops. I am quite happy to see lots of responses to my post not because so and so number agree or disagree with me, but because for a brief moment in time they thought about this issue. I'm less concerned with folks using the analogies than Iam with them being glib or cavalier about it. 2. Its mostly fun to see people's different cuts on football. I particularly have enjoyed some back and forth on the issue of how to play McGee at CB and the utility of using CB press coverages. However, there are these serious items where football touches upon serious issues and I love to see the discourse on it. So at any rate, these are my thoughts and thanks for all the responses (even the blather from ICE who I pay tribute to for having different ideas than me about football, but who I guess I do slam personally because of the certainty he expresses for these opinions) on this issue.

I wish GW well in any future endeavors also but: 1. I think on can legitimately be almosy wholly critical of his choice of co-ordinators in that: A Sheppard proved so not up to the job that even GW aceded to or pushed for his canning with a year left on his contract, B: Kevin Killdrive who replaced him was apparently GW's choice over Clements whom TD is publicly said to have advocated as a replacement OC. Killdrive as a bad choice as he only ran a productive O until opponents got enough film on it and BB laid out a template for stopping him. In the face of this Killdrive refused to adapt and GW refused to force him to adapt as we did things like pass 30+ consecutive times on 3rd and 2 or less. C. He hired one his old buds to run the ST which produced the best of the 3 units though that comparison isn't saying much and mismanagement of the coverage flat out cost us a game against the Jets when we allowed 2 returns for TDs on a daywhere the D actually stoned Curtis Martin and the O showed some productivity. The fact this unit actually improved to mediocre without any player changes is testimony to the problem being a poor plan being developed by the co-ordinator. D Gray has turned into a keeper and a great co-ordinator though one wonders how his units produced so poorly under GW's shared guidance with Grau and suddenly became one of the better defenses in the league when Gray co-ordinated with LeBeau. 2. GW's day of game management (a primary job requirement after hiring good co-ordinators) was simply awful has he had a horrible record with ref challenges, several blatant cases of lousy clock management and game decisions (who can ever forget the punt in the oppnents territory at the edge of FG range that yielded the team about a dozen yards and we lost a close one. 3. He said a hallmark of his teams would be discipline and yet he was repetitively HC of some of the most penalized teams in the league with no successf management attempts to control this problem. 4. He invested in showmanship which at best seemed laughable such as: A. The "opportunity laps" taken by players who made mistakes in practice which were at best opportunity 3/4 of a lap and came to be taken as a welcome break from coaching scrutiny when a player wanted a blow, B. The comedic air horn to wake up the players, C. Players fairly routinely questioning some of edicts such as when he strongly recommended both vet and rookie players attend voluntary workouts and Larry Centers basically told him to go jump as he had deonstrated as a vet that he came to camp ready to go without supervision. Centers was also on record with Empire saying that the camp which GW highlighted as being tough was actually easier than many camps he had attended. In addition, Winfield was publicly on record in SHOUT complaining hat the starters got more work and reps even in a Wade Phillips camp. D. He rediculously said that his first Bills team which finished 3-13 was going to compete for the playoffs. He either completely sucked at assessment or assessed our talent properly but failed to take an approach like saying we would be known as the hardest working team in football regardless of the record (it worked for the Sabres as a marketing tool to the fans and a motivational tool for the players. Instead his all or nothing rants simply left the fans and the players with nothing. And so on and so on. GW simply was not ready for primetime as an HC. I certainly rooted for his early, was willing to give him the benefit of the doubt even after the poor performance and idiotic statements of his first year, but certainly advocating canning the guy even after the improvements of his second year because it was clear to me that if the Bills did the job in his third year it was going to be in spite of him and not because of him. GW deserves props for being a great DC in TN and DC but really deserves great disdain for his work as an HC here.

In an article at TBD today April is hailed for applying military terminology to ST play. One of the reality checks that the horror of 9/11and our response in Afghanistan brought us all was the knowledge that incredibly well-paid football players are not warriors and that folks who sacrifice for you and me like Pat Tillman are true warriors and heroes. The adoption of military terminology for this boy's game certainly is more than human and unfortunately comes with the territory. However, as a beneficiary of the sacrifice which our troops make for those of us who sit comfortably at home, I will feel remiss if I did not flag this inappropriate usurption of the terminology. Maybe he meant it as some sort of tribute (I didn't read the article as the stealing of military terminology for a game sickens me) and as well meaning as this might be, I had hoped we had gotten past using military analogies in sport when the meaning of true military sacrifice slapped us in the face.

The learning experience for me this off-season was learning that KG apparently was not a TD man (as I had assumed given their past working together), but that apparently TD had advocated hiring another guy who had worked for him Tom Clements as OC, and it was GW who pushed for the hiring of Kevin Killdrive. This story could just be the revisionist history of the folks who still have jobs with the Bills, but a course of events where it was GW who pushed for KG and who got the job over TD's choice actually makes a lot of sense of what happened in retrospect. Faulting GW primarily for hiring KG does not let TD off the hook since one of the biggest jobs of a GM is to hire a winning HC and to help and make sure that the HC has the people around him to win. TD did not do that and deserves to be viewed as having failed at a major aspect of his job because of it. Specifically: 1. TD hired GW who had great DC chops with TN but was not ready for primetime as an HC. Worse yet, he hired GW and passed on John Fox who went to the SB with Carolina and Marvin Lewis who revived the Bungles in his first season as HC. Even with less stellar records for both these two this year, they still are better performers and choices than GW as HC. 2. TD struck me as having this passive-aggressive style of managing his HC hire in that he passively allowed his HC to make his own bed as long as the HC bore the blame for failing and only aggressively worked to rein in his HC when he transgressed into contract areas (the Larry Centers cut soon after GW publicly said Centers would be a Bill as long as he wanted to). In general this seem motivated by him pledging never again to have a guy he hired (Cowher) fire him. 3 TD seemed to know GW was not up to the job of hiring and managing good lieutenants. This was obvious after GW hired inexperienced guys his first time around and Sheppard proved not up to the job at all, his buddy (whose name I forget) was pretty spotty managing ST and Gray seemed to produce for about 3/4 of the game before his team went south. TD played whatever role he played in the ouster of Sheppard, but unfortunately did not insist on his choice for OC over Killdrive. He did address the defensive woes by bringing in his buddy LeBeau but saved face for GW by keeping Gray on board. In GW's third season, TD got former OC buddy Les Steckel in, but never got GW to use this leverage to force KG to diversify his game. The whole thing was maddening. At any rate all is well that ends well as the Bills ship of state seems to be moving in the right direction. 1. Clements is finally in under MM and they are employing an O which seems to be right thing to do with the personnel TD acquired (not counting on Bledsoe to win games and relying more and more on WM. 2. Gray actually seems to be performing even better now that he is out from under the GW thumb. The GW/Gray defense seemed to rely too much on scheme and has-been players like Robinson at LB and Jenkins at S. Gray seems to have mastered LeBeau's run blitz as seen by his playcalling last year and this year with this scheme. Further, he seems to have mastered it strategically as for several games in a row he has designed and implemented changes at half time which have simply shut down what Miami, the Ravens, the Cards and the Jets were doing well in the 1st half. 3, ST performance under April has improved by leaps and bounds. I like what I see so far, but all in all GW deserves props as a DC, but condemnation as an HC.

The Vice-President went to the hospital experiencing Shortness Of Breath, but from the EKG it sounds like he is fine and had a cold rather than a heart problem. What did you think I meant?

Ryan Leaf I define as a bust because he is out of the game and never contributed. Denney has been a disappointment for the level he was drafted, but as you say he is a back-up (your designation of him as a "solid" back-up is debatable but I guess as a former starter he gets the benefit of the doubt on this one) and is not best defined as a bust in my mind. Given the sense that by some professional estimation 50% of 1st rounders disappoint and never meet expectations deeming this as as the definition of a bust means that every team and every draft meister has bust so it makes this term less significant. In terms of the individual player and assessing him, the question on this particular point comes down to one for me of whether Kelsay won the starting job because he has elevated his play or he won it because Denny sucks. I think we will see tomorrow night which is the case. My sense is that the Bills think (hope) Kelsay can become a quality LDE whom OCs have to account for with special action when they make their plans to attack the Bills D. Denny's prime failing for the Bills was that the opposing OC could account for him through normal activity and simply requiring his LT to make his blocks. The cadillac LDE was Bruce Smith as the opposing OC had to tell two OL players to look for Smith (and maybe even have a third player chip block him. OC's faced the quandary that if they ran away from Smith they not only got rid of a big chunk of their run playbook, but he might chase the RB down. If they ran at him, he had the strength to hold his ground. Kelsay reasonably seems to me that he can require an opposing OC to assign a player to watch the intial LT block to see if Kelsay beats the LT and then chip him if he does. Further, his play will mandate that if the left side is the point of attack then the OC better then double team Kelsay and if the point of attack is the right side he will need to assign a player to seal the backside (which will stop him from double-teaming Schobel. I don't think that the Kelsay pronouncement so much means that Denney is a bust as it means that the Bills braintrust is now challenging Kelsay to stand-up. I hope that Sunday's game proves he is up to it.

I don't know, perhaps I'm just an ornery cuss who hates giving up as even though the playoffs are just a dream in the mist at best for this team which has played so badly this season, I'm not at the OTJ training point for McGee or the team yet. Though the playoffs are near impossible (Wade taught me you never say never until the math prods the Fat Lady) I still think the priority has to be putting ourselves in the best shape to win rather than giving McGee a sink or swim learning experience. Though the playoffs are highly doubtful, I think the Bills have a better chance winning this game using our coverage scheme in a way that covers up for McGee's deficits. I think you clearly do not abandon the run-blitz style which brought you to the #3 D just to protect McGee, but it can be adjusted to use a little more one deep and two deep covers which use Milloy and Reese to cover for him depending upon how many receivers the Pats send out (I doubt much 2 deep happens as they are likely to read it and flood the routes). I think a lot of this starts and ends with the effectiveness of the pass rush and in particular how much solo pressure kelsay generates. If it takes all 7 guys in the zone blitz to hurry (sacking him consistently is a bit much to hope for) Brady it will be tough for us because this forces Milloy (most likely) to cover Graham and constrains our ablity to help him deep. If we need the safties to blitz to hurry Brady (the case last time) then turn out the lights we are done. There are two things which I think will becritical to the D side of the game for us: 1. If we get solo pressure from the front 4 and sometimes the front 7 it creates some interesting possibilities for us in disguising coverages. Flip-flopping coverage responsibilities on Graham between Milloy/Reese will free Milloy up to freelance in backing up McGee or running the safety blitz once or twice in this game. Also, if the Pats overload on the McGee side thus freeing up the Clements side, if the Bills communicate and tranasfer the coverage of crossing patterns to Milloy this will free Clements up to use his athleticism to play centerfield. Using Posey in pass coverage on Graham also would provide us with some interesting disguises which may allow for playing Brady who will be trying to take advantage of McGee. If Brady has time he will likely figure it out and rape the Bills, if his time is limited we will be able to rape him. 2. Injuries will be key!!!!!!! If Graham (the most pivotal example) goes down for even a few plays this will so limit the NE playbook that they will be forced to turn to cheescake like sing Vrabel as a pass catcher or the kicker as a thrower. They blew this wad as a surprise last week. Nicks and injuries will play a far larger role on a Pats O depleted by injuries to folks like Deion Branch and to their CBs which pressed O player Troy Brown into D duty that things are just close to edge and implosion ain't far away. Givens et al. have stepped up nicely for the front-liners but it gets pretty thin after that and even a single injury may give our #3 D a big advantage. Likewise on our side where McGee's problems show how weak we are at CB to a potent O. Idiots like the Cards and Boller took McGee to the cleaners and good O players like Pennington/Moss performed at their highest levels on him. Its unusual (perhaps NE is used to it after last season) to see things brought close to the edge by injuries but I think that how guys deal with the vaguries of injury will say a lot in this game.

This thread got so long I couldn't help myself, so given it was Saturday morning I looked. Amazing. Specifically: 1. The amount of fact-free opinion that folks are basing stridently held opinions on is as Billy Fucillo would say HHHUUUGGGEEE. There are so many questions left unanswered and unexplored in the brief article its rediculous to draw a firm conclusion. 2. The copie of the police reports were helpful, but even they raised a lot of questions a jury (most likely a special court) will consider upon further examination. The situation (kid backs into a corner) conceivably is one where bumrushing the kid would be hard, but why was he able to harm himself seemingly so much with a glass shard and what actual threat of future harm was there? How appropriately conditioned were the multiple officers involved? There seemed to be time for a lot of exploration into what regs allowed regarding Tasering a 6 year old and how long and what happened during this time? Did the kid injure himself in the hands weilding this glass "shard" and if so how big was it? The whole thing is so rediculous it smells like an urban myth but is so bizarre something obviously happened? 3. What are the effects of subjecting a 6 year old to 50,000 volts? 4. What's next particularly regarding his parents? At any rate, this would seem to be a case where facts matter a lot and even the police report raises tons of questions as to what the facts were.

I actually do doubt that Bledsoe has suddenly learned some new technique from the brilliant Tom Clements that those dullards Bill Parcells and Bill Belicheck were not aware of. This is particularly true when this new method or old method he suddenly has been taught or embraced is a simple move like using the slide step. What actually strikes me as more accurate is: 1. Bledsoe has gained new confidence in himself. the Mularkey offense and in the OL, a confidence which has been lost after the sorry productivity in his game and in the offense last year. This recovered confidence has him being more decisive in the pocket and hesitating a lot less. This is the change I see: 2. Bledsoe is embracing different approaches which in the past he did not actually resist (he seems to be far to pliable an athlete to resist what his coaches order him to do) but even though he never said NO, he never said yes and embraced them fully. I suspect this is the case, though I don't see a ton of evidence in terms of him doing things extremely differently, outside of the results being a lot better as the entire O functions better for a range of reasons. However, Bledsoe would be other than human not be willing to grasp any change which might work at this point. 3. MM has found new ways to do the same things good coaches have done all along in Bledsoe's career to minimize his weaknesses and gain the benefits of his strengths. With Parcelss it was continually in practice using the force of his will as he kept yelling throw the damn ball when Drew would go into his trademark pat. BB and Weis constructed a powered down offense for Brady when Bledsoe got hurt and when Bledsoe came in to run that O in a must-win game the team and thus Bledsoe stuck with what they practiced all week. In MM/TCs caase they seem to use an alarm clock to fill in for Parcell's will and they are running a run oriented O that apes the BB model of a powered down offense which does not call on Bledsoe to win games with his arm. As far as the slide step, I think it has always been a natural part of Bledsoe's repetoire. I don't think he used it as much in his time as a Bill because he was often snowed down by the rush it was not possible to use. he has never been a runner and no one will correctly call his fast on his feet, but the slide step has always been there as one of his capabilities, we are now running the O in away that makes it useful and forces him to use it.

On the contrary, McGee is simply not a good enough CB to play in your face coverage unless he gets a lot of help deep for the times when the WR beats him and his great athletic skills are not enough for him to recover and get back in the play. The zone blitz and coverage style which Gray seems to employ often leaves it to the CB cover his guy or take a responsibility without a lot of help or back-up. We have seen McGee play aggresively with this style since TV got hurt and in each game we have had to pay for the results (47 yard pass by Boller to Taylor over a leaping McGee who just missed breaking up the pass because he fronted Taylor looking forthe INT, TD for the Cards as their FB walked in around end because McGeebit inside and lost his containment responsibility, Santana Moss catching balls all day with McGee having the main responsibility for him. Does this mean that McGee is a bum? No, not at all. The casual viewer may make this conclusion based on the results, but from these eyes which have paid more attention to football than my wife would like, it mostly means that this great athlete McGee (as shown by his 2 KRs for TDs and a nice fumble recovery last weekend) needs to learn the game a little better so that he can play with the experience a Vincent has shown where he still gets tons of INTs but he picks his spots and does not count on his athleticism all the time. McGee should occaisionally get in the WRs face because mizing up your stykes is a key to good coverage rather than simply challenging your opponent every time. These are NFL athletes. Even if you beat the opposing WR 70-80 % of the time this means on on the 10 throws where the QB looks your way he is going to beat you for 2 or 3 likely TDs. I think Mcgee rather than being more aggressive needs to be more brainy and not depend upon the athleticism which makes him a great KR guy because that same athleticism which results in you being toast when the receiver knows exactly where you are going and you are reacting to him. Even worse, as good of a QB as Chad Pennington has shown he can be, this does not even compare to what 2 time SB champ brady has shown he can do with the short-passing game RAC offense. In my view in order for McGee not to be a huge liability in this game three things (among a lot ofthings including dumb luck) need to happen: 1. Get after Brady with a good pass rush from our front four and with the zone blitz from the front 7- The Bills cannot count on getting Brady given some good OL play from Light and the gang, good blitz pickups and run/pass options from Dillon and the RBs and given tremendous judgment and a quick pass release by Brady. However, even if you don't sack him the key is not give him all the time in the world to pick you apart. The Bills tried and sometimes succeeded in creating this pressure by using the DB blitz a lot last game. However, this left the DBs on an island and McGee will be taken to the cleaners if that is the case this time. The front 4 (in particular Kelsay he now has the reward of being the full time LDE needs to create pressure on his own. A sack would be even nicer but consistent pressure will be good enough) will need to push and perform and the zone bliz can be emploued from time to time so that the LBs get the pressure (and dare I say it) the DEs look for the INT in the short zone. If we need to rely a lot on the DB blitz (though I'd give Milloy a chance at the safety blitz twice or so) to get pressure it will only be a matter of time before Brady toasts them. 2. Disguise the DB coverages- This will be a tall order against Brady who has shown an insane understanding of the game and the field at a young age. However, if the pressure rushes him rather than allowing him to take his time, Gray and the Bills have shown some greaty ability to disguise their coverages. I think the desire to pick on McDee actually creates some real opporunities for the Bills. The Pats may line up two WRs on the left side in front of McGee and leave Clements with no one on his side but he will be looking for the cross. The TE Graham will run straiight toward Milloy. Milloy needs to fake like he is going after Graham who instead will be picked up by an LB or Reese (advantage Graham against either) but if Milloy can sale Brady on him taking Graham but instead he is looking for the WR doing the cross, this gives Clements the freedom to double cover the WR McGee has. McGee will look out of position to Brady either way depending on wether he has the over or under coverage. However, if Clements has the other coverage and most important if the rush makes Brady throw to the perceived opening quicker, Clements has a good shot at playing centerfielder for the INT. This approach worked for the Bills in the first game against Miami last year against Fiedler. It may not work against Brady who is far better than Fiedler but this is the type of disguise the Bills will need to make work. As the two safety position are relatiively interchangeable in the Bills D scheme, and the far less than perfect Reese does pass coverage better than run-stopping look for Reese to take the big TE Graham (a scary mismatch on the Bills but if it works it frees up Milloy) and them Milloy will be free to take some Clements pass coverage freeing him up to freelance and help out McGee or Milloy can do the occaisional safety blitz on Brady. 3. McGee needs to vary his coverage style- In my view McGee plays in your face too much and depends upon his atleticism to make up ground and cover his mistakes. This may have worked in college where he is was the best athlete on the field. but does not work as well in the Pros where everyone is a good athlete and you can count on the QB delivering the ball on a frozen rope. McGee will need to do press coverage some of the time as you have to present variety or the WR and QB will catch on and do you in. However, McGee should only press when he knows that we are in a zone where he will get back-up if he is beat or there is a high likelihood that Brady is going to throw short looking for the 1st down.

I think the heavy amount of blitzing came from a philosophy that one of Brady's strengths is great decison-making. While this means he can diagnose the blitz and exploit it under prerssure, it means that if you don't put extra pressure on him he will have time to set up a chair in the backfield, choose between several options, take his time and really tear you a new one. He is good enough he may not make a mistake on your blitz, but he will almost certainly not make one if you don't blitz. I think it is revisionist history to judge Weis as having eaten Gray for lunch last time as the game was tied into the 4th quarter meaning Gray and the team had held their own against a better team. The wheels came off thanks to the fumble and the Seymour return for a TD but I think blaming the D for this is obviously silly. Can Gray do the job this time? It actually looks pretty doubtful given the Pats are simply a better team and they have the crowd advantage of being at home this time since even if you invest in the idea of our D being competitive last time, Brady will not have to wade through the same crowd noise, etcetera to do his thing. However, there are a number of events which give the Bills a fighting chance in this one: 1. Injury impacts on their D- The Pats have really put on a school for the rest of the NFL on calling reserves up and calling them out to respond when a frontliner goes down. The acquisition of Colvin last year was a good one, but because the reserves stepped up they didn't miss a step when and other starters went down. Yet. if you believe that Ty Law and Tyrone Poole are good players who deserve their starting slots, you gotta believe that this TEAM is playing lesser players than them as the starting CBs. Both teams run offenses based on controlling the ball (the Bills aspire to smashmouth and the Pats employ Brady's touch and decision-making in the short passing game to control the flow) but this game may turn into a track meet and if so the Pats may well step up but they are undermanned. In addition, no team is perfect and the Pats have been vulnerable to good runners in the past. This did not make a cause Ls for the Pats because the offense was so good and controlled it was only a matter of time until Brady and the gang outscored a team running well against them. Even worse for Pats opponents once they got antsy and tried to hit the big play to outscore Weis/Brady they would tend to go away from the bread and butter run to throw INTs to Law. This option will not be there for the Pats. If the Bills run behind WM and an old but improved OL they may stick with the Pats for 3 quarters as they did last time. The if they show early an ability to attack the Law/Poole less pass D they will run and pick their spots in the 4th rather than run stupid french pastry like the aborted Bledsoe naked bootleg which led to the fumble and Seymour return last time. Injury Impacts on their O- I thionk one of the great things the Pats did as a TEAM last week was to have players step up into unusal roles to fill gaps and take advantage of surprising match-ups. Having their kicker throw a completion, Vrabel take in a completion and most impressive Troy Brown step into the DB vacuum was tremendous and harkened back to the day of 2-way play being the norm. However, a trick can only be a trick once and you may beat future opponents but you will not fool them. In addition, Brown's play was inspirational, but with a week to think about it rather than give an inspirational response both he will be challenged to do it again and opponents will have time to think about the easier task of exploting Troy Brown than exploiting Ty Law. BB will need to come up with a new plan B rather than going to Brown because if he does this again as a way to play D the effects will probably be seen on their O particularly if this becomes a track meet. We'll see. 3. Doing something different- One of the ironies of beating a team is that it raises questions as to wether a team (NE in this case) should abandon what worked when it is clear the Bills will need to do something different. One of the hallmarks of BBs work to exploit Bledsoe and take advantage of this match-up is that he has always found something different (like his D setting up extremely late in theirDs on plays and this denying the reactive bledsoe anything to react to). This time, even running a normal D will take some work by NE as they fill the gaps left in their secondary. The more complicated any new look is which the reserves adopt, the more likely they are to be exploited. In addition, since they lost, the Bills have been thinking about what to do different against NE. I expect the shoe to beon the other foot in this game in terms of the Bills actually setting the tone by employing something different. The advantage will still be with the Pats because they are a better team than the Bills and at home. However, if the Bills can execute and get some good bounces early, a blow-out of the Pats is actually possible (far from probable but actually possible. Bravado may make a Pats partisan deny this, but the scores of the two games last year was 31-0 and 0-31 for reason and this is just reality. While a Bills blow-out is far from likely because who was at home was a leading likely indicator last year, the CB issues provide a tangible difference this year. If I'm the Bills, though my bread and butter is smashmouth with WM, I cannot resist the temptation to use the athletic Moulds and the speedy Evans to test the Pats deep. The Bills also have a weakness in that McGee is no Vincent. What I do if I am the Bills is challenge the newly awarded starter Kelsay to pressure Brady with a solo effort which allows me to rush him without employing the DB blitz as much as last time. I use the DBs instead to try to lure Brady into doing what he wants to do which is challenge McGee but I disguise my coverages to the extent I can to have an off DB try to pick-off a Brady effort to exploit McGee (for example, in the first Fins game last year, the Fins lined up with both WRs on the Winfield left side. Clements communicated well with Milloy and had him cover the crossing WR coming to the right side and Clements took over the help-out coverage for Winfield. Fiedler read Milloy as covering the crossing WR who ran right at him and figured he had Winfield one on one and threw up a long one over Winfield. Clements was now in the centerfield coverage and actually came seemingly out of nowhere and picked it off. The Bills will profit by luring Brady into thinking that he can exploit McGee (who can be beaten one-on-one by Givens or the other NE wideouts), but give him some back-up either by disguising civerages so that it is FS (Reese or Prioleau) who has Graham instead of SS Milloy and Milloy helps out McGee (who might look beaten as he takes underneath coverage of Givens while Milloy comes out of no where providing over coverage. Likewise in particular situations, the Bills may attempt to fool Brady by shifting Clements into the centerfield role and having the FS or SS take his CB duty. This game will be fun to watch.

Sunday's match-up strikes me as more and more interesting the more I think about it. As best as I can tell it will primarily a chess match between the Weis and Gray. Sure BB is the god of the Pats, but the individual play calls are the responsbility of the co-ordinators and this will tell a lot about the context of the game which BB and MM are dealing with. Thw Weis offense has been nothing short of great this season. However, the 3rd ranked Bills D will be quite the challenge for this potent O. My guess is that a lot of this will revolve around Weis attempting to exploit the likely Bills weakpoint which will be Mcgee our reserve CB. This problem actually present some opportunities for the Bills if Brady gets over-anxious in trying to explot this weakness and misses any disguised coverages we may run to give cGee some help from the less than powerful Reese or the talented who still has a grudge to settle Milloy. A ral key to this game may end up being the pass-rush because if the zone blitz succeeds in rushing Brady (I don't think he can be rattled but he is human and can be rushed) there will be less time for his to sort out disguised coverages. Gray has not only shown good tactical capability in calling plays for one of the top-ranked Ds in the league, but he has actually shown some great strategic chops in designing on the fly, teaching and implementing defensive changes at halftime which have markedly shutdwn in the second half offenses of our past several opponents. Brady and crew will be Gray's toughest test yet and I do not expect him to stop them completely. However, I think the real advantage for the Bills in terms of overall context will be the injuries to Law and Poole. If this game turns into a scoring track meet then advantage Bills given these injuries. NE's D can be run on normally and now it appears they can be passed upon as well with the injuries.

This will be an interesting one to watch. I think the Bills should run their usual coverage style with McGee initially and see how he responds to his errors the last three weeks to reformulate his game. it would be near impossible if the requirement for him to do this were a demand that he get faster or more agile because that ain't gonna happen. However, the need for him to improve is actually to try to do less in terms of making a game-breaking INT or dramatic play. He needs to lay back a little and never let the receiver get past him rather than continually be in the opponents gacr even if the opponent gets past him. Making this switch can often cause problems for a player if he is so used to an in your face style that he simply blows it trying to make a transition to being more careful (this actually may be why he did so poorly with Moss last week if the misteps, bad footwork and tripping he had came from him trying to careful instead of playing his usual headlong game). but while transition can be difficult it is a skil which can be mastered rather than trying to beat the old saw that you can't teach speed. NE's offense is actually a good one for him to face if he is going to make the transition to giving up a little space. NE does get big yards on some pass plays but a lot of them are RAC rather than the pure vertical game of the old Oakland teams. I will not be upset if the trade for him backing off is missing an INT or a pass break-up if he makes a sure tackle and forces Brady to beat him several times in a row in order to score. If Brady kills us in a method like being bitten to death by ducks then so be it. If McGee can't make the transition to more careful play then the Bills still have the option of changing their coverage patterns to cover for him. With the #3 D in the league we will be reluctant to do this, but it is something the Bills have done and practiced before as the use more zone coverage or even nickel coverage to hold down the pass while the run D remains vigilant and even stout. Two things which Jerry Gray has given me is a confidence in his ability to make good game calls and to make great adjustments in the D to shut down things which are working forthe opponent.

I also feel that MW has gone through a learning experience prompted by the unfortunate context of his Grandmother's (who apparently raised him as though she were his Mom) death. He reacted poorly to her death which is understandable to me, but reacted to it in a fairly unprofessional manner letting his weight balloon up and not attending "voluntary" practices. Being human is understandable, but his reactions cannot be condoned as they were not professional from someone who's work and teammates are depending upon him and from someone making millions to represent (and get $) from our region. It looks like with the support and with the attitude adjustments of his colleagues he seems to be responding in a correct and with the thumbs up even an uplifting manner. I know some folks want to panic and move him to LG, but he certainly has the agility, the size and the past actions to be a good tackle in this league. I think the alleged football observations of some that he has not shown the ability to play RT are wrong in that he clearly has had problems at tackle, but they have been on rushes on his inside rather than generally being speed rushes on the outside which test agility, have come on stunts which test his football brainpower and have been through poor co-ordination with the young RGs lined up next to him in his first two seasons. As besT a I can tell JMac raising the issue of him going inside was meant to adjust his attitude by threatening his buck making ability when his FA contract comes up. If this is tru as I think it is, I'm glad he fooled and scared MW in addition to fooling some on TSW as well.

Actually, to be accurate about this. ABC is not a station at all, it is a network which owns a few stations (there use to be a limit on the number they could actually pwn and control, but under de-regulation this limit has been removed or greatly curtailed) but has affliate agreements with hundreds of other companies which actually are the stations. ABC, like other networks takes a history of taking a variety of actions which for reasons one can see as altruistic or as curing favor with the public to make money are presented as ABC's desire to honor the troops which protect our country and ABC's ability to make big bucks. Generally, from what I see and hear a vast majority of folks seem to take a showing of Saving Private Ryan as honoring out troops. This is in part because of its realistic as movie's can get depiction of WWII and war in general (people for instance tend to use profanity when someone is trying to kill them). Moving along a spectrum, it was ABC which ran a showing of all the pictures of all of our troops who had paid the ultimate sacrifice for their country on Nightline. Some viewed this an appropriate honor and the least we could do given US citizens have been asked to do our part for the war effort by shopping rather than undergo the sacrifices our parents endured when our country was at war. Some stations refused to broadcast the reading as they took it as an attack on the war in Iraq. The entire issie is muddy on my view because there is no agreement among Americans as to what is right and what is wrong on this issue. We all generally have our individual opinions on what is right or what is wrong, but there is no consensus. The real issue it strikes me is not over the question of what is right and what is wrong, but what do we do as a society on issues for which there is no clear consensus, what do we do on issues where a strong majority may feel a particular way, but a significant minority feels differently and perhaps most difficult what do we do when even a small minority feels very strongly about their views but the majority disagrees with them.

If this game turns into a track meet with both teams using a lot of empty backfields, I tink it advantages us as both their starting CBs are gone. I doubt we will do our part of this equation as our strategy is to run and run it again as WM has been a real producer for us. Nevertheless, back-up CBs are a real tempting target and I think we will see more 1 RB Bills sets and see WM going out on pass plays. In terms of their O, I think they have got to test McGee early and try to get in his head after the debacl last week. Thus, neither tesm will want this to be a track meet, but temptation willprobably get the better of both sides.

My sense of GW is that he was bit to addicted to his schemes and instead shoul have altered his scheme to allow players to make the best plays they can make. I was willing to give GW the benefit of the doubt when he was first hired, but from the point where he unrealistically insisted that the Bills were fighting for the playoffs (the rebuilding team fininshed 3-13) I began to have and express doubts. While some argued that what else could he say because giving up was unacceptable, I think a good HC finds a way to split the bady and demand excellence even when he is realistic about the task which confronts us. The irony for us TSW folk is that we had already seen the power and effectiveness of "realistic optimism" with the Sabres. They built an ethic and promoted themselves as the hardest working team in hockey. Such an approach would have suited the Bills perfectly in the 2001 season as GW could have instilled and demanded hard work from the players who like it or not were going to produce something like a 3013 record. I began to give up on GW when he started taking a line which wasn't realistic and ended up revolving around him making excuses for why his scheme didn't seem to work rather the emphasize players getting better.

Nest year is the key to this talk as many posters want to turn out OL into tinker players who can be moved around successfully whilly nilly, but this has not been the means for achieving OL succes in the NFL in the past. It was interesting to me to see the PTI discussion of OL changes in which Merill Hoge (he's a paid pundit so his word should not be taken as gospel but he is former player so its fine to reject his word but it does merit a reason for rejecting his thoughts) said that football teams aspire to make no more than 1 or so personel and position changes on the OL in an entire season. He contrasted this with Pittsburgh's past shuffling of the versatile Alan Faneca and the increase in the success of their running game today not simply because of Duce Staley but they have kept Faneca and the OL in the same positions. I think if you read what JMac said he emphasized the off-season for this work and even in that context said might rather than stating it as a certainty.

Not very good in my view. However, as long as Vincent is hurt and able to practice in a serious way at least a little (which does not seem to be the case this week as it appears McGee will start) I don't think MM has a lot of choice. I think many folks (including my self) are merely whistling as we walk past a graveyard if we don't recognize that McGee and the Bills will have to change their games a bit to make up for McGee's youngser failings at CB. Recognizing this reality does not mean that we shouldn't rely on McGee a lot on Sunday night. 1. We have no choice except for Kevin Thoms and Jabari Greer who are actually have less to offer in my view than even the problematic youngster McGee. Unless Vincent makes a miraculous recovery or he is able as many vets have been able to do (Milloy for example) step right in an contribute with little or no practice thne McGee be the man. 2. Even if his CB play sucks, this does not negate his KR play. Many view these web declarations as hving some level of completeness and certainty they do not have. it is rational to fault McGee a lot for his CB play and at the exact same time sing his praises for his ST play. Indictments of McGee as an athlete by us couch potatoes are silly anyway. This athlete sucks at CB coverage and excels at KR and these are just the facts of his production. McHee's problem in my view is actually that he seems to rely too much on his outstanding athleticism and not enough on his brain. Its fine with me if he lets it all hang out on KR duty (though one key to TD returns is having the patience to allow your blocks to be set and the a sudden rapid attack to take advantage of the split-second advantages created- many return failures I see are due to impatience from the return guy running before his blockers attempt to make plays), but as a CB he should look to play it safe a bit more. If brady beats him fine, just don't beat yourself by taking yourself out of the play. I think three sets of looking at McGee's work show this: 1. 40+ yard reception given up against Baltimore- McGee made an outstanding leap to inerfere with the is pass but Taylor from Baltimore made a better leap and beat him on the grab. I found this quite frustrating as Kyle Boller probably ain't going to beat you nless you give him the chance and ifMcGee had made a point of staying deeper than Taylor rather than trying to stay in front of him to INT a poor throw from Boller, he might have been able to knock this one down. he mad a nice athletic play later in the game to break up a pass, but i think he plays a better game when he emphasizes the block over the INT. I know Turnovers are a big issue for the Bills and being aggressive makes them happen, but since we are playing our back-up CB, I think care rather than wreckless abandon is the order here. 2. TD by the Cards FB- McGee had the outside contain duty on this play and he cheated insided which led to the Cards walking into the endzone. This was a c;ear example of though hanging back does not allow one the best chance at making a play the downsides are clear. 3. Coverage on Santana Moss- It was obvious as tjet piled up 160 of so of their 200 yards and change of offense on McGee. I'd much rather see him force Brady to throw a perfect pass (which unfortunately Brady can do) rather than see him becoming a sitting duck because he depends on being a good athlete to keep his footing or recover when beat. If I'm the Bills, I order McGee to give up space rather than play for the INT most of the time. I try to use a bit more zone coverage than we're used to using on the plays where McGee does play hard (as he will have to vary his gamestyle to keep Brady guessing. Finally, I rely heavily on the zone blitz as my method of using more zones. Brasy is good and can diagnosis blitzes, but because he is good it doesn't mean you run away from that part of the game, but if he beats you fine, we just want him to have to work hard to do it. Brady is a controlled guy and not a trac meet guy. However, as the Pats will be missing their starting CBs, I think a track meet works to our advantage. McGee does not have to INT Brady in order to win, he needs to make Brady work hard to beat us. If the clock runs slow because he is throwing at openings left by our loose coverage fine with us.

What do you defined as produced? What do you define as forever? How is his "role" defined. I ask these questions because I think one can easily define them as it being a true statement that WM is the first Bills draft pick since Bruce Smith produce when stepping into his defined role or alternately one can also truthfully say that Nate Clements or Travis Henry produced when they stepped into their role. So your post raises more questions than it answers.