Fan in Chicago

Okay, I am going to flip this. In what specific ways do you think the Bills hurt themselves with this decision ? I think the value of this decision is no more than $2-$3 MM/yr if all goes well with his health. Chump change if Watkins is fully healed and plays to his immense potential.

Alex Smith is the quintessential 'bridge' QB. If anything, the Chiefs should have drafted a QB last year. From their perspective, better late than never.

I am in the exact opposite point of view. i think it is a very cold, financial move based on probabilities and uncertainty regarding his foot. If the doctors had said he is 100% good to go and highly unlikely to break down again, then we wouldnt be having this conversation.

I varied the probabilities and I think the breakeven was somewhere between 60-70% of him being healthy for 16 games. The re-upping price was varied between $13 and $17 MM/year. I didnt store the results of every iteration but can do that if you want to see it.

which is essentially what the Bills are doing by not picking up his option.

Sounds easy but overcoming alcoholism is really really tough. I have dealt with couple of alcoholics close to me in the past several years and have seen their struggles as well as those around them. It is different in family and business. McC would have to prove an extensive period of sobriety before the Bills should consider hiring him. First ask the simple question - has he been off the bottle since his dismissal ? I really dont buy the 'functioning alcoholic' defense.

I actually did an options analysis on the various outcomes. It is in a spreadsheet and I wish i could cut and paste an image. But in short, I laid out the possibilities: 1. Extend him now 2. Pick up the option For both of these, I made a sub-tree which had him playing all 16 games or less than that. To keep it simple, I assigned a value to him playing a game as a per-game salary 3. Option not picked up This had multiple sub-trees. In addition to above, it had extend at end of this year, franchise tag him then have him walk etc,... In an option analysis, you add up the probability weighted sub-trees to assign a value to each major option. Doing it this way and playing with some probabilities, I came to the conclusion that it is in the best interest of the Bills to WAIT and not pull the trigger now. This is purely a financial exercise. A full blown analysis will require some Monte Carlo type modeling which I am not trained to do. But, in essence, I will give the Bills the benefit of doubt and think they actually ran through this simulation. Which is what led them to the decision of not picking up the option. I actually support this decision. Having said that and as an aside, I am getting convinced that McD is trending towards being the new Greggo.

That thread was started with the intent to thank him for his work here. Whether or not you agree he did a good job. This thread already existed to discuss his dismissal. That one had the premise in the OP. No one is squelching free speech if made respectfully.

Any idea why he was cut? That article doesn't give the reasons.

Unlikely until Brandon is still around. But again, I would love to be proven wrong.

Not too sure about that but I wont argue it too hard. The Pegulas are showing themselves to be the dreaded 'meddlesome owners' that many used to accuse RWilson of being. I just dont like the way they are handling the Bills. I would love to be proven wrong by seeing a winning team.

Okay. I didnt see any quotes on the last sentence and thought it is you talking

Thanx for the link and post. I didnt see this as a Bellichick focussed article. He does compare to that gold standard, sure. But really points to how messes up the Bills organization is and is likely to continue to be due to Brandon's continued presence. The day Brandon gets fired, will be a day of great joy for all Bills fans. Hope the man gets kicked to the curb and never gets hired by another pro-sports team. As an aside - I see major shades of Greggo in McDermott. As the resident expert on Greggo, what do you think? The brief history of the Pegulas says otherwise. They never owned the Ryan hire even though it was their choice..

I didn't hear the PTI thingy. But the words you quote are simply a colorful version of what you wrote right after that

The Bills organization will be a great one to maintain sobriety, don't you think? ;-)

I am thinking not many remember the Donahoe days

We are fine. I am just lamenting the sequence of events which prove something I have been in denial about regarding the organization,

Do you think that by itself should weigh in on a GM's performance evaluation ? Wsnt it addressed by handing McD the mic ?

I am curious which crackrjack GM candidate will be now ecstatic about this opening.

A - frigin - men

Not quite sure if your take is that significantly different from mine. But given that neither of us have concrete proof of what went on inside the organization, we just have to go by the sequence of events and the ultimate decisions themselves. Suffice to say that I am not going to argue this point with you too hard.

That assumes that Whaley had a problem with that power structure, which we didnt see any evidence of. If anything, it appeared that he was willing to work with the coaches and get the HC the players he needed to implement his schemes. If he was a power monger, he would have resigned a long time back. IMHO. ofcourse

Falling short of people who agree with you ?

I said, IF the Bills hire a Panthers staffer and I said there would be an investigation. Did I profess to possess proof ?

While that may be true regarding their FO ((I have no idea), no self respecting organization can keep a drunk in a top spot. Or for any influential spot for that matter