BuffaloBob

Why are so many peoples' panties in a wad over this? First of all, don't you think it makes sense for the Bills to do their due diligence just to inquire about what it would take? Shouldn't they know what all of their options are, regardless of whether they would actually go through with it? Secondly, everyone talking about having to use our second first rounder is flat out wrong. At the most, they would have to give our second (which I am not advocating BTW). Has it occurred to anyone that the Bills might be looking to put a package together that includes one, some or all of the players they have dangled over the past week or two to make this move? What if we only had to give up a third and Kelsey, or a fourth, a fifth and Roscoe, or something similar to get the deal done? And BTW, just a simple inquiry is probably all it takes to start one of these Internet tizzies in the first place.

Actually he really didn't nail it! Pettigrew is very much know for his pass catching. The guy catches everything thrown to him and has very soft hands. He is isn't know for speed and threatening the deep middle, but the guy knows how to get open and he doesn't drop the ball when it's thrown to him. It just also so happens that the guy can block quality DEs like a left tackle, too. That's why everyone wants the guy. He is an every down TE, not some glorified slot receiver. Most of the tight ends that are mentioned after Pettigrew can't and/or don't block.

ROTFLMAFO!!! I love this continued criticism of the front office that they screwed up because they somehow didn't think it made more sense to require the 21st rather than 28. Wow, I could have had a 21! Why is it so hard to get the fact that we basically had the Eagles willing to pay a first plus and his contract demands, and that's it. All this rumination that there were other teams who were interested is crap. Obviously if there was anyone else, their level of interest was not enough. So who was Philly negotiating against? Themselves! The only leverage we had was that we would somehow be willing to live with this butthead for another season of holdouts and crappy play, only to further reduce his value to anyone else in the league, for seven positions in the draft. It seems to me that Philly had approached the Bills early on and probably didn't even offer a first rounder. Probably why the Bills wouldn't go for it. When no other team was willing to cough up the required first plus, along come the Eagles back and willing to cough up the first round pick plus days before the draft. And the Bills are supposed to play hardball for a 21 rather than a 28? If there was anyone else out there willing to do more, do you really think the Bills would have simply grabbed this deal without trying to get more? Moreover, there was no way to know how long the butthead was going to take to come to terms with the Eagles, a requirement for the deal to get done. And that deal needed to get done in advance of the draft. Who knew he was going to go to Philly and lap up a contract in a couple of days. Given the general consensus that Peters was a naturally talented guy with a lot of question marks, I think the Bills did a great job of getting this done and getting rid of a real headache. If the Bills were a really good team, I would have loved to see them make him play out his contract. But this team needs too many holes filled to be dealing with a guy who thinks he should be the highest paid tackle in the league for a season and half of good play, and who was willing to do so to the detriment of the team.

"I'm not sayin' he should killed 'er, but I understand!" Chris Rock

According to the chart, it is the money each of those players received in 2008. No, and the concern of many, myself included, is that he will pull this stunt EVERY time he feels under-compensated. I would not have problem if the Bills upped their offer with incentives that could bring the deal closer to what he is asking, as that would at least solve the problem of keeping him motivated. But it still doesn't solve the problem that he will have have essentially held the team hostage in a way that other players on the team did not who got their deals extended. Moreover, I am also of the opinion that he has NOT put in a body of work that entitles him to be the highest paid or nearly highest paid LT in the league. I don't care about his upside or his potential, and I don't care that the new contract he willingly signed and performed only one year under before trying to hold the team for more money is undercompensating per the market. In my mind, to be the highest paid at anything there should be a well-established track record for that level of performance that warrants that kind of huge financial commitment from the team, including a rock-solid commitment to the team on his part. If he's that worried about a career ending injury in team conditioning and off-season workouts, maybe he should be in another field. And as for the possibility of injury in games while demonstrating his commitment, let him buy insurance for the $600,000 that he is paying in fines to sit out. I think the offer the Bills have made him is more than a reasonable one given market parameters and given what he has done on the field so far. I think it also reflects an unwillingness to overpay him for his poor decision-making that led to less than stellar play last year and which put the team in a real bind. And regardless of what some people think about sack stats, the reality is that it ain't THAT ambiguous. It is certainly possible that on a few occasions, someone else blew an assignment that made him look bad, but I submit that anyone with a little knowledge of football can make a pretty sound assessment of most of those sacks. At best, he was inconsistent last year and clearly gave up at least three blind side sacks that I saw that were not ambiguous. I want the Bills to stick their guns, and if he shows no willingness to get his ass into town and work-out with the team or to sign what is a very reasonable offer, then I am perfectly happy to be rid of him. Even if he ultimately signs what the Bills are offering him, he'll be back for more in no time. If he decides not to sign and hold out, we will have at best the kind of performance he put in last season. I could do without that. We have managed to win some games without him and lost lot's of games with him. We have managed to achieve paltry offensive numbers with him, and we've done well on occasion without him. What that tells me is not the huge impact player some think he is. He is certainly not deserving of what he is demanding.

The average over the entire contract is what is relevant, not what the player puts in his pocket the first year. Most teams pay huge signing bonuses the first year because it represents guaranteed money to the player and because as far as cap accounting is concerned, it can be amortized over the entire contract. So most of those huge deals have a large signing bonus and a very small salary the first 3 years or so of the contract. The resulting average compensation works itself out over the ensuing years because the salaries are small for the next few years. So in the case of Flozell Adams for example, the guy pocketed over 1/3 of his deal in the first year at $14 million. Notice that notwithstanding that he has pocketed nearly $15 million, his cap hit for that year is only a little over $3 Million! That's because the signing bonus is amortized over 6 years and 1/6 (2.167 Million) is added to the paltry $1 Million in salary for cap calculations. So that only leaves a total of $29 million left of the total contract to be paid out over the next 5 years. That averages out to $5.8 Million per year over the next five years! Because teams try to keep the cap figure low for the first half or more of the contract, Adams' salary will only gradually rise in the 2nd through 4th seasons, and then swells in the last two years or so. So, his salary will likely be something like $2 Million, $3 Million, $5 Million, $7.5 Million, $11.5 Million over the next five years. So now do you get why the average value of the deal is what is relevant here? Moreover, some teams will back-load the contract even more, pushing even more of the salary of years 2-4 to year 5, and the more that is done, it can render the effective average of the contract to be even less, as it becomes more likely the player will not see the salary of that final year because his cap value is so high for the last year.

Nice post and beat me to it. Those numbers quoted above from USA Today were not the AVERAGE yearly compensation for those players over the life of the contract. Those total salaries included the upfront bonus money they received when they first signed a new deal. Notice that the actual salary (i.e. non-bonus money) is typically well under 10% of the total for the first year. What those figures don't show is that their total salary for the next few years will be primarily made up of actual salary and will be just a couple million bucks per year. Then as they get to the back sie of the contract, the salary will increase up to a level that the player may not even see.

How can he be subject to punishment by the NFL for his actions prior to being drafted and signing a contract? He is not currently in the NFL, he is not currently a member of the NFL players union, and therefore he is not subject to the NFL's drug policy agreed to by the union.

Oh great, so you reserved the possibility that MAYBE the tards in Detroit helped the tards in our front office screw it up, even though you believed it was our front office? Oh, OK. As it turns out, you are still wrong.

The fact that his agent had to get a NEW contract, negotiated, drafted and signed with Detroit is not on the Bills. My point is and has always been that if a trade had indeed been consummated (which means that compensation had been agreed to, and Dockery had agreed to play for the same contract), there was no reason the Bills could be blamed for not getting the paperwork filed. And yeah, it would have been a simple filing had Dockery not insisted on altering the contract that would have otherwise just been simply assumed. The ultimate point here is that you, among all these other people instantly piled on the front office for screwing this up and simply not filing the paperwork because they are tards. Even after that, you still insisted that the Bills at least be partially blamed for this not getting done. You were obviously incorrect.

Where does it say there was a TON of paperwork to do? It simply says that with an agreement not reached until literally within minutes of the deadline, the paperwork could not be completed and filed. Even a one page memo can't be typed, proofed, printed and faxed in a couple of minutes smart guy. You were the one calling the Bills tards for this, when you were completely wrong, but go ahead and cover yourself by arguing irrelevancies.

Umm, Yeah I do actually. It is a simple memo that outlines the terms of the trade. But you keep right on blaming the Bills because that is what you want to do, even though you and everyone else here bashing the front office have no facts to support that position. The FACT is, if the Bills had time to file release paperwork, they had time to file for a trade, unless the Lions protratced to the talks to the point that it was not possible to produce the document first. Nothing complicated about it. As for what led to a deal not being consummated before the deadline, if there in fact was one in the works, is pure speculation. OK, was pure speculation until the blog just posted. If what he writes is true, this was a simple matter of Detroit not offering anything the Bills wanted until there were minutes left. Even the best typist can't get a memo typed printed and faxed in two minutes.

If there was enough time to fax in his release paperwork, there was enough time to fax in a trade as well.

Based on the three articles to date, there is absolutely no basis upon which to conclude this. In fact, the opposite is true. I completely agree with this guy's assessment of the situation. The Bills were NOT going to pay this guy $4.5 Million. Everyone in the league knew it, including Detroit and the 'Skins. Detroit knew they had NO chance of getting Dockery into town and signing the guy AFTER was released. So they feigned interest in a trade JUST to get him into town and get a contract offer in front of him. They pushed the Bills to the deadline until the FO had NO CHOICE but to release him, and they figured to sign him without giving the Bills anything, and perhaps without being on the hook for the rest of his deal (which no other team in the league wanted to pay either!). But it backfired on them. When the Skins got wind of the ploy, they got on the phone with Dockery's agent and made him an offer, too. He took their offer instead, and why not? Who wants to play for Detroit when they can play for the 'Skins for almost the same money and more guaranteed up front? The Bills FO had to file paperwork to release him, just as they had to file paper work for a trade. Do you people really think the Bills front office doesn't KNOW how to do this? If they were there to fax in his release, they were certainly there to fax in a trade if that had been consummated. The ONLY way this makes sense is that the Lions pushed the Bills to the deadline and the Bills had no choice but to fax in the release instead. The team that got screwed in this was Detroit. If they really wanted the guy, they should have given the Bills the compensation. They rolled the dice and lost.

Actually, this was mentioned on the pregame for tonight's game. The interesting thing is that it was segued into by Bob Costas prompting Peter King with, "there is some serious issues currently going on with the Bills ownership, Peter?" (Of course, this was a paraphrase, but they made it sound like it was something hot, new and current. King led off with a "Yes, Bob, owner Ralph Wilson wants to sell the team and Jim Kelly talked to me and told me he is currently putting a group together to buy the Bills." At first, I was kind of excited, but then realized that this has happened before when Jim gets fired up and then Ralph quickly shoots the whole thing down. So I decided not to post what I heard. It would be a major change in attitude for Ralph, and a welcome one as far as I'm concerned. But I have a feeling that Jim is probably trying to build some momentum for it in the hopes Ralph will give up his prize toy before he checks out from hotel earth.

I realize reading comprehension may not be your strong suit, but perhaps you ought read the thread again. No one is defending JP. Those of us invoking the name of JP are simply demanding the same accountablity of Trent as was expected of JP. All of these arguments made in defense of Trent for his horrific play the past two games were just as easily made in defense of JP, and the JP haters would have none of it. So the fact that the JP haters are running to defend Trent with the same arguments now makes me laugh my ass off.

Oh well, that proves it then! QED!

How do you expect these arguments to work now when these exact same arguments didn't work when JP was laboring and suffering from the exact same team deficiencies? And once again, Trent's pick six had NOTHING to do with either line that I could see. Nor did his two straight sacks he took in the red zone that ultimately led to the missed field goal.

:w00t: :w00t: I really need a laugh after a second consecutive division loss. Thank you for that! So help me out a bit, exactly how is it the O and D-lines fault that Trent held the ball out there for Porter to take away from him last week? How is the lines' fault that he threw that pick six near the goal line, as he had PLENTY of time to make the right decision there? How was it the rest of the team's fault that he took those two ridiculous sacks late in the game when he had PLENTY of time to make the right decision? It wasn't his fault he didn't throw that ball away and instead took that sack for a safety and damn near fumbled it away for a TD? I guarantee you that had Losman taken that sack today and fumbled, you would have been bitchin' that he has no pocket presence, or that the team just knows they can blitz him because he can't handle it. But of course Trent was merely a victim. On several occasions in this game, he had plenty of time to make throws and had people open, and threw late and cost the team a chance for a completion. Sorry dude, but you are hilarious!

I did say it ain't sayin much, didn't I?

Wow! I find it very interesting that all of those facets of the game were not issues when JP lost games! Yet, it is virtually the same schemes, the same or better players. Now I know none of these factors existed back a few games ago when we lost the Arizona game. In that game, it was simply JP. Of course, any poor play by those other facets of the game were simply because Trent wasn't in there inspiring them to better things. Wonder where all that inspiration went over the last few games?

This is the best line we've had here in five years, and while I realize that's not saying much, how come its only now that the O-line is finally exposed now that Trent is starting? Sorry, but I think it's you who needs to get his head out of the dirt.

As Sims made clear, that was going to be a pick regardless of Roscoe stumbling. The CB was all over that route.

Yeah same to you. The exact same could and should be said about the Arizona game, yet you and the JP haters were blaming him for the loss. And this just in: Trent makes some really stupid mistakes that are actually in fact HIS fault. If JP had played the exact same game the past two weeks, you'd be screaming for his head and telling us all how he has no intelligence. When Trent basically gives two division games away with 6 turnovers in two games on some absolutely ridiculous plays, we get to hear how he didn't play that bad and it was the rest of the team that sucked, not him. But hey, the homoerotic cracks really help cover that up.