Casey D

Excellent Post!

I think the question is why do you have that impression given that lots of people who know him well speak highly of him. Saying someone is an idiot without elaboration is not really helpful to the reader. But I guess you are now saying that he is not very bright (a/k/a "idiot") based on the way he speaks, which isn't much but it is something I suppose. Like George W. Bush? Did you think Gailey was a brain surgeon based soley on the way he speaks?

Well put. No matter what you do, you will get criticized. Move too fast and you are not examining every option. Take your time, you are not decisive and are letting all the good candidates get scooped up. Wins are the only thing that makes all this good or bad, and you can't know that in advance.

My question is not really how this will turn out-- of course we won't know for a while if this was a good hire. My question goes more to how the Bills conducted business with this hIre. Was there a difference than in the past? Did they do a good job of finding and getting someone who has real potential as compared to what othe teams did? Hindsight is 20/20, how did they do now under the circumstances in hiring a new coach? Funny... :-)

So the only retread hired was Reid, Lovie (who I liked) and Whiz were passed on by 7 other teams. Cowher and Gruden did not come out of the booth for anyone. Assuming everyone else was acting rationally and with no spending limits on a new coach, how do you feel like the Bills did in picking a new coach? Who did better? Worse? For me, after evaluating the situation, there are few guys who were hired that I would rather have than Marrone. And the fact that guys I did not mind like Lovie and Whiz were passed over tells me something about them. So I guess I am pretty happy with the hire.

Agree. When he said going against NE is a high level chess game, I thought "finally." Wannstadt was largely playing checkers... :-)

I would think Marrone would want at least one familiar face at a new big job-- makes sense to bring a trusted deputy. And Marrone was an OC himself, so he can help on that side of the ball a lot. If Hackett has talent as many say, 33 for an OC is no big deal. Everyone has to be an OC in the NFL for the first time sometime, every great coach was a virgin at one time-- as was every failure. I'd give it a chance.

It was not published "exclusively" by BN. It was first published as a text on a bunch of players' phones, and then republished by the BN. If I reprint a fact that someone else published, that does not make me the first publisher or the exclusive publisher.

Actually as a legal matter, the reprinting of a text by Marrone likely is a "fair use" under copyright law as it is simply repeating a fact... Marrone's tweet. Nothing was taken that was original material from the News, such as analysis of the text. We could debate this in court of course, but it is not "plainly stealing" or "plainly illegal."

I liked the idea of Smith. And 10-6 sounds great to me. But I think that's the ceiling. A likely return to repectability-- Smith was great. A Super Bowl win-- I like the chance more with Marrone. So I guess we might be shooting for the moon, but that seems reasonable. It's more of a gamble, but seems like a good gamble to me.

Shocked when I woke up and heard this. But when you drill down, this guy is extremely well-regarded and was very hot in NFL circles right now. Seems safer than Kelly because Kelly has zip NFL connections. Guy is from the Parcells coaching tree. I favored Smith or Whiz but you pretty much know their ceilings. Marrone has a higher ceiling but a lower floor. Getting to the playoffs--more likely Smith or whiz in the short term. Winning a Super Bowl, I'd take Marrone. Don't know much more, but I'm willing to give him a shot... seems like a good leader.

The obvious mistakes Gailey makes, as on Sunday, are well recognized-- poor clock management, risk aversion and the wrong time, taking needless risks at the wrong time, underutilizing Spiller, etc. But if as, relatively speaking, we can all see this as casual observers, how bad must he be at the fundamentals of football game planning and coaching that is at a level that we cannot really discern at any detailed level. In other words, if he can't even manage a clock, how can he possibly be matching wits on more subtle and important football things with coaches who are good. He's like having a small town country doctor performing brain surgery. What chance does the patient really have. It just seems to me if he can't do relatively simple things an average fan would do, how bad are his decisions faring at a more granular level versus other professionals who are good at what they do. When I think about it that way, there really is no hope unless we find at least someone who can make basic decisions, and hopefully a little brain surgery too.

Finally a Festivus thread. I can't wait for the feats of strength after the conclusion of the airing of the grievances... :-)

Gailey said not a long term injury. Likely out next week. Get a more definitvie prognosis tomorrow. No break per Gailey

yikes

I just think you are being too dogmatic-- I like the running game as much as the next person. We were behind a lot in many games early. Three runs and a punt when you are losing 17-0 in the second quarter is not going to happen over and over if you are coaching-- you've got to get points fast. Your idea is good in theory, it is not when the game is unfolding as it did many times last year after the 5-2 start. But whatever.

Your statistical analysis is misleading IMO. In most games the defense was so poor that 31 plus points was needed to win on relatively few possessions. This problem was exacerbated in several games when the team was down 14-21 points early in the second quarter. In those situations, the running game was shelved for obvious reasons, and its not surprising you lose when you throw alot because you are throwing alot when you have gotten far behind. I agree there were some instances where the game was tight and we could have run more, but largely we threw too much because our defense was awful, it was not a strategic decision. Improve the defense-- as the FO is doing-- it will take pressure off the O to score all the time and the running game will be used more. Just my opinion... CD

There is a Boston Herald article from two days ago making the comparison to Brady. Not warranting the comparison, just that it was made.

Aaron Corp Richmond, formerly USC. Some comparisons to being Brady-like. Seems like a good pickup.

I think the front office has done a good job of recognizing the weaknesses on the team and have tried to address them in an intelligent way. Did not reach with the first pick, and got by all estimates a very good CB at a position of somewhat need. Got lucky when Glenn fell and got the BPA at a position of great need. As to Graham, seems like a bit of a reach BUT clearly a position of huge need-- a speed WR. We got boatloads of posession receivers like a Sanu of Rutgers (who was still available) and I have not looked but I doubt there was much better available with the third pick in terms of speed. On third and 6, if Graham can just sprint down the sideline every time and clear out space, he's probably worth the pick. And if he can do more, as the FO seems to think, then it is gravy in my book. They need to create more fear of a deep threat to make the rhythm passing attack of Gailey work more efficiently. So they've tried to address the problems. The FO does not appear clueless as in the past with other regimes. So I am happy. Some LBs and more OLs today and I'd likely be very happy. As to whether these guys are actually any good, only time will tell, but the new FO seems pretty saavy so I am optimistic. CD

This guy looks like he will be an amazing NFL WR. Where is he projected in the first round?

Gailey said they are going to evaluate the players, and decide if going to a 4-3 might make sense. Sounds like a totally reasonable evaluation and approach.

10th

This season has been so emotionally charged from the great start to the 7 game losing streak to the win yesterday, it has been hard to give a dispassionate analysis of the season to get some handle on where this team is abilty-wise. If you look back at the season now, the team was probably more competitive than it feels given the losing streak. Out of 15 games, the Bills won 6 against some good teams, including NE, Oak, Philadelphia and Denver. They crushed two weaker opponents in KC and Washington. So those 6 wins are of fairly high quality. Three of the Bills losses were tight games that could have gone either way-- Cincinnati, NYG and Jets2. Those are all solid teams, so 3 more solid games by the Bills, albeit losses. There were two losses where the Bills were in the game, but deserved to lose, Tennessee and Miami2. Not disaster games however--watchable to the end. Then there were 4 putrid performances, Jets1, Dallas, Miami1 and SD. Because the putrid performances were largely strung together later in the season, they provide the most vivid image of the season and indicate that the Bills are truly awful and totally lack talent. But when you look at the whole body of work, there were 9 good games and 2 fair games to go with the putrid 4, so 11 games out of 15 were at least reasonable efforts. It suggests the team is not as bad as it has felt for the past two months, and that while the team is not as good as the 5-2 start, it is not nearly as far away from that standard as it has felt recently. With a good off-season keeping and adding talent, and some better luck next year injury wise, they might be as consistently good next year for 16 games(or for most of them if they could, say, reduce the true stinkers to 1 or 2 games) as they were for the first 7 this year. Here's hoping and Merry Christmas!

I agree. It's like a baseball pitcher going through a dead arm period. Fitz has never played a full season like this. He needs to rest his arm, and work on a workout regimin that will help him through the rigors of a long season.