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We beat KC (how, I'm still trying to figure that one out), got killed by SD, but the other three, we managed to steal losses from the jaws of victory. The Pats, Panthers, and the Dolphins were all games there for our taking, but instead of being 7-5 and in the hunt, we're sadly 4-8. In each of these games we managed to blow golden opportunities. In all three games, play calling and coaching in general was horrible. Those games are the ones you have to win. A blowout will happen from time to time (I still can recall the KC 33-6 win over the Bills back in 1991), but winning the close ones is what defines a decent team. Clearly, we are not for that and a miriad of other reasons. The only real bright spot all year long, with only a few notable exceptions, has been our special teams. So what will the Bills play for to finsih out the year? Will JP continue to develop or will that dung heap of humanity, we reservedly call our offensive line, stunt that growth? Will Aiken step up and finally show some ability as a WR (special teams - he's very good already)? Will Parrish finally get a chance to show he can be a play maker? He's had a few decent kickoff returns so far, but he's also made a couple real bonehead rookie mistakes as a punt returner. Will McGahee play like he finished last year, or continue to head downhill (again for multiple reasons) as he's been doing of late? Is it time to put Rashad Baker in a FS and tell Vincent, thanks you were great once (sadly not for us) but your time is up? Will Milloy follow or will the Bills give him yet another year, especially since all we have is Wire backing him up presently? Is it fair to say we color both Moulds and Adams gone? Will the Bills end the guard experiment with Williams and let him go too? Will TD's regime remain intact, and if not, how severe will be the house cleaning? How much "dead" cap space will we be carrying next year with the house cleaning of players? 2006 is not shaping up well based upon the current health of the Bills. It could be 2001 all over again...... Stay tuned, as the "World Turns".

Glenn, it's good to see you post here a bit more these days. Yet, how dare you throw Ruben Brown in our faces? He was skewered here for being a pro-bowl player only because of past rep. Never mind that his peers also took part in his formerly annual election. We got Anderson and Villerial now. We're........ ....doomed? Ruben Brown was the first Bill who had a serious issue with the new regime, IIRC. He left Buffalo unceremoniously but to his credit, he has played had solid play for the Bears, something we haven't seen from our guards since he left. Villerial, when healthy is adequate but surely no great talent and it appears this "over 30" guy is starting to break down (he's had numerous nagging injuries all year too). No comment is needed with any of the other "bum of the week" types we've thrown in there this year. Peters may develop into a player, and has great athleticism for a big man, but he's not there yet. His pass blocking has been adequate with signs of being good, yet his run blocking to date hasn't impressed me. He routinuely seems to get beat on the run, at least from what I see. Yet, he at least is the only O-line guy we have that seems to have an visible upside. He may yet be our LT next year. Gandy, has been mostly solid and serviceable. Maybe he should play the RT position or move in to guard. Anderson should be shot, plain and simple. Teague I feel is adequate, and may never be more than that, but I'd like to see what he'd look like if he didn't have a stiff right next to him on both sides. Anderson should have been cut weeks ago and replaced with Tucker (yes, sign him for the rest of the year), and keep him next year as a center/guard backup if healthy. Tucker at least played with fire, even if he wasn't the most talented guard to come down the road. Mike Williams? He was a pick that no one in football questioned when it was made. Yet, he has really disappointed this year, beginning with his nagging injuries and now the attempt to move him to guard. Late last year, he was playing pretty well and many thought he was finally arriving, but he has taken a well documented huge step backwards this year. It just seems that he lacks the fire one would like to see. Converting him to guard in mid stream simply doesn't make sense. It's not like he's played that position before either. I'd love for that switch to succeed, but he's in a real tight spot this off season. I see a substantial renegotiation of his contract or we will probably waive goodbye to Big Mike. Will Preston be of any help down the road? I hope so, but his reported "mean streak" has yet to provide any positive results when he's been in there so far. Next year will be his big test to see if he can step up to become a player, or will simply fade away. Our defensive line gives me even greater concern. We have three stiffs playing and one talented but undersized end (Schobel). I still feel Adams is very talented, but I've already colored him gone.

Ah, reason.......If we do end up with a high enough 1st rounder, and other teams have players targeted that they feel are must picks, then we've got a shot at trading down to get an extra pick. That's not automatic though as we witnessed with our selection of Mike Williams. It's been said that when the Bills went on the clock for the 4th overall pick, the phone never rang. Also, high first rounders will bite you in the but $$$$ wise, ala Mike Wiliams. Even if he was playing well, a 10 mil cap hit is huge. Best bet is to trade down (hopefully not too far though) and pick up an extra pick.

That was his point. Even when they play soft, they still get beat deep. So why not mix in some press coverage and actually make the receiver work a bit to even get off the line of scrimmage once in a while. Mix it up.... t

At least in 2001, we expected a crummy year. This year we expected better, even with JJP taking our at QB. We thought we had some sembelance of defense....

I've kind of defended Adams, as he does bring unique talents to the field, but it's painfully obvious that he's best when a team already has a two gap DT next to him so he can go after the QB, collapse the pocket and penetrate against the run. He lacks interest in being the plugger and with what he's being paid, he should be far more willing to adapt. Yet, it does come back on TD doesn't it? Adams, as it seems, has been well known as wanting to play to his strengths and has objected to similar roles before. Recently, it's been said he can be quite a disruptive locker room guy when he's not happy as well, which explains why a player as good as him has traveled as much as he has. Yet, TD knew this, or should have. If they wanted him, it had better for his attack, penetrating, pocket collapsing skills, because Sam wasn't going to be happy any other way. He was and is a known commodity. All this makes us long for the day when we had Ted Washington, a true mountain of a man, plugging the middle. I've never seen anyone better at stuffing the run than big Ted.

A friend just e-mailed this and I thought it's worth sharing, something that should make all Americans proud. It was written by an Australian: Written by an Australian Dentist... To Kill an American You probably missed it in the rush of news last week, but there was actually a report that someone in Pakistan had published in a newspaper an offer of a reward to anyone who killed an American, any American. So an Australian dentist wrote an editorial the following day to let everyone know what an American is . so they would know when they found one. (Good one, mate!!!!) " An American is English, or French, or Italian, Irish, German, Spanish, Polish, Russian or Greek. An American may also be Canadian, Mexican, African, Indian, Chinese, Japanese, Korean, Australian, Iranian, Asian, or Arab, or Pakistani or Afghan. An American may also be a Comanche, Cherokee, Osage, Blackfoot, Navaho, Apache, Seminole or one of the many other tribes known as native Americans. An American is Christian, or he could be Jewish, or Buddhist, or Muslim. In fact, there are more Muslims in America than in Afghanistan. The only difference is that in America they are free to worship as each of them chooses. An American is also free to believe in no religion. For that he will answer only to God, not to the government, or to armed thugs claiming to speak for the government and for God. An American lives in the most prosperous land in the history of the world. The root of that prosperity can be found in the Declaration of Independence, which recognizes the God given right of each person to the pursuit of happiness. An American is generous. Americans have helped out just about every other nation in the world in their time of need, never asking a thing in return. When Afghanistan was over-run by the Soviet army 20 years ago, Americans came with arms and supplies to enable the people to win back their country! As of the morning of September 11, Americans had given more than any other nation to the poor in Afghanistan. Americans welcome the best of everything...the best products, the best books, the best music, the best food, the best services. But they also welcome the least. The national symbol of America, The Statue of Liberty, welcomes your tired and your poor, the wretched refuse of your teeming shores, the homeless, tempest tossed. These in fact are the people who built America. Some of them were working in the Twin Towers the morning of September 11, 2001 earning a better life for their families. It's been told that the World Trade Center victims were from at least 30 different countries, cultures, and first languages, including those that aided and abetted the terrorists. So you can try to kill an American if you must. Hitler did. So did General Tojo, and Stalin, and Mao Tse-Tung, and other blood-thirsty tyrants in the world. But, in doing s o you would just be killing yourself. Because Americans are not a particular people from a particular place. They are the embodiment of the human spirit of freedom. Everyone who holds to that spirit, everywhere, is an American. It says it all , for all of us

That he did, as well as build winners with two other teams since. The man has a proven track record and Ralph should have bit the bullet and let Littman go, not the man who built his franchise into SB contenders.

That's generally agreeable, but Sam has always been an aggressive, attack type player, and when allowed to do that, he has been very successful. I don't hold Sam blameless in all this but to continually place schemes above the talents available isn't very sound thinking by the coaching staff. To this end, MM is ultimately accountable. Players are paid to play so if they run their mouths a bit, especially over playing time, etc., so what. I'd take a player who wants to play, even hurt, and wants to win yet whines a bit (ala Smith?) any day over coaches who are paid to think and can't (insert MM) any day of the week. It's like taking your top IT guy and having him wash windows, when your servers and network has just crashed.

To me, you're pretty close to the real issue. Sam likes to attack, not sit back and tie OL's up play after play. Clearly the Bills wanted him to become a two gap run stuffer, but that's not Sam's game. Sam, even with his size, can pressure a QB. His tremendous quickness, especially at his size, is amazing. He can disrupt plays before they get started, yet the Bills want to stifle this unique ability, a play makers ability, to be the run stuffing two gap DT that Sam never has been. Note, he was very sucessful with the Ravens (with Siragusa being the two gap guy), and his first two years here (with Phat Pat being the two gap guy). The back drop to all this is now the board seems to think we need to make a statement with Sam? To me this mostly points right back at TD and MM. It's more of the same old story of trying to force a square peg into a round hole. Use his talents, not try to make him into something he's not. Yet hey, that's what all the great coaches do, right? They have a scheme and come hell or high water, you play it. To heck with scheming to their players strengths, it's all about the scheme. Sam's not blameless in all this, but MM looks like the fool to this observer. Sam's upset about not playing, and he should be. I'd be more upset with Sam if he wasn't. I wonder if the bad press from Phat Pat and what's going on now with this quality veteran player will do little more than to put hesitation in the minds of other FA's considering coming here in the foreseeable future. Money talks, but it still often comes down to intangibles in close bidding wars and that's where we'll lose. No matter how you slice it, Sam Adams is our best DT and if healthy enough to go, he adds to our chances of winning, much more so than Bannan or Anderson.

??? What games were you watching? First the run defense was much better, no compariosn to what we have now. Second, Phat Pat was usually playing two gaps and did them well tying up two OL's on almost every play. If anyone was the gap shooting, all or nothing guy, it was Sam, and I'd have to say that especially during the winning streak last year, Sam played extremely well. Our problems last year had nothing to do with the DT position(s).

At this point, Nick has most likely nailed it. I don't see a big shake up (TD-MM) yet, which is not to say that either one of them has had anything of real substance to hang their hats on. For every plus, theres a handfull of minuses. The biggest mistakes are obvious (Phat Pat and benign neglect of the O-line).

Re-writing history a bit? It wasn't a matter of choosing one over the other, it was that Phat Pat's contract was up, Sam's wasn't. Sadly, TD's offer, as was quoted from TD himself was around 1 mil less than what Minny offered. Seems as if TD gambled that we would get the "home team discount" that Phat Pat talked about and lost. TD added that he was surprised that he and Pat didn't get the deal done. I'm not defending TD, as this was a deal he should have got done unless of course we had a stud in waiting, which we all know we didn't. Those two, Phat Pat and Sam made a great pair and it's sda that they weren't kept together. Blame TD for this? Sure, but not for taking one over the other.

He had over the top coverage on the play. Posey was supposed to have the underneath coverage on the TE. Just because you make your case vehemently, it doesn't make it right. A 3rd round pick was wasted on Wire? Most would agree, but spew the venom for this play where it's deserved. Aim it at Posey.

The Bills rolled the pocket a few times, but most of what I saw of Losman running wide were plays he was forced out of the pocket on. One play really pissed me off, and that's when JP rolled to his right after being flushed only to have three receivers on that side all come back and try to occupy the same square yard of turf. Stupid, stupid, stupid....

MM placed Sam on the inactive list......so he went home. It's not as if he walked because he wasn't starting. Leaving surely earned Sam no points, but it already appeared that MM and staff have decided to go it without Sam anyway. No way Sam comes back for another year. Too bad. He played his tail off the second half of last year too and still is our most talented DT...by far.

"Execution....I'm in favor of it"......(McKay)

Fined? Might get suspended..... However, maybe he was told he'd be "inactive"...

Yes, I've noticed that, maybe ala Jimmy Hoffa stye as well. Yet, that doesn't change the fact that as the health care industry continues to consume more and more of a family and business revenues, with increases year by year of more than 3 times the rate of inflation, something will have to give. Socialized medicine may not be the answer, but having no answers at all is far worse.

FFS, I find that I agree with your point by and large. Each side can make an argument against the other as to why GM and Ford have reached the point they have. Yet, the proof was in the pudding, so to speak, and the cars they cranked out in the 70's and early 80's were just what they were, garbage. Imports forced them to rethink what they were doing, yet as is common with well entrenched and overgrown corporations, the winds of change blew too softly, and they were passed up. Here in Dayton, we have multiple Delphi plants, of which one and possibly two are in serious jeopardy of closure. The former GM Truck & Bus assembly plant just received word that the third shift will be shut down. This facility assembles many GM SUV's, large and small, along with small trucks. This plant's chief rival, a plant in Oklahoma is slated to be closed completely. Both GM and Ford were guilty as charged for riding the SUV craze with little else to offer that they could profit from. One loud sound bite has come from GM Corporate that has barely raised a ripple on the scene so far was that the health care system in the USA is broken due to the never ending rapidly escalating cost of health care. This is the first thing they targeted as needing major reduction in cost along with wages. What I find totally perplexing is that I read sometime back that of the top 20 (based upon economic measurement) countries in the world, 19 of them have national health care plans. Only the USA is without. That doesn't mean every one of them is 100% socialized, but in varying degrees, they are. Our system is breaking and we need to fix it. It can remain private, but not without real change, real ideas, and real solutions that are fair to both the insured, to the provider, and to the employers who provide this benefit. It may be bad news for the Law profession, those that practice litigation in this area, but the bleeding has to stop. This issue is only going to get larger and more troublesome as time passes. I submit that we've already stayed the course too long, just as GM and Ford did with product that isn't meeting the requirements of the marketplace. Yet, this is a subject for another day, another forum, and another post/thread.

This thread is abolutely pitiful. That anyone can defend TO at this point is indicative of what's gone wrong with our country. To begin, there's comparisons of apples to oranges, selective memories, and a bit of revisionist history being thrust upon us here. There's comment that somehow McNabb showed TO disrespect by not jumping up and down and doing cartwheels when it became apparent that TO would probably play in the SB? What did you expect? McNabb, none the less, gave him the ultimate in respect by putting his feelings aside and by thowing TO the ball a good number of times, if I recall correctly. This meant the team and winning came first, just as it should be. May I ask, what did TO do in return when the game was over? Nevermind, we all know what he did. He began blasting McNabb publicly every chance he got and to anyone who would listen. TO then decided that last year's signing bonus he got from the Eagles was so nice, he wanted another. Renegotiating a contract, one year after signing and darned good contract, is way out of line. The Eagles basically said no, which was just and proper. TO responds by amplifying his attack against McNabb, and then extends it to a coach and earns, repeat, earns time off for his outburst. Yet, when he came back and the season began, there was McNabb again throwing him the ball, frequently, placing the team and winning above his personal feelings for TO again, just as it should be. Throughout this whole ordeal, McNabb has shown amazing restraint in his comments towards TO, who on the other hand has shown none. The demons inside TO still couldn't let it go. He then throws a tantrum because the Eagles disrespected him by not showering him with honors for his 100th TD. Big surprise there TO as you've done just about everything one could do to get the Eagles to wish you away. Still not finished, he decides to pick a fight with Hugh Douglas, and offers himself to anyones else that thinks they might want a piece of him. So TO, already on notice by the team previously, is suspended, which was just and overdue. TO's only enemy is himself, no one else. He made his bed, now lie in it. To compare this, even loosely, to the bickering Bills of 1989 is an extreme reach and borders upon absurdity. Kelly, Reed, and Thomas didn't go after any coaches as did TO, none of them blasted the Bills organization for a lack of recognition for personal honors, none of them got into a locker room fight and then asked if anyone else there wanted a piece of him, etc., etc., etc. I'm no McNabb fan. To me, he's a great athlete who's playing 15-20 lbs heavier than he should be, and a QB who's not the most accurate passer. Yet, he is a competitor, a team player, and someone who showed remarkable restraint in his statements to or about TO. I wonder how many here could have done the same.

He would only keep RB's that ran with a "slashing" style.

One of the best lines given in an interview...ever....Definitely a top 5.

Actually the 1980-81 teams (Knox) were pretty decent. The best OJ saw in Buffalo was 1973 thru 1975, in which the Bills led the league in scoring in 75 (unfortunately as good as the offense was, the "D" was equally as bad). but those were short spurts. Clearly the Bills best run was from 1988 to 2000. 1975...420 points, OJ had 1817 rush yards and 25 TD's, Jim Braxton 823 rush yards, 2974 team rushing yards (averaged over 200 yards a game on the ground!), Fergie had 25 TD pass and approx 2500 yards, Bobby Chandler with 55 catches and approx 750 yards. This was also a 14 game season back then. They ran at will, could throw anytime (in fact every single player who caught passes for the Bills that year averaged over 10 yards a reception, with the high being JD Hill at 18.5 on 36 catches, although John Holland had over a 20 yard average but on only 7 catches), yet the D was horrible and the Bills finished 8-6. But that was an exciting team to watch. 1st in scoring and total offense, yet 21st in defense.