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From what I have been told by DirecTV reps, if you are in WNY AND have Center Ice you will be able to see the games on the Center Ice channels (773 for tonight's game) as DirecTV claims Rochester / East have Anger/Slander/Evil as their home market and Buffalo has Pens as home market. This contradicts what I have always understood the NHL blackout policy to be, but I have been told that by at least 3 of their customer service reps / supervisors. However, until / unless something gets worked out between DTV and MSG you will not be able to see the Sabres pre/post game shows as they typically are not carried on Center Ice. Dave.

I don't think they'd have a problem selling the new B&G. The issue is what do you do with 1,000 Black Noronnen sweaters. Dave.

As near as I can tell, there's nothing to the story. He dumped the stock 1 month before it tanked but put works in motion to drop it from his blind trust 2 months earlier at the behest of critics who didn't want him owning it. Doesn't appear to be a lot of smoke there, but I guess time will tell. Dave.

Huh? Dave.

There is no way that Ralph would ever hire Polian back, even if the Colts were dumb enough to allow him to be available. Ralph's buddy and head accountant hated Polian and vice versa (personality issues, not financial ones); Ralph sided with the accountant as Ralph didn't like Polian's attitude very much either. I would definitely like to see Polian back. Especially when you consider that Polian was instrumental in developing the Salary Cap. Dave.

I will agree that Wade had a very strong loyalty to his friend, but there is NO WAY that guy should have been anywhere near an NFL sideline. Ronnie Jones took one of the best special teams units in the league and made it just about the worst. Wade had no problem with making DeHaven the scape goat for the home run throw forward and then replacing him with a guy with no special teams experience. He should have been willing to tell his friend, "hey, sorry, we tried. Go back to college for a few years, get some more experience and maybe I can bring you in as a quality control coach." Actually, the ST coach he should have refused to fire was DeHaven. Didn't Wade want to move Jones to Linebackers Coach? I can just imagine how that thought process must have worked. "Well, we've got a good linebacking corp, heck they're almost as good as special teams used to be. Ronnie can't f*** that one up, can he?" Sorry Wade, I think he could have. Overall, I think Wade did a good job. It's a d*mn shame that one more than likely illegal fluke play ended up lining up the dominoes on him. Dave.

Might work. More likely though, it would cause the companies to only provide insurance to top executives as the added cost of insuring the "masses" would exceed the value of the deduction for the employees they were currently providing insurance. Dave.

Agreed about making adjustments on the fly (4-3, 3-4 who do we have who's healthy? and he made it work). The thing that doomed Wade was the Home Run Throw Forward. If that doesn't happen, Bruce DeHaven is STILL the Bills' special teams coach and idiot boy with the cones is still an assistant college coach or pool boy or whatever but not an assistant with the Bills. And Wade would never have been put in the position of defending idiot boy or keeping his job. He probably would have lost his job a couple of years later when the wheels fell off in the salary cap purge, but he wouldn't have been gone before Donahoe showed up. It didn't help Wade with the "disciples" that he couldn't get Dickerson off his case about wearing headphones. (The funny thing about that is I was going through an old junk drawer and found the Wade Phillips tickets that the Bills gave out at the Rams game and Wade was wearing headphones on those.) Dave.

That sounds pretty reasonable as to why throws are going high. Any idea on how they can speed up his getting comfortable in the pocket and stepping into the throw? (I mean other than getting the O-Line to give him some time back there on a regular basis!) Would running some designed rollouts WITH the protection moving with him help? Thanks, Dave.

You're absolutely right. Sheldon should have caught the ball on that pass. JP has made some good throws this season (the long one to Evans in the first game comes to mind immediately), it's just that he seems to be overthrowing most of his passes (it may just be the beer remembering the high throws and not the others, but I definitely have a perception that his throws tend to be higher or wider than necessary). Going back to my original post in this thread, I was wondering if there was anything the coaching staff could work with him on (if in fact he really is overthrowing a significant portion of his throws) or if it is something that he just has to work through by getting more experience on the field. Dave.

It's not just the long ones he seems to overthrow. Most throws - short, medium, and long, SEEM to me to be either wildly overthrow or thrown at the head of the receiver. If he could get his target lowered about 18 inches, I'd expect to see him completing more passes, especially given the way he rockets the ball. Dave.

It's my understanding that it is just the Sabres games and pre/post game shows that were picked up by Dish. Your best bet would be to check programming guide on Wednesday to see what channel the game will be shown on. I'm dealing with the opposite problem currently. I have DirecTV which gets MSG, but DirecTV and MSG haven't negotiated a deal for the Sabres games back feeds. So I get MSG, but no Sabres as of yet. Dave.

It's hard for me to really comment on that one, as he's only seemed to have time to throw on a handful of occassions. Dave.

If you quadrupled the number of them, especially w/ reducing their salaries; law of supply and demand says it gets cheaper to bribe a congressman. Demand has remained constant; supply has increased and marginal cost of bribe the market setting bribee is willing to take has likely gone down as well. You would get even less accomplished, and pork-laden bills just got a lot more pork in them as you now have many more congresscritters to feed at the trough. In theory, it would make the govt. more representative and responsive as each congresscritter would now represent a smaller constituency; but reality is - the cluster f*** gets worse, not better. I know you were just joking, but that is a horrible idea. Dave.

Actually, what I think it is the guy showing he's a pretty good politician, democratic opinion that he's the stupidest thing this side of Jessica Simpson aside. If Miers gets confirmed, then he has someone HE knows extremely well and feels comfortable with on the Supreme Court. I have to assume that he feels very comfortable with how he expects her to rule on issues that he considers important. If she gets shot down, due most likely to her never having been a judge, then he gets to nominate someone else - quite possibly Rogers Brown who by all accounts I have read (and no I have not seen details of her decisions) is very STAUNCHLY conservative who the Democrats will now have an even harder time defeating IMHO. I think the Democrats would be extremely reluctant to filibuster or vote down 2 nominees within one year of an election for fear of being viewed as strictly obstructionist. So do the Democrats give him a pass on a nominee that they have very little paper trail to follow, hoping she turns into another Souter; or do they fight tooth and nail with the very strong possibility that someone who is known to be more conservative is waiting in the wings? Either way, I think Bush "wins" this "fight". Dave.

Watching JP for the last 4 games, I've been getting just as frustrated as a lot of other posters and I'm sure the coaches as well. The thing is, it seems to me that most of JP's misses seem to be overthrows on passes to the middle of the field and too throwing too wide on sideline patterns (I know there are a few underthrows, but they seem to be in the minority.) Most of the drops and catches as well seem to be up near the target's head, not down on the numbers. The announcers have mentioned on several occasions that JP seems to have too much adrenalin or is getting too pumped up for the games. If he is in fact overthrowing the ball predominantly, what can the coaches do to try to get him to lower the throws a little, without taking the velocity off the ball? Could the coaches get him loaded up on caffeine in the practices so he's as wired in them as he is in the games? Could they have the receivers line up on practice plays a yard or 2 short of the line of scrimmage and have them run the route as if they had lined up at the line of scrimmage, so that when they run the route in the game it ends up where JP is throwing the ball? These suggestions are more in jest than serious, but the question is serious: what can they do to change JP's preparation to reduce the overthrows, if anything? Or do they just have to let the season progress and as he gets more comfortable in there, he'll stop overthrowing? Thanks, Dave.

The Bills have given up 47.1% on 3rd down. That is 28th in the league and barely out of last place (worst is 50%). The Bills offense has major problems at this point in time and all the 3 and outs in the Tampa heat & humidity and other games definitely did not help the D, but the D isn't helping itself. They have to get off the field when they put themselves in a position to do it. Currently they are not. Especially if the other team is playing it close to the vest, I'd expect their 3rd down percentages to be much better if they were a very good defense. They still have 12 more games and the next two are very winnable. Unfortunately, until the D steps it up on 3rd down and the O finds its bearings, the Bills will have great difficulty winning any games. Dave.

Looks like Bush will announce tonight at 8:00 Eastern that current White House counsel Harriet Miers as nominee to fill the O'Conner vacancy. Link It'll be interesting to see how this one plays out. You know the cry of cronyism will be heard loud and strong. Also, I expect cries about how she isn't even a judge, even though it appears a few Senators of both parties recommended to Bush to choose someone outside the current judiciary. Dave.

I was pretty ticked as well when he decided to punt. The thing is, that was MM showing that he had no faith in either QB to move the ball. Even if Holcomb had made the 1st down (pretty unlikely considering what had been going on the previous couple of series), I don't think MM thought that he could get the ball moved down field in any reasonably efficient manner. Remember, Holcomb still needed to lead 2 scoring drives. While it was an extremely long shot that the D would hold NO 3 and out, he did have 2 prayers left after Moorman made an excellent punt. The 1st was Aaron Brooks has had a tendency to play, shall we say, erratically in pressure situations in the past. If Brooks fumbles or has a mental meltdown and goes into the endzone on a sack, then the O only needs a score to either win or tie (depending upon how many points Brooks gives the Bills). The other prayer was that, assuming the Bills held NO, Clements or Smith could run the punt back. Then, if the Bills get an onsides kick, again they only need 1 score to win. While the likelihood of either occuring, especially with the way the D has played in the 4th quarter of the last 2 games, were extremely slim, it looks to me like MM thought they gave him a better chance than a reasonably long 4th down attempt. That MM had no faith in the O at this point of the game is roughly as troubling to me as the horrid play of the D on 3rd down and in the 4th Q. Dave.

Didn't all 3 Sabres goalies end up in a fight with the Flyers goalie that year? Or was Dom's the previous year? Shields actually won HIS fight. Dom didn't get creamed, but he never could get his blocker off. Dave.

Robby was definitely not a goon. I never once saw him go after someone from behind nor hit a guy while he was down. (Brad May on the other hand....) Also, Rob could actually play on a 3rd line on occasion. I remember several games in the Aud when Rob was "checking" Jagr and Jagr was afraid to even come near the puck, because whenever he did, Rob hammered him. Dave.

If you're looking for a more generic type menu, the Brew Pub is very good and has an excellent selection of beers (their own and others). If you are looking for more "Buffalo specific food", Schwabl's (789 Center Rd, just off Union several blocks south of the Airport) has excellent Beef on Weck. Expect to wait a fairly long time if you try to go in the evening. Duff's on Sheridan has excellent wings. Dave.

Justice Kennedy manufactured a "national concensus" opposing the execution of 16 & 17 year olds by adding (rather arbitrarily) the 12 states that have no death penalty to the minority (18 out of 38) of states that have the death penalty for adults rather than juveniles. The majority did not consider whether the states without a death penalty treat 16 & 17 year olds as adults in criminal matters which would have been more instructive to determining whether there is a national concensus on the issue. He and the other 4 justices are making stuff up as they go along on this one. You are correct in that Kennedy explicitly states that the majority views were based upon their own interpretation of the 8th amendment, but Kennedy does go out of his way to point out where international laws support this view. (I can't believe I actually wasted the time it took to read the decision and dissents.) Considering Kennedy invented the national concensus he is using to interpret the 8th amendments and also rambles about this country's "evolving standards of decency", I am not overly impressed with his statements that international law did not shape majority opinion but merely supports it. Neither, I might add, did 3 of the dissenters find much merit in his statements regarding international opinion. Even if I grant you that the international opinion did not factor into the decision, I still cannot see where Scalia in the minority was not following constitutional law and the majority was (which was the original assertation in the post I was responding to). Dave.

Let me know if you get anything back other than a form letter thanking you for your concern about the wonderful democratic process. I'd be shocked if you get any legitimate response. Dave.

Yeaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa!!!! I really don't want to go back to Time Warner. Thanks for the update. Dave.