Bill Swerski

I don't like the Jauron hire either but, he did learn under Mike Holmgren and Tom Coughlin. Two pretty decent head coaches.

Odds are that Jauron will bring in some of his assistants from his Chicago days. John Shoop should be waiting by the phone...he was just let go as the Raiders QB coach after Norv was fired. He should be ready to rejoin Jauron as they were very tight. Gary Crowton might get a call from Jauron as they are close and Crowton is currently the QB Coach and OC at Oregon. He runs an imaginitive spread offense that is a bit gimmicky but makes the most out of limited offensive talent. Greg Olson who served as QB coach in Chicago as well as Detroit will get consideration. Greg Blache was Jauron's DC in Chicago and is currently the DL coach in Washington, he'll be getting a call. Anyone from the Holmgren/Mariucci/Coughlin coaching tree that is currently unemployed or could use a promotion, will be getting a call from Jauron. Coaches like familiarity with their staffs, I assume Jauron will be no different.

If a porn star would ever show up in Buffalo, he probably would.

Let's start with Evans. The scouting reports (Scouts, Inc.) that I have seen point to Evans being an erratic route runner with average hands. He certainly has a world of potential and route running skills are part instinct and partly a product of chemistry with a QB. Knowing how to break off a route, when and how to make double moves, and putting your body in position to make a catch are skills learned over time. Evans is still young and has a tremendous amount of upside, that is not in doubt. The exact same things were said of Dez White and David Terrell in Chicago. Evans is much more mature than Terrell and has a similar pedigree to Dez White. To this point, the Bills have done a better job of utilizing the deep speed of Evans whereas the Bears misused White as the primary target on their 3 yard WR screen offense. Evans looks good but, lets wait another year or two before anointing him to be anything better than an above average WR. As for Booker v. Moulds...both WR's have great hands, run solid routes and have the type of speed that makes them quality middle of the field WR's. Eric Moulds is seen in Buffalo as a WR1 whereas outside of Buffalo, that's not really the case anymore. He is at his best when he has a talented WR opposite of him that can force the safeties to cheat away from him. If he is forced into double coverage or is found in the middle of the field with a safety creeping, he is pretty much a useless WR. Moulds has a lot of trouble getting seperation off the line and lacks the deep speed he had his first few years in the league. At this point in Moulds' career, there isn't a whole lot of difference between he and Marty Booker. Since there's a 90% chance that Moulds will be playing elsewhere next season, it's really academic anyhow... Jauron's offense requires a blocking TE, so Campbell fits the bill pretty well. The Bears never had anything above pedestrian talent at TE either. I guess I consider starting TE's with no discernible skill at any facet of the game to be pretty useless. Campbell is average at everything and excels at nothing. Kevin Everett is a pass catching TE with below average blocking skills, he's not a real solid fit in this offense unless Jauron hired someone outside his Chicago crew as the OC. McGahee is nothing more than an average RB. Perhaps saying this is verboten in Buffalo but he has no burst through the hole and is too tentative and indecisive behind the line. Watching objectively, I fail to see the difference between Willis McGahee and Anthony Thomas. They are both North/South runners with little ability to get to the edge or get through the second level of the defense when they have the opportunity. Does he have room to get better? I don't know, it depends on his level of desire and whether or not he will finally regain the burst he had pre-injury. Holcomb is indeed a legit level #2 QB in the NFl, absolutely. He has the type of talent that gets you through a few games when your starter goes down and makes everyone feel warm and fuzzy that he's on the bench. He's a well liked presence in the locker room by all accounts and is a real team player. Exactly like Frank Reich, Alex Van Pelt, and yes, Jim Miller. Jim was a guy with just enough talent to make you think he could lead a winning team. He was also the victim of two traumatic injuries that robbed him of his skills. The torn achilles in 2000 and the torn rotator cuff in 2002 cut shirt a career that was remarkably similar to Kelly Holcomb's. As for JP vs. McNown...both were acquired in odd draft day trades, they were both extremely cocky young QB's who were handed their jobs without real competition, were disliked by the veterans, had popular vets behind them on the depth chart (Miller/Holcomb), were mobile with strong arms, and were too agressive for their own good during games. The similarities between Losman and McNown are absolutely striking. Does Losman have time to resurrect his career? Perhaps. He is gonna have to win the job in competition, learn to be a leader, and learn humility. Does Jauron have a good track record with young QB's? Absolutely not. The OL in Buffalo needs to be blown up. Start with dumping Bennie Anderson, Chris Villarial, and Mike Gandy. Move Trey Teague to OG, keep Jason Peters at LT, renegotiate the contract of Mike Williams and move him inside to OG, start Duke Preston at C, and sign a RT in FA. With the proper coaching, you have a relatively young OL that could be halfway decent.

http://www.bearshistory.com/seasons/1999.html

I guess your position on the Jauron hire has a lot to do with where you stand on the Levy hire. If you trust Marv (81 years old and out of football for a decade) to make excellent decisions, you like the Jauron move. If you think Marv was a bad hire (like I do...as do the majority of people outside of Buffalo), then you think hiring Jauron was a bad move.

It was a remarkably cold January day in Chicago and the fans of Chicago were ecstatic that the long and horrible Dave Wannstedt era had mercifully ended. The Bears had cast a wide net in their coaching search and had brought in a bunch of candidates during a "down year" for coaching prospects. Gunther Cunningham, Sherman Lewis, Joe Pendry, Dave McGinnis, and Dick Jauron. We were all hopeful that the McCaskey family would select a quality candidate from the slim pickings of the market. They eventually settled on Dave McGinnis and brought him into town to firm up contract details. McGinnis was a Ditka disciple and had long ties to the Bears franchise. Well, the Bears scheduled a press conference to announce the hiring of McGinnis...too bad he had yet to sign a contract and the Bears were trying to force him into a cheap contract. Needless to say, things didn't work out, the Bears were embarrassed, their doddering old team president was a public joke, and Dick Jauron rode back into town to take the job. He was the second choice of the orgnization, took a wildly low salary, and was about as inspiring to the fanbase as bread pudding. Oddly enough, I think today is the anniversary of that horribly dark day in Bears history... Dick Jauron...always the second choice and always hired because he'll work for peanuts.

Paging John Shoop, Mr. John Shoop, please pick up the white courtesy phone...

In my short time in Buffalo, I learned to love and hate this team as if it were my own.

Jim Haslett - 2000 NFL Coach of the Year Dom Capers - 1996 NFL Coach of the Year Hey! Wayne Fontes once won a Coach of the Year award, perhaps the Bills should have called him too!

No, I emailed that to the guys in studio. They read it? That's surprising...

You mean the one season out of five in which his team did not have a losing season? Smash-mouth running? Err, kinda. I hope you love plays like the 3 yard WR screen, the TE screen, the 4 yard curl, the 2 yard up and in, and most importantly, the punt. These are all big staples of Dick Jauron offenses. Trust me, I watched it for five years in Chicago...it is maddening.

The Bears actually had coffers of talent on the defensive side of the ball. On the offensive side of the ball, this Bills team looks a lot like the Bears teams that Jauron coached. A veteran QB who the vets like but who has little talent (Miller/Holcomb), a young, mobile, strong armed kid QB who everyone hates (McNown/Losman), an overrated RB who has little burst (A-Train/McGahee), one solid veteran at WR (Booker/Moulds), a speedster who runs poor routes and has questionable hands (White/Evans), no talent at TE, and a weak OL. Hell, the Bills even have two of the castoffs from the miserable Bears OL (Gandy/Villarial)! Jauron will probably be "comfortable" with those guys.

Who said I was the GM of any team? I am just detailing my observations and those of other Bears fans when it comes to Jauron's coaching prowess, or lack there of... I do hate the hire, as you will as well. If you're going to hire a proven loser whose notoriety comes from being a "defensive specialist", why hire a guy whose defenses have been mediocre with multiple teams? He was a mediocre DC in three cities, a less than medicocre HC in Chicago, and does nothing to excite the fanbase. He most likely was hired because he's cheap and Marv is "comfortable" with him, much like Donahoe was "comfortable" with Mularkey. I'd rather see a team hire a young guy with a fresh outlook than a recycled bum, what's so wrong with that? FWIW, I'm not advocating a blitz happy defense, especially with the limited talent the Bills have in the defensive backfield. I am also not advocating Jauron's defensive schemes that have proven to be ineffective in three cities. Take it or leave it.

Bill Belichick had little talent on the roster, an owner at war with the city and fans, horrible situation. Jauron had none of those problems.

Well, I lived in Chicago throughout the Dick Jauron era and I can most assuredly tell you that what you have described above has little in common with a Dick Jauron team. His teams were boring, unimaginative, undisciplined, and exceedingly boring to watch. His personality makes Mike Mularkey seem effervescent and effusive. Jauron stonewalls in press conferences, mumbles, and generally makes one wish your team had never hired him. The 13-3 season had very little to do with his coaching, it is referred to in Chciago as the "miracle year" due to the improbable series of events that lead to five wins. The offense was atrocious and the defense was overrated. They played a last place schedule and got lucky...much like this year's Bears team did. The rest of his teams were miserable failures and the players did not enjoy playing for him. His defenses specialized in the "bend but don't break" schemes that were proven ineffective in Jacksonville, Chicago, and Detroit. The day he was fired in Chciago was a great day. This guy is "ol' boys network" hire and I am thoroughly disappointed with Marv's first move. I'd rather the Bills had given a guy like Bobby April or Jim Caldwell a shot rather than this recycled bum. I don't know the reasns as to why Sherman was not hired, nor can I speculate, but Dick Jauron is the wrong hire. Have fun Bills fans, you're gonna f@cking hate Dick Jauron by Week 1 of the preseason.