Dibs

I agree that would be the most obvious choice, except for his contract situation. Cutting SJ now would land us with an additional $8.475M dead cap hit for next season. It makes more sense to me to simply keep him for an additional year, but not as the #1WR. It would be a hell of a gutsy move to make though. If it happens, I'm sure there would be plenty of fans wailing about the bad decision to give him the contract in the first place......but it certainly would make a massive statement that this is a totally new regime that is going to endure some hardships in the short term to get the ship righted for the long term. I'm now eagerly waiting to see just what Brown was referring to....

I think getting Schaub(or a QB similar) would be one of the worst mistakes a team can make. Ignoring the specifics of Schaub's contract status atm(which is relatively high), teams that lock themselves into a QB who is in the above average-good range is a virtual guarantee of not winning the SB. It comes down to a simple question. Would you rather be a regular playoff contender every year and never be good enough to win the SB.....or would you rather languish in mediocrity for however long it takes to find that illusive great QB(or very good QB who has streaks of greatness)?

Perhaps I have revisionist memory here but my view all season has been that Woods makes the tough catches. With all the talk about how polished he is as a route runner, I've been surprised that it has been his hands that have impressed me the most. Again.....perhaps I am not remembering all the plays correctly but in my view Woods looks to become minimally a solid reliable performer for us in the future.

Which guys though? TJ Graham and who else? SJ's contract definitely means he stays. Chandler is a FA. We'd be crazy to get rid of Pears or Legursky as they would make good backups if better starters were found. Bradham?....but again would provide backup ability. Seriously, who would you get rid of?

DOOOOOOOMED!!!!!

I've just finished watching the game & the only things in my head are the sodding OL......and the f@#$%ing refs. I'm not an OL watcher generally when I watch the games......but to me it felt like this was the worst performance by a Bills OL in a good handful of seasons. Absolutely disgusting! Though Manuel had a bad day....if the OL played as poorly today as I thought they did....he gets a little bit of leeway in my mind. That combined with the most infuriatingly frustrating ticky-tacky horrid calls(non calls) by the refs when he finally seemed to get in a rhythm......

You must have missed my reply to you the last time you made this claim. Here it is again with Tannehill added. All QB performances against Jets this season: Brady(2nd game) 22-46-228-0-1 (4 sack for 23 yds) QBR 53.5 Freeman 15-31-210-1-1 (3 sacks for 25 yds) QBR 67.9 Brady(1st game) 19-39-185-1-0 (1 sack for 7 yds) QBR 71.0 Manuel(1st game) 19-42-243-1-0 (8 sacks for 85 yds) QBR 71.8 Brees 30-51-382-2-2 (2 sacks for 16 yds) QBR 79.0 Tannehill 28-43-331-2-1 (1 sack for 3 yds) QBR 94.2 Flacco 17-26-273-1-1 (4 sacks for 28 yds) QBR 97.1 Ryan 36-45-319-2-0 (2 sacks for 12 yds) QBR 113.1 Roethlisberger 23-30-264-1-0 (4 sacks for 24 yds) QBR 113.8 Manuel(2nd game) 20-28-245-2-0 (1 sack for 0 yds) QBR 121.9 Locker/Fitz 21-32-257-4-0 (2 sacks for 13 yds) QBR 131.9 Dalton 19-30-325-5-1 (1 sack for 2 yds) QBR 141.7 This doesn't prove he will be good.....and none of his stats prove that he will be good, bad, horrible or great.......but it does prove that he had more than a modest performance against the Jets when compared to other QB performances against them. Please, give a player his dues when he earns them.

It's not a bad assumption to make though. FJ is the 2nd oldest RB in the league(likely will be the oldest next season)......and CJ will be a FA in 2015. Even if CJ is re-signed we will need somebody of quality to replace FJ to compliment him. It might not be all about the RB position.....but it makes sense that they are thinking about the future of the RB position at this time.

He said "to a certain degree". I generally agree with this. I tend to think that great weapons can help a decent QB look good....and a good QB sometimes look great. But with a great QB(who has matured into greatness), he will perform well regardless of his weapons(ala Brady early this year) & will usually make decent players look good.....and good players look great(perhaps even HOF level great). I'm thinking the point being that we want EJ to develop into a truly great QB rather than merely a good one as that would give the best chance of winning the SB.

I wasn't implying that the Saints had no plan to sign Graham(in fact I said that re-signing him was the most likely outcome)......just that their cap situation is a lot worse than previous years, which may lead them to the decision not to re-sign. Usually when teams are in tight cap situations, they use future money to pay for today's players. Teams can keep doing this for a while.....but invariably it catches up to a team's cap. As example.....using the 6 players you have mentioned. (Brees, Grubbs, Lofton, Lewis, Colston, Bunkley). Their combined 2013 cap figure is $34.11M Their combined 2014 cap figure is $51.66M (Which is the main reason why they are very tight next season) Their combined 2015 cap figure is $66.66M The cap will start increasing again in 2015 so that should help them, but as it stands, re-signing Graham will make things extraordinarily tight for them, likely meaning the loss of several other good starting players.

Ironically, had the accident victim's family not made a fuss about it.....nobody would have known nor cared who the driver was.

I'm going to be a homer on this and say that Robey only grabbed the jersey after the WR pushed him.

I think the Chandler argument is quite similar to that of SJ. The state of the league atm is that there are quite few consistently good-very good TEs or WRs. Compared to the average starting TE, Chandler is likely right amongst the pack......as would SJ be with #1 WRs. Most starters at their positions have flaws. Good at one thing, bad at another.....inconsistent.....streaky in performance.....great when things are going well but horrible when they aren't.....play poorly when most needed.....injury prone......etc, etc, etc. IMO both Chandler and SJ are assets to the Bills because it is obviously difficult to find players that play to the level above where SC & SJ are.

I don't think I'll win twice. You aren't on my block list & I don't recall thinking strong negative things about your posts. It's silly to leave this loving comradery of supportive and friendly Bills fans(ahem) just because you backed the likely outcome in a situation and it ends up being wrong. If Graham hits FA.....stay....have a beer.

Kennedy: 14 in 1992 Randle: 15.5 in 1997 Sapp: 16.5 in 2000 Not much chance of record being broken this year.

I'll drink to that!

I don't doubt that that is what they would like to do......and likely will do. Their cap situation however is so tenuous that one would have to assume that there is a reasonable chance that they won't re-sign Graham. Cutting Smith and Harper would see them roughly at the 2014 cap level. The FA losses they need to replace apart from Graham are starting players.......FS(Jenkins), RT(Strief), C(Puente), LB(Haralson), LT(Brown), FB(Collins) With the injured LB(Vilma) as an additional FA......plus good role player/backup guys of DE(Johnson), WR(Meachem), FS(Bush), QB(McCown), OT(Harris), CB3(Carr) Graham could quite easily find himself a legitimate cap casualty.

Would this be the most aggressive defense in Bills history? It seems the polar opposite of the old "bend but don't break" D that was used here not so long back. Often, this D appears to be a "break or break" D. Either we break through for a sack or cause a turnover......or the opposition breaks out a big play or TD. I'm starting to think that we are perhaps a tad too aggressive sometimes.

Chandler was utilized more this season when EJ was QB than any previous season. In his 8 games with EJ he has amassed 27-328-1. Over 16 games that would be 54-656-2 which would be career high catches and yards.

Though I think that sometimes there is unrealistic optimism after a season there is more often solid base realism by people stating just how far away we are from being competitive. The situation atm is greatly different IMO. The 2011 off-season we were looking for 12 starters(and major contributors). SS, CBx3, DEx2, LBx3, QB, WR3, OT Last off-season we were looking for 11 starters(and major contributors). SS, CB2, CB3, LBx3, DE, QB, OG, WR2, WR3 This off-season we will likely be only looking for 4 starters(and major contributors). LB, OG, RT, TE. That isn't to say that there are players who we couldn't improve on outside of those 4 positions.....but players like Urbik & SJ are all of a level higher than those mentioned that have needed replacing. Realistically TE & RT could be added to the previous two years lists but it is only now that we can think of replacing okay(but not solid-good) players.

Surely the hiring of Marrone was due to the GMs influence? Am I wrong on this? ......and as one can't really assess the success/failure of the Marrone hire at this point in time, doesn't it become mute at this point in regards to grading Brandon. Essentially you have given Brandon a C- based upon the concept that he has brought in an analytics department & that you don't like his pedigree. I would think it impossible to give Brandon any sort of grade at this point in time.

Thanks, that all sounds about right. I'm thinking that we were perhaps lucky that Spiller was limited by injuries this season. Locking him up in the off-season or early next season might save us a lot of money down the road. Interestingly.....and most likely due to the old rookie contract numbers....Spiller's current contract is 13th highest in average/year. http://www.overthecap.com/top-player-salaries.php?Position=RB I wouldn't like to guess what he might be worth to re-sign at the moment(or up to early next season) but as long as it's not in the elite level(top 2 Peterson, Johnson) it won't be too much increase over what he has already been paid. .....and paying him early should also reduce the future cap costs.

I still blame Cancer Man for most of these events. He hates the Bills, has access to incredible alien technology, and is obviously still using it to thwart us to this day. As long as he lives....

That is so true. That area along the five yard line is deceptively flat.

I personally think that he should have gotten a lot more production out of FJ and CJ when they were injured or couldn't play.......and far more out of SJ and Woods on the weeks that they were injured or couldn't play as well. The incompetence is staggering.