Albany,n.y.

The advantage we have with Fox televising the game over other NY State cities is that the owners of Albany's Fox station also televise the Bills preseason games. I'm guessing the Bills preseason games aren't on the Fox station in Syracuse. Even though the Jets have a bigger fan base than the Bills, only the Giants & Bills had their preseason games on TV in Albany. Even with all their winning seasons and being a lot closer than Buffalo, NE is still a distant 4th in the market here, but they did con a radio station into carrying their games while the Bills haven't been on Albany radio in years. At one time the Bills were carried on Albany's strongest radio station that you can get pretty far along the east coast. As soon as we start winning again, Bills games will return to Albany radio. The ranking of fans in Albany is: 1) NYG 2) NYJ 3)Bills 4) NE 5)Whichever team is in vogue to jump on their bandwagon. The reason the Bills rank 3rd is even though we're influenced by NYC, because there is a combination of students & state employees who came here from WNY (and some of the students stayed) we'll always stay ahead of NE in the fanbase because there aren't a lot of New Englanders in Albany compared with WNY refugees.

Albany is Bills territory. Obviously Syracuse is not. The local stations know that on a week like this one where there is no competition from the Giants & Jets on the network the Bills are on, they better show the Bills or their switchboard will be bombarded by Bills fans. You just don't have that level of fandom in Syracuse, otherwise you'd have the game. It makes perfect sense that Albany gets the game to those who know Albany-you are not among the people who know anything about the fans in Albany.

Marty has Alzheimers. He can't coach anymore and may have been showing signs after his UFL stint:https://www.kansascity.com/sports/spt-columns-blogs/vahe-gregorian/article126264229.html

The only protest I remember came from Sam Wyche in Tampa. Christie signed as a plan B free agent. Back in those days teams would put their kickers & punters into the plan B pool in order to save roster spots of regular positional players. Christie signed with the Bills after he had promised Sam Wyche that he wouldn't be leaving Tampa. There was no Buffalo exemption in Christie's promise as was stated above-if that was the case Tampa would have protected Christie. Wyche was PO'd saying Christie lied to him. I'm close to 300 miles away, so I can't say for certain that there weren't protesters, but I used to read the Buffalo News every day (we used to get it in Albany in the days before papers were available on the internet) and there was nothing I read in the paper about pro Norwood protests. I'm calling BS on the 1,500 protesters. I do recall some wiseguy writing a letter that was published in the Sunday News sports section where he joked that Norwood was asked about his time in Buffalo & replied "I can't kick".

This offseason the Vikings were guilty of something the Bills, to a lesser extent, have been doing for years: Taking a mediocre QB drafted in one of the mid to late rounds and handing him the keys to the franchise & overpaying him. When Cousins became a free agent there were Bills & Jets fans who were each begging their team to bring him in. Fortunately for both teams management (or in the Jets case possibly the luck of him signing elsewhere) decided to do the right thing and bring in a highly touted rookie to build around. We've tried what Minnesota did, giving big money (albeit after an initial cheaper contract) to mediocre QBs like Taylor, Fitzpatrick as well as the ridiculous Rob Johnson trade & big $ signing as well as taking the option on Bledsoe when they could have dumped him sooner rather than later and it cost them big dead cap $. Minnesota dumped all their QBs from last year to bring Cousins in. They might have been better off just re-signing Bridgewater to a similar deal that the Jets gave him prior to his trade to NO and/or paying less for Keenum to return with a deal similar to his Denver contract.

I'm listening to Bucky & Sully on 1270 via the internet and Maiorana is about to join them on the air & has a regular Tuesday spot with them.

To put things in perspective look at Jack Kemp's stats during the Bills 2 championship years of 1964 & 1965: He passed for around 45%, had an average around 2,300 yards & threw almost twice as many picks as TDs. The game and QB stats was very different back then & a QB could win championships with low completion percentages and a TD/INT ratio that had more INTS than TDs. For his time & what he meant to the NFL, Namath is a HOFer.

What many people seem to misunderstand is there is a huge difference between a fan rooting for losses and a team trying to lose. We as fans can root for losses and better draft choices because it is not our jobs to try to win every game. It is the team members and management who need to try to win every game. If a fan wants a higher draft choice instead of a meaningless win, that's the fan's right to do so. If a team tanks, they are disrespecting the game. Nobody who is rooting for a lose out wants the team to go in the tank. If you can't tell the difference you are blurring the line between player and fan. I know I'm not on the team and I have no direct connection whether the team wins or loses. I can root as hard as I want for a win or loss and it means nothing to the actual result.

If the Pats playoff position is locked in, they tank the last game by resting the starters & screw the Jets draft. Win-Win for NE. Half these guys won't even be on the team. There were players on the Super Bowl teams who hated losing because they lost so many games in the mid 1980s. This building a culture of winning by winning games when you still finish under .500 is BS.

They'll be picking around 15th, no reason to trade down-take the best OL, WR or TE. The OP still is thinking we'll be drafting in the top 10-look at the schedule-we won't. I'm almost never in favor of trading down other than getting 1st or high 2nd rounders. You trade a known commodity for an unknown. Fortunately, Beane understands that trading up gives the team an advantage of taking a player the scouts have as worth it who you wouldn't otherwise get if you stand pat.

Sammy Watkins over Khalil Mack was also Whaley's choice. The fact that only John Miller & Shaq Lawson remain from the Whaley drafts has shown Whaley is not GM material. Bengals shooting to be #1: In the 2020 NFL Draft.

It was only a very cold day to a Floridian? It was warm enough that when there was a mist it was rain & not snow or freezing rain. I've been to a lot colder games.

At the game. I still have the program & ticket stub

The trade was another winner for Beane, get a 2nd and a 1 year CB rental for a guy with an injury history on the last year of his contract that precludes an extension due to said injury history. Add in the 3rd he got for Tyrod, also on the last year of a bloated contract, and throw in what will be a very high 5th for a QB outplayed and beaten out by Peterman in camp and I can easily forgive the 3rd he traded for Benjamin, whose TD vs Indy helped break the playoff drought.

The Bills now have 12 rookies on the roster and another on IR. Great job by Beane acquiring young talent through the draft, free agency & great use of the practice squad getting guys on there & then bringing them up after some seasoning. Now maybe only half or a little bit more than half will be long term Bills players, but his record in 1 year already shows how superior he is to all the GMs we've had this century.

This reminds me of the time I bought a new Audi and kept my beat up old VW Golf with the drivers side held together with bolts & Bondo for the 1st winter. When I drove the VW I'm sure the other drivers had a whole different opinion of me than when I drove the Audi. I was thinking of getting a bumper sticker to put on the VW saying "My other car is a new Audi" just because it really was but never did. The problem with the VW was that if it got wet it would stall out whenever the car stopped for a light. I once got stuck in a traffic jam where it was continually stalling and got a lot of grief from the people behind me. All I could think of was I should have driven in the Audi that day.

No way. Imagine the NY media if the Jets hired a guy fired by Jacksonville after a double digit loss season. The GM would be run out of town on a rail. The Jets are going to play to the media & hire a big name like one of the Harbaughs or McCarthy. They're not bringing in a rookie coach again unless they feel that Darnold needs continuity and promote Bates.

The worst team we played all year was the Jets who on that day didn't have their heads in the game from the very 1st play through the end. If the Jets are as listless in Orchard Park as they were in NJ, Barkley will end up playing in the 4th quarter with the Bills up by 40 and Allen resting on the sidelines to protect him from cheap shots late.

I'm in the same boat. I've been that way with most of the QBs the Bills drafted over the years since the Kelly era. I ended up dumping my hopes quickly on most of them, the quickest being JP followed by EJ. JP was my quickest because I thought Trent Edwards was going to be great. I was at the NE game when Wolfork took out JP and I stood up & said "Don't get up". I cheered Edwards entrance and went so far as telling the NE fans I had talked with earlier that Trent in for JP was the Bills equivalent of Brady in for Bledsoe. It took another 2 years for me to give up on Trent. In the end he entered a game & I said that it would end with a quick injury exit and I invoked the name of Rob Johnson. Shortly after Edwards left the game injured. When Tyrod signed as a free agent I figured he was an adequate place holder who would be better than EJ & Cassell, and would beat them out in their 1st camp together, but I always felt he was just a guy who you're always trying to replace with a real franchise QB. I never saw anything to get excited about with Peterman & when he got overhyped before the LA start (which I had the misfortune of attending) I started referring to him as Nathan Marangi because there were people who said he had to be an improvement over Tyrod and it brought me back to the 1970s when fans wanted Marangi to replace Ferguson and finally got their wish when Fergy got hurt and Marangi set records of futility that still stand today, even though Peterman did worse in some categories before his release. What I want to see from a rookie QB are flashes of brilliance. Allen is already providing that & I'm super optimistic. I'm so optimistic I bought his jersey after the Vikings game. Right now I feel like it's 1986 all over again, that we've found our QB for the next decade or more. I hope he's a lot more Kelly than Todd, Rob, JP, Trent and EJ. If he doesn't work out there's always another QB to draft down the road but the rest of the season & going into next year, I'll be pretty psyched up every time I see 17 out there.

You definitely need a new kicker. Crosby is too inconsistent to count on.

Personally, I think the TD/Int ratio is a horrible stat. A better stat is total TD drives attained. If a QB drives the team all the way into the redzone & the team scores by the QB throwing an easy TD, how is that any more significant than a TD drive that ends in a rush instead of a throw? Also INTs have a context too. Obviously throwing a pick 6 deep in his own territory is a lot more egregious than throwing an INT on a Hail Mary that ends the half . I suggest total TD drives/significant INTS that lead to points by the opponent as a much more meaningful measure than simple TD/INT ratios.

1 more win and the team surpasses Kelly's 1986 4-12 record, and Kelly came here with 2 years of USFL experience. Some of us want to enjoy thoughts of future seasons of 12 or more victories led by Allen while others are always looking to find negatives in everything. The main objective for a team is to be a champion or at least be a championship contender. If all you want to do is think the team will never attain that status, I advise you find another team pretty soon that looks like they're about to stink for the next decade because you won't be happy when the Bills start compiling double digit wins year after year. Your best choice may be the Cincinnati Bengals who have an out of touch owner and if they do hire Hue Jackson are almost guaranteed seasons of futility until he is fired again. Why would you say that when if you're watching games it's pretty obvious that one of Allen's strengths already is above average ball security? He's thrown 1 meaningful INT in his 2 games back.

I'll be concerned about beating the Patriots when 1st place is on the line. It's not this year. If we beat the Pats because Allen played lights out & outplayed Brady, I'm all for it, but the only thing I care about the last 4 games is Allen's development.

I think one of the reasons is the team has had too much instability at the backup QB position. Maybe if Barkley signs a multi-year contract and they can count on him as being the clear #2 QB, then we can have the backup QB holding. However, if Bojorquez is the punter next year, he'll probably hold as long as he understands the difference between a FG and a fake. .

Instead of calling ownership intellectually deficient, take a look in the mirror. When did they pass on Cowher?