Albany,n.y.

"I'm a uniter, not a divider." George W. Bush aka "The Great Divider"

All reports are greatly appreciated by those of us not in Rochester. You have all confirmed my worst fears about Gandy. The sooner this guy is sent packing the better. Then we can find out if Teague, Peters, McFarland or even Gudmundsen can be our LT. I think once Tucker is ready, Teague will move to LT & they'll see how Teague, Anderson, Tucker, Villarial & Williams look as a line.

JP will be fine. Gandy will be benched and gone soon enough.

Holcomb better outplay JP, because as stated above Holcomb will not be playing against the other team's starters. This bodes well for the preseason w-l record since we have a better 2nd sting QB than the other teams-that usually translates into exhibition wins. A few other thoughts: All you people calling JP a rookie who will struggle are being moronic, unless you believe he's a bust. The idea that 1st year starting QBs struggle makes no sense and is disputed by the facts. Here's a list of some NFL starting QBs who started in their 2nd season after seeing limited action their 1st year: Tom Brady-Won the Super Bowl as a 1st year starter-his 2nd season in the NFL after riding the bench in his 1st Kurt Warner-won the Super Bowl as a 1st year starter-his 2nd season in the NFL after riding the bench in his 1st (and don't throw in the NFLE & arena crap) Daunte Culpepper-led his team to the NFL championship game as a 1st year starter-his 2nd season in the NFL after riding the bench in his 1st Michael Vick-Led his team to a Wild Card spot & beat GB in GB in the 1st round afyer starting only 2 games as a rookie Aaron Brooks-After Jeff Blake's injury, started the final 5 games, leading NO to a division championship & a playoff win before losing to fellow sophomore Culpepper. Rode the bench his 1st year in GB. There also Donnovan McNabb, who started 6 games as a rookie & led his team in his 2nd year to a wild card & 1st round win. Kerry Collins who started 13 games in his rookie year, performed well for a 1st year expansion team & had his team in the NFC championship game in his 2nd. Ben Roethlisberger who led his team to the NFL's best record before losing the AFC championship to NE in his pure rookie year. Byron Leftwich, who started 13 games his rookie year after missing a lot of camp with a holdout without a lot of struggling. Even Shaun King was able to win playoff games in his pure rookie season before falling to St Louis and 1st year starter Warner in the NFC championship game Drew Bledsoe may have struggled a bit as a rookie starter, but most of his career has been spent underachieving. Rex Grossman looked good as a pure rookie when given starts late in the year & got hurt his 2nd year & the jury is still out on his career. Carson Palmer may have struggled a bit before coming on in the 2nd half before his injury, but he is the exception, not the rule. About the only other players I found who did struggle were the Manning boys, both on lousy teams. Peyton led the turmaround to a division title in year 2. Kyle Boller -who has and will always struggle until he's bounced out of the league-ditto Joey Harrington & Patrick Ramsey. David Carr has played about the same, so it's hard to say what the problem is other than his supporting cast. So if you think JP is going to be a quality or better NFL starter, don't expect him to struggle-the struggling 1st year starters on decent teams are few and far between. If they stuggle as 1st year starting sophomores, they usually are busts or marginal players.

Matthews is the oldest at 35, born 6/1/70

In the NFLE draft, sure.

WR Roscoe Parrish -Yes TE Kevin Everett –PUP, mid season yes OL Duke Preston -Yes CB Eric King -Yes OL Justin Geisinger -Yes RB Lionel Gates -Yes UDFA WR Tony Brown, Tennessee-No TE Brad Cieslak, Northern Illinois-No ILB Liam Ezekiel, Northeastern-PS WR Therrian Fontenot, Fresno State-No DE George Gause, South Carolina-Yes FB Jon Goldsberry, Purdue-PS OG Geir Gudmundsen, Albany (N.Y.)-PS OLB Wendell Hunter, California-PS CB Rob Lee, Northern Illinois-No SS Daniel Leger, Colorado School of the Mines-No FS Jim Leonhard, Wisconsin-PS CB Evan Oglesby, North Alabama-No WR Will Peoples, Oklahoma-No PK Joe Rheen, Kansas State-Already Cut DT Tom Sverchek, California-Already Cut CB Marvin Ward, Northwestern-No

Their group was in Massachusetts last June. They were protesting against Catholics & gays. Worst signs were "Pope in Hell" Local Mass. people on the news that day were saying they were better than the protesters & weren't going to do anything against them. Somebody should have beaten the s**t out of them instead of taking the high road.

The dark horse Republican candidate is the only one I've ever seen speak in person***, His campaign slogan can be "The future is now" and his cabinet can be called the "Over the Hill Gang" . If the Republicans succeed in getting Hillary nominated (which I don't believe will ever happen-the Dems can't be that stupid) The the campaign staff can be called the "Over the Hill Gang" ***-When he gave his father's speech because George Allen was dead when he got elected to the HOF.

He's going to announce this is it for him as governor. Unfortunately, he's also thinking that he can become president in 2008. Another delusional politician. How does this guy ever believe he can get enough delegates to win the Republican nomination with his record? The conservatives in his own party will crush him. Same goes for Guiliani, who temporarily moved in with a gay couple when he was between marriages after his split with Donna Hanover and needed a place to stay. Imagine the primaries in the bible belt with either of these two New Yorkers being called pro abortion & pro gay. http://timesunion.com/AspStories/story.asp...sdate=7/27/2005

Also, April said that kicker Rian Lindell, who has had both ups and downs in his time with the Bills, is looking better than ever. "This offseason he's looked fantastic," April said. "He really was way, way out ahead of where he was a year ago at this time and way out ahead of where he was during the season. He's certainly kicking better than I've ever seen him kick and I think he's going to have a big year." http://www.buffalobills.com/news/news.jsp?news_id=3271

They had Brett Favre rated as the best player in the entire draft, but had spent their # 1 on Rob Moore in the supplemental- draft. They tried trading up but nobody would trade with them. Atlanta picked Favre 1 pick before the Jets and they settled for Browning Nagle. The guy who had rated Favre so highly then took the GM job in Green Bay & traded for Favre the next year.

KFFL says he took a pay cut this season. I don't know who is dumber-he or his agent. Lamont Jordan played good soldier behind Martin & earned a ton more. If TH had only been bright enough to keep his mouth shut and back up Willis for 1 more season, he'd have been a lot better off. Titans | Contract Update: T. Henry Sat, 23 Jul 2005 20:04:11 -0700 Updating previous reports, RB Travis Henry's four-year contract extension with the Tennessee Titans will pay him the following base salaries: $1 million (2006), $1.25 million (2007), $1.5 million (2008) and $2 million (2009). As noted earlier, the extension reportedly included a $4 million option in 2006, which brings the total value of the extension to $9.75 million. Henry's base salary for 2005 was lowered from $1.25 million to $540,000. It's not clear if Henry received any additional bonus money for 2005. Here's Jordan's contract #s: The Raiders finalized a five-year, $27.5 million contract with the free-agent running back. Jordan's agent, Alvin Keels, said Jordan will receive $11 million in guaranteed money and $17.8 million over the first three years of the contract, including $15.7 million in bonuses.

Not necessarily. If McNally is so good, there are a lot of other candidates on the roster to choose from if/when Gandy doesn't cut it at LT with the pads on. I think too much emphasis is placed on whether Gandy will succeed, just because the pre-training camp depth chart has him #1. He could be an utter flop and we can field a good OL with either Teague at LT & Tucker at center, or one of the other guys from camp. Why do so many think that McNally is good enough to get Gandy to be the #1 LT, yet are so skeptical about his ability to coach up Teague to be the #1 LT?

The only problem is that all indications are Gandy has always been a model citizen, has the smarts & never had weight problems. Most of the "got it" types either struggled with weight or maturity. In Gandy's case, he's going to have to improve on his natural abilities-a tough thing for a guy with no other problems.

I wish John Kerry would stop running for president already. He's constantly sending e-mails to anyone who contributed to his campaign and he has this delusion that he can both get the Dems nomination & win the election in 2008. It's over, John. You proved that you don't have what it takes to win an election on a national level, and you're getting too old. Get out of the way and let someone who can actually win the presidency get the nomination. That means someone who is not from the northeast (this means you too Hillary) and does not have the baggage that causes so many people to hate you and vow never to vote for you. If the Democrats want to win the presidency in the forseeable future, they'll have to go to someone who has proven he can win elections in a red state. That excludes Kerry, H. Clinton & any other candidate with delusions of grandeur. I'd also throw Edwards out since he was a total dud (and he was an embarrassment on some of the Sunday am talk shows) during the campaign. I don't care who it is, just give me a moderate candidate from either party and stop running far right & far left candidates. Somehow, I doubt the Republicans will do this until their right wingers start losing and the Democrats may be too dumb to realize the far left is certain defeat.

Here is Gandy's 2004 season: 2004: Started the season as the Bears starting right guard and started five games at the position: vs. Det (9/12), at GB (9/19), vs. Phi (10/3); vs. Wash (10/17), and at TB (10/24) before being released by the Bears on 11/8/04. From everything I've heard about the guy, he may be an adequate guard, but he's overmatched at LT. It's still a long way to opening day. If Gandy is our LT, we're in the same boat as the year The Condo, Jerry Crafts, opened the season as our starting RT after Ballard left. I expect that we'll be better than that & Gandy is only the starter on paper as of pre-pre-season.

Tucker will be the opening day center, not Preston. Preston will be eased into the job, not thrown into the fire. Drum Gandy will never start a game for the Bills. If not Teague, then McFarland, Peters, or even Sobieski or Smith may emerge in camp to beat out Drum. I expect McFarland or Peters to end up ahead of Gandy on the depth chart. Gandy may not even make the team. Our #1 pick next year is definitely an OT.

The interest rate is different because a 30 year loan gets a higher rate (more risk) I used a .25% difference, even though it's really around .50% different at my credit union. I ran a 30 year mortgage at 6% for $147,600. The money still owed after 15 years of payments is $104,868. I rounded this #. 15 years from the start of the mortgage, when my mortgage is paid, I'd still owe $104,868-it is not my savings on the loan , it's the added equity I have on my home by having a completely paid mortgage. Likewise the present value of paying $885 for 15 years @ 6% is $104,868. The $104,868 difference using 6% interest rate is a sure thing. I do not have to speculate on anything-zero risk unless my home is worth less than $104,868 in 15 years-which wouldn't mean a bubble burst but an outright depression. Meanwhile, any "investment" regardless of its past performance has some risk. Also-I don't know the answer to this-I'm $104,868 ahead and I don't have to pay 1 cent in income tax on the money. Is that true with the other investments that would yield me more than $105,000, or would my profits be taxable, possibly causing the $140,000 that AD quoted to fall below $105k?

Oh no! I never though of our RT!

I'm founding the organization DRUM (my official nickname for Mike Gandy) Defenses Runaround Underachieving Mike

I don't quite understand your statement. Here's what I calculated. I took the 1st year's interest (to keep the calculation simple) on a $147,600 loan at 5.75% 15 years & a $147,600 loan at 6% for 30 years. The difference in interest x 30% (rounded for fed & NYS taxes) tax break ended up being around $170/year. I added the $170 to the $4,080 to equal the $4,250. I referred to this $4,250 as the after tax difference since $4,080 is before extra tax breaks. I'm not an accountant, so if an accountant would call it something different so be it. Edit-I forgot to add the last step. I then took the FV of $105,000, payment of $4,250, plugged in 15 years, hit i on HP12C & got 6.76% on the non rounded #s. It's 6.78% using the rounded #s.

Without the if I sell part, I get an extra $885/mo in my pocket when I need it by investing an extra $340 /mo when I can afford it.

To losmanera: By your original post's logic, (before they cut him) Tampa Bay's signing of Akili Smith was equal to getting the 3rd pick in the NFL draft. Once a player is cut (like Gandy was in Chicago) his value is the same as signing any street free agent, the player's value isn't equal to his original draft position.

Time to climb out on the limb. By the end of preseason Dylan McFarland will be ahead of Gandy on the OT depth chart. Now this is not necessarily a vote of confidence in McFarland. I don't think Gandy is going to start, & once "Drum" Gandy is benched, I'd say it's 50-50 he doesn't even make the team. I remember last year at this time there was a lineman who was #1 on the depth chart at LG-Mike Pucillo. Gandy is this year's Pucillo.