BillsVet

First, no one knows if they'll be able to restructure Mario's deal with him playing as well as he has. But his hit is around 19-20M each of the next two years and that's huge whether the cap is 123M or and expected ~140M. Second, we don't know what Hughes or Dareus will command, but considering both are having their second straight high-performing season, it's safe to expect they'll want top-5 money at their position. For a DE, that's at least 10-1M per and a DT probably more. Third, there are a few players who'll need extensions either after this season or after 2015. Glenn is still their best OT (and they're weak there), and they'll need to look at whether they want Bradham who enters his walk year after this year. Meanwhile, at some point they're going to need to get their QB, which seems further out than this defense should have to wait. And we haven't even talked about improving the CB, G, and TE positions. They've got a cap hit of ~123M right now for 2015 and if the cap is 140M in 2015, they'd need to get Mario down at least 7M and hope Dareus and Hughes take no more than 20M total for that year in cap dollars. AND sign their rookies, albeit minus a first rounder. Those odds are long and doesn't include money for Bradham or Glenn. That's a tall task and unlikely, unless other cuts like Mike Williams, Kraig Urbik, and Keith Rivers are made. I'm not even sure that'll clear enough space to do all of this.

Having just finished Polian's book, it's interesting how he described the Colts' team building strategy. Everyone knows they chose to build around Peyton (franchise QB's take 15-18% of the cap) and paid other offensive stars big dollars. That means sacrifices on defense, so they employed the Tampa 2 which allowed for younger players to play (who cost less). There's more to it than that, but you get the idea The Bills obviously don't have the franchise QB, but they'd be spending a huge amount on their DL if they re-signed Hughes and Dareus. Considering Mario's deal (it may be restructured) and Kyle Williams' deal runs through 2016, that's a lot of money there. They need to improve the OL and Glenn will want an extension after this season. Meanwhile, Robert Woods will be in his walk year after 2015, as will Alonso. These are all critical questions for down the road, but the Bills will probably have to pick either Hughes or Dareus. Normally I'd be inclined to take a pass-rusher, but Dareus is a talent who can't hit the market.

Buffalo should beat up on the Jets. I'm where I am now because the Bills came up small when it mattered: home against SD, NE, and KC. Those were all debilitating losses we'll point to when the season ends as examples of why this team was a pretender. Emotions are predictably high, like say when you destroy a bad NYJ team. Logic tells me this team isn't bound for the post-season, save for about 4 wins in their final 5 games. But we'll see.

Conspiracy I tell ya!

Someone has a signature talking about how the Bills end up every season: beating bad to mediocre teams and losing to the average to better teams. Well, nothing's changed so far this year: Teams they've beaten have a combined record of 26-40, or .394. Teams they've lost to have a combined record of 34-21, or .618. Until the Bills start beating good teams like perhaps Cleveland but definitely Denver, Green Bay, or New England, they're not playoff caliber.

I don't understand why second-guessing Buffalo's front office is automatically wrong to some. It's not like this current personnel group (with many of the same characters since the late nineties) has proven anything beyond being able to go 6-10. Watkins vs. Beckham Jr. is going to be a continuing debate whether people like it or not as both of their (and others) careers unfold.

When RW hired Marv as GM and then replaced him with Brandon he sent a message knowingly or not that the Buffalo Bills were no longer competing. And it's those hires in the most critical football position that made it impossible to find a legitimate GM when neither of those two lasted long in that job. Even when RW hired good football guys like Saban or Knox, they eventually had to leave because it was obvious the owner would meddle enough to make it had to win. And that continued into the nineties when he told Wade to start RJ.

The question should be, how much better is Watkins than those other WR's who are playing well from the 2014 draft? We're nowhere close to making that conclusion, but from a team-building perspective trading a 1st and 4th in 2014 amid this WR class isn't a slam dunk move. The bigger issue is why the Bills would invest so much in the WR position (Watkins trade, Woods in the 2nd/2013, trading for Mike Williams) without having a decent QB on the roster. Because those 3 guys were acquired before Orton and when they figured Manuel would be OK in 2014.

I DON"T KNOW WHAT WE'RE YELLING ABOUT!

That was interesting, wasn't it? I'm of the belief that Brandon's involvement in the team isn't good for the organization, but my vote doesn't count. That said, I could live with him having zero to do with football ops and staying on for business development. In the interim, I hope the Pegulas hire a real football consultant to review the team who will make recommendations there. That area needs massive changes right now.

"Mom! The meatloaf! We want it now!" I can't remember anyone who ripped on Pinto. No one. You're the first...now crawl back into mom's basement.

Yep. There was enough tape on Fitz from Cincinnati (2008) and then Buffalo (2009-10) to know he couldn't be a franchise guy. Why Nix didn't draft a QB for the future in 2011 is beyond me. Actually, I think Nix and Gailey figured anyone could play QB in Gailey's system. Unfortunately they were dead wrong and it's still affecting this team. And that's what you get when senior management hires inferior football people just happy to be in the NFL.

Wait, I thought Buddy was a Top 5 talent evaluator? In all seriousness, Buddy's refusal to draft a QB in 2011-12 is what's setting this franchise back in 2014. The domino effect was it forced them to draft a guy in 2013 when Nix was being pushed out the door. After years of tape on Fitzpatrick, it should have been apparent he couldn't be a good enough starter. Buddy may have known a little about talent, but strategically he didn't know much about how to build a team in the 21st century NFL. Mainly because he badly underestimated the importance of the QB position.

Littmann must have been quite a hot-shot financial guy in the late 80s/early 90s to warrant being kept over a GM who got this team to the playoffs from 1988-1991 when RW made the decision to fire Polian (in the summer of '92). I recognize both were strong personalities and this is in the past, but I find it indicative of a problem RW always had. The Bills over the years seemingly always shaded too much to the financial side of the house than to football, to the point that financial people were given supervision over football people. Polian was good enough in personnel to overcome that, but when he left Butler only somewhat maintained the football side of the house. Successive GMs however were not good enough as the NFL became more competitive and we have what's looking like 15 years of no playoffs. To me, that says something was catastrophically wrong with senior management. And Littmann was the tallest hog in the trough there. I don't think anyone's arguing the Bills should have been losing money to ensure on-field success. But the Bills were operating behind the times and Littmann was part of that, though successful at squeezing more money (with Brandon's help) in these final years of RW's ownership. And no one was going to tell RW they needed more money to win, least of all someone like Brandon who won promotions making this franchise more profitable as the team stunk on field. Polian's departure was the moment this franchise started a long slow-ride into irrelevance. We didn't know it at the time, but the Bills haven't recovered from his firing. Fact is, if Littmann had been sent packing we wouldn't even know it on-field. And I find it noteworthy that Littmann was only in his mid to late 30s when he got the team treasurer job. At that time, Polian was a proven NFL GM with more than 5 years of playoff teams behind him. There may not be a lot of top financial types out there, but there are fewer outstanding NFL GM's (even in 92-93). Hopefully the Bills can find one and get this team on track more than 20 years after "Trader Bill" was unceremoniously let go.

When was the last time, in your humble opinion, that a coach/GM/other higher executive was responsible for those players who you light into for failing on the field. And BTW, Bryce Brown was a player Whaley had targeted for a long time according to what I read. So Whaley had to know the guy was prone to fumbling and still made the deal. Management may not be able to avoid all player failure, but they're responsible when a team continues to miss the playoffs. It can't always be the players. In the end, management is usually at fault, but most fans don't know of Doug Whaley or his personnel directors and fewer know what those guys do behind the scenes. Ergo, fans don't blame them, but only that which they see on the field. And that means players and to a lesser degree coaches. For the record, those players on the field weren't all inherited from the Jauron years, and I recall people here talking about how the roster had been made over so much the past few years by Nix and Whaley. Start with the team president and work your way down for a change.

Well, Jauron, Steve Fairchild, Turk Schonert, Alex Van Pelt, Gailey, Modkins, G. Edwards, and Wannstedt were each a little "cat" then. All defended, all inadequate.

Ordered the book already. I don't expect massive shots to be taken at Wilson, Littmann, or others, but it should be an illuminating read.

Well, I doubt the governor has much else going on these days. He should prioritize the programming of Buffalo Bills games above all other things right now.

Fendi Onobun is still the best name for a garbage bin TE pickup.

Who hired Marrone? Who hired Whaley? Did they just drop out of the sky over OBD and start as HC and GM? Or could it be that, as I suspect, Brandon is behind these moves. It's the same issue that's plagued OBD for years: inferior (and unqualified) senior management making bad decisions on football people, coaches, players, et al. It remains impossible for the Bills to keep hiring bad coaches without something pointing to management above the coaching level. And I get that someone will say no one wants to work here, or that they can't be perfect in their decision making, but at some point this organization needs to string together a few good decisions in a row. But with new and younger owners in charge, something at the highest level needs to change. Or else this cycle of failure will continue.

"I love the smell of napalm in the morning."

When does Russ Brandon claim Nix hired Marrone? Or will Russ throw Whaley under the bus for the Marrone hire to save his team president job. Either way, same old Bills.

One of the big names in the player agent business. I remember him negotiating Mario's deal 2+ years ago to be the highest paid defensive player. Guy just lost some major money.

NFL HC's are definitely a select group, but if you don't win, you don't survive. And Marrone is a career 11-14 guy who's supposed to make the playoffs with this improved roster. I'm still not seeing what Marrone has proven in these 25 games besides being a conservative coach that isn't the innovative type promised to the fans. Said Marrone at his intro PC in January 2013: ""We want to be innovative," he said. "We want to be on the cutting edge." Buffalo is most assuredly neither of those things. It's a myth to think, with a new owner on board, that this HC deserves more than 2 seasons. Some coaches aren't even getting that anymore, especially when new owners and GM's enter the picture. If Marrone doesn't get this team to at least 9-7 he's probably getting the ax.

I love when you throw in the win emoticon. Because I know you're serious. There are teams in the NFL who've won, rebuilt, and now are winning again. Heck, Arizona (despite losing Palmer) has the best record in football. All of this after hiring a new HC (Arians) after the last one (Whisenhunt) began losing after Kurt Warner retired. And yet the Bills are still in the DMZ of the NFL: not really rebuilding but not winning either.