BillsVet

Above all else don't, I repeat, don't destroy your running back. No more than 15 carries per game, even if the running game works.

The difference between a small market like Buffalo and Indy continues to be management. And until more fans realize the guys running the show for the Bills are not good enough, there's little that can be said for the organization regardless of what they do in UFA and on draft day. They've handled free agency in different ways, spending on several lesser players (06) and spending big on a few players (07) yet neither worked. 08 UFA was somewhere in the middle money-wise, but had a positive effect. Not enough to make up for the joke HC, but decent. With most likely a tough schedule in 09, it's going to be an uphill climb. I know I'm preaching to the choir here, but at some point the Bills will face reality that a real GM is required to clear out front office dead weight and begin anew.

The only saving grace for Guy is if he was merely supplying information for whomever decided on free agents for these past two years. My bet is DJ had final say and made the call on whom to pursue. With 13 out of 14 FA signings in the 06-07 time frame gone, I'd say whoever is making the call needs to go. Yet the front office remains the same, although Perhaps DJ's condition for staying was to merely give up personnel authority. Either way, a shake-up was in order and as The Who say, "Meet the new boss, same as the old boss."

OK Russ Brandon, you've made the point to Lynch that you're not happy. We get it now. Jones played for Chicago last season and didn't fare too well. IIRC, he underwent Lisfranc surgery after being hurt in Detroit. Not sure if he's a viable option, even if for depth.

When your team makes the playoffs, you tend to be happier. None of us around here have known that feeling for almost 10 years now.

I still believe teams will budget a certain amount for player salaries as any business would for their employees. But with labor strife imminent, teams can spend as little as they want with no repercussions, save fan animosity. Having said that, I've never seen a team with 50-60M+ in cap room. And this year there's not as much to spend it on. I don't think the Bills cut Kelsay because they would have done it by now. Historically they slice their trash off just before UFA opens. Regardless, the only number that counts is salary cap hit of a given team. Teams are expected to have a cap hit of no less than 110M in 2009, but not necessarily by March. They have time to hit this figure.

Bill, Dockery's signing bonus is accelerated so that all of it hits their cap figure this year. I believe it's something like 5M left. Not sure on that one, but it keeps them from paying him the salary he's been stealing since the beginning of 08. My point to all of this is as the cap rises and teams keep their better players, UFA will be castoffs and malcontents. This means spending is even more risky and means a razor thin margin of error on draft day. Then again, Buffalo hasn't been all that great on draft day or in free agency.

And it begs the question, among the carousel of front office characters, who made the final decision to acquire this guy? Right, it was a consensus approach. And the guys making that decision, Levy, Jauron, and Guy are people who had/have no idea when it comes to building a NFL team. It probably seems like I'm piling on. I'll give credit to the front office for making the move, but that doesn't excuse how big of a screw up they made two short years ago.

They made an offer to make it seem they were interested in keeping him. I'd add that it was right after Kelvin Hayden received 43.5 over 5 seasons, so offering 4 or 5 yrs and 20M was really an offer they knew wouldn't be accepted. Buffalo isn't trading McGee either. He's their most dependable CB, and while he's not spectacular he gets the job done. McKelvin is still a 2nd year guy, as is Corner. Losing Greer hurts, but we'll know how much when he's elsewhere to start the 09 season.

They became more than stop-gaps when no one was there to replace them. All of those guys you mentioned are out of the league less than 2 years from signing with Buffalo. I'd expect a stop gap to last longer than that in the NFL. Yet when the Bills spent big in FA, they ended up with guys who were released 2 years later. So we've learned when the spend little they're not very good. When they go big in FA, they aren't that hot either. But don't change the front office.

Why do you think Carolina is letting him go? Not trying to be a smart aleck, but do you think it's related to their signing of Wharton and Gross?

NFL teams found an additional 4M in cap space when it was determined franchises hadn't spent enough during the last year. That said, it's rare that a team signs a player in free agency who is a difference maker anymore. There may be a few available like Haynesworth or Houshmandzadeh, but nowhere near what it was in the late nineties. As long as the cap rises as quickly as it has, teams will be keeping more of their own talent. And that's placing a huge burden on teams to draft well or else. Buffalo is 0 for 2 in UFA from 06 and 07. Only 1 of their 14 totals free agents in those years is still with the team. The draft has to be perfect for a team like Buffalo. If not, there may not be any alternative.

Now for LG, C, DE, DT, SLB, S, backup QB, WR, and TE. We get those little issues out of the way and we're all set. Oh, and signing Peters and Jackson to long term deals. I almost forgot those two minor issues.

I'll do some quick math here. The Bills signed 14 free agents between 2006-07. Out of those, only one of them remains. That's Langston Walker, who's contract isn't too bad. He'll never be a Pro Bowler, but thats 13 misses in free agency. I don't care what context those guys were signed under, all of them were failures by the Levy-led front office. Marv gave personnel authority to people because he wasn't up to speed on his job after sitting out 8 NFL seasons. And for the record, Dick Jauron's influence on this team spread out from the playing field. He had a lot of sway in personnel, and the drafts and free agency periods are the resulting product. Building consensus is how Buffalo got where it is now.

Where shall we give credit? To these flunkies: Jeff Littman, Dick Jauron, Jim Overdorf, and John Guy? None of them are NFL success stories, yet all hold significant sway over who Buffalo grabs in UFA. I'll be optimistic when the entire front office gets the nuclear treatment. Until that time, nothing will change.

We've been saying this for many years now. 2006, 07, 08, 09. When will it end... It will end when a General Manager is able to come in and begin this whole thing anew. Until that time, OL and DL will be a significant issue. They couldn't spend their way out of it once, I shudder to think they'll try it again.

As much as Guy takes a hit for the fiascos in free agency (06 and 07) I believe you when saying DJ was leading the personnel end of the team. All of this is now reason enough apparently for the team to give Modrak more power in personnel. Too bad Marv, Brandon, and Ralph didn't see it earlier. Either way, it's a pathetic joke of a way to handle personnel. Teams have GM's who usually have a Pro Personnel and College Scouting Director with a requisite amount of scouts. Not Buffalo though, they have no GM, and the authority was delegated to DJ. He predictably failed, leaving the franchise in the mess they're in now. Still, if DJ had final say on personnel, it's chilling to think someone saw fit to give this to him. DJ's was getting paid less than 2M per, and he was in effect spending more team money on Dockery, Walker, Tripplett, Royal, et al who signed deals in excess of 100M. Amazaing.

But he watches 80 hours of film per week, so don't second guess him-ever.

For the record, I'd like to know how many other teams have cut a player after 2 seasons with a contract that large? Buffalo obviously isn't paying the entire 49M, but IIRC, Dockery got 18.5M guaranteed in the deal.

Some were living in a fantasy world and thought they'd snag him. Hopefully those individuals aren't working in Buffalo's Pro Personnel department, but it's possible. It's not a surprise, but reality now for most rational NFL fans.

Daniels per PFT Should be a deep draft position. But he's not coming here.

Guy is a JAG among NFL front office personnel. Apparently, both he and his staff are never held accountable. Unless, other people (Dick Jauron and/or Marv) were the ones using the Pro Personnel Department's information to decide on which players to acquire. That's all I can think of, outside of him having naked pictures of someone.

He's saying free agency is starting, not that they're going to do anything specific. It's an article in advance of free agency, nothing more and nothing less.

Sounds more like Sun Tzu. You weren't a philosopher in previous life, were you?

Don't you dare attack Marv Levy the GM. It's amazing that Dockery was signed to big money, when in fact they were attempting to run a variant of the WCO. As a 330 pound guard, we know he didn't fit with having lineman able to pass protect. From a team-building perspective, he was 180 degrees from what they wanted. I can understand having a guy like Mitchell at WLB in a C2 perhaps. But lumbering guards at 49M is a stretch and two years later he's history. It's mistakes like this which hamstring an organization longer than the player is here.