BillsVet

Having a C who does not resemble a matador would certainly do wonders for this team. Mack seems to be the best of the 09 class and has versatility, which will be required when someone gets hurt. Could not help but agree with this post, especially about building depth on the OL because Walker, Dockery, and the current depth is poor or unproven. That final quote says it all about this franchise. RW is running the show, with Brandon basically talking tough but having very little say. In the end, it's the Ralph and Dick show. Neither has earned any level of respect for their football decisions of late, and nothing seems to be changing. I would hope Modrak can overrule anyone on draft day, but this franchise has not proven they make good decisions during the offseason.

The only part, and this has been covered ad nauseam, is if you use a top 10 pick on a guy who's not a bust nor a star, and an excellent player was available at a position of need, then it becomes worse. If only Cutler and Cromartie had been available and no one else, Whitner's not bad. The Bills didn't have a need at those positions in 06. But when guys like Bunkley, Ngata, and Mangold go later, it's not so great. But no, his draft spot shouldn't have anything to do with deciding to re-sign or not re-sign the guy.

Getting rid of Whitner because he's not dominant is no solution either. He's signed through 2011 IIRC, so there's plenty of time to make a decision on him for the future. The point has been made several times around here about being on a treadmill. The draft is replacing the players who left the team. Milloy/Whitner, Clements/McKelvin, Fletcher/Posluszny, McGahee/Lynch. No team can lose talent at that pace and feature good squads. Essentially the 06, 07, and 08 drafts were spent replacing productive players. .

All of the arguments against Whitner are based on subjectives. Poor ball skills, bad angles, his use in the Bills defense. None of it can be substantiated with numbers. And so it becomes a statistics issue, which can be pushed either for or against. The vehement nature of this thread indicates some fans think Whitner's still going to be good. For me, I want a top 10 pick to be the foundation of whichever side of the ball they play. Someone to build around, but that is not true of Whitner. He is a cog in the wheel, but I'm not sure if he's as big as some would have him. Was the team better without him for that stretch of games? I'm not sure, but I can darn guarantee that without Bob Sanders the Indianapolis defense is much worse. Whitner's impact cannot be defended solely by how he's used, nor can it be shot down on stats alone. If he needs help to be successful, he's not the guy worthy of a top 10 pick. And I don't care what Michael Huff does or doesn't do. That has no bearing on this topic.

There's another way to look at this. And a positive one I might add: It took Chicago 5 years to get rid of DJ. It'll only take us 4.

BPA at a position of need should be the teams draft strategy, with particular emphasis on the lines if your teams are poor. Taking a CB would be like taking a LT right now. You already have fine players at those positions, and it would hinder your ability to build elsewhere. I'd like to see pass rush early and often. People talk about never having enough DB's, and DJ's proven that theory is garbage. For once I'd like to see the Bills follow the Giants lead and take pass rush help in round 1. No TE or C is worth the 11th overall pick.

I'd first like to know what Matt Cassel's mother thinks about this. Surely she would have a more inside perspective on this. I'm not sure Sanchez is as coveted as you make him out to be. He has 16 career college starts and while his numbers are good, that's not exactly the thing a team likes when using a first rounder on a QB. Rose Bowl or not, I think NFL teams know that using a top pick should be on someone with a longer track record in the college game. Also not sure if Pete Carroll's strong recommendation to remain in school might hurt him. That situation is either PC being a college coach and wanting to keep his QB, or a situation where he didn't think Sanchez was ready.

Excellent post. It's a touchy subject, but collective talent rarely overcomes poor coaching. Good coaching can, on the contrary, make average or below average talent better as in the case of the Dolphins. Players are the most visible people for this franchise, and that's why they get a large part of the blame. We see when they screw up or succeed. Meanwhile, when a John Guy, Jeff Littman, Russ Brandon, or Jim Overdorf make a mistake, we don't see them. But it is manifested in the team that takes the field. There's little demand to change the front office before players, but it's clear the Bills aren't interested in making changes to the front office despite many of the same people running the show since 2001. Naturally, fan ire is directed to on-field personnel, coaches included. Every solid NFL team has a capable GM and coaching staff that can carry the GM's vision onto the field with the team. Buffalo has no GM, and a coach who I don't think could coach any of the other 31 NFL teams. It's my hope that if 2009 is bad, the entire front office is nuked. Brandon should be reduced to marketing boy again, to pave the way for a real GM.

Every offseason this team needs to solve huge problems. In 07 it was at RB, LB, OL, and CB. In 08 it was LB, WR, DT, and TE. Upgrades are required this year at DE, LB, TE, and C. No wonder mediocrity is the most well-used term when describing the franchise. Having huge needs each off-season is an indication the long term planning on this team plain stinks. Call it a lack of financial resources, but if this team drafted better it wouldn't be in the predicament they always find themselves. A well-known front office executive once said that the prices in free agency are the penalty for drafting poorly.

This team is guys that we talk about as having, "high motors" or play hard for their coach. Kelsay is the epitome of these phrases, and espouses why this team consistently underachieves. For whatever reason, he was deemed to be a keeper after 06, and there's little doubt that talent-wise he's not good enough. If he's starting next season, something is seriously wrong at OBD. Kelsay is not the reason Buffalo's DL stinks. But he's not making the problem go away, either now or down the road. I'd like to know who decided the team needed to retain him in advance of UFA 07.

Yet the record is only 2 wins more than the 05 team after three complete seasons of rebuilding. The question no one is asking is why aren't they significantly better after 3 seasons of rebuilding. It doesn't matter if the team has better individual players. What counts is how they play as a team. As for QB play, you criticize a guy who has 23 career starts under his belt. Demanding outstanding play from a guy with less than a season and a half of starts is insanity. Most guys don't begin at a Flacco or Ryan level and improve from there. BTW, TE is 11-10 in games he finishes, though he needs to be more durable. Demand accountability from the franchise, and if a 2 win improvement over 3 seasons is good enough, well, to each his own.

The point is not to demonstrate the obvious that Buffalo isn't good enough. But right now, after three years of rebuilding, saying they're anything less than much improved from 06 to 08 is not good enough. As a previous poster noted, the Bills have taken a back seat to the other 3 teams in the AFC as they've leveled off at 7-9 in the past three years. Perhaps we'll be surprised on 2/27 when UFA begins.

Seasons that refrain has been heard among Bills fans since 2006: 3 The goal of rebuilding remains to improve and contend for a title. Not improving or getting worse probably means the power brokers in the front office don't know how to get better. But that's another story.

Buffalo allowed Clements and Fletcher to leave without having a replacement after 06. They traded McGahee in March 07 without having a replacement. The Buffalo front office doesn't have a rhyme nor a reason for doing a lot of things. In the end I don't see Kelsay getting the boot, but if he's starting for this team next season on opening day something is very wrong.

Three years ago the Bills entered the offseason fresh off a 5-11 record, the firing of a maniacal GM and an abrupt departure of their HC. In came Levy and Jauron to right the ship, but three 7-9 seasons later it would seem only the means to achieve mediocrity have changed. In 06, the Bills schedule included 8 games against eventual playoff teams. In those eight contests, Buffalo managed a 1-7 record, while going 6-2 against other opponents. The Bills entered the bye week 2-5, but finished 5-4. Beating the Jets 31-13 in the Meadowlands represented their lone victory versus a playoff-bound team. Buffalo's combined opponents winning percentage was .539. 06 Bills strength of schedule Fast forward to 08. Buffalo played the 31st ranked strength of schedule, finished 2-8 in their final 10 after starting 5-1. Individual player talent may be similar from 06 to 08, but the end results suggest that the sum isn't nearly greater than the parts. Upgrades are still required at a host of positions, namely C, TE, SLB, and DE. Contrast that with the varying and obvious needs this team has had after 06, 07, and 08 and it seems nothing changes in the end.

Ralph is content to offer his low-end product because he assumes (correctly) that people will attend games. He has no reason to change if fans do not demand it in huge numbers. I simply don't trust OBD to make the right moves, whether it be in the front office, hiring coaches, in UFA, on draft day, or gameday. They always seem to make the wrong move, or not enough good decisions to succeed. Ralph's a big part of that, yet he's savvy enough to give the fans one nugget to keep them interested.

This rationale to generalize success as demonstrated by amount of TD catches is absurd. But let's take it a step further: Jerry Rice had 3 TD catches his rookie season, so clearly Hardy is close to Rice's caliber as well. Their ascent to greatness has started from essentially the same point. Upon closer inspection, Rice caught 49 balls in 16 games while starting 4 in 1985. Hardy had flaws coming out of college. And some of those have not been worked out in one season. His route running is poor, no doubt the result of taking on undersized and slower DB's in college. At Indiana they did not change routes to adapt to different defenses. Additionally, Hardy had an issue beating the press and separating from defenders. Those issues haven't been ironed out yet.

First, congrats to RW for being elected into the HOF. But just because RW says these things means nothing to me. This is the same guy who was reportedly very upset about the Cleveland MNF debacle and the NYJ loss in December. Many of us thought he would do something. And in late December he ultimately did nothing. This franchise does not have the benefit of the doubt IMO. They need to act before I'll believe anything they say.

I'd say going ofer the decade in playoff appearances in pretty bad. Spin that any way you want, it's bad. The only difference between Buffalo and Detroit is we're not so awful in the regular season. The Bills have won 14 more games than Detroit since the 2004 season. Good GM's (at least teams that have them) succeed on draft day. No, they're not perfect, but I challenge anyone to find a guy who drafts poorly and can retain his job. Some of the best GM's out there like Polian, Newsome, Jerry Reese, AJ Smith, and the Belichick/Pioli hit on far more than the average the rest of the league hits on. Polian got the opportunity to start with HOF'ers because he drafted them. Let the record show that Polian could have taken other people first overall in 1985. And he could have taken Ryan Leaf in 1998.. If you researched where HOFers are selected, you'd know they're not all in the top 10 of the first round. Besides, it's not an absolute requirement to have HOF talent to win in the post-season. Outside of Brady, perhaps no other Patriette will be a guaranteed HOFer when their run is over.

Tarik Glenn was voted to have the worst physique in the NFL multiple times IIRC. But he was good enough to protect Peyton Manning's blindside from 98-06. If they can play football it's all that mattered.

Matt Bowen's take on Green Bay firing Sanders

Maybe Bill Kollar knew what he was doing after all. Chicago fans laugh at us every day for hiring DJ.

At this point, any coach willing to work for DJ must be questioned and desperate for work. Besides, any coach who signs on in Buffalo knows the coach has one season to prove himself. That's not a lot of job security.

I shouldn't assume, but by 2010, Whitner will be a bargain re-signing for Buffalo to show they're willing to keep their own.

Whitner's just not getting to the ball. When a guy doesn't defend passes, force turnovers, or make tackles at or behind the LOS it tells me their recognition skills are poor. Leonhard probably benefits from the front 7 (which oughta illustrate you need DL and LB's before DB's) but he seems to have better instincts in coverage as well. That's sad considering he's a UDFA and not the 8th overall pick.