BillsVet

King Carl is finally dethroned. And all it took was a heart-breaking loss to the Chargers for him to see he's not good anymore. That's progress in Chiefs land, and I'm sure Whitlock is somewhat relieved. Now, maybe RW will after CP.

I actually feel sorry for DJ in that he's in over his head as a NFL HC. And now I think he knows it. I'm sure he has plenty of book smarts, but his street smarts aren't there. Everything I've read suggests he is a nice guy, but I can't believe what I've seen this season from him and the whole staff.

It's not. How can Buffalo go 7-9 in 06 with a tough schedule yet are 6-8 two years later with one of, if not the easiest schedules in the league. Losing Milloy, Fletcher, Clements, and others have hurt, and replacing quality vets with inexperienced rookies has shown. You can't take BPA, nor draft solely on need. DW was not BPA at 8 in 06, but you'll never admit it. Nor did Buffalo have a huge need for a SS over a DT. Both positions were poor, although Buffalo made it worse by cutting Milloy who has life left in him with Atlanta. Baltimore wasn't a world beater in 05, hence their high draft position the following year. But they reload every year. It's why they're successful from year to year. There is something unique in Buffalo's front office. They have no point man right now for decision making. We know ML didn't make decisions, but deferred to DJ on many matters. He was after all, out of the NFL for 9 years before returning to a position he was ill-suited for. I blame ML first, but DJ second for their poor drafting in 06. We will never figure out who made the call for Whitner, but if I was a betting man, and I'm not, DJ made the final call. Who's going to trump the HC with 30+ years in the NFL in that case? A brand new octogenarian GM with no experience in the NFL as such? You don't need big name FA's to win games. Indy wins by drafting well (with our friend BP as GM) and avoiding the spending spree every UFA season. Even when Buffalo has money to offer (as in 07) they select guys who aren't as good as they think. Paying dollars in UFA is the penalty for drafting poorly. I still say Levy took one for the team when he agreed to be GM. Ralph probably begged him, in the wake of the TD disaster. Unfortunately, RW didn't realize he was hiring someone incapable of handling the job. And the result is 3 more losing NFL seasons. They need to make better decisions in who to hire in the front office and in-turn, who is hired to coach. Mike Tomlin isn't getting big money, but their front office obviously is a good judge of coaching talent. Marv screwed up hiring a coach who is hopelessly out-classed by rookie HC's and bad HC's. He is an embarrassment to the franchise. They don't need to get lucky, they need people who know what they're looking for. And right now, that front office is among the worst in the league. Russ might know how to market, but he couldn't pick a HC who could win to save his life. The Baltimore Ravens admittedly have a good defense. But with 17 guys on IR, rookie HC, and rookie QB, they're in position to advance to the post-season. For goodness sakes, they had Justin Bannan and Jim Leonhard starting today! Buffalo's draft record, as BADOL pointed out, beyond the 2nd round is pitiful. I like Fine and Steve Johnson, but aside from Edwards, this team has little to show of value beyond their top picks. JP failed because he has a million dollar arm with a ten cent brain. He also has the accuracy of Steve Vaughn without glasses. He was a project QB when he came out, and no matter who was coaching him, wouldn't have succeeded. Bill Walsh could not have made JP a legit NFL starter. He had an OK season in 06, but could never progress because he was one dimensional. We're 4-5 players away every year. The Bills need an OLB, S, DT, pass rushing DE, G, C, and another TE. Hey, a PG post!!!

That too. If RW had any humility, he would admit failure in everything he's done since and including BP's firing in 1993. 16 winning seasons since the 1970 merger, with ten of those between 88-99 when BP or John Butler handled the GM role.

As in, "I should have had insurance on DJ going 1-9 down the stretch and costing me millions for a contract I never should have offered."

Read the book, "The GM" about Ernie Accorsi's final season as GM of the New York Giants. He allowed one of his subordinates to select Kiwanuka and never had any intention of selecting McCargo. Buffalo was fooled into thinking NYG would take McCargo, and the ploy worked. ML and DJ have Ivy League degrees, but they ride the short bus in the world of NFL personnel. It's not luck with quality personnel men like Ernie Accorsi and Jerry Reese. Little wonder the Giants are SB champs and still strong this season.

One example: With the 26th pick in the 2006 NFL draft, the Buffalo Bills select DT John McCargo of North Carolina State. With the 32nd pick in the 2006 NFL draft, the New York Giants select DE Mathias Kiwanuka of Boston College. It's decisions like this which continue to bog the Bills into mediocrity. Not to mention Buffalo gave up a valuable 2nd and 3rd. The choice to select McCargo was panned at the time, and correctly predicted to be a bust.

Dean- Your defense of Buffalo's front office continues to amaze me. Over the long haul, we're finding that numerous personnel mistakes have saddled this franchise. It was previously the TD excuse that Buffalo was unable to reach the post-season. But increasingly, it's the very people you've supported who are directly responsible for having a perennially mediocre team that joined the Lions for most consecutive season minus a playoff berth. That means Marv, and his coach-select, DJ. Let's man-up and admit that hiring Levy was a mistake, as was trusting DJ with any shred of personnel decisions. Consensus is something that looks good on an inspirational poster inside corporate offices, not something to use while handling personnel decisions. Consensus is another way to keep a majority of people happy, which is to say, it might not be correct. Marv Levy and Dick Jauron made bad decision after bad decision in the front office during 06 and 07. RW approved this and then further bungled the front office by neglecting to name a GM when it was realized ML would step down. When we look at teams league wide, we see every one of them has someone guiding personnel. Buffalo delegates this function to Guy and Modrak whose record is a question mark, considering that the consensus approach clouds who is really at fault for a given decision. Furthermore, when Bills fans look across the NFL, they see franchises lapping them on the track to success. Since 2001, Carolina has gone from being bad to good to bad to being good again. Almost the same can be said for Atlanta, Baltimore, and Miami. When more Bills fans start looking at how successful franchises are run, they'll see how inept our front office remains.

Wayne Fontes has a better winning percentage. And the list goes on and on. SB, do you remember when people were saying DJ had won COY in 01? It's ironic I don't hear that refrain as much anymore.

I've always thought being a NFL HC is like being a fighter pilot during times of war. If you're not successful, you're shot down in short order. Jauron's career, by virtue of being hired by an octogenarian, was lengthened inexplicably beyond reason. I do believe DJ went 1-4 with Detroit following Mariucci's firing. Still, 7 out of 8 seasons without a winning season should not be rewarded, contract or not. One winning season in which he lost his only career playoff game. Only Bart Starr (.406), John McKay (.333 with the expansion Bucs), and Joe Kuharich (.417) have coached 130+ games with a worse winning percentage than DJ (.433). Norv is up there, but he's at least been to the AFC title game, which already out-does DJ.

I seriously believe RW has good days and bad. His reactions have run the gamut, from being angry after the Cleveland MNF loss to laughing after Miami last week. He made the point after the Miami game that the coaches don't make plays. But they are the ones calling them and their decisions have a lot to do with whether a play succeeds or fails. Outside of the Detroit Lions and Oakland Raiders, the Bills front office is the biggest joke in the NFL. No owner aside from those franchises is worse.

This coaching staff out-thinks itself on a weekly basis. Against the league's 31st ranked pass defense, they decided to throw short on every pass play. I'm glad they finally had a good outing from the OL, but it's clear to me that they coach scared. I realize TS didn't want to let JP open it up for fear of throwing a pick or 4, but the idea to throw short routes severely limits what the defense has to worry about. I'm willing to overlook a Lynch drop as long as he shows what he did today. He was all heart, which is more than can be said for the moribund HC.

Dean, your effort in defending DW is nice, but without foundation. They say you can judge a draft after three seasons. Even though DW was injured, his play wasn't spectacular or befitting an eighth overall pick at any time. I don't understand how a shoulder injury would inhibit his ability to cover a WR or TE. We can finally begin assessing the 06 draft, and as time wears on, realize how average it truly was. No significant starters on this team, with a bunch of safe picks who became below average to average NFL players. The problem with most Bills drafts (both TD's and ML's) is that they couldn't find playmakers. Rather than take a chance on a guy (Antonio Cromartie was an injured CB taken 19th in 06) Marv and Dick went with safe picks. The result is average players who don't distinguish themselves. It's why this team is worse now than it was in 06 with NC and LFB playing.

I'm amazed at how much WGR relies on young on-air talent. I'd expect more of their talent to have been in the business a bit more before moving to Buffalo. All in all, I like Simon for not being as obtuse as I'm sure they've asked Schopp and White to be. Apparently that gets ratings now, and so an element of that will be prominently featured. He's not perfect, but more enjoyable to listen to than any other talent WGR employs.

Unless you have a link, I'm not taking you at your word. Cap Figures 3/26/08 The Bills have cap space, and while this link is an estimate, I believe it's fairly obvious that Buffalo is not middle of the pack in cap dollars. And spare us the examples of misses in the draft. That's a yearly thing with this franchise, regardless of whether it's TD, Marv, Brandon, Ralphie, or whomever running this franchise. They're all incompetent.

No, fault the front office, specifically Russ Brandon for not knowing what the heck they're doing. You get what you pay for, both on and off the field. We are Detroit Lions east with a few more victories.

The anger is the result of 9 straight seasons without a playoff appearance and 13 years without a playoff win. I think those fans who are upset have a legitimate reason to be. Especially when the owner laughs after losses.

I don't know what Russ Brandon makes, but it's not enough if he has to market this team with DJ as HC next season. RW said the Toronto deal did not mean more would be spent on players. I wonder if it includes buying out coaches who are out-coached by rookie HC's and guys like Romeo Crennel. C2C is another PR scheme designed to make fans think the Bills are spending what other teams are. That's false, in that the only thing that matters is the salary cap itself. The cap hit is the only dollar amount that counts in the salary cap. Buffalo actually has 20-22M in the cap this season.

Mike Smith hired Mularkey. And so far it's been a good hire.

Floyd Reese has been trying to get GM jobs in Cleveland and before in Detroit these past few weeks. He's not the guy I want heading this organization from a football perspective. I don't want anything to do with him. The question remains: Just who would want to work for a 90 year old owner who doesn't seem to care anymore?

As I said in a previous post, just because TD didn't work out doesn't mean you don't attempt it again. Every team in the NFL has someone handling pro personnel and amateur scouting. And every team except one has someone with a football operations experience overseeing them. The lone exception is the Buffalo Bills. To think Russ Brandon is going to guide this front office and get the team to respectability is non-sense. I'm sure RB would tell you it's not his cup of tea. I say make RW makes RB president, leaving him to hire a GM. At that point, the new GM hires a coach, with consultation from above. I don't think that's unreasonable. For every TD there's a guy like Tom Dimitroff who did great things this off-season He hired Mike Smith, drafted well, and retained veterans like Lawyer Milloy, John Abraham, and Keith Brooking. He cleaned the team of guys like Crumpler and Deangelo Hall, but left enough for Smith to work with.

What this team needs most is a football man who has a track record of success. That person should be given authority over all football operations, without non football people like Wilson and Brandon interfering. It's a pipe dream as long as RW owns the team, but he's been swinging and missing quite a bit since BP left. If Brandon can't convince him to hire a real GM and they go with the amateurish setup they have now, I can't see them winning. That offering for a front office is unacceptable, just like DJ's coaching. My fear is RW won't hire another GM because TD didn't work out and alienated the fan base in the process. If Marty comes in a la Parcells in Miami, I wouldn't be averse to it. I don't think it'll happen, but what this team needs is someone to change the losing attitude. Marty could do that.

PFT on Jauron Florio isn't perfect, but it's reasonable to expect a move is made after the season. Jauron has lost this team, and even with one of the easiest schedules in the league, has floundered to a 6-7 record. What's most alarming amid all this talk of the coaches is the point Florio makes at the end of the article. Buffalo may elect to only hire a coach and get by with Guy, Modrak, and Brandon making the personnel moves. If that comes to pass, and we don't know at this point, it's confirmation that this franchise is a ship stranded in the ocean. I would think the lack of a veritable football man running football operations should be something they've learned from these past three seasons of Marv and Russ. Neither are/were qualified to handle personnel decisions.

Jim McNally was recognized as one of the finest OL coaches in the NFL. Even so, he couldn't get Langston Walker to move quicker laterally. He couldn't get Dockery to be more agile. He couldn't prevent Fowler and Preston from being pushed into the backfield on every down. Talent is what this team is in short of supply of at key positions. Good coaching can help make a bad player mediocre, but it can't make a mediocre player good. We're looking at an OL which cannot move well, which is a requirement to run block. In pass blocking, where people are generally holding their own, this OL isn't bad. It still doesn't make up for a lack of mobility.

It's ironic that many thought the Bills offense would improve by being a year older, while adding nothing but James Hardy. It was foolish to think a rookie HC taking the same guys who played under Fairchild along with a 2nd year QB would be successful. I need to see more from Edwards, but given the offenses he's been given, he's got time.