BrooklynBills

We signed him to pay special teams so I would think he'll wind up playing there mostly, but he also can play any LB position so I would think he'll rotate in at multiple places on the LB level. If Lawson is fully healthy, he'll be the starter by week 9. But his pay gives them alot of flexibility to put a faster group out there because he can play MLB.

If EJ was not Whaley's guy, he wouldn't have gone all out to get him a top prospect WR in the next year's draft. If EJ wasn't his choice, he could have easily distanced himself from the pick by bringing in another QB the next year when he officially became the GM. But he didn't. He had to be dragged into bringing in Kyle Orton in TC; so much so that there were visible arguments between Marrone and Whaley on the field. When they fired Gailey, Brandon and Whaley took over, and Nix was phased out of decision making. Nix "retired" right after the draft. His "retirement" was Brandon spin and purely a way for the organization to get rid of him without outright firing him. It was painfully obvious to anyone watching without Bills-colored glasses on. EJ is absolutely on Doug Whaley. Their front office decision making is based on "hope and a prayer" and not on analytical thinking. They are constantly reactive in their thinking. And it always seems like we are behind the 8-ball with regards to the roster because of it.

You can add the kouandijo pick in here as well. He was a 2nd round pick expected to play RT; they thought immediately. Most teams didn't have him on their boards because of medical reasons. Now the talk is that he can only play the left side because of his knee issue. So you have Glenn being paid as a top 10 LT and a you've spent a 2nd round pick on his backup.

Because if CK is your starting LT, he is going to make alot more than 4-6 mil per year. And by soon, I take it you mean in 10-15 years when most of these guys are not in the league anymore.

Dude. They signed him to that contract with the intent to move him to LT. Also, they needed to pay him that much so he would not go to FA where he would surely get a LT contract. They negotiated with him and treated him as a LT which is why he is making so much money. He will be there LT by next season when they release Jason Peters. The next highly paid RT is Bryan Buluga, at 6.75 million and a deal that was signed just last year. Moving CK to LT and making him the starter means you are going to have to sign him to an extension at roughly the same as what Glenn is making as soon as next year if he is successful there. Actually, it would be a very Bills-y thing to do to lock up over $20 million/yr in Ts. Not to mention that CK will have problems with faster edge rushers. The Jets DLine is very good but they have no speed on the outside.

David Shaw

Glenn and Watkins are the only talented offensive players he has drafted since has been here, including when he was assistant GM. Anyone could have made the Watkins pick(BTW he isn't even the best WR in that draft) and the Glenn pick is an abherration when you look at all the other offensive "talent" that he has drafted.

Cardinals - For sure loss @Patriots - for sure loss @Rams - 50/50; hard to predict a road W though 49ers - 50/50 @Dolphins - probable loss Patriots - loss @Seahawks - loss Bye @Bengals - loss Jaguars - 50/50 @Raiders - loss Steelers - loss Browns - win Dolphins - 50/50 @Jets - loss So at best, we are going into the bye 2-7, with a good possibility of being 1-8 If we just split the 50/50 games, 3-13 overall record

Glad we just paid Glenn $12mil/year. He would literally be making 2x as much as the next highest paid RT.

Any talk of hiring a new coach without discussing cleaning house in the front office is a waste of time. I do not want the following people to have any input in the hiring of a new coach: Terry Pegula Kim Pegula Doug Whaley Russ Brandon This is Pegula's mess. He was offered help from the NFL via a consultant after Marrone opted out and he denied the help. He let Brandon have a seat at the table influencing his decision making. He let a green, over-his-head GM run the coach search. Do you remember the coaching search, where they literally interviewed everyone, had zero direction, and ended up picking a safe, retread coach? It was a joke. They picked Ryan on his past performance with no vision of where the league is headed. As far as what the Pegulas should do to fix everything: 1. Clean house. Literally everyone. 2. Hire a consultant(Ron Wolf/Charlie Casserly) 3. Sign the checks

This. He is strong. Speed will give him problems though is ultimately why he won't be a regular NFL starter. Also his knee is a time bomb that's been ticking since he was drafted. He was not supposed to be a developmental player; he was supposed to be a finished product at RT who would be solid but not last very long.

CJ Spiller - top 10 pick Marcus Easley - 4th round; no offensive production Ed Wang - nothing Levi Brown - nothing Kyle Calloway - nothing Chris Hairston - nothing Johnny White - nothing Cordy Glenn - good TJ Graham - nothing Zebrie Sanders - nothing Mark Asper - nothing EJ Manuel - nothing Robert Woods - 2nd round pick; no production Marquise Goodwin - 3rd round pick; no production Chris Gragg - nothing Sammy Watkins - good; overpaid for him; top 5 pick; he may be the #3 best receiver in this draft class Cyrus Kouandijo - 2nd round pick; not a starter Cyril Richardson - nothing Seantrel Henderson - starter by default; possibly beaten out by waiver pickup Jordan Mills John Miller - meh so far; jury is still out Karlos Williams - talented; not even on team any more Nick O'Leary - no Dez Lewis - nothing Cardale Jones - too early; Jonathan Williams - too early Kolby Listenbee - too early No production from anyone past round 2. And the best offensive player he picked, that he traded an extra 1st round pick for, is not even to best WR from that draft class. Why should this man continue to be employed after this year?

If Pegula fires Rex and retains the rest of the front office, then yes, an outside coach would absolutely look at the Bills job in a very negative light. In a clean house situation, this is a potentially attractive job. Wealthy owner, top 5 pick, probably a 2 year grace period before you are even considered on the hot seat.

I've been a rex supporter. I am done now. That was an embarrassing sequence.

Exactly. It is in Brandon's interest to not hire a VP of football operations. It would minimize his job a bit and he would have no more influence.

Closest we've ever been to the playoffs in 16 years and we've been a joke since he was fired. He wasn't the best but just because they fired Donahoe doesn't mean that they needed to abolish the position. Again, if they hired a stud HC and not Dick Jauron, they could have gotten away with having a bunch weak GMs.

All of them did. And none of them have shown they are qualified to be making that decision. Whaley has found some good players, but he is an imposter as a GM. The organizational philosophy of "Whaley finds the players and Rex coaches them" or whatever their mantra about "the 53" that Brandon spews in every football media session is asinine. Who is your CEO? Who is setting organizational vision? Is it Whaley? I doubt it because they've changed offensive and defensive styles several times under his watch which tells me he is not dictating anything with regards to how they play on the field. So then it would come down to the HC, but they didn't hire a HC who had any semblance of being an organizational decision maker in his background. The point is that you can have an organizationally weak GM if you have a CEO type as your HC who will make smart decisions OFF the field and who has the clout and power to be the final decision maker, like a Pete Carroll or Bill Belichek. Conversely, you can have Rex Ryan as your HC if you have a strong GM/Team President who is making organizational decisions. For example, the idea that Ryan tried to run a combination of his defense and the Bills 2014 defense would absolutely not have happened with a strong organizational leader at the GM spot. We've just hired Rex Ryan as our coach and we aren't going to run his defensive system aka the main benefit of having him as your HC? I'm sorry, that doesn't happen with a strong GM helming the franchise.

It will be the same until Pegula brings in someone to run all aspects of the football side of things and set an organizational vision, a la Bill Belichek, Pete Carroll, Ted Thompson. Our management is a joke.

Rex has had 3 primary NTs in his history: Kelly Gregg, 6th round pick, practice squad on 2 teams before landing with ravens. Sione Puoha, 3rd round pick, backup with jets for 4 years before he became regular starting NT with Jets. Damon Harrison, undrafted, sat 1 year, then started every year until he left as free agent this off-season. So I would imagine we will draft a guy in the later rounds, and roll with a combo of Barnes and Kyle Williams.

He has two inside sources for this story: 1. An ex-coach no longer with the team. 2. A high ranking FO official with questionable info. If you read this piece with a critical eye, it isn't very noteworthy. Just more Schwartz ball washing to stir up the section of Bills fans who thought Schwartz was going to stay on as DC no matter who was the HC, despite the fact that he had no intention of being anything but the HC once Marrone was gone.

Is Mario still a talented player? Absolutely. But even if just maintained his previous 2 years production into this past season, we would still be here talking about releasing Mario. At his cap number, he should be producing at a top 5 non-QB player in the league, at that just has not happened at point in his time here. The fact of the matter is that he has the 2nd highest cap number for a defensive player and he's not close to being in that class of player, even in his best years. The writing was on the wall last off season when nothing was done with his contract as far as an extension or a restructure. That was the time to bring down his cap number and extend him a few years. But either the Bills made their decision on this or he balked at an extension. Also, it is much more likely that Mario too saw the writing on the wall with regards to his contract, realized that the Bills are not going to pay me $19 million next year, and mailed it in. He knows he'll get a nice new contract based on his reputation and he can chalk up this bad year to Rex using him incorrectly. All his scheme-hating in the media is purely so that he can take that into the off-season when he is negotiating with other teams. The Mario situation has WAY more to do with money than Rex running him out of town.

His defenses without Rod Marinelli as DC are pretty awful. I think he very overrated as a defensive coach.

Pete Carroll basically runs the defense in SEA. Mike McCarthy won a Super Bowl as the primary play caller for Green Bay. Ditto Sean Payton with the Saints. Arguably the best team in the NFL, Arizona, has a HC who is also the de facto OC. Mike Holmgren won a Super Bowl calling plays. Jon Gruden also. I think this point is overblown. And Pete Carroll isn't scheduling 15 minutes for anything. That guy is more laid back and casual than anyone in the NFL.

It took Carroll a year to get his defense going also. And he had back to back 7-9 seasons to start his tenure there. If the Bills simply wanted to keep the defense rolling, they could have easily promoted Schwartz to HC (which by all accounts he would have accepted) and brought in a new offensive staff. But they probably realized that he had a terrible record as a HC and that his defenses never had sustained success year to year. Also, hopefully they realized that their defensive model in which they invest so many resources on the defensive line was unsustainable. They have to give Ryan more than one season to figure this out.

In Football Outsiders DVOA rankings, Pettine's D ranked higher than Schwartz's D, mainly I think because the Bills offense was a total tire fire under Marrone in year 1.