The real reason why the Bills are under the cap

[John from Riverside]

Oh, I almost forgot ... the insane "we have young guys we want to develop" excuse for trading Lee Evans was shot down when they kept Ruvell Martin ... who was not on the team until 12 days AFTER Evans was traded. They loved their young talent so much, they kept something called RUVELL MARTIN and cut Roosevelt, Huggins, Aiken and Buster Davis. So I can only conclude they were lying, or they believe Ruvell Martin gives them a better chance vs. Kansas City than Lee Evans would have (that's the standard Gailey said was used for cuts).

 

I was not aware that Lee Evans was a good special teams gunner

[BillyBaroo]

is it going to take a ton of $ to lock up Parrish?? or even Johnson?? I hope we are saving it because they know we have a high draft pick to sign next year and might be able to make a good move in Free Agency with more time due to no lockout.

[CodeMonkey]

Code Monkey, so what you're saying is the Bills shouldn't resign a WR that had 80+ catches, 1000+ yards & 10 TDs last year, just because the team was 4-12? Yeah, that makes so much sense... So you don't think that Nix & Gailey doing a major overhaul on the smaller, speedy players that Jauron loved had nothing to do with our 4-12 record. Plus, that record landed us Marcell Dareus, who will be the centerpiece of our defense for 10+ years, just like Bruce Smith was.

 

So continue with your whining, I'll call the Whaambulance for you.

Sigh. Maybe that whaambulance is loud enough that is affecting your brain.

I never said to sign, or not sign, anyone. All I said was signing current players for future years is not a reason for being far under the cap now as the OP suggested. Please read and try and understand something before you complain about it.

[miserable_fan]

is it going to take a ton of $ to lock up Parrish?? or even Johnson?? I hope we are saving it because they know we have a high draft pick to sign next year and might be able to make a good move in Free Agency with more time due to no lockout.

I think Stevie will cost a pretty penny

[CodeMonkey]

I think Stevie will cost a pretty penny

If he produces this season at or above last season I'm sure he will.

Edited September 4, 2011 by CodeMonkey

[gus2378]

I was not aware that Lee Evans was a good special teams gunner

 

OK. I'll give you that. Let's say Martin beat out Huggins for that spot and the other WRs were battling it out for 5 spots. Even Evans on the decline helps you win more than whomever you choose to label #5. It was a save money move, and that would be fine if they actually saved money to improve the team. To claim you are saving it so you can extend the likes of Roscoe Parrish is insane.

[BillyBaroo]

I think Stevie will cost a pretty penny

I still don't see him as an elite NFL receiver - maybe it's God's fault?

[Nitro]

I am a former living in Indy and looking at the Bills I can see potential for good and bad. If it were not for Manning, the Colts would be a consistent 5 win team. Polian has been lauded as great but look at his drafts. He has plenty of busts. He gets by on street free agent O linemen (Jeff Saturday), small D linemen and a constant turn over in the secondary. Are the Bills running backs better than the Colts? YES! After Reggie Wayne the Colts WR corps is no more talented than the Bills. The Bills are 2 players from being a playoff contender...the dreaded LT and a monster LB. The trade of Evans was a good move. He has become a 1 dimentional player and is consistently shut down by quality CBs. He was not producing and aging, not a good combo. Wait until the end of the first 4 games to panic.

[purple haze]

 

As a side note, I believe that Buddy's "building through the draft" philosophy is more of a practical acknowledgement of the relative nonattractiveness of Buffalo as a free agent destination than it is a true philosophy of winning (as evidenced by his efforts at Clabo).

 

 

No it's not. Building through the draft is what teams that win consistently do. The Bills of the 90's were built through the draft. An organization cannot constantly sign FA's and expect to win consistently because most times those FA's don't pan out. What makes Buffalo an unattractive destination is losing. If they were winning they would get FA's willing to go there. Most teams are trying to build through the draft it's not just a Buddy Nix philosophy.

[eme123]

Code Monkey, so what you're saying is the Bills shouldn't resign a WR that had 80+ catches, 1000+ yards & 10 TDs last year, just because the team was 4-12? Yeah, that makes so much sense... So you don't think that Nix & Gailey doing a major overhaul on the smaller, speedy players that Jauron loved had nothing to do with our 4-12 record. Plus, that record landed us Marcell Dareus, who will be the centerpiece of our defense for 10+ years, just like Bruce Smith was.

 

So continue with your whining, I'll call the Whaambulance for you.

 

 

Try 38 catches for 578 yards. Maybe his 44 catches for 610 yards the year before was more impressive for you. We don't need Lee Evans!!!!! Any Tom, Dick, or Harry WR in the NFL can get those numbers ALOT easier than Evans did.

 

The Only thing Lee Evans was capable of doing is waiting the whole game for a safety to cheat off his deep assignment and burn pas the corner. It shows in Lee's yards per catch 15.6. That's a nice number. It's not so nice when it 3rd and long and you need someone who can catch the ball just short of the sticks and make A play.

 

When Donald Jones, Parrish, Easley or whoever cream Evan's stats this year maybe you will stop your whining. I can almost guarantee whoever are other starting WR is will have more yards than Evans just by wiling to do run the routes that Evans wouldnt.

[John from Riverside]

OK. I'll give you that. Let's say Martin beat out Huggins for that spot and the other WRs were battling it out for 5 spots. Even Evans on the decline helps you win more than whomever you choose to label #5. It was a save money move, and that would be fine if they actually saved money to improve the team. To claim you are saving it so you can extend the likes of Roscoe Parrish is insane.

 

 

I have said it before and I said it again I think Lee Evans is a quality person and a great deep threat....and the way this offense is set up he not only wastes his talents on this team but he is actually a detriment to the team because he cant run screen, go over the middle, run timing routes, block downfield, everything that every receiver does on this team (except Roscoe....who does everything but block and gets a pass because he is uncoverable)

 

Evans is also gone because he did it right and asked for a trade without going outside the organization....this team has a way of taking care of players if they handle things in certain ways (see Kelsay)

 

Evans is probably going to have a great year which will keep this going all year long.....I am hoping that Easley, Nelson, and Jones show up enough that it wont get out of hand.

[benderbender]

Does building through the draft include not resigning Poz?

[FightinIrishBills]

So they do not want to sign better players that could make them a better team now. Instead they want to save the money now so that they can resign the key players from the 4-12 season last year? Even though if they spent the money this year on short term veteran improvements they could cut these players in the future when they needed to in order to fit under the cap? This is your logic? This theory makes the Bills front office seems so stupid that it makes you look like a "gloomer" in my opinion. LOL

 

I am not privy to the inner working of OBD, but I sure as hell hope you are not correct for the sake of the Bills future!

 

This is a great way to woo free agents to Buffalo

 

The "sign players now to make the team better" is short-sighted. The quality of the player your getting in FA usually isn't enough to make your team that much better in the short term. You need to develop your own players, especially your early round talent. You won't get a team's worth of players from FA, most likely just a piece or two that will complement your home-grown talent.

 

I don't disagree with a couple short-term veteran signings, but you need to have a solid foundation before you add those pieces. Otherwise you're just wasting time and money in developing your young franchise-potential talent.

 

Does building through the draft include not resigning Poz?

 

Not when you're Buddy Nix and the player in question is a middling product of the terrible drafting organization that preceded you.

[ieatcrayonz]

Code Monkey, so what you're saying is the Bills shouldn't resign a WR that had 80+ catches, 1000+ yards & 10 TDs last year, just because the team was 4-12? Yeah, that makes so much sense... So you don't think that Nix & Gailey doing a major overhaul on the smaller, speedy players that Jauron loved had nothing to do with our 4-12 record. Plus, that record landed us Marcell Dareus, who will be the centerpiece of our defense for 10+ years, just like Bruce Smith was.

 

So continue with your whining, I'll call the Whaambulance for you.

This post explains why they dropped Evans. So they can re-sign Roscoe and get away from the small speedy Jauron types. Good one.

[gus2378]

This is a great way to woo free agents to Buffalo

 

The "sign players now to make the team better" is short-sighted. The quality of the player your getting in FA usually isn't enough to make your team that much better in the short term. You need to develop your own players, especially your early round talent. You won't get a team's worth of players from FA, most likely just a piece or two that will complement your home-grown talent.

 

I don't disagree with a couple short-term veteran signings, but you need to have a solid foundation before you add those pieces. Otherwise you're just wasting time and money in developing your young franchise-potential talent.

 

Not when you're Buddy Nix and the player in question is a middling product of the terrible drafting organization that preceded you.

 

I agree with the idea of building through the draft. But wake me up when they actually have some of this "young franchise-potential talent." So far, it pretty much begins and ends with Wood and Dareus.

 

I actually tend to agree with those saying Evans was not a great fit for the offense ... I still think he's better than Donald Jones, but whatever. Poz himself said he left because he didn't fit the defense. But that is entirely different than "we have to get rid of these guys and can't bring in help so we have money for extensions." That's a crock. They have plenty of money for extensions. What they don't have is many guys actually worthy of extending.

[Jerry Jabber]

Try 38 catches for 578 yards. Maybe his 44 catches for 610 yards the year before was more impressive for you. We don't need Lee Evans!!!!! Any Tom, Dick, or Harry WR in the NFL can get those numbers ALOT easier than Evans did.

 

The Only thing Lee Evans was capable of doing is waiting the whole game for a safety to cheat off his deep assignment and burn pas the corner. It shows in Lee's yards per catch 15.6. That's a nice number. It's not so nice when it 3rd and long and you need someone who can catch the ball just short of the sticks and make A play.

 

When Donald Jones, Parrish, Easley or whoever cream Evan's stats this year maybe you will stop your whining. I can almost guarantee whoever are other starting WR is will have more yards than Evans just by wiling to do run the routes that Evans wouldnt.

 

Huh?! You got me confused with being an Evans lover. The numbers I stated were Johnson's numbers last year, not Evans. I completely agree about your assessment on Evans and I'm sick & tired of hearing people cry that we only got a 4th rounder for him. "38 catches for 578 yards and 44 catches for 610 yards the year before" does not get you a 3rd round pick or higher. No GM in the NFL will give up a 3rd round pick or higher for those kind of numbers. With Evans' lack of production, it comes down to 1 of 4 things (or a combination of the four):

1. Once Evans got the big payday from the Bills, he packed it in and didn't play as hard since he got paid.

2. Evans is a one-trick pony and needed a QB that could throw the deep ball (meaning 60+ yards) multiple times a game.

3. Once Evans' buddy Losman was gone, Evans was upset by that and stopped playing as hard.

4. Evans was tired of playing on a losing team, lost his motivation and was not playing at the level he previously was.

[John from Riverside]

Does building through the draft include not resigning Poz?

 

 

Are you serious with that?

 

- Didnt want to play in a 3-4

- Got a stupid offer for what he does.....this happens whether you are biudling throught he draft or not....that is when you go out and get a vet to fill that spot....FOR THE MOST PART they are trying to biuld through the draft.

[Jerry Jabber]

For those that don't agree with this assessment and say that there isn't talent on this team worth resigning, and Ralph is cheap...then by your logic, the Bills shouldn't have resigned Kyle Williams, just because the Bills were 4-12 last year. So, Williams shouldn't have been resigned, plus there's no need to resign guys like Steve Johnson, Parrish, Fitzpatrick, Merriman, Wood, and Levitre. While we're at it, when it comes time for Dareus to be resigned, the Bills should just lose him to free agency. So screw keeping any good players and let's have the Bills do what Daniel Snyder does in DC every year and play fantasy football with the team, overpay over the hill free agents.

 

This post explains why they dropped Evans. So they can re-sign Roscoe and get away from the small speedy Jauron types. Good one.

 

So if you were the GM, you would just let young talent like Easley and David Nelson go, just to keep a guy that produced: 38 catches for 578 yards last year, and 44 catches for 610 yards the year before. That's brilliant...

[JohnC]

You might think that is crazy, but there is a team in Washington that is a perfect example of this. They sign the big FA's every year, and fall on their faces. Then they are married to aging players that are past their prime in terms of playing, but in their prime in terms of earnings.

 

This is what a real rebuild looks like.

 

In less than two years Mike Shanahan has dramatically re-shaped his roster. He took over an old team and now it is much younger. He took over a cap heavy team. In short order he cut a lot of the expensive players such as Portis, Haynesworth etc and now they are comfortably under the cap. In less than two years he has totally reworked the OL. He drafted LT Trent Williams, picked up RT Jerome Brown from free agency last year, brought in Chester at RG ths year, cut his center and replaced him, cut his RG in Dockery and replaced him. Voila, a completely reshaped OL.

 

The Skins did utilize the free agent market this offseason. They didn't pick up any high-profile free agents. Instead, MS acquired a number of mid-level free agents to bolster the roster at very reasonable prices. Shanahan didn't have many picks this year so he smartly moved down in the draft and acquired additional picks. The net result was that the team got younger, cheaper payroll and there is now better competition and depth within the roster

 

Shanahan would be the first to tell you that the McNabb deal he made last year backfired. He quickly acknowledged his mistake and acted on it. While the Bills held on to useless players such as McCargo etc he quickly corrected what he perceived to be his mistake.

 

Bills' fans no longer have the right to accusingly point to the owner of the Redskins, Danny Snyder, to use him as an example of what not to do. He is not now involved in the football side of the operation. What he is doing is allowing Mike Shanahan to make the football decisions and without his interference.

 

Will the Skins make the playoffs this year? Probably not. But what the owner of the Redskins and Mike Shanahan have demonstrated is that a team can quickly be reconstituted in a fairly short time frame if you act intelligently and with some urgency.

 

There are a lot of Ralph Wilson apologists on this board. That's fine. But I would take Dan Snyder over dopey Ralph Wilson as an owner in a heart beat.

[mike oxhurtz]

For those that don't agree with this assessment and say that there isn't talent on this team worth resigning, and Ralph is cheap...then by your logic, the Bills shouldn't have resigned Kyle Williams, just because the Bills were 4-12 last year. So, Williams shouldn't have been resigned, plus there's no need to resign guys like Steve Johnson, Parrish, Fitzpatrick, Merriman, Wood, and Levitre. While we're at it, when it comes time for Dareus to be resigned, the Bills should just lose him to free agency. So screw keeping any good players and let's have the Bills do what Daniel Snyder does in DC every year and play fantasy football with the team, overpay over the hill free agents.

 

 

 

So if you were the GM, you would just let young talent like Easley and David Nelson go, just to keep a guy that produced: 38 catches for 578 yards last year, and 44 catches for 610 yards the year before. That's brilliant...

 

JJ, I completely agree with you. CHIX has been doing a complete overhaul of the roster from Dickie J & Marv. http://www.buffalorumblings.com/2011/9/4/2403478/buffalo-bills-roster-2011-buddy-nix-chan-gailey

 

"Now that yesterday's roster cuts have sunk in, it's time to update those numbers: of the 53 players currently on Buffalo's roster, 40 are players that Nix and Gailey have either acquired themselves, or inherited players that they've made serious commitments to."

 

People forget that Nix helped transform the Chargers from a 1-15 team to a consistent playoff team, that had a better win/loss record against one of the top AFC teams of the 2000's, the Indianapolis Colts. Nix stated the Chargers beat the Colts by having bigger lines (both offense & defense). Nix stated he plans to build the team through the draft and mentioned that the Steelers have been successful that way. The Bills defense of the late 90's was awesome and we had some huge guys on defense at that time (which Nix was involved with Butler & AJ Smith for building the defense). CHIX beefed up the defense this year. Next year, you can bet the focus will be on the offense. When your team gives up nearly 170 rushing YPG, then you have no choice but to address it. 8 times last year, teams rushed for over 200 YPG, that's pathetic!!

 

Everyone hates it that it's been 11 years since we've been to the playoffs. With that said, fans should expect a good Bills team that not only makes it to the playoffs, but is a long-term playoff team like Chargers have been since Butler/Smith/Nix took over in SD. Donahoe tried building a quick playoff team through FA and failed.