Good article on Bills front office purge

[oldmanfan]

 

That's not going to always happen with two strong personalities who both have a lot on the line in high pressure, high profile jobs. Someone has to be the leader. If they are truly going with McD's vision, then it should be him.

I suppose. One would hope such scenarios are rare.

[atlbillsfan1975]

Last off season everyone in Atl wanted Dimitrofs fired. This year it is all about how Quinn and Dimitrof Work so well together. I hope we can find that tandem that can work like that together . That's what it takes. A coach that can explain the type of players he needs and a GM who can find them. Then let the coach coach.

[stuvian]

at the end of the day Whaley was an old regime guy who was not of the Pegs' choosing. I think McDermott will be the guy for a long while. He must have convinced the Pegs to build the operation around his thinking . At the very least we will no longer be a house divided

[NoSaint]

https://theringer.com/nfl-buffalo-bills-gm-doug-whaley-fired-sean-mcdermott-d87e027bae86-d87e027bae86

 

"Good for the Bills. They may finally have a chance to catch the Pats. Not because Whaley was bad at his job, but rather because he was picking players, not building a team. Being a GM in the NFL is not like being a fantasy football owner. There has to be an understanding of the essentials needed for a team to succeed. And when the head coach and GM dont agree on those essentials, there is chaos, followed by losing.

As Nantz told me years ago, no one cares who the GM is; if youre winning, they care about only the head coach and quarterback. Now all the Bills need under Uncle Seans direction is a QB."

Here's where I disagree:

 

When a gm isn't allowed to pick coaches and the coaches change coordinators at annual pace-- how is a roster built?

 

2011 D.C.-- Edwards 34

2012-- wannstedt 43

2013 -- pettine 34

2014 -- schwartz 43

2015 -- Rex debacle

2016 -- rob, try to get 11 on the field sometimes

2017 -- McDermott 43

 

2011-12 OC -- chan

2013-14 -- Hackett

2015 -- roman

2016-- roman/Lynn

2017-- Denison

 

If you don't give the GM the ability to build a philosophy-- how do you expect him to build a roster?

[BillsFan17]

Until we see what the new FO structure is I'm not goin to sit here and complain about what power mcdermott has or doesn't have.

 

The writing was on the wall for Whaley for some time now, no reason to believe McDermott was operating at a higher power than anyone else. There are variables at play that need to be taken into account in regards to how things look from the outside.

 

I could see if McDermott walked into Baltimore and did this with Ozzie, but our GM and scouting department needed a change.

 

Would be more confusing to give Whaley total control of a team he's about to be removed from no?

 

So again, at first glance, yes it looks like mcdermott has all this power, but he was acting in a role, that the person holding would not be in all that much longer.

[billsredneck1]

i have a good feeling about this situation. after 43 years as a fan, i have not been this excited about an offseason and direction of this team in years. i think mc d will be a successful change and think he will take us forward for years to come. he will need to tweek a few things here and there but i got a good feeling about the whole situation.

 

right now i couldn't be happier and when all is said and done concerning the pegulas' sports team management and accumen , this will be accredited to them turning things around for the good.

[Buffalo Barbarian]

https://theringer.com/nfl-buffalo-bills-gm-doug-whaley-fired-sean-mcdermott-d87e027bae86-d87e027bae86

 

"Good for the Bills. They may finally have a chance to catch the Pats. Not because Whaley was bad at his job, but rather because he was picking players, not building a team. Being a GM in the NFL is not like being a fantasy football owner. There has to be an understanding of the essentials needed for a team to succeed. And when the head coach and GM don’t agree on those essentials, there is chaos, followed by losing.[/size]

As Nantz told me years ago, no one cares who the GM is; if you’re winning, they care about only the head coach and quarterback. Now all the Bills need under Uncle Sean’s direction is a QB."

Excellent article, hopefully all the pegula haters will see the light now.

[CanadianFan]

 

Yes. Moreover, any credible assessment of the players Whaley drafted, must take into account that Whaley has had to try to build 3 teams for 3 head coaches with different offensive and defensive schemes.

I don't get the "drafting players, not building a team" line.

 

 

 

I could be wrong but I had the impression that the seeds of Whaley's firing were laid back in November, and they were just waiting until after the draft to proceed *shrug*

 

I don't think one has to create narratives about it being "necessary" to push Whaley out the door or about "scouting not building a team". My personal thing is that the GM and coach usually come and go as a set. Give whichever one you hire first the partner he wants, and Ix Nay any down-the-road excuses.

 

Yup, I agree with you on both counts. If you look at it Whaley tried to bring the type of players each coach wanted. I recall Whaley saying what he liked about McDermott was that he is not scheme-centric and that he can adjust his schemes to suit the player personnel, which is what was needed as the team's basically had 2 different schemes from times with Marrone and Ryan.

Edited May 5, 2017 by CanadianFan

[Bill_with_it]

 

 

 

Cracks me up.

 

When people talk about defensive or offensive ranking, they mean yards. Period. It's how this is judged.

 

Until Buffalo does well in scoring for a year. Then suddenly Bills fans change how they evaluate everything. And it will change back if we score poorly but make a lot of yards.

 

Offences are ranked by yards for good reason. Yards figures are much less affected by defence and STs than is scoring. Yards better isolates how well the offence itself is doing. Scoring is affected a ton by field position. Not to mention that defences and STs sometimes actually score points (and the Bills were top ten in that department last year).

 

And the offence had the 11th best average drive start in the league. While leaving the defence the 23rd best average drive starts. Which meant the defence helped the offence while the offence left the D in bad situations.

 

 

 

 

In any case, yeah, we've had a very good run game the last two years, during which we've had bad defences. We've whipsawed back and forth between different offensive and defensive schemes during Whaley's term, and it has killed us. And isn't it possible that that's exactly what the article is about? That Whaley didn't have a vision on team building and so he just brought in players and picked coaches who had their own visions, meaning the team had little or no continuity.

In the history of the league yards never ever have one a game. Points scored is the only relevant matter. Edited May 5, 2017 by Bill_with_it

[Gugny]

Hard to build a team when you have a different head coach and system to build for every 2 years. Like or hate Whaley, ignoring the fact that he wasn't allowed to pick his own coach and had 3 different coaches in his short time here is just wrong.

 

Amen.

 

And I hate to say it, but if Whaley "looked the part," then I think this fan base would have been a little more open to realizing how great of a job he did under two incredibly schitty owners.

In the history of the league yards never ever have one a game. Points scored is the only relevant matter.

 

When the points are scored is far more relevant.

[Billy Zabka]

Lombardi echoes what I have been saying for years, that Whaley is good at finding individual talent but lacked in most of the other areas it takes to be a good GM.

[GG]

 

Amen.

 

And I hate to say it, but if Whaley "looked the part," then I think this fan base would have been a little more open to realizing how great of a job he did under two incredibly schitty owners.

 

 

When the points are scored is far more relevant.

What are you taking about. Whaley is straight out of central casting young GM.

[Bill_with_it]

 

Amen.

 

And I hate to say it, but if Whaley "looked the part," then I think this fan base would have been a little more open to realizing how great of a job he did under two incredibly schitty owners.

 

 

When the points are scored is far more relevant.

Na id venture to say what that score looks like when the clock hits zero is more important. Thats why there is 4 quarters. Did you watch the superbowl last year?

[Gugny]

Na id venture to say what that score looks like when the clock hits zero is more important. Thats why there is 4 quarters. Did you watch the superbowl last year?

 

That's not relevant. What's relevant is that the Bills scored 26 pts. per game (great) and had the best run game in the league (fantastic), yet still managed to have a losing season (very bad).

 

Did you watch any Bills games last year?

[Bill_with_it]

 

That's not relevant. What's relevant is that the Bills scored 26 pts. per game (great) and had the best run game in the league (fantastic), yet still managed to have a losing season (very bad).

 

Did you watch any Bills games last year?

Yeah I certainly watched every one. The defense gave up more points than the top ten offense scored. Could the offense stand to improve? Absolutely. Was the defense the deal breaker to the plaoffs last year? Without hesitation yes.

[Tcali]

I like Lombardi but he's has a lot of misses in his career. Whaley had a top 5 defense and top 10 offense under his watch in 4 years without being able to pick a head coach.

..and even if whaley had vince lombardo coaching he wouldnt have won because he never got us a QB.

[Coach Tuesday]

But that is the whole point. The front office structure needed to change. And the reason that Whaley wasn't "allowed to pick his own coach" was because the man has not at any point(in interviews, with draft strategy, with the type of players that were brought in) established a vision for what a team of his would look like. Don't you think they have had those conversations with him? If he had a convincing answer or plan, they would have let him execute it. They did not want to fire him. They had to.

 

From Doug's own mouth has always come the idea that he is in charge of acquiring the players and the coach will coach him. And that philosophy sucks and is pretty much evident as the root of any dysfunctional issue with this team since Whaley/Marrone Year 1. It goes beyond Whaley because this mantra was regurgitated from Russ Brandon's mouth also any time he would talk about "the 53." That's why Rex and Roman appealed to them so much; because they thought that they could just feed them great players and they could plug and play them into his multi-hybrid schemes on offense and defense. It was clear from the Watkins trade, when Whaley quoted his Pittsburgh mentor Bill Nunn that if you like a guy so much you go get him despite the cost, that Whaley was in over his head as GM and that he hadn't a real clue as to build a team.

 

It's not Whaley's fault. He was a player acquisition guy in Pittsburgh but he was not in the inner circle of decision making. They brought him here and he mentored under another career scout in Buddy Nix along with Brandon and Overdorf(3 guys that have no success in the league as a top administator) and we really expected him to become a great visionary manager.

Great post.

The structure right now is finally the right one (or one of two or three that could work). Whether McDermott, who was coaching defenses six months ago, is the right guy to give all of the power to - that's an open question. At some point the Pegulas have to luck their way into a good hire, no?

[Hapless Bills Fan]

And they didn't, regardless of what some may imagine. McDermott was highly recommended by the league's own internal search committee as well as Polian.

 

Just a nit that Polian is a key member of the league's career development advisory panel, so there isn't any "as well as". Same thing.

The CDAP is a bit controversial apparently in some circles as being a means for members to push favorites who have an 'in' with them vs any kind of objective quality-of-candidate evaluation.

 

Cracks me up.

 

When people talk about defensive or offensive ranking, they mean yards. Period. It's how this is judged.

 

 

Urrrr, stats sites track both yards and points for good reason - because both are used. There's really no "they mean, period" about it. In fact PF/PA is the default sort on some sites (pro-football-reference I think).

Certainly not here, performance on points has been talked about long before Rex Ryan and Tyrod Taylor, which your number of posts suggest you perhaps ought to know?

 

 

 

[HappyDays]

Offences are ranked by yards for good reason. Yards figures are much less affected by defence and STs than is scoring. Yards better isolates how well the offence itself is doing. Scoring is affected a ton by field position.

Why would scoring be affected by field position, but total yards wouldn't be? You can't really believe total yards is the best measure Thurman. I don't think anyone except the NFL itself uses that as their main tracker. Our offensive DVOA was 10th which includes that abysmal last game. They have our run game as 1st and our pass game as 19th. I think those rankings sound about right. They're already taking starting field position into account. You're the one who got me into Football Outsiders in the first place, don't back out now!

[BmarvB]

Very good 'right on the money' article. WInners build teams (like the 90's BIlls), everybody else gets players

Edited May 5, 2017 by BmarvB