Assessing TD

[Fake-Fat Sunny]

In a thread below a poster rantred against the rantings of several posters who have said from time to time cut T Henry now because they hate him and/or his play (this is an odd view INHO because TH would love to be cut and it would be doing him a great favor which seems inconsistent with hating him, his play or simply wanting the Bills to get something for nothing).

 

Amusingly someone responded to this notion with total sarcasm that cutting him was the right thing to do but a poster missed out completely initially on the sarcasm. At any rate the thread digressed into TD assessment and raised the issue for me of judging his performance.

 

I figured I would throw my two cents on TD onto the waters and see if folks had anything to say.

 

My own lame judgments of TD are:

 

A. A year to year assessment since though performance is the ultimate judge for me, I actually am quite willing to reward a GM who failed in performance but did as good a job as can be done dealing with the reality he is given.

B. Also skewed by though me only really caring about W/L I am quite well aware that the ultimate decision about keeping him or not by the owner is influenced by whether he is turning a profit or not and keeping the owner happy.

C. An overall assessment based on W/L and prospects for the future.

 

Toward that end:

 

1. 2001- I judge TD's performance to be at about a B level. He reasonably deserves the benefit of the doubt as a new hire in a horrendous situation as Butler ran out on us and Wade gave up on his last season by declaring us done while we statistically were not eliminated (a real world issue since Indy had the same record as us at the time and did make the playoffs that year). In addition tio getting the benefit of the doubt, TD was simply outstanding in doing a great job stabilizing the floundering post-Butler Bills by managing the salary cap and doing the dictated blood-letting in a almost as efficient a manner as possible (thoise who claim cutting the cap is simply dictated and easy ignore the reality that many teams (even good ones) butcher their cap year after year. Even if one accepts that no skil demonstrated by TD could produce good results, the reality is that with a bad owner like a Bill Bidwell or even if you are the best team in the mid 90s to mid 90s as SF was a bad GM can certainly do a bad job of cutting the cap. TD deserves great fault despite the benefit of the doubt he gets as a new hire in a horrible situation he screwed up badly in choosing GW as his HC (understandable though not condonable after the last HC he hired ran him out of Pitts). However, all in all I think he was the best we could do in the post-Butler era at the time.

 

2. 2002- I give him an A at this point as moving from 3-13 rebuilding to 8-8 was simply phenomemal. The Bledsoe move was a great one as it not only restored faith in the product he was selling but resulted in on the field performance which was as good as could be expected.

 

3. 2003- Saw he chickens come home to roost as he plummeted back to a C level as the failings of Bledsoe became apparent and even worse were exploitable by opponents as the failings of GW as a poor HC became apparent. I think a team can win with Bledsoe's real and large failings but to do so you can't have an OC like Kevin Killdrive in control who refuses to diversify his approach, you cannot have not ready for primetime OL position coaches like Vinky and Ruel, and the GM needs to use his good judgment to supplement the HCs failings and TD did not do this. If TDs job eas only judged by on field stuff (like I do) then he easily gets a D (as seen in his eventual letting GW go and hiring of MM there was hope). However, it is also clear that in terms of the other aspects of his job like negotiating contracts with outside vendors, negotiating player contracts and other factors kuje drafting folks like WM TD did a great job so i stick with a C.

 

4. 2004- While missing the playoffs still leaves hin inadequate in a total judgment by me, the improvement and close call this year once again elevates the TD job to the B level for me. i find his belated abandonment of Bledsoe a good sign as I do not think we want to do what is necessary (or would it be the best option for us) to win with Bledsoe's limitations. If the JP experiment works out and he did a good job picking a replacement QB when he did he easily deserves a B for 2004 if not higher.

 

B. In terms of my second judgment, he deserves a B (if not lower) for his W/L, but he gets an A for his business management so i think he stays.

 

C. In terms of W/L which is where my real fan assessment lies I give TD a C(-). Hope for the future is the main thing which does not give him a D since we missed the playoffs in everyear he has been here. Some might give him an F for this result, but i think you have to take into account that the 8-8 his second year was really about as much as any team could produce and like it or not last year they failed by not making the playoffs but did produce a winning record that cannot be judged an F as though SF, the Lions and the Bills are all exactly the same (NE is a good example here as they missed the playoffs in 2002 but can anyone seriously say that it is meaningful to simply judge this team to be an F same as the other teams which missed the playoffs that year, Anyone who judges the 2002 Pats to be exactly the same as a team as the 2002 Bengals simply because they both missed the playoffs that year knows little about football).

 

TG is a c(-) in the areas I hold important but hope springs eternal for me in the 2005 season.

[MartyBall4Buffalo]

Overall I agree with your assessments of Tom Donahoe's job thus far as the gm of the bills. However me personally I hold 3 things to be self evident.

 

 

Gm's should be graded on on the field product. Overall Team, and Win/Loss record.

 

 

26-38- 1 winning season, 2 losing seasons 1 .500 season No Playoffs- He get's an D here. I know 2001 should be a wash, but the 3 season's since than have seen nothing but turnover after turnover, from coaches to schemes, and have had melt in the brewing pot of mediocrity. I expect more of the same this year, while also being fed up with it.

 

Overall Team Roster- Gm's should also be graded on how they fill out a team. While Donahoe has done a good job finding 1st and 2nd rd players, (Lee Evans, Willis Mcgahee, Nate Clements, Aaaron Schobel, Travis Henry, Chris Kelsay ) He's failed miserably producing later rd picks, as none that I can recall, have amounted to proving they can be quality starters. Terrence Mcgee is the only one that sticks out at this present time.

 

 

He's helped field a top 5 defense, mostly by signing free agents like- sam adams, takeo spikes, london fletcher, jeff posey, lawyer milloy, troy vincent. Not that any of that is bad cause well they give us a upper echelon defense. However I think Donahoe clearly ignored depth this season only drafting 1 defensive player 5th rd undersized cb Eric King. Depth will be a big issue in the coming years, as we lose players to free agency, or they start to get too old.

 

On the other side of the ball, Yes drafting Willis Mcgahee, is starting to look like a huge steal, and if Lee Evans improves on last year, and if Losman pans out we have some quality skill position players for awhile. However as has been beaten to death, the oline never seems to be addressed. Mike Williams, hasn't lived up to his draft day status, while he did show signs of improvement last year, enough to warrant his cap figure of 7+ million hardly. Chris Villiarial was a good addition, however he's 32 years old and on the downside of his career. Trey Teague wouldn't start for most teams in the league. I like the signing of Bennie Anderson, and don't hold much water with ravens fans opinions of him as a poor pass blocker and penalty magnet. Baltimore during Andersons tenure there wasn't exactaly loaded with a good qb and wr's. and Well LT Mike Gandy? Blah.

 

I can't say with a straight face on that I honestly expect much of anything out of this unit. Jim Mcnally might be a great oline coach, but you can't expect him to cook a gourmet meal out of cheap groceries. Also we've yet to find quality #3 receiver and or a te, even though we've had our opportunites to draft them, when they were a need. I was excitied about Kevin Everetts potential here, but another year of cement shoes campbell. We need more receiving productivity out of this area, especially with a young qb, and to the overall benefit of our offense.

 

Grade- C. While the defense is tops, the lack of improvement from year to year on offense gets him this grade.

 

Overall evaulation-

 

The on field product has definitly seen it's hi's and lows, and at some points look's fantastic and at some points looks porous. At times the team looks like one of the tops in the league, others it looks like we're in the same boat as the arizona cardnials and detroit lions of the league.

 

I blame a lot of this on scheme change. 2002 pass happy offense, 2003- tried to run pass happy offense, with a group of players that were set to run ball control, 2004- still didn't rank high in yardage, but the play calling got better. This to me reflects poorly on Donahoe who as gm hires these coaches. I look foward to this season, cause to me at least it seems to be the first season of continuity within the offensive scheme. As of Right now I give Donahoe a c for a middle of the road performance.

[Alaska Darin]

Overall Team Roster-  Gm's should also be graded on how they fill out a team.  While Donahoe has done a good job finding 1st and 2nd rd players, (Lee Evans, Willis Mcgahee, Nate Clements, Aaaron Schobel, Travis Henry, Chris Kelsay )  He's failed miserably producing later rd picks, as none that I can recall, have amounted to proving they can be quality starters.  Terrence Mcgee is the only one that sticks out at this present time.     

369084[/snapback]

Since 2001, when Tom Donahoe took over, his record of finding starters after the 2nd round is on par with the better GMs in the NFL (New England and Philadelphia).

 

After 5 minutes of exhausting research, I found the following:

 

The Philadelphia Eagles had ONE starter in the Super Bowl drafted since 2001 after round 2 (Westbrook). The New England Patriots had TWO (Koppen, A. Samuel).

 

The reality is, there salary cap has made it difficult to nurture players long enough to make a difference.

[Reuben Gant]

 

After 5 minutes of exhausting research, I found the following:

 

The Philadelphia Eagles had ONE starter in the Super Bowl drafted since 2001 after round 2 (Westbrook). The New England Patriots had TWO (Koppen, A. Samuel).

 

The reality is, there salary cap has made it difficult to nurture players long enough to make a difference.

369177[/snapback]

 

That is amazing. Maybe Tom should be judged by how he does in Free Agency...

Mike Gandy better come up big.

[plenzmd1]

Since 2001, when Tom Donahoe took over, his record of finding starters after the 2nd round is on par with the better GMs in the NFL (New England and Philadelphia). 

 

After 5 minutes of exhausting research, I found the following:

 

The Philadelphia Eagles had ONE starter in the Super Bowl drafted since 2001 after round 2 (Westbrook). The New England Patriots had TWO (Koppen, A. Samuel).

 

The reality is, there salary cap has made it difficult to nurture players long enough to make a difference.

369177[/snapback]

 

AD great stat. I was about to say the same thing. What kills me if your roster is filled with guys from the later rds, people will say the GM doesn't make the most of his early rd picks. One of those things that is hard to win public opinion either way.

 

Lets not forget we had 4 undrafted free agents make the squad last year, and at least one, Dorenbaus(spelling) the year before. So I'll give him credit there.,

 

I agree with the earlier assesment that the Bledsoe deal was a neccasary evil when it was done. While I was no Drew fan, the club needed some hope. Overall, I am one of those guys that in week one last year siad fire Donahue immediately after the week one loss as I was so pissed Lindell was still on the team and it was obvious MM had no Faith in him.My thought was MM was hired to be another yes man who wouldn't challange TD.

 

Now, however, I am willing to give him a little more slack. Good finish last year, willing to admit the Drew experiment didn't work, and seems like MM is not a yes man after standing up to Ralph last year.