A different approach to assessing MW

[Fake-Fat Sunny]

Cliff note: MW is a bust for us but the reasons this is the case are rooted in the Bills being so bad in O leadership under Kevin Killdrive and this year. MW cannot be absolved from blame because he is wellpaid to deal with whatever the context is he confronts. However, the bad thing for us is that he almost certainly must be cut by the Bills after this season and if he finds better context with a new team it is possible (its debatable how probable it is) for him to not only laugh all the way to the bank for being a bust, but to laugh even harder going to the bank for a new team which helps him be all he can be. Cliff notes end.

 

This issue has been reviewed in recent threads, but I am taking a different approach to this (acknowledging the negatives that he in essence is a bust as a #4 pick). Rather than asking what we did wrong, instead I want to track what could it would have looked like if it had gone right AND Then looking at whether these were reasonable hopes or why those hopes did not play out.

 

The Pick Itself:

 

The best justification for the pick was that we could not find a partner to give us value in trading away the pick. While, in a perfect world we would pick the best player available at #4 and he would turn out to be a stud who worked out ( a brief look back at past #4 picks actually revealed a plethora of players like Peter Warrick or Philip Rivers who disappointed), it ain't a perfect world and trading away this pick for value seems by far in 20/20 hindsight to be the correct move to have made.

 

As far as the pick itself if no partner for a trade emerged, then picking the best OL guy you can get is the likely the correct move. This player is guaranteed to be slotted at the #4 salary level which the market mandates is for an LT. The two reasonable choices are MW and McKinnie. MW has questions because he guarded the TX QB blindside in college from RT and he must be able to make the switch to justify the pick. McKinnie can play the LT position right off the bat, but is a small below MW in combine performance and also he and his agent seem to be a bit of jerks in discussions.

 

This is borne out in the early problems between McKinnie and the Vikes (no or double fault assigned here because it takes two to tango) and the Vikes players being idiots and McKinnie fits right in

 

MW shows great aglity for a player his size in both objective measures like the Combine shuttle run results and subjective measures in terms of nimbleness that he shows he on film and with workouts.

 

The question of whether he can make the flip to LT is certainly there. He presents as a nice likeable guy rather than a mean cuss but this presentation is little more than a balance as there are strengths and weaknesses associated with both presentations. If he is a mean cuss then proper modeling and leadership will be critical for him to make sure that he remains positive and team focused ratherthan becoming a cancer who is self focused. Since he is a nice guy, the training he needs is for a mentor who keeps him on track and diligent. Either way a good answer(s) for mentoring a player needs to be found.

 

Rookie year-

 

The reasonable track for MW his first year would be for him to earn his way into the starting line-up virtually immediately if only based on his size, athleticism and college experience. In an average world while he would have the growing pains of any rookie, he would be productive in his individual work. Further, it would be a real demonstration of progress if he was a critical part of a productive OL.

 

Actually, in his rookie year, the mission was accomplished (to borrow a phrase from out El Presidente) in all regards.

 

MW made the starting line-up no problem. His individual work was good and he certainly was not a glaring issue in the problem areas we had (we gave up way too many sacks but the lack of a mobile QB in a pass-happy game with only Ruben having any previous experience at his OL position were even stronger reasons for our sack problems).

 

An objective measure which points toward MW at least being part of a productive OL and having a good year himself is that this O qualified 3 players (including an RB who ran for 1400 yards) for the Pro Bowl and the WR who did not get this accolade had 94 catches.

 

MW did not accomplish everything we wanted or could be done his rookie year, but he set himself up on the road to become the LT we needed.

 

Second year

 

It reasonably can be judged that MW had an adequate year here, but the wheels began to come off a bit.

 

Overall, the Bills O sucked as they went roughly 10 consecutive quaters at crunch time during the season wityhout producing an offensive TD. However, the lead reasons for this debacle seemed to be an unwillingness to change the O from Kevin Killdrive. The running attack was still productive as TH racked up over 1200 yards.

 

The worse thing regarding MW was that his faults seemed to play a role in some of the most egregious sacks. The interesting thing as far as diagnsoing this issue is that his problems were not realted to him repetitively being beaten by speed rushes around the edge due to some lack of mobiliy related to his weight, but actually a real difficult coordinating with RG Pacillo which all too often saw them standing over a sacked Bledsoe with body language that cried out "I though you had him" after an opposing DL pulled some stunts and switches and the right side of the Bills OL got lost.

 

My sense of the problems here were that in his rookie year, MW lined up next to Sullivan at RG and even though Sully is not a great player, he had played the game before and at least could teach MW a thing or two about what it meant to be a pro.

 

In his second year, MW found himself as being the more experienced of the two players at RG and RT and he proved incapable and likely too inexperienced to carry along Pacillo who had never player RG as a pro.

 

Likewise he was operating within a horrendous context as not onlywas this O anemic and struggling under Bledsoe's guidance, but Kevin Killdrive was in the process of running an O which produced so badly it led to him being fired. Even worse his OL position coach Pat Rule took over for the equally inexperienced s an OL coach Vinky who had little to teach MW beyond the basics of being a pro. Ruel, like Killdrive ended up getting canned with time left on his contract.

 

The adequate news for the Bills was that Jonas Jennings had come into his own as the LT so there was no immediate outside need for MW to make the jump to LT in 2004. However, his non-development in 2003 raised the stakes for 2004 as a year where MW needed to jump to the next level and justify the switch to LT because JJ would be a free agent after next year. Unless JJ showed that he was beyond the injury issues which has not allowed him to play 16 games at LT his first two years, the Bills really needed MW to resume the progress he made as a rookie a justify a move to LT.

 

Third Year

 

The wheels came completely off for MW in the off-season.

 

The grandmother who raised him as his mother passed away. Being deeply upset from losing the woman who raised you is only human and easily understandable. However, responding unprofessionally and letting down your teammates and the region that depends on you is not condonable at all given the big bucks he is paid.

 

He got authorized absences from all the "voluntary" minicamps. However, he failed professionally as he let the pain of losing his Grammy cause him to not stay in even marginal shape. The Bills were in the midst from the transition from tje Vinky/Ruel/GW reign of error to the JMac/TC/MM era and they did not really watch MW like a hawk to make sure he was performing even marginally as a pro. He came into training camp fat and not ready and it was bad.

 

However, JMac did a pretty good job from outside observations applying both sticks and carrots to improve MW. From vocalizing a threat to move MW to guard which would cost him a lot of money in his next contract to awarding MW a gameball when his play improved he got far better production from MW as the season progressed. It ended with many outside observers feeling that MW was the best OL player on the Bills line.

 

This accolade did not say much for 2005 because the OL players the Bills had were still pretty bad or had clear failings as individual players (Villarial at RG is a solid player but clearly is on the backside of his career and has shown some increasing injury issues, Teague is a bright guy who can call line changes, can block well enough due to his athleticism, and did finally learn to make shotgun snaps after a sure-handed Bledsoe saved his bacon several times as he learned this job- however, h has trouble multi-tasking though he can do these individual jobs and occaisionally would get bullrushed when he had other tasks to do, LG was a real adventure with finally Lawrence Smith stepping up after Pacillo and Sullivan were so bad they got cut and finally Tucker took this job though injury got him cut for 2005, and the LT spot went almost by default to pick-up Mike Gandy as JJ proved when SF spent too much on him abd he proved to be injury prone).

 

MW's 2004 performance provided some hope that his 2005 performance would be based in his good rookie year or the better parts of his 3rd year. However if he messed up again like when his Grammy died or with the poor coaching and mentoring he had in 2003 the year could easily become a lost year for MW and honestly justify him being called a bust.

 

2005

 

Unfortunately this has been a disaster year that likely spells an end to his career as a Bill. If he remains with the team he is scheduled to get paid by his contract next year a sum which cannot be justified at all for his level of play and the position he occupies. He and the Bills are limited by the CBA from arranging a pay cut for him which would be more appropriate to his level of play and the position he is playing.

 

A cut if MW will hurt the Bills as his bonus already paid acceletates into deadspace which counts against the cap next year, but this bad outcome is better than the horrible cost of paying him huge amounts at a level he has not earned.

 

His failure this year is at least partially linked to injury as he did show up for camp in far better shape than he reported last year or in his career. However, he never turned being buff (for him at least as he still is a bigboy) into on the field performance. His demise has not been painfree or even smooth as the team was falling apart as well on its way to a 4-7 record so far. The move of him to LG really was no more than flailing around looking for someway to get some value out of the #4 contract he signed. However, he sucked at this new position (moving him inside did not solve his big problem which has never been a lack of athleticism but a failure to cooridnate well with his teammates.

 

The irony is that a new lease on life of a new team MAT be just what MW needs to renew his career, but a trade by the Bills to this new team looks unlikely as there is little reason for a team to assume the huge contract he would get, particularly when they might get him at no player cost as an FA.

 

Overall, I think that MW was a reasinable pick to make though by far trading the 1st round pick would be the smart thing to do (as the Bills did in 2001 getting an extra pick that became a Pro Bowler and still getting the first CB picked in the draft even with the trade down, as the Bills did in 2003 getting a replacment QB for RJ in exchange for the 2004 1st and still being able to gt a new 1st for nothing from AT for PP- even better they were able to spend that 1st on WM and get an injured #5 or so quality player for #23 money, and also did with the 2005 1st getting JP who needed the training of being picked as their QB of the future in 2004). MW was the best hope for a pick at #4 that year if you had to make one.

 

In his first year, MW did not disappoint with his production in the real world (though the only reasonable alternative McKinnie did disappoint big time his first year). I think the theory that his becoming a bust is not demonstrated by his having a good first year as a Pro (and a pretty good second half of his third year). The theory which makes more sense to me is:

 

1. MW became a bust because he had stiinky position coaches his first two years in the league. Its hard to say how not-ready for primetime and OL positio coach duty Vinky and Ruel were. They both lost their jobs after their year of work with the Bills. Even if one looks to some other factor as the lead in MWs fate, one cannot discount the impact that having Ruel and Vinky as his OL coaches had on his career. Folks who want to find some other point of blame must anwer the question what impact do they think Ruel/Vinky had on MW and whether this impact was significant or not. If they want to claim their failings were insignficant they have some splainin to do.

 

2. MW never had the teammates around him to propely mentor him and help him become the pro we wanted. Ultimately the blame falls on MW. Even when you are dealt a bad hand in life, it is the responsibility of the individual to play that hand. My sense of reality does not absolve MW of blame at all. However, I think it is reasonable to explain MW's failings as being rooted in his inability to become a productive Pro with the Bills utterly failing to provide him with adequate mentoring and guidance as an OL player from his trsmmstes.

 

As a rookie, only Ruben Brown had the experience to play this role for the whole OL and I am even more impressed with Ruben's work in the 2002 season after thinking this through. In 2003, MW's great failing is that he was incapable of providing the young Pacillo with the guidance he needed when it was actually MW who still needed guidance. i think it is no coincidence that 2004 turned out to be MW's most productive year as a Pro with the steady Villarial next to him as the primary guy he had to coordinate with.

 

The Bills failed uttlerly on the OL in the late 90s and early 2000s not only because they failed to invest to get the horses to play OL, but failed to invest to get some old hands to mentor and school the talent they did acquire.

 

3. The O lacked a positive context to build around. JMac said he was no miracle worker and proved he was right about that. From Kevin Killdrive's failure to diversity his approach after opponents had ample film on the Bills and BB drew a roadmap on how to take advantage of Bledsoe and the Bills to Clements failing to develop a consistent O with JP at the helm, the Bills have never provided a reasonable consistent context for the OL to perform within.

 

A quality OL is by all means NECESSARY to make your O work, but it is not SUFFICIENT in and of itself. JMac had made silk purses out of sows ears with OL before in CIN amd with NYG. However, the context simply is bad and thus the OL does not perform.

 

4. MW does not have that nasty edge and is a nice guy. Granted this is true but it falls shot of explaining why he has become a bust. A nasty edge really helps a player perform in some cases, but it also can be accompanied with a me-forst attitiude and a chip on the shoulder than can be cancerous for a team. Being a good guy is not sufficient at all for performance, but you do not have to be an asswipe to be good. It helps to be a nice guy if it means you can work and cooridinate well with your teammates.

 

The deal here it seems to me is that one can make it work with an edge or with being a nice guy. The key however to making it work is that the other players and the coaches need to coordinate and supplement with the type of player who either has an edge or is a nice guy.

 

The problem with MW seems to me is that given the positives he brings to the table and the negatives which also exist, the Bills had idiots for position coaches MWs first two years and due to a lack of OL player leadership called on MW to do things he could not do and it all fell apart.

 

The sad thing here is that not only must the Bills cut MW but there is a reasonable course that may emerge in his young career which sees him become quite productive with his new team.

 

If a team signs MW at RT which has a stable OL and a good OL coach, he may surprise some folks by having a good year and good career. In the worse case for us, with proper training, MW mat still be enough of a player to become an LT.

 

We'll have to see. It all comes down to MW having at least some motivation to become a qualit pro (his good 1st year and second half of his third year and showing up to camo buff for him are signs that this desire is there). I doubt that personal motivation will be enough however (his penalty for getting the cut he deserves is that he is rich and set for life and can sign a new deal to make him even richer at the NFL minimum) if he signs with the right team and they have the personnel and the OL coaches to work well with him and help him be all that he can be, the worst may occur that not only do we draft a bust, but after he busts abd we cut him her earns Pro Bowl accolades eslewhere.

 

It is doubtful but can also happen.