What should the Bills have done at QB

[Like A Mofo]

First of all, this was Losman's second year. He had his whole rookie year to study the playbook, game film, etc. He's had two training camps, two summer offseasons, one and a half preseasons. So I'd expect to see a little more from him than from a true rookie.

608115[/snapback]

 

 

So based on this, you expect Philip Rivers to step right in and be a stud, because he has studied game film etc for over 2 years?

 

He will struggle...and should be expected to...just like JP should have been expected to struggle.

 

Don't get me wrong..I do like Holcumb...but why people are SO quick to dismiss on JP in under 1 season of gameplay is beyond me.

 

Aikman was 1-15 in his first year, based on the way you give assessments, he would have been gone from Dallas after 1 year of you were their GM.

[mead107]

i still want to know if holcomb is so damn good, why was he not picked up by some other team ???

[Dan Gross]

113/228 works out to a completion percentage of 49.6% for Losman. Given that Holcomb (even before this year) had a significantly higher completion percentage and yards per attempt, I'm not so sure Losman will become the next Holcomb.

 

You're right on the percentage, accidentally copied from the QB rating.

 

But even if he does, is that really what we hoped for when we used a first round pick on the guy? I mean, let's say Holcomb is better than 1/3 of the starting QBs in the league: guys like Gus Frerotte, Kyle Boller, Joey Harrington, etc. The fact we have a QB of the future who might someday also be better than guys like those isn't exactly a reason to start making reservations for the next Super Bowl.

608075[/snapback]

 

But yet you say that we'd "win now" with a guy of Holcomb's performance level because he's better than 1/3 of the starting QB's in the league.... I'm still trying to figure out how it is that you can conclude without any doubt in your mind that Losman has at best the career potential of Ryan Leaf based on how he was thrown to the wolves last year. Holcomb brought experience at being thrown to the wolves, coupled with no false sense of security that a running game and defense were going to bail him out, and managed to eke out marginally better performance overall (however you add up the points-per-game it's not like he was lighting the scoreboard up...). It's not that I think Losman is the next Favre, it's not that I'm even convinced he is or isn't the answer. I just know he hasn't been given the chance to show who he really is. I know what Holcomb is, however, and it would be more surprising to me to see Holcomb playing better than Holcomb did last year than it would be for me to see Losman playing better than Holcomb did last year...

 

Look, it's an open competition now, which I support. If Holcomb wins, I'm worried, because he is not the "solution." If not, then we have something, which could admittedly be a Rob Johnson (great in practice, lousy when the bullets fly) or not, but at least you'll have a starting QB that the team will rally around, and that hopefully smarter coaching will actually support with a Roeth-type game plan that helps him get comfortable with the game...while he plays....

 

Again, I'm not saying that Losman is the second-coming of anything, but I'm just not ready to kick him to the curb as a bust.

[Orton's Arm]

Aikman was 1-15 in his first year, based on the way you give assessments, he would have been gone from Dallas after 1 year of you were their GM.

608123[/snapback]

That's not true: I don't judge a QB by the team's win/lost percentage. Also, Aikman was taken first overall. The things I saw that made me pick him that early would cause me to have a little more patience than maybe I'd have with a guy picked up in the 7th round.

 

I just don't feel Losman proved he could be a good pocket passer in college, so a pro team shouldn't have the same level of faith in him as they'd have in an Aikman.

[Like A Mofo]

That's not true: I don't judge a QB by the team's win/lost percentage. Also, Aikman was taken first overall.

608134[/snapback]

 

 

So based on where a QB is drafted holds merit?

 

Ryan Leaf 2nd overall? Andre Ware 5th overall? Joey Harrington 3rd overall? Alex Smith 1st overall last year?

 

Again, you might prove to be right about JP...but how loud do we have to say it..

 

JP has not even played 1 full season ON THE FIELD YET!!!

[The Senator]

So based on where a QB is drafted holds merit?

 

Ryan Leaf 2nd overall?  Andre Ware 5th overall?  Joey Harrington 3rd overall? Alex Smith 1st overall last year?

608138[/snapback]

...vs. Dan Marino - 27th overall in '83?

[Orton's Arm]

But yet you say that we'd "win now" with a guy of Holcomb's performance level because he's better than 1/3 of the starting QB's in the league.... 

If the rest of your team is good enough, you can get by with merely being decent at QB. Holcomb's done a good job at turning lemons into lemonaide. I'm not saying a "win now" attitude will bring any Super Bowl rings. But with a good defense and a good OL, Holcomb could get you 9-7 or 10-6.

Again, I'm not saying that Losman is the second-coming of anything, but I'm just not ready to kick him to the curb as a bust.

608131[/snapback]

A reasonable approach.

 

If I were the Bills' GM, I'd be very willing to use a first day pick on a QB who seemed to have the potential for greatness. Then I'd sit him on the bench his rookie year, while Losman started. I wouldn't feel much confidence in Losman, because he's proven so little in college and in the pros. But hey, I could be wrong, and this would be Losman's chance to prove me wrong. If Losman impressed, he could continue starting in 2007. If not, I'd bench him in favor of the draft pick.

 

Where does Holcomb fit in this picture? He's pretty much a win-now QB, but the Bills don't have the overall talent to win now. By the time the Bills get their non-QB positions in order, Holcomb won't be the same QB he is today. So if possible, I'd trade him for a draft pick.

[Orton's Arm]

So based on where a QB is drafted holds merit?

608138[/snapback]

Yes. The Bills wouldn't have booted Bledsoe out of town so that a 7th round pick with no NFL experience could take the reins.

[The Dean]

As I said earlier, there's no arguing with you.

608120[/snapback]

 

Wow! Talk about the whole pot/kettle thing. That's gotta be the worst one ever.

 

You are striving for a "system", something numbers based with a veil of objectivity to prove your point. If you had football sense (a feel for the game and a REAL understand of it) you would simply talk football talk and eschew this nonsense. I really think you may be Jerry Sullivan (or a poor man's version of him).

[Pyrite Gal]

If I were the Bills' GM, I'd be very willing to use a first day pick on a QB who seemed to have the potential for greatness.

608146[/snapback]

 

This would be a real waste and a likely death warrant for a Bills team which took this approach.

 

The reality is that there is a salary cap and a team can simply try to get and stockpile talented and/or well paid players who simply sit on the bench.

 

Every player who simply sits without playing not only does not contribute on the field, but he takes a roster spot from another player who could be contributing to the team.

 

The salary cap makes this calculus even worse as a player's cap hit whether he plays or not merely means we do not have the $ to buy more talent elsewhere.

 

We saw this big time with the foolish manner with which Butler handled the RJ/DF contracts. When the smoke cleared and for 1999 we had a cap hit that included a $5+ million prorated cap hit to RJ AND $3 million in made incentives in 1998 to DF's 99 cap hit, AND another $3 million or so in salary now owed to DF, we had a combined QB cap for the QB position well above the highest QB salary in the league and probably well above what any other team allocated to the QB position.

 

The result was:

 

1. We had to sign DF long term so we could prorate his salary over a number of years.

 

2. We still had to cut a bunch of vets who knew how to stay in their lanes and instead play cheap rookies and UDFAs on ST.

 

 

The result was the TN Homerun Throw-up.

 

The Bills are locked in at QB with a 1st round pro-rated draftee QB contract to RJ like it or not. We fortunately have a reasonably doable contract at back-up money for Holcomb. We simply cannot afford another QB from the FA market or even a first day draft choice without doing without a a player who will actually play merely to have yet another QB on the bench.

 

Draft another QB if you want, but the effect would be that we would likley cut Holcomb as we have the JP cap hit whether you keep him or trade/cut him (the resulting cap hit would be even worse).

[Orton's Arm]

You are striving for a "system", something numbers based with a veil of objectivity to prove your point.  If you had football sense (a feel for the game and a REAL understand of it) you would simply talk football talk and eschew this nonsense.  I really think you may be Jerry Sullivan (or a poor man's version of him).

608188[/snapback]

You again. I see you're still on this whole "football sense" kick. It's too bad the numbers don't back up what your "football sense" was telling you. Earlier, you wrote there wasn't anything in particular wrong with JP's play, but the surrounding cast was the problem. I've shown how JP version 2 led the offense to 7 fewer points per game than Holcomb did. Given that Holcomb's play wasn't perfect either, don't you think that leaves considerable room for improvement in JP's play?

[Orton's Arm]

This would be a real waste and a likely death warrant for a Bills team which took this approach.

608193[/snapback]

I agree it was a bad idea to use up so much cap space on Flutie and Johnson. You're right about how the Bills probably could have won that Tennessee game if they'd had more salary cap room.

 

But the Bills team that exists today isn't as good as the team that took the field against the Titans. This team's a few years away from being something good; and we should use that time finding the QB of the future. The fact there's a lot invested in Losman doesn't make him any more or less of a QB than he'd be if he was an undrafted free agent. If he can't get the job done (which is likely enough) it would take years before the Bills could fully recover.

 

Think about how previous failed QBs of the future have hurt this franchise. Todd Collins couldn't get the job done, so the Bills used a 3rd round pick on Billy Joe Hobart. This was a move born of desperation.

 

Later on, the Bills again attempted to address the QB position by trading a 1st and 4th rounder for Rob Johnson. Johnson failed, leaving the Bills in a weak bargaining position. This led to another desperation move: trading away a 1st round pick for Drew Bledsoe. Everyone talks about how it was either him or Jeff Blake. That may be true, but the Bills put themselves into that position of weakness.

 

If Losman fails, will the Bills be as desperate as they were when Todd Collins and Rob Johnson failed? Perhaps. If it's a choice between drafting a great QB this year, or being desperate and drafting an iffy QB next year, I'll take the former.

[Kultarr]

We saw this big time with the foolish manner with which Butler handled the RJ/DF contracts.

608193[/snapback]

 

I disagree with this completely. The original contracts were not foolish.

 

Butler/Smith gave Flutie, who was a complete long shot to even make the team, a vet. min. contract with various bonmus clauses. Few thought Flutie would make the team, let alone make every single one of his bonus clauses. The odds were something along the lines of winning Powerball with 1 ticket.

 

Since Flutie was light-years away from a "sure thing", they went out and traded for the hottest prospect available in Rob Johnson. They signed him to a very reasonable, young starting NFL QB contract at the time. Matt Hasselbeck, the guy that just QB'd his team to the Super Bowl, was traded the next year in the same manner and signed for almost exactly the same amount of money. The Bills simply did not overpay for Rob Johnson based on the expectations of the time. Switch the players and the circumstances, and you'd be crowing about how Butler was a "damn genius" and screwed the Packers in pulling a future All-Pro QB that led the Bills to the Super Bowl for a rather modest ~$5 million a year in Hasselbeck.

 

The brain trust overpaid for RJ only in 20/20 hindsight, because Rob Johnson turned out to be supremely brittle and a slow-minded, hesitant decision-maker on the field. But this is surely not at all what they thought they were trading so much for. In retrospect, Butler/Smith's mistake was in thinking that Rob Johnson could be a starter in the NFL. And that miscalculation has had enormous consequences rippling forward through time for the franchise. Flutie coming out of absolutely nowhere and getting on the field and having success was a total shocker and unanticipated by everyone save the rabid Flutie worshippers. If Rob Johnson was 1/10-th the QB they thought they were getting, Flutie never would've even seen the field and never makes those bonuses.

 

It's fun to speculate that the Bills held all the cards and could've served up some "tough management" sorts of contract offers, in retrospect, but this is too fantastic. Was Rob Johnson's agent a moron? Was he going to let his client sign a low-ball offer simply because it was "the Bills"? Nope. Not a chance. The market is what it is, and the Bills (and any other team for that matter) had to pony up something in the right ballpark and zip code. Then there is the Flutie contract and his bonuses: the reason these did not count against the cap initially was that nobody, not even in the NFL office, considered these bonuses to be attainable. Again, Flutie's agent could not have gotten him a mega-deal as an NFL starter because absolutely no one in the NFL thought Flutie was a starter. Due to Johnson's amazing brittleness, Flutie fluked into making every single one of these "hard to reach" bonus clauses in his contract. It was truly incredible.

 

All of which then, of course, broke the camel's back, divided Bills Nation, and cap-strung the team.

 

And, in to that toxic spill, rode one Tom Donahoe on his white stallion...

[Orton's Arm]

I disagree with this completely.  The original contracts were not foolish. 

608283[/snapback]

The way I understand it, once Flutie started having success on the field, Butler gave him a new contract with a much higher rate of pay. At that point, two guys were getting paid like they were starters; putting the Bills in worse cap shape elsewhere. That big bonus for Fina (the year before TD cut him) didn't help either.

[Kultarr]

The way I understand it, once Flutie started having success on the field, Butler gave him a new contract with a much higher rate of pay.

608292[/snapback]

 

That was for cap relief and, not to mention, after the fact. All of that bonus money went against the cap, and Butler had to restructure it to get back under the cap. (It's not at all clear if he could've cut enough players to get back under the cap.)

 

But that is a far cry from saying "Butler was a fool" because he should have some sort of perfect prescient knowledge of how the Bills QB situation would work out. That point is and always has been ridiculous.

 

Butler took what he thought was a good, reasonable gamble. He lost big. It happens.

[Kelly the Dog]

That was for cap relief and, not to mention, after the fact.  All of that bonus money went against the cap, and Butler had to restructure it to get back under the cap.  (It's not at all clear if he could've cut enough players to get back under the cap.)

 

But that is a far cry from saying "Butler was a fool" because he should have some sort of perfect prescient knowledge of how the Bills QB situation would work out.  That point is and always has been ridiculous.

 

Butler took what he thought was a good, reasonable gamble.  He lost big.  It happens.

608301[/snapback]

My recollection of it was that Rob Johnson was a fourth round draft pick that had started one game in his career and played pretty good in it and had gotten hurt. He was just traded for the ninth pick in the draft, and a fourth rounder, which was a fairly steep price for an unproven 4th rounder. The real mistake was that the Bills didnt need to resign him then. He was already under contract for the full year and maybe even another year of restricted FA. (I could be wrong about the RFA but it was his fourth season of his rookie contract).

 

The 25 million contract was completely unnecessary before the season started other than to make Rob feel good and secure in his 25 million. But it was a monumental mistake, as he got hurt in his first game, and looked bad doing it. Flutie's 25 million contract was also too much when we already had one, and more than Butler needed to pay, although he did need to restructure it.

[Orton's Arm]

The 25 million contract was completely unnecessary before the season started other than to make Rob feel good and secure in his 25 million.

608357[/snapback]

Restricted free agency only applies to draft picks who have been in the league less than four years. The idea is that even if a draft pick signs a short contract, the team that drafted him still has some kind of rights to the guy through year 4.

 

Since Johnson was going into his fourth year (and was in the last year of his contract) this wouldn't have applied to him. The $25 million contract wasn't designed to make Johnson feel good--though I'm sure it had that effect! If Butler hadn't extended Johnson, Johnson would have hit free agency after the season had ended. If he doesn't re-sign with the Bills, we're out those draft picks. If he plays well and does re-sign, it would be because the Bills won a bidding war. Not good. If you're trading away that kind of draft value for a guy, you'd better make sure he's under contract for more than just one year.

 

Johnson's play in the Jacksonville game was more than "pretty good." It was stellar; which is why teams were so eager to acquire him. After the Bills had obtained the rights to Johnson, San Diego offered us the 2nd overall pick in the draft for him. Butler refused, and San Diego would go on to use that pick on Ryan Leaf.

[Kelly the Dog]

Restricted free agency only applies to draft picks who have been in the league less than four years. The idea is that even if a draft pick signs a short contract, the team that drafted him still has some kind of rights to the guy through year 4.

 

Since Johnson was going into his fourth year (and was in the last year of his contract) this wouldn't have applied to him. The $25 million contract wasn't designed to make Johnson feel good--though I'm sure it had that effect! If Butler hadn't extended Johnson, Johnson would have hit free agency after the season had ended. If he doesn't re-sign with the Bills, we're out those draft picks. If he plays well and does re-sign, it would be because the Bills won a bidding war. Not good. If you're trading away that kind of draft value for a guy, you'd better make sure he's under contract for more than just one year.

 

Johnson's play in the Jacksonville game was more than "pretty good." It was stellar; which is why teams were so eager to acquire him. After the Bills had obtained the rights to Johnson, San Diego offered us the 2nd overall pick in the draft for him. Butler refused, and San Diego would go on to use that pick on Ryan Leaf.

608363[/snapback]

No, you sign him after you have seen him play. You think RJ was going to accept a 25 million contract in April but decline it in September or October? No. And his one game was the first game of the year against a 6-9-1 crappy team. Just as well. And RJ got hurt in the game. He threw 28 passes that season with 2 TDs 2 INTs and 6 sacks. Talk about a harbinger of things to come.

[Orton's Arm]

The previous system did not quite suit my needs, so I just devised a new system to evaluate our QB situation...

607924[/snapback]

I'm going to try to be patient with you here, and walk you through the system step-by-step.

 

1. Start with the total number of points the Bills scored.

 

2. Subtract the points scored by the defense and by the return units. Holcomb lost 14 points in the Bengals game alone through this step. Losman version 2? He didn't lose any points here.

 

3. Subtract 3 points from any scoring drive which started in field goal range. Two of Losman version 2's scoring drives started in FG range, so he loses six points. The same could be said about Holcomb. However, since Losman version 2 played in fewer games than Holcomb, this step hurts Losman v2 a little more.

 

4. Take away the points from drives where the QB made little or no contribution. Holcomb loses 3 points through this step. Losman version 2 doesn't lose any.

 

All three points-per-game adjustments I made hurt Holcomb, but only one hurt Losman version 2. Even so, Holcomb still led the Bills' offense to an average of 7 more points per game than Losman version 2.

[Ramius]

San Diego offered us the 2nd overall pick in the draft for him. Butler refused, and San Diego would go on to use that pick on Ryan Leaf.

608363[/snapback]

 

Where the hell did this claim come from?

 

Next i bet you are going to say that the Texans have offered us their #1 and #2 for holcomb