San Jose Bills Fan

I think Andre gets in this year. The only locks IMO are Walter Jones and Derrick Brooks. Jones is in the discussion of best OTs ever and Brooks is on the very short list of best weakside LBs ever.

The Dareus debate is a sub-conversation to the trench player vs skill player discussion. It's very hard to say. Dareus was picked before AJ Green, Patrick Peterson, and Julio Jones. Regardless of people's preferences, that's four awesome football players.

Weird thowing motion. Marginal velocity and distance. Very accurate and his ball is very catchable. Just outside the group of truly elite QBs. I'd rather have Rivers than Cutler and Stafford, for instance.

I see TJ Graham isn't mentioned anywhere so it sounds good to me!

The Bills situation is dictated by the fact that Kiko is the only 3-down linebacker that they have. On teams that have two 3-down linebackers, both of those LBs play a very high percentage of snaps. Some examples include Thomas Davis and Luke Kuechly in Carolina, Bowman and Willis in San Francisco, Wagner and Wright in Seattle, Laurinaitis and Ogletree in St. Louis, Lavonte David and Mason Foster in Tampa Bay, and Karlos Dansby and Darryl Washington in Arizona. There are more but you get the point. If the Bills drafted a playmaker/difference maker 3-down linebacker in the draft, his contributions would be significant. Moreover, the Bills are weak at outside linebacker.

You asked me: "So, you're not ok with drafting a guard at #9?" I gave a very clear and well-supported argument which in this case happens to be conventional thinking. As for last year, have you considered that it was a one-year aberration? An outlyer?

I've seen very little of Manziel but he seems like he's got certain gifts that make him very different from other QBs. I previously described him as a 6'1" 200 pound, 20 year-old Flutie. That was meant as a high compliment because I'm a huge Flutie fan.

^^^^^^^^^^^^ Happy New Year? Dude, you're sniping at me. :lol: I disagreed with one point you made and suddenly I'm "deliberately misconstruing you," "building strawmen," and "shoving words in your mouth?" Take it easy.

I understand your point but Wade was fired in 2000. That's an interesting theory. What do you base it on?

I think Hue Jackson did an outstanding job as the head coach in Oakland but new GM Reggie McKenzie came in and had to hire his own guy, Dennis Allen. I don't think the Bengals offense is gonna miss a beat. If anything I think they'll improve. It's interesting that you equate talent with results. Many people think of talent in terms of potential more than they do results. Just an observation. I have a friend who lives in DC and is a Hard Knocks devotee. He felt the same way as you. I don't watch the series but my friend said that Gruden gave Dalton plenty of preferential treatment and that there was a double standard for accountability on the offense. Yes and No. Gruden has been his coordinator for 3 years. In addition, Gruden urged the Bengals to draft Dalton over Kaepernick and Mallett. Gruden has to be accountable for some percentage of Dalton's play.

Agree with your post except Fitz wasn't coming back under any circumstances because the Bills wanted him to take a pay cut. But Tarvaris Jackson who we already had, was an ideal veteran placeholder/mentor for EJ. Jackson has arguably had a better NFL career than Kolb and would have cost the Bills a hell of a lot less money than Kolb.

I'm not pro or anti-Manziel but how would you rate the team Manziel played on? Was he surrounded by a lot of talent?

Looks like there will be a record number of underclassmen declaring for the draft: http://profootballta...nter-the-draft/ Gil Brandt of NFL.com reports that 80 underclassmen already have applied for early admission to the draft. That’s seven more than last year’s record high of 73. Brandt expects the final number to exceed 100 by next Wednesday’s deadline.

Without going into detail, I think your view of team building in today's NFL is somewhat obsolete. As for my thought process, I've stated repeatedly over the months that until you're on the clock and know exactly what your options are, it's all conjecture as to what to do. That said I'm generally against drafting a guard in the first round. Only if it were the Bills most dire need and I could be guaranteed that the player was the second coming of Steve Hutchinson (17th overall) or Alan Faneca (26th overall) would I take a guard at #9 (see what I did there?). Now last year's #7 pick was guard, Jonathan Cooper. Unfortunately he was injured in preseason and missed the entire regular season so he gets no grade. Last year's #10 pick Chance Warmack only played in 10 games last year also due to injury so he gets no grade. In 2012 David DeCastro was the first guard drafted (24th overall) but has unfortunately had injuries and played just 18 games in two years so he gets no grade. Three picks later the Bengals took Kevin Zeitler at #27. He looks like he's gonna be a good one but again, he was drafted 27th overall, the first guard drafted after 2 OTs. We'll see if drafting Zeitler before Cordy Glenn and Mitchell Schwartz was a good idea or not. In 2011 Danny Watkins was the first guard drafted (24th overall). Watkins is a bust. Even on one of the worst O-lines in football and even after the Incognito-Martin fiasco, Watkins could not break the starting lineup. Guards by nature are guards because they're not talented enough to play tackle or center. Guards can and are found in the later rounds. As long as I'm repeating myself I'll again point out that of the 5 guards on the 2013 All Pro team, 2 were drafted in the 3rd round and 2 were drafted in the 4th round. Again there's a very good reason why it's NFL convention to not draft guards in the first 20 picks. At this early juncture I believe that the Bills would be best served using their first round pick on a wide receiver and waiting until the 2nd or 3rd to address their offensive line needs.

One more edit and you have the makings of a pretty decent haiku.

BTW, John. My specific objection to Marrone's year-end explanation of the special teams play was not that he blamed the players or that he was inaccurate about not having a core of special teamers. My objection is that he is the one who assembled the roster. My immediate thought when I heard his excuse was "how long does it take to assemble a core of special teamers?" I also mentally rewound through the Bills career of of Corey McIntyre who was a premier special teamer and I wondered why Marrone chose to let him go when fullback has remained an afterthought in his offense. Chris White was also an outstanding special teams player who the team traded away because they didn't properly address the QB situation. As I stated when Crossman was hired, the success or failure of special teams is often dictated by the head coach in terms of how many starters he allows to play them, how much oversight he exercises, and how much practice time he allots. Any way you cut it up, Crossman's failure is Marrone's failure.

See my subsequent post. Read through the thread.

I think you shorted him a few vowels.

IMO, the Packers have a good receiving corps. Jordy Nelson is a fine player. Randall Cobb is an Antonio Brown clone. James Jones is vastly underrated. He's very savvy and dialed-in to the offense and he and Boykin are good-sized targets. Their wideouts are certainly much better than ours.

If Marcell Dareus wasn't so fat and lazy he'd be making a lot more plays like that.

Well you sure live in a football world. Happy New Year, K!

I just watched the game against Northern Illinois. He looks A LOT like one of last year's prospects, Matt Scott of Arizona. Very athletic, quick-twitch athlete, good arm talent and a very quick release and a nice feel for the game. The kid definitely has some tools but he played at a the FCS level so it's a huge step up. BTW, Matt Scott went undrafted last year but is a member of the Jacksonville Jaguars.

Well I'd go so far as to say that EJ will have a lower interception percentage than Fitz when the smoke clears on his career. Hopefully he becomes a more aggressive passer as well.

Condensed Games from 2013: vs. Eastern Illinois: http://draftbreakdown.com/video/jimmy-garoppolo-vs-tennessee-state-2013/ vs. U of Tennessee/Martin: http://draftbreakdown.com/video/jimmy-garoppolo-vs-ut-martin-2013/ vs. Jacksonville State: http://draftbreakdown.com/video/jimmy-garoppolo-vs-jacksonville-state-2013/ vs. Eastern Kentucky: http://draftbreakdown.com/video/jimmy-garoppolo-vs-eastern-kentucky-2013/ vs. Northern Illinois: http://draftbreakdown.com/video/jimmy-garoppolo-vs-northern-illinois-2013/ So that should give anyone interested a good 180-200 snaps from this year with which to judge him. These are not highlight packages. Point being, you'll see incomplete passes, sacks, rushing attempts and interceptions in these videos along with any passes he completed.