GaryPinC

DeMarco is 5 months older than LeSean. He has been running for two less seasons but is a two time pro bowler compared to McCoy's three. They both signed 5 year $40 mil deals in 2015 but the breakdowns and guaranteed $ are different. They both have identical career rushing avg ypc at 4.6. Before Murray came to Philly for a relatively poor 2015 season he had two very strong seasons in Dallas where his avg. ypc were 5.1 and 4.7 respectively. He is not as productive a receiver as McCoy but otherwise statistically they seem fairly close in rushing ability. I don't follow Murray much so can't say if this is true in talent. career stats: Murray: http://www.pro-football-reference.com/players/M/MurrDe00.htm McCoy: http://www.pro-football-reference.com/players/M/McCoLe01.htm Contract #s: http://overthecap.com/player/lesean-mccoy/761 http://overthecap.com/player/demarco-murray/621 Wouldn't seem to be that impossible a deal so I was wondering why DeMarco is considered an average back as opposed to having a bad season at the hands of Chip? Before 2015 his career avg ypc was 4.8.

So, Shady grew up in PA and before Chip Kelly and this season was playing for the team he loves. Passionate guy despite being a bit of a jackass. Chip is gone. What if Shady approached Whaley about getting traded back to Philly? Would you trade him straight up for DiMarco Murray? Shady + late rounder for DiMarco? Yes to either one for me. Thoughts and opinions?

Good article. Here's another decently balanced one from msn: http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/crime/prosecutor-says-%E2%80%98making-a-murderer%E2%80%99-omitted-crucial-facts/ar-AAgnXkT?li=BBnbcA1 I didn't watch the series, I hate, hate, hate this type of "investigation", but it just shows the power of media bias. Every producer in this situation does it because they're convinced of an injustice and that's how it ends up looking because certain facts were conveniently omitted or de-emphasized. Really just a travesty of justice and it's a shame producers can't be held liable for misrepresenting the story. I hate frivolous law suits but just once I'd like to see the victim's family sue the producers/studios for emotional distress or something relevant.

It's a great point about baseball and only one of many flaws of what he is trying to assert, IMO. Is it really so groundbreaking to take the W-L of every team in the league for a decade, throw them all together and show a regular distribution about a mean and median? Every league has a negative skew though, is it small enough to keep with parity? If the same teams are always to the left or right of the mean is that truly parity?

I'm with you, this is not a very useful article and a rather poor, biased one considering Urschel's intelligence. But being able to do higher level calculus and analyze a real world situation are obviously two very different things. Urschel seems to assert that there is parity in all 4 leagues and salary structure does not make a difference. To do this he defines parity as performing to a 0.500 record and first takes every team's record over a decade and bins it into a league-wide bar graph. Is this appropriate? What about charting individual teams year to year according to the mean? In an ideal world, the mean would equal the median at 0.500 and there would be a normal (symmetric) distribution about the mean. What are the actual means/medians and corresponding errors for each league? There is a negative skew in every league so can he justify all these numbers being close enough to 0.500 to give parity? If not, what is the reason? In the last 10 years (2015-2006)the Bills' avg # of wins is 6.6 +/- 1.35 the New England Patriots: 12.4 +/- 1.65 Do these fit the definition of parity? IMO, his best attempt to answer this is looking at year to year movement, i.e. the pie charts showing "stays put/moves towards the mean" vs "moves away from the mean". Even this seems weak as first of all you would want to split out the "stays put" group and these metrics would probably be better assessed with individual teams over the 10 years. How many individual teams fit a regular distribution about the mean? This would seem to me to be an interesting test of parity. So, whether or not there is parity, how do you justify salary structure as a significant factor as compared to quality of coaching, quality of talent selection and acquisition, injuries, etc? In each league, has the salary structure changed over time to any measurable effects on parity? Is there any correlation of baseball payrolls with winning? What comparisons between baseball and football, who have the biggest comparative divergence in salary structure? Really fascinating questions to me but Urschel's article really doesn't enlighten much.

This is an important point as Rex can't blame the front office for the failures this year. He already admitted he shouldn't have shot off his mouth so much at the start of the season and changed how the defense communicates the last two weeks. Good coaches are not too proud to change the way they do things if it's not working so we'll see.

I have to agree with Hondo's perspective much more than yours. You are right, DW was not in a tough position and they did not delay because having a player like McCoy was on his wish list. I doubt the deal got ugly, I think the FO knew they were going to have to overpay because that's how it often goes with premier free agents. He did the same for Charles Clay. DW gambled McCoy would be a lynch pin to turn around the offense and keep it solid for the next few years. He wanted the playoffs this year and lost. McCoy will probably never be worth his contract but he plays with passion out there and I like having him on our team. I also respect DW for rolling the dice to try and get this team over the hump now, not in the future. Good thing he can also pick talent like Karlos, Darby, and Gilleslee. Sorry you're so bitter over this.

Let's hope, he can't blame the front office this time! Good coaches have to be willing to incorporate change when it's needed. We'll see.

+1 agree. The first intelligent move Haslam has made since becoming owner.

I agree with you but at the same time suspect Roman has given him the green light to use his legs more as he sees fit. I think most of the season they've tried to coach/force TT to be a pocket passer until the last few weeks.

I'm not sure that Bill would even be in the same situation because I think he sets a much more disciplined, structured, team-first approach then Rex.

So thankful they made this show. Even back when I was immersed in this now-history, I always appreciated what amazing teams those were and how much of a privilege it was to watch that talent get after it year after year. So much more fun than the 70's and 80's, and once I accepted each loss no one could mock my team because I always appreciated their journey and fight. The losses sucked, but what an endearing cast of characters they were and that's what it's ultimately all about. Only thing I didn't like was the ending. Every true Bills fan can picture that kick going through and what it would look like if it had, so I thought it was patronizing and a poor representation of my dreams.

+1 I remember I was incensed because every player they showed on the sidelines looked like their dog had just gotten shot. And it was a tied game. But it was clearly over in their minds. Troy Aikman hints at the same mentality in his comments going in at halftime. They ran out of gas because they were mentally beaten. Still love them though and will show the kids the special because those teams should be revered. What they accomplished was amazing, they were a pleasure to watch and sometimes sports is about more than just a trophy.

It may be my inattentiveness, but I've never seen the right and left offensive tackle swap positions at the line like he did today in the 4th quarter. Trotting Cordy Glenn to the right TE position next to Mills was also pretty novel. Bringing a TE from the other side of the line to crack down on Watt was pretty cool too. They really planned for watt. Kudos, Roman and Kromer.

Not yet for me, I was at the game but he did take a nice step forward today. Clearly going through one or two progressions at the start, he improved in spots but still throws a little late quite often. He's getting better though. I really liked in the third before Carpenter's missed 50 yarder how he had room to run but saw a seam to Woods in the endzone though the ball got there a split sec too soon and woods couldn't adjust to it. Knowing it was third down he could have run for the first and should have but I did love the mentality. He's improving and has a legit shot to be our franchise but we may not have the answer until next year. We'll see but I have hope in him, and that's a great thing because we won't be in a good position to draft one.

Can't agree with you on this one, I was at the game and didn't keep a strict eye on Mills but he did really well on Watt. The one sack Watt got he lined up way far outside and the tight end completely wiffed on the block. I may be wrong, but in the second half (late third or 4th quarter) I noticed Mills and Cordy Glenn swapped positions because Watt had lined up over left tackle. Interestingly, they were bringing Glenn over to the right tight end position to load up that side. Roman/Kromer were very creative in accounting for Watt on every play and deserve kudos for that. Beyond that, I came away believing Mills will be our starting right tackle next week.

+1 Also are they patient enough to give the people they hire a fair chance to succeed and learn from mistakes?

No, The ozone hole's only been studied since '79 and while there was a steady decline to a baseline in the 80's, it's stayed fairly constant since then. We don't know if there's a 30 year cyclical nature to it or not. Plus, the hole is only there during the Southern Hemisphere spring and summer, around 4-5 months. Plus plus, some years with a large hole there is a much stronger ozone concentration at the edges then the years with smaller holes. Hopefully some scientist somewhere is studying the cause of these more pertinent issues. We might actually learn something instead of all this guilt by association.

The Pegulas have proven to me to be everything positive you could want in an owner. You can't just knee jerk your front office out when a season doesn't go as planned. Not the owner's fault if people below them can't carry their job out. Can anyone on here provide evidence they are not willing to devote whatever resources are necessary to produce a winner? What more can you ask of an owner? Want to see a "D" owner, check out Jimmy Haslam's decisions with the Browns.

Too bad the article only covers data through 2013. Amazing how quick they are to declare victory for a mild 3 year uptick. Reminds me when GW Bush declared victory in Iraq. Too bad 2015 has the fourth largest hole on record: http://theozonehole.com/2015.htm Whoops.

I agree that more time is needed with TT. Obviously the Pats game plan told to him was to get Robert Woods involved out of the gate. Through the middle part of this game I felt like TT was going through his progressions more and looking guys off. The Clay completion stands out in this regard, and I consider it a small step forward despite some accuracy issues. TT is playing safe, solid football. But his progressions and decision making are still too slow, hardly a surprise after 8 games. Plus the scouting book is out on defending him. But I challenge anyone on here to prove to me it's because it's because he is incapable versus needing more time to really settle in so he can quicken his decision making and excel at the position. He's all we got and I'm actually glad because only time will reveal what he can become so the impatient knee-jerkers are out of luck!

Surprised Miller has done so poorly, thanks for that info. My main contention is the notion that Cassel would have won us the jacksonville game. That is sheer folly and seemingly ignores the fact that at least EJ threw the ball downfield and brought them back into contention. It's pretty doubtful Cassel would have thrown much beyond checkdowns and would have probably committed his own style of turnovers. They both suck as quarterbacks, and if you take into account their different styles but weigh their total game relative to each other, how do you really figure Cassel pulls out the jags game? He just spent 4 games behind the best O-line in football and how did he do? EJ put the last nail in his starting QB coffin with the Jax game but I'd rather have him then Cassel. Meh.

FWIW Manuel threw some better passes in the second half but still took some bad sacks, was missing open receivers and had little feeling for the pocket. Just too many basic things he can't hold together when he plays. I like him too but sorry, exit stage left.

The one really positive thing Pettine had to say in the article was that Manziel is in the building he is very professional. I think the big factor is that Pettine doesn't feel he can count on him as a person yet. I thought Manziel showed better qb awareness (blitzes, pocket, etc) then Manuel did. That being said, he didn't seem to be going through his reads and was throwing very late to wide open receivers. I'm a big fan of letting young quarterbacks develop on the bench but have to agree in this case Manziel has good command of the offensive plays and it seems his O-line can protect him, so outline a plan to give him 2 more starts and make a decision then. I agree with others that the Browns need to see what they've got with the season lost.

Yea, you're right. It is a tough play to discern because of the speed and the angles and the first time I saw it I did think it was a hold. I just don't think Joekel stretched his arm out wide to corral Hughes, which I agree would be holding. He turned his body to Hughes and tried to ride him outside best he could, for me he kept that left arm in front of his body and bent, showing me he had some degree of control. You sure can, it's called moving your feet, taking a good angle, having good leverage and keeping your balance. And he didn't recover his position, he cut off Hughes' deep line to the quarterback, not by stopping Hughes but by cutting off his angle until Bortles scrambled forward.