Thurman#1

I'll book it: And book this: Draft day next year it's going to snow two feet in Nashville!!!!!!!! Book it!!

Yup. He engineered a rebuild, and this is what rebuilds look like this early. It is painful, but that's the way these things go. We'll see over the next few years how good a job they've done. Yeah, we've been really bad for a long time. No, the vast majority of that isn't the new regime's fault. Yes, some fans have been very patient. Of course, some have screamed, moaned and whined for the whole 18 years, but let's look past that. But no, the fact that we've been patient for a long time doesn't mean more patience isn't needed. "No matter how great the talent or efforts, some things just take time. You can't produce a baby in one month by getting nine women pregnant." - Warren Buffett Rebuilds are one of those things that just take time.

40 - 60% for both. They have a lot to prove. I'm very hopeful but I'm from Missouri, though I've only been there for about 48 hours.

You sure were wrong. Why would you think things couldn't get worse at QB than having a QB who was around the 20th to 22nd best in the league. There are 10 - 12 QBs worse than that every year, and those usually include the rookies who end up starting and plenty of other very young guys. Of course it was capable of being much much worse, and it was always likely to get worse for a year or two. That was the likelihood. We had a chance if McCarron had been good, but with their Whaley-inherited salary cap woes, they weren't going to get a more expensive vet, and the flier on McCarron didn't work out. That was too bad, but bad QB play this year .... the second year of a rebuild and the year we drafted a rookie well-known to need a ton of development ... was always likely to be worse. So, no, Beane and McDermott work for an owner who understands rebuilds. In the third and fourth years, their seats will indeed become hot if things don't look up. Not this year. The Pegulas get it.

Agreed that it's not all the QB's fault. What's at fault is that it's year two of a rebuild ... of a team that has made defense the priority early. The second year of major rebuilds are painful. That's the way things go. In the third and fourth year, either things get better or you start to realize that it may be a coach issue or a GM issue or both. Right now though, it's what everyone should have expected.

Yeah, no, indeed. Our WRs were even worse than this year. Zay Jones and Benjamin have both started to look pretty decent the last two to three games. Brandon Tate, Deonte Thompson, Jordan Matthews and the rookie Zay (plus Kaelin Clay and Taiwan Jones) weren't as good. They just weren't. They did have a slightly better QB throwing to them, but that didn't make them better, just in a slightly better situation. Bwah ha ha ha ha. Oh, that's precious, Avisan, really. It's clear you didn't mean it to be, but that's hilarious. Yeah, Humber, Preston Brown and Alexander, the early starters last year, were better than Tremaine Edmunds, the second-year Matt Milano, and Alexander. Right, gotcha. Right, average defense at worst. Great, go find all the preseason forecasts that predicted that, especially the "at worst" part. Some thought we'd be average but I'd love to see all of your links to the articles predicting we'd be average at worst on defense. In the real world, the D-line looked OK but nobody expected Tre to be as good as he was so early. The D looked like it might possibly be decent but equally might be pretty bad, and the O looked like it would be sub-mediocre. Not going to bother going point by point through your nonsense, but last post you amazingly said this: ... and I challenged you to produce a few of those articles that mentioned "being annual contenders for the playoffs." Surprisingly, you didn't link to any of them in this post .... Still waiting ...

But as for high draft picks not mattering, that's utter nonsense. They're not the only thing that matters, but they matter plenty. And as for them not mattering for the Bills for the last 20 years, they are part of the reason we sucked for so long. We reloaded and reloaded and reloaded and even when we did occasionally rebuild we got unlucky and had to do it with generally lower draft picks. We had the #4 pick one year and got Dareus instead of Cam Newton. And other than that, where were all the high picks? We pretty much didn't have any. We kept being "good" enough to draft 9th, 11th ... on and on and not high enough to get real impact players.

There really is no such thing as tanking in the NFL. It's a hockey term and maybe another sport or two. In football, what they do is rebuild.

If his is revisionist, that puts it on the same footing as yours. Yeah, we backed in, but let's see some links of a bunch of forecasts mentioning "being annual contenders for the playoffs." Our recievers were worse than the ones we have now, the right side of the OL was (and is) weak, our LBs were considered very weak with Brown, Humber and Alexander as the expected starters and the safeties looked solid but not nearly as good as they ended up playing. We weren't expected to be good. Yeah, we were very lucky to sneak into the playoffs. But the defense considerably outplaying expectations absolutely came down to the new regime. And that's nonsense about identifying offensive talent. They have put their emphasis on the defense. They've used very little draft capital or FA money on the offense. But of the people they did bring in, Jones and Benjamin are finally beginning to play well, Dawkins looks like a huge success and Ducasse has been pretty solid, a significant FA bargain. The verdict is still out on Allen, of course. That could turn out to be an awful pickup. Or not. Too early to know.

Good argument for those who disagree with you. In two years they've spent almost no draft capital and very little FA money on the offense on anyone but Josh Allen. And Kelvin Benjamin and Zay Jones have both started to look good the past two games, Ducasse has been pretty good, easily outplaying his $1.2 mill a year price tag, and the rest were pretty much vet minimum depth types. You left out Dawkins but he's been a terrific pick.

You maximize the personnel you have - you reload - when you have good personnel. Which Schwartz very much did, thanks mostly to Buddy Nix. When you don't have good personnel, your best move is often to rebuild.

Wow, tough question. Why did they make him the #3? Hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm. Jeez. Couldn't have been because he played third-best, could it?

The difference being that McVay is reloading, not rebuilding. He joined a team with a GM who's been in place, building a solid roster for years and picking the #1 overall QB the year before he got there. The Bills did not have a roster that would have made a reload tenable. They weren't good. The Rams had build a strong defense that was very young, and had brought in Gurley and Goff before McVay arrived, and they were in good shape with the salary cap. But yeah, you make a good point, McVay was a lot better than Fisher. And you're certainly right that you don't always have to start over. Do you really think the 2015 Bills had enough talent to reload around? I don't, especially when Whaley had built a very mediocre squad while treating his salary cap situation like a sailor in port treats his pocket money. If you do think we could have reloaded, I guess we'll have to agree to disagree.

This is an opinion stated as a fact. And not even a particularly solid opinion ...

No, they haven't. Their goal is to build a team that consistently competes for championships. It's way way too early to see what kind of job they are doing. I'm really really hopeful, but so far they have done a good job only at following their plan. How will that plan work out? Too early to say. They still have a ton to prove. I do like the tenets of the plan. They're smart and committed. But plenty of smart and committed team leaders have failed. We'll see.

Nope. The last two SBs have been won by: 2017) Philly, the #4 defense 2016) The Pats, the #8 defense (and as might be predicted by their bend but don't break nature, the #1 defense against scoring) And the three before that were won by: 2015) Denver, the #1 defense 2014) The Pats, the #13 defense (and the #8 defense against scoring) 2013) Seahawks, the #1 defense And the offenses were #7, #4, #16, #11, and #18 in the same five SBs. Defenses still win SBs.

We "is need of one"? Nah, we've got one, the two-headed McBeane. And it's too early to know how good they'll be. Anyone judging a regime by the second year when they are rebuilding needs his own rebuild ... in his football IQ. Reactions that early are by definition knee-jerk. Beane and McDermott have a lot to prove but their grade "Incomplete." In the second year of his rebuild, Bill Walsh went 6-10. The next year he won the Super Bowl. You just don't know. What you should know is that it takes more time than they've had. Am I saying McBeane is the new Bill Walsh? Nope. I'm saying we don't yet know what they are.

Yeah, Schwartz cobbled together a defense all by himself. All he had to work with were Jerry Hughes, Mario Williams, Kyle Williams, Brandon Spikes, Nigel Bradham, Preston Brown, Leodis Mckelvin, Stephon Gilmore and a young and motivated Marcell Dareus. How did he do it with such scrapings, leavings and dross? Yeah, Schwartz got them up to the #4 defense but they'd been the #10 the year before. That was a talented lineup. That defensive roster and our current offensive roster should not be mentioned on the same internet, never mind in the same breath.

... is it's the end of the 2020 season and we still aren't any good and show no signs of getting there soon. Short of losing the locker room completely, that's pretty much the only reason.

Sigh, another person who confuses his opinion with fact.

Last thing we need right now is an inexperienced QB who will need to be developed. He likely did that with the (correct) feeling that McCarron could be a mentor to Allen, while Bridgewater couldn't. Then McCarron became #3 not #1 or #2 and showed signs of discontent (according to Carucci). If we'd known that would happen then yeah, Bridgewater would have been a better pickup.

The lineup they wanted? That's overstating it, I think. More like the lineup they chose based on the limitations inherent in the situation ... particularly their promise to the owners to clean up the cap by the end of this season, the need to acquire a lot of draft capital in case it was needed to bring in a young QB and their obvious plan to prioritize the defense over the offense this early in the process.

Yup. Some of the posts on here are almost as bad as that game was. The carping and mewling ...

Fine, you want better coaching, better weapons, more experience and a much more innovative offensive system. I'd argue that you're making unwarranted assumptions. I would like to see him get whatever he needs. I don't think all four of those are obvious needs, and I'd argue that a better OL might trump almost all of those four, and possibly - though I certainly hope not - more time on the bench might also be a bigger need than those four. As for your list of four, it's one opinion. If McDermott, who has a ton more info on the situation than we do, shares it, DB'll be gone. If he's still here it'll be a very good indication indeed that there is good reason to think that he was handicapped by the roster. And Daboll doesn't have a horrible track record as an offensive coordinator. His track record is mixed and debatable. Terrific at Alabama. Arguable at places like KC in a sinking ship with Crennel at the helm and Cassel at QB and at Miami with Matt Moore and Chad Henne at QB. Remind me, has anybody made these QBs look like NFL starters? Same with Cleveland. Whereas he apparently did a terrific job at NE. It's arguable. If he'd been terrible and everyone knew it, he wouldn't be here. And I'd also argue that Goff has a much much better idea than you do of what caused him to look better. And while he gives a ton of credit to McVay, he simply thinks he improved an awful lot in his second year. He's probably exactly right.

It's the fans fault that the team has sucked for a long time? Nope. That's on the people who created those rosters, hired the coaches, etc. Guys like Marv as GM, Whaley, Nix, etc. It's the fans fault that the fans own expectations for turnaround time in the current conditions are unrealistic? Yes siree Bob. Not that all fans were suffering from the overoptimism. But obviously plenty did.