Thurman#1

Because there are two types of teams that make the playoffs, teams with a chance, and fodder teams. Generally around three teams a year with none but a theoretical chance. And that's what the Bills would be with TT unless they also have the Buddy Ryan - Mike Singletary defense from the year they won the Super Bowl, or one on just about the same level. And we're years away from that if it ever happens. There's never been a fodder team that's won the Super Bowl. Never. People talk about the Giants the year they beat the Pats, but they absolutely were not a fodder team. They were peaking at the right time, Eli's light had come on and they had almost beaten the Pats in the last week of the season. The three fodder teams that year were the 9-7 Jeff Garcia Bucs, the 9-7 Jason Campbell Redskins and the 10-6 Titans, QB'd mostly by Vince Young, who'd scored four points more than had been scored on them that year. No, the best team doesn't always win. But one of the best eight or so in the playoffs does. The fodder teams don't. Aristocrat is the one who brought up the Seattle comparisons, not FireChan. And no, we shouldn't lower the bar. There should be one goal and one goal only moving forward. Winning the Super Bowl sometime in the next few years. Nothing else matters. That bar should never be lowered.

. "The drive stats of our website also features drive stats compiled by Jim Armstrong. These stats are computed from NFL Drive Charts and are not adjusted for strength of schedule or situation. Take-a-knee drives at the end of halves are discarded." - Football Outsiders

Wilson that year: passer rating 101.2 (7th in the NFL), 8.2 YPA (7th in the NFL), TD Percentage 6.4%, 4 4th Quarter Comebacks, 5 Game-Winning Drives Tyrod last year: Passer Rating 89.7 (20th in the NFL), 6.9 YPA (26th in the NFL) TD Percentage 3.9% , 1 4th Quarter Comeback, 1 Game-Winning Drive NOT ... EVEN ... CLOSE! We do indeed have a better run game. And a much worse pass game.

I doubt it. Roman had much the same approach in San Francisco. What he didn't have in either place is a QB who was especially efficient. Very likely his approach has depended on who his QB was. Which makes total sense. Here's the key quotation: "'I wouldn't try to pigeonhole us just yet that we're going to try to be ground and pound,' Roman said, via the team's official site. 'Who really wins big doing that? I think you have to have balance. But that doesn't mean we're not going to make people respect us in that phase of the game.' "Perhaps it was entirely on accident. Roman was described by the interviewer as a 'ground and pound' coordinator earlier in the conversation but that also happened to be the mantra of former Bills head coach Rex Ryan, who always leaned toward a hard-nosed rushing attack."

1) Points is NOT a QB stat. It is a stat that is probably 75 - 80% from the whole offense and the rest from defense and STs. Trying to use it to big up Tyrod doesn't make sense. Our running game was terrific on offense. Our pass game wasn't. 2) I notice you left finance out of the discussion. And for good reason. Must've had a lot of game-winning drives and 4th quarter comebacks then, right? We scored a lot of points against bad teams and didn't score many when it counted. Clearly the defense was very bad. Equally clearly, the offense was terrific when running and substandard when passing.

A team without a franchise QB thinking about taking a QB in the draft, if one's available, who's not a sure thing? Some similarities to 2013, maybe, but really that should probably remind you of maybe a third of all seasons of all NFL teams. Teams without a franchise guy are always trying to figure out if someone they can get in the draft could be that franchise guy. And no, he shouldn't be blamed for letting Tyrod go without a plan in place anymore than the Jets should be blamed for letting Fitz go without a guy who's as good. Letting your best guy go - if he's not good enough to get you to your goal of a championship and especially if he's very expensive and you're having cap problems - makes a whole ton of sense. I mean unless you're willing to sacrifice your long-term future to achieve the magnificent achievement of another seven-, eight- or nine-win season.

Not choosing Tyrod with that contract isn't a tank, it's one of the very logical ways to proceed. And the difference between Tyrod and someone else is probably 2 - 3 games. Maybe. If you bring Tyrod back at that salary, it can't be for one or two years. He'd be the most expensive bridge QB in history. It's got to be that you're committing to him. IMHO that just doesn't make sense.

Because we've given them so much reason over the years to worry about us? They'll maximize what they get in trade, and if it's us who pays, they'll be OK with that. It wouldn't be because there are red flags we aren't seeing, just that they value draft picks an awful lot and we gave them the best value in picks.

It's the off-season. That's usually the time the GM does the talking. He might be a quiet guy, but so far, IMHO this is par for the course. Not that Rex didn't find ways to break into public consciousness.

And you're right too, Kumquats are more delicious than radishes. Can't blame you for trying to switch the argument, though. The main one you're working on sure doesn't look like a winner.

8-5 for Trubisky (61%) 1998 9-4 1999 7-5 2000 8-4 Total 24- 13 (64%) Those were the college records for a QB who had a reasonably good NFL career, Drew Brees. Wins are great things, but they are a team stat. Kirk Cousins won 70% at Michigan State It's hard to tell which games Aaron Rodgers started but in his two years at Cal when he started almost all the games they went 8-6 and 11-3. Bet I could find more if I kept looking. Carson Palmer, probably. Roethlisberger, probably. Not that I'm rooting for them to take Trubisky. i don't really have an opinion there. But win-loss is a team stat.

Ah, the famous "Next year is the great draft for QBs" cry. We hear it every year. Every single year, without exception. And then they play the season and everything changes and it's "Nah, nobody this year, but next year is going to be awesome," again. Honestly, every year next year is the year. That doesn't mean I think we should force it this year. If your guy isn't there, don't draft a QB. But remember that with fans and pundits this year's candidates are generally over-criticized while next year's are under-examined.

I have no opinion on Mahomes, I haven't watched him. But what you see these days in terms of QBs in the draft is this ... if you wait till his value, he's already gone. Very few exceptions. If you want a guy, you have to take him a bit earlier than his value would indicate. And will get it from the Redskins. Not going to be available.

The last two seasons are a big thanks to Rex? Yeah, agreed. A bad hire. But it's been sixteen years of "Maybe we can get by with this sub-mediocre QB and get to a Super Bowl anyway." Keep Tyrod and IMHO that'll be seventeen years of no playoffs. Ceiling would be a playoffs one-and-done. I'm not alone thinking that another seven or eight or nine-win season won't make me a single angstrom unit happier than a two or three-win season with a great draft pick producing a real impact player. I don't want it to get worse. But to me, there is only one thing I react to at this point as far as being happier or sadder. And that's whether we've stepped towards becoming a team that contend for a title in the long run. And we haven't, not since the Music City Miscarriage of Justice. I don't care about anything else. And keeping Tyrod and winning a game or two extra over the cheaper guy we can replace him with won't be a step towards a title. It's a step towards winning a couple extra games in yet another of a seemingly endless string of mediocre years. But it was Tyrod too. It wasn't only the defense. That's the way football works. It isn't only Tyrod. But he's a part of it. The pass game simply hasn't been good. They can win? Yeah, agreed with that too. Hell, we won seven this year and eight last year. Maybe next year would be nine with Tyrod. But he shows zero signs of being the kind of QB that Super Bowl contenders have. And his contract impact is way out-of-whack for the player he is.

Apparently they already have, when you have to go back to 2015 for one of your three points, the second is the pro bowl alternate stuff and the third refers not to the passing games specifically but to the whole offense and even is affected a lot by the field position that the STs and defense give the offense. I like Tyrod as a person. I was really hoping for the major improvements this year that they were hoping for, but just the opposite happened. I agree that things can get worse. But I've seen this team continue to reload and reload and reload sub-mediocre QBs and mediocre teams again and again for the length of the whole playoff drought. And all those 7-9s and 8-8s didn't make me any happier than a 2-14 followed by a high draft pick would have.

John, I've said this a million times before, but to repeat ... scoring simply is NOT a QB statistic. It just isn't. It's a whole offense stat, with a major defense and STs component in terms of field position (and the Bills offense had the 11th best average drive start field position in the league while leaving the defense screwed with the 23rd worst average drive start field position). Tyrod and our poor passing game should get down on their knees and thank our excellent run game for doing so much scoring to make the offense look good. 17 passing TDs, 29 running TDs and three scored by the defense. Just barely more than a third of our scoring was by the passing attack ... in a league where not one single solitary lonely desolate unaccompanied isolated other team in the league scored less passing TDs than running TDs. Thank goodness the run game was so good. Because the passing game just wasn't. Tyrod's regression was indeed big. 20th in passer rating and 26th in YPA.

Agreed, with one exception. Dalton is not mid-level. He was terrific in 2015 and this year, their o-line was awful and they couldn't run the ball well either, in a four way tie for 20th at YPR and he still played pretty well.

Being proud of being a Pro Bowl alernate these days is like being proud of getting a prom date after eight girls say no, including your sister and your cousin. It just doesn't mean much. Again, you're right that the receivers were great ... but he had open guys on pretty much every single play. I watched five Sammy-less games on All-22 and he did. Guys were open. And for the eight-millionth time, you guys who talk about receiver problems never seem to mention the other side of the coin, which is that NFL QBs would kill to have a run game as good as the Bills have. It's a huge help to the pass game, but we still just weren't good throwing the ball. I'd agree this much, he improved from Baltimore. But his regression this season as defenses caught on to how to defend him wasn't "slight." It was big.

None of this in any way rebuts anything I said. Doesn't even address it except for using some of the same words, such as "sacks" and "wide recievers." If you have anything that actually addresses my posts, go ahead and reply to me. Oh, and if you're trying to support Tyrod, you might not want to compare him to Russell Wilson. For the obvious reason that though they're stylistically similary, Wilson is a ton better. Wilson can both run and pass at a very high level. As for the McCoy comparison, thanks for making my point. What happens to McCoy's yardage losses? Are they left out of his totals the way people try to leave out the sacks yardage from Tyrod's totals when they come up with the not-an-actual-stat yardage per game totals of 249 yards per game? Nope. McCoy's lost yardage is added right into his totals. But we can't put Tyrod's in because ... because ... well, we just can't. Agree with you on Hogan, though. It was a bad move.

I hope you're right, but the scouting reports I saw didn't so much say that he had better mobility and pass coverage ability than thought as that he could play zone pass defenses, which essentially doesn't require a ton of mobility. As I say, I hope you're right, but from what little I hear, the new system requires real speed. Too early to say, really, but there are questions about him. And yeah, you're right, what would you get for him. He's probably OK after the accident and he's got a contract teams wouldn't mind acquiring, but he's an unknown quantity in terms of pro ability. Have to disagree with you about Zac Brown. He really is that good. Would probably be a great fit too, but we might not be able to sign him. And trading Dareus is borderline insane. Ignoring the fact that he's our best player - I'm irritated by his behavior too, but he's our best guy - trading him right now would have a dead cap hit of $32.7 mill. No possible way on Earth that happens.

Gil Brandt had him #27. http://www.nfl.com/news/story/0ap1000000162920/article/hot-100-25-luke-joeckel-ziggy-ansah-still-top-2013-draft-class Brooks had him #30. http://www.nfl.com/news/story/09000d5d828bf038/article/2013-nfl-draft-uscs-barkley-woods-among-top-30-prospects NFLDraftScout had him 40th http://www.nfldraftscout.com/ratings/dsprofile.php?pyid=83592&draftyear=2013&genpos=qb There were plenty of people who had Manuel earlyish 2nd or late 1st near the draft. I'm sorry, I just don't buy that such a large amount of the regression was caused by the other factors you're referring to. IMHO it was mostly from defenses simply figuring out what the Bills were doing to protect Tyrod by simplifying the playbook. The longer you have to do that stuff, the easier job defenses have in scheming against him. (Again, when Roman was let go, one of the things Lynn said he would do to make things better was to cut back the playbook and "simplify the reads." That makes things easier on the QB, but also the defenses.) The folks who blame this on WR problems have something of a point. We did have lower level WRs. But I went and watched five mid-season games without Sammy on the All-22 and I saw guys open on almost every single play. Yeah, Sammy might have been more open, and yeah teams might have defended us differently with Sammy on the field ... but guys were open. And the folks citing the WRs as an excuse never mention the huge advantage given Tyrod in our tremendous run game. Teams were scheming to take the run away from us. They didn't worry much about our pass game, and for good reason. Again, we heard it from more than one team, "Make him play quarterback."

... if winning that year is your number one priority. ... and if you're going to leave salary cap considerations entirely aside which, for good reason, no team would ever do. Otherwise, though, if you're going to consider the long-term drive towards getting a championship more than winning a game or two in a season where the ceiling might be a playoff one-and-out resulting in a poor draft pick, and you're also going to worry about the cap as should always be done ... you might. In any case, there's another possibility ... bringing in another vet who wouldn't be as good as Tyrod but would be vastly cheaper, someone like Hoyer, Glennon, Foles or Barkley. Again, no, they're not likely to be as good. But their cheapness will perhaps more than make up for the difference between maybe 6 - 10 and the 8 - 8 or 9 - 6 and a worse draft pick that Tyrod might get you to. If Cardale needs another year's development, this might be the best option.

Tyrod has averaged a bit below 210 yards per game, not 249. Or are you referring to that new Tyrod-Taylor-fans-only stat called "Offensive Yards from Scrimmage Including Positive Pass Yards And Positive Run Yards But Carefully Excluding the Negative Yards that Should Logically Be Subtracted Because of Sacks Except That We Don't Want to Do That Because It Would Make Tyrod Look A Bit Worse" stat. If you're going to combine those, you should include all yards from the guy, which would include subtracting for sacks. Somehow Tyrod's fans love creating the new stat where they add things, but don't want to include anything that would cast him in a worse light. Those are all actually separate stats for a reason. Here's what it really looks like: Running Yards: 572 and 580 for the season over his two years. Highest in the league. He's a terrific runner. Passing Yards: 216.8 and 201.5 per game. Very low. But it's not fair to isolate per game stats because he had fewer attempts than nearly any starter in the league. In fairness to Tyrod, you also have to look at Yards Per Attempt. Tyrod's were 8.3 and 6.9. Very good his first year, and extremely poor this year. A major regression, to 26th in the league this year. Huge regression. Substandard this year. Sack Yards: Worst in the league in times sacked this year, despite far fewer attempts than most QBs. May be because he often left the pocket even when he wasn't under pressure. Not to mention that he generally held the ball till he could actually see that someone had broken open, which meant holding the ball too long sometimes. 212 sack yards in 2015 and 192 this year. Among the worst in the league. But Tyrod is an excellent runner. Agreed that Bledsoe was worse than Tyrod in Bledsoe's last two years on the Bills (although some of that might be that Tyrod has an infinitely better run game that forces teams to focus on stopping the run first, while Bledsoe in 2003 and 2004 had a run game that averaged 3.9 YPC both years and had an OL that was much worse). But saying you're better than the 2003 and 2004 Bledsoe is not saying much. Bledsoe's legs were gone, he couldn't even move functionally in the pocket, stepping away from the rush, never mind actually running. Sorry to throw this all at a rather innocuous post reasonably comparing Tyrod and Bledsoe, but that stat that folks are making up by adding together pass and run yards is nonsense unless you're going to look at it all together and then do so for all QBs besides. There is a reason these stats are generally looked at separately.

If the best players "virtually quit on the team," they weren't the best players. The good ones play their best because that's who they are. Give up hope on the team, yeah, plenty of people in bad situations lose hope. But the good ones still give everything they have. And yeah, the team would have much less of a chance to win without Tyrod than with him. NEXT YEAR. And the players should really care about that. But the team management should be looking past it. Their primary focus should be long-term, towards the years when they will actually have a real chance to compete for a championship. Nothing else matters. The players shouldn't be caring about the salary cap. The front office should. I've got no problem with them letting Tyrod go if they do so. It might mean a game or two next year. I don't care. Tucker has often talked about this story before. And one difference between then and now is that the defenses in 2003 and 2004 were terrific, so the team felt they had a real chance to compete. Which IMHO they didn't after Bledsoe lost most of his movement skills to age. But again, you want the players thinking they do have a chance and fighting for it, even if it's not realistic. You don't want the FO kidding themselves in the same way. They should look at things coldly, logically, realistically. About your problems with Whaley, I really agree with most of them. I didn't want him back. Not worth worrying about decisions in the past at this point, though.

$15.5 mill - his option bonus to be paid this year, the first day of the league year, so they'd already have paid it plus $2.853 mill - the portion of his 2016 amortized Buffalo Bills signing bonus that hasn't yet hit the cap ---------------------------- $18.353 mill - total I notice this has already been answered but thought the details might be a bit interesting. Depends how long they keep him. If they released him the next day, $12 mill. If they keep him for the remainder of his contract, the contract total minus the $18.35 mill. Go here: http://www.spotrac.com/nfl/buffalo-bills/tyrod-taylor-7899/ But basically, when you say that the Bills cap hit would be $18.35 mill, you're saying the Bills won't do that. Not in the cap environment they're in. As pointed out above, they could make the trade in the two-day window and not have to pay the option. But making that trade also will likely be very difficult. I doubt they'll find a taker. Or if they do, they won't get much, IMHO. If his contract had been less, they might have gotten quite a bit, but teams are unlikely to want to pay a lot of draft picks to get the privilege of paying a lot of money.