metzelaars_lives

OK you win, EJ was good last summer and preseason.

He was an effective game manager in the first two games last year, I'll give him that. But at no point was I thinking he'd somehow arrived.

Again, everyone always points to the four games. I care way less about his performance in those last two games than I do about the fact that his entire 2014 offseason and preseason was a complete and utter train wreck- so much so that they went out and made the emergency signing of Orton. Why does no one ever remember this? It wasn't that long ago guys.

I don't necessarily disagree with most of what you wrote. I think though, that saying "hey we don't quite know yet, it's still early" and saying "my gut is that it's not happening" are not mutually exclusive concepts. And I would question the "progress" he's made. As I've stated time and again, he had a serviceable rookie season top to bottom. I was certainly ok with him being our qb going into 2014. But he clearly regressed last year, that can't be up for debate. And now this year, he's running third in the qb competition. Is he better today than he was in August of 2013? I wonder. Reports out of camp would lead you to believe he's not. I guess I just don't understand whose fault it is. And for the record, I never said anything about his performance the other night. He looked fine. Unfortunately for him, so too did the other two guys. Good news for the Bills by the way (kind of lost in all this).

Dude I have never cited anyone's practice stats. Look, I'm not pushing an agenda. The coaches, at least as of today, have EJ third. This is clear. I am simply deferring to them as I have yet to attend a practice. Let me ask you this: why do you think the coaches and all the reporters, etc. all have EJ third? Do you think THEY have an agenda?

"Less than likely" is what I've maintained throughout. Do you still think there's a better than 50% chance he's our opening day starter week 1 2017? Is this part of your "Jokeman" shtick or are you really citing Tyrod Taylor's mop up duty and practice stats?

My thoughts exactly. This should not be viewed as some sort of fringe or "hater" post. This is the way most reasonable people feel about the situation. And yet for some reason on this particular board, a post like this is the outlier.

I hope so! And ironically he's the only one of the three that no one's talking about. The one thing I'd ask you is to give me an example of a time where a rookie QB gets to waltz onto a team with an established veteran to sit behind or perhaps mentor him for a few years, a proven coaching staff, a great offensive line, etc. Aaron Rodgers? Brock Osweiler? Carson Palmer? We're talking a few very rare instances here. And Rodgers' line sucked when he first started. At some point you have to put the onus on the QB. Way, way more often than not, the situation is gonna be less than ideal for a young QB. I am more in the "if he's good, he'll be good" camp and less in the "circumstances have to be just right" camp.

I appreciate you being one of the first to elaborate about this vague "lack of development" concept. Well I would agree that the conditions for him may not have been ideal to succeed, a) it wasn't really the Bills' fault as they brought in Kolb to sort of mentor him and b) the Bills offensive line was one of the very best in football in 2012- no one could have seen their regression under Marrone coming the way it did. I would argue that all of these excuses (and they are excuses) are superseded by the fact that he simply has not looked sharp throwing the football in camp the last two years (he was no doubt worse last year than this year). I'm talking in 7 on 7 drills where it doesn't matter who your coach is or who is on your offensive line. If he looked sharp throwing the football in practice and then struggled in game situations, I would be more inclined to go along with what you're saying and question why his success was/is unable to translate to game situations. Fair? I think me and Chan's raging religious debate in the shoutbox a few months back would discredit your theory. See, these posts are exactly what perpetuates the constant arguing when it comes to this very delicate subject. The poster was responding to me and I am not in the "EJ stands no chance" crowd. In fact, I laid out my stance on EJ very clearly on the previous page. Feel free to take a gander.

Oh well. I was being totally sincere and thought it was a reasonable post.

I don't even know what you're talking about.

Uhh I did exactly that and even cited them by name??

Wasn't your original post that started this whole thread completely sarcastic?

Alright I admit it, I was trolling for a couple days there. The EJ debate got the better of me and after the one dude blocked me, I realized I was being kind of juvenile. I will issue one final statement on the matter and then I am taking an oath to not comment on the QB situation until September 13th. I promise. Here it is: The EJ defenders on this website are out of control. In fact, this website is not a fair representation of Bills fans in general. If you listen to Buffalo sports talk radio or talk to Bills fans in the real world, it is rare that you find anyone so adamant about defending the guy but for whatever reason it seems like half of you guys are committed to this ridiculous cause. In the last two days under the guise of a pro-EJ poster, I have not said one single thing that I haven't seen posted on here a hundred times. Marrone intentionally ruined EJ? OC in Buffalo told us all that recently. The Bills organization is responsible for stunting his development and "ruining" him? It's said on here every day. I still have no idea what that means. First they let him play. Then they benched him. I am at a loss. What else were they supposed to do? Is there a third option? EJ has all this potential but Ryan Tannehill has already maxed out even though he only started playing QB five years ago and has improved by leaps and bounds every season? That's like more than half of you. Gugny stated that, contracts aside, he would rather have Ryan Tannehill on his roster than EJ Manuel. Like, he really said that. We're not allowed to even begin to speculate as to whether he can be good or not? I hear that all the time. If I am skeptical about EJ then I am a "hater" and I want to be right about his failure more than I want the Bills to win. OK whatever. "But, but, QB X wasn't very good in his second year..." Ya know what, Jamarcus Russell and Ryan Leaf sucked at this stage in their careers too. Guys, he's in his third year here. There is no conspiracy against him. It's not Joe B's fault. It's not Doug Marrone's fault. He came into a QB competition with an opportunity to prove me and everyone else wrong and win the job. He has looked the third best so far, period. And then of course, there's the "well one day Cassel looked good and then one day EJ looked good and then one day Taylor looked good, I can't keep track..." crowd. Stop. He has looked the third best. Even John Murphy, the biggest EJ advocate of them all, recently conceded that he doesn't seem to be picking up the offense whereas the other two guys are improving every day. It seems to me that what some of you want is for the Bills to just hand EJ the job because he's younger and unproven and "we know what we have in Cassel." Life doesn't work that way guys. You wanna start over Matt Cassel? Then play better than him. That's it. How well do you think it would sit with the team if they just handed the job to EJ even though everyone in the locker room knew full well that Cassel/Taylor gives them a better chance to beat the Colts on September 13th. If you're Winston or Mariotta, perhaps you get to start over a veteran who might be better right now. But not a guy who was not a great college QB, has clearly regressed since being drafted and quite frankly, should've been drafted in the third round in which case, we wouldn't even be having this conversation. It's his third year guys. He's been on the pot for a long time now and nothing's doing. When he is relegated to third string or cut, I'm not going to exclaim "I told you so" because I never told anyone anything. I just said I thought it was less than likely that he would develop into a franchise QB. I still think that. I think it's plainly obvious. I just can't believe how many of you disagree(d). I don't have time to waste waiting around for a guy to develop who has shown zero indication that he's going to develop. I just ask that if Matt Cassel is the starter week 1 that you guys get behind him, stop with this childish "Meh" thing and let's unite as Bills fans and stop this bickering. And if Cassel performs poorly in the regular season, you are not allowed to emerge back out of thee woodwork and start with your EJ crusade again because that's the guy he couldn't beat out in the first place.

+(how do I insert the infinity sign on here??) You have hit the nail on the head. For a first round pick in his third camp, Manuel looks amazing. At worst, he's well ahead of where he should be. It's a shame the Bills brass doesn't see it like us. I posted the same thing on here yesterday- I don't care about winning some silly playoff game. I want a franchise QB. And if that means the Bills suffer through a couple 8 win seasons with EJ, then so be it. By 2017-18 or so, the guy is guaranteed to be a complete stud. And I'm sure Kyle Williams and the vets on D would agree with us. People just refuse to see the bigger picture.

Well that was actually his first year as a true rookie. His second year, he threw for 24 TD's and 17 INT's and almost 4,000 yards. But I think it's pretty clear that Tannehill has hit his ceiling and has no more room to improve. I mean granted, he only started playing the position of QB five years ago but folks, we've seen what he can do. All he does is throw short passes. With Manuel, his ceiling is limitless. I wouldn't trade Manuel for Tannehill right now. I don't want a guy who is guaranteed to never be better than a competent, middle of the pack QB and has hit his ceiling after a mere three years in the league. I like the mystery of the unknown with Manuel. He's big, strong, can move, he's got a rocket for an arm and he's a natural born leader. Hey if "Moron" didn't intentionally ruin him last year, I have no doubt he'd be running away with this QB competition. To me, Tannehill is more Meh than Manuel.

Apparently Cassel has looked great against the Browns today. Wonderful. This is the worst case scenario. If Meh keeps looking so competent maybe they actually keep him instead of handing the reins over to EJ. That would set this franchise back several years.

Yeah I was. Can't believe that just happened. Can they just cancel this practice already?

I love 52/53 but that is one area where they are seriously lacking in depth. This would be a bad one.

Can we agree it's not happening for Goodwin? People who think Goodwin should/will make the team over Hogan because he might make 4-5 magical plays a year are completely delusional. And I loved Goodwin after 2013 but his body is clearly not built to play in the NFL. Hogan's clearly is. Hey maybe they both make it but I doubt it.

No idea why there is such a strong anti-Hogan contingent on this website. Can you really picture Goodwin stepping in and being the reliable pass catcher that Hogan was last year? Not to mention, he's great on special teams. He's going to make the team. Deal with it guys.

Agreed 100%.

Ehh I might disagree with you there. While I am obviously still very optimistic as far as Manuel goes, Brohm only got to start two games to Manuel's 14. And he was a big time college player. I'm blaming the Bills on that one. They should have been patient with him and let him start for like three seasons regardless of his performance and/or if there were more capable veterans behind him. Then and only then could anyone possibly even begin to offer a fair analysis on Brohm.

Hey knowing this team, we'll acquire a perfectly capable young QB and ruin him once again, having no way to offer a fair analysis as to what kind of QB they could have been (see: Losman, Edwards, Brohm and now, potentially, Manuel). Any one of those four could have been an all pro QB but alas thanks solely to the Bills organization (and no fault of the QB's themselves), we'll never know. Way to go Bills.

Hey until Friday, I was one of these guys that was simply obsessed with seeing EJ fail and as a result, I lost track of who I really am: a Bills fan. I didn't really believe that EJ wasn't cut out to be a franchise QB, I just kept perpetuating this persona I had created. In fact, deep down, I thought the kid was a hell of a ballplayer. I scoffed at those who blamed him for the Houston game last year! Hello, earth to EJ bashers: Marrone set him up to fail. And not to mention, I've seen Tom Brady have a bad game or two. You don't see Belichick yanking him out of the lineup. Bottom line, whether they played him or sat him, everything the Bills organization did was wrong and a direct cause of his shortcomings on the gridiron. Now if this new regime would just see what we on TBD all see and let the kid play for a few years and THEN make a judgment on the guy, I think this team has big things ahead of them. Spare me with this Meh guy and this crazy out of control running QB. Still can't believe we're one preseason game and he hasn't gotten hurt yet! Give me a sturdy pocket passer like EJ who can move around and make plays WITHOUT getting hurt all day. Granted, EJ has had like three major injuries in his young career and Taylor, to my knowledge, has had none, but I think we all know it's just a matter of time.