All_Pro_Bills

I never root against the Bills. The last time I pulled for the Jets was to beat Baltimore in SB3. But that was a different time when its was the AFL vs. The NFL.

Every one of these QB's comes with issues whether it's performance, behavior, age, just to name a few. Otherwise, why would they be available? For the Bills the big questions are do they think Tyrod has shown enough to consider him a solid starter going forward and what the team needs is a viable back up option? Or does the team need to bring in a free agent with the promise of an open competition for the starting job? My biggest concern with the Bills is exactly who is going to make the evaluation on the QB situation? I don't have a lot of confidence they're get it right. Because looking at the teams track record for what seems like forever, they don't seem to have the skillset to sort things out when it comes to the QB position. The recent past is littered questionable decisions that even to the casual observer appeared to be wrong at the time. Such as, they picked EJ who in the 1st?

Yes, the prevailing wisdom at the time was the Bills needed some incremental improvements and one of these needs was a 'better' head coach. Ryan was supposed to be that incremental talent on the sidelines that would provide the Bills with the edge needed to push out 1 or 2 more wins and get into the playoffs. Some other additions were made on the offensive side and the logic was that if the offense would improve a bit and the defense would hold steady the team would be more successful. The offense did show improvement but everything else was a disaster. I'll admit it that at the time of the hire I expected Ryan to be an improvement but I just haven't seen anything to justify that belief during the course of the season and likely into the future. My wife said it best at the time saying "why would you want to hire a coach who's known as a defensive genius that you scored something like 90 points against in two games last season"?

IMO Terry Pegula made a major blunder and its not meddling here or there. He should have cleaned house of all Wilson regime personnel from top to bottom immediately after last season, enlisted the support of some subject matter experts, hired a new general manager, and then let that GM identify and hire a new coach who would be charged with hiring his staff. This would have established organizational structure and ensured everyone was on-board with an single strategy and approach to the team both on and off the field on day one. Right now we appear to have a GM and head Coach that aren't on the same page with personnel and philosophy regarding players, schemes, you name it. Just looking at the results this season shows this arrangement simply can't and won't work. This team has clearly regressed in so many ways including both organizationally and statistically and the sooner ownership comes to this conclusion the better. While its a big financial hit I think ending the Rex Ryan experiment after this season is over has to happen for this team to make any progress. It's time for ownership to admit a mistake and take the right actions to get things moving in the right direction. This season is lost but there is time to save us all from several more years of this soap opera of an organization. Rex the person seems like a great guy to sit down and have a beer or two with but to me its obvious he's not the guy I want coaching my team.

In looking at the scenarios and the schedules I've pretty much conceded 1 wild card spot to the Chiefs. I see the competition for the final spot between the Bills, Steelers, and Jets as the most likely outcome. The Steelers have the Bengals and Broncos left on their schedule. If they win both of those frankly they deserve the playoff spot. The Bills just need to win out. For all purposes its playoff time now. Lose and they're out. But none of the 4 games left are against an 'elite' QB which has pretty much been an automatic loss with this crew. Rex generally doesn't let an average QB beat his defense. That means the games should be decided by how well the Bills offense executes and protects the football. I just don't see them losing to Dallas based on the performance of their offense I've watched without Romo. Just dreadful. The defense is good. I wasn't all that impressed with the Redskins on Monday night either. I haven't watched much of them and expected better based on the pre-game build up. The Eagles game is a toss up at this point and their victory over New England was due to some rare mistakes by the Patriots rather than stellar play from the Eagles. They got lucky. It might boil down to week 17 and a winner take all battle with the Jets for the final spot. A game between two teams that have brutally disappointed their fan base in the past when the chips are on the line.

Why didn't Goodell make his move against the Patriots the Monday night game the week before?

Nice to see him admit the current process, whatever that is, is insufficient. But a veteran HQ should have a workable and effective process in place game one of the season. Just another example of Ryan's lack of attention to the critical details and 'little things' that make up the thin margin between winning and losing most weeks in the NFL. Rather than spending his time playing the baffoon by planning stunts like wearing a Clemson helmet to a press conference those wasted moments and brain cells would be better being focused on the week's game plan instead.

This post is a fantastic summary of the frustration I've felt, and I suspect most here do, as a Bills fan. This team, and franchise, is emotionally and mentally weak. It's not a bully as Rex claimed he was building but rather a sissy that gets pushed around. Rarely does anyone make a big play when the games on the line. As for Ryan, I just don't see him being the guy to change this, rather than that he's reinforcing this problem and he's not the answer.

This. Let's try something new. Have the GM hire the head coach, not the owner and the marketing guys. Flush this turd staff down the toilet now before things really start to stink, l believe we've seen enough since we've been down this path way too many times.

My Jet fan friends warned me about Ryan's game management problems telling me you'll see for yourself soon enough. And here we are with this challenge screw up. So, does Pegula cut his losses at $20M and eat the 4 years or do we endure this nonsense for another season or two? Does anyone truly believe Ryan is the guy to coach this team? Sure you can argue 11 games is too small of a sample to jump to that conclusion but why lie to yourself. You've been here before and know where this goes.

The team competed today but the coaching staff lost the game. And the challenges? Awful. Two he wasn't going to win, two he would have but didn't challenge. Looking at things not really any upgrade from Marrone at a much higher pay level.

Look across the field to the other sideline last night and tell me what level of integrity you see?

There were certainly some head-scratchers with Roman's play calling but I think the core problem is the offensive line is once again a liability combined with a first-time starter QB that is learning on-the-job. To this point I believe he has the smarts and the work ethic to improve but his ability to 'read' the defense and go through his progressions with the receivers but its just good enough yet. The other concern is Taylor's durability. He's taken too many hits while in the pocket or scrambling and needs to protect himself better or the protection needs to be changed to expose him to less potential physical contact. If he's degraded or out next week I have a hard time envisioning the Bills are coming out of Sunday at 6-5 with EJ back there coughing the ball up 2 or 3 times.

LOL. There's absolutely no evidence that play would have been a TD if not for the whistle. Its wild speculation and there's 50 yards to the end zone. What if Darby doesn't pull up when hearing the whistle, jumps the route, and intercepts the ball with a clear path to a pick 6? Let me speculate, not a single media source is going to say the mistake cost the Bills a TD. More Patriot ball washing by the lapdog media..

Why would a receiver 'give himself up' under the circumstances? Down one score, seconds left in the game, no time outs. if in the mind of the official he believed a player would make a conscious decision to give himself up and stay in bounds while the clock expired to lose the game then his competence, judgment, and motives need to be questioned. That excuse is at best lame and at worst a blatant lie to cover up a major screw up.

When the Patriots players ran onto the field from the bench the offense expressed its intent to substitute. Whether the actually did substitute is not relevant. The officials noticing the offense was attempting a substitution should have stopped the clock and the ref should have stood over the ball to prevent the offense from running a play. Once the offense had set its lineup for the play and the defense had an opportunity to respond the ref should have started to clock and allowed the center to position himself to snap the ball to the QB. If handled properly the play should not have resulted in a penalty for either team. But they screwed this up along with maybe a dozen other plays most of which went against the Bills which should be no surprise to anybody here! Like the last play of the game where Watkins was ruled to not have gotten out of bounds. Sure looked like he got out from every angle. My only explanation on that one is the officials thought the rules had reverted to the college level where touching a player down is not necessary. On the whistle BEFORE the receiver caught the ball (clearly shown on replay) I think the refs blew the play dead because Brady was out of the pocket and they were protecting him from what the official thought was going to be a hard, clean, legal hit on the sideline. A mistake which somehow cost the Bills over 25 yards. Just mindboggling incompetence. My apologies to the board for venting a little off topic.

My wife says the Bills are going to win and ordered me not to have any negative thoughts or yell at the TV tonight so I can't post anything bad. The way I look at it the Bills are playing with house money here. Win and or lose they have games aganst Houston, KC, and the Jets. Those are the games they need to win to make it to the playoffs. Throw in 3 NFC East non-conference games. Its possible they go 5-1 in those next 6 and finish 10-6 in a wildcard spot. Nothing to lose tonight, no pressure.

A conspiracy doesn't need to exist to explain bias in officiating. All businesses have formal rules and procedures. If you examine those at your job you'll likely conclude the way work gets done has very little correlation to how closely the procedures in place are followed. At my job for example, I suggested that if we followed the exact intent and instructions of the countless and sometimes senseless procedures in place absolutely nothing would get done. So what does that have to do with officiating NFL games? Its because all organizations have social and political processes that for the most part are informal. This applies to the NFL business. You won't find these documented in any league information or procedure documents. An example might be certain owners are said to have more 'influence' than others at league meetings. How can this be? This extra power isn't documented anywhere and there are no league rules applying to owners that grant one owner more power than another but it is something that exists. These political and social actions govern how things work more than rules. So on the field you don't touch Brady or you get a 15 yard PF but Cam Newton gets told (allegedly) he's too young to get the call in a certain situation. Even though the rules apply to everyone equally and evenly in the book. There's no formal rule or discussions or conspiracy. The NFL doesn't tell officials to protect Brady or Manning, or call holding or PI on specific players or team. Simply, everybody knows how 'it' works. And what we witness every Sunday is just the playing out of these informal systems which result in the questionable and puzzling calls.

I couldn't agree with the original poster more. The game will simply not be called with any consistency. That's guaranteed. But that's also true throughout the league. I know we're Bills' fans and we focus on the bias we witness in our team's games but the fact is if you watch a lot of other games this is happening every week in most every game. Depending on the crew, the teams involved, the quarter of play, the specific players involved, the score at the time, and so on, the ref's just call things differently. The lack of consistency in enforcing and interpreting the rules is mind-blowingly awful. That all said the Bills can do a lot to further their cause by avoiding all those stupid personal foul and unsportsmanlike conduct penalties which seem to multiply every time we play New England. And don't hold or block in the back on every single kick off and punt return. These types of penalties were real factors in the first meeting. Maybe they lose, maybe they win, but don't giftwrap the game by giving up a lot of free penalty yardage by playing undisciplined football. Make them earn every foot on every play.

While most including me agree he's a likeable and good guy, Fitz is an 11 year veteran that has played for 6 different teams during his career. His lifetime QB rating is a little over 80. His rating so far this season is 89.2. If statistics win out then over the course of the season he'll probably revert back to his average which means he'll likely underperform the remainder of the season. Hopefully, starting Thursday night against the Bills. At age 32 he's reached his peak potential and is all he can be. The Jets will soon find out firsthand what the other 5 teams already learned. After the season the Jets will reach the same conclusion and will be looking for a QB assuming they've lost faith in Smith to be the answer.

This is a key insight. Along the lines of 'all battles are won or lost before they begin". Preparation is the key to victory. So a logicial defense might be to "show" Brady something that isn't what it appears to be, essentially utilizing deception and disguise. You need to confuse his pre-snap reads like if the WR goes in motion and nobody follows him you might read zone coverage and moments before the snap the defense needs to adjust to a man-to-man press scheme for example. This goes for the offense too. After you watch a team play every game you see tendencies and I seem to know what the Bills are going to do on most plays. If I can figure it out then certainly the professionals are way ahead of me. Bottom line, be unpredicable because predicability leads to negative outcomes. The Giants had success in 2 SB's by deploying their DE's inside over the Guards to put pressure on the interior of the offensive line that was not geared to defend speed but rather the size and strength of the typical DT. When they brought in the heavy offensive package the defense shifted to the standard set. And certainly playing 10 yards off their receivers is unacceptable. You need to play press coverage and physical every single down. The other unconventional thing I would employ is hiring a security firm to make sure nobody was stealing my signals, or playbooks, bugging my communications or locker room. Maybe its paranoia but why take a chance? The Patriots seem to know what you're going to do on offense and defense almost every single play. Is their coaching that good or is there more to it? I say, eliminate the "more to it" possiblity. I might even go as far as having three different coaches signal in the play to the team and if they are stealing my signals let them try and figure out which one is real and which two are fake on every down. Create confusion and uncertainty. The other problem is New England provides a unique challenge with their personnel. And if you play a team once or twice a year and maybe not at all, are you going to set up you team to beat that one opponent as opposed to setting your lineup and team for the other 14+ games?

Nice too that the Dolphins get the mini-bye prior to facing the Bills which sort of negates any preparation advantage the Bills might have gained. What's that, 4 of 8 games against teams with extra prep time?.

I want to believe they have a chance and mathematicaly they do but realistically where do you get 7 more wins out of the next 9 games? Of course I'm assuming 10 wins gets the wild card but even if its 9 where do you get 6 more wins out of the Bills schedule? Before the season I had them at 5-2 at this point with losses to New England and Cincinnatti. Let's face it, this team is a major disappointment. There's no way I expect them to make the playoffs. Watching a lot of football to this point they don't look the part of a playoff worthy team when compared to the effort and performance of the other teams fighting for those 2 wildcards. And looking at the schedule I can invision a 5-11 finish. Maybe that's worst case, maybe its the most likely outcome given their performance to this point. Maybe they win 6 or 7 but what's the difference. The result is the same. And at the end of it all the head coach can boast how they never quit as we watch other teams in the playoffs one more time. With the offense everybody knew it was a work in progress and given the uncertain situation at QB nobody knew what to expect out of this group. Expectations were low and with the play of Tyrod I believe his performance to date has been a clear positive for now and the future. The fact that he missed the last 2 games, along with other players out of the line up combined with having to play an erratic and inconsistent EJ certainly contributed to the 3-4 record going into the bye. The defense has been a big problem. Everybody expected this unit to be the cornerstone of the team. Playing tough and keeping opponents off the scoreboard with the team getting just enough from a slightly improved offense to win. That's the story we were sold. What we've gotten is something completely different. A defense that played great football last year with more or less the same personnel that this season that looks terrible and statistics back that up. Sats aside my big problem is this defense rarely makes the big stop when the game is on the line. Against the Patriots and Giants when the offense came to life and brought the game back to a one-score deficit the defense folded and gave up a long drive in a handful of plays. And this past Sunday, bad penalty calls aside, after getting the go-ahead score on a pick they couldn't hold the lead. Which leads me to the biggest problem. A head coach that's all talk and no action. I was lukewarm about the Rex Ryan hire from the beginning but was willing to give him a shot. He said all the right things and pushed all the right buttons. But why would you hire a coach from a team that you laid 80+ points on in 2 games last season? While some cite he made it to the AFC Championship game in his first 2 seasons with the Jets the fact is that was Manginni's team along with GM Mike Tannanbaum. After that it was a slow decline into mediocrity. In one off-season he's transformed a tough blue collar ready to give it their best Bills team into a punchless joke, subject to ridicule and laughter from the rest of the league because of a big-mouth coach who has no control over his players who also shoot their mouths off way too much and then don't back it up on the field. Under his leadership the current staff has ruined this defense. They are not Top 10, they are not even Top 20. Talking loud and tough and coming up small and looking stupid. But he snowed Pegula and parlayed his bravado into a 5 year $25M deal. While it's not the first time anybody BS'd their way through an interview and showed up on the job unprepared to do the work the impact is out there for all to see. At this point I'm left wondering why Pegula made this hire in the first place. And I think his ability to evaluate management and coaching talent needs to be questioned. Unless things turn around signifcantly it's only matter of how long Ryan lasts.

Tom Landry characterized the game as 'the worst loss of my career' to a Bills team coached by Hank Bullough who once famously said of one victorious opponent (I do not know which team it was), 'they took the sails out of our wind'.

You're lucky to miss 1967 thru 1971 and 1984 thru 1986. Those we dark days without hope until Saban reappeared and Levy came took over.