transient

Jason Peter's game left town with his humility, his work ethic, his diet, and Jim McNally.

IIRC, the first team didn't score a TD last season in preseason, so hardly great.

Nowhere in my post did I allude to Locker doing this to get his degree. My point was that he took his father's advice to heart and thought about whether or not he would regret not playing college ball for one more year, which is a sign of maturity. The article suggests that his decision was in part based on his relationship with his teammates and coaches. Beyond that, he says very little definitive about why he made this decision, and instead talks about his hometown and his view of football as a sport. The point I was making was that you said you were put off by what he didn't say despite the fact that the article uses very little in the way of direct quotes about this decision. I am basing this opinion on the fact that I am currently an English speaking individual who realizes that explaining your reasoning for a decision such as this probably takes more than 3-4 sentences, and that when the 3-4 sentences that are included aren't even left to the discretion of the person whom the article is being written about, then the likelihood that they are representative of what HE wanted to say is diminished. For all we know they conveniently left out the part about having something to prove, or wanting to go out on a winning season, or wanting to get the most out of this coaching staff. My point is judging people based on what they didn't say when you weren't directly a part of the conversation is an exercise in futility that will leave you making judgements on incomplete information.

Maybe Fitz is normally the one to pass him the blunt.

I don't have an opinion of Locker as a player. I've never seen him play. But, I think the fact that he actually went back to college because he would never be able to do it again and he might regret it later on if he didn't shows the ability to think long term and not just look at what is staring him in the face right now, and is more emotionally mature than most college students (who don't have the additional lure of millions of dollars) are capable of. You also ignore his reference to his teammates and coaching staff as a motivating factor for returning. Comparing him to Leinart, who was soaking up the LA celebrity limelight, is a bit off base IMO. As for people hanging on every word that comes out of an athlete's mouth as somehow indicative of a character flaw, this trend is getting really annoying. I defy anyone on this board to say they've never had words come out of their mouth that didn't convey exactly what they meant, let alone under pressure in their twenties with a reporter with a microphone or a notepad in their face and the fallout from the editorial process to deal with. I'm sure the 3-4 quoted sentences that made that article are but a fraction of what was actually said.

Didn't listen to the segment... and won't. What I'm guessing I'd hear was Sullivan acting as though it is inconceivable that someone would disagree with him because he is the most enlightened person in his universe. Then, once the disagreement occurred, I'm guessing that name calling and berating ensued instead of rational conversation with presentation of facts to back his argument. Let me know if I'm wrong. Regarding his writing BS about players, I think he's also the one who's said Lynch is somehow a cancer in the locker room, when by all accounts his teammates seem to love the guy. sul·ly [ súllee ] (past and past participle sul·lied, present participle sul·ly·ing, 3rd person present singular sul·lies) transitive verb Definition: 1. spoil: to spoil or detract from something, especially somebody's reputation, that has previously been pure and honorable, or become spoiled or tarnished a reputation sullied by scandal 2. make dirty: to make something dirty Hmm, seems about right.

You should've seen her face. It was the exact same look my father gave me when I told him I wanted to be a ventriloquist. ...I wish someone would give me $250,000 to write my name on a piece of paper with the understanding it was unlikely I would ever work for them. It's a Seinfeld quote... Mandelbaum, Mandelbaum, Mandelbaum (Before you look it up in the dictionary, it's in reference to his avatar).

If you put Fitz's head on Brohm's body he would fall over from being too top heavy... unless, of course, you also somehow transplanted Poz's neck onto FrankenQB.

Why are so many so black and white on this issue? It was TE... no it was the playcalling... this... that... no this... no that. TE looked similar to last year. That being said, I don't care how wide open receivers were down field, he's not Favre, and he's not going to get the ball downfield without setting up to throw. We know that... he probably does too. Regarding the run, I still don't understand why we started the game with Spiller. Miami was stacking the line... why not hammer ML into it for a bit to try to soften up the defense, then try to utilize CJ's speed as a change of pace... or throw FJ in there to sort his way through it for a few first downs, then throw CJ in there. I can only assume that part of it is that ML and FJ aren't back to 100%. As for setting up the run with the pass or vice-versa, one can exist without the other. In fact, at times it becomes a necessity. But you don't abandon one or the other. Abandoning the run makes a bad offense easier to defend. Gotta say, though, I agree with Gailey, this one's largely on him for putting together a bad gameplan. I expect that it was in part due to not knowing what this team was going to look like under fire. Hopefully he can adjust to his team's strengths and better disguise their weaknesses as the season moves along, or it's going to look a lot like last year. It's the first game of his tenure, and bad teams don't go to the playoffs the next season in the first game. Give him some time. Hey, at least the defense looked respectable... that in itself is a revelation worth talking about. How do you justify the pocket collapsing with only a 3 or 4 man rush? Normally QBs have all the time in the world in that situation to stare at all of their receivers covered downfield before heaving it to the one with the fewest guys hanging on him.

A fate worse than death.

Nix has stated repeatedly that he knows the line needed work, but that the only two tackles they had graded top ten that could help them this season were gone by the time they picked. Your assessment of blue chippers all over the board is yours and McShay's and Kiper's... they were your guys, not their guys. The fact of the matter is they had needs at NT and DE also, and if Troup and Carrington were better in their eyes than the available talent at OT they would have been defeating their purpose and slowing down the rebuilding process by taking players they didn't believe in when others they did believe in were available at other positions. Picking up an aging LT with neck problems (Brown) or with reported motivation issues(Gaither) isn't likely to speed the process. ALSO, if they really do believe that Bell and Meredith can potentially fill the tackle roles, they would be wasting draft picks and time by not finding that out before moving on. Determining that they are not the answer based on last year's debacle is premature, as is determining that after week 1. If they aren't improving by midseason, then it's clear they need to invest in the position next year. It's one game. Did you really expect that they'd look all world based on a few preseason victories? I fully expected that thier defense was going to get torched by Miami's running game. IMO, the disappointment surrounding the game yesterday was that they couldn't pull out a win in a close game that I didn't expect them to be in a position to win going in (and that they were painfully boring on offense again). If their defense continues to look respectable against the run and their linebackers figure out how to drop into coverage, this team is way ahead of where I thought it would be. If the line, WHICH IS 3/5 SECOND YEAR PLAYERS improves over the first half of the season, they just might be competitive by midseason. More than that this season is a bonus, IMO. With regard to Urbik, I wonder if he doesn't move to R guard with Wood moving to center and Meredith to RT once Bell is healed enough to play a whole game.

I envision that looking something like Robin Ventura charging Nolan Ryan.

1 on Friday during the walk throughs... and man will he celebrate afterward.

+1 This may actually be the perfect pick up for the Bills. Mitchell was second on the depth chart, anyway, and was iffy at best given his talent and recent string of injuries. Ayodele played for Edwards, so he's a replacement part that is already up to speed and was good enough to start a bunch of games the last few seasons. Essentially he's Mitchell with 2 years in the system, already.

Not a pic, but you might be able to freeze frame Kelly diving across the goal line. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wgmoX_FcT3Q

Yeah, maybe he can give us some of last year's defensive schemes... you know, the ones that George Edwards wasn't privy to. He was with the 'phins last year. He's coming from Denver. Just ball bustin.

I was just thinking along the same lines. Also thinking, not so much a conspiracy theory but along those lines, that to make the Bills relevant this year they have to be the worst team in the media's eye. We're certainly not the best, and we really shouldn't be in the playoff conversation nationally, though from a fan perspective it wouldn't totally surprise me if we made it. So how do you keep a rabid fanbase (and we're pretty widely recognized as a rabid fanbase) interested in the conversation? Insult them... repeatedly... to the point that any rational person could see it was a joke. The pundits realize that, truth be told, fans aren't rational. Insulting a true fan's team is like insulting their family, and they're forced by instinct to defend them. ESPN, NFL network, radio shows, etc are only serving their purpose if they have an audience, and as Howard Stern proved in the nineties, more people will tune in if they're pissed than if they agree with what's being said. Either that or they truly ARE complete flaming idiots.

225/yes. Something tells me passing yards will be easier to come by for TE this season with defenses needing to focus more on Spiller. Obviously this is based on what we saw in preseason, but if it continues, play action will be there all day long. As previously stated by Mr Barker, the bigger concern is just how many yards their rushing attack rolls up on us!

It would be interesting to get a look at the boards he put together and see where some of these players were graded compared to where we took them, as well as see where he had other players that were not taken by the Bills. If his is not a prominent voice in the war room, then his biggest failing would seem to be not standing up and shouting like a man possessed when they were bypassing obvious talent. Given that Nix is a personnel man and Modrak is still here, it is telling. You also have to think Modrak is smarter than we give him credit for when he declined the opportunity to be GM after Donahoe was fired.

I've always thought this "cash to cap" philosophy was a result of teams carrying tons of dead cap space from signing bonuses of players that ultimately were bad signings. The Bills went to it after the end of the Butler era when they purged the team and couldn't use 1/3 of their cap because it was taken up by amoratized bonuses that had "come due" because the player was cut. When done right, it gives you the freedom to shape your roster year to year, as you point out with the Steelers and Colts. It is not a de facto way of doing things on the cheap, as so many believe. I read somewhere (can't remember where, so no link) that instead of a ton of upfront money that is spread out across the life of the contract, the Bills and other teams get around it by paying roster bonuses from year to year.

If the goal of my "project" was to make it to the playoffs or SB, and this new person helped me do it whereas the old person who's place he took didn't, then I guess my "project" was better off with the new person and I'd have to shut my mouth and deal with it, now wouldn't I. Unless of course I was the person who was kicked to the curb... then I should have played better in the first place.

Yeah... unless, of course, you thought that an upgrade at DE would have helped you win that one game last year that would have put you in the playoffs. Then you might not really give a **** if he was in training camp with you or not.

While I agree with what you're saying, the constant 3 and outs by the offense didn't help any. The defense had a tendency to fade toward the end of the third quarter because of it.

I didn't have any milk available to shoot out of my nose, so I had to make do with the apple I was eating.

LMAO. That horrid visual made me shoot a chunk of apple outta my nose.