GrudginglyOptimistic

The person actually responsible is the one guy responsible for both Modrak and Guy. That is Mr. Ralph himself.

No way. It all starts with the top and though it appears there is no way to fire the owner, you gotta advocate firing Brandon as the next best thing. It is impossible not to see that the Bills problem is not simply that they are 0-4 years of making the playoffs under Jauron but that we are 0 for a decade under the leadership of Mr. Ralph. The owner cannot be fired and though a personality transplant for Ralph might be the thing to do if he had the come to Jesus moment required it unfortunately would be a literal come to Jesus moment and there is a complete lack of clarity as to whether the Bills would survive in Buffalo after this event. Brandon neither deserves nor should get a pass.

I'm Done

While your post is obviously interesting (if you do not think so then not the number of responses this thread has engendered). However: 1. You are right on target that this is 5th hand and on the face of it has the very limited degree of believability that any 4th hand account would inspire, However, I would think anyone who hangs around in court as much as you seem to would react to the testimony of a single witness as not necessarily being reliable (even if you found them perfect in the past there must be independent confirmation of the same set of facts in order for even the one person to be believed beyond a reasonable doubt (or even based on a preponderance of the evidence), In this case the additional hands you site are not confirmations of a specific fact case (Golisano says X and persons B and C confirm Golisano's statement of X). They simply are independent alleged confirmations of potential motivations for why the alleged claim of Golisano is true. If your DWI attorney had some direct knowledge that Ralph met with the CA folks on X date and said Ralph said (or even better had tape of Ralph saying this is why he froze Golisano out then maybe this might be the difficult to believe 4th hand account one might consider and discount. However, the situation you lay out here is thinner than 4th hand as it includes not only an assumption of correctness of the 1st hand account, but also accepting a logic chain which might be true but need a whole lot more corroboration to be taken seriously. 2. On your first point in chain, I am not sure why you find this scary. Even if true there are a whole bunch of reasons why Mr. Ralph might want to freeze Golisano out A. He might consider Golisano a dickwad (probably true from the way he has handled the Sabres. B. He may love Golisano and is saving him the effort of putting together a acquisition team cause he has already decided to sale to LA or alternately he is saving him the trouble cause he has already decided to sale to Jimbo/Thurman or he wants to save him the trouble because he is gonna give the ahooting match to a not-for-profit in an irrevocable trust and is gonna avoid the entire estate tax issue. I mean who knows. C, He in fact is gonna sale to LA, but the economy is topsy turvy right now and the idea that anyone is gonna find a billion in capital right now is pretty dubious and Ralph does not consider Golisano a serious bidder. 3. One other thing I find pretty lacking in the logic chain you lay out is that even if all this is true, it does not guarantee at all an outcome that this deal goes through and the Bills leave Buffalo or certainly even if the Bills are sold that Buffalo ends up without a franchise. Specifically: A. The NFL effectively has a veto over any individual sale if the entity chooses as by rule and firmer law than if they wanted to move the team they can veto any sale to a new owner as not acceptable to them. The NFL has a couple of financial reasons why they would want to disapprove a sale or simply slow it down to scare the banks and bondholders from putting up the capital to make this deal which likely will be over a billion dollars: (1) The pretty clear NFL fiscal strategy is to try to expand to get the huge number of eyeballs watching TV in Europe, Mexico, S. America, Asia and even in Toronto. The market rules and while the market for an individual owner might be richer in LA, for the NFL as a whole the market is better served by showing some solidity and loyalty to a new city being asked to pony up big bucks. The uncertainty caused by the NFL creating a ruckus, lamentations and within in the town of Buffalo is not the best selling point to get Mexico City, Berlin or Tokyo to put big bucks into a team. What the latest CBA confirmed and Mr. Ralph's losing vote confirmed is that this is not your grandmother's NFL anymore. What one individual owner wants is important, but if Jerry Jones feels Mr. Ralph may benefit from selling his team to LA, but he merely gets 1/32nd of millions in the transfer fee but sets back his ability to score 1/32 of billions in expansion to other countries the NFL may not let a negotiation and move by Mr. Ralph go through. (2) One of the other players in this deal is the City of Buffalo. Even lightweights in a failing city like Cleveland were able to beat the NFL to a draw in case that did not even have the extra leverage of a team transfer in ownership. WNY (and in fact all of NYS will whine as the state will have no team playing games and ponying up taxes within its borders) will attempt to mount a blocking action and even as feeble as the leadership is in NYS, the vans better roll up at night like they did in the Balt/Indy shuffle because the status quo is for a Buffalo franchise and blocking is easier than doing. (3) another player is the US Congress and while the NFL currently enjoys a partial exemption from anti-trust laws my sense is that this will at least come into serious play if this team were to make a move. The costs to the NFL of a team move might be high. I do not see how you credibly simply ignore these other factors and one i have not even thought about yet. If I were you I would not get scared at all yet. Others who actually have some dollars in this fight definitely need to prepare for a fight but they will have a lot of tools in their war chest which can make this a real fight that they can prepare for. Those of us on the outside prepare best by rooting like madfolk for their team on the field of sports battle right now and simply preparing to look sad if the situation calls for it.

Open the pod bay doors Dave

Hey SDS- If someone has a bunch of loose cash laying around, one interesting (but probably fiscally worthless) investment would be to pay you (or some Aglish literate person who understands computos) to pay SDS for his time if he is willing to give it or to pay a writer to work with SDS (and potentially others) to write a history of development of the modern www using the story of the development of a site like TBD (or other communal sites) to tell the story. The twists and turns of the steps taken to build SDS would certainly be interesting to the computo geeks out there (my guess is not nearly enough readers to make such a publication pay and a group of readers used to the web and its free (except for an upfront investment prohibitive or scary for many). However, such a piece might be interesting to a broader group of readers if this good writer could turn the trick of chronicling the geek story within the context of an interesting personal tale (SDS building a family which might parallel him building the TSW community (neither having your first kid or building a site like TSW in the new world of the www came with an instruction manual and maybe there are parallels that allows for interesting storytelling (perhaps the aging and death of geocities can parllell the loses of a family member if life had been awful enough to co-operate. who knows maybe SDS's life was not dramatic enough). Such a story might also have some general interest and drama if TSW (and the demise of the D&C bulletin board due to the newspaper's commitment to free speech and some early D&C users not being committed to being responsible enough not to attack the D&C board while they took advantage of free speech) could also lend some of the personal stories of users who made the transition from D&C to TSW or found TSW. I know for me I personally am pretty boring, but the role that D&C and then TSW played for me was that in later 97 we left Buffalo to migrate to another town for several months where my wife got a lung transplant. The Buffalo News was committed as a business strategy to be the second person into the pool on the Internet and they decided to not be the paper of record for Buffalo until someone figured out how to make money off the Internet or at least until the first slug of bugs were worked out. TSW provided a way to get Bills news quickly and in greater depth than the normal media offered. Most important when my wife and I were away from Buffalo and family for traumatic surgery, TSW provided us with the immediacy of hometown news and a virtual community when were missing family badly. My guess is that there are likely similar life/death stories where TSW played a role. Perhaps the geek story made of even greater human interest to "normal" human beings might allow for chronicling of a time in our history that was amazing. Even without the broader story telling hats off and many thanks to SDS and the crew that made up the TBD community during the birth of this site. You played an even more useful role than you likely even know about and the stuff you know about is interesting in and of itself.

It just points to the real problem not being a still complex though straight-forward move of can Jauron, but that the real problem is up above the HC level with the pseudo GM and team owner. I am not sure which would be a worst indictment of the FO, they were totally complicit in and drivers of the stupidly timed Turk firing or on the other hand this was all Jauron's doing but somehow the FO lets hom pull such stupid moves. Either way it is a firing offense for your psudo GM and though you csnnot fire the owner the buck has to start and stop with Mr. Ralph as he ultimately signs all the checks. He already has shown a willingness to give the car keys to another guy as TD had a never before held title and got to whatever he wanted. Unfortunately this seemed to include him picking not ready for prime time coaches. Mr. Ralph needs to face reality and give the car keys to Holmgren, Shanahan or Gruden or some other person who has proved he can win the Big Shoe qnd then for the most part get the heck out of the way.

LOL

My first and second reactions to this theory interested me. My first thought was that I doubted Holmgren would be an adequate leader in the NFL as a GM. My second thought was that even if this is true, this would be so much better than what we have right now. My answer to these contradictory thoughts? Git er done Mr. Ralph! If Holmgren comes it would only work if it was a sign that the actual rate limiting factor for the Bills was getting out of the way in terms of football decisions and was turning things over to Holmgren in the hopes he would pull a Polian. This was the past recipe for success, until Mr. Ralph got in the way and pulled demonstrable boners like: 1. Firing Polian (apparently over some slight by Polian to a member of Mr. Ralph's family though I do not know the detail fer sure) 2. Totally messing up a player assessment of how much career Kelly had left when he made the handshake deal only he could make to reward Jimbo in his next contract which never happened. 3. Regardless of who started it developing a toxic relationship with Butler that left the Bills twisting in the wind when he shipped off to SD. 4. Hiring TD out of desperation but then totally failing to manage this employee who bruised by getting run out of town in Pitts proceeded to make a bunch of stupid football decisions seemingly based on making sure he was never again fired by an HC he hired (mission accomplished as neither GW or MM pulled a Cowher on him but he got canned anyway as he forgot that little thing of hiring an HC capable of delivering a winner. These and other adventures (likely the decision to start RJ in the last playoff game we played) were all Mr. Ralph doings. As great as the praise is Mr. Ralph really does deserve for keeping the team in this small market while there was big bucks to be made elsewhere, an honest assessment recognizes he is the lead cause of our current situation and not Brandon and not today's favorite deserved whipping boy Jauron (he is consistently mediocre as demonstrated by an astonishing three straight 7-9 seasons and easily deserves canning, but like it or not he only gets responsibility for a third of our 0 for a decade playoff streak and the extreme likelihood is that if you can Jauron and replace him with MM. GW. TD, a great but declining Marv you get the same result. Holmgren as a past SB winning HC and trained with the experience of meesing up in SEA MIGHT be an answer if he gets total control over things as TD had and then uses his positive and negative experiences to forge a winner. One can only hope.

Whether 1. one is entirely cynical of TOs motivations as this post is, or 2. honestly believe that an old dog can learn new tricks (or that an old dog at the end or his career can act quite differently than a new dog just putting his mark on the NFL or a performer near his peak on the way to the HOF), or 3. That even if TO has not changed at all it has been a clear MO of his to be a good teammate and productive player his first year so he can act a fool in later years. It all adds up to TO being a non-story for the media if they are waiting for his own actions to indict him. This has not stopped the media (falsely throwing them into one group, but hey folks who care can prove me wrong by being media folks who publicly distance themselves from their brethren and cisterns who have demonstrably done bad reporting if anyone in the media cares about my humble opinions on this which I doubt they do) from throwing out reports that TO: already was back to his old antics by missing the first Bills voluntary practice (which a: he had no obligation to be at, b: it turns out that the first Bills practice coincided with a long scheduled event honoring TO for some of his previous charitable work, and c: unlike his past habits he actually made pretty regular appearances at the voluntary workouts) had gone out of his way to defend Michael Vick when it turns out that Tim Graham himself who asked TO about Vick said he surprised that his in passing response was interpreted as some TO campaign for Vixk. had his joking remarks in passing that the no huddle O made an old out of shape guy like him work to hard turned into TO launching some sort of campaign against an offense he hated, TO is a jerk from all I have seen. However, he is a jerk who almost certainly do the right thing his first year with the Bills if only because that is his previous MO and if one takes the cynical view of this poster he better fly right for the Bills in an attempt to generate another big FA contract elsewhere. TO is a jerk but the media (in general but we await individual media types to separate themselves from the media lemmings by simply pointing out some clear inaccuracies) really has been worse on this one, Just cause TO was a foul interview after the last game does not mean at all that Jerry Sullivan, Paul Hamilton and the rest of the lemmings are good journalists. In fact on the contrary.

Tim, I think you are a very enjoyable reporter to read about the game of football. Where I think that the problem exists is that the media generally, Sully at times in particular, and you from time to time, end up reporting more about (whether folks are defending him or attacking him) about TO's personality, his spontaneous exhilaration or declarations, or his planned antics or whatever else. The problem is that while TO's character (or lack thereof in many opinions) is important because it is obviously related to team chemistry and play on the field, but it is hugely different from play on the field. The media (using this term to generally for accuracy but we internet blatherers do not hold ourselves to the same demands of accuracy that the working media should) has strayed way too far away from football pn the field and into a bunch of speculation and flights of fancy about individual player motivations and relationships. One article about TOs attitude and the attitude of the team in pre-season is good journalism and thank you for doing that. However, a ton of discussion about TO's personality and his ramblings about Michael Vick, how he feels about the Bills no huddle until he has experienced it a several games, and much of the other blather about what he is tweeting is simply silly and a pretty poor excuse for journalism. Just because it is new or even news does not mean it is newsworthy. The best stories about TO are likely the ones not even printed because they really draw conclusions before a game has been played or even several games to establish anything resembling a real pattern. Just because some people are interested does not make a particular point interesting. Even if a point is a real INDICATOR does not merit someone drawing a CONCLUSION about TO as a Bill. Sure he has a lot of history, but history by definition means it is in the past. Think about it sure but I sure wish journalists would leave it out of articles. Sure there are individual episodes worthy of coverage (like how so you feel about your consecutive catch streak ending> However, the only answer to this question is bad and I am moving on. Galactic analysis about this is totally silly as no analysis has been done yet. Even questions about how TO feels about his relationship with Edwards, Evans, Jauron are pretty silly because there are only initial episodes and no real relationship until roughly mid-season. This fan judges TO's antics so far in his career ad being pretty silly. The facts of TO becoming a point of division in his last three teams is most relevant for any reporter in recognizing that the MO is clear. TO spends the first year as a pretty good teammate and with his singular onfield accomplishments wins over the hearts and minds of many fans. There is no reason to expect that this will not be the story with the Bills and the most relevant fact about him being a Bill as far as his personality is that he has a one year deal. Yet, it is pretty undeniable that TOs prescence her so far has been marked by articles which declare him already melting down before he even stepped on the field to practice at voluntary workouts, the bizarre reaction which you witnessed first hand about TOs Vick views, an overblown reaction to a passing TO comment about the no huddle and then folks consider hin being sullen and snippy when he does his first press conference and clearly there are those who want to desperately see him throw Edwards under the bus. TO is a jerk IMHO and I am free to have my opinions fact-free or not on TSW. However, it also is not unreasonable to expect a little journalistic detachment from folks who are trading themselves as journalist. If you are defending TO or indicting him as a Bill two or three games after he hads played football games as Bill that is fine, However, if that is your approach then recognize that you will be considered to be just another blatherer rather than as a journalist. TO should have been more of an adult in answering media questions after the game. I flat out agree with that view. However, the media should have been more adult in their questioning and not clearly been looking for and salivating to become part of the story when they offered TO the opportunity to say something stupid and then got annoyed when he would not say much at all. TO was pretty bad on Sunday and the media from questions by Paul Hamilton and columns like Sullys and some of your comments were worse than TOs not earning the bucks he got and showing the best performance or of the media getting much smaller but still adult bucks for covering this boys game.

Not so fast BZ. If someone makes a stark claim as you did, saying the Bills were at the top of the league for injuries, it is this statistical declaration which draws a legitimate call for links to some of the background and substantiation for this claim. In fact, such a stark claim would seem to be one which while not proven (the issue of injuries in the NFL is in essence a complex enough issue that it cannot be proved or disproved with one or a handful of studies) there could has least be some statistical or unbiased sourcing indication that this is more than just a fact-free opinion (which we all are entitled to on the internet and which are easily rejected by right as well. Without even the hint of any links to your stark statement, it would seem to be one easily considered to be the usual internet blather. A call for at least some hints as to support for your claim falls no where near the level of a demonstration of research which your claims demand. IMHO

IMHO, the problem is now that folks almost all seem to measure excellence by how big of a splash you can make and how big of a contract you can get by getting attention so you can get a big job on ESPN (or one of its pint sized regional equivalents or internet based blather vehicles. The premium is on being loud and insulting and trying to get noticed. Back in the day, generally the way to get excellent was to be judged good at your craft. Being at the same newspaper/magazine for years and learning your craft was a legitimate way to get excellent. In today's world the average worker may hold 6 or 7 jobs significant in a lifetime and if someone stays with one organization for ten years it seems a rarity. Whose to say which is better overall as im the modern world there are more opportunities and travel between towns to resettle are much more available to the individual today. However, one thing we have lost is knowledgable sportswriters.

I am reluctant to admit this is true as one of the likely outcomes for a fan who thinks this is true is actually pretty gruesome to contemplate being in that frame of mind.

Perhaps a way to transfer this conversation off of the sideshow of Jauron (or the off-off sideshow of Sully) or the off-off-off reductionist issue of what he said in what specific column and the fact it does not represent his entire public and vocal output on this subject is to find a point of common agreement. I am quite comfortable with simply relegating Jauron (and his reign of error) to a sideshow because I think all would agree that the REALLY BIG issue for the Bills is the ) for a decade record of playoff appearances. Like it or not Jauron only gets credit for a third of this problem. Certainly saying goodbye to Jauron is gonna be a part of our getting better, but this has to either be merely the first (or second step contractually as Ralph has demonstrated he makes it a priority not to pay HCs for watching their kids' high school football games as he did with Wade when he canned him and would not do with MM until he agreed to not make Mr. Ralph pay for forcing him out). Jauron is a symptom but we have a decade plus of evidence that Mr. Ralph is the cause of our mediocrity and failure. Yes, Jauron deserves censure and job action (if Mr. Ralph would agree to it and he has shown little evidence in the past he will send DJ packing with multiple years of Mr. Ralph payments owed to him due to the extension Mr. Ralph gave him), but it takes a pretty effective set of blinders for anyone to feel that firing DJ and then seeing Mr. Ralph make the same mistakes he has made in the past decade with his hiring and managing MM, GW, Wade, TD, Butler and likely Brandon and Marv is gonna happen again with some fantasy DJ replacement. Calling for DJ's ouster is easy but seemingly entirely inefficient and unlikely to produce a better team without talking about or even hinting at whats next in terms of hiring a new HC. In fact. calling for DJs ouster seems to be the equivalent of urinating up a rope in that Mr. Ralph just extended him last year for what is likely at least a couple of more years and it seems pretty impossible given Mr. Ralph's past actions that he is gonna pay DJ for two or three years of working outside the NFL. Its tough for a Bills fan as like or not no one on this planet is gonna fire the owner. My guess for what is actually possible is: 1. Mr. Ralph seems to want to be able to dally and dicker with his toy the Bills from the press box on gameday, but is happy to turn over running the team and building partnerships that earn him nickels from St. Johns Fisher, Wegmans, and negotiating individual contracts with players to someone else. That was TD as a start who did a very good job moving the Bills into the 20th century with management and direction of off-field partnerships for training camp, game and season ticket sales, media networks, etc. However, on the football side of the game TD was motivated by the demons of wanting to avoid an HC he hired running him out of town like Cowher did so he hire great Administrative Asst GW with his contacts and lists and he spent his time coming up with an on field product not ready for prime time. Mr. Ralph need a GM who can run the business (he has one in Brandon) and who can negotiate specific contracts well (he seems to have this also in Brandon), but who also has a vision of building a winning football enterprise AND the ability to get his minions to believe in that vision OR if not then the intelligence to hire an HC to inspire the team and Buffalo base and make intelligent gameday choices. Brandon has shown no ability at the last point and Marv in hiring Jauron has found a great guy but one who neither inspires the masses (aka customers) nor makes pristine game day decisions. Ejecting Jauron without putting in place a GM who has shown capabilities beyond the good things Brandon does (keep the off-field business partnerships humming and negotiate the individual parts of contracts) to also inspire the team and the masses or hire an HC who can do this) is one of the primary demonstration of wearing blinders going among Bills fans, We need to demand of Mr. Ralph that he hire a GM with a strong vision capable of leading this team to the playoffs and beyond. 2. The GM needs to then hire an HC to deploy this vision. This I think is a huge sticking point as Ralph has shown no desire to pay a salary to an HC he has let go. He lost the appeal (as everyone with half a brain said he would) to try to squirm out of the year he paid Wade and he somehow pressured or bribed his way out of having to pay MM for the multiple years left on his deal). As Mr. Ralph publicly announced and seemingly agreed to extend DJ last year, my guess is he has at least another 2 if not 3 seasons which Mr. Ralph is gonna pay him for one way or the other. The good news is that DJ seems like a nice enough guy that if we got in a GM with a real vision for building a team he MIGHT be able to deal with the constraints of a Mr. Ralph who has shown no willingness to pay an HC to not work for him to do the on-field work for that GM. I am not sure who that GM is but I do know for sure that no one who has called for DJs ouster has sketched out a plan that is gonna satisfy Mr. Ralphs desire not to pay someone who is not coaching for him.

If a Bill stood up to Jauron it would almost certainly not make a difference. His many fans because he is a nice guy, undoubtedly several players would come to his defense. There is a fair likely hood also that Brandon would also be helpful to Jauron and get rid of the man who stood up to him. However, lets carry out your fantasy scenario and this stand up player leads and inspires the coup d'etat which leads to the canning of Jauron. This actually leads even more directly to the REAL problem with this Bills team for folks who are not in denial and simply blaming Jauron. The guy who ultimately signs the checks, Mr. Ralph, who now has even more direct power over the team since he has done away with the traditional GM model would lead the team to: 1. hire a coach who has pretty much the same profile as Jauron, or 2, who hired and then mismanaged the uncompensated for weaknesses of a TD (which led to the hirings of failed HCs GW and MM), or 3. who developed such a toxic relationship with GM Butler that he left us high and dry or 4. who had such a stupid relationship with the last coach who at least got us to the playoffs he canned him (deservedly actually as Wade publicly gave up on his team when mathematically they were not eliminated and a team with the same W/L as Wade when he surrendered actually made the playoffs) but where Mr. Ralph truly demonstrated his idiocy was when he tried to keep a year's salary of the coach he fired and despite the warnings of all concerned was destroyed in the arbitration decision about whether Wade or Mr. Ralph was righ 5. or make a Brainiac like move which led him to fire the GM who really built the winner of the 90s. It does not surprise me that you did not understand my post as I am sure it makes no sense to someone who has blinders on and is so focused on getting rid of Jauron that they do not realize that as mediocre as he is he is merely a symptom and not the cause of the sorry state of the team we love, To advocate for the dismissal of Jauron is fine, but to do this without even a hint as to what the TRUE problem on this team needs to do is the clearest showing of blinders going!

I think TO looked pretty small with the manner that he used in not answering the media's questions. The problem though is that the media looked even smaller than TO with the way and with what they asked him. One does not need to be in denial about how pitiful the Bills situation is (the problems start at the top where the common denominator Mr. Ralph has had a central role in firing Polian, having a toxic relationship with Butler, running to TD when Butler left us in the lurch and then failing to manage the worse parts of TD (while emphasizing the good parts), then running to Marv when he had to can TD, who then joined Mr. Ralph in hiring Jauron who just ain't adequate as an HC anyway you slice the 7-9s. This being said, I do not think one can honestly deny that Sully and the media in general look pretty small and petty for how they have handled this clusterthang known as the Bills and the 0 for a decade performance making the playoffs. Sully and his brethren clearly keep looking for the easy story of a TO meltdown when his clear MO has been to be a good scout in his first year for a team. The media idiots (with Sully as a local columnist prominent among them) have simply done bad reporting by taking anything that Owens says (his comments on Michael Vick which Graham who got them says was completely overblown by some) (his comments in passing about the no huddle making him run with his "out of shape" body being overblown into him hating the no huddle). The media has simply sucked in accurately reporting what TO says and even why he says it. The media seems to want to totally ignore past TO actions that do not fit into their deadline driven everything happening right now is of galactic importance. TOs MO has clearly been in SF, in PH and in Dallas to be an entertaining but pretty cool hardworking teammate. He does not divide the locker room until he wins over some teammates and fans. The TO is being selfish mantra may well end up being true as it was in SF, in Ph, and to some extent in Dallas, but reality says you either wait for it to happen here in Buffalo (who knows he is getting older so maybe it does not happen here- I would not bet he won't meltdown) but a good reporter waits for this to happen and neither reports it before it happens or tries to make it happen. TO was pretty sad in how he handled this past weekend, but it is pretty clear to this observer that the media led by Sully was even worse. I am not in denial that the Bills are pathetic, but you are in denial if you do not realize that Sully and the gang are at least just as if not more pathetic than the Bills.

The thing that drives me nuts is that people seem to be driven so wild by Jauron, when these deserved feelings remind me that the problem was the leader who signs the checks not only for Jauron but for Mularkey, GW, and who fired Wade but foolishly tried to get the money back from his last year and who had such a toxic relationship with Butler that JB left us high and dry. Like it or not Jauron can only be blamed for a third of our 0 for a decade playoff less performance. Folks should rant about Jauron all they want and be correct as far as it goes, but without mentioning the failings of Mr. Ralph these rants are reduced to little more than mindless whining.

If we win, then the season continues with a situation much like us being bitten to death by ducks (we beat bad teams but lose in excruciating fashion to good teams). If we lose then the season is for all intents and purposes over. I think we can win, but on the road it will be tough as it always is.

If it is possible to correct polls retroactively then add AVP to this list of QBs as he started multiple games post Kelly . IMHO he fits on this list above the ill-fated attempts of Todd Collins but below the seemed to be a possible long-term starter at one point in his career but never developed beyond that point). AVP never gave the impression that he was anything more than a good back-up.

We're fans so basically any question is legit (or drug induced and in that case should be looked at with amusement rather than anger. However, there are legit answers to this legit question. Among them are: 1. In his third game as a rookie after missing most of pre-season it is just about simply silly to even expect much less demand that he performs like a star. Even if he did (or does in a game in the first half of this season) likely the best explanation for this is dumb luck rather than anyone declaring him a for sure star in the NFL. Just as it would be pretty rational to discount any great performances he might have at this point, it also is pretty rational not to get worried if he has not starred yet. Of course on the other hand, we are fans so no one should expect us to be rational about this. 2. Overall, the lead bit of irrationality among us fans is the conventional wisdom that a 1st round choice should be a starter in his first year (or a clear star by game 3 despite missing major parts of camp as reality says Maybin has), The fact is that even with a strong draft class a few years back only slightly more than half the first round players were listed #1 on their teams depth charts at the beginning of their second season, And this is a sample biased toward talented choices. The fact pretty much is only a little more than 50% of players chosen in round 1 are going to be starters by the end of the first year (much less game 3). There is a heavy bias toward these starters coming from the first 10 picks and Maybin at #11 just misses this threshold. It simply pushes reality to expect or demand stardom from Maybin by game 3, but we are fans so who says we are rational. 3. Maybin was not a star in this game in anyone's book, but he did have a reasonable outing today as an important part of a Bills DL rotation which held the NFLs highest scoring team to 10 points going after roughly 3 quarters of play. The big D problem tonight was that they got eaten alive on the run in the 4th, but given that they got zero help from the (the 7 points were produced by the ST on a fake punt) its hard to go too ballistic on the D for finally breaking down in the 4th. These are the legit reasons that answer your legit (given that we fans are gonna be irrational) question you asked.

It also is incredibly well documented in each of his three stops where he became a disruptive force that in his first year he was flamboyant. produced on the field, and was a good teammate who earned many friends in the lockerroom and support from fans. Having then set this standard, he then undeniably had disputes with Garcia, then McNabb, and then Romo leading to his demise in each city. Why folks are freaking out that he already has turned on TE, already is forcing a choice between him and Evans to be #1, or hates the no huddle is sillier than picking up TO when demonstrably this has not been his MO and the Bills only have him for a year. Since the team really has little chance of competing seriously for the playoffs this year with the horrible management of our OL situation the past few years leading to us starting 3 first time starters in LeVitre, Wood, and Bell getting TO for a year to force DCs to look at dt'ing both WRs and us further reducing the amount of stunting and complex rushes further with the no huddle and #WR sets, getting TO and letting him walk after a year seems like a logical strategy to me. Cap room is not the problem hindering rebuilding of this team and I think you are wrong if you think this is the problem.

Not to worry initially John as TOP is an issue if we get into a shoot out with them (likely we will lose if we just try to outscore them) when other factors taking the game one series at a time will determine whether the TOP results end of reflecting the game score. TOP is a critical indicator but you have to acknowledge these two stats are different things and hands down the final score is the only stat that matters, The actual things that matter actually line up fairly well for the Bills" 1. Do not turn the ball over much. The average Saints drive start this season was just beyond the 40 which is a tribute to them winning the ST battle and most of all of getting a good number of INTs. The good news for the Bills is that under Bobby April even with a mediocre team overall the ST basically has led the league in ST performance over the last three years. Edwards does check down a bit much though he finally aired it out a bit last week with great accuracy. If the Bills avoid gift wrapping the game for the Saints as the hapless Lions did behing their rookie QB and the Iggles did with their back-up the game need not become a track meet. 2. The primary benefit of the no huddle for us is that it makes pass protection a lot simpler for our incredibly inexperience OL. Face the facts that though Wood, LeVitre, and false start Bell are incredibly talented and the experience level drops even farther wih the loss of Butler and easing the OL load is issue one for this team. If we play to Evans and TOs strength, amp up the pressure by forcing them to cover Parrish one on one as they dt our WRs, the ability of Jackson as a receiver forces the other team to run a pretty standard 4 DL blitz easing things for our young OL. The no huddle is your friend and perhaps the main savior of TE and not making the same mistake as offensively challenged Lions and post McNabb Iggles. Even better their pass rush looks pretty mediocre after two games with them having racked up only two sacks (1 even to LB Vilma) despite them clearly having forced their opponents to load up and pass to catch their high scoring O. 3. Like regular football the key is basically to run and to stop the run. The Bills should be able to run on a Saints team which honestly deserves credit for their great offensive work even if it was against weak opponents but their D is after two games against troubled O ranked in the lower third of the NFL for most of the key defensive stats. If we run against them like we have and opponents have run against them and we avoid turnovers to their weak pass rushing team we can beat this team playing in our house. Starting the game with ST (which we are guaranteed to do) and using the no huddle to simplify the blocking assignments and stunts they will face strike me as keys to this game.

I think a lot of this is about a situation where members of the media can't resist making themselves part of the news rather than just reporting the story. The thing is that I think most fans MAY care a little about what Jerry Sullivan, Skip Bayless, etc think about what the Bills do, what TO does, and maybe what TO says, but generally do not care at all what Sully, Bayless, etc, think generally. When To refuses to talk, it places in stark relief that many readers really do not care what Sully, Bayless, etc are writing if they focus at all on TO since what they are writing is not about the Bills, is disproportionately about what TO has done for the Bills (as was thrown to little along with Evans in the first game and it was bad and then good in the TB game, and he really said nothing after the TB game. In particular Sully, to some extent Bayless, and other media wonks want desperately to write what they want to write with their personally selected pre-chosen script about TO, but with him having no overwhelming impact on the Bills so far, the impact in the TB game was a bad drop but then a capstone TD, it left them with no way to do their pre-determined script since TO said nothing, Sully, Bayless, etc find it really hard now because in order to do their work they have to take the unusual tack for them of simply reporting the news and reality and leave the comfort of their predetermined script behind. It is amusing to watch.

The Tampa 2 style D we run is designed for the WR to be covered by the LB in the deep seam in the middle of the field. London Fletcher actually could do this quite well as he always was a sideline kind of player. He also had great open field ball skills such that we could use him as the short return guy on KOs and he actually led all LBs in the league in INTs his last year here. What we never had though were the quality of safety of the Polamalu or Sanders type who would allow our CBs to play the in your face coverage you want because when they get beat (as will always happen some when you are taking on the best WRs in the world) it is the safeties closing with a vengeance (or scaring the WR they might be coming) which allows the CB to lock, load and play tight. The Bills braintrust was never pleased with Fletch so they let him go and got the fleet footed Poz as their speedy MLB who was a big hitter. Unfortunately his arms appear to be brittle so we have ended up with Marcus Buggs playing this key role. Is he up to it? NO! Thats why you had Ellison playing the role in the first game but unfortunately he is not up to it either. I do no think you will get your wish as long as we are running our modified Tampa 2 with the personnel we have available to Fewell and our team