GrudginglyPessimistic

Pretty good 10 easy steps but after reading thread I would alter them: Pretty and it seems pretty sound acclaim that going it alone with Jax is not much of a strategy. Unless you know something the rest of the world does not seem to it does not seem unreasonable that the same potentially future longer suspension that scares you should also scare Lunch straight. Unless you know some real specifics that indicate to someone on the inside that Lynch is another Travis Henry who could not escape his demons because of his drug addiction the younger Lynch with 2 Pro Bowls on his resume is a better keep than Jax. At any rate having two RBs in this league is an intelligent strategy. Firing Jauron is fun after the frustration of the last 3+ seasons but is really misguided as a strategy that is a centerpiece of getting better since Jauron is simply not at fault for the other 7 seasons of the 0 for a decade performance. I'm glad you put the Holmgren call first as merely switching the HC who should be held accountable for the last three seasons lets off the hook the owner whose reign of error is at 10 seasons and counting. The blocking fullback call leads directly to a call of then who. Dealing with the TE problem by getting players who can be taught the HB role looks like a better bet to deal with both TE and FB problems. Otherwise pretty good

Jauron is a definite loser as an HC as clearly demonstrated by his three straight years of losing records and horrendous start this year. However lancing this boil when the team has cancer seems so misguided that this effort at least needs a strategy to try to advocate change at the top where the real problem emerges from. I mean seriously the Bills are 0 for a decade for making the playoffs and do you seriously blame Jauron for the first 7 years of this record of failure. Of course there is no way to fire the owner in this economic model and Mr. Ralph does deserve credit for presiding over the glory days of the 90s and the AFL championships. Calling for the demotion of Brandon to the mere role of beancounter and bringing in a GM who has a record of past SB success seems like a far more intelligent strategy than calling for Jauron's ouster as though this is going to solve some problem. If there is any word to spread about this it is merely the word that this is not a serious effort to actually improve the team. Mr. Ralph has shown before he is capable of stepping back and allowing real football guys like Polian build a team and with TD he did totally turn the car keys over to a GM (though in this case Mr. Ralph actually would have done well to stand over TDs shoulder to make sure he did not do what he did which was do some great things but overall he seemed driven by a desire not to get run out of town by an HC he hired like Cowher did. This can Jauron thing comes off just as much as endorsement of the first 7 years of mediocrity than an indictment of the last 3.

This why the "it is guaranteed to go to the highest bidder is nonsense." If the highest bidder is Rush Limbaugh (or someone else who raises the hackles of any of the other essential players in this) then they are not going to be approved by the 75% of the other owners it takes to get approved. Since Mr. Ralph does not have any apparent heirs who want to pay the likely substantial costs of inheriting this gift they would have done nothing to earn, my bet is that in the end it will be the NFL as an entity which pays off any estate fees to Mr. Ralph's designated heirs and takes control of the team because that is where the money will be.

I am under no illusion that this will be easy. I think the folks who are living in an illusion are those who think this is a simple calculus between small market teams and large market teams as it actually is much more complex than that simple equation. The ironic thing here I think that the old model of an owner be it Mr. Ralph, George Halas or any individual is the thing that is type of owner is outmoded here. My guess (and this like all the other predictions here be they by folks like me who know this is too complex for the average individual to understand alone or those who think they actually understand and can predict this stuff from their armchairs or their desk) is that I would not be surprised when Mr. Ralph dies to see the NFL as an entity raise the capital to pay off Mr. Ralph's heirs and any estate tax (which anyone with good lawyers and the ability to give their heirs cash rather than the legacy of individual team ownership should be able to escape). My guess as to who the next owner of the Bills will be is the NFL itself. I do not think that there is anyone I can see who will be able to raise the over a billion in assets it will take to buy the team and can swing the approval of 75% of the owners which is ESSENTIAL to make any deal work. Particularly after the recent meltdown of the economy this is going to be a very different game and be a potentially lucrative but World Series of Poker like risk.

The key point as many always point out is the NFL will likely go where the money is. The key point here is that the money is in new markets like Mexico City, Berlin, Tokyo and other places where the NFL would love to stimulate more eyeballs to watch so the real money from TV nets can make them rich compared to the relative peanuts to be found from gate sales. This means the key thing to think about when considering Dallas is how do you use America's team as a tool to help you get Mexican eyeballs and the key thing when considering Buffalo is how do the NFL use the Bills to get Toronto eyeballs. The answer is likely not to move the team but to create rivalry with new teams to be created and situated in Mexico City and Toronto. This is not your grandmother's NFL any more where individual owners made individual decisions. Mr. Ralph and the Bengals voted for the good old days when Tagliabooboo twisted arms to make all the owners see this and they lost the vote 30-2. The idea of small market vs. large market is 20th century thinking. Here in the 21st century there is one market and that is a global one. If the NFL could do the whole thing like a Madden game in the studio they would. The Bills have far more value to the NFL as one of the orignal AFC teams and the link to tradition than they do as a franchise which can be sold and moved. I think this is the Econ 101 about whether the Bills move or not.

The problem is though that though your THEORY does fit the limited context of the subset of facts about this situation that you describe, your THEORY does not even touch upon a number of other facts and also other possible theories with more real world substantiation to back them up: AMONG these facts are: 1. Your theory seems to be too much stake in a version of the NFL where the owners were George Halas like kings who followed the golden rule (he who has the gold rules) and did what they wanted throwing around nickles like manhole covers. The mid-80s player lockout ended with the owners soundly kicking the tail of the Ed Garvey led NFLPA that worked by the outmoded AFL-CI style rule book. The problem for the NFL owners were they had soaked the public trough by saving the $ other major sports leagues spent building player training and farm systems. Instead the got the colleges (often using your an my tax dollars) to subsidize player training and development in Division I and other football efforts. The problem for the team owners was that while most of the players trained by colleges, individual trade was restrained by agreements to limit the draft to mostly be player who could not enter the NFL until roughly 21 (in other sports kids sign big buck contracts when they are 16 or in individual sports like golf or extreme sports kids who are 13 can rake in big bucks), However, in the NFL most players did not sign their ownership rights away until they were adults (or alleged adults since idiots like Pac-Man Jones will probably never be adults. While most pro football players are coddled kids on steriods, there were a few with the intellectual power of a Troy Vincent, a TKO and most important of a Gene Upshaw. After the Ed Garvey's got their nuts handed to them these smarter athletes struck up a deal with really smart NYC lawyers who realized that the way for the players to win far more than the 52% of the gross Garvey demanded was to instead threaten the owners that the NFLPA would dissolve. Faced with the prospect of actually having to compete in a free market where individual team owners would actually have to compete financially to sign deals with individual players, the team owners ran kicking and screaming away from the free market. The new CBA negotiated by the NFL and NFLPA realized that the players were now partners with the owners in the first step of a CBA based on the players being guaranteed by the salary cap of receiving a massive % of designated receipts. The current salary cap brought to fruition a world which Upshaw declared the salary cap would now cover the total gross and needed to start with a 6 as far as the player %. The current cap awards the players 60.5% of the total gross and arguably now they are not only partners but the majority partners of the current enterprise. In this light Mr. Ralph's will is critical but far from the only determinant of who owns the team. In fact we just saw this weak where objections from the NFLPA simply forced out Rush Limbaugh as an owner of an applying team, the 75% of current owners who MUST agree to any deal can effectively block any new owner under certain circumstances even if they are the highest bidder you falsely claim is guaranteed the team by the will (though I do not even see a link that substantiates the THEORY that Mr. Ralph's will says exactly that- it may but where does it say that for sure). All this may be blather to some or too many, but the fact is this is generally what happened and the nice THEORY you laid out may fit the limited context you seem to subscribe to but does not include this version of reality at all when even if you disagree with some of specific no theory that ignores the general reality can be taken very seriously. In addition to the facts of ownership, a reasonable theory also needs to include: 2. the facts of the partial NFL exemption from antitrust being endangered by a move of the Bills to another town. Even the stupid local leadership of Cleveland (one of two cities in the US poorer than Buffalo in current accepted measures) beat the NFL with this threat and Modell was not even offering the fresh meat of an ownership change which makes the move you describe vulnerable. 3. Even beyond the force of Congress, you are talking about the new owners walking away from 57.000 in annual season ticket sales and years of marketing and building up cash from sales of Zubazz pants and Perry's ice cream. Yes the Buffalo market is smaller than the Portland market, but this does not mean that the Buffalo market does not generate millions of dollars that a new franchise is simply walking away from and will need to recreate. Excitement about a new team will do some of that, but you have to at least acknowledge there are substantial economic reasons for staying as well. There are also several more theoretical issues that any THEORY should at least account for: A. The marketing plan for the NFL seems quite clearly to be to expand to new markets overseas. In this theory, connections to the tradition of an original AFL team is not an insubstantial asset. While this may make no difference to the individual NFL owner it actually may make a difference to the new NFL which as a whole is selling tradition and excitement to new franchises overseas. Pitiful pictures of abandoned Buffaloanian and extended lawsuits while the NFL fights past antiturst and other things to make the move are not a good sales point. B. I agree with those who say money will rule the day. However, i think folks are wrong to simply think that 75% of owner approval can be found for the 1/32 of the transfer fee each owner will get. Again, the money is not in a small cut of the transfer fee, the real money is in selling new franchises to Mexico City, Berlin, Tokyo, and other towns. The fight to move out of Buffalo is merely a distraction from going after the real money and makes selling franchises to get the real money more difficult. The THEORY of the team moving to LA for a small cut of the transfer fees based on the good word of some DWI lawyer may be correct, but it easily could be all wrong a it does not at all fit other real world facts and legitimate theory. The stay here and sell to the real money theory may be wrong but the THEORY which seems to bring fear to your heart simply does not seem to address the full reality.

Not so fast. Ralph owns the Bills, but it has agreed to operate within the rules of the NFL which gives the league the right to veto any sale made by any owner which goes against the business interests of the NFL. Thus, if Adolf Hitler (or the living equivalent) was the highest bidder (or Ed Roskie to use your example) if the NFL rejects by vote this owner then the deal would not occur. It is certainly the case that Adolf or Ed could then sue the NFL claiming that its veto was an arbitrary and capricious act. However, it is pretty clear that Adolf would lose this case and having an owner who was hated by everyone does not make sound business sense for the NFL or the City of Buffalo. This is an easy case and it get tougher as the prospective owner is not so anathema. However, the recent Rush Limbaugh hoo-ha in St. Louis is instructive and my sense is that the NFL would have a pretty good case for rejecting a bid that Limbaugh was a significant part of as his presence as a significant (or peripheral) owner would make it harder and to some extent untenable to run an entertainment business called the NFL. The business model makes the most sense if it does not offend regarding non-football questions. This element is relevant to the Bills in that the NFL business plan seems pretty clearly to expand the product to get at the TV network dollars associated with getting eyeballs in Mexico, Europe, Asia, Canada and anywhere to watch the product. Any doctrinaire thought that a Bills team would simply go to the highest bidder wherever they want to move the team to does not properly take into account that the business model of the NFL which has a clear say in who can become an owner in this collaborative that the Bills are by rule and agreement bound to is one that actually gets more value from the Bills remaining in Buffalo rather than moving to another city. 1. The business model seeks to place new franchises in foreign lands and link them to the tradition of the NFL. While the league could acceot (or even encourage) a team moving from an original NFL or AFL town, having these teams remain in these towns and connected to the original merged NFL is not without value. For an individual owner the customers and $ may be be measured by the franchise, but for the NFL, the customers and dollars are eyeballs across the nation (and globe for NFL purposes) and having links to the traditional story is of greater value to the whole than where those links are located as long as the fans in that municipality are wild about that product for TV viewing. The Bills coming in with near record season ticket sales despite their 0 for a decade playoff performance holds the team in good stead as a marketable item. 2. The current policy of the NFL is to actually disdain city switches by team. If the NFL is pursuing a business model of setting up new franchises in new towns and asking new customers to join their merry band in allegiance to their new team, having the marketing of the NFL be centered for a couple of years in seeing videos of downtrodden Bills fans as their franchise leaves town is not a good selling point for new franchises. The NFL would have a challenge in vetoing a Ralph's estate sell to the highest bidder, but any bidder will want to weigh carefully if they want to put together the significant amount of capital and partnership needed to wage a winning court battle against an NFL which does not want the new owner as a partner, against a town fighting for its team, and also against the US government where folks like Chuck Shumer and other elected officials will be demanded by WNYers to threaten the NFL's exemptions from anti-trust laws. It depends on who your high bidder is but my sense is that pro-Buffalo Bills folks would have at least a fair chance (or a good chance if the high bidder included somewhat like Limbaugh) of blocking any new ownership team that wanted to move the Bills. In part this is why one of the first statements from any proposed new ownership group for the Rams needs to be a commitment not to try to move the team.

Well if he bought the team then fellow abusers of drugs like a Travis Henry might get a more sympathetic sounding from ownership. If Rush came here, its probably the beginning of the rehab of Travis as a Bill.

Owning an NFL team under the salary cap since the players threatened to force the free market on the owners and they ran kicking and screaming to the more socialistic model of the salary cap brings the league as close to a printing press that prints legal tender as you can get and not be the Federal Reserve. Under any cap which forces all teams to pay the same amount for players (and as more teams move to cash to cap fiscal models even the practice of robbing the future to pay for the present is being eliminated) it makes no difference when you draft. Theoretically if Jauron is so bad with the team it costs them fans it might cost the overall league money, but as this would open the door to moving the team, even these lost fans can be recouped.

JP Losman perhaps. Rumour has it he is an FA in the NFL and he knows our system.

Two salaries went down for the season so there would seem to be the need to sign both a PS player from elsewhere and a street FA headed for retirement. Even if you are a cheapskate these would seem to be ample leverage to get both players at a level near the player minimum as the PS player will get the benefit of moving to a regular roster and the near retirement vet gets back into the league. One can also incentive up the contract giving the player a potential big paydate and not laying out the cash upfront if one is a cheapskate (oops I mean careful businessman). I wish Mr. Ralph was more of a sportsman than a businessman in managing this team (sign).

My recollection from the scouting reports was that he actually had shown the size and speed to pick-up backs coming out of the backfield, but had limited experience doing this as he was pretty much assigned to get after the QB on the pass rush for his job. The main problem my guess would be that he had is that it is often said of pros who move from standard Ds to a version of the Cover 2 we play that it often takes a player a season to get comfortable and not look like an idiot in the scheme. This was certainly our experience here where McGee looked like an idiot, gave up a couple of TDs, and even got benched his first year with our Cover 2. However, by his second year he got pretty good at it and now is our shutdown corner. It is not shocking that Maybin is a washout in his first year (particularly after missing several weeks of pre-season camp) and it would not be surprising at all if he turned out to be pretty good next year. However, judging from the LB number he was given he probably is simply overmatched when he gets into a game at LB right now and Jauron is not even gonna got there.

It was always my assumption based on his body size and his playing style in college that this was the intent. Judging from the number he was given and the Bills shortage at LB even before the injury bug hit our MLBs it appears this also was the intent of the Bills braintrust (if we want to give them that credit). Clearly this has not worked out. At best it is because the lost PT during contract negotiations did not allow Maybin to learn and demonstrate the ability to do pass coverage in the Tampa 2 style D we play (a troubling sign in terms of Maybin's ability to simply play ball and learn), At worst it is just a flat out blown assessment by the once vaunted Bills college scouts.

As I think about it, I think the key to Mr. Ralph attracting one of the HCs who had proven they can win the SB is likely to be the extent that they hit it off with him personally. This then would have to lead to this person getting the whole set of car keys the same as Mr. Ralph has shown he is actually willing to do since he turned over seemingly total control to TD. Mr. Ralph turned to TD when it turned out whomever's fault it was he had totally misread and mismanaged his relationship with Butler. Unfortunately, TD seemed to keep himself in Mr. Ralph's good graces by actually doing a pretty good job with the business side of the Bills (not a terribly hard thing to improve actually since a lot of the work involved simply moving Bills procedures and relationships into the late 20th century- it was not terribly long ago that when one went to the will call window tickets had been hand alphabetized in a shoebox). The problem was that though TD was a savvy business manager and a smart and gutsy negotiator (he bent Arthur Blank and the Falcs over a table on the Peerless deal and his gutsiness when the draft saw every team ahead of the Bills who needed on take an RB in the 1st but he still held his ground and traded Travis for a 1st when TD knew he was a bomb waiting to contractually explode) he was unable to hire a good enough HC out of fear the guy he hired might run him out of town like Cowher did. If Ralph can suck it up again and hire a real GM (who may want to be HC as well) and get out of the way beyond being a check and balance on any key weakness a new GM/HC hire has we may do well. If Mr. Ralph sticks to his bad habits shown since he fired Polian and uses his owner's perogative to pinch pennies here and there and insert himself into some of decisions that turned out badly (the handshake deal he made with Jimbo to compensate him in his next FA contract was a handshake deal only he could make and was a total misread of how much Jimbo had left. It was this mistake that set the Bills on a course of miscues as they have repeatedly tried and failed to replace Jimbo). Mr. Ralph has demonstrated time and again that he is simply an idiot to work for with his tilting at windmills after he justifiably fired Wade, mishandled the TD situation, forced out MM rather than canning and paying him and pinched pennys when he was forced to turn to Marv in hiring Jauron. I hope that Mr. Ralph has "matured" a bit and can turn over the keys to a good GM/HC or likely any good candidate with his pick of jobs will not choose to go lose with Mr. Ralph.

Mr/ Ralph is holding the Bills fans hostage in that to rebel openly against him might well result in his taking the team out of town or letting them walk. I do not see the type of protest you suggest working or even happening with Mr. Ralph operating by the Golden Rule. He who has the gold rules!

Given the demonstrated track record of Mr. Ralph we are likely looking at a replacement for the utterly failed Jauron reign of error who is going to be at the level of: Jauron- selected for Mr. Ralph by Marv who came here to rescue Ralph from him bollicksing of the TD situation. Marv pretty clearly had a shelf life of about two years and his replacement with psuedo GM Brandon shows who ultimately is responsible for the 0 for a decade non-playoff run (hint Jauron clearly bears the blame for the last 3 but you gotta look higher up if you want to assign real blame correctly for the decade of failure). Mularkey- selected for Mr. Ralph by TD in the last year of his reign of error. GW- selected for Mr. Ralph by TD in the first sign TD was not over getting run out of town by an HC he hired in Pitts. Wade- ended having to go to an appeals panel for his last year of salary after Mr. Ralph canned him for stupidly giving up before the team was mathematically eliminated (part of Mr. Ralph teaming up with Butler on toxic relationship which left the Bills twisting in the wind when Butler left town like he was the Baltimore Colts. Hiring a legit HC almost certainly needs to start with us hiring a real GM who has the cajones to take on Mr. Ralph like Polian did last time we built a winner.

I agree with the idea this O sucks. It probably would have been better with Turk. However, after watching Turk show complete inadequacy last year, it probably would only have been marginally better on Schonert. Neither AVP or Schonert seem to be up to being more than QB coaches. The fact that this O is less than nothing does not indicate Schonert was much more than the nothing he achieved as OC last year.

Having two solid RBs is a great thing in today's NFL. After watching Poluszny go down and have us forced to go with the overmatched Buggs at MLB that we had to go with Mitchell and then Mitchell goes down so we go back to Buggs only to see him go down, it makes little sense to me to take a position like RB (where there is traditionally greater punishment and injury compared to MLB) the way you can only deal with having one RB is beyond me.