hondo in seattle

I ask myself that. Even though he was still young, when he was cut by the Bills, I thought his NFL career was over. Reports were that he looked good in camp. But his regular season performances were stupefyingly bad. It was the first - and only - time I thought a young guy played himself out of the league. I was wrong.

Kelly was more consistently accurate with the ball, despite the lower completion percentage. Not all good throws are completions. Sometimes receivers drop balls, or are separated from balls with good hits, or step out of bounds... And sometimes QBs throw incompletions intentionally or are hit when throwing the ball... Sometimes, I would watch games and count how many bad throws Kelly made. In most games, there were very, very few.

I was excited when we acquired Vince. He had led the Rams to the playoffs multiple times - even as far as the Super Bowl. He threw for 500+ yards in a game once. I thought we had found a credible QB to replace Fergy. Ferragamo was the first QB I saw wearing plays on his wrist. Back in those days, it was a turn-off. I figured he was either too lazy or dumb to learn the playbook. Nonetheless, he threw for 377 yards in his first game as a Bill! We were off and running! It was the only good game he ever had as a Bill. That year, Ferragamo and Bruce Mathison combined for 9 TD passes versus 31 interceptions. We scored a mere 200 points all season long - far and away, the most anemic offense in the league. Both of these QBs richly deserve to be in this conversation.

Joe Brady, "Do simple better."

The bolded is very true. Back in the 60s and 70s, NFL offenses were built around RBs, and college backs were drafted high, often 1st overall. If you were young, fast and athletic, you wanted to be a RB. Slow-footed, less-athletic guys found other positions to play, like QB. Now the best athletes are WRs and DBs. And, as you say, more and more of them are becoming QBs. If the next CMC was in the draft, I'd want him the way an addict wants his next score. But would the level of confidence be high enough to ignore all our other - more blatant - needs? Probably not. Some stats guru, I don't recall which one, once analyzed player injuries. The loss of a starting QB was the only injury that made a measurable statistical difference in W-L probabilities. I imagine that works in reverse, too. Getting a back that's maybe 5% better than your current starting back probably won't impact your season record. Finding someone 20% better, which might, is unlikely unless you have a truly awful starter. Cook isn't truly awful. It's taken a while for me to admit this but he's actually good. Yet, I still fantasize about a backfield that consists of Josh and Thurman Thomas. And when we want power, Cookie Gilchrist comes in at FB.

As I understand it, the QB coach breaks down film of the opposing team with the QBs looking for tendencies and weaknesses. The QB coach also helps run drills and goes over this week's plays with the QBs (the entire playbook isn't in use every week). So even if the QB is experienced, there's a lot to do before each game to prepare. In the offseason, a QB coach will help 'install' the offense. It seems a bit weird to me but what QB coaches don't usually do (though there are exceptions) is coach QBs on biomechanics and how to throw the ball. If a QB wants to work on that part of his game, he has to do it with a QB-whisperer in the off-season. I've heard coaches and players say that Brady is collaborative and takes suggestions and feedback from his players and coaches. So, Curry will have some input on scheme and play calling.

Buffalo has been blessed with some talented backs over the years. For instance, Cookie was a bruiser. OJ was an elusive artist. Thurman was a Swiss army knife. All were tremendous in their distinctive ways. GB, I don't agree that all the people who want to upgrade Cook want a different style. They just want someone better. I like Cook well enough but if I had the chance to replace him with a clone of Cookie, or OJ, or Thurm, I would. Any one of them. The more potent our running game is, the less defenses can focus on stopping Josh. Imagine if we had a RB who was as talented as our QB. How do you defend that? Where I might disagree with those wanting an upgrade is in the evaluation of the opportunity cost. With only so many cap dollars and draft picks to spend, we can't chase everything we may want. We have bigger needs than RB - positions where an upgrade would provide a bigger ROI.

Before the season, I thought of Cook as a third-down back who would be a good safety valve out of the backfield. He's a better runner than I thought. Good vision and burst. Effective up the middle which I doubted. But he's a worse receiver than I thought. The drops were killer.

This is an interesting hire. I thought Shula would get the job.

The record doesn't prove that Belichick isn't a great coach. It's just the reality that coaches don't suit up. Coaches help but players play the games. And what these comparative stats don't measure is how much Belichick helped Brady become Brady. Brady's success isn't just about his precision. It's about his ability to read defenses, process information, and make good decisions. I don't know how much of that is due to Belichick, but I assume some of it is. If I were an owner, these are the three staff positions I'd want to fill first with superstars: GM, HC, and opposite coordinator (if the HC is a defensive guy, I'd want a genius OC; and vice versa). And I'd want my GM to find a superstar QB. With those four in place, it's hard to lose. The Pats dynasty isn't all about Brady. Belichick played a critical role. He also played a key role in the collapse of the dynasty with his failures as a GM.

For a team that's been on top of the AFCE for a few years now, we have a long shopping list. I'm hoping Beane finds a way to upgrade the roster and get us into the SB but he certainly has his work cut out for him.

With geriatric Frazier, we had one of the best defenses in the NFL. I don't think our failures in the playoffs had anything to do with Frazier's age. Youth isn't an automatic cure. Frazier was born the same year I was, btw. I don't believe my cognitive skills, imagination, inventiveness, mental energy, etc. have declined at all. Saying Frazier is too old to run a good/aggressive defense is an insult to everyone my age. Spags in KC is the same age as Frazier and me and seems to be doing just fine. Prejudice based on age is just as pernicious as prejudice based on race, gender, ethnicity, or anything else.

Daboll was recently effusive in his praise of Dorsey: "First, he’s a great person, a great teammate... He’s very smart. He’s a good leader. He’s very good with scheme and X’s and O’s... He has a good understanding of just football in general... He’s well-versed in a variety of systems, and obviously the spread and RPO worlds are two components he has a really good mind for... Ken is just a really good teacher. He’s well-prepared. He did a great job with the quarterbacks when I was with him. He leaves no stone unturned... He’s competitive and he was just really detailed with that position, so when he was with me, I leaned on him a lot. He has good ideas. Good with scheme, good with fundamentals, a really good football coach.” So what went wrong? The offense looked stale, predictable, and one-dimensional after the three big blowouts.

I love the enthusiasm! But I'm not convinced the youth of our OC/DC duo gives us a competitive advantage. If I was a soldier going to war, I'd be worried about being led by some kid fresh from the academy who's never been under fire before. I'd rather go to war with the grizzled old vet with a reputation as a tactical genius who's already fought and won many battles. But who knows? Maybe both Brady and Babich turn out to be tactical geniuses. I can only hope.

I'd love to have Derrick Henry. In his prime. On a rookie contract. What I truly want is a young Cookie Gilchrist. Someone who will pound the rock up the middle for 243 yards and force opposing DCs to defend the run. Someone with a mean attitude who will throw a would-be tackler to the ground so violently that he has to be carted off the field. And then after the play, go to the enemy sideline and yell out a challenge, "Who's f**king next?" That'll fire up the offense. Today's second-level defensive players are better at coverage than tackling. They're faster than they are strong. Lookie, Lookie, Here Comes Cookie would be like a locomotive smashing through a matchstick barrier. Trying to load the box to stop him would give Josh a field day. Are there any Cookies in the draft?

I agree that so many promotions from within seems kind of weird. When I ran business organizations, I mostly promoted from within but liked to hire from the outside sometimes for fresh ideas. But all the Bills' promotions are obvious... Babich has a thin (ish) resume but has been around football all his life and performed well in his stints as a position coach. Many think he's a young, up-and-coming talent. Dodson called him, "The best coach I've ever had, hands down." West likewise has earned praise from players and might be another emerging coaching star. Holcomb has been a LB and DC before. Seems like an obvious choice for LBers. Brady is the only promotion I'm not entirely comfortable with. I didn't think he was awesome in his tryout as an OC. But maybe an offseason will allow him to implement his ideas better. I was hoping we'd find someone better but I'm not sure how hard McD looked. Sometimes there are phone calls and interviews that don't make the news. The new QB coach could come from the outside though Mike Shula, an internal guy, might be the more obvious choice.

This is weird. I've only been to 4 games in my 50 years of fandom and we've won them all. I was at the first Monday night game in Orchard Park when OJ got hurt and didn't play the second half and we surprisingly won anyway. I was at the playoff game in Miami where Kelly and Thurman shined. I saw a meaningless game at Candlestick. And I was at the big regular-season victory over the Chiefs a couple of years ago. If we make it to the SB with Josh, I think the mafia should pool its money and send me there!

Ice cream consumption goes up in the spring as the weather improves. Suicide rates go up in the spring, too. Ipso facto, increased ice cream consumption causes suicide. Sometimes correlations are meaningless.

I used to be an army officer. When I went to war, I read some shockingly uninformed articles in reputable news sources about the likely outcomes. But the ignorance of the authors didn't surprise me. Outsiders know less than insiders. That's how it works. Terry is part of the Bills organization every day of his life. I'm guessing he talks to people within the organization nearly every day. How could he possibly know less than Dunne? I stand by what I said. If I was Pegs, I wouldn't look to a writer like Dunne to solve my organizational challenges. I'd talk to the knowledgeable people inside the organization and my football confidantes outside. In fact, I have such a low opinion of Dunne's understanding of NFL organizations, if I needed advice, I'd turn to Matt Millen before I'd turn to Dunne.

Heartbreaking. I hope you spend more time remembering her wonderful life than her passing. I wish you, your family, and everyone whose life she touched, my very best.

It's true that most running QBs don't last long in the NFL. But most passing QBs don't either. It's not called the Not-For-Long league for nothing. Is there data that says the more a QB runs, the more games he loses to injury? Or the more he runs, the shorter his career? Argument by anecdote doesn't cut it. I think you also have to consider the frequency and quality of the contact. Immobile QBs with poor vision often get hammered in the pocket. Josh doesn't get sacked a lot because he's elusive and I'm not sure he's taking more hard hits than the average QB.

A couple of thoughts... Do you think we would have beaten the Chiefs in the playoffs this year if Miller, White, Bernard, and Milano were all fully healthy. I do. And yep, our defense doesn't fare as well in the playoffs as in the regular season. But is this due to poor coaching? I mean, does McD suddenly become stupid? Does his preparation suddenly become lackadaisical? Does he idiotically make radical changes to his defensive scheme? Does he go on a drug and alcohol binge during the playoffs? Maybe. Or, more likely, the team over-performs during the regular season because of McD's good coaching but then the lack of talent - exacerbated by injuries - gets exposed in the playoffs against quality competition. The way I look at it, there is no team so good that it enters a season as an unstoppable force with a 100% chance of winning the Super Bowl. There's too much parity in the NFL... too many injuries... too much luck involved. There is a select group of teams that enter a season each with a 10% or so chance to win it all. Thanks to Beane and McD, the Bills are one of those teams. The dice just haven't landed in our favor - yet.

Thanks for posting. Very informational. I learned something. I like James Cook. But I'd like Cookie, too - a brutal Gilchrist-type power back who would run up the gut against these faster but lighter defenses.

Thanks for posting all the excerpts. If this is all true, they're a mess and it doesn't sound like even a Rodgers-led Jets team would threaten the Bills next season.

When you hire from within, I suppose it does reek of "more of the same." But I may be a little more open-minded than you. I would've hated for people to think that I'd be a clone of the guys who promoted me in my career. I never was. I don't expect these guys to be either. I think Brady might energize the offense. And I think he might not. I don't believe he was super impressive in his half-year tryout, but I do recognize that he was thrown into the fire with someone else's playbook and scheme. The players seem to like Brady, but they liked Dabs and Dorsey too. To sum up: who knows? As for Babich, I've heard nothing but good things about him. Of course, he'll be working within McDermott's scheme. And considering how we've ranked defensively and how we've been able to patch together a credible defense despite key injuries, that's not a bad thing. Does Babich have the drive and skills to help get the team over the playoff hump? We have no way of knowing.