ToGoGo

I thought he did pretty well against us considering he's a rookie. What caught my attention is that when he played the 2nd half, Brady and Belichick watched him with A LOT of interest on the sidelines. Especially Brady. He must be doing pretty well in practice for Brady (who seems like he doesn't respect anyone) to watch him intently. I suspect they already decided he's their guy for the future, Brady suspension or not.

This might sound indelicate, but it's not the first one that worries me, but the 2nd. At the very least, he's been involved with some very shady people. Who's to say he's not anymore? History shows that many NFL and NBA players bring that entourage with them to the major leagues.

I don't have much to go on, but I don't have a good feeling about him personally after watching some interviews. You just get vibes about people. I think there is a VERY good reason a talent like his fell to the 5th round. I don't expect anybody here to believe me, but I had the same vibes about Aaron Hernandez during a prime-time game a few years ago when they showed him socializing with another Pats player during a blowout win. Maybe not a murderer vibe, but definitely a criminal vibe. To balance it out, I got a good vibe from Darby and Lewis.

Yolo put it best. He doesn't like black stars with "swag". I don't know how else to say it without being non-PC. You're still not getting the point. I think because the "Chip Kelly is crazy" narrative is getting more clicks right now.

So he's repeating himself because he feels strongly about it, not sure why that's so embarrassing. Regarding your 2nd point, and I've heard this from other people in the thread, you mention that the "reality is" that Chip is not racist and "might just mean" he wants all the attention. Please explain to me why it's reasonable to think "Chip wants all the attention" and why it's wrong to think "there's a racial tinge to it"? Why is one a perception and the other a reality when you don't have any evidence for either? I'm just trying to understand the reasoning behind it because it seems to have developed into a meme within 4 thread pages.

I'm about to ask a lot of questions. I'm doing this to open up the debate because I want to get to the core of some of the opinions on here. Why are you so sure there isn't something racial to it? Why do you "really doubt it"? How do you know he has a problem with loud guys, and not loud black guys? We have a guy on our team who thinks so and apparently whispers that other players think so. Why is he embarrassing himself? Is he really embarrassing himself, or is he just saying stuff that you don't agree with? Why is it factually wrong? I can see someone saying "I don't think that's the case" like HOF Watkins, but why is it factually wrong? Again, why is he embarrassing himself? Are you just embarrassed since he's a Bill and trying to project your embarrassment on to him?

I mean, who is it embarrassing for? Bills fans? That's pretty selfish. The guy has earned the right to speak his mind by being a star player. Agree or not, but that's how it goes. When a nobody talks, people say "who the heck is this guy, shut up and earn it on the field". Well this guy has earned it. We knew what we were getting when we brought him on board, the team is desperate to make him comfortable here, and he knows we're not going to shut him up. Rex and Whaley know we're lucky we even have him so they're going to deal with it. If you think about it, he's the closest thing we have to a star QB. As for the fans on this board squirming because they're terrified of negative attention, I just don't really care. The man is an established star and veteran in this league and he feels like he was traded for some very shady (pun not intended) reasons. He's not the first star player to be traded by Kelly and there are apparently whispers from others in the league that agree with McCoy, who is the only one with the balls to speak out. Do you trust the NFL to handle it internally after the Rice incident. If anything, the Rice incident proved that the only way the NFL will act is if there is threat of public embarrassment. There may not be any proof, but I know from experience that you know when somebody doesn't like you. You would tell your friends and they would say "really? what did they do? what did they say?". And you'll say "nothing, but I can just TELL that they don't like me". Sometimes it's all in the vibe. McCoy has had a lot of time to digest it and months later he's still talking about it. If Kelly is really getting rid of star black players because he fears they'll talk back to him and he'll lose the locker room, well then, that should be out there. In my opinion solving social injustices are worth far more than having some negative attention affect the team. For me to tell McCoy to shut up because I get annoyed when players talk and it might affect our W-L column seems very petty and selfish to me when put into perspective.

Perhaps, but I'm sure he has editors who are smart enough.

I think what the OP was pointing out, was not that "this is it", but that there is a common belief held by fans that we are somehow "cursed" or we are "losers for life" or "pathetic creatures like us don't win championships". I'm of course exaggerating, although I'm not totally off either. He was showing that there have been signs from both teams that things are turning around and that that disgusting stench from the Ralph years is clearing out. I'm fine with people playing the caution card, but if they are playing it because "well, things just don't go my way so I'm going to lay down over here and expect failure", well that's really annoying. It's also a self-fulfilling prophecy.

You know, there's a quote by billionaire investor Howard Marks that says (and I'm paraphrasing) "One of the stupidest things you can do is to think there's no risk when your stock is going up, but to think there's no hope is just as stupid." In other words, there's a reason John Paulson made $8 Billion during the recession. He made money off investors who thought the economy was never going to turn around. Life moves in cycles, the Jerry Sullivans of the world can think what they want, but we're due for a long run of success. If they want to play the "I'll believe it when I see it" card, then they can miss out on all the fun.

Thanks, glad you got it. On your 2nd point, I've thought about that before. The way I see it is yes, he's getting clicks and he's the toast of TBD for it. But at what cost? His reputation and integrity is going down the drain. Short term, he's winning. But what about long term when the "get clicks by getting emotional reactions" fad in journalism passes? What about when journalistic quality and integrity is back in vogue? He's toast. He'll need to be a politician to turn that around.

My opinion on this varies. 1) First off, let's not act like they bring no value at all. They're attractive and they're nice to look at in between plays, which is worth something. Playing eye tag with cheerleaders is a tradition on every level and a football game without cheerleaders is a little weird. If they brought nothing to the table then they wouldn't be at the games at all. Nobody forces girls to do it. If you have a problem with "society encouraging it", then that's a different argument. 2) They are technically independent contractors, but they could just as easily be employees. If you're paying them, then you need to pay them fairly. The NFL has done a good job distancing themselves from this by hiring contractors instead of having them on the payroll ("The Giants respect women" LMAO what an amazing PR team). 3) I know a few former Jills and girls who have tried out for the Jills. They don't do it for the money or as a job. They do it to be called a Jill. There's a social prestige that comes with that. More likes on Facebook, more jealous looks from girls, more male attention, more promotion gigs on Chippewa. There's a reason the pay is so low yet the demand remains high. There is plenty of value there for the girls outside money. 4) My thought process on this is that the actual job is not degrading to women because the girls enjoy the benefits that come with it, otherwise they would not do it. Nobody forces them to do it. However, the contractors seem to be on a power trip because they know how valuable a spot on the Jills is and how much sh*t the girls are willing to eat to get it. That said, as long as they are getting paid at least minimum wage and they are not being overworked or breaking labor laws, let them do what they want.

I know this is really unpopular, but I'm a big believer in drafting a QB every year. Every invention in history has been accomplished by trial and error experimenting. The odds of you being successful are FAR lower when you select a QB every 5 years, than if you select one every year. Similar to you trying only 1 idea every 5 years, than 1 idea every year. If the value of a good QB is X times higher than any other position on the field (and we have a mostly stacked team in every other position), I see no reason to pass on a Petty/Grayson/Hundley in the 3rd, 4th, or 5th round every year. At that point you can cut Tuel and have 4 promising QBs face off and you cut the one who shows the least potential or provides the worst results. Run the QBs like an A/B test until you find a winner. I see spending 4th round picks as similar to spending $100 in a marketing campaign to find the best advertisement. To make money, you need to spend money and to get good QBs, you need to use draft picks. This way you go into every draft saying "OK, we're taking a QB, who's the best guy at the best draft position". Now you end up taking Pat White, Colt Mccoy, Andy Dalton, and then Russell Wilson. Now boom, you have a franchise QB and a good young backup QB in Dalton you can trade for a high pick. In exchange this would have cost us Eric Wood, Alex Carrington, Aaron Williams, and T.J Graham. Are those 4 guys worth more than Russell Wilson and Andy Dalton?

I would cut Brown AND Dixon to keep Fred for one more year. Those guys are easily replaceable, Fred is not.

What I heard somewhere is that he wants a bigger contract wherever he gets traded. That might explain the lack of interest.

When we're down 5 in the 4th quarter against the Patriots on 4th and 9, and Bryce Brown gets stopped 2 yards short, we'll regret we cut Fred Jackson. That's all I have to say.

Watched the Texas Tech tape. He's tall and long. Smooth runner although I agree, not a speedster. Made a couple highlight reel catches. Did it against solid competition. The draftniks question his toughness and I did see him run out of bounds one play where he should have stiff armed the guy Fred Jackson in Chicago style. Crappy QB throwing to him so he knows how to adjust. Interesting small school receiver. Definitely worth a 7th round pick.

On the topic of Darby's physical toughness, I see some people denying it, but I think there's some merit. It's pretty clear he avoids hits when he doesn't have to, let's his teammates do the tackling, comes in from the side instead of squaring up. It's easy to see why some people would call him a b*tch when it comes to the run game. But you also need to understand that he's one of the smallest guys on the field at all times. He's doing what he can to avoid injuries. Would I like to see some more ballsy physical plays, yes, but overall I think he's good enough to be a strong player. The speed and quickness more than makes up for it. The hands....we'll see if it's just mental.

You know, beyond the overbearing pessimism, the self-righteousness, and just the general "I think I'm smarter than everybody" vibe he always gave across, I still felt like he was knowledgeable and had the integrity to do some TBN level research before he opened his mouth. When he wrote that tweet about John Miller yesterday, I went and watched whatever videos were available of him. I admit I don't follow the draft much but even when I did there were hundreds of players I never heard of. So it's OK not to know about some of these guys. But I watched the tape and came away with the general impression of "this guy is pretty good". Then I thought about what Jerry Sullivan said when he clearly never watched a second of game film on the guy. Look, I get that TBN pressures him to tweet. I get that people want real-time reporting with world class research and knowledge, and that's just not possible, so there's going to be a trade-off. But at what point in his career did Sullivan get so "lost" as to just create pessimism out of nearly thin air without doing even a second of research. I get the pressures, but when did he decide that was OK to do? He reminds me of Paul Newman as a lawyer in The Verdict giving business cards out at funerals of people he doesn't know. Integrity long gone. All it shows is his instant eye for finding that dark cloud, as you said. Now that I know he no longer bothers to do any research, it's tough for me to have any more respect for his journalism. At least whatever was left. If the journalists are no longer doing the research, who's left to do it?

They only watch one game and base their opinion on that. They should also watch the UCF tape. The kid can play.

I'm far from a draft scout, but I watched both videos of him on DraftBreakdown.com and I liked him. Steady, strong, great at run blocking, eager, not lazy.

I feel one of the best resources available to fans in order to get a decent feel for a QB's personality is Gruden Camp. If you go back to past episodes and rewatch the QBs who made it, you start to see trends. 1. They are dominant and gain the respect of Gruden in one on one conversation. People think Gruden is just chewing the scenery but I think he messes with the QBs on purpose to see how they respond. The best example of this was Cam Newton. You'll find the biggest busts are the ones that automatically become submissive to Gruden, like Gabbert or this year Petty. This is not a knock normally since Gruden is a very dominant guy, but as a QB you need to be one of the most dominant guys in the huddle in order to command attention and respect. To add more to this, Russell Wilson is not a dominant personality per se, but you'll notice he was completely unaffected by Gruden's. Luck was the same way. They were not intimidated by him at all. No trouble holding eye contact. You see that this year with Winston and Hundley. 2. Fast processing skills and decisiveness. The best was clearly Andrew Luck. Knew every single passing concept instantaneously. No "umms" or pauses, just immediately started writing on the board. You also saw his decisiveness in little things like "let's do this in trips formation". Gruden didn't tell him which formation or even tell him to pick one, he just immediately chose one. All these little things come through on the field. Grayson on the other hand clearly takes a few moments to think, says "umm" before doing anything and just overall clearly second guesses himself a bit. QBs need to process fast and make immediate decisions. 3. Talking to the players in the huddle. At the end of this video http://espn.go.com/video/clip?id=12469292Hundley is telling 3 receivers what to do in the huddle. You can see immediately that he's the alpha male there but the way he talks, his firmness, his command of their attention, and how two of the guys look down when he talks. The players must be ready to give everything for their QB, and they won't do that for a QB they don't take seriously. Going by this, Hundley and Winston made the best impression on me. Winston took over the show completely with his charisma, but Hundley was just very eager and confident. Last year out of all the guys I was impressed by Derek Carr for his unwavering confidence and self-assureness, and he turned out to be one of the best. We have access to all the game film and the physical abilities are broken down by everyone. Everyone agrees intangibles are the most important thing. Well I think Hundley's the guy for us if we take one this year. I'm actually kind of hoping we avoid Petty and Grayson.

Just be creative. Give them difficult computer games and see how long they keep trying compared to the average person. It's really not that difficult to come up with ideas. They have computer tests for ADD, so concentration tests would be easy to do. What's the pain in trying? The NBA is open-minded, why do we have to be stubborn about changing the tiniest things? You are arguing semantics. Of course, they are all related. I didn't exactly write out a thesis on this before writing my post, simply threw out important characteristics off the top of my head. Nobody is determined at everything, but an NFL football player needs to be determined to be a successful player in order to be successful, do you agree or disagree with that? If you were a physics major and were not determined to do well on a test, then I'm going to pass on you during the physics draft. You are also beginning to grasp that if you are not interested in something, you won't be determined. Testing their actual interest in having a successful career would be another solid characteristic to test. See we're getting somewhere. However, even if you did want to pass the physics test, but you were prone to play video games while you studied and make other poor choices, I would want a way to test that. To make it simpler, if you wanted to do something, I'd like a way to test how likely you are to achieve it, and how much adversity you are willing to go through to achieve it. I believe that's what separates the success stories in the NFL, from the busts. Just like it separates the success stories in every other field on Earth, to the other guys. How could we create a combine test to sniff out a Justin Blackmon type who screws up a bunch of times, gets repeatedly suspended, and then decides to just quit the NFL rather than work hard and try again? Does that sound like the kind of guy who quits after a lot of adversity? It does to me. What about a Derrick Rose type who keeps coming back from injury and not giving up mentally and still playing at a high level? Are these "worse ideas than the Wonderlic"? I really really really really really disagree with you on this being a bad idea. I just don't think you understand how important these characteristics are to a professional athlete. FAR more important than some tricky multiple choice logic puzzles. Not that the Wonderlic is useless, I just think the flaw is having that be the only mental test they give them (besides interview questions). When the NFL bust rate is as high as it is, it means there is something fundamentally missing in professional scouting. They have absolutely mastered watching film and physical measurements, but are absolutely clueless when deciding who will make it and who won't. What other industry has a bigger strike out rate than professional sports during the draft? Especially with the time and effort they put into it. There are major discoveries to be made here, and frankly we're arguing about some 50 question IQ test that is proven to tell us nothing but who's book smart and who's a little dumb at school. Why not test for everything we possibly can and then look back on the correlations? Add an extra day to the combine where they do nothing but different mental aptitude tests. One day we'll look back and start seeing patterns.

If they're going to give a personality test to predict future success, intelligence should only be 1 of many different testing variables. They need to test for persistence, determination, positive or negative attitudes, expectations of success or failure, confidence, decision making in stressful situations, desire to succeed, ambition, concentration, etc. No wonder there are so many busts. They could cut that number in half just by testing for the things I listed above. For example, will power is far more important than intelligence. Persistance and faith in your ability is nearly equally important to skill and intelligence.

Good for him. Seems like an intelligent investment.