CA OC Bills Fan

I haven't lived in Upstate NY since 1993 and in the blackout region since I left for college in 1978, so it has no affect on me. However, my parents, in their upper 80's and still living in Rochester, can't see any blacked out games and I think that's very unfortunate. Unfortunately, I agree that for the Bills this is probably the correct decision because of the change in revenue sharing if they change the blackout policy. However, I still have at least two concerns. First of all, the decision to extend the blackout rule to Syracuse a few years ago stinks. The farther away from Buffalo you get the more they are competing for new, young fans with the Jersey teams. I think allowing them to watch on TV will bring in new fans that may otherwise be lost for life to the Gints or Jerks. Secondly, I think the new policy from the NFL sucks. They needed to change the blackout rule. But, making the choice up to each individual team and financially penalizing teams for changing their policy is a sham. They should have either changed the policy across the board, or, they could have made it up to individual teams but not by giving a disincentive to teams to opt in to the new policy. Also, I really don't believe that many people, particularly from farther away like Rochester or Syracuse, decide to buy game tickets because they are afraid the game may be blacked out if they don't do so.

Yes, they still played 2 games against each division opponent so half of their schedule were division games. So far as why the Fish are in the AFC East, that was because of Ralph Wilson. The league wanted the Bills, Browns, Steelers, and Bengals together since we are all pretty close. We had a huge rivalry with the fish dating back to going 0 for the 70's against them and then into the Kelly / Marino years (where we owned them). Ralph would not accept any realignment that didn't include Fish / Bills in the same division. At the time, I completely agreed with him. I remember reading an article stating that it was short sighted, that if we played the other teams close to us twice a year, could go to games in their stadiums and their fans would come to Buffalo, new rivalries would arise pretty quickly. Now, a decade or so later, with the Bills and Fish afterthoughts for most of that time to the rest of the NFL, I tend to agree with that article.

I read this as meaning that LA/Anaheim and Nashville are in. It says that an owner of another major sports league team can only buy an NFL team if that team is in his home territory and home territory includes the home territories of Cleveland, LA/OC, Nashville, and Memphis.

I was listening to Ross Tucker on the NFL channel on satellite radio this morning. I just turned it on in time to hear them talking about this. They said that Garrard declined a try out. They mentioned someone else also declined a tryout, but I don't remember who. They were bashing on Miami for not having a viable backp. I didn't even know that Henne was hurt and didn't hear the extent of his injury.

Prior to May 2005, the maximum score was 1600. It was raised to 2400 at that time. The average score was around 1000 before the score was raised. 1580 is virtually perfect in both math and verbal. According to Wikipedia, scoring 1540 means you've scored better than 99.5% of test takers. No stats on 1580 but a perfect 1600 is better than 99.93% of test takers.

I agree that there aren't many blockbuster player trades, but not sure which player you're talking about (Bennett or Dickerson). Bennett had not played a down in the NFL. He was the second overall pick in the draft but wouldn't sign with the Dolts. What would have happened with Eli Manning if the Chargers didn't trade him immediately but kept trying to sign him into October and then gave up and then wanted to trade him? Of course a LB isn't a QB, but basically the Dolts were trading the 2nd overall pick in the draft. Dickerson was 3 seasons removed from the all time single season yardage record (yes, in 16 games, not 14) and led the league in rushing 3 of his first 4 seasons ('87 was his fifth season). The Dolts were desperate to get rid of the second overall pick and get the value they would have gotten on draft day for him. They got the best running back in the league when top running backs had much more value than they do today. The Lambs got a decent running back and a ton of draft picks that they wasted away.

Overall I agree. However, I remember watching that draft at the time and everyone on TV was thinking we should take Leinert. I don't think that most people had Cutler as rated higher than Leinert coming out of college. So, although of course you are correct in that had the front office had evaluated Whitner, Cutler, Losman, and Leinert correctly they would have taken Cutler. But, there's also a good chance that they would have agreed that a quarterback's value is much higher than a safety yet gone with Leinert.

Not sure if you're kidding or not, but the saying is "you can't force a square peg into a round hole". So far as your analysis, it all depends on the size of the peg and the hole. If you had a round peg with the same diameter as the length (and of course the width) of a square, the square is bigger. Of course, if the diameter of the round peg is the same as the diagonal of the square, then the circle is bigger. It's my understanding that the expression more refers to it's not a comfortable fit to have a square peg in a round hole than to mean that it can't be done. See Wikipedia. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Square_peg_in_a_round_hole In any case, I agree, Stroud is a class act who doesn't fit the 3-4.

Do I understand you correctly? You know that other teams would not have offered him a similar contract because if so then he wouldn't have resigned with Buffalo? One goal of any decent GM is to resign their own free agents prior to hitting the open market. Every year there's dozens of free agents that resign before free agency. Most top players, especially quarterbacks, resign without a franchise tag being used. On this board, we argue every potential free agent and for virtually any decent player there's emotion around the arguments pleading with the front office to sign the player before they test the waters. How often does someone on this board still lament that we let Pat Williams go when he was more than willing to resign with Buffalo at a reasonable price before he became a free agent. In most cases, the team does need to make a substantial offer. Otherwise, most players will do as you say, they want to see what they're worth on the open market. Whitner wouldn't sign for what the Bills were offering, but, there was a price he would have signed for. He likely will end up making at least as much on the open market than he was asking for from the Bills. Many of us (including me) don't think the Bills should offer what he's asking. That doesn't mean that there won't be another team willing to offer it. And, it may just be a good move for that team. I understand your point that you don't believe Merriman will pan out. I have no idea other than I hope (as you do as well) that he does. But, I believe that if Nix feels it's a good risk while having all of his medical reports, then I'm glad he took it.

Since he was already claimed by the Bills weeks or months earlier and was still under contract with them, we'll never know what any other team may or may not have offered him. Merriman was not a free agent and therefore teams could not negotiate with him while still under contract with the Bills. You may be correct that noone else but Buddy would have taken a chance on him (personnally, I think others may have taken the risk as well), but, because he was signed to an extension before he became a free agent, we'll never know for sure.

Not correct. The Dolfish and Suckaneers also put in claims on him. Since he was waived, the order of claims goes from worst record to best. Since the Bills were the only winless team at the time, they had first choice on waiver claims. Link: http://www.sbnation.com/nfl/2010/11/3/1792406/shawne-merriman-waiver-claims-dolphins-buccaneers-bills I also disagree with the second point. If he is healthy and ineffective, I don't believe that Gailey will leave him on the field just to show the world what a stupid decision it was to sign Merriman. Gailey likely will give Merriman a chance, more chances than someone who was never good (Maybin), but, he won't play the entire season if he sucks.

I want to go. I have seven (my family and another). We live in OC.

I live in Orange County and am definitely going assuming there's a season. Please let me know about ticket information. Joel