Grant
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Posts posted by Grant
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A friend asked me the other day, "Jeez, man. Why do you like the Bills?"
Ordinarily, such a comment would not affect me in the slightest. There are hundreds of thousands of reasons I like the Bills. What do I care what he thinks?
But I got thinking.
Aside from the fact that the Buffalo Bills still play in Buffalo and the fact that I have a strong reverence for past incarnations of this team, I can't really remember why I like these Bills.
-Aside from a small handful, I don't care for many of the "me first!" players on the roster.
-I'm unenthused with the head coach, who has yet to really succeed anywhere. It would be nice if he started here though.
-Marv Levy as GM only worries me and so far hasn't made a decision to ease that.
-The current uniforms look ridiculous.
I'm looking for good reasons to support THIS VERSION of the Buffalo Bills. We all loved the teams of the past. What are these Bills doing to earn my support and money? Am I just rooting for the "Buffalo" in Buffalo Bills or is there something on this team worth cheering for?
PS.
If you're thinking of replying with something to the effect of "If you don't like 'em, GIT OUT!", you can save it.
And bonus points go to replies that avoid schmaltzy sentiment like "back in my day, being a Bills fan MEANT something"
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I tend do doubt there was tampering. Am I mistaken or wasn't Mularkey interviewed by a few other teams besides Miami? I remember hearing he was a "hot commodity."
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And Jauron is the "hiring the coach with a losing background and hope he's magically turned it around just now" hire, which rarely works out.
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Except those crying now because the Bills didn't hire Marvin Lewis, were the same ones who were saying "fug Marvin Lewis, and his wife, we want people who want to be here!'
Not necessairly.
This wasn't hindsight. Lewis was the popular fan consenus at the time. Similarly, Weis was the most popular choice two years ago when we chose Mularkey.
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exactly...most moves that fans don't like, are good moves.
That's weird. Most fans hated the hiring of Gregg Williams and Mike Mularkey, when the preferred fan choices were Marvin Lewis and Charlie Weis, respectively.
Seems to me the fans have been more accurate and it's management who's been lacking.
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I like the way you think! Hopefully you're right.
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Well, I'm glad to hear that! Since we here in Buffalo have the best QB in the game, he's all set! I'm sure Jauron can help us get to maybe even 8-8!
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ALREADY making excuses! Great!
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We've got a GM who is a winner and highly respected in the league. Yes, he's not been a GM before, but it is logical to assume that he is getting input from Pollian, AJ Smith, and others. Marv wants to win and he knows how to win. He is not going to hire a a coach that will have a high proability of failure. Won't happen.
A coach with a history of losing doesn't have a probability of failure? What?
You can be optimistic about Jauron, fine, but you can't deny that the odds are against him. Given what we know - he has a history of failure, our players have a history of failure and we have a general manager with no experience - the probability is the Bills will fail.
Well, he is, actually. He'll be learning how to win, hopefully. Jauron does not have a history of winning. Therefore, he needs to learn how to win.
Frankly, I think most people would prefer a rookie HC with a history of success then an experienced HC with a history of failure.
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Of course there is no black and white here. Jauron has to do a couple of things to succeed: gain and keep the respect of the players, make them believe in the system, and have them buy into the team concept. A tough job for sure for anyone.
Players buy into the system much easier if the coach is credible. Having a winning background provides instant credibility.
It may be that Marv felt he could work better with Jauron, and there can be no friction between the coach and the GM at this stage of the game.So he hired a yes-man and his buddy instead of a proven winner.
Maybe. Maybe not.
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If we were talking about Bill Parcells vs. Dick Jauron or Jon Gruden vs. Dick Jauron, I would agree with you. However, we are talking about Mike Sherman. MIKE SHERMAN people. This guy had one of the great quarterbacks of this era and some solid offensive weapons, yet couldn't get his team deep into the playoffs. He took over a team that was two years removed from winning the NFC and managed to produce a winning record. Very impressive indeed and my hats off to him -- I would have loved to see him come to Buffalo. Jauron, on the other hand, walked into a dump of a team. It took years of drafting and free agent signees to overcome that. Sherman, on the other hand, was in a position to win right away. After serving one year as head coach, he was HANDED the general managers job after Ron Wolf retired. He must have had a great deal of front office experience, right? Wrong.
Point here is that Sherman is not THAT much of a slam dunk over Jauron. Get over it.
Nobody thought Sherman was the next Parcells.
But he had a consistent winning record. Was consistently in the playoffs. Maybe he never went deep, but neither has Tony Dungy. Both men are head-and-shoulders above Jauron, who has been consistently mediocre-to-bad. Yeah, Jauron walked into a dump of a team, but it was also a dump of a team when he left. So what good did he do?
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The problem is the fans don't have to work with Sherman, Marv and Ralph do. Why would anyone hire a coach or anyone for any type of position for that matter that you don't freel you can work with? Did Marv hire him becasue he's his friend or is he his friend because they share common opinion on how to build teams, pick players coaches etc.
I believe that the problem is about the organization of power within the organization. A head coach needs to have power in order to command respect. Lately, our general managers have been hoarding the power and have not been allowing the head coaches as much power as other HCs in terms of hiring/firing and player selection.
Take a look at the coaches in this year's Super Bowl. Or any Super Bowl. How many Super Bowl coaches were as powerless as Williams and Mularkey? None that I can immediately think of.
Why is a head coach with power important? It's a single, unified vision. The head coach is in control over how the team plays on the field and who is brought in and shipped out. If you don't play well or land in the coach's dog house, you may not be on the team for long.
Overall, I think the Bills have been avoiding hiring strong, powerful coaches who virtually guarantee success (Lewis and Weis especially) in favor of cronies who they are certain won't oust them from their position as general manager.
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Whether or not Dick Jauron is somehow able to achieve success in Buffalo is irrelevent to me at this point.
What the hire means to me is that, even without Tom Donahoe, this organization is still far too concerned with cronyism. Once again, our general manager has hired a head coach who clearly will not challenge the GM for power, is a personal friend of the GM and has (at best) a questionable resume.
From my perspective, the Bills have been more interested in hiring their friends rather than hiring the best person for the job.
Marv Levy once said something to the effect of, "If you do what the fans want, you end up sitting next to them." While I believe that to be mostly true, I think the fans have been more accurate with the past three coaching selections than our GMs.
In 2001, we wanted Marvin Lewis but got Gregg Williams. In 2004, we wanted Charlie Weis but got Mike Mularkey. In 2006, we wanted Mike Sherman but got Dick Jauron. Somehow I suspect the fans will have been right with this one again.
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1999 seems so long ago.
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It was a fantastic game.
But I can't believe it's already been 15 years...
Who is representing Buffalo at Senior Bowl...
in The Stadium Wall Archives
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I can't see Ralph relenting from any of his coupons!