Dan

The preseason means nothing and the regular season means next to nothing. Its the playoffs that matter. That's why Jauron is still keeping the real plays under wraps. He doesn't want to tip his hand before the divisional round. He's smart like that.

I'd imagine Belicheck would say the same thing now as well. But I'm not sure that translates into willingness to coach here as much as it is willingness to come here and win a football game. I'd take a credentialed guy like Holmgren any day. Not so much because it means we win (or even have a shot at winning) the Super Bowl, but because it could bring us back into relevancy, i.e. the playoffs. After a couple of playoff seasons then we could discuss is he the guy to get us to the SB. Small steps.

BillsVet, if I may, the criticism that you and several posters like you have faced has more to do with how you make your argument not so much the argument itself. You seldomly, if ever, say anything positive about the team. Every post, in every thread is a negative comment about the FO and/or HC. Someone can start something as trivial as an "I like this player's shoes" thread, and your contribution will be along the lines of "yeah but the FO is a joke for blah, blah, blah...". Myself, and many others, agree that there are serious problems with the FO, with the HC, with the team. However, occasionally, they do do something right. No one is ever 100% wrong in every instance. And that is precisely what your posting history consists of... pointing out in every instance bad decisions. Please, don't take this as a personal attack. I have no beef with you, I appreciate your opinion. More often than not, your opinion has been highy accurate. However, the way in which you state your opinion tends to dilute its message. If the Bills draft someone that's a bad pick and you state it, you'll receive criticism. But, only because you state all the picks are bad, all the moves are bad, all the decisions are bad. So, in a way, it tends to fall on deaf ears after a while. Kinda like... "oh BillsVet doesn't like the pick, well, duh, he doesn't like anything they do". I guess all I'm saying is although you may be 100% right, don't be surprised that people don't rush to suport you and not because they disagree with you, but mostly because they've stoped listening. If that makes any sense.

This is all one of the primary reasons I don't care to watch basketball. I've tried. I really have. But, every time I try, I see stuff like this. Refs just seem to make up calls at will. And you're right, Shaq was about the worst to watch. Now, I don't realyl watch SportsCenter, but you'd think this would be some huge scandal reported all over the place. IMO, it dwarfs the steroid issue. Sadly, the NFL seems to be heading down this same road. They have entirely too many "judgement" calls that the refs get to make now. There's not a game that you watch that at some point or two or three you're asking yourself "WTF was that?". The game announcers even readily admit they don't know what roughing the passer is anymore.

Is this the 2nd or 3rd time this season an opposing defender made the same comment? It's pathetic that all the fans can see it, the defenders can see it, the TV commentators can see it; yet we keep running it.

Marv's team was loaded with future HOFers. They knew how to play. The current Bills have no idea how to turn it on when they need to. They're coached to be relaxed and they play relaxed.

Practice would help?

Bingo. We have a winner. It's an old cliche for a reason: you practice how you want to play. The Bills practice soft; they play soft. Result - they look weak on the field and get beaten up, literally. Anyone watching the game heard Gannon's opinion about Jauron's practice schedule. You don't give players the Friday practice off. But there's our coach, giving players a day off just 2 days before he's about to give them a week off. So there they are on a pretty Sunday afternoon, running at half speed, just going through the motions with visions of their vacation in their head and BAM! someone smacks them upside the head.

Once again Jauron shows us exactly why he shouldn't be here any more. First, having big, slow DTs dropping back to cover small, fast WRs is just dumb. Someone should be fired and banned from attending any NFL games for life for even considering that as a viable defensive "scheme". So, Jauron gives TO Friday off!?!!?! He's got a QB with 2 starts under his belt. An offense struggling to even resemble being professional, let alone find a rhythm. And you give your guys days off just before they go into a bye week! Infrggincredible. Another brutal game to remind us all just how bad they can be.

(I'm paraphrasing, of course.)

I read your last sentence, then glanced over to see the poster... and noticed the avatar pic. Brilliant! It summed up my initial reaction perfectly as I read that.

I know. It's tough to sift through all the hatred and crap being spewed.

Has there ever been a thread with so much misinformation in it? Uuum.... the Bills only play 7 regular season games a year in their stadium, not 16. That may or may not go back up to 8 games in a few years. We just recently went 13 years without a Monday night game. We're now 3 years running with a MNF game; however, this year it was a road game. So, no guarantees that the advertisment gets seen on MNF. This year's other prime time game is in Toronto. So, any advertiser expectingto get national prime time spotlight would be SOL this year. Again, with a team like the Bills, there's no guarantee that your advertisement gets a national spotlight. That's actually not a bad idea at all. I believe this inaccuracy has been addressed. Jerry Jones even turned down the money because he didn't like the deal. And he's a billion dollars in debt. Apparently, all NFL owners don't agree with your assessment that a crappy deal is better than no deal at all. Yes, because we should only honor people or recognize their life achievements AFTER they die. What a great world you must live in. My guess is no one will care.

I'm sorry, but when has Ralph ever threatened to move the Bills?

I've wiped quite a few computers in my day and re-installed all, for a variety of reasons. My advice, before doing so, download all the drivers for all the various components first. Then copy them to a CD or USB stick. Actually, I would do this for any computer I owned. The easiest way to make sure you get everything back up the way it was is to go to the My Devices and double check all the hardware and drivers. In the few times I haven't been able to do that. I just google the laptop brand and model and can usually find all the drivers that are supposed to be installed in short order. So, its still just about as easy. So, I'd say getting everything to work properly on a laptop with a new OS install is usually pretty easy. Worst case scenario, it may take you a day to do it if some of the hardware is atypical to that model.

You obviously missed the point of his rant. He's already written Ralph off as having moved the franchise years ago because he hasn't sold the team for a buck fifty to Kelly with the promise that the team will forever stay in Buffalo - even if Kelly sells the team again in 5 years. See basically, either Ralph does something right now to absolutely guarantee the team stay in Buffalo for another 50 years or he sucks and has no loyalty. Understand the beauty of the arguement now?

//hanging head in shame// Yes, yes, I do.

And, for the most part, I agree with you. However, as I alluded to just prior, how do we really know there's a local investor that's actually capable of buying the team. Ok, yes, Ralph can sell it at a discount. But, even 10%-15% off market value for the Bills is a hell of a price tag. Does someone really have that kind of money that has also approached Ralph and said here it, let me buy the team? Also, we have to consider the league. What's to say the league hasn't told Ralph he can't discount the price of the team more than a certain percentage. Let's not forget, the league has the final say in who buys the Bills. Maybe the only serious interest he's gotten has been a group from LA? And Ralph really is doing the right thing by not selling and giving a local investor ttime to get the funds. We really just don't know.

Firstly, I think that the financial burden of buying an NFL franchise brings can change the way an owner feels. Do you think any of the teams that have moved, moved because they didn't like the city they were in or because they wanted/needed to make more money? I don't think a Kelly-backed group would want to move the group. However, the financial reality may force his backers into a decision that Kelly has no choice but to accept. Bottom line, any new owner will have to make quite a bit more money than Ralph currently does due to their much larger debt. Secondly, do we have any solid evidence that someone like Golisano or a Kelly-backed ownership group has the money or interest to actually buy the team right now? Everyone keeps saying sell it to Kelly. Well, where's Kelly's money? Where's his backers? Where's anything more than Kelly dropping cryptic hints at oppurtune times? How are we to know that Ralph didn't sit down with Kelly and discussed it, only to realize that Kelly's group is woefully unprepared at the moment to buy the franchise? Bottom line, here, is that we have no idea who has legitimately approached Ralph to buy the team.

Agreed! Another horrible decision by the league, IMO. The Pro Bowl now becomes just another of the Super Bowl spectacles. Not to mention, a large number of the league's best players won't be participating in the game nor any of the stupid little challenge things they do. As meaningless as it is, I enjoy it all. The season is over, you know football is done. So, its become my one last chance to see some of my favorite players for a while. Yet another reason Goodell is an abomination of a commissioner.

What I just don't get is how does selling the team guarantee that the Bills stay in Buffalo? There's absolutely no guarantee whatsoever that a new owner will keep the team here. Regardless of what they say, they'll be buying something that leaves them 100's of millions of dollars in debt. They'll do whatever they can to make money. Ralph has owned the team since its inception and has said that as long as he's alive, the Bills will be in Buffalo. That is the only sure way to guarantee the team stay. Period. We have an owner that has promised to keep the team in Buffalo as long as he's alive. So, what do people want? They want him to die so some unkown person can buy the team and do with it as they wish. How does that make any sense? It doesn't. So, everyone's upset about the quality of product on the field. And rightfully so. But booing Ralph during a HOF ceremony does not send a message that you're unhappy about the Bills' play. It sends the message that you're unhappy about Ralph making the HOF. There's a time and place for everything. And a ceremony honoring a person's lifetime achievement is not the time nor the place to boo the present. It's a time to honor him for giving us a reason to cheer, and cry, for 50 years. There's plenty of oppurtunity to boo Ralph for the Bills' current state of affairs. Heck, there's a smart guy that's taking donations to put that message on billboards. There are plenty of other avenues to state your dislike of the current state of the franchise. It would be far more effective to pursue one of them. I've said it before, and I'll say it one last time, I read threads like this and it's like listening to some spoiled little brat kid pissing and moaning about their parents. How much they hate them. How unfair life is. Because they wanted a new Porsche for their birthday and all they got was Mustang. Whaaa... whaaaa Mommy and Daddy have so much money, they should give it all to me, me, me. Pathetic.

For all the people that complain about the lack of quality journalism or reporting.... read the above linked article. A very good read, Tim (and this from a guy that tries not to read).

Although huddling up may have helped the line get their heads in the game regarding the snap count, the Bills' no huddle was not a hurry up offense. In other words, it did not lead to less time of possession - that is yet another falsehood that is rampant on this board. week 1 - Bills -22:52 Pats* -37:08 week 2 - Bills -29:33 Bucs -30:27 week 3 - Bills -26:26 Saints -33:34 week 4 - Bills -22:51 Fins -37:09 week 5 - Bills -31:34 Browns -28:26 week 6 - Bills -39:03 Jets -33:13 week 7 - Bills -25:20 Pants -34:40 source: nfl.com In the no huddle, we lost TOP in 3 games, won TOP in 1 game, and 1 game was essentially equal. So, 3/5 or 60% of the games we lost TOP. In the last 2 games we huddled up, but only had the TOP advantage in the first game. So, 50% of our games we lost TOP. Yeah, yeah, not enough games, stats are flawed, did I watch the games, all of that. But, the end result is the same. The Bills did not run a hurry up no huddle; they routinely hiked the ball with 10 seconds or less on the clock. Hence, they did not lose TOP in every one of their games. However, I do believe going back to a huddle offense has helped the offense the last two weeks. The line seems to be much more on the same page and making fewer fundamental mistakes. But, I there's no reason to think it's given them an edge in the TOP statistic.

Breaking down QB play is really hard in the NFL.

Agreed. I say playoffs or bust. I don't care what the record is - playoffs or bust.