PolishDave

Are there still more cows in Wyoming County than there are people? Seriously?

I wouldn't think it would be career suicide for Whaley? I could be dead wrong about that though and I could be in the minority. I want a manager who makes the best decision for the roster, not the best political decision for himself. I wonder what the average fan reaction would be. I would think that the average fan is not overly impressed with EJ (could be dead wrong about that too) and therefore would not have any problem with drafting another QB. Career suicide?

Very smart move by him I would say. I was thinking he already hit the pinnacle of his career and was going to start on the downside. If this is a step down, it is about as small of a step as you can take. I predict the Bears will ultimately regret this move within a couple of years. But who knows?

Yes, I agree with you there also. I have been a season ticket holder for many years and I will be next year too regardless of what moves they make this off season. I think there are about 30,000 of us out there who do that (maybe a little less than 30,000). But the Bills don't want to go into a season with that low of a commitment from the fans. They want to sell 50,000 + season tickets like they did a few years ago. Obviously it would be ideal in their case to have a completely sold out season ticket holder base with a waiting list as there is in some cities. But that isn't realistic here. I assume they are going to try to do something to raise that 30K number up closer to 50k or 55k if at all possible. I just wonder "what" they are thinking?

Sometimes actions speak louder than words. There are a couple of regular posters on this forum who immediately jump into a conversation and start defending EJ the minute someone criticizes anything about him. Those very same posters claim that they are "undecided" about EJ. Yet based on the way they defend EJ to ends of the earth against any criticism whatsoever, it is apparent to me that they are very much not "undecided" about EJ at all regardless of what they say they are. You can call yourself "middle of the road" or "undecided" but your actions reveal your true underlying feelings and motivations. That is all I am saying. And I don't care if you like EJ or not or if you think you are "undecided" or not. That is up to you. Everyone is entitled to their own opinion. I am simply pointing out what I think that other poster might be thinking.

I agree with you, but that isn't going to help them sell season tickets going into the 2014 season. What do they do to cause fan optimism for the 2014 season?

To your point, I bet he gets tired of reading the same people saying how great EJ is going to be based on the way he played this year. That too is tiring when you believe the exact opposite. Just sayin...

I respectfully disagree. I can see how you would think that. But, I am convinced that the opposite is true. The NFL is an extremely successful marketing machine that is slowly( maybe not so slowly) spreading its influence across the globe and creating millions upon millions of new NFL fans every year. The product referred to as the (NFL) is a hugely successful American export that will continue to grow and expand its influence throughout our lifetimes I believe. To be clear - I think it is gaining in popularity here in the USA and abroad.

With all this talk on the board recently about which Qb the bills could/would take under the right circumstances, I wonder if this isn't the big sleeper surprise they will hit the fans with. Not necessarily Johnny Football but any of the big name quarterbacks who might be out there. If the situation presents itself, and the Bills did draft another Qb in the first, I think it would have the exact impact on ticket sales that the front office would hope for and I think it would have a hugely positive impact on the fan base. The reasoning would be that "This Bills Organization Is Committed To Building A Superbowl Caliber Team And Will Stop At Nothing To Accomplish That!" And it would be believable too. Having said all that, No I don't think they will do that and I don't know if one of the big QB names are going to be left at pick 9. But, it would shock the fan base who thoroughly expects the GM to pick anything other than a quarterback in the first round. It would sell more season tickets.

I agree that his contract was a problem. That was the mistake of Mr. Nix who decided to sign him to big money while he was on a hot streak. That was the real mistake right there. Had they not done that, they could have signed him at the end of the season to a very reasonable contract in my opinion. But they still could have kept him until they got a better quarterback. Yes they would have been paying him more than he was worth. But they still were under the cap. So they didn't have to let him walk. They chose to let him walk.

I listened to his interview with Murphy the other night. The wife and I started counting every time he said "Ya know". We were giggling the whole time because the when we first started counting, he was using the phrase "ya know" 9 or 10 times within each answer to each question that Murphy was asking. In a couple cases he used the phrase "ya know" like 3 times within 3 seconds. Ya know...well...ya know ya know.....that's the kind of thing we are trying to fix here. Too funny.... I forget which player used to do that. There was a guy here a couple years back who did that a lot during interviews after games. Except that player would really emphasize those words. He was like "Yuuuuuuu Knoooooow" and he would repeat it like that. He would say it really slow with a lot of emphasis. Whish I could remember who it was..... lol

Cutting a player when you don't have someone better to replace him with is stupid in my opinion. And making the assumption that "anyone is going to be better" is just as stupid. Cutting or releasing players like that are decisions made based on emotion which rarely end up being good decisions. I thought the job of a general manager was to improve the talent at every position as much as possible so that the coach is equipped with the best tools available to win as many games as possible each season. Isn't that what they teach at General Manager 101 classes? If you think that cutting or releasing a player without having a suitable replacement for him is a good idea, then you and I have drastically different ideas of what good managers do. You only do that when the players attitude is a cancer in the locker room. Which in this case was the exact opposite of the situation at hand. I believe that all you guys who are glad that Fitz is gone from this team are basing that decision on emotion only and not on logic.

Nice post. I like If - Then types of analysis. A couple of points I would like to add based on my own opinion only. 1)Kolb is going to be gone period. 2) If Bills draft a QB, then either EJ, Lewis or Tuel will get cut. 3) If at any point Tuel moved above Lewis or EJ on the ranking chart, then one of the lower two would be cut right away (probably EJ) 4) Human nature being what it is, I suspect that the coach will play EJ non-stop claiming he still has upside even if EJ flounders. I predict this because humans would rather prove themselves right than admit they screwed up and move on.

Even though it is a very unpopular position to take on this forum, I happen to agree that this team would be better off with Fitzpatrick on it. A lot of Bills fans hate Fitzpatrick because they put the majority of blame on him for how bad the Bills were last year. Admittedly Fitzpatrick didn't have a very good year. But, there is no doubt that he is head and shoulders more talented than anything on the Buffalo QB roster right now. So yes the Bills would be better off with him here. And in the supposedly "open quarterback competition" Fitz would likely would have won it easily. He would have started this team all year. It is quite possible that the Bills would have one at least one of those Patriot games given that Fitzpatrick generally played well against them. Heck, he was QB the last time the Bills beat the Patriots. I am not a huge fan of Fitz in all honesty because I think he is just an average quarterback. But, this team wins more games and has a shot at the playoffs if we just had average quarterback play. And I had no problem with the team deciding to get a new quarterback to replace Fitzpatrick, But if you are going to do that, it has to be an upgrade at quarterback, not a downgrade. Even the signing of Kolb was a major downgrade from what Fitzpatrick brought to the table even with his tendency to throw picks at the end of the game. You don't just fire players or fire coaches unless you have a better replacement to fill in for them. That was the one major mistake the front office made coming into this year in my opinion.

Super cool. Seems like a great kid. Bills players and personnel really seemed very welcoming to him. Good on them. Inspiring.

I would call him up to the podium, do a shot of whiskey with him, and the call someone else as my pick.

It's gonna be a hometown sweep Colts - Colts handily beat the Chiefs in KC a couple weeks ago. If they could win at Arrowhead, they can win at Indy. Look for repeat. Eagles - Saints are nowhere near as good on the road (coin flip game) Bengals - Bengals are monsters at home - Too bad they don't have home field throughout Packers - Rodgers shakes off rust and plays like Favre without the interceptions

Based on the interview Marrone just gave on the John Murphy show I think you are probably right. Marrone said the special teams this year has been good except for the Patriots game and one other play this year. That one remark alone degrades my impression of Marrone a lot (and I happen to like him more than most here probably.) Sorry coach, but if you throw out all the bad plays that players and coaches make before you evaluate them, then what is the point of evaluating them at all. Very disappointed in his stance on special teams. Why not throw out all of Ej's crap plays and declare that it was unfair he missed the probowl? Heck while you are at it why not throw out the plays EJ got hurt on and just say he was never hurt at all this season. The more I think about his remarks, the madder I get.

It was already public knowledge that Nix was stepping down and being replaced by Whaley. So there is no way that Nix would have been given the responsibility of deciding personnel for an incoming GM. It just is not plausible. No incoming GM is going to allow that to happen where they get handed some other guys junk the day before they take over. EJ was Whaley & Marrone's guy. They made that decision because they were in charge of that decision. The only reason Nix was still acting GM during the draft was so they could use Nix as a scapegoat if the draft turned out to be a horrible mess up. Rest assure that every player taken in that draft was primarily decided by Whaley and crew.

If there is enough backlash from the fan base I wonder if he will change his mind? It seems that every year the fans generally like to pick one person as a primary scapegoat in this organization and call for their heads. It is human nature (mob mentality really) that has existed since the time before Christ. Suppose the newspaper guys or NFL Channel guys start writing about how bad this special teams unit has been and start talking about how it makes sense to get a new guy in there? Suppose it starts to dominate the conversations on the Bills' own website and on the talk radio circuits. Do you think that forces his hand? Do you think Whaley and Brandon tell Marrone that the team needs to do this for the good of the organization? They need to sacrifice one of the goats so that the natives (fans) settle down? Isn't that what past coaching staffs in here have been forced to do? Give the little vampires (fan base) a little blood so they stay alive and keep coming back? Business is business and these coaches (even assistant coaches) know how the NFL works right? I wonder?

You might very well be proven right about your suspicion. Maybe he doesn't make a change. Or, maybe he is just tip-toeing on eggshells for the time being until he makes his final decisions. I can totally see him avoiding the topic for now, but coming back in a week or a month or more and saying that they have decided to make a coaching change at that position. Also keep in mind that if Marrone is truly smart (which I think he is) then he probably isn't going to say anything or hint at anything until he knows he has a better replacement lined up. That would be the prudent thing to do in my opinion. Hopefully he has already sent out feelers to other coaching staffs prior to now or will do so this week maybe.

Fair enough Bandit. But if you think that what the Bills front office does every year isn't "spinning" the truth. Then we will have to agree to disagree. I am firmly in the camp that even if the Bills fired every last good player and every last good coach on their payroll, they would still tell the fan base that "This is going to be the best Bills season yet baby! Wooohooo! Get psyched! Woo hoo!" Come witness a new era in Buffalo Bills history. Woo Hoo! Get my point? If you don't think they would spin it that way or if you don't think that actually is "spinning" then I certainly am never going to convince you otherwise.

I don't think anyone is disputing that the Bills want to be good? Are they? But if you don't think that the president of the Buffalo Bills isn't trying to sell kool-aid to the public then I don't think you know much about how businesses operate. Professional football is about politics and marketing as much as it is about playing football. One of the main jobs of management is managing fan perceptions. They have to manage perceptions of their customer base (Bills fans) as much as any company has to manage the perceptions of its customers. This is a business first and foremost that happens to conduct business in an industry called the NFL. Every single year without exception, the front office tries to spin their off season moves into being as positive as possible. They look for ways to reach out to the fan base and get them excited. That is their job. If they don't do that and do it well, then the Buffalo Bills don't sell out any games at all and the season ticket base would be below 30,000 year after year. They have to spin. They have to twist the truth. They have to pull the wool over the eyes of the fan base. There is a tremendous amount of lying and truth twisting going on almost on a level with national politics. I can't believe you can't see that. If you can't see that, then I can guess who you voted for in every presidential election in your lifetime.

I am also very happy and impressed with the moves they made in the veteran market and UDFA market with the exception of Kolb. I think that was a colossal mistake signing him at all. But I don't wish to keep beating that horse as it seems few other people on this board thought Kolb was going to be as bad as I thought. Being that the quarterback position is so essential to determining how your season plays out, I really fault them for not having a better starting QB in place for this season. Forget about having better backups. How about having a good starter to start with? And if they go into next season with EJ as the starter from day 1 (as I fully expect them to do) and EJ doesn't immediately show substantial progress over this year, then I will be extremely disappointed that they didn't find a way to put better talent in the qb position to start the season with. And that fault will rest squarely on the shoulders of Doug Whaley in my opinion. If that front office can consistently draft as well as they did this last year and continue to make good veteran personnel upgrades, then I fully expect the Bills will return to prominence in the NFL within a few years. It even could be as soon as next year if they could only get that QB thing somehow working. I can't wait to see what veteran moves they make and also what draft moves they make. Really looking forward to team building this off season.

My opinion of Pettine and of this year's Bills defense took a step backward after that Patriots game. However, I still believe he is one of the best defensive coordinators in the NFL. My opinion is based on seeing the Bills play against his Jet's defenses and after seeing him turn this Bills defense around in one year. It is undeniable that the Bills defense stinks against the too much of the time. In the other phases of the game that I consider to be most important such as pressuring the quarterback, I feel they are very good. Based on their sack numbers alone, it is arguable that this Bills defense is possibly the best pass rushing defense they have ever had. Pettine deserves a huge chunk of the credit for that. Remember Wanny had the same defensive line for the most part and could not stop the run or rush the passer. Pettine is more than half way there. This defense will get even better if the starters avoid injury and they add another playmaking linebacker. Out of all the changes that occurred this year compared to last, I think that I am most confident (out of all things) in the addition of Pettine as defensive coordinator.