LA Grant

Just an example of how emotional and impulsive fans can be with this stuff. Wade was run out of Buffalo because of a gaffe he made during an interview segment on Monday Night Football. The Bills were injured and limping but still technically in the playoff hunt but Wade said they were probably out of it. They finished 8-8 that year and he was let go. The better option would have been for Wade to stay put, learn his lesson about not sticking your foot in your mouth, and continue on. But no, Wade was fired along with John Butler and in came Tom Donahoe and Greggo and the drought began.

Jerry Sullivan should be thankful for CTE or he'd be the #1 worst thing about professional football.

His name on the stadium should've been taken down a looooooong time ago. Turns the idea of "honor" into a joke. There really is no good justification to keep it up. If it were up to me I'd take it down today.

Wade is a major factor in their success. He called a great, great game today against New England. I can't stand the Broncos franchise but I'll be rooting for Wade as a person.

Funny, the Eagles fans I've talked to about Schwartz in the last few days are not thrilled with his (potential) hiring — mostly due to that the last time they ran a Wide 9 under Jim Washburn it was very weak against the run. Luckily for them, Schwartz's Wide 9 defenses are great against the run because he puts so much focus on it. For me, personally, I think Schwartz will do well there with their talent.

He has a lot of the attributes I think we'd want in a #2 or #3 WR. That BR article hypes you up for him definitely, seems like he only lost out in GB b/c they wanted faster WRs... seems like teams just can't get over his bad 40 speed. Teams are sometimes stupidly myopic about things like that, and Boykin could definitely be productive. I like that he has an existing relationship with Tyrod and is known for his run blocking, too. Hope he works out.

Of course! That is almost certainly what they will do, too.

I would like to see them change back to the blue & yellow rather than the dark blue and muted gold. I bet they will, actually.

This is great! A respected guy like Ed Reed will absolutely make sure all players are totally bought into the Rex Defense.

Golden State Chargers has a nice ring to it, I think.

That's how I see it too. Hughes is an idiot but if it were up to me Vontaze wouldn't be allowed to play.

Great piece. Ty Dunne is the only sportswriter worth a damn covering the Bills at the moment.

This makes sense. I bet this exact scenario is what management is thinking.

True, he's not a vocal leader, but "role model/teacher" is a leader. You need many leaders in a unit, and you need leaders within each position group. Gilmore's leadership has already proven to have a HUGE impact — Darby. And both of them said how important it was to his overall development, with Gilmore mentioning how difficult it was for him to learn the position without any veterans on the team during his first few years. So I don't think that should be overlooked. And I disagree on the last point. Darby is not better than Gilmore, at least not yet. I 100% agree with you on the tackling. The team as a whole needs to get better about this, but certainly this is a weakness in Gilmore's game. I don't think he had many PI/Holding penalties this year though. Anyway my overall point is — to not extend Gilmore would be a huge, huge mistake. A guy who's just entering the prime of his career at age 25 and is absolutely a Top 5 corner in the league and you're talking down his value? Y'all are being foolish right now.

I don't really know so honest question — isn't LeBeau's zone-blitz philosophy pretty similar to what Rex does? Lots of disguised pressure, things like that? I remember the one year LeBeau helped out Greggy was one of our best defensive years during the largely pathetic '00s.

Huh? I was saying Darby is not better than Gilmore, but one of the reasons Darby is as good as he is, is in large part due to Gilmore. In other words, Gilmore's an elite corner based on his play alone but he's even more valuable to the team based on his leadership. I will go as far to say as Gilmore is our Defensive MVP.

Is Freddy healthy? What's up with him?

I think Gase will be an upgrade for them. Would've loved to have seen it go to Marrone.

Gilmore is absolutely elite and, along with Hughes and Dareus, our best defensive player. Probably better than both of them considering CB is the toughest position and he's on an island. His comments should be encouraging. The dude puts a lot of work in and was huge with bringing Darby along this year too. Gilmore is great. Disagree. Also I think Gilmore had a lot to do with Darby's development, Darby said as much.

Well, the success on offense this year was due to Rex then, too, by that measure. Ultimately, he's .500 as coach of the Bills. I just think it's ridiculous to assume because he's got a fun-loving personality that it means he's somehow not focused as a coach or putting in maximum effort. When players do charity work for the team during the season, which they all basically have to do, does that mean they're not focused on the game? That's an hour they could've spent working out or watching film! Outrage! No one is saying Rex is perfect, he definitely isn't, but then again few coaches are. Compare Rex's focus to Marrone, who wasn't even aware that Hughes was benched during last year's Green Bay game.

I think Rex would agree with you that he was horrible this year and screwed up this defense, for whatever that's worth. This season was his worst year statistically for a defense and it wasn't for lack of talent. It seemed like a bad, prolonged meshing period. I think your theory here as well in your thread about the playbook make sense. Veterans like Mario have had a different coordinator every year since being here. The defense would've been better off with continuity but that ship sailed when the Pegulas chose Rex, or more specifically when Schwartz resigned after meeting with Rex. But starting over doesn't do anything but set everything back once again so staying with Rex, at this point, is the best move. He's a smart defensive mind and he'll figure it out. I think.

Agreed. It's possible for people to be funny AND smart. It's why I think calling for coaching sacrifices are generally misguided. Rex knows what he's doing with defense. His losing records with the Jets were generally due to the offense. We are fortunate to have Tyrod and Shady and Roman. I'm very confident the defense will bounce back with force next year.

This quote came to mind for me immediately as well. Anyone who questions Rex's commitment to film would be advised to read Collision Low Crossers — it follows the Jets for an entire year (the 2013 season) and you realize just how much time theses guys put into working the film.

Damn, Tyrod has style in spades. And they should put a restraining order on Vic Carucci so he can only ever report from the parking lot, where he belongs.