BillsFan4

-RT would be very high on my list, and RG too if they insist on trying to start Ducasse. I really don't want to go through another season with Jordan Mills as our starting RT, and I Definitely don't want to go through a season with Vlad Ducasse at RG. Miller or Groy need to step up and take that spot, or they need to try and address it from outside the organization. -CB would be another position high on my list. I'm hoping someone can step up and take that CB#2 spot, but as of now I'm not really comfortable with anyone as the #2 yet. Probably best hope is EJ Gaines returning to his rookie year form but I wouldn't be banking on it. So if they can find any upgrades over what's on the roster, I'd love to see it. Possibly an upgrade at nickel CB too. -At least 1 WR, maybe 2 (especially if they cut Holmes for the comp pick, but I'm not sure they will. It may very well depend on what type of replacement they can find first). -Depth at LB, with an eye open for potential upgrades on some of our starting or 2nd string LB's as well (depending on fit and price). -S depth would be nice. Poyer and Hyde look good as the starters but it'd be nice to have more behind them. -Any other spot at the bottom of the roster that could be improved. The quality of depth players on this team is an area that is definitely lacking. Injuries happen. Any upgrade at any depth position would be welcome!

Hey, I like this trade by them! If they actually play him it could help push that 1st that they sent us a bit higher in the draft. lol

Does anyone know what the conditions on that 4th round pick are yet? I'm still hoping it can move up to a 3rd if Ragland plays a certain number of snaps this year and/or next year or something along those lines.

He really seems to be trying to build an entire cohesive organization with a single vision from top to bottom. I think that is something the Bills have truly been missing for a long, LONG time. It's been the higher ups (aka old Ralph Wilson cronies) vs the coaching staff (and even the GM) for what seems like forever. Something starts going wrong and the scapegoating would begin. Players weren't always acquired for the right reasons either IMO. We had marketing with their hands in the pie, trying to sell tickets (etc). Now all of that seems to be different, and it's what gives me the most hope. It's a very refreshing change from what has been the normal operating procedure at OBD for decades.

IMO Spikes is about as good a fit as Ragland was in this defense. May as well just have kept Ragland then, as he has more upside.

https://www.sbnation.com/2016/12/18/13351854/vontaze-burfict-history-cincinnati-bengals-asu-personal-fouls Some history on Burfict's dirty play

Are you normally a good, responsible employee and this was more/less an out of the ordinary one time thing? Or are you late often and considered a bit of a habitual offender? And are you normally pretty attentive during these meetings or do you occasionally fall asleep during them? (although I don't know if the report/rumors of Dareus napping are actually true) If it was my first offense, I'd expect some leniency. But if it is something I had a bit of a history of doing, it would be understandable if my employer sent me home for the day (and I've actually seen that happen before - someone get sent home without pay (which probably didn't even happen to Dareus)).

Yup, cause the Bills have been such a threat over the last 17 years that they needed someone from the outside to come in and sabotage them...lol. If the other owners really wanted to sabotage the Bills, they would have just tried to talk Pegula into leaving all of Ralph Wilson's old cronies in place... Is this actually a serious thread? If it is, there are some thoughts that really should just be kept to yourself!

I think it was just a joke. Look at the twitter handle - @CrazyGuyNotReallyOnTwitter. It doesn't actually exist. I think that poster was just having some fun.

He wasn't under contract for 2017 though. He signed a 2 year contract with Buffalo in 2015. While he was still technically under contract, it was set to expire. I guess they could have forced him to stay for a few more weeks (or a month or whatever it was) until his contract officially expired but they still would have had to sign him to a new contract for 2017 to keep him on staff. If they did offer him a job and he wanted to go elsewhere, there wasn't really anything Buffalo could do about it.

Ian Rapoport @RapSheet Teams knew early on in the summer that #Bills LB Reggie Ragland would be available. Buffalo was patient, waiting for the right value. Yup. It appears that most teams knew that Ragland wouldn't be a fit in this new defense. He seems like a very specific scheme fit, in a 3-4 like Rex ran and like they run in KC where the DC (Bob Sutton) was a long time Rex Ryan assistant. Sutton worked under Rex in NY for 8 years as a LB coach and defensive coordinator.

Good post. It also has to be said that Murray wasn't a Pegula hire. He was brought in by Lafontaine to be more/less a glorified scout, while LaFontaine ran the organization. Murray was never hired to be the one running everything. I think he also put himself on the hot seat, to a degree. He came in and said "rebuilds don't need to take years, give me 2 drafts", then he proceeded to trade away much of the draft capital that Regier had stockpiled. I think Pegula was sold on the patient approach and building through the draft by Regier, and when the results weren't there after Murray tried to speed things up, combined with his terrible asset management in trades and his gruff personality plus his end of the year meeting where he supposedly didn't have any real answers on how to fix all the problems the 2016 season showed, it ended up causing Pegula to move on.

Kyle and his family have a house in Louisiana that they spend the offseason at. My guess is that maybe his house had some damage from the hurricane.

This was a good read. http://buffalonews.com/2017/08/29/inside-bills-gm-brandon-beane-assistant-gm-joe-schoen-ready-chaotic-24-hours/ Inside the Bills: Beane, Schoen ready for a chaotic 24 hours. 'During the team’s mandatory minicamp in June, Beane had the whole personnel department, both college and pro scouts, get together. The goal was to make sure that the entire group was unified. “I've seen it where college staffs and pro staffs aren't gelled for various reasons – sometimes there's fingers pointing of, ‘you know, you pay these free agents or you guys aren't drafting well’ – things like that. We've had them cross looking at things. We'll involve our pro guys after free agency in the draft process just like we included the college guys in this part. I think it's important so that everybody sees everybody's work and understands everybody's pitching in.” That continued during training camp at St. John Fisher College, where the personnel department had a room to just “hang out, talk, B.S. about life,” Beane said. “We played hoops together. People saw the competitive side of guys. There were some moments when it got a little heated. But that's cool because everybody says 'man, if this guy wants it here, he's going to want it out there on the road. He wants to win. He'll do anything.' I really felt a great bond and the feedback we got back from the college guys as they left was super excited. So I feel great where we're at.”

http://buffalonews.com/2017/08/29/marty-biron-joins-sabres-broadcast-team/ Marty Biron joins Sabres broadcast team. Brad May out.

Burfict is a POS and quite possibly the dirtiest player in the entire NFL (and that's saying something). He has a loonnngggg history of dirty plays and trying to purposely injure opponents. I have zero pity for this guy.

Doesn't he have a home in Louisiana and wasn't that area hit by the hurricane?

I don't get why some put All the blame on McDermott for this anyway. A brand new HC. Whaley had at least a year, and in Gilmore's case 2 years, to sign these guys to deals. It was reported long before McDermott was even hired that Whaley was only willing to pay Gilmore $11.5M and that he wasn't even negotiating with a Robert Woods. He also put the original round tender on Hogan the year before (just like Gillislee got) and didn't match the Pats offer sheet. Very similar to what happened with MG... The cap situation and amount of free agents the Bills had Has To be taken into account too. They entered the offseason with $-9M in cap space and 26 free agents to sign IIRC. I believe they had the most free agents in the NFL. If you sign Gilmore for $13M and Woods for $7M, that's $20M in cap space right there...

There were posters here (and I'm still relatively new but I'm told that they are reliable and usually right) saying that McDermott tried to keep Kromer. He wanted him to stay. LA offered him a raise and Buffalo matched but Kromer wanted to go somewhere he had a chance at being an OC again and I guess he was told that was a possibility in LA. So once Krmoer chose LA, McDermott moved on to Castillo. I don't know if this is true or not, but it would make sense.

The Bills stand zero chance at winning the division. So the Patriots beating the Chiefs could potentially help the Bills in 2 ways - 1) higher draft pick from them, 2) they're in the AFC, we could potentially be competing against them for a wild card spot (unlikely though). So as much as I hate it, I'll be rooting for the Pats this one time as I just want whatever outcome is best for the Bills and the Pats losing seems to be it.

Wow. I like Stafford, but highest paid player in the NFL? Damn, that seems crazy to me. I'll be very curious to see the structure of the contract and guaranteed money. These QB contracts are getting to be insane. I can only imagine what someone will pay Cousins as a free agent, or even Brees (on a shorter term) if he makes it to FA. Edit - I just looked. $27M per year cap hit and $92M guaranteed! Wow!

They brought in a guy who will have all of 2 days to prepare for a (mostly meaningless) 4th preseason game, and someone who they will almost surely drop as soon as a Tyrod and Yates are better. You don't think it makes sense to bring in a QB who already knows how to run the system when they have 2 days to prepare him to play?

They are looking for a guy who can come in an play in this scheme 3 days from now. They are not practicing today, so this QB has Tuesday and Wednesday to prepare for Thursday's game. He will likely be cut as soon as Tyrod and Yates are healthy. This makes perfect sense.

It's still a 4th round pick, so the odds of hitting on it are that of a typical 4th round pick. Just because people say that it's equivalent in value to a 5th round pick this year doesn't make it a 5th round pick in the actual draft.

Murray kind of did that to himself IMO. He traded away a ton of good, high draft picks to speed up the rebuild and flat out said as much. He said rebuilds don't have to take years. He said "give me 2 drafts". Had he just been more patient and used all those 1st and 2nd round picks he traded away, Pegula probably would have been more patient IMO. Plus, him being such a jerk didn't help I don't think, especially since LaFontaine hired him, not Pegula.