SoTier

Well said, Alphadawg7.

On a team that had a pass-first offense under supposed coaching genius Chip Kelly for 2 of those 4 years ... hell, that offense even made Nick Foles look like a top QB for a while, and Pederson runs a pass-first offense too. On the Bills, Foles has only been able to play in 10 games with 25 catches for 284 yards and 1 TD. If the Bills can let Hogan, Goodwin, and Woods walk and trade away Watson, why on earth would they want Matthews even if he is "cheap"? Shell out $50 for a winter coat at Walmart rather than $200 for one at LL Bean and see which one keeps you warmer at 10 below.

Why is it "Reboot time"? Despite the big deal made about all the changes at OBD, the Bills have pretty much managed player personnel the same crappy way they have for 17 years: let talented players walk rather than pay them and replaced them with high draft picks and scrubs. Face it: the Bills desperately needed to replace Stephon Gilmore, so they couldn't take a QB then even though 2 good prospects were still available. How many other times in the last 17 years have the Bills passed on more talented players because they "needed" to replace a DB, WR or RB they got rid of? What's so special about 2014?

I have no idea who is the culprit in the Bills FO but unless the Bills figure out how to "afford" to retain the decent players they draft, they aren't EVER going to make the playoffs. It's not like they're drafting busts; ex-Bills are scattered all over the league, many of them starters, some of them Pro Bowlers, most of them key pieces of playoff teams, including Super Bowl winners ... but they either weren't "good enough" for the Bills or they were "too good" for the Bills to afford to re-sign. How can that be when the Bills are not paying for a franchise QB or a marquee DE or a super WR? Aside from Dareus, Glenn, and Clay -- and maybe McCoy -- I don't believe any other of the Bills vets are making top money for their positions. Taylor certainly isn't. The Bills couldn't afford to keep Hogan in 2016 or either Woods or Goodwin in 2017. They sold the Watkins trade to many of the gullible on the assumption of "they wouldn't be able to afford to sign him" in 2018. They couldn't afford to keep Gilmore or Gillislee or Zach Brown either. How are they going to sign any veteran players above the veteran minimum if they have a QB who will be demanding $20+ million a year (likely $30+ by 2023)? Hell, even high first round QBs like Winston and Mariota currently make nearly $7 million a year on rookie contracts.

What has Matthews done to merit even being brought back? Find somebody better. ^^^ Again, you refuse to face reality. Watkins is a good WR, maybe even a great one which he might prove to be if he stays in LA with Goff and McVay. You can't blame Watkins because the Bills traded up to get him, never ran a pass-first offense, and have failed to draft a franchise QB since 1983. Every time the Bills decide to shed another blue-chip player, they hint at this and fans grab it up and run with so that it becomes "FACT". Pity the poor Bills! They can't afford to re-sign most of their best players ... even though they aren't paying a franchise QB or even a premier DE. If they actually do find and develop a franchise QB, which seems highly unlikely, they're going to have to let him walk after his rookie contract or totally gut the team around him to keep him. Neither solution seems promising for the future, but keep applauding the Bills for their "foresight".

"Zero patience"? With a team that hasn't managed to get into the post season in 17 years? With a team with exactly 2 winning seasons in those 17 years? The Bills have been perpetually "rebuilding" since 2001 ... and they are have gotten nowhere. I'm not impressed by Jauronball 2.0, however much you think it will be solved by dispensing with Tyrod Taylor and replacing him with a rookie QB.

Well, that's only if you ignore facts, sweetie ... Sammy Watkins has 184 receptions, 2984 yards, and 29 TDs in 4 seasons, 3 with the Bills ... but carry on pretending the geniuses at OBD know how to build a winning team -- or are even interested in doing so.

Has the phrase "you get what you pay for" EVER occurred to most posters here? I know that the Bills don't really care about winning as long as there's butts in the seats, but fans who want to win can't have it both ways: a veteran player is "cheap" because he sucks, and if you think the Bills are going to win more than 7 or 8 games a season by filling the team mostly with rookies and cheap vets, you've obviously been playing Rip Van Winkle for the past 17 years.

Keep telling yourself that. How are the Bills going to replace the players they shed and didn't replace this year when they're undoubtedly going to shed more players in the coming off-season? They don't have enough draft picks to fill all the holes they created even if every one of their picks is a difference maker, and if they decide to trade up for a QB, they'll have a lot fewer anyways. They won't add expensive FAs but will round up more career JAGs, STers and PS refugees and call them "quality players". It's the essence of Jauronball 1.0 just given a shiny new paint job for 2017.

Plain and simple, the Bills WRs this season are not NFL caliber. Aside from Benjamin who has played 1 game plus 1 series of another game, none of them would be starters on any other NFL team ... if they even made the team. Holmes is a career STer. Thompson was a street FA when signed by the Bills.

How, exactly, will you know that you have "an above average QB" if he doesn't have protection or targets? When he goes elsewhere and shines like so many other ex-Bills have done in recent years?

It's Jauronball 2.0. Replace most talented players with JAGs, career STers, and PS refugees and pretend they're "just as good" because they "buy into The Process" while adding 1 big name "star" to con fans into filling the stadium ... rinse and then repeat ... ad nauseaum.

You're wasting your time pointing out facts to Shady. Some posters with agendas don't let the truth deter them from spreading their propaganda. Why fix what's not broken? It's Jauronball 2.0.

The Seahawks already had a talented team when they went without first round picks in 3 drafts, dude! They weren't trying to build up talent on a team that's full of JAGs, career STers, and PS refugees. Oh, and they haven't been quite so "fine" either. Russell Wilson, another QB the Bills could have taken but chose a WR bust instead, is like 80-90% of their offense and the only reason they don't have a losing record this season.

The Bills HAD "speed guys" ... the three of them are now playing in LA and in SF. Obviously, speed and sure handedness aren't part of the "skill set" that the Bills brain trust want.

How would having a "good QB" -- or even "any QB" -- fix the play calling unless the Bills get a twofer deal ... a new QB and a new OC?

I'm done "cutting the Bills slack" about anything. The supposed purpose of an NFL team is to win football games, but that obviously isn't what the Bills are interested in. If it was, the best Bills players wouldn't be scattered around the NFL on teams going to the playoffs while the Bills are loaded down with JAGs, career STers, and PS refugees yet again. Since the Drought started, if you include Wade Phillips (he coached 1 year during the Drought), the Bills haven't really suffered from bad coaching except for Jauron and Ryan. Phillips has been successful as a HC and even more successful as a DC, and Gregg Williams went to win a Super Bowl as New Orleans' DC. Mularkey, Marrone, and now Lynn appear to be solid NFL HCs ... Chan Gailey, like the others, didn't do a bad job as a HC but he was hampered by his team's lack of talent. Fans like to scapegoat coaches for the team's failures, but I think the Bills' problems go higher up the corporate food chain. Too many bean-counting accountants with other agendas than winning football games have made -- and continue to make IMO -- too many key decisions that impact whether the Bills have the talent to win football games no matter who their coaches are. So, Mike Mularkey stays on the list of the coaches that got away, just like Antoine Winfield is the first name on the list of outstanding players that the Bills let get away even if he left more than a dozen years ago.

Define "good coach". If you mean a HC with the reputation of being a good HC around the league and a winning record elsewhere in the NFL (like an Andy Reid or John Fox) before the Bills hired him, you have to go back 39 years to the hiring of Chuck Knox in 1978. Since then the Bills have hired either retreads (Levy, Phillips, Jauron, Ryan) or NFL neophytes (Stephenson, Bullough, Williams, Mularkey, Marrone, McDermott). Gailey actually had a winning record as an NFL HC in Dallas but he had been coaching in the college ranks for more than a decade when the Bills hired him, so he wasn't quite a retread but also not quite a newbie, either. He certainly didn't have the reputation of being a good coach around the NFL at the time he was hired. The only two who worked out were Levy and Phillips, and only Phillips had success both before and after he left the Bills, although he's probably best as a DC rather than a HC. Mularkey, Marrone, and Lynn seem poised to create a new category of Bills HC -- the good ones the Bills let get away. Good leaders pick good subordinates and let them do their jobs.

Why do you assume that? Have you even watched the Titans or Jags? Both are as flawed as the Bills in their own ways. In fact, outside of NE and Pitt, there are no really good teams in the AFC. The AFCW winner might be 8-8.

Again, you can't really say that because he hasn't done particularly well as a rookie, and even if he did, that doesn't mean he's going to continue to improve to become an accomplished pro WR. Unless they are really, really bad, it takes 2 or 3 years at least to determine if most players are keepers or not.

Old Time AFL Guy: that article was really poor. Is the author a Texas or Nebraska fan by chance? He offers no real substance for his prediction except mainly that Mayfield is short and will likely win the Heisman Trophy. Obviously, the author has never heard of Drew Brees, Russell Wilson or Kirk Cousins, all of whom fell out of the first round because they were deemed "too short/too slight" to be NFL starters, and have still found success. As for the Heisman Trophy winners coming up short in the NFL, that's an exceptionally stupid argument. The Heisman is awarded on collegiate achievement not on suitability for NFL success. Most QBs who get drafted into the NFL, even those taken in the first round, wind up disappointments, and the divergence of the college and pro games has made that even more likely. Even college QBs who have "all the right metrics" for NFL success frequently crash and burn. PS Since I don't follow college football, I have no preference for any collegiate QB ... it's just that the article was so bad. PSS When I tried to quote your post, that article messed up my reply format for some reason, so I didn't use it. I don't know if that's a general problem or something loopy with my browser.

We'll see. If the Bills shed most of the rest of their higher priced talent (Clay, Glenn, McCoy, Incognito, Taylor, Williams, Wood) in the off season, I think you'll have your answer about how "unfettered" Beane isn't because it will be the same kind of thing that they did in 2017 before Beane was even hired.

The only problem I have with the Bills going 9-7 and losing a playoff tie-breaker is that they miss the playoffs ... and that's likely because of one of the numerous poor decisions made by the Bills FO and/or coaching staff. Bringing Taylor back for 2018 and taking a QB prospect in the first or second round would be much too sensible for the Bills to ever do, so you don't have to worry your pretty little head about that for the next few months. OP: If a team signs a player off another team's practice squad, they have to put him on the active roster. That means that a player currently on the Bills roster gets cut. Who would you suggest get the axe (specific player or position) so that the Bills "scouts" get a closer look at some kid who wasn't good enough to make any other NFL roster all season? This is given the fact that the new QB won't know the Bills playbook, and that the starting QB gets about 80-90% of the coaches' attention and the backup gets almost all of the rest. What is to be gained by doing this now? This is something that the Bills might consider in March when the new league year starts, but not now. Look how long it took Garoppolo to get up to speed for the Niners ... and don't tell me that he wasn't given a whole lot more attention by the coaches than any PS refugee could even hope to get.

Why? The Bills have a fifth round rookie QB who does not appear to be ready to play in the NFL, so they should replace him with a PS QB from another team who would be even less ready? Or are you suggesting that the Bills replace Tyrod Taylor with a PS refugee?

Every violation of the rules is not a "character flaw". College kids drink. They smoke pot. They go out and get rowdy, and sometimes run afoul of the law. As long as they don't make that kind of behavior habit, then they likely will grow out of it and go on to lead normal, sober adult lives ... just like most of us stoned rock n rollers from the 60s did. Heavy drinking and drug use by young professionals, whether athletes or not, in their late twenties and early thirties when they should be focused on their careers and/or families is far more serious even if it was/is "only" rumor, especially when twenty or thirty years ago bad behavior by professional athletes was often covered up or ignored even by law enforcement. I just think it's as unfair to condemn collegiate athletes for occasionally engaging in petty misconduct common to the student population as it is to ignore/mitigate much more serious actions, whether legal or illegal, they might engage in that indicates they might have serious attitude/personality problems. Agreed. They will take one even if he's not all that good just to say they took one. I just hope they don't trade up to take one just to take one like they did for Losman.