SoTier

IMO, it doesn't matter. If you can't get the QB you like/want, then you pass and try again the next year. If you take a first round QB, you are basically prevented from taking another first round QB in the next four years whether he's a hit or a miss, so make the right pick. Only in rare cases (like Manziel) is a team going to give up on a first round QB within a year or two.

#1: This is totally untrue. What the Bills had been doing since Bill Polian was fired back in the 1990s was putting making profits ahead of winning football games. After a poor start, it seems that the new ownership has committed to bringing winning football back to Buffalo. That means that the Bills aren't looking to "make do" with another cheap QB prospect as they had in the past, but the reality is that since they don't have the #1 pick (and aren't likely to be able to acquire it), they don't have their pick of whatever QB they want. The Bills may only like 1 of the top 4 or 5 QBs well enough to trade up for him, and if he's gone, what would you have them do then? Invest multiple first round picks in a QB that they view as a marginal first round prospect just to have a first round QB on the roster? Or draft a second tier QB prospect in the 2nd or 3rd round to be at least an upgrade over Peterman and maybe more if they get lucky? FTR, Jones and Peterman were Day 3 projects. Nobody is suggesting that. The discussion here has been about Day 2 (rounds 2 and 3) QBs who might make good "backup plans" like Mike White. Second rounders Andy Dalton and Derek Carr and third rounder Russell Wilson were all good enough to start from Day 1 as rookies. #3: I don't follow college football but everything I've read about Allen reminds me of JP Losman. He seems like the kind of marginal first round QB who has "bust" stamped on his forehead, and I'd prefer that the Bills pass on him even if he were available at #21.

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Agreed. The chances of the Bills getting "their guy" at QB in 2018 seem to be pretty slim. Everything needs to fall perfectly, and that's a tall order, so they need to have contigency plans. If you're going to pick a "consolation" QB, then do it in the 2nd or 3rd, not waste a 1st on a QB likely to be a backup or a low level starter. Maybe lightning strikes and you get a Russell Wilson or Drew Brees or even a Tom Brady. If not, it's relatively easy to part with a 2nd round disappointment and move on.

If the Bills can't get the guy they want -- and that's very likely given where they sit in the draft -- it would be stupid to settle for a consolation prize QB that they really didn't like that much just to draft a first round QB. Why is the concept that drafting a first round QB just to draft one is a stupid move such a hard concept for you to grasp? Taking a Day 2 QB isn't ideal, but it's better than investing in a marginal first rounder or not taking a QB at all. And Nathan Peterman is not a Mike White clone. White is a Day 2 prospect, and rounds 2 and 3 have yielded some decent QBs in recent years. Peterman is barely a Day 3 prospect, starting with his lack of an NFL arm.

I have no problem with the Bills deciding to use their first round picks on other positions and take a QB in the 2nd or 3rd round. That strategy worked great for Seattle in 2012, and pretty well for Cincinatti in 2011 and Oakland in 2014. With more and more colleges moving away from pro-style offenses, there seems to have been an uptick in the number QBs outside the first round who have some success. You can include Cousins and Prescott who both came out of the 4th round (Day 3) ... and perhaps include Foles and Keenum, too.

That's not what I said at all. I said drafting a first round QB was risky, but that drafting a QB who was the #1 consensus pick was a pretty safe bet. I also said that trading up to draft a first round QB, especially in a year like 2018 where there's no clear consensus best QB, is even riskier. I also said that the Bills have drafted QBs in the first rounds in the last quarter century for the wrong reason: to put butts in the seats -- and that's cost them big time, primarily in the lost opportunities to draft QBs who could have actually helped them win games: Aaron Rodgers (2005), Jay Cutler (2006), Joe Flacco (2008), Teddy Bridgewater (2014), and Derek Carr (2014) -- all useful QBs who were better than Losman or Manuel. Keep in mind that when a team drafts a first round QB, they aren't going to draft another first round QB for about 4 years unless said QB is a bust like a JaMarcus Russell or Johnny Manziel. I hope you are right. Like the OP, I'm not opposed to trading up a few spots to take Mayfield, but I don't think it's possible for the Bills to get into the Top 4 short of sacrificing too much for a QB who's more likely to bust than not, which would likely be Rosen. If Jackson was available at #21, I'd take him (not at #22!). I don't know if I'd spend a first rounder on Allen or Rudolph. In case you missed it, that team was so good it overcame numerous injuries to key players, including their starting QB, and won the SB with a backup QB. .

While this is true, the reality is that the draft is such a crap shoot, even at the top, that trading up is probably not going to be a winning proposition for most teams that do it even for a QB. QBs who are the consensus #1 pick are about as close to "can't miss" picks as possible; they hit at about 80% since 2000. Even QBs drafted in positions 2-4 fail almost 50% of the time while QBs from 5-32 hit at about 25%. Except for Wentz, teams trading up for QBs outside the #1 pick have found duds instead of studs over the last 15 years, including JP Losman (2004), Mark Sanchez (2009), and Robert Griffin III. This year there's not even a consensus #1 QB, so drafting a QB is even more dicey, and trading up is nothing but a crap shoot. This is the attitude that has resulted in the Bills' failure to find a good QB for a quarter of a century. Drafting a QB in the first round just to draft one is a flawed strategy because sometimes there just isn't a good one available (EJ Manuel in 2013). Trading up to do that is even stupider (JP Losman in 2004). The Bills need to approach drafting a QB with the primary goal of winning football games, not to placate fans to sell tickets, which is what they've done in the past. The Bills missed on a trade up in 2004, the Jests missed on a trade up in 2009, and Washington missed on a trade up in 2012. Well, if I win the top prize in Powerball, I'm set for life, too.

These folks need to be in PA complaining about the fracking waste facility since that's where the facility would be located, and it would operate under PA environmental laws (such as they are) and possibly under federal environmental regs (good luck with getting those enforced by the current regime). FTR, PA law allows fracking waste to be stored in open ponds which practically guarantees that the fracking chemicals will either spill or leach into local water supplies. With that in mind, the waste treatment plant seems preferable to leaving it the way it currently is.

2 firsts or "2 firsts and maybe a little more" to get a chance at a non-QB? I wouldn't, not even for a pass rusher. Even to get a QB, I'd have to be guaranteed that my QB was there, so it would have to be when the trade partner was on the clock ... unless it was the #1 pick of course.

Okay, then who would the Bills sign? It's easy to pretend that the Bills can upgrade the QB position with some cheap unnamed FA QB, but when you start putting names to "veteran FA QB", the picture looks very different. You don't like Moore or Henne, then what about Teddy Bridgewater? Mike Glennon? Josh McKown? AJ McCarron? Geno Smith? Trevor Siemian?

The argument about Tyrod not being able to mentor a young QB because he's not a conventional QB is nonsense. As others have said, teaching young QBs is the job of coaches, and to paraphrase Brett Favre, who was at best unhelpful to Aaron Rodgers, "It's not my job." Tyrod Taylor isn't Kurt Warner. He's also not Eli Manning. The reality is that if Nate Peterman had played better, benching Taylor for him would have never been an issue. If the rookie QB plays decently when given the opportunity, then it's a non-issue. It only becomes an issue if the rookie QB isn't good enough ... as JP Losman wasn't in 2005.

How is having a Matt Moore or Chad Henne playing ahead of a rookie QB "creating the best situation for that rookie"? Are you suggesting that the Bills need to insure that the veteran QB on the roster is absolutely no threat to their "future franchise QB"? In that case, the Bills should just reprise 2013 and start the season with Peterman, the rookie QB, and a practice squad refugee. That guarantees that the rookie QB will be starting before mid-season and saves a ton of cap space to boot.

Cry me a river. Well, the disaster that was the Bills in 2013-2014 is a cautionary tale for teams (and their fans) who think sending a veteran QB packing to save a few $$ because they plan on drafting a QB in the first round.

I agree. I'm shocked that the major Interstates in this country aren't perpetually littered with the wreckage of Jerseyites who insist on cruising along in the left lane at or just below the speed limit.

Mea culpa. I mistakenly called the Stone Age people who built Stone Henge and the other stone circles scattered around Britain Druids, but they came much later. The recent theories about Stone Henge is that it was used in solstice celebrations. Without assuming that the Earth was spherical, the ancient astronomers would have never been able to so accurately predict solstices and eclipses because they wouldn't be able to mesh their celestial observations, calculations, and predictions with any other model. It may have been that the priest castes saw the idea of a flat earth as being a metaphorical explanation for the masses, which is also similar to what happened in early Christianity. Most historians accept that the Bible, especially the Old Testament, is an historical document which relates events that happened in the area of the Fertile Crescent before most of the people living in the region had written language (like the ancient Israelites). History isn't science, however.

This is blatantly untrue. Any and all of the peoples who were either seafarers on the oceans or astronomers had to accept that the Earth is round in order to navigate out of sight of land and to calculate solstices and solar eclipses. That includes peoples as diverse as the ancient Polynesians who colonized the Pacific, the Druids, the Mayans, and the Vikings. Furthermore, the Bible is not a scientific document, and that position is supported by Christian denominations representing more than half of all Christians. You are "an educated man" only in your own mind, sir, even if you have collected a library wall full of college degrees. Your knowledge and interpretation of history, especially intellectual history, is erroneous, Euro-centric, and more than a half century out of date. You have also demonstrated a sad lack of critical thinking, including an inability to evaluate the quality of sources.

I just think it's foolish to penalize a QB for being short when the other parts of his game are first rate.

NASCAR doesn't allow numbers to be retired. The teams "own" their numbers as long as they actively use them, but if they don't use them on a car for a specified period of time, it goes back into the hopper to be used by another team. After Richard Petty retired in 1992, his many fans wanted NASCAR to retire his #43 but Petty Motorsports had to put it on another team in order to keep it. Historic #43 is currently driven by rookie Darrell "Bubba" Wallace, Jr, who finished second in last week's Daytona 500.

I think this was the plan at the draft that got derailed by Glenn's injury. The Bills haven't had a good pair of bookends at OT in forever ... it's why the Bills need to keep Glenn if he's healthy however tempting it might be to trade him. Unless they need to use him to move up to get the QB they want, I wouldn't like that they traded him. I agree except for the OTs. See my thoughts above. Glenn's foot is either going to be fixed by surgery or it's not; for an OLer, it can't really be allowed to be a chronic condition. So, if Glenn comes back healthy, his health isn't a factor. Neither is his age since most OTs can play into their mid/late thirties these days. More importantly, while Dawkins played well as a rookie, he didn't play LT as well as Glenn does when healthy. He may also be physically better suited to play RT than LT (since he was originally drafted to play the right side). I think the entire OL except Ducasse struggled adjusting to Dennison's blocking scheme, which suggests that none of them are particularly physically well suited to it, so they would probably all benefit from a switch. Resurrecting Miller would be a major win for the Bills because they could then concentrate on adding youngsters at guard/center to eventually replace Incognito and Groy. Ducasse was a bust as a second round pick of the Jests, and has bounced around the league since as a backup guard. He didn't suddenly improve because he moved to WNY. He improved because his linemates struggled. Killing starlings, house sparrows, and monk parrots (all non-native species) is okay. Others, no ... although you may feel differently if a family of crows decide to nest in your neighborhood. You got that backasswards, sir. Having a good OL makes all but the most incompetent QBs better, and it can make a good QB more successful than a great one.

Well, what if the Bills only like one QB, and they can't trade up high enough to grab him because he went #1? Are you one of those who just wants a first round QB and any of the ones the pundits like will do?

Well, it seems to me that you're claiming the right to do what you want to do but you are denying the OP that same right. As somebody else said, if you don't like the topic, then don't bother with it. Sheesh!

You are not being realistic. The Bills don't have the cap space to sign Cousins without creating more holes that they wouldn't be able to fill except through the draft, so signing him would preclude the team improving over last season except at QB. You simply cannot count on hitting on all your Day 1 and Day 2 draft picks, especially when you're drafting in the bottom of each round. Minnesota isn't going to let both Keenum and Bradford leave in FA and keep Bridgewater whose knee may or may not hold up to playing full time. More than likely, they'll pay Keenum and either let both Bradford and Bridgewater leave or keep Bridgewater. In either case, neither QB is a good candidate for a "bridge QB" because of their bad wheels. However much you don't like it, none of the other available FA vet QBs are as good as Taylor has been when he's had a decent OC and some targets. That includes both McCown and Fitzpatrick. A team cannot assume that any first round rookie QB will be good enough to start immediately ... or at all during his first season. That means that a team needs to have a competent QB who can start for anything from none to all the games. That's not the likes of Trevor Siemian and most of the cheap FA vets. Keenum might but I don't believe he leaves Minnesota. I would think the rest of the FA vets would struggle to get the Bills to even 8 wins, primarily because they tend to produce significantly more TOs and NONE of them are any more "clutch" than Taylor. I feel the exact same way about Bradford which is why I don't want the Bills to waste resources on him. The ONLY reason Bradford hits the FA market at all is his knees.

the start time for the NASCAR race has now been moved up to 12:30.

Excellent post. In a previous life, I was a middle school science teacher for a few years, so I like all science (well, astrophysics is pretty hard for me to get my brain around), and paleontology and evolutionary biology are the most fascinating for me.