SoTier
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Posts posted by SoTier
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I think the blame for the Bills' horrendous record from 1970 through 2014 rests squarely on the shoulders of the late Ralph Wilson, Jr. He was the constant through that entire period, and he was an active owner. Wilson's success in the AFL with winning championships on shoestring budgets seemed to have colored his attitudes towards running the team, and he was always cutting corners to save money, preferring profits to wins.
All during the 1970s and 1980s, the Bills drafted poorly and often failed to sign the good draft picks they did make: OJ Simpson held out into the regular season I believe; Tom Cousineau went to play in Canada rather than play for the Bills; and Jim Kelly preferred the Houston Gamblers of the WFL to the Bills. The coaching staffs were abominations. Except for Lou Saban in the mid 70s stint and Chuck Knox in the early 80s, these guys were even worse than the coaches since Wade Phillips left.
Low attendance finally forced Wilson to put a "football guy" in charge of the team. That would have been Bill Polian, who actually brought the Bills organization up to modern day standards. However, Wilson and Polian had a falling out, and Polian departed for Indy.
Polian imperfectly understood how to manage the salary cap, but his astute eye for talent overcame that. John Butler and AJ Smith were Polian's proteges, and they kept the Bills talent pool alive for a few years after BP left. When they left to build a powerhouse in San Diego in the early 2000s, there was nobody in the Bills organization who had a good understanding of how to manage the salary cap while maintaining talent ala New England, Pittsburgh, and Baltimore. Actually, there was nobody at OBD who could competently manage the salary cap OR recognize talent, as the team's crappy record from 2001 through 2014 demonstrates.
The Pegulas have only had about 2 years of ownership, and they didn't make a good start with falling for Ryan's BS. Hopefully, they'll learn from their mistake.
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Listen, you are making total sense and I agree with you but it appears that in this and other posts on this thread, you are giving Marv Levy a pass.
The truth is that Levy hand picked Jauron. They both shared the opinion that the secondary is the most important part of a football team. Levy admitted that he turned down multiple trade offers for the #8 pick in 2006 so he could draft Whitner. The 2006 draft destroyed this team for many years and it was Levy's baby, his first draft as GM.
It is easy to understand why Levy gets so much room here and has for many years. As a coach, Marv was great at keeping the huge egos in check, something that must have been hard to do. But he was a horrible GM, maybe even worse than Whaley. That bad.
I'll admit that I may be prejudiced since I like Marv and absolutely detest Jauron as easily one of three worst HCs the Bills have had (Ringo and Bullough being the other two turds). Levy was part of the "GM By Committee" where the Bills really didn't have a GM, but he seemed to be largely a figurehead for the group, which included Brandon, Modrak, and Jauron. My gut feeling is that Levy didn't exert much influence on who the Bills drafted or signed as FA, and that Jauron dominated any discussions.
Whaley was definitely better than Levy and that rest of his group. So were Nix and Donahoe. The sad state of the Bills' talent (or, truthfully, lack of talent) at the end of the 2009 season makes that easy to see.
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2010 NFL Season Preview:
Veteran Additions:
OT Cornell Green, DE/DT Dwan Edwards, ILB Andra Davis, ILB Reggie Torbor.
Draft Picks:
RB C.J. Spiller, NT Torell Troup, DE/DT Alex Carrington, WR Marcus Easley, OT Ed Wang, DE/OLB Arthur Moats, DE/OLB Danny Batten, QB Levi Brown, OT Kyle Calloway.
Offseason Losses:
WR Terrell Owens, WR Josh Reed, TE Derek Fine, OT Jonathan Scott, G Richie Incognito, DE Aaron Schobel, DE Ryan Denney, SS John Wendling.
Read more at http://walterfootball.com/offseason2010buf.php#sTEJWLy3I2pJGIgL.99
The veteran players the Bills added were pretty much trash, but the players they lost were also about the same level at that time. Except for Owens and Incognito, none of the others were ever regular starters for other teams after they left the Bills. The draft didn't yield much but Spiller, Carrington, and Moats were modest successes. Spiller might have been much better in a different situation. IIRC, Moats played in 2016 for the Steelers.
As for the others:
- Terrell Owens was at the end of his career and had only one good season, 2010, after he left the Bills. He had 72 receptions for 983 yards and 9 TDs in 2010 ... with Carson Palmer throwing him the ball. With Ryan Fitzpatrick pitching behind the Bills unreasonable facsimile of an OL, do you really think he'd have done as well?
- Josh Reed signed with the San Diego Chargers but was released before the start of the 2010 season.
- The highlight of Derek Fine's career was catching a TD pass from Trent Edwards in 2008. He went on IR in September, 2009. He was waived by the Bills, by St Louis, and by Houston all before the beginning of the 2010 regular season.
- Jonathan Scott bounced around the NFL -- Detroit, Buffalo, Pittsburgh, Chicago, Atlanta -- as a backup OT, and not a particularly good one.
- Richie Incognito was a good one who got away but apparently something he did/said offended somebody at OBD because he was another one of those players that the Bills FO wanted gone no matter the cost.
- Aaron Schobel retired after he was released by the Bills and no other NFL team offered him a contract.
- Ryan Denney signed with Houston in 2010 but was waived by them during the 2010 season.
- John Wendling was a good ST player who went on to make a Pro Bowl as a ST player. However, that was the best he was.
IIRC, the 2010 draft was the last one with Tom Modrake's participation. I believe he was fired in 2010, and that's when new scouting and evaluation staff were added. Was he the sole reason the Bills' draft sucked? Unlikely, but he was probably part of the problem.
One of my big problems with the new regime is that some of the sins of the previous regimes seem to have continued which would indicate that they originate higher up the corporate food chain than GM/HC.
- As others have noted that the Bills have what amounts to a tradition of shedding their best DBs rather than paying them and then using first round picks to replace them. Even going back to pre-salary cap days, the Bills had a penchant for drafting DBs in the first round.
- The Bills also seem to conveniently have "leaks" about players being on the trading block or being difficult or "not wanting to be here" -- often in out of town media -- in preparation for sending that player packing, either through trade or release. Negative rumors or even actual articles surfaced in regards to McGahee, Losman, Schobel, Evans, Lynch, Peters, and numerous others. It's why I found the supposed "rumor" of Watkins being available for trade to have some credibility: the Bills have been there before. Maybe I'm just paranoid, but I worked for almost a decade for an outfit where nobody paid any attention to formal announcements but tuned into every rumor on the wind because those always contained far more truth than anything coming from the FO.
- Drafting for need is a blueprint for disaster. It's totally short-term thinking, something that the Bills have excelled at for nearly 20 years, going back to the disastrous 2000 draft when they took Erik Flowers. Passing on better talent just to take a body at a position of need gave the Bills Donte Whitner, John McCargo, Leodis McKelvin, Aaron Maybin,and EJ Manuel. If the talent is about equal, then going for need is fine (ie, Marcell Dareus rather than AJ Green), but passing on Brian Orapko for Aaron Maybin is beyond stupid. Hopefully, the Bills didn't screw themselves over in the 2017 draft but that remains to be seen.
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Marshawn Lynch. Lee Evans. Jason Peters. Aaron Schobel, Byrd, Fred Jackson-there was talent on those teams. They went 7-9 every year. Nix couldn't even get to the seven win mark. His body of work was below average. The 2010 offseason was one of the worst in the team's history. Extension of Kelsey, Fitz.Whaley was average at best. Nix-16-32. Whaley-30-34. Neither good enough.
Pesky things, facts.
None of these players were on the Bills for most of 2010:
- Marshawn Lynch was traded to Seattle on October 5, 2010.
- Jason Peters was traded to Philly before the 2009 season.
- Aaron Schobel's last season was 2009.
As for the others, the reality is that they weren't all that great.
- Fred Jackson, however much he was beloved in Buffalo, was, in fact, a journeyman RB. That he was the Bills starting RB in 2010 just underscored how talentless the Bills roster was.
- Lee Evans was an okay WR but never a top one. As the thirteenth player take in his draft year, he was a disappointment. On most teams, he wouldn't have been the #1 WR.
- Jairus Byrd was a genuine talent, but he was one player out of 53.
Who else did the Bills have in 2010?
- Spiller was a rookie.
- Wood was a sophomore slowly coming back from a broken leg.
- Others who were good/decent players included Kyle Williams, Whitner, Stevie Johnson, Posluszny, Kelsay, and Fitzpatrick.
Most of the players on the Bills roster that Nix and Gailey inherited weren't NFL caliber players except possibly on special teams.
The 2010 off season was hardly "one of the worst" in team history. Fitzpatrick wasn't extended in the 2010 off season but during the 2011 season when the Bills were in a big hurry to lock him into a contract in case his price went up ... just like they agreed to extend Jauron in 2008 after they beat San Diego. Both were likely done at Ralph Wilson's insistence.
2009 was much worse as the Bills extended Jauron despite the disaster of the 2nd half of 2008, drafted Aaron Maybin, traded Jason Peters (and getting fleeced royally by Andy Reid), and lost OT Langston Walker because he refused to play LT. Do you consider signing Terrell Owens and selling 55+K season tickets as balancing all the negatives ... or even coming close?
These posts drive me crazy; this has been a failed organization since 1999. You can rationalize past efforts, laud them, make excuses, whatever, but talent acquired does not mean squat! Do you win and are you still playing in January consistently offers the final grade!
Somebody asked me a question about GM/HC combos, and I answered. Thinking that NIx/Gailey were the best of a poor lot doesn't mean that they were any good. They at least helped the Bills get a better talent foundation going forward rather than further depleting it or just treading water.
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Chuck Knox teams were very good. He should have been kept. Top coach in NFL at the time
Agreed. He'd have given Belichick a run for his money in the current salary cap era because the Bills used their own self-imposed salary cap back then, so he made do with a minimum of stars and a lot of journeymen. IIRC, he left because the Bills wouldn't give him more leeway in acquiring more talented players.
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After Shaq had to get his surgery and Ragland went down, there was no way Whaley was gonna let J-will sit if he could practice. There was already enough complaining about his drafting injured players.
There's a big difference between drafting a player with an injury in round 1 (Lawson) or round 2 (Kouandijo) and drafting one in Round 5. Most fifth rounders will be lucky to stick as ST players.
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Nix and Gailey produced a terrible record of 16-32.
They started with NOTHING in the talent department thanks to Jauron and the GM-By-Committee. Brian Moorman, the Bills punter, was like the only Bill to make the Pro Bowl during Jauron's reign ... and that was because I think there was still a rule that every team had to have at least one representative. If all you go by is the record, then yeah, they were awful, but from where they started and where they left, the team improved greatly. If you had actually watched the Bills play during the Jauron era, you would understand what I'm talking about. Unfortunately, I had season tix back then and got to watch the disaster in person.
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...just curious and yes it IS hindsight....who in that lineup gave you confidence during those eras that the schneid was done?......I will offer my opinion (JUST an opinion) as well................
I bought into the Donahoe/Williams, Nix/Gailey, and Whaley/Marrone. I even bought into Jauron as HC for a while until I realized exactly what he was doing to the team.
In hindsight, I think that Nix/Gailey was the best of a poor lot since Butler/Phillips in 2000. Thanks to Jauron, the Bills by 2010 were probably as talent-less as an expansion team. Nix improved the talent immensely, and Gailey managed to get that crew to win a few games even though they didn't have a defense and a limited offense with Fitzpatrick at QB. Nix's only major faux pas, IMO, was trading Marshawn Lynch, and my guess is that that may have been ordered from higher up the corporate food chain. I think the Bills had decided to get rid of Lynch in 2009 before Nix became GM, which is why they drafted Spiller.
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Initially I'm hoping for a coach that was nothing like Rex but Jauron kind of was. Jauron was humble and emotionless while Rex was arrogant and didn't stop talking. Both didn't really work out.
Perhaps fair but firm, cautious without being conservative, and more discipline. Hoping to see a solid foundation built this year.
Are you serious????
Oh, geez, RR was a buffoon who was a lousy NFL HC so let's go back to a walking cadaver who was an even worse NFL HC! There are probably at least a half dozen current NFL HCs you could wish McDermott could be like, and dozens of retired ones who at least had winning records!!! How about hoping McDermott could turn out to be another Belichick without BB's penchant for cheating? Maybe Pete Carroll? Maybe Andy Reid? How about Tom Coughlin without the anger management issues? Mike Tomlin? Even younger guys like Adam Gase from Miami or maybe Jack Del Rio from Oakland?
Jauron???!!!! Chan Gailey or Doug Marrone would be infinitely better choices than that soulless cretin Jauron who has to rank among the absolute worst HCs the Bills have ever had, and that's including the likes of Jim Ringo and Kay Stephenson. BTW, don't confuse reticence with humility. With Jauron, it was his way or the highway, as witness how he drained off virtually all the Bills talent in order to fill the roster with compliant special team caliber players while sending bonafide talents packing (ie, Jason Peters among others).
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I'm not sure what you mean by "nostalgia" somehow "wearing off". Maybe you mean the connection between current fans and those rapidly aging memories ... there's an entire generation of younger fans to whom names like Kelly, Thomas, Reed, and Smith are merely legends because they never saw them play except on YouTube clips. It's what happens as people move further away in time from any event important to them, whether it's the "Glory Years" of a football franchise or some important historical event (like the US entrance into WW I, which happened 100 years ago this year).
The 1990s teams will always be the benchmark that Buffalo Bills teams are measured against until such time as the franchise approaches or surpasses those teams. Unfortunately, that doesn't look likely to happen in the foreseeable future.
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For all you Tyler Perry/Madea fans, just in case you missed it, you can purchase your very own copy of Madea's Family Reunion on Amazon video for $4.99 ...
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What specifically makes you say this? They are certainly different than the Ryan regime.
Oh, I don't know ... maybe because as Bills fans we've been down this road before? Donahoe and Williams back in 2001 ... GM by Committee under the nominal head of Marv Levy and Jauron in 2006 ... Nix and Gailey in 2010 ... Whaley and Marrone in 2013 ... If you could resurrect all the pertinent posts on TBD and BBMB from when those combos were all new and shiny (ie, May/June of their initial years together), I'm sure you'd find at least as many posters "being all in" with those combos as with McDermott and Bean these days.
You can cheerlead for the new regime if you like, but I'm skeptical that I'll be happy with them come December. Only 10 wins or a playoff berth will make me "all in with the new way of doing things", and I don't see that happening ... or likely to happen in the foreseeable future since the "new way of doing things" has too many disturbing echoes of "the old way of doing things".
If things truly change, ie, the Bills start winning football games, then I'll gladly eat crow, but I doubt I'll have to be prowling food.com for crow recipes any time soon.
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Bar has been low for far too long.
It certainly has been as evidenced by all the comments in this thread gushing over the latest Bills regime. Apparently, for many Bills fans, fresh faces in the FO and on the coaching equals "vast improvement", and they're "all in" with the new regime even before a single game has been played. I hate to point out to all you admirers of the Emperor and Empress's new wardrobes that their new togs look just like the old Emperor's ones repeatedly did at the same points in football year calendar.
For me, the more I read and hear about the new regime, the more skeptical I'm becoming that it is going to be any different from all the previous failed regimes.
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Marshawn Lynch.
You don't have to let him walk. Not sure why this needs repeating. Its called the franchise tag.
Thank you.
They also traded away Jason Peters, All Pro left tackle at the time and in the future, for a late first rounder (not even Philly's higher first rounder) and a couple of other picks because of a contract dispute ... when they didn't have anybody to play LT, not even a body. IIRC, Jauron tried to force Langston Walker to switch to LT, and he refused, so he was axed. Eric Wood was the late first rounder, and Andy Levitre was the 2nd rounder but they refused to pay Levitre, and he left for Tennessee I think. A decent center and a journeyman guard are hardly worth an All Pro (and likely HOF) LT.
If you want to go back to ancient Bills history, consider that the Bills traded away a young QB, Darryl LaMonica, in 1967, for an older journeyman QB (Tom Flores) and a WR . LaMonica, "The Mad Bomber", went on to become one of the most exciting QBs of his era and took Oakland to multiple playoff wins and a Super Bowl. Flores lasted less than 2 seasons as a starting QB in Buffalo.
Getting fleeced in trades is a Bills tradition. The better the player the Bills are peddling, the worse deal they're gonna make. Chuck Knox and Bill Polian were the only ones who were successful traders for the Bills.
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Dumb if true. Billsy.
My prediction, if they trade Watkins for a pick they will use that pick for a.... WR or RB. Billsy.
Quintessential "Billsy". Buy high and sell low is how the Bills roll!
Even more Billsy: the Bills trade Watkins for a late second rounder who turns out to be a journeyman WR or RB, and Watkins goes on to have a HOF career.
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For the draft picks to stick the coaching carousel has got to end.
If you don't see improvement this year the media will start their undermining articles, and by the second year end will be calling for a change. That's how they do it here.
First of all, when 8 of 30 first and second round draft picks over more than a decade are outright busts -- they were essentially useless for the Bills and every other NFL team -- how is this a result of "the coaching carousel"? If they were good players, they could have been traded or they would have been picked up and gone on to have solid NFL careers with other teams. None of them did. The first and second rounders who left the Bills who went on to have good or great NFL careers for other teams had good or great careers for the Bills, too. That says that the Bills have had serious problems with talent evaluation since at least 2000. If they can't hit on first and second rounders as often as they should, then they're not likely to have a lot of success finding talent in the lower rounds, either.
Secondly, the Bills have continually let many of their best talent -- some of them bonafide Pro Bowl and All Pro talent -- walk rather than pay them the going rate for players of their caliber or sent them packing because they didn't demonstrate proper submissiveness to the aims of the football geniuses at OBD, and then the team has had to use draft picks to replace them. That's not on "the coaching carousel", either. I'm sure that Marshawn Lynch, Jabari Greer, and Chris Hogan all thank the Bills FO for their Super Bowl rings BTW.
Finally, if the sniping of jackarses in the media has much influence on coaches' tenures in Buffalo as you seem to think it does, then that's yet another indicator that the real cause of the Bills' failures over the last 17 years can be found upstairs at OBD rather than in the locker room or on the field. "The coaching carousel" is simply a manifestation of the incompetence and dysfunction in the FO that has existed since at least the departure of Butler and Smith in 2000, and which may go back further to the departure of Bill Polian.
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Just about all local and/or regional retailers like Kobackers, Sattlers, Hengerers, JN Adams, AMAs, Hills, Ames, etc from everywhere around the country are long gone as well as many national retailers like Woolworths, Neisners, Montgomery Wards, etc. Likely soon to be gone from malls near you are many currently familiar names like Sears and JC Penney.
I noticed from an article in the Buffalo News that Macys has left most of the malls in WNY. In fact, there have been a lot of articles recently about all the problems retail stores, especially department stores in malls, have been having. It's a consequence of changing trends in retailing, which happens fairly regularly in the retail industry.
There's also a lot of doom and gloom about shopping malls in general because of the problems in retailing. Mall foot traffic is seriously diminishing. When I go to the Chautauqua Mall, I go for specific stores: Jo-Ann Fabrics, Office Max, and this kitchen gadget store -- or the restaurants. When I go to the McKinley Mall, I don't actually go into the main mall but to its outlots: Pier One and Olive Garden. The last time I was actually in a mall just to "window shop" was probably four or five years ago to the Summit Mall in Erie, PA. I do my "window shopping" on line, and I think I'm more in mainstream these days than my friend who never shops on line (doesn't even have a computer) and regularly shops at malls.
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I use Intellicast on the PC and 4Warn Weather on my phone, preferring Intellicast because it's more specific to Jamestown and the Southern Tier. 4Warn will give weather alerts for Jamestown & Chautauqua County, but its forecasts seem more geared for the immediate Buffalo area, and Jamestown is 80 miles south. In some parts of the country, there might not often be all that much difference in climate over 80 miles but in western New York/northwest PA it is because of the lakes, especially Erie, and the changes in latitude and elevation. It's most noticeable during the winter, of course, because of WNY's lake-effect snow storms but you can see it in temperatures, first and last frost dates, etc. The lakes and hills create lots of microclimates. My gardener friends in Dunkirk/Fredonia can grow lots of plants I can't on my hill in Jamestown.
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When I worked in suburban Albany, NY, we had a moose on the loose in the area just west and south of our site. It didn't actually invade our parking lot, but it was playing in traffic on the nearby expressway during morning rush hour and caused a major traffic jam as DEC (Department of Environmental Conservation) staffers tried to herd it to a safer area. Smacking a deer with your car is bad enough ... smacking a moose is likely to be terminal. They weigh about a ton and stand like 6-8 feet tall at the shoulder I think.
I worked for the local community college here in Jamestown, and we had migratory Canada geese nesting and raising broods on our pond every year. One year one of the young geese had a deformed wing that prevented it from flying. The family wouldn't abandon the handicapped goose, so they wouldn't have migrated south in the fall, so when the geese were moulting and couldn't fly, we had a "goose round up" to catch the handicapped one and send her to a nearby nature preserve (where she's still living), and her family would be able to leave on time with all the rest of the migrants. We had probably 50 people, and it was still a hilarious disaster. Luckily, nobody gotten bitten.
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You realize almost 70% of players drafted miss right? My biggest problem with your list is the high draft picks we used and later let walk whom were good that sets everything back further and further. You have to waste more high picks to replace them. See Gilmore... the cycle goes on and on.
http://www.dailynorseman.com/2017/4/12/15274148/most-nfl-draft-picks-are-busts
My list of major misses was for first and second rounders, the supposed blue chippers, not Day Three scrubs destined to spend their careers playing special teams if they stick at all. All teams miss on high picks on occasion but I don't think winning organizations regularly miss at the rate of 27% (ie, more than 1 out of 4) on first and second rounders. Moreover, I didn't include any of the first rounders in that group who most consider "disappointments" like Whitner or McKelvin but just the guys whom everybody considers busts. Frequently gambling on drafting guys with physical issues in the first and second round -- sometimes even trading up to get them like the Bills did for McCargo -- is plainly a stupid strategy ... like counting on winning Power Ball to fund your retirement.
How Is having to draft DBs with regularity in the first round to replace the good ones the Bills let walk not just another example of FO incompetence? The Bills have been shedding top class DBs with regularity long before the rookie salary scale came along. The Bills started that when they let Antoine Winfield, their 1999 first rounder, leave for Minnesota where he was a Pro Bowler several times.
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Just another good college head coach that couldn't cut it in the NFL. Seems to happen alot.
That's because winning in college ball is 99% about school name and recruiting success. Successful big time college coaches collect and stockpile talent, blow out conference weak sisters and run up the scores against modest programs like UB or Ball State so that the idiots who produce the collegiate rankings are suitably impressed with the teams' awesomeness ... and proud alumni donate millions to stadium renovations, weight rooms, scholarship funds, coaches salaries, etc.
The failure of big name collegiate coaches crashing and burning in the NFL goes back decades, probably at least to the 1970s. It's become even more noticeable with the salary cap leveling out the talent among pro teams. When big name collegiate HCs try the NFL, 99% of them fail because they have to be good, smart coaches with sound game strategies. There are no UBs or Ball States for the Oregons or Alabamas to overwhelm on talent alone since the talent difference between the best and worst NFL teams is only marginally different. Moreover, since pro players have years to hone their skills and knowledge of the game, they're a whole lot smarter than college kids, so NFL game plans on both side of the ball are much more sophisticated. The few collegiate HCs who prosper in the NFL tend to be like Pete Carroll -- guys who already have NFL HC experience.
In Kelly's case, his "system" really was a gimmicky one. He won a lot of games in Philly while defenses were figuring it out, but once they did, that was all she wrote for Kelly in the NFL.
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That was a great game.
I haven't been a hockey fan in a whole lotta years since the Sabres have been about as pathetic as the Bills and I just put the game on because nothing else appealed to me, but I'll probably watch the Finals now.
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I have perennial gardens to weed at home and the remainder of my veggie garden to plant at my camp (tomato, eggplant, and pepper plants).
On Monday, if it doesn't rain, my neighbor and I will attend the Jamestown Memorial Day Parade and the wreath laying/flag raising ceremonies at Lakeview Cemetery. Her grandson's paternal great grandfather is being honored for service in World War II at the ceremony. We'll probably attend the ceremony even if it rains.
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agreed. the issue isn't retaining them its picking players worth retaining
I totally agree. The idea that the Bills' low talent retention rate is because of anything except the product of FO incompetence doesn't fit the facts. The Bills have sucked at drafting, especially in the first two rounds, since John Butler and AJ Smith left for San Diego after the 2000 draft. It has absolutely nothing to do with changing coaching schemes sending lower round picks packing.
The Bills have drafted the following in the first and second rounds since 2001:
2001: 1- Nate Clements (#21), 2- Aaron Schobel (#46)
2002 1- Mike Williams (#4), 2- Josh Reed (#36)
2003 1- Willis McGahee (#23), 2- Chris Kelsay (#48)
2004 1- Lee Evans (#13), 1 - JP Losman (#22)
2005 2 - Roscoe Parrish (#55)
2006 1 - Donte Whitner (#8), 1- John McCargo (#26)
2007 1 - Marshawn Lynch (#12), 2 - Paul Posluszny (#34)
2008 1 - Leodis McKelvin (#11), 2- James Hardy (#41)
2009 1 - Aaron Maybin (#11), 1 - Eric Wood (#28), 2 - Jairus Byrd (#42), 2 - Andy Levitre (#51)
2010 1 - CJ Spiller (#9), 2 - Torrell Troup (#41)
2011 1 - Marcell Dareus (#3), 2 - Aaron Williams (#34)
2012 1 - Stephon Gilmore (#10), 2 - Cordy Glenn (#41)
2013 1 - EJ Manuel (#13), 2 - Robert Woods (#41), 2 - Kiko Alonso (#46)
2014 1 - Sammy Watkins (#4), 2 - Cyrus Kouandijo (#44)
2015 2 - Ronald Darby (#50)
2016 1 - Shaq Lawson (#19), 2 - Reggie Ragland (#41)
The outright busts: Williams, Losman, McCargo, Hardy, Maybin, Troup, Manuel, Kouandijo. That's 8 total wastes from 30 picks in Rounds 1 & 2 between 2001 and 2014, which is almost 27%. That, boys and girls, is abysmal drafting.
One striking thing about the list is the number of players who had physical questions about their health when they were drafted. Mcgahee, McCargo, Troup, Kouandijo, and Lawson all fit that category. Of the veterans, only Mcgahee worked out. We'll see about Lawson.
Another striking fact is how many of the guys who actually did work out, some of them Pro Bowl players, the Bills either let walk or sent packing in their primes. That would include Clements, McGahee, Lynch, Posluszny, Byrd, Levitre, Gilmore, and Woods. Certainly the most egregious example of this is Marshawn Lynch.
If you think that the Bills haven't made the playoffs in 17 years for any reason other than front office incompetence, I have a sllightly used but recently rehabbed bridge over Chautauqua Lake that I'd like to sell you.
As for the new administration, they'll have to prove themselves before I fall for OBD's shell game again.
Worst cut in Bills history
in The Stadium Wall Archives
Posted · Edited by SoTier
This is either the first or second most used excuse for OBD's incompentence made by fans who refuse to face the reality of how hard the Bills have worked to miss the playoffs for the last 17 years, ranking right up there with "he didn't want to be here". Foolish fans have made these claims about nearly every decent player that the Bills cut or traded or didn't resign in FA over the last 20 years.
Specifically about Lynch: he was suspended for four games in 2009 and he then he had an ankle injury. The Bills had him on the trade block in 2010, so they used him sparingly. It's hard for a RB to run for a lot of yards when he doesn't get the ball.
Ruben was a cut/release for salary cap reasons. He was another guy whom fans claimed had "quit". He went on to road grade for the Bears the year rookie Kyle Orton, their running game, and their defense took them to the SB. If they had stuck to their old formula instead of going with Rex Grossman at QB, they might have won it all.
A certain percentage of Bills fans ALWAYS make excuses for stupid moves by the Bills FO by blaming players.
This is the third most used excuse by Bills fans to send a player packing. "The Bills weren't going to make the playoffs with X anyways." The reality is that you can't make the playoffs without talented players, and talented players cost more than STers. Missing the playoffs in 2004 was squarely on the Bills defense which let the Steelers' second stringers shred them like limp noodles in the last game of the season. Rookie RB Willie Parker ran for 100+ yards. The Steelers second and third string QBs threw at will.
Would the Bills have made the playoffs in 2005? I don't know. They won 5 or 6 games with JP Losman and Kelly Holcomb as their QBs, which was the equivalent of not having a QB, so it's entirely possible that they would won a few more games, maybe enough to do the trick.
Of course, Bledsoe was cut to save $$$, as was Fitzpatrick, and the QB situation in 2013 was eerily similar to 2005. The Bills didn't want to pay Fitzpatrick, so they sent him packing without having a starting QB on the roster. They used three that year: EJ Manuel, Thad Lewis, and Jeff Tuel. They won 5 or 6 games that season, and might have won more in 2013 because poor QBing clearly lost them several games.