SoTier

You sound like one of those fools who don't wear seat belts because he/she doesn't personally know anybody who was saved from serious injury or death because he/she was wearing one. You do realize that a week out from landfall, the exact path of any hurricane is still too subject to a variety of atmospheric steering forces for anyone to predict with high accuracy for any specific location, right? It's hardly "bad faith" to warn people of the possibility of dangerous weather. Prior to Katrina, Louisianans and other Gulf Coast residents held "hurricane parties" as they waited for big storms to come ashore rather than evacuate. They don't do that much any more.

I would take "noodle arm" with good "other desirable QB traits" over "non-noodle arm" with mediocre/poor "other desirable QB traits". The question for the AFCE QBs not named Allen is, do they get better in their second and third seasons, and if they do, how big are their step ups? I expect that Mac Jones will improve because he reminds me of Tom Brady in 2001/2002. We tend to forget that Brady wasn't always the Tom Brady of 2007. Early in his career, he was considered a "system QB" with modest talent by many, especially football message board gurus who were fans of other AFCE teams. I think that Zach Wilson has to improve significantly as a sophomore or the Jests will be QB hunting again in 2023. I don't think that Tua changes much. He was a dink and dunker in college, and he's still a dink and dunker in the pros. I don't know if he can really get the most out of Hill and Waddle with his style but it might be enough for the Fins to make a WC spot. There's also a new coaching staff in Miami which might or might not be an improvement over the previous regime, which did get a lot out of the talent it had. I voted for the Pats being a push and the Jests and Fins being improved.

Thank you for setting the record straight. Compared to the manure show that were the Bills drafts under Russ Brandon/Dick Jauron (2006-2009), Nix was a breath of fresh air. One of the things to keep in mind about the Bills GMs from January, 2006 through May, 2018 (when Russ Brandon was fired), GMs had very limited power. Essentially, Brandon and his bean counters controlled budgets, especially coaching staff budgets, and frequently decided which players to acquire or keep based primarily on financial considerations. Russ Brandon operated on the principle of maximizing profits with little concern for fielding a winning team. Before joining the Bills in the early 2000s, he had infamously sold off most of the talent from the 1997 World Series Champion Florida Marlins in the 1998 MLB off-season, resulting in the Marlins finishing with the worst record ever for any MLB team that won the World Series the year before. The Marlins payroll went from the near the top of the league to bottom feeder territory but their profitability improved significantly. The Bills GMs during Brandon's regime were: 2006 - 2007: Marv Levy was a figurehead. I think it was Wilson's way of helping Levy financially. 2008 - 2009: No formal GM. Brandon ran the show financially. Jauron selected the talent. 2010 - 2013: Buddy Nix was primarily a talent evaluator. He resigned as GM in May, 2013. 2013 - 2017: Doug Whaley was again another a talent evaluator. He was fired immediately after the 2017 draft. 2017 - present: Brandon Beane was hired with a lot of support from Sean McDermott. Like his predecessors he didn't have full control over the team. When Russ Brandon was fired in May, 2018, Pegula gave Beane full control of the team. After the end of the 2018 season, the Bills fired the entire offensive coaching staff except for Brian Daboll. They not only replaced all of the fired coaches, but also hired a bonafide QB coach to mentor Josh Allen ... and as the pundits say, "the rest is history".

I think I've likely been a Bills fan longer than you've been alive since my fandom began in 1963, so if I wanted to be snooty about bandwagon fans, I could diss anybody who became a Bills fan during the Glory Years, especially somebody pretending that he/she knows what "a real fan of the Buffalo Bills would enjoy". FTR, this real Bills fan of 59 years loved it.

Yes, they did. I think at about the same time, too. They can't fire the college scouting staff before the draft because they know the collegiate players. I think Modrak and the other management guys got the boot first, and then some/many of the scouts were let go. IIRC, the Bills added additional scouts.

Thank you very much! It's an awesome site. I was checking what birds were migrating at night through my county and the rose breasted grosbeak was the third one on their list. Yesterday afternoon, I happened to look out my kitchen windows at the bird feeders and there's a brightly colored male rose breasted grosbeak (and likely his more drably colored girlfriends) at my sunflower feeder.

On May 2, 1982, The Weather Channel debuted! It made a weather junkie out of me! I wake up with TWC every morning.

One draft doesn't make a trend but only 1 QB was taken in the first round in 2022, and that at 20th, and none were taken in the second round. That's the first time that's happened since 2000. One of the big arguments for the rookie salary scale was that first rounders, especially QBs taken high in the first round, were getting astronomical salaries before they took a snap. One of the results of the rookie salary scale was that it set salary ranges for rookies by draft position. It made taking a QB high in the first round relatively "cheap", especially when teams could get an extra year at a reasonable price by exercising the fifth year option. This led to what appeared to be QBs being "overdrafted", ie teams in need of starting QBs taking QBs that maybe they didn't really love or weren't really first rounders just to make sure they got one. Is this really the beginning of the end of QBs being "overdrafted" or is it just a fluke? For a decade or so, it seemed to work really well. It became fairly common for 3 or more QBs to be taken in the first round. Between 2011, the first year of the rookie salary scale, and 2020, the last draft that teams have to decide whether to exercise their fifth year options on their first rounders, there were 28 QBs taken in the first round. Only 6 of those QBs became bonafide franchise QBs, at least for several years: Newton (2011), Luck (2012), Mahomes (2017), Watson (2017), Allen (2018), and Jackson (2018) which is only about 21% success rate. Another 6 -- Tannehill, Winston, Goff, Wentz, Mayfield, and Murray -- have been at least decent starting NFL QBs but certainly not nearly as good as the first six. I believe that all of the teams that drafted these 12 QBs exercised their fifth year options on them. Deciding to exercise the fifth year option on a first round QB is easy when a young QB shows to be a stud early on but with some that don’t continue to develop or regresses, the decision to exercise the fifth year option is a lot harder. Moreover, it can be a very expensive mistake as Baker Mayfield and Sam Darnold from the 2018 draft demonstrate. Meanwhile, between 2011 and 2019, other NFL teams drafted QBs after the first round and also found bonafide franchise QBs or decent starting NFL QBs. Russell Wilson (2012 3rd round) and Dak Prescott (2016 4th round) are bonafide franchise QBs. Kirk Cousins (2012 4th round) might also be one, too. Andy Dalton (2011 2nd rounder), Derek Carr and Jimmy Garoppolo (both 2014 2nd rounders) have all been decent NFL starters, and probably better QBs than at least some of the second group of first rounders. In fact, between 2011 and 2016, the third and fourth rounds produced as many franchise QBs as the first rounds, and Wilson has had a significantly better career than either Newton or Luck, and Prescott also appears likely to have a better career too. These results and the astronomical rise in QB salaries may have made at least some NFL teams reconsider “overdrafting” QBs since they’ve become quite expensive, and are only “bargains” if they actually develop into top tier franchise QBs, which only about 1 in 5 QBs drafted high actually do. The #1 pick in the 2022 draft will probably get a first contract of about $41 million dollars, much of it guaranteed. Pick #33, the first in the second round, will cost slightly under $10 million without most of it guaranteed. QBs taken in the third round will generally make less than $1 million a year.

^^^ I don't think that either of you remember how Josh Allen played as a sophomore. He showed flashes of possibly being a really good QB but he was inconsistent in his accuracy and his decision-making and played "hero ball" too often. It was only in his third season that Allen blossomed into a top QB. Hurts has shown enough potential that he could very well develop into a franchise QB. Just because he might be as talented as Josh Allen doesn't mean that he's trash, but the Eagles will never know how good he can be if they don't support him with top quality targets. Eli Manning was a decent NFL QB but not nearly as good as his brother Peyton, but he has as many Super Bowl rings as Peyton.

Well, now they have a bonafide #1 and maybe a #1A. My point is that they wanted to give their young QB every opportunity to prove himself and not be hampered by a poor supporting cast. That's exactly what a well run team does.

The Eagles did for Jalen Hurts what the Bills did for Josh Allen: got him a real WR1. How is that "horrible"?

Only about 60% of the players taken in the first round are good enough to stay with their original team for four years. I haven't seen any stats for fourth rounders lasting for four years but I'd bet it's 10% or less for fourth rounders. It's probably significantly less for fourth rounders going to perennial playoff contenders. The chances of a fourth rounder having significant impact with the Bills would be pretty slim.

If Jones explodes this season, he would have wanted a new contract for next year anyways, so this is a smart move on their part IMO. I think this is probably a reaction to the failure of so many first round QBs to actually turn into franchise QBs. These are the first round QBs taken since 2015: 2015: Jameis Winston (1), Marcus Mariota (2) 2016: Jared Goff (1), Carson Wentz (2), Paxton Lynch (26) 2017: Mitch Trubisky (3), Patrick Mahomes (10), Deshaun Watson (12) 2018: Baker Mayfield (1), Sam Darnold (3), Josh Allen (7), Josh Rosen (10), Lamar Jackson (32) 2019: Kyler Murray (1), Daniel Jones (6), Dwayne Haskins (15) The bolded QBs are the bonafide franchise QBs who are/were worth their fifth year salaries, although all but Lamar have gotten extensions/new contracts, and Lamar's lack of an extension/new contract is more that he hasn't pushed negotiations rather than the Ravens not wanting to keep him. That's only 4 franchise QBs out of 16 QBs taken in the first round. The underlined QBs (Baker and Kyler) have shown some promise but they haven't proven that they are actually worth even the big bucks of their fifth year option much less new contracts IMO. Their play seems to be similar to the how Goff and Wentz played in their first three years: some flashes but not consistently top quality play. The Rams and Eagles both exercised the fifth year options on Goff and Wentz, gave them new contracts, and regretted doing so. Cleveland exercised Baker's fifth year option but his play last season didn't merit a new contract. The Browns went out and got a better QB. Kyler hasn't shown that he can perform at a high level for an entire season, but he's threatening a hold out if he doesn't get a new contract before the start of his fourth season. We'll see how that all shakes out.

Individuals matter. Nobody is arguing for the Bills to draft "a RB" in the first the way people argue for a "CB" or "WR". They are specifically arguing for Breece Hall because they believe he's a special player with the potential to be special. I would love it if the Bills drafted Zion Johnson at #25 but that's because he's potentially a great player on the IOL not just because the Bills have a need to improve their IOL. A potential Pro Bowler/All Pro type player at a less-valued position is worth a first round pick for a team drafting late in the first round when the prospects available at more highly valued positions aren't as outstanding individuals.

I would prefer Zion Johnson myself at 25 but I'm not going to complain if they take Hall. It may be a moot point anyway since most of the recent mock drafts have both Zion and the other outstanding center, Tyler Linderbaum, off the board before 25.

I believe that Buddy Nix thought the same thing about Russell Wilson before the third round of the 2012 draft. I don't think anybody is advocating this. I think that posters pushing for Hall believe that a better run game gives the Bills a more diverse offense which makes it harder for defenses to stop and that Hall makes the run game better. I happen to share the belief that the Bills need a better run game, so I'm good with the Bills taking Hall at #25 but I would prefer them to take one of the top centers -- Zion Johnson or Tyler Linderbaum -- because that would also improve the run game by improving the OL IMO. A better run game, whether it's achieved by adding a faster RB or by adding a stud on the interior OL, is the best way to protect Allen. He should not be expected to have more than 1 or 2 designed run plays a game. If the Bills RBs can run for 3 yards or so pretty much whenever they want to, especially in the Red Zone, that takes the pressure off Allen to run. They couldn't do that last season without Allen running, and that needs to change. It's playing Russian roulette.

I had to cut down my old ash tree about 4 years ago because it was suffering from ash dieback. It was also rotting inside and infested with ants ... and attracted multiple nuthatches and woodpeckers. All of the nuthatches have abandoned my yard, not even coming to my bird feeders. A few downey woodpeckers show up at the sunflower feeder, especially during the breeding/nesting season. The nuthatches were very feisty birds for their size. They not only picked on smaller birds, but they'd chase bigger birds away from their space on the feeders.

That's like minimum wage in NYC.

The Bills didn't go "all in on Fitz" because the Bills under Russ Brandon were all about maximizing profits not winning football games. If Fitz had managed to morph into Aaron Rodgers, they would have kept him at mid-range starting QB money. They also didn't spend on backup QBs; I think almost all of their backups while Brandon was the head of the organization might have been practice squad players at best on most other teams. That included Nathan Peterman during Josh Allen's rookie season. Russ Brandon became Bills GM in 2006 and was finally fired in 2018. Keeping Brandon after he bought the team and then promoting him after the Rex Ryan disaster to head both the Bills and Sabres was the biggest mistake Pegula made. Luckily, Pegula made the right pick for Bills GM with Beane. The Sabres paid for Brandon's "money ball" philosophy for a lot longer, although they seem to be finally making strides in the right direction.

That wasn't Nix. He might have been on the Bills staff at that time, but it was Brandon and Jauron running the draft in 2009. Jauron loved smurfs on defense because they were supposed to be faster (I still remember watching Bills LBs regularly being dragging downfield by RBs). IIRC, Maybin had straight line speed even at 240 lbs (which was like 30+ lbs more than his playing weight at PSU) but he didn't have much agility so he couldn't develop the kinds of moves that lighter edge rushers use to get to QBs.

What makes you think that Aaron Rodgers would have been anything but a mediocre QB on the Bills in the 2005-2009 period? Mularkey couldn't get much out of Pro Bowler Drew Bledsoe in 2004-2005 and Jauron seemed to have a pathological dislike for talented players who didn't toe his play-not-to-lose-by-too-much line. Captain Checkdown Trent Edwards was Juaron's style QB. He banished Beast Mode Marshawn Lynch to his "doghouse" in 2009 when Lynch was the only offense the Bills had. Rodgers would have clashed with Jauron instantly simply because he wanted to win football games not play not to lose them by too much.

I voted for Maybin, too. I never thought of the Penn State angle, but it's definitely a possibility. I just thought that Brandon let Dick Jauron be his talent evaluator and Jauron loved undersized defenders, so a tweener DE who was too small to knock OLers out of his way and too slow to loop around them was just up Jauron''s alley. Certainly, Manuel was drafted in 2013 solely to put butts in the seats, so he is my second choice. He was a classic "reach": a third or fourth round talent taken in the first round because the team "needed" a player at that position. Every time I hear one of these draftniks on TV advocating for Detroit or Carolina to take a QB because they might not be drafting this high again, I cringe. Drafting a QB with the #2 or #6 pick just because you need a QB even though he's not a top 5 or top 10 quality prospect is sheer stupidity. Drafting a second or third round talent high in the first round isn't going to make him better. Mike Williams is third on my list, mostly because I think Williams was totally mismanaged by the Bills. Williams played RT in college, and he was built like a prototypical pro RT at the time: a massive man who opened holes for inside runners. The Bills tried to turn him into a LT, a position for which he wasn't physically suited, because that's what they needed. I think he played well on the right side as a rookie, but his play tailed off when he was put at left tackle because he simply wasn't quick or agile enough to play there. In fact, he probably would have had a decent career if he'd been drafted later specifically to play guard. At the end of his career with Washington, Williams did switch to guard but his career was cut short by a medical issue IIRC.

At a time when football players behaving badly off the field has become commonplace (or maybe bad behavior can't be hidden as easily as it was in the past), Allen isn't just a superstar on the field, he's one off the field as well.

True but Jack Kemp was drafted by the Steelers in 1957 when they were in the NFL. Kemp played 2 seasons with the AFL LA Chargers that became the SD Chargers before he was traded to the Bills when they played in the AFL. After the 1966 season, the Bills fell apart, and Kemp's career ended in 1969, the year before the AFL totally merger with the NFL. Joe Ferguson was a nice QB but he wasn't a great one. He was the only QB the Bills drafted who became Jim Kelly spent 2 years in the original USFL. Daryle Lamonica was drafted by the Bills and later became a superstar but only after he left the Bills.

I was po'd at the Bills for about six or seven years because they didn't draft Russell Wilson in 2012. The Seahawks became one of my favorite teams because of Russ -- except when they play the Bills. Now I'll become more of a lukewarm Broncos fan. I was po'd after the fact at the Bills for a couple of years because they traded out the #10 pick in 2017 and so passed on Patrick Mahomes. KC is one of my favorite teams -- as long as they aren't playing the Bills or if their winning a game would impact the Bills. I've always liked Drew Brees, Matt Ryan, and Kirk Cousins, so I have little doubt that I would still like Josh Allen even if he had no connection to the Bills. After all, it wouldn't have been his fault that the Browns drafted him first overall. If he'd been drafted by the Jests, I don't think I could "like" him but I would probably pity him because he wouldn't be the QB he is with the Bills ... Isn't it utterly and completely awesome that we Bills fans no longer have to console ourselves by saying that some other team's great QB wouldn't be the great QB he is if he'd had been drafted by the Bills? The Bills actually drafted a QB and developed him into a superstar. First time this franchise has ever done that.