SoTier

I would far prefer the Bills to go WR, DL or C/OG if there's a top rated prospect available at #28 before they take another TE. Kincaid, Knox and Morris are a pretty good trio of young TEs. Don't mess with what's not broke, especially when there are real holes elsewhere.

I've been a Bills fan since 1963. Except for the great Bills AFC teams in 1964 and 1965, the Bills have NEVER been league champs. Between 1967 and 1987 -- 21 seasons -- the Bills made the playoffs only 3 times -- in 1974 under Lou Saban and in both 1980 and 1981 under Chuck Knox. After only missing the playoffs twice between 1988 and 1999 under Marv Levy and Wade Phillips, the Bills then managed to flounder for the next 17 zstraight seasons without making the playoffs. FTR, that's 13 playoff seasons in 50 seasons. Let me tell all the complainers about the Bills not yet winning a Super Bowl, that winning football games is infinitely better than losing. Making the playoffs is infinitely better than not making them. Winning the division is better than making the playoffs via the wild card. Being a serious contender for the Super Bowl is infinitely better than being irrelevant to playoff discussions. I desperately want to see the Bills win a Super Bowl before I die, but if it doesn't happen, as long as the team (ie, ownership and FO) continues to make winning football games their first priority -- which wasn't always the case, especially in the 1970s and in the 2000s until 2018 -- then I'm good with the team.

Maybe but not that likely. Of the 32 QBs drafted in the first round since 2012, only 5 have become bonafide franchise QBs, and only 12 have become have become at least "quality NFL starters". I think that the 2021 QB class isn't unusually poor ... for all the hype that teams put into drafting a first round franchise QB, they miss more often than than they hit. Numerous draft classes have had no first round QBs become at least "quality NFL starters". A few times QBs drafted outside the first round turn out to be better than the first rounders. The most successful of the QBs from 2012, for example, are 3rd rounder Russell Wilson and 4th rounder Kirk Cousins, with an honorable mention to super-sub Nick Foles. First round QBs since 2012 (10 draft classes) ... 2012 Andrew Luck (1), Robert Griffin (2), Ryan Tannehill (8), Brandon Weeden (22) 2013 EJ Manuel (16) 2014 Blake Bortles (3), Johnny Manziel (22), Teddy Bridgewater (32) 2015 Jameis Winston (1), Marcus Mariota (2) 2016 Jared Goff (1), Carson Wentz (2), Paxton Lynch (26) 2017 Mitch Trubisky (2), 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) 2020 Joe Burrow (1), Tua Tagovailoa (5), Justin Herbert (6), Jordan Love (26) 2021 Trevor Lawrence (1), Zach Wilson (2), Trey Lance (3), Justin Fields (11), Mac Jones (15) Of the 32 first round QBs drafted that have had time to prove themselves, I rated 5 as actual franchise QBs Andrew Luck (career cut short by injury) Patrick Mahomes Josh Allen Lamar Jackson Joe Burrow ... and 7 QBs that are/were quality starters are ... Ryan Tannehill Jared Goff Baker Mayfield Kyler Murray Tua Tagovailoa Justin Herbert Trevor Lawrence. I also considered 3 QBs that might eventually be at least quality starters and maybe more ... Deshaun Watson (injuries and off-field issues) Jordan Love Justin Fields. All the rest were lower caliber starters for a while or subs if they managed to avoid being busts who failed to stay in the league beyond their first contracts.

I'm in total agreement with both these posters! I sure do miss the days of watching Antoine Winfield, Sr, Willis McGahee, Jason Peters, Marshawn Lynch, Stephon Gilmore, Robert Woods, Jabari Greer and numerous other players the Bills developed helping their new teams win playoff games and Super Bowls while the Bills' seasons were finished by Thanksgiving and fans turned their attention to dreams of FA coups and finding future stars in the draft ... year after year after year after year ... The current Bills are always going to have to work hard to improve their team from year to year because they currently have such a good team anchored by a true franchise QB plus a quality OL and top defense. There aren't going to be many if any big name FA signings. There aren't likely to be any top five or top ten draft picks, either. It's going to be relatively small changes or finding special talents in the draft after all the big name picks are off the board. Deal with it.

FYI for folks in the Southern Tier and Northern PA: the Lakewood Wegmans has a good supply of Josh Allen bags. I couldn't find them last week when I actually looked, but I stumbled upon them near the frozen food section this morning.

Actually, none of the posters who complained about their jobs in this thread disliked their "line of work" (ie, the work they were doing) but the way they were treated by their employers. Big difference.

Pumpkins to apples. Dawkins is not a potential FA commanding top money at his position as Hill. Furthermore, good LTs are significantly harder to find than good WRs. More importantly, the Chiefs were able to work around the departure of Hill because they have one of the best OLs in the NFL. A team can't have a good OL without having solid performers across the line.

Dawkins is better than a "solid" LT, and his "running his mouth" is maybe a 5 on a scale of trash talk. Trade away a starting LT because he "runs his mouth"????? Seriously? The Bills have real things to fix, but LT is NOT one of them thanks to having Dawkins. Extend/restructure is a no-brainer. You don't fix what's not broke.

Even in good weather, Great Blue Herons in flight look odd. In fog and diminishing light, they definitely have to look like something out of "Jurassic Park"!

To be fair, there was no date on that article, and one of the headlines of another was about Tuesday's presidential primaries.

Were you on an athletic scholarship? If you were, were you pressured to give it up, and did you? Did you graduate from this school or did you go to another school or just drop out? Did you "burn out" because of the pressure to excel at athletics while still learning to navigate your first semester of college? Did you feel you were missing out on your college education in order to play college athletics? You don't have to answer any of these questions publicly. Just think about your answers. Recruiters for big time collegiate sports programs don't give a real picture of what's really expected of college athletes. They sell them on an idealized picture of getting a free education plus perks doing something they love to do anyway. What they don't tell them is the cost that they'll be expected to pay. Student-athletes are always under pressure to perform at the highest level no matter the sacrifice but somehow that doesn't find its way into recruiters' spiel. It was that way in the 1970s, and it's still that way in the 2020s. It lessens the ability of collegiate HCs to control their star players by controlling all the purse-strings. Since the 1970s, collegiate sports have been "reformed". Some of the abuses that have been limited include: colleges can't give athletic scholarships to students who are so academically deficient that they can't score minimum scores on the SATs; athletes have to make at least minimum progress towards degrees; that a certain percentage of a team's athletes have to graduate within certain number of years from when they started, etc. Sadly, many of the institutions of "higher education" that field the most successful athletic programs in football and basketball fought these reforms tooth and nail.

This is not what NIL involves. NIL allows to individuals to profit, if they can, from the sale of their names, images, and likenesses. It's independent of the college, and the NCAA, up until 2021, prohibited this. The NCAA still prohibits colleges from paying athletes for playing sports, which would certainly benefit the most popular sports and the biggest schools in those sports to the detriment of less popular sports and smaller programs. I think that the NCAA's transfer portal is what encourages "free agency at the college level" but that is definitely NOT NIL

You have obviously not had any experience with a big time collegiate sports program like football or basketball. I worked as a tutor for a large Midwestern university's football players for a single semester in the 1970s. This school was always in contention for the National Championship. Even though I was a starving grad assistant and the money was very good, I couldn't continue participating in a system which I saw as extremely exploitive. Most of these young men never sniffed the NFL, never got their college degrees, and certainly never made "connections in business/life through boosters". When they used up their eligibility and/or were seriously injured, they were literally kicked to the curb. The NCCA programs are much better now, but accepting a college athletic scholarship to a major Div 1 program is not nearly the ticket to a better life that many people believe except for those few collegiate athlete who become stars.

Here's an article to better understand NIL: NIL The average length of NFL careers is about 3 years, so the percentage of players from every draft class who actually succeed, much less become long-term starters who make significant money, is tiny. Many draftees will never make nearly as much in the NFL as they do from capitalizing on NIL while collegians. This might not be true of first round picks or even most Day 2 picks, but certainly for kids drafted on Day 3. A lot of Day 3 picks are proverbial "big fish in a small pond" types who aren't going to even make NFL practice squads. NIL is about the NCAA allowing collegiate athletes the right to earn money off of their images, names or other likenesses, which the NCAA didn't allow until a 2021 court case. Colleges still cannot pay collegiate athletes for playing sports. NIL is about individual athletes profiting from their collegiate -- and in some cases, high school -- fame.

I read the summary and then plowed through most of the actual article. I think this is the key statement from the full article: "Behavioral factors show high variability within breeds, suggesting that although breed may affect the likelihood of a particular behavior to occur, breed alone is not,contrary to popular belief, informative enough to predict an individual’s disposition." BTW, I think my dog Gibbs might have been part of this study! When I got his DNA results back, I participated in a voluntary owner survey which asked many questions about behavior, disposition, physical traits, and health. They used the same little circle format for owner supplied photos as they used in the main article!

Today's sighting at Bergman Park -- a flock of a dozen turkey vultures apparently drinking from some large puddles in a dirt roadway at the back end of the park. I saw one swinging low over the field well before my dog and I came around the shoulder of the hill, so I knew they were there. I expected to see a carcass but there was nothing there, so it had to be the water. They were very big with huge wing spans. It was interesting to watch them fly off. They all faced the same direction -- southwest, into the wind -- before taking off when they realized I was coming their way. I guess that was the best way to get air under their big wings. They also took off in three waves as if they were in a formation rather than in a single flock like pigeons or ducks might do. Normally, vultures nest and roost on cliffs so that they can catch thermals to help lift them, so that was quite surprising!

Yes, they will -- or pee all over your house, too. It's mostly if they feel they're being ignored rather than lack of exercise. They are non-shedders, so they may be suitable for people with allergies, but not people who aren't willing to include them in the family activities. Male Airedales should hit 60 pounds or more, and some of the old-style ones top 80 pounds. Today, the breed is very good tempered, but in the heyday of their popularity in the 1920s, they were infamous for being fierce guard dogs. They were used in the 1950s and 1960s in the western US to hunt cougars and bear along with various hunting cur hounds. In fact, today Airedales compete in hunting field trials like sporting breeds like pointers, spaniels, and retrievers. I grew up with Airedales, which my dad used as hunting dogs with his pack of Black and Tan Coonhounds, and I had one of my own as an adult for over a decade. He was not a hunter, however, just fifty pounds of lap dog and hiking companion.

Irresponsible breeding does not necessarily result in dogs with bad temperaments. It mostly results in 1) oversupply of dogs and 2) unhealthy dogs. Furthermore, irresponsible breeders are not necessarily just the scum running puppy mills, but also the family guy down the street who decides to breed his unspayed female Lab to his neighbor's unfixed male Lab that has been suffering from hip displasia since he was 2 years old. It can also be the breeder dreaming of winning his breed at Westminster who doesn't care that the puppies from his/her next litter will have the same dog as 3 of the 4 great-grandsires. Boxer mixes are frequently mistaken as pit mixes. Many of the cur dog breeds that developed as hunting/farm dogs in the Appalachian Mountains in the nineteenth century and spread primarily through the Upper South and into Louisiana and Texas like the Catahoula Leopard Dog, the Tennessee Treeing Brindle, and the Mountain Cur can easily be mistaken for pit mixes as well. These breeds are about the size of pitbulls, have short hair, and are strong, muscular dogs usually with stocky builds. DNA testing is the only sure way to determine what breed mixture a dog really is because looks can be deceiving. Veterinarians, vet techs, and shelter workers give it their best guesses, but there's no guarantees on what gets passed down through the genes. My friends had a leggy, short-haired boy named Isaac that was primarily white with some black spots. He looked like some kind of Dalmation or Greyhound mix. He turned out to be Doberman and Border Collie. My boy Gibbs' mom looked to be a smallish tri-colored Aussie shepherd, but as Gibby began growing he bore an increasing resemblance to a odd-colored Dingo (he's gray/black color called a blue merle) rather than to an Aussie shepherd, and he became significantly bigger and stockier than an Aussie as he matured. It turns out he's about 40% Blue Heeler, 30% Aussie Shepherd, and 30% smattering of German Shepherd, Norwegian Elkhound, Black Lab, and "general dog genes". FYI -- the Dingo look in Gibbs' late puppyhood came from his Heeler ancestry as Heelers were mixed with Dingos in Australia. Australia Shepherds originated in Callifornia and have no connection to Australia -- or Dingos. Well said, sir!

Do Pitties set up their own fighting rings????

I'm glad you brought up mastiffs because they seem to be the favorite "guard dog" of new generation of sickos and/or criminals seeking to weaponize dogs. Lots of dog breeds have less than ideal temperaments, but it's the owners/handlers/supposed trainers who make individual dogs dangerous by their mistreatment.

Dogs, like people, are individuals with different temperaments and personalities. Some are stubborn, some are very smart, some are possessive, etc. Most dogs in the US are the descendants of dogs purposely bred to do certain jobs, and that human intervention in their ancestry often shapes their behaviors. Some of the traits that are useful for a breed's original purpose can make a dog a difficult pet when they no longer have real jobs. Working dogs like border collies and aussie shepherds, etc are notorious for getting into trouble because of their high energy. Small terriers can sometimes be aggressive because they were originally used to hunt rats and mice around homes and farm buildings. More importantly, when some breeds become popular, puppy mills and backyard breeders get into the mix and frequently fail to breed for good temperaments. If the dog is the right "look" or size or color, they breed that dog to make money. People tolerate small dogs like dachshunds and chihauhuas that have bad temperaments. They don't tolerate bad temperaments in large dogs, however, Great Danes, Newfies, and Leonbergers are among the gentlest of dogs. Unfortunately for pit bulls (officially American Staffordshire Terriers), their strength, tenacity, and loyalty attracted criminal elements involved in dog fighting and drug trafficking back in the 1980s, and the breed became synonymous with viciousness. It's important to keep in mind, however, these facts: All dogs have a prey drive, some significantly stronger than others. Even golden doodles can chase and attack what they perceive as prey, especially small furry things like cats and smaller dogs but sometimes small running children. All dogs are territorial, again some individuals more than others. They also express their territoriality in different ways, most notably by barking at intruders to their space, but jumping at windows and fences are common, too. Dogs are pack animals. They need a "family". Most dogs, especially in one dog households, bond to their humans. In multi-dog households, the dogs bond to each other as well as to their humans. Dogs that regularly go to dog parks or are walked often with the same group of dogs may form packs with their besties. Like teenagers, alone each is good but two or three or four together can breed real trouble. The same with dogs in a pack. Any dog that's mistreated or frightened or "mistrained" can bite or maul a person. All breeds have a range of temperaments, too. How a dog is raised and treated has much more to do with its behavior than its breed. It's the responsibility of owners to train and socialize their dogs to make them good citizens. Dogs need to respond to basic commands. They need to come when called, walk on a leash, not jump up on visitors etc. Socializing dogs gets them used to dealing with other people, other dogs, new situations, etc so that they behave in situations outside their homes or yards. Not all dogs have temperaments or personalities that enable them to go to dog parks or doggie day care, but they still need to have some new experiences. Keeping dogs locked in a yard or tied on a leash, and only taking them to the vet maybe once a year can reinforce territoriality, pack mentality and fear aggression.

More importantly to the idea that the Bills need 2 legit TEs, when Knox was injured this past season, the offense struggled, including Kincaid. When Knox came back, the offfense improved significantly. The Bills want to run a lot of 2 TE sets so that they can run or pass with the same personnel on the field, making it harder on defenses. They need to have two legitimate pass catching TEs.

Or, maybe, the Eagles are suffering from "Super Bowl loser syndrome": the team that loses the Super Bowl struggles the next season, frequently even not making the playoffs. Of the last 10 Super Bowl losers, only the Seahawks and Chiefs made the playoffs the season after their SB loss. XLVII - Broncos XLIX - Seahawks L(50) - Panthers LI - Falcons LII - Patriots LIII - Rams LIV - 49ers LV - Chiefs LVI - Bengals LVII - Eagles

Generally, DTs like Oliver take longer to come into their own than DEs simply because the learning curve for interior linemen tends to be longer than for the edge rushers; there's more to learn in the pro game than in college. That doesn't mean that Rousseau can't improve his sack numbers, but it seems that he's not real likely to do so. However, that doesn't bother me much because he's a good DE against both the pass and the run.

I can still remember those words and the hockey stick flying into the air as the buzzer sounded. After that, the final game, a few days later (when Team USA actually won the gold medal), was anti-climatic. Beating the Russians in 1980 was like the UB Bulls beating the Bills, and to do it in Lake Placid, their "home ice", was magical.