Dawgg

Total, I believe.

2 years, $4M. He's a marginal player and was paid like one.

Whitner is getting precisely what he deserves. He considered himself an elite safety and hired powerful agent Tom Condon in anticipation of a big pay day. Unfortunately for him, teams have 5 years of film that suggests that he is anything but elite. Glad to see the Bills hold firm; but if he were to come crawling back for $2M, I'd take him.

He was a converted tight end showing signs. Yes, the Bills took a flyer on him but he also deserved to be the highest paid player on that line. Instead, the Bills – par for the course – signed below average players for elite money, proving yet again that they possess the most incompetent front office in the NFL. When agents have middle-tier players on their roster, they know the Bills may come to the rescue with an elite-level contract. When the Bills signed Chris Kelsay to a rich deal, they redid Schobel's contract to make sure he remained the highest paid player on the line. When they signed Dockery and Walker to staggering deals, they expected a Peters (their only Pro Bowler at the time) to sit tight and smile? Please. To say the Bills handled this one well is pretty lame, considering Dockery and Walker are nowhere to be found.

Why does he deserve such a fate? Because he wanted to be paid like an elite tackle? He wasn't even the highest paid lineman on his pathetic unit? How can you blame him for being upset when idiot GM Marv Levy doled out a combined $85 million to Dockery and Langston Walker? Bills fans are amazing I suppose we should wish ill upon Pat Williams, London Fletcher and Antoine Winfield while we're at it.

Distraction from what? Perennially losing? Perhaps this team needs a distraction?

If only that were true

Well said. Those are the facts.

Ralph is making excuses but I don't blame him for that. His job is to whine as much as possible so that revenue sharing continues (which directly benefits the Bills). I don't consider Ralph to be cheap in terms of player acquisitions– he's doled out some hefty contracts to such players as Schobel, Dockery and Walker. Where he's been cheap is his front office. Nobody faulted Ralph for hiring Donahoe. It was an aggressive move at the time, one that was widely praised. If anyone took the flak for Donahoe's failings, it was Donahoe himself -- and perhaps rightly so, given the team's performance under his watch. That said, to bring in Levy and to promote Overdorf, Brandon, Guy and Modrak was a move that was more designed to keep Ralph comfortable than to win games. I disagree that hiring GMs and coaches is a crap shoot. The Bills' could have easily found a cost-effective talent evaluator from a winning organization who would have jumped at the chance to run the personnel department of an NFL franchise. But Ralph took it upon himself make the Bills a closed-door operation, relying on his "inner circle" to turn the franchise around. The truly unfortunate thing is that Ralph's miscalculations resulted in a decade wasted. Judging by his own admission, he knows he screwed up and it appears as though he's getting it right by allowing his personnel department to do its job.

Don't tell the homers on the board this! This is an owner who hired an out-of-touch Marv Levy to run personnel when Levy had no experience as a front office executive. This resulted in botched drafts (Whitner, Lynch, McCargo, etc), ill-advised free agent signings (Walker, Dockery, Fowler, Tripplet) and bad hires (Jauron, Dick). He then followed that up by handing the reigns to the team's marketing executive. Rather than bring an experienced outsider -- something this team desperately needed -- Ralph promoted a business development executive, which resulted in more of the same. He then followed that up by promoting Tom Modrak, who was a major participant in some of the worst drafts in years, inflating his title and allowing him to work from his home in Jacksonville, Florida. Ralph needs to stop making excuses. The Bills' inability to compete this past decade has little to do with their disadvantaged financial position and everything to do with a leadership void at the top. Having said that, give credit where credit is due: Ralph appears to have learned his lesson in handing the keys over to Buddy Nix. It's unfortunate that it took this long.

I'll take this softball. Answer: WATCH THE GAMES!

Howdy GG –- given that you were one of strongest defenders of the McCargo/Whitner draft, it's no wonder you consider it a dead horse now! In any case, I can only hope that Nix truly has final say. Hard to believe what comes out of OBD these days. Bro -- how I wish I were wrong. I would have gladly eaten crow to watch Donte become a force in the backfield or McCargo become a key cog in the D. But when you watch your team implode on draft day and insult the collective intelligence of its fan base, it makes even the biggest Bills fan sick to his stomach.

This is simply untrue. The 2006 draft was loaded and it was as obvious then as it is today. The Bills managed to bunk their selections at every step of the way due to an inept front office that is largely still in place today. I can't wait until Terry Pegula takes the reigns.

Hey Buddy, glad you can man up and admit your extreme love for the Bills sometimes prevents you from being able to evaluate Bills personnel decisions objectively. Can't fault you for that. I share that same love for the Bills – hell, I'd love to have been wrong about Whitner and McCargo but the fact of the matter is that I was infuriated that this inept front office and ownership have no accountability for their decisions and repeatedly insult the intelligence of the very fans who pay their salary. Newsflash: It is possible to be passionate and objective at the same time. After repeatedly taking personal attacks from the likes of you and other homers when the Marv's drafts took place, it's only legitimate to look back on these decisions 5 years later to see how those decisions panned out. We've gone over this, my friend. I simply said that the Bears got the better of the trade. Those picks (2nd and 3rd rounders) were far more valuable than McCargo. Even with Dvoracek being a bust, the Bears got an extremely productive player in the 2nd round in Daneal Manning, one of the game's better kick returners and a solid defensive starter. But feel free to continue misinterpreting what I said. In any case, it's good to be back.

I'd love to hear commentary from The Dean, Ramius, C. Biscuit97, syhuang and the rest of the peanut gallery who thought (and might still think) Whitner & McCargo were a prudent selections in the first round.

The irony in all this is that in that same press conference, Modrak was asked why the Bills reached on McCargo. He then made a crack at Mel Kiper, implying that Kiper has no idea what he's talking about. Had the Bills simply blindly followed Kiper's draft board, this team would have made the playoffs. Why Modrak is still employed by the team is beyond me.

http://findarticles.com/p/news-articles/buffalo-news/mi_8030/is_20060430/bills-pull-safety-trigger/ai_n42920730/

Ralph is not cheap. The Bills spend money, they just overpay for mediocre players because both and Ralph and his front office are inept.

It'd be nice to have a safety who makes plays every once in a while.

Poz flat out cannot play middle linebacker in the NFL. He's pretty bad. It's one thing to make the pick. It's quite another to give up a high 3rd to move up 9 spots when both Poz and David Harris were on the board. Good teams have a board, understand the value of picks and make their trade decisions accordingly. Inept teams overpay in draft day trades and pigeon-hole themselves into drafting a single player. They did it the year before with McCargo and they did it yet again for Poz. There were a ton of reasons to avoid making that trade. 1) David Harris was a better prospect than Poz coming out of college. It's up to the paid talent evaluators to make this assessment. 2) Solid defensive players were available. David Harris, Justin Durant, and Lamaar Woodley were on the board, rendering a high priced trade all the more questionable. 3) The Bills let London Fletcher walk. In making that explicit decision, Marv and his croneys were claiming that Poz would be a better long-term solution than Fletcher at the all-important MLB position. They were dead wrong. As for Dave McBride's questioning of the original post's intent, I think it's perfectly legitimate to evaluate how this draft turned out 4 years later. It was bad. Very bad. And we can thank Marv Levy and Tom Modrak for that. Good thing they're gone... oh wait... Modrak still manages the draft board.

It's a good thing Marv Levy gave up a high 3rd round pick just to move up 9 spots in the second round to pick Poz when Harris was on the board.

Many people called out the stupidity of this pick in 2005 to much ridicule and fanfare on this board. Just more proof that they were right all along.

If Newton checks out at the combine and visits (i.e. no skeletons in his closet, meshes well with coaches), I'd take Newton. I think Chan can figure out ways to utilize his ability. Draft Newton Use the remainder of the draft to take the best players at any position except WR and RB. Yes, we could use secondary depth with McGee getting old and Florence a free agent.

I'd take him at 3. I think he has the raw talent and moxie to succeed at this level, provided he checks out at the combine and doesn't have mental hangups that we are unaware of.

Saw that as well. The Bills are a joke It was also nice to watch players like Cromartie, Hali, Ngata and Mangold (all players the Bills could have chosen instead of Whitner) make a big impact on the games this week.