DonInBuffalo

Looking through the various press releases, apparently this picture was taken on Friday, 9/11. The players in the picture are everyone who was on the roster or practice squad on that date. The captains have their logos on their uniforms; those were announced on 9/11. They are wearing the road throwbacks, which they wore in New England on Monday 9/14. I'm guessing the picture was taken on Friday, because lots of the administrative types in the back row typically wouldn't be there on a weekend. I'm guessing Byrd missed the picture, so they pasted him over Dick. Look how Brandon, Ralph, and Bryd are a little further forward in that row, compared to the rest of the players. Still haven't figured out where that right arm came from. Possibly Dwayne Wright or Cory McIntyre from a different photo.

Yes, that's what I meant. Thanks for pointing out my typo.

I noticed Byrd's right arm as well. Does anybody else have the 1986 team photo? On that one, they pasted Marv's head onto Hank Bullough's body.

If a coach wants to get/keep the respect of his players, he needs to reward those that play better with more playing time. Jackson has outperformed Lynch all season, and deserves to start and to get more carries. On the other side of the ball, Byrd excelled to the point where they can't keep him off the field if he's healthy, even if it means sitting Whitner.

Even if the Bills run the table to go 9-7, which is a tall order to say the least, let's look at how much they still have to overcome to make the playoffs: - Only one of the Bills remaining games is against an AFC WC contender, so none of their other wins will help knock other teams out. - There are currently 7 teams ahead of the Bills competing for the 2 WC spots. Let's focus on the ones that are .500 or better to keep it simple: - Denver is 7-4 and still has 2 games left against KC and Oakland at home. It's extremely unlikely they'll win less than 10 games. - Jacksonville is 6-4 and is currently behind by 17. They only have one "soft" opponent left, Cleveland, so it's not unthinkable that they could collapse and fail to win 9 games. - Pittsburgh is 6-4 and plays Baltimore tonight. After tonight, their next two games are against Oakland and Cleveland, so if they win tonight they'll probably be 9-4 in a few weeks. - Baltimore is 5-5. After tonight, they still have games against Detroit and Oakland. In addition, Baltimore and Pittsburgh still play each other again on 12/27. Add all of that up and it sure looks like either Pittsburgh or Baltimore is going to win 10 games. Of course, there's nothing wrong with rooting for a miracle.

There are a few typos in that coverage map. It shows both the NYC and Atlanta areas as getting the KC-San Diego game. I looked up the TV listings for both cities for Sunday, and CBS has paid programming. That's consistent with the rule listed at the site that says that no network can show a game opposite the local team. If those CBS affiliates were allowed to show a game, presumably they would carry Indianapolis-Houston instead of KC-San Diego.

The problem with that approach is you would have to figure out a way to keep everything secret until you got him signed. Sneaking around behind Dick's back seems a lot worse to me than interviewing HC/GM candidates with the full knowledge of the interim coach.

A few things to keep in mind: There's no reason to believe that Shanahan is going to jump at the first offer the Bills make without first considering what other teams might be interested in him. There's also no reason to believe that Ralph is going to "hand him the keys" without first considering some other candidates.

There were some news/weather people that used local Buffalo news as a stepping stone to national level, CNN in particular. I can't think of anybody who worked on local network broadcasts that did anything national. The only people that come to mind are Ray Bentley and Steve Tasker, who did preseason games for the Bills before becoming network broadcasters. Tasker might even still have a weekly show on Channel 7 during the season.

I'm also looking at this from the perspective of someone who has worked for several companies that had a change of ownership. In all cases, the new owners made at least some significant changes almost immediately, and generally speaking all bets were off as far as being guaranteed to keep the same job you had under the previous ownership.

To clarify, I was thinking more along the lines of the new coach/GM thinking "I have to get this turned around before Ralph dies, or there's a good chance the new owner will decide to 'start fresh' with his own approach/staff".

I agree with this. Even if Ralph gives a new coach a lifetime guaranteed contract, that's Ralph's lifetime, not his. Once Ralph dies all bets are off.

Let's keep things in perspective here. Fewell was a position coach for about 5 years at the college level, and a DB coach in the NFL for 7 years before Dick hired him as DC. Since Dick is a defensive-oriented coach, he presumably had a lot of say in how the defense was run. So Fewell's experience is limited to say the least.

In the game that Kevin Everett got hurt, the Bills only had 10 men on the field for the play immediately before the game winning FG. The Bills didn't want to call timeout because the Broncos were out of timeouts and they were hoping the clock would run out before they could run a play that gained enough yardage to get them in FG range and get the FG unit on and that play run as well.

First let's get all the facts straight. When they attempted the 60 yarder at the end of the first half, the LOS was the 42. Jackson caught that ball about 5 yards deep in the end zone, (but directly between the uprights) so it was more than 5 yards short, let's estimate roughly 6 yards short. On the play in question, the LOS was the 29, and it was 3rd and 6. The play lost 4 yards, and there was a holding penalty. So you're only gaining 6 yards by taking the penalty, not 10. The choice was between: - decline the penalty. It's 4th down, and they're going to attempt a 51 yard FG. - accept the penalty. It will be 3rd and 16 from the 39. If they gain no more yardage, the FG attempt would be from 57 yards. Dick probably decided that since it was "only 6 yards", the right choice was to decline the penalty, because if you're defending a 3rd and 16, they'll have a good chance to throw something underneath and picking up 6+ yards, even if they don't get a first down. Here are the reasons why Dick was wrong: 1. As others have pointed out in this thread, when you are behind, generally speaking the proper strategy is to always try to extend the game as long as possible. A 51 yard FG is roughly a 50/50 shot, and if he makes it, you're chances of winning the game drop to virtually nil. Giving the other team a 50/50 chance to essentially end the game is something that should only be done as a act of desperation. 2. Given the choice between "hoping the other guy screws up", and "giving your players a chance to make a play", a good coach will in most cases opt for the later. That's how you instill confidence in your players; making them believe that you feel they'll make plays if given the opportunity.

One of the problems with Parrish is he's really to small to be a regular at any NFL position.

No teams get blasted every week. Most teams rarely get blown out, with some tending to get blown out more often than others. Yes, the Bills seem to be in almost all of their games. The problem is that they really aren't. In virtually all of their games, they are overmatched in both on-field talent and off-field coaching/preparation, and it's simply a matter of time before the other team prevails. Yes, they surprise a lot of good teams for most of the game, which at least shows they have some game. Unfortunately, since they lose pretty much all of those games, it's an obvious indicator that they don't have enough game.

talk is cheap and so is Ralph

Unless they've changed the rules, Ticket Exchange doesn't allow you to sell your tickets for less than face value.

Of course what Aristotle said/thought isn't what the quote said, and it wasn't spoken by him: http://literarytalk.blogspot.com/2009/06/t...s-of-dying.html

The biggest problem with this is the people who feel they are somehow morally superior and have some (actually any) sort of right to impose their (arbitrary) moral code on the rest of society.

More specifically, I remember reading last season that:1) Hardy never had to adjust his routes based on coverage when he was in college. 2) The Bills coaches didn't know that until he showed up at practice. 1) I can find understandable. 2) is almost unbelievable.

Byrd stays at FS. He's simply playing too well to keep off the field. Whitner moves to SS. Wilson has looked good primarily because they were playing such inept offenses. Scott, probably the best S against the run, gets on the field in a variety of packages: - in the goal line package, probably Byrd comes out. Range is of limited use with such a short field. - as another poster mentioned in a different thread, they used a nickel package with Bryd at FS, with Whitner and Scott lined up about 5 yards off the LOS in the New Orleans game. Essentially any time the offensive personnel and/or the down & distance give them the opportunity, they'll put Scott on the field and take out one of the LBs.

Bud Carpenter was and still is the Bills trainer. Rusty Jones left to go to the Bears about 4 years ago: http://www.chicagobears.com/team/coach.asp?coach_id=18 The person who replaced him certainly appears to have been groomed to replace Jones: http://www.buffalobills.com/team/coaches/j...c1-c310b8c79991 He started out as an assistant for a college program, did that for 2 years, then got promoted to the lead role for 4 years. (all sports) Then he got hired by the Bills and worked under Jones for 4 years before Jones left. He even went to the same college as Jones.

I just skimmed through Marv's record. If I added right, he was 0-4 with the Chiefs and 11-12 with the Bills. Based on that, I certainly wouldn't be surprised if some coaches had winning records.