KurtGodel77

Thanks. I guess when your defense gives you five turnovers, you don't need a whole lot of offensive yardage. Then there is the hidden yardage: running plays from Shaud Williams and Lee Evans.

I'll take the 37 points and the win any day, but how on earth is this possible? (I live out of town, so I didn't see the game.)

I think Shaud is good enough to justify trading away Travis Henry.

So now we're back to talking about individual contributions, are we? Dillon's individual contribution this week was 88 yards on 22 carries after running his mouth. Next week, McGahee's will be bigger.

Dillon hasn't won football games. The New England Patriots have won football games, just like they won games last year without him. The Patriots have already shown they can win without Dillon. Now it's time they prove they can lose with him.

Another thing: because the Green Bay game is at 4:15 Eastern (3:15 in Green Bay's Central time) it will be that much colder than an early afternoon game would have been.

I HATE this schedule. The only loss I see for our playoff foes is Baltimore at Indianapolis. MAYBE Jacksonville at Green Bay. The nice, frozen tundra of Green Bay . . . But the other two games seem like they will be wasted opportunities for our opponents to add to their loss columns.

This from Dr. Z's mailbag: "Nice comments from Steeler Dan of North Carolina, and I thank you. He thinks the biggest offseason signings were a pair of defensive coaches, Dick LeBeau in Pittsburgh and Wade Phillips in San Diego. I agree with your LeBeau choice, but I'd have Gregg Williams in Washington ahead of Phillips." This really annoyed me. Everyone else is getting Buffalo's defensive coaching talent, while we're stuck with a defensive coordinator who always gets outschemed by Charlie Weis. The only silver lining in this cloud is that Notre Dame job, but knowing the Patriots they'll find someone else as ridiculously smart as Charlie to take his place.

I've never heard of a first name like Urban before. Does anyone know anything about it or what it means? (No, I'm not interested in smart-aleck remarks like "urban is more crowded than suburban or rural.")

The only 40 times that really count in my book are the ones that are electronically timed. You have a beam or something, and the timer starts when the runner crosses the beam. It stops when the runner crosses the beam at the finish line. Human timers aren't accurate enough, and there is some reason to believe that stopwatch guys give guys the benefit of the doubt.

When I first saw the title of that award, I thought it was a joke.

The Focus is also really good on gas.

The Ford Focus is a good car. It was engineered by a German. This German tried to sell the design to Volkswagen. They liked the design, but said it was too similar to their existing designs. The Focus handles well, it's reliable, and you get a lot for what you pay.

Lol!!

In the long run, 2003 will have been an important step for the Bills. The 6-10 record caused us to replace our coaching staff. We used our high draft position to get Lee Evans; a player who is really coming into his own. Let's say the Bills had signed Terry Glenn instead of Bobby Shaw. Let's say that Glenn's ability to stretch defenses turned out to be worth an extra three wins in 2003. Gregg Williams would have probably kept his job. We'd have Kevin "Kill Drew" Gilbride to run our offense. Our offense started running out of steam in the second half of 2002, as defenses learned that you stop a Gilbride/Drew offense by sending blitzers up the middle. In 2003, Gilbride showed zero ability to adapt to the personnel he was given. That convinced me he was pretty much a one-trick pony. Even if you gave Gilbride another Peerless, I still think the second half of 2002 would be about the best our offensive team could have done with him as coordinator.

I agree it would be nice if we could clear those guys out of the playoffs, but I'm also rooting against the Jets. I want them to lose on general principle. Also, ridding the playoffs of their foul presence would free up a slot for Buffalo.

It dawned on me that the NFL quote isn't as bad as I first thought. Maybe the Jets would have to win, and several other teams lose, in order for them to clinch a playoff berth this weekend. Hopefully one of the teams that would have to lose is the Bills . . .

This from NFL.com: " The Jets have the league's leading rusher, their quarterback back in the fold and a chance to clinch a playoff spot this week. That's the good news." Um, if that's the good news, I'd hate to hear the bad news. Presumably, if the Jets have the chance to clinch a playoff spot this week, they'll have the chance again next week. And again the following week. This will continue up until the playoffs, I'd imagine. Certainly the Jets will win at least one game in their next four, so that leaves just one playoff spot for everyone else to compete for.

Christmas is based on the old Scandinavian holiday of Yule. During Yule, extended families would get together for days of feasting. The celebration would begin when the thickest log anyone could find was thrown on the fire. This log--called the Yule log--would normally take about twelve days to burn. Because the celebration would last about twelve days, there were the twelve days of Christmas. The Scandinavians would decorate pine trees to celebrate the holiday. I like this Yule style of Christmas better than our overcommercialized way of celebrating. Giving gifts to kids is fine because they always want toys. Giving gifts to soldiers or the poor makes sense as well. But most adults already buy the things they need, so this holiday causes their homes to become cluttered with the things they received as gifts.

I've heard it said that we will be over the cap next year, even without re-signing Jonas. Obviously we have to do something. Will TD succumb to the temptation of solving his cap problems by restructuring or cutting an overpaid, declining Butler player? . . . We'll see.

The problem with taking that $8 million cap hit for Moulds next season is that we lose Jonas Jennings. Jonas would cost a lot LESS than $8 million a year to re-sign, so we'd be losing other stuff as well. I don't like to walk away from young talent like Jonas in order to overpay for a declining veteran. (Yes, Eric is still very good, but he's not as good as he was two years ago. Next year he'll be a little less good than this year.) With a young core of offensive players in the form of McGahee, Evans, and Losman, it makes sense to keep other young offensive players like Jonas.

I love the game between Cincy and NE, because the outcome will help us no matter what: - If NE loses, Pitt won't have a reason to play in the final game - If Cincy loses, they won't have a strong reason to play hard against us next week

I'd rate those three as follows: 1. Jerry Butler 2. Eric Moulds 3. Andre Reed Even though Eric Moulds is probably better than Andre Reed, we can't afford his cap number of $8 million. He needs to restructure or he's out. It would be hard to get fair value for him in a trade, because next year he'll be ridiculously overpaid. But using Terrell Owens as an example is not a good one; because language in T.O.'s contract specified he should become a free agent. That case went to arbitration, and San Fran was lucky to get any compensation at all for losing him.

I was thinking the same thing. I have to admit that I'll be nervous seeing Drew go on the road to take on the Patriots.

It depends. If it's the Drew we saw a few weeks ago in NE, the answer is no. But if it's the Drew we saw in Miami . . . well yes. The way I see it, it's like clearing hurdles. Drew started with the little hurdles, playing well against defenses like those of St. Louis while at home. Then he had some success against better defenses, like the Jets'. But that was at home. People said he couldn't do it on the road, so he had a pretty good game against Seattle. The next hurdle was having a great game on the road against a great defense, which Drew did in Miami. Will he ever get good enough to clear the highest hurdle of all? (By this I mean can he ever play well against NE?) I hope the answer is yes.