Webster Guy

So is your biggest concern that we draft a speedy WR with a top 15 pick? or do you WANT to draft a speedy WR with a top 15 pick?

He said he was OK but I thought he looked very sluggish out there. Was glad to see they brought in Batten for awhile there. I think when they look at the game film they're going to start playing Merriman more sporadically, like a 3rd down specialist. I can't help but thinking the impact Moats would have had if he had started in Merrimans spot. I think he is going to find his way back into a pass rushing role and make an impact for us. Even if it's not Moats, and they plug in Batten or Carrington in Merriman's place, I'd rather see what one of these young guys could do in their second year. Guess I'm not sold on Merriman as a permanent piece of the team yet, despite his amazing preseason play. Was worried about LB Barnett too on that first long run by Charles over to his side and he was slow getting over there, but he seemed to get better as the day went on. Great coverage skills though, lookin' like a CB out there on a few plays. What a great win.

The Chiefs will do what our defense dictates. If we start with 8 in the box they throw, if we play standard 7 they'll feed Charles more often than not. I said before in an earlier post, we will beat these guys if we can get pressure with 4, and we have a good front four starting tomorrow. Better yet, KC will beat themselves. I think we are a better coached club. And our defense lineup is experienced this year. Dwan, Kyle Merriman, kelsay, Andra Davis, Barnett, Wilson, McGee. Dareus is the only inexperienced guy here, and he's not playing a mentally complex position. These guys will be tough for KC to fool, they're not going to score more than 20 on us. I cant wait for this freakin football game.

I say this as a Lee Evans fan who was sad to see him go : How do you know the move was idiotic? What if our passing game improves this year without Lee and Donald Jones or Easley turns out to be a stud like Stevie did last year. Now we have an extra pick and a younger receiver with more long term potential than Evans. You might be right, but it's like grading a draft right after it happens--nobody has any clue until it plays out. Including you.

A right of first refusal (if any were ever made) would be made to any local WNY buyers, not to move the team elsewhere. You're implying that if a new Buffalo based owner who wanted to keep the team in Buffalo offers the highest price, then the Wilson's would take the same amount of money to watch Buffalo lose the franchise and their name become mud like Modell's in Cleveland. Never. Ralph may be bad at staffing and retaining good employees, but I think he's a good human being. If it meant losing a hundred mil I could see them moving the team, but for even money--no way.

Donald Jones Offense Aaron Williams gets the start midseason and becomes an Antoine Winfield type of corner with killer hits and solid coverage skills.

Last year our only "quality proven wideout" was Lee, and a seventh round nobody emerged for pro bowl type numbers. Evans was my favorite Bill, but if you think we don't have solid depth at WR you're not paying attention. Back to the original point of the post, special teams return guys need to be ball protectors FIRST and foremost. I know Easely has the arm strength but man he seems to have trouble protecting the pill. Give me Roscoe on the punts and Leodis on the KR. Keep Freddy and Easley off special teams.

Good pickup there, I didn't know Wanny had a history with Palko. There are a lot of calls for blitzing here, but remember we will start Dwan, Dareus, Kyle and Merriman as the four linemen, and if we can get pressure with rushing them ONLY, then we won't we have to blitz as much and we will win this game. Remember you have two guys that have been probowlers, and the defensive rookie of the year in Dareus (sorry Von) and Edwards is no slouch either. That leaves our 3 remaining backers to roam without the 300 pounders in their face like we usually have. (just TE's and maybe a second blocking back, which is advantage Buffalo) In the 3-4 (when we actually play it) you still have the unknown 4th and possibly 5th rusher to confuse them. Kelsay may rush and Merriman drops, vice versa, or they send them both if they can't get there with 4. This still leaves us in position for the KC draws plays, delays and short TE middle stuff that we've always struggled with because of weak pocket pushing. I agree with posters saying stuff the box and stop the run, but that also leaves you susceptible for the long ball. Getting pressure with 4 is the defensive coordinators dream, and those first few series will likely tell the tale for the kind of day we're going to have in Arrowhead. I think this will be a close one but the Bills can definitely pull this off. The 7 point line is a gift to Bills betters.

Agreed. My most-fun player in the NFL to watch when he has the ball, and probably lots of other people's too. I'm afraid the dude doesn't have the body to stay healthy though. The problem with using him in the slot is that if it's a run play he's got to block, and he's in there with the big boys that are twice his weight sometimes. Stay healthy Roscoe, we need you buddy

good point i've never thought it of it that way. Reminds me of the draft where we selected mike williams 4th overall in the world and then signed undrafted free agent tight end Jason Peters. One panned out to be a pro bowl LT, the other sucked and is out of football......

Hmmmm. Paraphrasing some points made on this thread I can't understand "It's not Nix's call as to what they offered Clabo" "Ralph doesn't care about the Oline just ticket sales" "Gailey and Nix think the line is adequate" Jesus people.

He's a decent LT when he's healthy. Has knee and shoulder issues but seems good to go this year. Athletic, long arms, probably a better pass blocker than run (as someone suggested earlier). Had the best game of anybody on the Oline for the short amount of time they were on the field against Chicago.

It's camp and nobody is going to offer him any guaranteed money, just a body that will compete (or in his case, NOT compete) and get cut. How many NFL teams are looking for a 220 lb skinny linebacker that can't shed blocks. Steroid using con man.

Is there a window between the end of college football and the combine where players don't get tested? If they aren't tested at the combine then the system sucks and the NFL deserves this type of thing. I'm not a consipiracy type guy AT ALL, but its obvious that Maybin can't gain enough weight to play in the NFL which leads me to believe this is a serious possibility. If I were Ralph and I thought this were true, I'd refuse to pay him the rest of his guaranteed salary and sue him for misrepresentation and fraud. Even though I'd probably lose in court, Maybin would lose a boatload in lawyers fees and he'd be forced to offer a reasonable explanation for this. Lastly, I agree with an earlier poster that it's time to let this loser become forgotten and focus on the fun team we have now. Enough Maybin talk for me forever.

After last year we know that stopping the run, rushing the passer and decent Oline play are priorities. We look bigger and stronger upfront on D, with good Dline depth and Dareus a huge upgrade (still can't believe Denver passed on the Big Fella) What concerns me is that the two critical question marks are Bell at LT and Merriman for pass rushing. Both of these guys are injury prone, and if you take them out of the equation then I don't see us improving significantly other than run stopping. In fact, we don't even really have ANYONE legitimate backing up Bell on our QB's blindside, so we desperately need him to be healthy this year. He battles hard and seems to finish his blocks well. Hopefully that right knee holds up, and I think he has shoulder problems too, but we need him badly. Levitre played tackle in college, I wonder if he's every been considered a viable option for the job if something happens, maybe slide Hangartner back in C and Wood to Guard. Hopefully we'll never need to find out. As far as Merriman goes, he was just sitting there on waivers to be picked up because of his injuries. We didn't use a draft pick or trade anybody for him so he was free in that regard. He signed relatively cheap and was the only real pass rushing personnel upgrade from last year coming off of serious injuries. Its rare in the NFL to pluck somebody off waivers and have them significantly help your team. We're asking a lot from him. Nobody ever questioned his drive, just his body holding up for a season at LB in the NFL. If he stays healty and pans out, Nix is going to look like a genius. They say the achilles tear makes you lose a little quickness, and obviously Shawne had no problem with that in Chicago, so now the issue is durability. I just wonder if they should use him as a 3rd down specialist to ease him into the season so he doesn't re-injure himself. Sam Cowart had a similar thing happen to him with us in 2001, then the following season at the Jets he partially tore it again and he was pretty ineffective after that. Bottom line is, Nix is planning for the 2012 season to be our playoff year (based on giving away Evans etc) and the coaches need to be VERY cautious with Merriman this season. He's still young, (although steriods can age the body prematurely) and the guy is a beast that would give us potentially three pro bowl-type dudes upfront with Kyle and Dareus. Win, lose or draw this is going to be a fun season. Go Bills!!!!!!!!!

I don't care if the endzones are red or blue but the idea of keeping them plain green was so lame. I remember hearing when Donahoe did the new field that it was more traditional or some crap because the grass used to die faster when it is painted. Hmmmm, that's the kind of logic that we used to sign Kelsay....... Tradition for this Bills fan is whatever we were doing in the early 90's when we were elite. Now we've gotta work on keeping dudes out of the blue zones and gettin our boys in.

The new regime signed Kelsay with probably the most skewed field productivity/cash ratio of any re-sign I can remember. They won't cut him unless he completely sucks in camp.

Okay I don't want to embarass the guy who wrote this, but I hafta quote this one "Poz is washed up. He sucks and at age 26, hes far too old. Merriman is only 27 and still young" CLASSIC LOGIC. Chalk one up for the Cheektowaga School System..... laughin myAss off

The coaches for our team chose to have this guy run the defense last year. They went through training camp with a new coach and GM and Poz was the guy that emerged as the best for the position. On a team that is already weak at LB and has the money to re-sign anybody they want to, I'm not sure why this is even a question. He's a guarantee re-sign. Nobody is going to offer him an outrageous deal like Clements, Peters etc. There are people on here saying he takes bad angles and makes too many tackles way downfield. Just like the London Fletcher talk on this board before he left Buffalo and made the pro bowl with Washington. The dude is a good player, locker room guy, leader, at the perfect time of his career where experience and youth intersect. So we want to get rid of him to save Ralph money? He's the guy worth $700 million right?

My link[/url] You are completely mistaken. Buffet is a value buyer whose success is precisely that he DOESN'T limit his vision to specific markets. He's bought candy makers and train companies in the same year. Snyder bought the skins for $750M twelve years ago and its DOUBLED in value. NFL owners return on investments have been extremely strong. I think Jerry Jones paid around $150M for the Cowboys. http://www.businessinsider.com/how-much-did-nfl-owners-paid-for-their-teams-2010-10 The other thing he has shown is that he believes in community assets. He has said that divesting the Buffalo News from his Washington Post division would probably make sense because of it's weak financial status but he will keep it because he believes its valuable to the community. Bottom line, he is the kind of investor that has the weight and values to be involved in the Bills succession plans. Too bad Ralph doesn't reach out to a guy like that. He could alleviate so much worry and stress by simply communicating that he has a plan to keep them here. He seems so nice and folksy in interviews, and has a great reputation as a solid boss, but he's lost my respect in the handling of his estate and this community asset that we ALL have contributed to as taxpayers and fans.

There are simply too many intangibles at the QB position for that article to have any merit. QB stats are as close to meaningless as you can get. Here's a stat for you: Tom Brady sucked in the superbowl against the Giants defensive pressure and they only scored 14 points and lost. Since then he hasn't won a single playoff game, and that was four years ago. He is a HOF QB with above average protection and receiving corps. Can I then conclude that he plays poorly under pressure and is a sub-standard QB? That's the logic some of you are using. Judge Fitz on his performance as a three year starter under Chan and Nix. I think he makes us look better than we are on offense considering the weak tackle play on both sides of the OL. Same goes for Spiller.

Yeah and Poz had 151 tackles last year so does that make him an all star? LB stats are virtually meaningless (which I think you tried to imply after you quoted them). If you think Cowart returned to Pro Bowl form then you weren't watching him like I was. He lost a 1/2 step and was clearly never better than average. One of Donahoe's better moves letting him go and he was my favorite Bill by far.

I keep thinking Merriman is going to follow the same path as Sam Cowart did. From stud to dud because of the knees, and never the same player again. Out of the league in a few years. Im shocked that Nix has so much faith in this dude, but if he ends up coming back to pro bowl form then Buddy is a genius in my book. Even if he comes back as an average starter and is a good locker room guy, it's still a great move. Does anyone know anything about Merriman's character? I've never seen an interview with the guy........

Wow, your lawnmower story is just like Toronto taking the Bills.

I think you need to look at where these guys are picked in the first round, not just first rounders. AS we learned this year in the draft, being in the top 10 or top 5 raises your options and expectations. McCargo went late first round where more busts seem likely. Mike Williams at #4 was the highest of the bunch. He is out of football and my number one bust. Maybin is my number two bust. Sat out the entire training camp for more money and the guy is utterly incapable of beating an NFL tackle. When the scouting department compared Orakpo and Maybin video side by side, how they chose Maybin is baffling.