Matt in KC

Wow. Very cool! You should try out the blog feature on the wall and write up a little on what you're doing, and some detail on your collection. It looks like a lot of detailed work (which I appreciate and can relate to), and is obviously a labour of love. I'm sure MW will love it. You will of course have to tell us how that goes.

Why, is she not ready to quit yet?

#2 again... Tell her you'll be ready in a minute, but have to correct the guys on the football message board because the 101 top things not to do was really 123, but after a good ending it turned out that the replacement #2 item had already been said so you had to post an even better #2 to end on because after all the work the guys on the football message board put in it would be a shame to have it end on a off note so you have to come up with just the right way to end the topic since it had been going for days... (hello? Where did you go?)

I've kicked several addictions in my time, and feel for you. Avoid movies etc. that deal with what you're trying to do away with, and do not go to the places (or the people) that you most strongly associate with the stuff you're avoiding. It took me a loong time to feel okay going to a bar to play pool or hanging out at the neighborhood poker game without giving in.... Just avoid it for awhile. Assuming you were getting high every day, you'll probably be surprised that the weed will get a lot easier after 4-6 weeks. Until then, keep distracting yourself, especially with things like exercise that can feel good and reaffirm that you're being good to yourself by staying clean. One last thing: be mild with yourself and keep pushing to the place you want to be. One puff doesn't mean you've blown it, just that you took a puff. That does not mean you're right back where you were. Good luck. BTW, why the change in lifestyle?

http://www.stadiumwall.com/index.php?showtopic=27804

Wow. That's quite a picture. The truck didn't explode immediately:

When will the NFL start tracking missed tackles??

I'm, eager to see how CV and MW progress this preseason. In the scrimmage, the left side of the line dramatically outperformed the right.

$115,000 per catch. Wow. Maybe the Eagles will feel forced to let him go to Miami, where he can start off with a big signing bonus.... Note to Bills: Don't Feed the Animals!

I thought Osunde looked by far the best of the third string defensemen in the scrimmage. He was fast, strong and persistent. He played he played LDE, opposite Ritzmann at RDE, and clearly played better each down. I remember thinking that one more showing like that and he may well bounce Constantine off the PS. BTW, he has almost the same height/weight stats as Ritzmann, both 6' 3" , 255 lbs. Gause is 6' 4", 275 lbs.

I'm open to the idea that Peters is smart, and has some oher reason (semi-literate?) he scores in the single digits on his Wonderlic test. So long as he has the street smarts to do what it takes in the trenches.... At very least, he's fun to watch. He does seem to be picking up his new role quite well.

Signing off, indeed... RIP.

After reading questions about Posey, I kinda wondered why I've never even heard rumors that his starter status may be in jeopardy. (He's not sacking the QB often, not racking up tackles, not batting down passes... what is he doing!? ) I went back and watched the D-Line very closely this weekend while replaying the scrimmage on on my DVR (wife went to NYC). I learned a bit about our zone blitz. While I knew that it disguised where the extra rusher was coming from, and sometimes lead to weird choices (Edwards in pass coverage?), what I didn't know is that Posey seemed to be the central player. The key to the way we blitz is for Posey to come up right at (or near) the LOS, outside the LDE, and threaten to rush in. Half the time he rushes in on these plays, the other half of the time he steps toward the QB (so his rush has to be honored), and falls off into coverage. On running plays, of course he continues to crash in, but is usually a half step behind the DEs, DTs and whoever was called to be the blitzer (so he often does not get the tackle). Watching closely, I'd say this is not easy, and there is an art in just how much he can come in without leaving too much space behind himself for receivers, dependent on the opposing personnel, and what blitz was called (who's shifting to cover thehole left by the blitzer). I think Posey has many better traits than Stamer for this role: he's more nimble, is taller, has a larger wingspan (wingspan really helps if you may be a few inches too close to the QB when he lobs a pass over you), and I would guess that he's much more adept at making these reads than Stamer. I was surprised to see that Ryan Denney seemed to be the other "keeper" who was playing the Posey role in the Scrimmage (Wendell Hunter did too at the end). Denney is very tall (6' 7''), quick, has experience rushing from the end of the line, and of course he's not a starter so he can fill in for Posey. Considering these points, I think he's a better choice than Stamer to replace Posey, if we had too. I am impressed that we seem to have a DE backing up our starting LB (at least for the blitzes). This is an example of Buffalo customizing their defense based on the strenghths of the players on the team. I saw 15 plays where Posey played this role very well, and one where Milloy was saying (I think) that he did not fall off fast enough, on one of GB's few completions.

I would guess it's #41 - Marvin Ward. He's being faithful to the fans he's spent time playing for and being cheered by. Maybe we need to win him over to Buffalo?

Okay, so I reviewed the scrimmage on TiVo again, this time focusing on the Bills’ D-Line. It seemed to me that they were getting great pressure, so I wanted to see if I could figure out how they were doing it. Here’s what I saw: Starting Defensive Line: 90-Chris Kelsay 95-Sam Adams 98-Ron Edwards 94-Aaron Schobel The Bills started the game and played only four or five downs in this configuration, blitzing a LB on half the plays. They got decent pressure with four rushers when Sam Adams was one of the guys rushing. The configuration used much more by the Bills was to have the strong-side LB 96-Posey playing right up at the line, outside of 90-Kelsay. They did this for 12-15 plays, making it 5 players right up on the line for most of them, and rushing 5 or 6 players on about half of these plays. Posey would sometimes rush from the outside, but would more often take a hop toward the play, read pass-or-run and fall off on pass plays (covering TE, RB, FB, WR in zone). For run plays, he’d already be up to the line, moving the right direction to intercept the run. For runs, it usually looked like Kelsay had assignment to contain edge while Posey knifed into the middle. I was surprised how many plays the Bills did not have two DT’s on the field. They lined up three DEs on the line 4-5 times (not counting goal-line plays), usually with 92-Denney outside of Kelsay. For these plays, Denney’s role seemed to be the same as Posey's, falling off into coverage for half the plays, rushing on the others. Linebacker play on the line For the vast majority of plays, a linebacker lined up just off the line, or right up on the D-Line. Typically, the LB would have the opposite call of the Posey/Denney player, and fall off at the snap / crash on runs or blitz on pass plays, picking the holes opened up by the big guys starting the push. On a half-dozen plays, there were only three total DE/DTs on the line, each time with a linebacker or two joining them. I saw Kelsay-Adams-Spikes-Schobel on an aggressive four man rush (how would you like to try to block them?). Later, Posey-Bannan-Anderson-Gause-Stamer lined up. Posey fell off into coverage and Crowell joined in a five man rush, resulting in a sack. The oddest configuration I saw was Posey-Fletcher-Edwards-Spikes-Schobel lined up (all of our starting LBs!?). Fletcher and Spikes dropped back quickly, Edwards took a few steps back into coverage, and 33-Greer blitzed around left end while 26-Baker came from the right. This four-man rush looked like it was creative, but disrupted our defense more than their offense. GB threw for a score on the play, then went to their goal-line plays. The Backups / 3rd-String / Playing-for-their-lives-players Late in the scrimmage, a dozen or so plays had the following players lined up: 99-LDE Uyi Osunde 93-LDT Lauvale Sape 67-RDT LaWaylon Brown 91-RDE Constantin Ritzmann For these plays, 54-Wendell Hunter played the Posey role, hugging the D-Line on the strong side. 52-Daryl Towns seemed to be the only LB brought on a blitz, except one where 50-Liam Ezekial and Hunter also blitzed, and 99-Osunde fell off into coverage. Of all the third string players, I was extremely impressed with only Uyi Osunde. He was fast, and strong, and really chased down every play. I marked three run plays and five passes where he looked strong, and saw no mistakes (I only counted obviously good or bad plays). I am definitely going to keep my eye on him as my official “diamond in the rough.” Take Aways The biggest thing I saw was that we might be okay if we had to play without Sam Adams. I wish Farve stayed in longer so I could see if a veteran QB could adjust to our blitzes. If so, then I’m concerned about the pressure we can generate with a four man rush, and suspect we’d try to hide which four to give us an edge. This defense is built for speed, and I don’t think we could pull off these plays with players slow to get to their assignment at the snap. On nearly half our defensive plays, lighter players filled heaver-position roles, DEs playing DT; LBs playing DE or DT(!). Stamer vs. Posey (vs. Denney) While I’d say he has a slightly better pass rush, I do not think Josh Stamer is nearly quick enough (changing directions) to pull off the new role Posey is playing. He seems to have a more solid body, but is listed as slightly lighter than Posey, who is a couple inches taller and has a bigger “wingspan.” Note: Denney is also quick and is tall with long arms. I think this is why he played this role with the second team.

Yes, JPL is struggling. No, he is not doing poorly. In fact, I'd say he's a bit ahead on the basics, getting past rookie mistakes, and he shows huge aptitude in areas that start developing later on for the good quarterbacks, such as leadership. Other areas that are often constant/unchanging for quarterbacks, such as speed (of release, considering alternate recievers, and throw velocity) JPL looks to me like he's in the 80-90th percentile for starting NFL quarterbacks. Now that's exciting! I'm eager to see how well he audibles in the real season. I think you should be evaluated every day. Now, should you be disciplined based on a single "bad day?" I don't think so. I think a good boss would send the employee home for the day, or at least get them out of the spotlight. But, comparing my job to that of a professional athlete is a stretch. (Idon't know about your job).

You're right, FFS. Injuries are the big question with JJ. But for technique/performance when on the field, he was as consistent as anyone on the OLine. On the OLine, making fewer mistakes is more important than having big plays. If you can nutralize the guy(s) accross from you, that's usually good enough. This is what intrigues me most about Duke Preston (75), our 4th round draft pick. Is Duke a nickname for Raymond? (...or are they talking about his father?) I'm surprised that undrafted Jasen Esposito was getting snaps at Center in front of Duke, but they seemed to play well together. Maybe this was done to help him focus on blocking at the NFL level.

That's because Brandon and MadBuffaloDisease are the "two relaible league sources" cited.

Though JPL looked a little twitchy at times, I’d take him as he is now over Drew as he finished last year. A few comments on the moments that didn’t look so good (beyond the one obvious bad choice the needs to learn from) : When he under-threw his receivers he was delivering the ball where it could not be intercepted. On one of those, he under-threw Evans when he was double-covered, I think deciding at the last moment he shouldn’t be throwing there. He also rushed when reacting to a corner blitz, and overthrew Evans right after that. On the bad snap, the count was on one, and he barked out something unexpected (to Roscoe I think) and Teague thought it was him calling for the snap. But these are only the negatives. Overall, I’m very impressed.

Yes, I was surprised about Villarrial, who I thought did very well last year. ...enough so that I thought he got hurt yesterday (not Smith).

EDit: I know Peters was playing with the secod team. When I typed that I wsa thinking of the TC clips Astrobot posted where he was just about holding his own against Schobel (on some plays, just holding Aaron).

Of all the units, I was most pleasantly surprised with the O-Line. I watched the scrimmage a couple times and reviewed each play on TiVo. I kept a count of clearly positive and negative plays, and whether they were run or pass plays. I'm not an OLine guru, so I didn't count anything if it wasn't clearly good or bad performance by the player. 69-Mike Gandy, 66-Bennie Anderson, 70-Teague I was worried about the early reports, and what a whole new left-side of the line might mean with a new QB. It looks like I needn’t worry. I thought these guys did great, especially Teague, in whom I’d previously lost faith. Teague and Anderson did a bit better on pass plays than run plays, and Gandy looked stronger on the running plays. On the opening Evans reverse, Gandy and Teague were running hard and blocking (with Losman) 30 yards downfield! 58-Chris Villarrial, 68-Mike Williams, 71-Jason Peters Villarial started very slowly, and looked average or bad on a couple early run plays, good in pass pro later, and then disappeared. MW looked the worst of anyone who played OL with the first team. I counted four run plays and three pass plays where MW was the weak link. (3 runs / 2 passes where kudos were warranted). I hope he’s just warming up slowly for the year, and am not alarmed at this point. Mostly, he looked slow and a bit uncoordinated to me. Usually the problem was that he wasn’t touching the defender; they were running around or away from him and he did not get to them. Jason Peters seems to have the opposite problem of MW: He moves well and gets in the way of the defender, but has poor form that he is constantly making up for with God-given strength and speed. He often has his feet too far apart, taking big sidesteps to get back into position, and doesn’t get good leverage because he’s off-balance, standing up, his shoulders aren’t square, and/or he’s not using his hands well. (Note: MW does these things well, but he’s not “getting there”) Peters was better in pass pro than run support, and overall got average results with the first team, which is a big step forward. The left side of the first-string OLine outperformed the right side by a wide margin, in my opinion. The second-string OL played in this combo for a few series: LT: 71-Peters - Was suprised to see him lined up in middle of D on punt, not on the edge where he successfully blocked a kick last year. LG: 73-Justin Geisinger, our 6th round draft pick was stronger on run plays than pass, notching several nice plays I saw C: 60-Jasen Esposito (a few nice run, a few nice pass, a couple mental lapses) RG: 75-Duke Preston (2 nice pass, 2 run, backed into QB by bull-rush once is only negative I saw) RT: 79-Dylan McFarland only stood out on 3 run plays; was replaced later by 61-Jerman, who was mediocre, at best 73-60-75 seemed to work well together 74 -David Pruce - I saw two nice blocks on run plays and one poor play. Fodder 76-Geir Gundmundsen - 2 nice pass blocks and a penalty is all I saw. 72-Lawrence Smith: hurt/out – (more here) 65-Tucker: hurt/out – I’m eager to see if he can come back effective (when?) 64-Sobieki: hurt/out – not a Bill anymore as far as I’m concerned Of all the Bills, Teague had the best outing, by my count (7 positive pass plays, 3 positive runs, no negative plays)

We don't have to limit our team to just the 53 best coaches and trainers, do we?

I think we should give Woodbury a shot at #3 QB. If he plays as well as Matthews, why wouldn't we offer Matthews a job as assistant QB coach to help mentor JPL, if that's why we prefer him? (Just saw your post, MBD - - great idea!) This is all I could find regarding the emergency QB: http://www.jt-sw.com/football/pro/index.ns...cuments/0-rules Why on Earth is the official NFL rulebook not available online?!

335 + 10% = 368.5 is even more accurate!