OGTEleven

Interesting thoughts. I usually only bet during Saratoga and at the Breeders Cup. After that I wait until the Derby. I try to only watch the preps after my handicapping has begun. I do this so I can avoid chasing a horse that I see run a big race. I have seen enough of this years three year old crop to think that a Triple Crown winner is improbable. I don't think they are a bad group but I don't see a lot of separation. I agree with your opinion on I Want Revenge and think he will be overbet (I reserve the right to change my mind). I am not real big on Quality Road or Dunkirk either though. I'm interested to see how Old Fashioned bounces back too. I saw three of the contenders run at Saratoga last year. Desert Party ran in the Sanford (I think he won). Pioneer of the Nile broke his maiden on grass. Neither impressed me all that much. I realize it was a long time ago. The other horse I saw was extremely impressive breaking his maiden. His name is Regal Ransom. He looked great and I really liked his breeding for going longer. I'm pretty sure he is a Distorted Humor with Red Ransom as a broodmare sire. He didn't run as well later in the season. He just surprised his connections by beating stablemate Desert Party in Dubai. He will be a longshot but I am going to give him a look. The other horse that will be an interesting semi-longshot for me is Chocolate Candy. He looks as if he'll improve with disntance and may also benefit from the synthetic to dirt switch.

I agree with that. Although it was neither team's best game last night, it was pretty clear that there was a lot of talent on the floor. Siena would have been a legitimate bubble team if they had had just one win against one of their big opponents (Tenn, Kansas, Pitt, others) but all of those games were losses where they were pretty competitive. They deserve some credit for the schedule they played. I read somewhere that they had the #2 non-conference schedule in the country. They also beat a pretty good Northern Iowa team handily in their bracket buster. I don't think Niagara/Siena and the others will ever get an at large bid unless they have a crazy record and lose in the final. Even Siena would not have made it if they lost last night. I think they will always take the #6 team from the bigger conference even if I don't agree.

I am a Siena grad and attended tonight. It has been a while since I've been to a game (young kids). My first impression is that the MAAC as a whole has improved a lot since my last visit. Both teams got some bad bounces, especially in the first half, but there were usually 10 good players on the floor. I don't think either team played their best. I know Ronald Moore is better than that. I think Siena in the NCAA and Niagara in the NIT will give their matchups all they can handle. If they let Rider in the NIT, they'll be tough too. And my guess is that 50,000 people attending the tournament over 4-5 days has a lot to do with it being in Albany often (not every year). How many people did it draw when it was at HSBC? Niagara had a decent sized section tonight. The crowd was just under 10k.

I am very glad Ralph has made it to the Hall of Fame. He was an important part of buidling what is now the NFL. Fans in New England, Oakland and especially Buffalo should be grateful to him for their tem's existence. We can argue all we want about rosters, salary caps, coaches, labor agreements and anything else but the Bills existence is because of Ralph. I watched a little bit of the Sabres game last night (in Phoenix). It was the Coyotes feed but they kept showing people in Sabres gear throughout the place. This happens in Carolina, Dallas and several other places. What has happened to the city of Buffalo over the years is sad, but the bond people have built with their teams transcends the distance from which many fans now view. The value this team holds is largely based on the team being the BUFFALO Bills. Those people in Phoenix would not have been their last night if the Sabres had moved a few years ago. I don't know if the city will ever come back to what it was; in fact I dooubt it. I do know that Ralph could have received a lot of money to sell the team to LA or Toronto or San Antonio interests. Ralph has shown by his actions (or inaction in not selling) over the years, and by his brief speech yesterday that he understands the difference between money and VALUE. I know people cringe when he gives a speech and I do sometimes as well. Usually what he says has a lot of value in its content if you listen. I hope his induction speech echoes his words from yesterday and I hope some of the other owners pay attention (fat chance). I'm actually looking forward to it. Thanks Ralph.

If they must let Jauron go, they must. Persoanlly, I would like to see them stick with the style they have been trying to build rather than trash that too. They are 4-5 players away from being good, IMO. In their recent drought, if they got an extra turnover in each game, they could have easily won 3 of them. If Jauron has to go, so be it. I'm just saying that the style should stick and getting someone to manage that (better than Jauron) is the best way to go. I doubt changing to some headline grabber would produce results. It is more likely it would produce throwing the baby out with the bath water. I probably should have left the entire Jauron paragraph out of my original post. I am interested to see if people agree or disagree with the rest, but everyone just fixated on Jauron.

From reading the board, I think I'm in the minority on most specific categories when it comes to the Bills. One area where I'm with the crowd is being totally disappointed by 2008. Believe it or not, I think I get what the Bills are trying to do with the team. They are trying to have a strong defense, which creates turnovers and a safe, reliable, non-explosive offense which converts those turnovers to points and holds onto the ball. I think we can agree that they are not there yet. To me the strategy makes sense for a cold weather team like the Bills. I don't think we are that many players away, but we simply don't have the personnel right now. The guys we do have, especially on offense, don't have the right skill sets to adjust. The players we are missing IMO are a good pass rushing DE to go with Schobel, another solid DT, an outside LB and probably another LB for depth, a TE and first and foremost a Center. That is quite a few players, but with those guys, we are a winning team. Right now, with Schobel out and no pass rush, we are not going to get many turnovers from any NFL team. The defense is still holding teams to low point totals most games. That is a good sign. If we can get and sustain pressure on the opposing QB, we can get picks, fumbles and sacks. If we get turnovers, a Center and a TE, I think the O can do its part of the plan. I have to admit I am worried about QB but I don't think the Bills have a choice there. JP is gone, and Edwards has to be the man. At the beginning of the year I actually liked them both. As of now I I agree with the consensus on JP and have serious doubts about Edwards. He is seemingly made for the plan I listed above, but there must be something real bad on film. The last few teams we've played seem to know exactly how to stop him. Much of the pressure from the opposing D has come from the middle all year. We can't run there, and the pass rush from there kills us. I have to believe if we were better there the offense would be much better both running and passing (I would hope this would give Edwards more options and get rid of his indecision). A TE would be another option which would seem to fit Edwards' style. I have my fingers crossed on Edwards but wouldn't mind seeing a journeyman vet as JP's replacement. Ok, here goes the unpopular part. I think Jauron is the right coach for the team I described. If I think the team is short on talent to execute it's strategy (which I do), how can I blame the coaches? If you're building an offense that is meant to be slow and steady, but is a few players short, can you suddenly turn them into mad bombers? If your defense is supposed to create turnovers, and your #1 pass rusher is out most of the season along with an incomplete interior D and a thin LB corps, are you going to get turnovers? If they replace Jauron, they replace him, but I hope it is with a coach that can manage the style of play we are building. I do not want some loud mouthed idiot like Brian Billick who is hired for the sake of headlines. I think Brandon/Modrak are generally doing a good job of building the described team. We'll see about Hardy and I really didn't like the Ellis pick, but they have drafted for need. I think they will continue to do so. Ralph is Ralph and complain all you want. The bottom line is that without him there never was a team in Buffalo. There are money grubbing owners all over the league that would love to have the Bills in LA or Toronto so that they could make extra money (Kraft and Jones come to mind). Ralph may be meddling but one thing I do believe and appreciate is that he is trying to keep the Bills the BUFFALO Bills. It's not really in line with the rest of my post but I thought I'd mention that one Bills player (my current favorite) who would fit in perfectly with the old Bills and exemplifies what I'd like the Bills to be is Josh Reed.

These are probably somewhere between mainstream and obscure Knopfler (and Jones) Knopfler (and Emmylou) Knopfler (and Atkins and Everlys)

If you're trying to find a way to fix the problem do you focus on the problem or is the tool to fix it more important? If you are trying to fix the problem knowing you are using the wrong tool, do you keep buying more of the same type of tool? Do you tell the problem to just be satisfied with the solution your tool provides? Or would you examine the problem and consider using new tools? The Federal government (and the left) has deemed that the Federal government is the only tool that can be used. The problems are not going to be fixed that way any more than you can cure cancer by continually hitting cancer cells with a hammer.

It would be a big win without a doubt. Personally, so far this year I do not see any one of the 32 teams that I would call elite.

I don't have a problem with any of the goals you stated in your post. But as a scientist, can you honestly say that having the Federal government take money in taxes to help make sure the mentally ill aren't thrown out onto the street, or a family without health insurance doesn't end up living in their car, or urban kids have some kind of after school programs works? Personally, I don't see any evidence. There are layers of government to get through before the first dollar goes from your paycheck to an after school program in Boston. By the time it gets there it has turned into significantly less than $1. Once it is there it has to be monitored by locals who are all paid to be sure they are in compliance with the program. Many times, the allowable programs do not meet the needs of the individual. Rather than change the programs or allow flexibility, they give the recipient the wrong solution. Without even going into the openings in the programs for money to be stolen or the anti-motivational effects these programs can have, there are issues galore. To me, it is the antithesis of a solution to centralize programs for problems that are as distributed as can be. IMO, the Federal government is the worst possible administrator of programs like this because by definition they are the furthest away from the problem. As a scientist, does that make sense to you? I'm not aware of one of these programs that has a stated goal of ending itself such as "when there are no people living in cars, this program will cease to exist". Even if the goal is wildly unrealistic, it is still a goal. I work in computer sales and see the tug of war between centralization and distribution on a daily basis. The best systems allow the user to shape his own destiny while allowing enterprise wide organization and failsafes. Distributed systems handle the former reasonably well but struggle with the latter. It is the flipside for centralized systems. There are always moving targets in both user and enterprise needs and goals. The problems are difficult to solve just with computer systems that do what you ask them to do. When you add the office politics of people it gets real tough. And this is all within one enterprise, not a nation. These computing issues are dwarfed by issues governments have in implementing programs. And that is before we even dicuss the insertion of people into the equation. People include the innocent recipient who just doesn't fit into any specific program, the guy that decides to be lazy because of the program, the highly organized groups of people running scams to steal money from the programs, the local administrators who at times have their hands tied by red tape, the local administrators who are there because it is an entitlement job, the politicians who are good at understanding problems but not scripting solutions, the politicians that are simply looking to put a bullet on a Power Point in their next campaign, and the thieving politicians. When the Federal government is in control of these programs, all of these issues must be overcome and they must be overcome with people deliberatley and accidently sabotaging them. Does this make sense to a scientist?

The problem I see is that 95% of the people that want to see the game will just assume the Bills are on and then get angry at 1PM on Sunday. That will be too late. As it is now, the station will get planty of calls from dies hards that know on Tuesday night which game will air on Sunday, but most people won't know that. One idea may be to contact a local radio guy, Paul Vandenburgh. A lot of people listen to his show in the morning. It is mostly politics, but he dabbles in everything and often discusses local TV stations and their positives and negatives. If he mentions the decision about Bills/Jags vs. Colts/Vikes on the air, the calls to the station will multiply. If you're from Albany, try e-mailing him. It's worth a shot. http://www.talk1300.com/

sherm@wrgb.com I exchanged an e-mail with him regarding the last game of the 06 season. He said that CBS in NYC controls the selection. I just e-mailed him again (forwarded the old e-mail as a reminder). Maybe something will change but I doubt it. They are clueless. The choice that was made this week makes absolutely no sense whatsoever. Peyton Manning is Eli's brother and Eli plays for the Giants? That's about all I could fathom.

I don't know. Jauron expressed surprise he had had surgery. Wouldn't you think the coach would know ahead of time? And even if he found out late but knew it was the right thing, would he say anything about being surprised to the press? Maybe the Bills were advocating surgery for months and Crowell said no, only to change his mind 3 days before the season. I doubt we'll ever know, but if Crowell really did spring a surprise on the Bills with the surgery, then I think the IR was the right move. Not only did Crowell's actions screw the Bills and Ellison by messing up prep time, it put the Bills in a bad situation going forward. They now have to find another linebacker. To get him on the roster, they'd have to either IR the guy who has (possibly) been screwing with them, or cut someone else (the lowest man on the depth chart, that isn't a linebacker). This someone else has been working his behind off, and if Crowell really did pull a fast one, then the Bills made the right move.

I don't think we have any way of knowing who is truly to blame in this ugly (and ridiculous) situation. If it is true that the Bills have called Peters and his agent but he has not responded, then I have a hard time blaming Ralph at all. If the Bills said there would be no new contract for a year, and this is Peters' way of responding, then I would feel the blame is split but with most of it on Peters' shoulders. If the Bills said play out your 3 years and we'll talk then, I would blame the Bills. Even with all of the unusual circumstances surrounding Peters (UDFA TE to RT to LT to Pro Bowl), holding out with 3 years left is pretty unusual. The fact that his agent is new to him tells me a lot. Peters also owes a lot of his status to a Bills front office and coaching staff that believed in him and patiently taught him to the point where he could even consider this manuver. They renegotiated his contract once already. Why would he not believe they would do it again? If we took it to the extreme level and he sat until week 10, three years in a row, how much would he be worth to a team and would it make up for lost time and money? I have to believe that the Bills and Parker have spoken and are simply multiple millions of dollars apart and disagree on the timing of a new contract. Which party is to blame is unclear, but personally I can't see any scenario where the blame goes 100% to the Bills.

This is my first football post in a while and I never thought it would be in a thread about Brett Favre. I just saw a scroll on ESPN indicating Favre prefers a cold weather team to playing in Tamps. Scanning a list I come up with viable candidates as Baltimore, NY Jets, Cleveland, Denver, KC, Buffalo, and Washington. I should point out that I would not be in favor of a move by the Bills. I may be one of the only people that likes Edwards and Losman. I do think they both have their issues though so I could see the Bills poking around in the Favre situation. From Favre's perspective I think the best fit is the NYJ (because of the endorsment $ and QB situation). In the next tier I think he'd put the Bills and Denver (strong and loyal fan base, decent teams with questions at QB or at least what Favre perceives to be.) KC is similar but the team seems behind the 8 ball. I could see Baltimore or Washington but I doubt he'd want to walk into Cleveland because there is already a potential controversy. As for the teams' view of Favre I'd rank Washington on top (Snyder more than willing to throw Campbell under the bus), NYJ, Baltimore, KC, Bills, Denver, Cleveland. Combine scores and the Redskins and Jets top the list. Who know really though.

A sad day indeed. A true fan and advocate. God Bless.

I'm glad I didn't miss this. I have a feeling I will finally win it this year. Sept. 7 Seattle Seahawks 1 p.m. Tie Sept. 14 at Jacksonville Jaguars 1 p.m. Tie Sept. 21 Oakland Raiders 1 p.m. Tie Sept. 28 at St. Louis Rams 4:05 p.m. Tie Oct. 5 at Arizona Cardinals 4:15 p.m. Tie Oct. 12 Bye Oct. 19 San Diego Chargers 1 p.m. Tied on an intetional safety as regulation time expires Oct. 26 at miami dolphins 1 p.m. Win Nov. 2 New York Jets 1 p.m. Tie Nov. 9 at New England Patriots* 1 p.m. Tie but awarded a win due to caught cheating Nov. 17 (Mon.) Cleveland Browns 8:30 p.m. Tie Nov. 23 at Kansas City Chiefs 1 p.m. Tie Nov. 30 San Francisco 49ers 1 p.m. Tie Dec. 7 miami dolphins (at Toronto) 4:05 p.m. Win Dec. 14 at New York Jets 1 p.m. Tie Dec. 21 at Denver Broncos 4:05 p.m. Tie Dec. 28 New England Patriots* 1 p.m. Tie 3-0-13 First undefeated team to ever miss the playoffs. Screwed again.

Assuming the Bills stay put at #11 and assuming they take a guy seen as a quote unquote major reach, which player would you regard as ok? I am asking this because of what happened with Whitner. All of the experts assumed the Bills could have traded down and still selected Whitner, but in reality that was anyone's guess. The Bills filled a need and moved on. I'm not saying he is my top choice at #11 (hey, #11, I like that slot), but if the Bills picked Quentin Groves I think everyone would scream, but I would be perfectly happy. How about yours? Reamember, he has to be a major reach in the expert's eyes.

Early on I saw OLB/DE Groves from Auburn going very high, possibly even to NE. I see either him or Rivers as a strong possibility along with Alberts. I don't think the DL guys will be there and am guessing the Bills think they're ok without a first round corner (might be wrong on this). We're pretty much forced to go WR in the second IMO. It will be interesting to see who is there. It would be great if we could trade down a few spots and still get Alberts or Groves along with a useful pick, but I doubt we'll move.

I watched this and found the very basis of the argument to be without logic for many reasons which I'll skip for now. But for the sake of argument, let's go with the column structure for a moment. One would have to assume (since he offers no comprehensive description of the proposed actions) that in this column government(s) gain massive control over the economy(s). We would further have to assume that if the consequences in column B are so devastating that the actions to repel them in column A would have to be drastic. To match the extremity in column B, it could be assumed that we would have to cut all, or a very large percentage of our oil use for example. Sticking to column B but trying to get out and into column A, if the action taken were to truly have a chance of succeeding it would have to ensure total cooperation between governments worldwide as well as whatever is left of private industry along with cooperation of individuals. This cooperation would have to be assumed despite the fact that technologies exist to circumvent it and despite the fact that the temptation to circumvent would be almost irresistible (heating my house when it is 30 below, etc.). This required level of cooperation has never been approached in the course of human history. No grand research project on curing a disease, no space program or development of a computer chip ever required 1/10 of 1% of what this would. It is entirely unrealistic to expect human nature to reverse itself on a dime. Just to get out of column B and over to A we would have to assume all of these things come true. The argument is akin to Marx assuming that everyone would contribute all that he could, but would only take what he needs. It's very nice, but it is a fairy tale. Back to column A (now with the assumption that we somehow attained the cooperation to jump out of column B's inaction into the action of column A), the harmful impact described by the author here is sloughed off as a nuisance. Bad economy, etc; etc; etc. This harm is terrifically undersold. It wouldn't be a bad economy, it would be no economy. We would revert back in history to a time where many people would not be able to survive. There would be opportunistic groups looking to gain power through force and coercion. There would be violence in every street, disease in every corner of the world and general chaos. This has happened to varying degrees every time and every place government has too much power and it would happen again. Progress toward every advance in technology (whether alternative energy or unrelated technology) would stagnate do to loss of incentive and the human race would be relegated to sitting around waiting for a disease to wipe us out or an asteroid to hit or some other outside factor to end our existence.

As soon as their time expires the next team can go. They would risk running into a scenario where teams beneath them selected rapidly. They could end up with the #7 or 8 pick in a matter of minutes.

I play goalie and when I do that with my stick my penalty is that I have to buy a new stick. DP has no such problem I'm sure. His stick breaking technique was excellent.

One of these years I'll get it Sept. 9 DENVER BRONCOS - Tie Sept. 16 @ Pittsburgh Steelers - Tie Sept. 23 @ New England Patriots - Tie Sept. 30 NEW YORK JETS - Tie Oct. 8 DALLAS COWBOYS - Win Oct. 21 BALTIMORE RAVENS - Would have been a tie but Willis misses a block - Win Oct. 28 @ New York Jets Tie Nov. 4 CINCINNATI BENGALS - Tie Nov. 11 @ Miami Dolphins - Win Nov. 18 NEW ENGLAND PATRIOTS - Tie Nov. 25 @ Jacksonville Jaguars - Tie Dec. 2 @ Washington Redskins - Tie Dec. 9 MIAMI DOLPHINS - Win Dec. 16 @ Cleveland Browns - Postponed due to flood Dec. 23 NEW YORK GIANTS - Tie Dec. 30 @ Philadelphia Eagles - Tie 4-0-11 and one makeup game which is never re-scheduled because we made the playoffs based on a tie-breaker of most ties. Mathematically I have as good a chance as anyone.

I don't really like Imus but think in this case he was more stupid than racist. I think he was basically calling the Rutgers team ugly. I don't think much of it was based on thier race but he used racist words so who knows? IMO, he should look at his own picture on the current front page of the Drudge Report before calling anyone ugly.

This thing was brutal. I know we can be paranoid as Bills fans but there simply cannot be a question that Mortenson holds a grudge against the Bills. He is incredibly unprofessional. The garbage about "they're not just losing a running back but a very special player" made me laugh out loud. To me, if we had unlimited dollars we should have retained Nate. I understand why we didn't. I like Spikes, and to a degree Fletcher but totally understand why they're gone. Last year and this year are the first time in a long time that the Bills have developed a plan and stuck to it. That is a good thing, not a bad thing. In 5 years of TD our "plan" seemed to change monthly. They drafted for need last year and will again this year. TD drafted for glamour (and maybe for Mort). The only question is what does management see as our need. My bet is that we get Turner if the price is right (2nd rounder or thereabouts) and that Willis is our target in the first. Marv and DJ have stated that we need an attacking LB.