JP-era

My hangup with him is that he cant seem to beat the Pats. I dont know what planet many here live on, but if you want the best chance to get into and win the playoffs, you win your division and get home-filed advantage. The Pats OWN drew at this point and I dont see this changing. If we want to win our division, we must head in a different direction. Screw the wildcard, I want to win the damn division! Does anyone truly believe Drew can win the division for us?

The arguements you make are all valid for sure. But off the mark IMO. What TD, MM, and company have to look at is: 1) What do we need from the QB position to get to the playoffs and 1a) what do we need from the QB spot to win the SB? The answer to that is not apparent but the more apparent answer is who WONT get you there and thats Drew. The evidence is insurmountable at this point as far as him not winning big games. JP offers at least a hope for something other than a very predictable "bad" game from Drew. No one here knows what JP will do in these big games, and you wont figure that out from practices or anything else other than playing in those games. 2) Again, if the competition is open, the winner ONLY has to be better than the opponent. In this case, JP isnt going up against a star player, he is going up against a mediocre player at best. Drews stats are pretty damn bad this year. If JP shows any spark at all he wins the job IMO! I need to go into more depth on the definition of "spark" though. That to me means, showing he can buy you something extra with his legs, Make well timed throws to open WR's, hit WR's in stride and make good reads on who is open, and THE MAJORITY of the time NOT make big mistakes. I qualify the mistake issue because again, Drew has been pretty bad on mistakes that have been costly. JP only needs to show that he is the same and he automatically wins because he has a chance to get better and Drew most likely does not. Fake Fat, your right that it IS a matter of how ready JP is to start. But, I feel way too many people are saying that he needs to be pretty damn good/great out of the gate to win the job. I dont believe that is true. I think all JP has to do is be average and he wins because of potential to get better rather than decline (Drew). I dont see that as being that hard to do. Furthermore, as you stated, JP can play average and we can still win tough games with a stud D, great special teams, and great supporting cast around JP. JP represents opportunity for better play in big games considering Drew is basically a known quantity in those games. My prediction is that if JP proves sturdy and servicable, he wins over Drew!

I have a completely different take but will adopt the point of view that AKC took on this topic. My take is that your average psycho Bills fan, new to a message board, would most likely become utterly disgusted with the board and leave rather quickly. I can see a new poster coming here in search of an open ear, intelligent banter, and quality information. In the first few posts however, this new poster would find himself "blanketed" with slam responses, off topic retorts, or complete blasts of his/her point of view. I still remain AMAZED at the lack of patience/tolerance that most posters have toward others points of view. Gone are the days of several page posts with quality, well thought out arguements discussing a topic of interest. Now, most posters do their "thinking" offline and some here with the discussion complete, the arguement made, and the opinion formed. They simply state their stance in a "matter of fact" manner and slam anyone who dares counter it. After all, they have already thought about EVERY arguement that could be made and have already made up their minds that they are right. Im not sure I can follow this logically. Why come to a board, and "talk" about anything if your mind is already made up? Your not "talking", your lecturing. Clearly we have much to learn about debating (myself included). A debate is meant to discuss the "arguements", which means to look at all aspects of a topic before forming an opinion. I rarely see that these days. Probably the most detrimental part about this board, as of late, is the lack of respect for other Bills fans. I just cant see how, here, in the land of the twelthe man, we can possibly justify some of the responses that get posted here. Agree or disagree, we are all part of the Bills nation. As such we should support our fellow brotheren and allow each and every person to have an UNSQUELCHED, UNSLAMMED voice! If you were to simply "go" with the opinion of ONE poster, you certainly end up with the WRONG answers to most questions. The truth is, we are strong because of our diversity in opinion. Id be willing to wagger that every single off-season move, season record prediction, and final outcome was in fact predicted here by someone. That fact alone should tell ALL posters to observe tolerance, and invest some time to think through each and every arguement. The point of this board is to share rants, opinions, stances, and info. It IS NOT and NEVER SHOULD BE, a place to simply attack others to somehow boost your own selfish self confidence, or to make up for some ego problem. I used to enjoythis board ALOT more when we could post an opinion and get follow up responses with questions, not pat answers or explitives! Seriously, In part, my poll on whether people wanted to hear about Drew anymore was meant as an indicator to whether I should just shut-up on the topic for a while. It seemed that the majority of people said, yeah, zip it on this topic for a while. Message received, I will comply. Not as some ass-kissing act, not as some apease the gods thing, but as a RESPECT THE BOARD thing! I think we all could use a shot of that!

My take is going to be a new post.

However, Goo Goo Dolls remake of "Give a Little Bit" sucks compared to the original. Supertramp is one of my FAVORITE groups!!! Hey, If you want good music picks, hit me up, I make "hit" CD's for my friends and they just cant seem to get enough.

The remake of "leaving on a jet plane" inthe Armaggedon soundtrack is AWESOME!!!! A must have!!!

one guy at the start of his career, the other at the end...hmmmm you can figure it out.

Go ahead fire away.

Dominic Riaola and Casey Rabach both out there. None in college are THAT good.

Plattipuss are cool critters. Personally Im a fan of Ocelot and Lynx, both cool cats! Notice, I have NO interest in talking about football anymore for a while. Obviously the boards is pooled into factions and the little boys and girls have there arms crossed and ears closed.

He wont be a rookie, he will be a second year guy, with some limited playing experience.

Hes been my favorite for our 2bd round pick for a few months. Looks like Ruben all over again, but takes less penalties Elton Brown Virginia and David Baas Michigan are the other two I like. Brown is a little larger but slower on his feet, definitely dominates though. Baas is a Hutchinson road grader with a nasty nature but lacks a little in size, who starts at C for the Wolverines. Any of the 3 would be great but CJ is my favorite. Best, size, light on his feet, dominating blocker combo of them all IMO.

So everyone is convinced JP isnt ready. How exactly did we come to that conclusion? My guess is that its because we havent seen him play. OK, so play him! Let him train and start with the 1st team O, only then will we see him play and know whether he is ready or not. No one here was watching him practice, those arent open to the public. Furthermore, Flutie, and RJ both proved (from opposite perspectives) that what you see in practice is often NOT what you will get in games. So no one here has seen him play other than the mop up duty he got handing the ball off to McGahee. Drew screwed us, really, because if we werent (hopelessly behind Drew) making a late surge for the playoffs, we would have had a chance to see Losman more, I dont know if he would have started but he would have played more. We didnt get that chance and have NO real, in the heat of the game, data. If he plays we learn first hand where he is at. The only way to develop your young QB to play, is to play him. And the only way to know if he can cut the mustard is to play him and see!

Woah, wait a minute did you even read my reasons? JP isnt competing against a star, or even a good QB at this point, hes competing with a sometimes mediocre QB who cant win against good teams. Gheez, JP cant compete with that? right out of the gate?

Agree, lets move on to supporting JP! Now we are talkin!

on this team? When we couldnt do it with the 2nd ranked D, quality WR's, a much improved o-line, a stud young RB that went over 1K...All that he Drew STILL couldnt get us in? Ill take a BIG FAT NO! Were so used to eating dog crap that when we have cat crap it seems like pudding! Nice try, lets call a spade a spade, expect more, and move on.

2nd ranked D, quality WR's, Young stud RB who got over 1K yards, and an average QB= out of the playoffs! Next arguement. Case proven...Your QB needs to be at least productive against ANY team to win the SB. Bye Bye Drew!

What do you mean?

I cant pick and choose? I cant expect that my damn QB wont sit there take a sack for a fumble and TD to put BOTH games away? Fine how about just adding the POSSIBILITY that he could run out of those plays. How about just that 1 additional dimension that JP adds. There is 2 examples of what that COULD mean to the Bills. Your arguing that JP would not be as good as Drew at everything else. Maybe be true, but Drew is average at best. Could we expect JP to throw for less than 200 yards, 1 int, 0 TD's, and NO fumble against the Steelers? That seems pretty possible to me! And that would have meant a win! JP isnt competing against a star or even a decent QB at this point, hes competing against a mediocre/poor QB! Can JP do AT LEAST that good? Ill take that bet!

Love to but only if the Bills score a firts rounder. Ill be TRASHED by their first pick at say 22 in the 2nd!

get a playoff system or SHUT THE F UP! Not you, just the idiots that dont want it settled ON THE DAMN FIELD!

I think he could have wont that game with just 1 play being the difference. He sees the pass rusher coming right at him NOT FROM THE BLINDSIDE, runs out of the sack, therefore does NOT give up a fumble for a TD! & point differencial and the BILLS win that game by 2! The other game that we could have won was the Pats game where again, Drew gets sacked for a fumble and TD by Seymour. If it were JP and he ran out of it, we could have won that one too.

Moulds: apparently is willing to restructure his contract to stay. The issue with Moulds was always that HE made the comments he made about re-evaluating his future, add in the fact that he had the dropsies and the emergence of Evans, and his hefty 8.5 mil contract, and you could easily start the "cut or trade Moulds" threads. Now, when Moulds comes out and says he will restructure to stay and help his team that is a 180 degree change in attitude, going from evaluating whether you will even be a part of the team anymore to helping the team out with changes to your contract. So, Moulds himself has paved the way to stay. The story is not yet over however. Moulds agreed to RESTRUCTURE not to take a PAY CUT. IMO, Evans is our #1 WR now with the best hands (proven on the field this year) and the deep speed (again proven on the field this year). Moulds is starting to fade and has had a terrible year as far as dropped passes. Does a fading Moulds have the right to command the SAME contract only restructured? I dont think so. TD sets himself up badly if he converts more contract into signing bonus up front and/or backloads the contract. That means that somewhere in the future when Moulds does retire/is cut the Bills take a bigger hit than they would have if Moulds were to take a pay cut instead. The best situation for the Bills is to pay Moulds what he is worth TODAY and for Moulds to restructure based on THAT figure. I see this happening in the long run with Moulds apparent desire to stay. Drew: Claims that the team is "his" team. Yet he has absolutely NO say about that! The Rochester D and C wrote an article talking about how mediocre/bad Drew played this year. I found the information striking and shocking: He ranked 25th in the NFL in quarterback rating (76.6), 26th in completion percentage (56.9), and 26th in average yards gained per attempt (6.52). Thats pretty bad. Add in the 6.5 mil contract he is set to make, and TD will absolutely have a serious thought about changes to this situation. Does it means Drew is let go? probably not. But, TD wont sit back and pay a pretty hefty premium to get that type of poor performance, despite what Drew says. The game tape and facts dont lie, and Drew is only looking out for himself here. Great guy, but N OT the guy to win the big games or take us to the SB CLEARLY! If this team wants to compete for a playoff spot, they must find a way to compete with the Pats, something Drew has proven, on the field, that he cant do. My take, I think TD force a pay cut down Drews throat and hold an open competition next year for the starting job. If JP can prove that he has even just as much talent/mediocre play, the nod goes to JP with a bigger upside and without the "baggage" that may prevent Drew from beating our biggest AFC east foe. Drew takes a pay cut, stays, and backups up JP by the 3rd game if not earlier. Jerry Gray: Reported to be in the running for the Syracuse HC job. This would be a HUGE hit for the Bills if he leaves. He is the ONE guy that truly has the defensive scheme figured out. If he leaves, and we fill from within, you can expect changes. Could be slight, could be drastic. Either way, I think its bad. This defense, as currently schemed, is a proven commodity with back to back #2 rankings. You dont fix what aint broke. We lost 4 games early in part because of a new offense, any doubt we could lose a few with "changes" to our D? Losing Gray, and ending up with a declining D would tick me off. This team, this year, had all the making of a SB team, MINUS ONE. One 6' 5" statue that couldnt manage to play "decent" and win the big games. The "opening" to get to the SB is ever so small in todays NFL, I feel like this was our shot and if the good stuff doesnt stay the same and the bad isnt improved, we end up OUT of the playoffs again! I wouldnt mind that if JP is our starter and if we see that he is a season away from being a stud. But it undermines the team as a whole to head in the wrong direction as far as the D goes. Losing Jerry could do that. To me, if the D starts to get worse, the O needs to pick up the slack to get us into the playoffs and beyond. We should now know that Drew wont be the guy to do that, and there is a good chance that JP will be too young and too inexperienced to do it. Thats why it is CRITICAL for Jerry to stay. In the end, I think Jerry doesnt get the job because SYR wants to capatilize on a weak conference with someone who has lots more college coaching experience. With the big name vacancys filled could Butch Davis take this spot? Really it would be HIS choice not Syr. He deserves a bigger named college that Syracuse, but may take it. I doubt it, but who knows. Either way, someone else wins this job, someone who is already in college and with lots of experience. Sorry so long, but I hope there lots to chew on.

No chance of it!

Drew's games as our starter are very much over and heres why: I see the folks here are getting into true offseason form by taking the typical conservative approach and watering down how badly Drew played and that he did in fact lose games for us this year. 1) The Bills evaluate all positions every year. There is simply no way that the Bills evaluate the NE game OR the Steelers game and come away pleased with Drews performance. We all saw Drew throw directly at defenders and get picked. It is one thing to have a ball tipped and intercepted, its another thing to have a ball intercepted by a guy who streaks across the field and seems to come out of nowhere, but its just flat unacceptable to throw the ball directly at defenders! That shows the incredible decline in Drews ability. Throughout his career he has consistently thrown INT's but made up for it with good decision making, a strong arm, and consistent play. His arm is still strong, his decision making is suspect at best, and his play is now very inconsistent. More on this in a minute. 2) The Bills will absolutely compare Drews numbers with other QB's. And when the do, they will notice that when other teams stuck with young QB's such as Harrington, Leftwich, Carr, Palmer, even Rattay, each ended up with a higher passers rating than Drew! Thats a staggering fact. The front office wont overlook this when trying to argue that we need to start a seasoned vet like Drew to play well enough to win. 3) The front office cant overlook the above 2 and then proceed to pay Drew 6mil + next year! Drews numbers were mediocre at best and they have no indication that he will get better, in fact he is more likely to get worse! 4) There is more to the Henry/McGahee situation than the Bills ever let on. TD's job is to forecast how each of his players will play and whether each is good enough or not. TD had watched Henry fumble, and knew Henry didnt have the deep speed, added that into the Bills o-line equation and come up with one answer...We should get an insurance policy. McGahee was drafted and Henry was benched. The rest is history and now so is Henry. Ask yourself why TD insisted on getting our future QB, in the 1st round, of THIS years draft? Why would he be so insistant if he truly believed in Drew as our long term QB? The answer is, he didnt believe in Drew. Or that there was enough of a question mark that he felt they needed to start heading in a new direction as soon as possible. The question mark was there, TD acted to get some insurance, the questions proved true, and like Henry we will head in a different direction. 5) Ben Rothlisberger. The Bills will look at this team holistically and realize tha Drew had a good enough team around him to play much better. Then they will look at #2 above and come to the conclusion that they can in fact win just as many games behind a 1st year guy! This year is the the perfect year to demonstrate that it can be done. Furthermore, with careful consideration they will see that Eli played as bad as he did not because he lacked the talent, but because he lacked the supporting team around him and most importantly he was thrown in mid-season! The Bills will evaluate this situation and realize that it is FAR better to make the switch EARLY rather than try to again start Drew with a very good likelyhood of continued mediocre play or worse and then start Losman next season. The Bills believe in Losman now, they DID believe in Drew but his play showed them they were wrong. The believe in Losman so much as to trade ALOT to get him. When you have a 1st round QB with huge upside, a team that can probably win most of its games with an average QB at the helm, a fading QB who is playing mediocre and just cant win the BIG games needed to get to and win the SB, and a huge cap figure on your fading pocket statue, you come to one conclusion...things MUST change! Now as far as what happens? I predict that Drew takes a BIG pay cut to stay and that the starting position is truly up for grabs next year. But in fact the team is leaning towards Losman not Bledsoe as the starter next year. If Drew somehow ressurects himself, lites a fire under his own backside, and somehow shows the Bills that he can win the big games without actually doing it, then maybe they take another chance on him. But at least with JP they actually have a chance to win those games, where as with Drew we now know for sure, HE WONT!!! My true predicition is more stark...JP is given the team early in training camp after Drew is either retired, cut, or the pine rider at a MUCH reduced cap figure!