Orton's Arm

I hate to nitpick such a strong post, but there's something you wrote with which I disagree. Montana was more than just the "accurate system QB" you've described him as. Montana excelled in throwing short to intermediate passes that could be caught without his WRs breaking stride. Very few quarterbacks are good at that; and perhaps none have been as good at it as Montana. Before Montana was drafted, Walsh's preferred style of offense involved an emphasis on the running game and on long bombs. He ended up redesigning his offense from scratch to create a perfect fit for the QB he had. The 49ers' offense emphasized the things Montana did well; and de-emphasized things he was weaker at. Very few QBs are able to even come close to reaching Montana-like levels in the categories of things Montana did well.

Nauseating indeed. In this case, your opinion is indeed simple, in the strictly pejorative sense of the term. Your material on this thread is of low enough quality that I'm not exactly inspired to search out the other posts you've written. Being overly negative by your standard and overly negative by any reasonable, objective standard are obviously two very different things. In that free dinner thing, I predicted a 10-6 record for the Bills this upcoming season. Do I need to make a Senator-like 19-0 prediction to avoid your lame attempts at ridicule for "doom and gloom"? Implicit in your own conduct in this thread is the assumption that yours is the only opinion that makes sense. This board is clearly unbalanced: there is a lot more sarcasm/ridicule/etc. than there is intelligent discussion. Your own activity on this thread has unbalanced it further. If you feel a close-minded approach merits ridicule, ask yourself whether you've made the slightest effort to be open to anything I've written on this thread. If you answer that question honestly you'll answer in the negative; so by your own judgmental standards you yourself deserve ridicule. Such is the nature of these boards. But when an intelligent discussion is underway, I'd appreciate a modicum of effort on your part to refrain from ruining it. I don't know whether you're justified in claiming that you "add plenty of legitimate football talk to this forum." Certainly you've added nothing whatever of value to this thread.

I've already acknowledged, at several points in this discussion, that the 2006 draft was a good one. I'm getting a little tired of trying to explain to you that, when I wrote that the 2006 draft was good, what I really meant was that the 2006 draft was good. If I didn't see a particular opportunity, I obviously wouldn't feel frustrated by the Bills having missed out on it. As to your other point, the 2006 draft was clearly better than what we'd come to expect from the not-so-aptly-named TD. No, it does not show that at all. It shows that I feel a mistake was made; but you can make a mistake here and there and still have a very solid draft. No, we went through 5 years of TD acting in short-sighted ways that sacrificed the long-term. We went through 5 years of TD constantly trying to upgrade positions like RB and slot receiver, while ignoring the offensive line. We went through 5 years of TD letting players like Antoine Winfield go so that he'd have the cap space to overpay for aging veterans like Troy Vincent and Lawyer Milloy. We spent five years watching the Bills use their draft picks on players who had worlds of athletic potential, but lacked the range of mental and other "soft" qualities needed to be good football players. Need I go on? One could write books about the ways in which TD messed up this franchise. Look at the way he used his first round picks: 2001: Nate Clements. Result: a good CB who went first contract and out. 2002: Mike Williams. Result: um, yeah 2003a: traded for Drew Bledsoe. Result: released after three years 2003b: Willis McGahee. Result: traded for two 3rds and a 7th. 2004a: Lee Evans. Result: a successful receiver 2004b: You Know Who. Result: Currently a backup, and has asked to be traded 2005: traded away for You Know Who I feel that each of the above mistakes can be explained by short-sightedness, failure to see the big picture, and over-valuing athleticism while under-valuing soft qualities. Let's look at TD's mistakes. 2001: Nate Clements. He already had Antoine Winfield on the roster, so why draft Clements? Based on TD's subsequent actions, the plan was to let Winfield walk after his first contract was over. Nor am I aware of TD making a serious effort to extend Clements. It appears TD was perfectly happy to use first round picks on players that would go first contract and out. Problem: short-sightedness 2002: Mike Williams. He had all the athletic talent in the world, but didn't have the toughness or passion for football necessary to succeed. Problem: over-valuing athletic talent. 2003a: Drew Bledsoe. Bledsoe had produced several years of mediocre play prior to becoming Tom Brady's backup. A rebuilding team, such as the Bills were at that time, should not trade away a first round pick for a player with most of his career behind him. Problem: short-sightedness. 2003b: Willis McGahee. This was the second time in three years that TD used a round 1 & 2 pick on a RB. This, despite inheriting a roster with Antowain Smith, but without an offensive line. Problem 1: failure to see the big picture. Problem 2: short-sightedness. (A RB, even one who's out for his rookie year, provides more instant gratification than trying to upgrade your offensive line as a whole.) 2004a: Lee Evans. Problem: none. 2004b: J. P. Losman. This was a player who had excellent physical traits, but had never proven himself as a pocket passer at the college level. There were significant questions as to whether Losman could process information quickly enough to be a successful NFL quarterback. Problem: over-valuing athletic talent. TD's problems with first round picks were a subset of his problems as GM. Those problems were caused by his lack of intelligent, disciplined, long-range thinking. They were not caused by his having too high a risk tolerance. I'd hardly call Mangold a boom or bust type.

Maybe part of the reason is that our expectations were spoiled by the class of '83. That could also be part of it; but maybe not as big a part as some people might think. Terry Bradshaw played a lot in his rookie year. Players like Joe Montana and Bart Starr took a few snaps as rookies, and became regular starters in their second years. In the past, it seemed like a lot of great quarterbacks were put into exactly the right offenses to take advantage of their skills. Joe Montana and the Walsh offense, Jim Kelly and the no huddle, John Elway and the Denver shotgun offense, Brett Favre and Green Bay's gunslinging offense, Dan Marino and Miami's pass-happy offense. Maybe it's just me, but it seems like nowadays, offensive coordinators have become more rigid in their thinking. They'll impose a particular system on a quarterback, even if that system isn't the one that's best to take advantage of his strengths. If a young version of Brett Favre were to declare himself for the draft, he might be shoehorned into a West Coast offense; and he might be asked to avoid anything even remotely resembling a gunslinging style of play. These limitations would keep this player from reaching his full potential. There were times when I felt Steve Fairchild's playcalling kept Edwards from reaching his full potential. When your playcalling is run, run, pass, it means your quarterback isn't going to get any chances to convert on 1st or 2nd downs. To sustain drives, your passing attack as a whole has to be perfect on 3rd down; and that puts enormous pressure on any player (especially a rookie). With run, run, pass, each and every time your passing attack fails to create a first down, your punter will take the field. Hopefully Turk meant meant it when he said he'd open up the offense. Edwards' style of play seems best suited to an offense that does a high percentage of passing; with an emphasis on short to intermediate passes that move the chains. He also needs to be given the chance to throw the occasional long bomb; especially with players like Evans and Parrish on the roster. With the right playcalling, I could envision Edwards operating an offense that produces long, clock-killing drives, that demoralize the other team's defense while keeping it on the field. When teams over-commit to stopping the short to intermediate routes, it will be time to burn them with Evans. The two factors which might keep Edwards from reaching his full potential are playcalling (let's hope for more passing on 1st and 2nd down!) and personnel. Edwards' style of play works best when the offense has a big, possession-type receiver, as well as a good TE. Hopefully, Hardy and Schouman will provide the answers at their respective positions.

Spare us your commentary about what constitutes intelligent discussion. There's a certain irony to that comment. Your own posts on this thread--and indeed in your own post--have been consistently inflammatory and egotistical. You've implied that you're more of a fan than me. What, precisely, gives you the right to make such an egotistical and inflammatory assertion? If I point out the ways in which I think the Bills could have done better, it's because it's painful to me to see them waste any opportunity at all. It is indefensible for you to use that as a basis to question my "fanhood." Of course not. Just keep ridiculing any non-homer post that comes your way. No one will conclude that this means you just want to read homerism. Really! George W. Bush once said his goal was to be a good steward of the environment. If reading extreme posts irritates you, I suggest you steer clear of your own posts in this thread. Do you feel your own posting record in this thread demonstrates that you, personally, are a happy person? I don't know what would motivate someone to, as you have, barge into a perfectly good, intelligent discussion, and contribute nothing but sarcasm, ridicule, and other inflammatory content. You appear to me to be a miserable person--at least where this thread is concerned. Stop trying to put negative labels on other people: "negative ninny," "not a real fan," etc. Invest that effort in trying to make intelligent contributions to whichever discussions you find interesting. Trust me, you'll have a lot more fun that way, and you'll become a lot less irritating in the process.

Thanks.

If you'd actually bothered to read my posts before responding, you'd know that I'm among those who have taken exactly this cautiously optimistic view of the Levy/Jauron era. And in the process, you act like a tiresome know-it-all yourself.

Stow the sarcasm. I'm not out to convince anyone that I should be hired as a GM. If you don't have anything useful to contribute to this thread, perhaps you should stick to lurking.

You are wrong. Letting your first round picks go "first contract and out" is an excellent way to harm your franchise. If the Bills consider CB to be an automatic "first contract and out" position, they shouldn't use first round picks on CBs. When you use a first round pick on a guy, the hope should be for him to spend his career with your team. Guys like that are the building blocks of successful football franchises. I'm not the slightest bit concerned over how well McKelvin will actually play. My only real fear with him is that he'll end up being another "first contract and out" first round CB. If the Bills extend his contract at some point, I'll mark him down as a successful pick. The Bills have indeed made significant improvements under the Levy/Jauron regime, but there's still a lot of work to be done. The Bills could use starting caliber players at C and TE. I wouldn't mind seeing upgrades at one or two of the other offensive line positions. If the Bills can get those things taken care of during the 2009 draft, and if they can extend Evans before he hits free agency, they'll have taken a big step forward. There's a lot to be excited about, and I expect the Bills to be a much better team this season than they were last season. But I'll feel even more excited when the things I mentioned above have been dealt with.

An excellent point. My intent was not to suggest the front office did a bad job with that particular draft. As you've pointed out, our draft for that year was strong. But even after a successful draft, a team should ask itself, "What things could we have done differently to have had an even better draft?" This isn't about 20/20 hindsight. What I'm describing is an attempt to improve and upgrade the pre-draft evaluation process to produce better results in the future. A team should look not just at the players it drafted, but also at the players it did a lot of research on. How did players in the latter category do? Are some of the players playing below their expected level? Why are they playing below that level? Is it because of lack of passion, or lack of toughness or work ethic, etc.? How could a team's evaluation process be modified to do a better job of weeding out such players? Conversely, a team needs to identify the players it didn't notice, but should have. How might its evaluation process be changed to make it less likely for such players to slip through the cracks in the future? Thanks, but that wasn't what I was after. I'd like to see the Bills win the Super Bowl some day. Toward that end, I feel they need to maximize whatever resources they've been given. When they fail to do so--as for example their failure to accept Denver's trade-down offer--it frustrates me. You can congratulate me until you're blue in the face, and it won't make my feeling of frustration go away. Only a Bills Super Bowl victory will do that! Jimmy Johnson once said that you can either be safe and be good, or you can take a chance to be great. I think it's obvious which of those two approaches this staff prefers. A coach or front office person's #1 priority is probably to hold onto his job. "Safe and good" is the obvious way to do that. As a fan, I want the Bills to win the Super Bowl, without particularly caring which coaching staff or front office group happens to be in charge when that Super Bowl victory happens. "Safe and good" typically doesn't win Super Bowls. The approach I outlined in my earlier post would have created a chance of the Bills losing out on Whitner. In exchange for accepting that risk, the Bills would have had the chance to get all three players (Mangold, Whitner, and McCargo). If they missed out on that chance, they still would have had two of the three, plus Denver's second round pick. But I think having Whitner on the team gave them a feeling of safety (no pun intended). Whitner's presence in the secondary helps keep other teams' offenses from getting out of hand. Losing out on Whitner would have been very damaging, at least until the hole at SS could have been filled in some future draft. On the other hand, it typically takes offensive linemen a year or two to begin playing at a high level. For these reasons, the front office probably felt that risking losing out on Whitner might have meant a risk to their careers. From a job security standpoint, it made sense for the Bills to stand pat and take Whitner. From the perspective of a team trying to put in place the pieces to win a Super Bowl, the plan I outlined in my earlier post would have been better.

As I've mentioned to you before, Denver traded up to get that #11 pick. Their original pick was somewhat lower. Good for them. I was never sold on Justice. The Denver trade-down was clearly on the table, and I feel the Bills should have taken advantage of that fact. The other trade I mentioned was a possibility, which is why my earlier post described what the Bills should have done if that trade became available, as well as where they would have been left if it wasn't available. I didn't advocate Justice or Bunkley (or Ngata for that matter, even though in hindsight I should have). I expressed the view that if the Bills didn't think any of the QBs were worth the 8th overall pick, they should have traded down for Mangold. My comments were made both before and immediately after the draft. As Marv's comments made clear, a trade-down possibility for a second round pick was there. You've characterized my position as "wanting to win the lottery" "assumptions" "unreasonable" and "could be magic." Given that I advocated the trade-down for Mangold at the time, you don't get to come back at me later with "could be magic" type comments.

An excellent post, Obie Wan. It's clear you did a lot of research for it. Ever since the Super Bowl years, the Bills' offensive line has generally been mediocre or poor. This past season was an improvement, but even there I felt our line was mediocre at best when it came to run blocking. The line was neglected under Butler, and again under TD. The current regime is a little different. When Marv became general manager, he acquired a roster with a lot of washed-up players like Troy Vincent and Lawyer Milloy, and very little in the way of young talent. Marv said something along the lines of, "if you build for the future, you're building for someone else's future." Over the last three drafts, the Bills have generally used their early picks on positions associated with quick learning curves: RB, LB, CB, SS, etc. Offensive linemen take longer to develop; and this team has filled (or, in Melvin Fowler's case, attempted to fill) its needs via free agency. This general approach of getting quick impact players via the draft, and long-term impact players via free agency, arguably made sense given the Bills' lack of talent at the end of 2005. But now that most of the major holes have been filled, perhaps the Bills will feel able to spend a higher percentage of their early picks on slow developing positions, such as the offensive line. At very least I'd like the Bills to take a center early in next year's draft.

In general, I agree with the Bills' philosophical approach of getting the specific players they want, even at the expense of draft day value. In this particular case, I feel their approach should have been, "There are three players in this first round we really want: Whitner, Mangold, and McCargo. We need to take any two of them; but it would be nice to have all three." With that philosophy, the Bills would have traded down from #8 to #15; acquiring a 2nd round pick in the process. If Whitner is still there at #15, they take him. Then they acquire McCargo, using the same trade they actually used. To get Mangold, the Bills would offer the 2nd round pick from the Whitner trade-down, plus their third round pick (used on Ashton Youboty). By trading away those two picks, the Bills might well have been able to move back into the late first round, where they could have grabbed Mangold. There's no guarantee Whitner would have been there at #15. If he'd been off the boards, the Bills should have either attempted another trade-down, or else should have taken McCargo or Mangold at that spot. Then they should have traded back into the first round (as they did to get McCargo) to take whichever of those two players (McCargo or Mangold) they hadn't drafted earlier. Under this plan, the Bills either end up with all three players; or else end up with two of the three plus an extra 2nd round pick. As it is, they got two of the three, without that extra 2nd round pick. Dibs' post made me feel better about this whole situation; but I still feel the Bills could have gotten more than they did. On the bright side, no one else's team is perfect either; and the Bills did a solid overall job with that year's draft.

I'm a little confused by this portion of what was otherwise a very solid post. How am I "in some way justifying that [Mangold] could have been drafted at #11" when I wanted the Bills to trade down to acquire him? Mangold at, say, #15 or #20 is a much nicer pickup than Mangold at #8. I wouldn't go that far: there are 31 other teams which also have worthwhile opinions about draft picks (well, except maybe Detroit). I wonder how many of those other teams felt Whitner was worth the 8th overall pick. Not necessarily true. Perhaps the team with the 15th pick felt Mangold was the 12th best player; but drafted some other guy whom they felt was the 10th best. Maybe the 16th team had him rated highly, but didn't need a center. Perhaps a team near the end of the first round had a high grade on him, but either couldn't trade up to get him, or else felt he would fall to their spot. Without seeing teams' draft boards, it's impossible to say with certainty where teams had Mangold rated. I realize that . . but it's possible the Bills have swung too far the other way; and felt they had to have a SS, even if he wasn't the next Ed Reed, and even if they had to use the 8th overall pick to absolutely guarantee they got him. Just because you disagree with someone's opinion doesn't make it an "emotional reaction." I've seen the same thing, and you may be right about this. That list of names was by far the strongest part of your post. Maybe you're right to imply my expectations for an 8th overall pick were unrealistic. I still feel the Bills would have been better off had they traded down and drafted Mangold; but your post made me feel better about their decision to stay put and take Whitner.

Your last comment isn't applicable to this situation. Bill and I had been thinking about a trade-down for Mangold before the draft even began. When the Bills chose Whitner, Bill and I immediately expressed the view that the Bills would have been better off trading down for Mangold. What more could we possibly have done to have keept you from labeling this a 20/20 hindsight situation? Not everyone would agree with your comment about Whitner being a better prospect than Mangold. A number of mock drafts didn't have Whitner going in the first round; and Vic Carucci didn't have Whitner ranked as one of the 32 best players in that year's draft. After Whitner was drafted, some on these boards wrote that it's worth spending the 8th overall pick on a SS if you get a Ronnie Lott. The problem with that line of thinking is that the probability of any given player turning into the next Lott is very small. Whitner is not, and never will be, Ronnie Lott. Nor is he in the same category as Ed Reed. Players like Brad Butler and Keith Ellison are successful picks, because they've contributed a lot more than you'd expect from 5th and 6th round picks. But if you credit management for finding players who exceed the expectations associated with their respective draft positions, you also have to acknowledge cases where players have fallen short of those expectations. Whitner hasn't lived up to the expectations associated with the 8th overall pick.

What do you mean by 15th in rushing? Do you mean that the Bills had the 15th most rushing yards of any team in the league? Or do you mean that the Bills had the 15th highest average yards per carry of any team in the league? If a team calls a high percentage of running plays, it may achieve a relatively high rank in the rushing yards per game category; even if its average yards per carry stat is weak. In Buffalo's case, we had some good RBs playing behind an offensive line that wasn't good at run blocking.

Players like Jerry Rice, Michael Irvin, Marvin Harrison, and Eric Moulds were taken in the first round. Taking a WR in the 1st isn't necessarily the kiss of death for your franchise.

Has anyone ever told you you're a truly sad human being? By your own admission, your work contributes nothing to anyone's benefit. You've made over 14,000 posts on these boards, most of which have been mean-spirited, content-free attempts to make other people unhappy (as above). Even the members of your own family want nothing to do with you. You're a statistical physicist who doesn't even know the difference between a binomial distribution and a multinomial distribution. You think the regression effect only applies to autocorrelations (which is stupid, even for you). You've just gone along with Ramius's attempt to ridicule the widely recognized concepts of expected value and estimation error; thus squandering whatever threadbare remnant of credibility you might once have had. Please do not waste any more of my time. I want nothing to do with you.

I'm done trying to explain the concept of expected value to you. There are plenty of good explanations out there already. I suggest you Google them.

The article appeared on May 1, 2006: shortly after the Bills' draft. If memory serves, Marv's comments about potentially missing out on the player you want to get a second round pick were made weeks or months after the draft had been concluded. The article you found didn't "disprove" any assertion I'd made, except in your own mind. As your earlier comments made clear, the concept of expected value is beyond you. Your most recent comments demonstrate you also don't understand the concept of estimation error.

The article you've linked to doesn't mention Mangold's most recent season, so don't cite it in a way which implies that it does. I was wondering how long it would take you to a) start acting like a two year old and b) prove you didn't, and still don't, understand my earlier posts. The concept of expected value is clearly way over your head.

There are a lot of good points in this post, but paying players for their stats isn't something that should be implemented. Take QBs, for example. If you're paying them for TDs, do you penalize them for INTs? What happens when it's the end of the first half, or the end of a game, and the coach tells the QB to make a desperation throw? The QB knows that the throw will probably be intercepted, so he's not going to want to cost himself what would probably be hundreds of thousands of dollars. Then again, you might have a DB--let's call him Nate--who goes for an interception at a point in the game when he should be batting down the pass. You could have a QB--let's call him Rob Johnson--who would rather take a sack than throw the ball away, because sacks don't count against QB rating.

No, it's more than just a fantasy. It's the logical conclusion based on Marv's comments about not wanting to potentially lose out on the player you want, if all you're getting is a second round pick. If you missed out on the article with those comments, I suggest you Google it. Your implication that Whitner would have gone 3 - 4 spots after Buffalo had picked is, to use your own phrase, "merely speculation and fantasy." I've seen at least one sports writer claim that if Detroit didn't get Huff, their next choice was that LB, Ernie Sims. Are you right that Detroit (or someone like them) would have taken Whitner? Is the sportswriter correct in asserting Detroit would still have taken Sims, even if Whitner was there? Who can say for sure? A large number of mock drafts didn't even have Whitner going in the first round. Vic Carruci didn't have Whitner rated as a first round talent; although he was quick to point out that where you rate Whitner all depends on the style of defense you run. Unless you know something the rest of us don't, there's no justification for you to assert as fact that Whitner was taken 3 - 4 spots early. We simply don't know where he would have gone, had Buffalo not taken him. As for your comment about "reaching" 1/2 a round to grab a center, it's easy to say with 20/20 hindsight that Mangold went with the 29th overall pick. But before the draft, neither Bill nor I suggested that the Bills trade down to exactly pick #28, and take Whitner right there. I suggested that if the Bills didn't think any of the available QBs were worth the 8th overall pick, they should trade down and take Mangold. Bill did better, because he simply suggested trading down for Mangold, without confusing things by mentioning QBs. Trading down to #15 (which I believe was Denver's original spot in the first round) would have gotten us that 2nd round pick Marv mentioned; and would have allowed us to pick a better football player than Whitner. So yes, the Bills would clearly have been better off trading down and taking Mangold, even if they took Mangold at #15. Yes, they could have improved that situation even more by trading down yet again, and taking Mangold in the early to mid 20s. I simply don't know whether this second trade-down would have been feasible. How sure were they that Mangold would have lasted until the late 20s? Would there have been a willing trade partner to let the Bills go from #15 to somewhere in the early to mid 20s? Without knowing the answers to those questions, this second trade-down might belong in the 20/20 hindsight category. To address a point someone made earlier, the Bills lacked a starting quality SS (our best SS on the roster was Matt Bowen) and we lacked a starting quality C (our best C on the roster was Melvin Fowler). Mangold would have filled one of those positions of real need, and that 2nd round pick from trading down would have allowed us to fill some other position.

No argument there. Plus, if McKelvin lives up to his billing, he'll be a much better CB than McGee, and a lot more valuable on defense than Parrish is on offense. If you're going to risk guys on special teams, better to risk the guys you can most afford to lose on offense and defense.

Back when we had the 8th overall pick, with Leinart and Cutler still on the boards, yes, it would have been easy to trade down. Denver had offered us their 2nd round pick for doing so.