Orton's Arm

The Ravens of 2000 had a very good offensive line, led by a Hall of Fame-caliber LT in the form of Jon Ogden. They had a good running game in the form of Jamal Lewis, and a TE at or near Hall of Fame level in Shannon Sharpe. With the possible exception of Dareus, not one current Bills defensive player would be good enough to start for the Ravens of 2000. All four of their defensive linemen required a double-team, and offenses never had enough guys to double team all four at once! It was a ridiculously good defensive front! Their LB corps was led by Ray Lewis, and all three LBs were at or near a Pro Bowl level. They had two shutdown CBs to go along with safeties like Ed Reed. If you weren't at or near the Pro Bowl level, you couldn't start for that Ravens defense, at any position! And several of their guys weren't just Pro Bowl level--they were at or near Hall of Fame level! Which is easier: a) building a team like that, or b) acquiring a franchise QB (as nine of the last ten Super Bowl winners have done)? One last thing: even though that Ravens defense was one of the three best in NFL history, it resulted in just one Super Bowl win. The same could also be said about the defense the Bears had in 1985. The only time a core group of players has won multiple Super Bowls has been when that core group included a very good or elite QB. The 49ers of the '80s had Montana, the Cowboys of the '90s had Aikman, the Broncos of the late '90s had Elway, the Patriots of the 2000s had Brady. If you employ a strategy designed to win three or four Super Bowls, then getting a little unlucky might mean you win only one or two. But if the strategy you employ can result in only one Super Bowl win, then getting unlucky means you don't end up winning any Super Bowls at all. Teams which attempt to win Super Bowls by employing a Ravens-like strategy almost always fail.

You've hit the ball out of the park, both with this post and your other posts in this thread. Everything you've written is spot-on accurate. I'd also like to reiterate that a typical NFL team will acquire a franchise-level QB about once every 45 - 50 years. A team that passes up a franchise QB in an effort to fill other needs first consigns itself to near-certain mediocrity for a very long time to come. (Presumably the next 45 years or so, assuming it will acquire new franchise QBs at the average pace for an NFL team.) I will also add another argument: because QB is the most important position on the field, QBs tend to be taken earlier, relative to their talent level, than players at any other position. This means that the best (or at least highest-rated) QBs will tend to go to the worst teams with the most holes. A team that waits to fill its other holes before taking a QB will not have access to the highest-rated QBs of the draft. Filling those other holes will reduce its draft position. Tom Brady is often cited as a franchise QB taken in the later rounds. But he was picked back in 2000. Since then, how many Tom Brady stories have there been? Since 2000, there has been only one franchise QB taken 33rd overall or later: Matt Schaub. (If I'm forgetting anyone, please let me know.) Assuming a typical NFL team drafts an average of 0.5 late round QBs per year, a team trying to find a franchise QB in the later rounds of the draft would have to wait an average of 160 years before succeeding. I would prefer not to have to wait 160 years for the rebuilding process to succeed, but that's just me. The argument has been made that a bad situation might spoil the development of a rookie QB. There might be some truth to this. However, I would argue that a lot of franchise QBs, such as Peyton Manning and Troy Aikman, began their careers in bad situations. I would also argue that the overwhelming majority of first round QB busts would not have become franchise QBs no matter what their situation had been. Does anyone seriously believe that Ryan Leaf, Joey Harrington, Jamarcus Russell, or Akili Smith could have rivaled Manning or Rodgers, had they been in better situations? That said, I hate the thought of a first round QB being set up to fail. One way to avoid that is by eschewing franchise QBs until the other pieces are in place. (A strategy that practically guarantees you will not draft a franchise QB or win a Super Bowl). Another strategy is to do what the Bengals did with Carson Palmer. As a rookie, Palmer was told he would be third string, and that nothing he could do would get him out of third string status during his rookie year. A reasonably solid, serviceable veteran, in the form of Jon Kitna, was the Bengals' starter that year. In Palmer's second year, he was anointed the starter, and Kitna was told there was nothing he could do to earn back the starting spot. A veteran QB will often outplay a first-time starter, so that decision avoided a Johnson/Flutie-style drama. More generally, the Bengals' process is how all rookie first round QBs should be brought along! Letting the rookie sit on the bench for a year also gives you an extra year to fix the team's other flaws.

I agree that the Bills have tended to squander their early picks on luxury players such as RBs while eschewing better players who could have filled genuine needs. One vey minor note: to allude to something is to refer to it, to elude something is to dodge or avoid it. The word you were looking for in that last sentence was elude.

Welcome to these boards. It's nice to converse with fellow Bills fans! Glad to have you here. You mentioned six elite quarterbacks in your post: both Mannings, Rodgers, Brady, Roethlisberger, and Brees. Those six quarterbacks have accounted for nine out of the last ten Super Bowl wins. An elite quarterback is a puzzle piece without which it's almost impossible to build a Super Bowl winner. If your plan is to win the Super Bowl, you know you're going to need an elite quarterback sooner or later. Also, as you correctly pointed out, very few elite QBs enter the NFL over any given ten year period. I'd argue that roughly six elite QBs have entered the league over the last ten years. (I realize Peyton Manning was longer ago than ten years, but there are one or two other QBs who could be added to your list.) 6/10 = 0.6 elite QBs per year. When those 0.6 elite QBs per year are spread out across all 32 teams, it means that a typical team will acquire an elite QB about once every 50 years. If you know that you almost have to have an elite QB to win the Super Bowl, and if a typical NFL team will add an elite QB about twice every century, then if you team has the chance to add an elite QB, it should . . . take some other player instead? I'm not quite following the logic here. Of the six guys you mentioned, two were taken first overall, and another was taken in the top-12. Any team which has a record bad enough to be able to draft that high has a lot more problems than just quarterback! For example, the Colts went 1-15 in 1997. Suppose the Colts had said, "We have too many problems here for any QB to be successful. There's no need for us to draft a quarterback like Peyton Manning when the rest of our team is such a mess. We think we can sign a good stopgap QB for now, build the rest of the team, and get our franchise QB later." Had Polian employed this thought process, how many more opportunities would Polian have had to draft a QB of Peyton's caliber? Or, if the Colts didn't have a franchise QB, could they still have won the Super Bowl under Polian's watch? The above is not merely a case of 20/20 hindsight. It's illustrative of how valuable a franchise QB truly is, how rare opportunities are to acquire one, and therefore how important it is to take full advantage of every single such opportunity which comes your way.

I'll give you a hint: the DJ stands for something which rhymes with Ick Moron. Not that the Bills have (yet?) been coached by anyone answering to that name, but . . .

The defining event was the firing of Polian. Period. Yes, the Bills continued to win for a few years after that. It wasn't as though anyone in the organization was prepared to say, "Polian is gone, let's immediately cut every player he ever drafted." The nucleus Polian had assembled provided dividends years after his firing. John Butler's first draft occurred in 1992. Butler's first round pick was used on John Fina. Fina was consistently among the bottom third of starting LTs. Other than him and a (somewhat) decent safety (Kurt Schultz), the Bills came up empty in Butler's first draft. Butler's second draft was even more disappointing. The first round pick was squandered on a DB--on Thomas Smith, in fact. He left Buffalo after seven years. Their second round pick was used on John Parella, DE. Parella had a very good career--for the San Diego Chargers. He only spent one year in Buffalo before he and the Bills parted ways. Other than those two guys, nobody in particular was drafted that year. In 1994, Butler used his first round pick on Jeff Burris--a CB who immediately went first-contract-and-out. Other than Burris, the only notable acquisition that draft was Sam Rogers, a reasonably solid LB. In 1995, Butler added a Pro Bowl OG in the form of Ruben Brown. He also added another reasonably solid LB in John Holecek. 1996 was a better draft than usual for Butler: he added Eric Moulds (WR) in the first round, and Jay Riemersma (TE) in the 7th. In 1997 Butler returned to form: every player from that draft was a bust. You could also say the same thing about the 1998 draft, although Sam Cowart would have been a very good player if it hadn't been for that injury. The first round pick of the 1999 draft was used on Antowain Winfield, a very good CB who was allowed to go first-contract-and-out. The second round pick was used on Peerless Price--a WR whom the Bills would later trade away for Atlanta's first round pick. Other than those two, nobody good was picked that year. The 2000 draft had more busts than a Victoria's Secret catalog. That represented nine years of drafting. Nine years during which the core Polian had put together grew gradually older, then retired. Butler added only two new core players: Eric Moulds and Ruben Brown. One could also argue that Butler deserves credit for having added Antoine Winfield, and that the blame for Winfield's early departure rests with TD. However, Polian allowed other first round CBs--especially Burris--to leave Buffalo in a real hurry. Had Butler still been the GM when Winfield's first contract expired, would Butler have been as casual about Winfield's departure as he had been about Burris's? Using nine years' worth of drafts to obtain a good WR and OG, and some solid ILBs and a TE, is not the way to "reBilld" the team of the Polian era. Butler's drafts brought the Bills precisely nothing at the following crucial positions: QB, LT, NT, RDE (3-4), pass rushing OLB (3-4). It was Butler's failure to find talent at these positions, in combination with the critical injury to Paup, which most greatly contributed to the 3-13 season of 2001. The firing of Polian set the stage for roughly two decades of subsequent failure.

Nor should he. Manning is in the twilight of his career. He needs a team that's a QB away from being a legitimate Super Bowl contender. That team is not the Bills. Looking at things from the Bills' perspective, an aging veteran like Manning cannot be part of a Super Bowl winning team in Buffalo. By the time the other necessary pieces of a Super Bowl winner have been assembled, Manning will long since have retired.

While your general point may well be correct, I'd argue that Super Bowl winning teams do tend to have top-5 players at two key positions: QB and pass rusher. Green Bay is an excellent example of this: they have the best QB in the league, and a top-5 pass rusher in the form of Clay Matthews. Previous Super Bowl winners have also typically had top-5 QBs, and good pass rushes with (often) elite players.

There is a long-standing philosophical debate about what would happen if an unstoppable force was applied against an immovable object. JP Losman going up against the Bills' defense would be pretty much the opposite of that. And yes, I agree with the OP's point that the Bills need draft position and a franchise QB a lot more than they need a couple meaningless wins thrown in at the end of their season.

Very strong post! Too often, the Bills have approached the draft looking for immediate results or quick fixes, instead of building toward a clear long-term plan. Even when they have had a long-term plan of sorts, it hasn't been a very good one. Take the second half of the TD era for example. His long-term plan for the offense--such as it was, and what there was of it--seems to have been based on speed. Starting in 2003, TD used early draft picks to add the following players: Willis McGahee, Lee Evans, Roscoe Parrish, Kevin Everett, J.P. Losman. Each of those players represented a speed upgrade over the guy he was intended to replace. In addition, Losman's strong arm would allow him to connect on passes deep downfield. That plan failed for a variety of reasons, including the fact that mentally limited QBs typically fail in the NFL, and that it's hard to have a great deep passing game when you don't have an offensive line. There is a better way to build a long-term plan than that! First, I would point out a regression analysis done by the New York Times, which demonstrated that passing offense is four times more important than rushing offense, and that passing defense is four times more important than rushing defense. (And no, there was nothing in the analysis to justify the "offense puts people in the stands, but defense wins championships" idiocy you hear so often. Offense and defense are equally important in winning games.) It's been said that a QB's best friends are his running back and his defense. That's absolutely false! A QB's best friends are his offensive line and his receiving corps. The only reason coaches and front office people talk about surrounding young QBs with good RBs and defenses is because they have mixed feelings about trusting the shiny new QB they just drafted to make plays. The thought of putting the game into his hands makes them nervous, so they draft RBs and defensive players in hopes that they'll have to ask the QB to do almost nothing. Such hopes are ridiculous. Sooner or later the shiny new QB will be called on to make plays, regardless of how hard coaches and general managers work to avoid having that happen. When (not if) he's asked to make clutch plays, it would really help if he's given the tools he needs to succeed! Look at how much more Steve Young accomplished with the 49ers than he did with the Bucs. The 49ers gave Young a good OL and a good receiving corps. The Bucs focused their draft day resources on RBs and the defense, even though their OL was a joke and their receiving corps was mediocre. If the three most critical components of a good passing attack are (in order) a good QB, a good OL, and a good receiving corps, the two most critical components of a good pass defense are a good pass rush and good pass coverage. Therefore, teams should focus their early draft picks on those five areas. On the surface, the veritable ocean of early draft picks the Bills have poured out on DBs could be justifiable based on the above list, because they address one of the five key areas. But over the last decade, there have been 3.5 times when the Bills allowed their DB with the best combination of youth + proven accomplishment to leave via free agency. Those DBs include Antoine Winfield, Nate Clements, Jabari Greer, and Donte Whitner. Whitner is the 0.5, because it's highly debatable as to whether he truly represented the best combination of youth + proven accomplishment when he left, and because his play has since been eclipsed by Wilson and Byrd. The only reason he's mentioned at all was because when he left, most other Bills' DBs were either too old (McGee, Florence) or too young or unproven (Byrd, Wilson) to be considered both youthful and proven. The other only reason was because a 3.5 reference was clearly necessary! If a team decides that its best DBs will be allowed to go first-contract-and-out, then any early draft picks it uses on DBs cannot be considered a serious attempt to build the long-term core of the team. I would also argue that, of the five items on the list, DBs are probably the least important. If it's a choice between Aaron Rodgers and Darrell Revis, you take Aaron Rodgers!!!! Overall, I would rank the importance of the positions as follows: 1. QB 2. Pass rush 3. OL/pass protection 4. WRs 5. Pass coverage I realize the above places greater importance on offense versus defense. My thinking is this: in order to win the Super Bowl, you almost have to have a franchise QB. If you're doing that anyway, it would make sense to give him the tools he needs to succeed. In previous years' playoff games, the Patriots' defense was often very effective at shutting down Peyton Manning and the Colts' offense, precisely because Manning's offensive supporting cast had been dominated by the Patriots' defense. There's no sense in letting a very valuable asset (a franchise QB) be rendered useless because of the lack of a sufficiently strong supporting cast! The Bills have very seriously neglected the first and third items on the list on draft day. In addition, they have neglected the fifth item on the list when it's come time to extend DBs currently on the roster. Instead, they have chosen to squander their scant financial resources on overpriced and overhyped free agents from other teams, such as Lawyer Milloy, Derrick Dockery, Langston Walker, and others. They've let their best DBs go first-contract-and-out, and have used numerous first round picks on the replacements for those departed DBs. As far as I'm concerned, the correct allocation of the Bills' first picks of the draft should be as follows: 1. QB: 20% of the time. (Current track record: 3.8%, if you count Rob Johnson and half of Kelly.) The only reason this number should ever be less than 20% is if the Bills are able to achieve franchise-level play while using fewer than 20% of their first picks of the draft. Obviously, the Bills have failed to find a franchise QB ever since Kelly hung up his cleats. 2. Pass rush: 25%. You want more than one good pass rusher, which is why this number is higher than for QB. 3. OTs: 15%. The focus here should be on OTs known for their pass protection, not necessarily their run blocking. Run blocking is a nice bonus, but pass protection is essential. (Current track record: 5%.) 4. WRs: 10%. 5. DBs: 10%. (Current track record: 25%.) Drafting one first round cornerback every ten years, and keeping him here the entirety of his career, seems about right. 6. Other positions: 15%. Most of this 15% should be used on players who can contribute to the pass offense or pass defense. Pass catching TEs, RBs who can be Thurman Thomas-like on third-and-long, interior OL who contribute to pass protection, etc. The above does not represent a hard and fast rules set. Every draft day strategy needs to be flexible based on the quality of the players actually available. But the emphasis should always be on obtaining strength at the QB position first, OL and pass rush second, DBs and receiving threats third, and everyone else fourth.

I agree that there is little substantive difference between where Hunter was picked (12th overall) and where Kelly was chosen (14th overall). In that sense, one could argue that the Bills (sort of) had two first draft picks that year, one of which was used on a TE, the other on a quarterback. I'll also go along with the first round pick traded away for Rob Johnson. Johnson was a young, unproven player when the Bills traded for him, so the pick used on him is somewhat analogous to a draft day trade. However, I strongly object to the notion that the pick traded away for Bledsoe is in any way analogous to a first round pick used to draft a quarterback. There is a world of difference between drafting a young, unproven QB in the first round, and a 3-13 team trading away a first round pick for an aging veteran. The former represents a legitimate attempt to find a long-term answer at quarterback. The latter is a short-sighted attempt to trade away the future for the present, and is the precise opposite of using draft picks to build a long-term core that D.D. had described in his original post. If it will make you happier, I'd be willing to go along with the idea that the Bills' "true" first pick of the 1998 draft was Rob Johnson (for whom they traded away their first and fourth round picks), not Sam Cowart (chosen in the second round of '98). Further, I'd be willing to go along with the idea that Hunter and Kelly were "tied" (or close enough to being tied) for the first Bills' draft pick of 1983. That means that out of 40 cases, there were 1.5 times when the Bills used their first pick of the draft to take a young, unproven quarterback. That works out to 3.8% of the time during the last 40 years, or 3.5% of the time over the last 43 years. Conversely, the Bills have used their first pick of the draft on a RB or a DB 50% of the time over the last 40 years.

As I see it, there are three possible philosophical approaches to drafting: 1) Best player available. 2) Draft for need. 3) Draft for most valuable position available. This means taking QBs, LTs, RDEs, etc. early, while waiting until later to take safeties, OGs, RBs, and the like. I think that an ideal drafting approach would combine elements from all three. If you take what you think is the best player available, regardless of need or the importance of the position, you'll wind up with a water bug back. If a GM drafts for what he (incorrectly) thinks are the most important team needs, without regard for best player available or the importance of the position, he'll end up taking Donte Whitner 8th overall. As you correctly pointed out, a drafting philosophy that leads either to a Whitner or a Spiller is deeply flawed. As I see it, a first round draft pick should be justifiable under each of the three drafting philosophies. That doesn't mean he has to be the absolute best player available. But it does mean he has to be reasonably close in talent to whichever guy is the best available. Similarly, he doesn't have to play whichever position your team needs the very most, but there does have to be at least some need at whichever position he plays. Finally, he doesn't have to play the absolute most valuable position on the team (quarterback), but there does need to be a bias in favor of more valuable positions. (Especially when picking in the first round.)

You were one of my favorite posters even before I saw this thread. Let me just say that I wholeheartedly agree with everything you've written here. You have gotten to the heart of what's been wrong with the Bills over the last ten years, and have been insightful and eloquent in expressing both problems and solutions. Because you've covered this topic so well, it's hard to add to what you've written. But I will add this: over the last 40 years, the Bills have used their first pick of the draft on a RB on ten different occasions, and on a DB on another ten occasions. That's 50% of their highest draft picks going to DBs and RBs. Not once during that period did the Bills take a QB with their first pick of the draft. Only twice during the last 40 years, or 5% of the time, did the Bills use their first pick of the draft on an OT. One way of implementing the disciplined mindset you've described in your post is to begin by identifying the key positions on offense and defense. There should be an effort to channel draft picks into those key positions, so that you can build a core of good players which will last for many years to come. The Super Bowl era Bills had such a core--a core which the post-Polian Bills have lacked. On offense, I'd choose QB, LT, and WR as my three core positions. I'd be fine swapping the WR for a TE if need be, as long as the QB had at least one target who required double coverage. On defense, I'd use a Wade Phillips-style 3-4 (not a George Edwards style 3-4!), and my core players would be my NT, RDE, pass rushing OLB, and #1 CB. That's seven core players total, which seems ambitious but achievable. Of those seven, the QB, LT, and defensive pass rushers are the most important. The Bills have done almost nothing over the last ten to fifteen years to build such a core. The quarterback position has either been neglected on draft day, or else first round picks were traded away to obtain aging second-string veterans from division rivals. Other than the Mike Williams pick, no first or second round picks have been used on OTs during the TD/Marv/Jauron/Nix eras. Even when the Bills somehow stumbled into someone who could have been a core player--like Antowain Winfield--they let him go first-contract-and-out.

You have to be careful about who you say stuff like that to. If CJ turns out to be another Travis Henry, he'll take you literally!

I very strongly disagree with the bolded statement. First, there are more than two or three elite QBs, including Manning, Brady, Rodgers, Schaub, Brees, and possibly others. Second, if you look at the teams that won the last ten Super Bowls, all but one were quarterbacked by elite or nearly elite QBs. The lone exception was the Bucs of 2002 (2003 Super Bowl) with Brad Johnson at QB. But even there, they had to combine Johnson's Pro Bowl season with a very good defense to win the Super Bowl. It's a mistake to assume that the Bills can with the Super Bowl while receiving significantly worse quarterbacking than almost every recent Super Bowl winner. As for why I voted to place Fitz in the non-elite category, the best two seasons of his career were last year and this year. In those seasons he averaged 6.8 and 6.9 yards per pass attempt, respectively. A quarterback typically needs to have a career average of 7.4 yards per attempt to meet my definition of elite. A key reason why not even Fitz's best seasons are as good as elite QBs' career averages is because Fitz makes a lot more inaccurate throws than an elite QB would make.

I respect you for manning up. Not everyone has the self-confidence or integrity to admit being wrong. I agree it's more fun (and probably healthier) to celebrate the good things as opposed to dwelling on the negative. Unfortunately, Bills fans have had very little reason for legitimate hope over this past decade, which means our hopes have generally been false ones. I've read a little about American soldiers taken prisoner and tortured during the Vietnam War. Not that being a Bills fan is exactly the same as this, but . . . To continue, the article stated that prisoners who indulged in false hopes--"we're sure to be home by Christmas"--were generally the first ones to break down. The ones who made it through were those who believed that they would be set free eventually, but had no idea when "eventually" might be, or how much they'd have to endure in the meantime. Long-term optimism plus short-term realism is probably the best combination for any endeavor--including being a fan of this team! @BuffOrange: I haven't started an I-told-you-so thread. Bills fans have suffered enough already without me adding a thread like that!

This.

Excellent point. The Bills need a new defensive coordinator. If the fan base can see this, I'm sure Perry Fewell can see it too. The problem, as you pointed out, is that his preferred Tampa 2 style isn't very good, except under just the right circumstances. Circumstances which will not occur in Buffalo! If Gailey is fired, the Bills would lose their offensive play caller. Meaning that any new head coach would have to bring in a new offensive coordinator. If Gailey is fired, whoever his replacement turns out to be will need to be able to find good coordinators for both offense and defense! That being said, I don't think Gailey deserves to be fired. I just want to see him upgrade the Bills' defensive coordinator after the season is over.

I'll agree with you up to a point: Spiller seems to have value as a player, and the potential to become more in the future than he is today. Also, players don't control where they're drafted, so it's unfair to blame him personally if he hasn't (thus far) lived up to his ninth overall billing. Over the last 40 years, the Bills have used their first draft pick on a RB ten different times, on a DB ten different times, on an OT only twice, and on a QB not at all. Not coincidentally, the Bills have lost significantly more games than they've won during that time. Unless you're getting a very special player, I'd generally be opposed to taking a RB with a first round pick. Similarly, I'm not opposed to drafting the occasional DB in the first round. But that's providing that several conditions are met. 1) That the DB is the best player available when the pick is made. 2) That the need cannot be filled internally, for example by extending a player already on the roster. 3) If the DB becomes a good player, he must not be allowed to go first-contract-and-out! Since 1993, the Bills have used six first round picks on DBs. None of whom have met the above criteria. Their track record with first round RBs during that time has been very similar. The Bills have used four first round picks on RBs during that time. While the jury is still out on Spiller, neither Antowain Smith, Willis McGahee, or Marshawn Lynch did nearly enough for the Bills to remotely justify their respective draft positions. None of those three were the best player available when they were picked, in each case the need for a RB could have (and should have) been filled by players already on the roster, and each of the three had a short tenure with the Bills. The flaws with the Bills' RB drafting "strategy" closely parallel the flaws of their DB drafting strategy. The drafting of Spiller seems to represent a continuation of this kind of strategic failure. But that shouldn't stop us from appreciating what he has to offer as a player.

Over the last 40 years, the Bills have used their first pick of the draft on a RB on ten different occasions. They have used their first pick of the draft on a DB on ten occasions as well. 50% of the time, the Bills used their first pick of the draft on a RB or DB! Bill from NYC may seem a bit . . . opinionated on the need to avoid taking RBs and DBs early. But his opinions are a perfectly legitimate response to what has been a very real and ongoing problem. Not once in team history have the Bills used their first pick of the draft to take a quarterback. Not once! The closest they came to doing so was in 1983, when they used a first round pick on Jim Kelly. But they had already taken a TE a little earlier in the first round. Quarterback is the most important position on the field, and a good quarterback has a greater potential to influence the outcome of the game than a good player at any other position. That being the case, the Bills decided to relegate the QB position to second- or third-tier importance so that their best draft day resources could be lavished on DBs and RBs! Is Fitz better at quarterback than (for example) Spencer Johnson is at linebacker? Absolutely! In that sense quarterback is a lesser need than a number of other positions on this team. But if you look at the ten most recent Super Bowl winning teams, nine had QBs who were hands-down better than Fitz. The tenth had Brad Johnson and the Tampa Bay defense of 2002. Brad Johnson was voted to the Pro Bowl the year his team won the Super Bowl. If the Bills are going to build themselves into a Super Bowl winner, they will need to upgrade at QB (among a number of other positions). The best time to obtain an upgrade at quarterback is when you have lots of other needs at other positions, because that's when your record will be the worst, and your draft position will be the best! If you wait until your team's other needs are filled before taking a quarterback, your record will be too good, and your draft position too lousy, for you to have access to the most highly rated QBs of the draft. The Packers team that won this most recent Super Bowl looked like it was thrown together. They could neither run the ball nor stop the run. The offensive line was a joke. The defense had serious problems. But they had two saving graces. One was a very good pass rusher in the form of Clay Matthews. The other and more important saving grace was Aaron Rodgers who, IIRC, had exactly one non-perfect throw during the entire Super Bowl! If the Bills are able to acquire a player like that, they will have taken a major step towards becoming champions!

1) It always bothers me when bogus penalties are called, while genuine rules infractions are ignored. While I didn't personally see the game, the play you described sounds like a clear case of the latter. 2) It's possible that the Bills' OL of the future should have a first or second round draft pick at LT and Hairston at RT. 3) Again, I didn't see the game, so I don't want to argue with someone who did. That being the case, my impression is that Spiller did some things well and other things badly. The dropped pass is a concern, as was the fumble in the end zone. But you don't typically get that high a rushing average without doing some things well. If the Bills had to do that draft over again would I have them take Spiller at 9th overall? Absolutely not! But I do see some potential in him. 7) Glad to hear about Shepherd. 9) I too like Fitz as a person, and wish that all football players were like him. I wish I believed that he was, or could develop into, a franchise quarterback. Unfortunately, I dont believe that, and I also don't believe the Bills will win a Super Bowl as long as he's the starting QB. 10) "My daughter Amanda (who I implore to sign in) got me a Bills tree ornament as a Christmas present. It consists of 3 Bufflalo Bills celebrating. Which 3? Whitner, Evans and Lynch." Hopefully you have a good sense of humor about this! Of all the people on these boards who might have received such an ornament . . . and from your own daughter no less! As you proudly hang the ornament on the most visible portion of your tree, think about how Christmas can be a time to celebrate the 13th overall pick used on Evans, the 8th overall pick used on Whitner, and the 12th overall pick used on Lynch! It's also a time to be thankful for the GMs who chose such productive and wonderful players with their early picks. 11) Agreed on George Edwards 13) I agree that Buffalo has a very good fan base!

Look at the quarterbacks for the ten most recent Super Bowl winners. 2011: Aaron Rodgers 2010: Drew Brees 2009: Ben Roethlisberger 2008: Eli Manning 2007: Peyton Manning 2006: Ben Roethlisberger 2005: Tom Brady 2004: Tom Brady 2003: Brad Johnson 2002: Tom Brady Of the ten entries above, nine (including Eli Manning) are from quarterbacks that are clearly, hands-down, better than Fitz. In 2009, 2010, and 2011, Eli Manning averaged 7.9, 7.4, and 8.4 yards per pass attempt, as compared to the 6.8 yards per pass attempt Fitz averaged in 2010, and the 6.9 yards per attempt he's averaging this season. (Numbers which represent by far the best averages of Fitzpatrick's career.) One of the entries includes Brad Johnson, a very solid quarterback who had a Pro Bowl year the year the Bucs won the Super Bowl. Is it possible Fitz can put together a Pro Bowl year too, and that his Pro Bowl year will happen to coincide with the Bills having as good a defense as the Bucs did in 2002? Yes. But is this likely? Not very! If the Bills merely want to win more regular season games than they lose, then Fitz is not the problem. Fix the defense, add some depth on offense, improve the OL, and voila! But if the Bills want to win the Super Bowl, they're going to need a quarterback who can go toe-to-toe with the guys on the above list. Fitz is not that guy, and never will be that guy. It's way too early to judge the 2011 QB draft class, so I'm not going to go there. Peyton Manning didn't look all that good as a rookie, a fact which resulted in . But I agree with the larger point that franchise quarterbacks are very rare, and that typically between zero and one are added to the NFL each year. If franchise QBs are both very rare and very valuable, then any time you get a chance to add one, you do it! Period.

Thanks for your compliments! I'll agree with your post up to a point. I'd argue that statistics can be misleading, because people can pick and choose the statistics that best fit their arguments. But people can do the same thing with words as well. Suppose you know five positive and five negative things about a person. Depending on the impression you want to create, you can discuss the five positive things and withhold the five negative, or vice versa. But someone who wanted to be as accurate as possible, without "selling" an inaccurate or biased point of view, would mention both positive and negative. Similarly with statistics, someone who valued accuracy above all else would seek out the most rigorous possible methodology, and would let the chips fall where they may. There are people who use statistics like that! I'd argue that people who use statistics fall into one of three categories. 1) People who understand statistical tools, and who build rigorous and honest methodologies to seek out the truth. 2) People who have an imperfect understanding of statistical tools, and do not fully understand what their statistical models are telling them. 3) People who deliberately use statistics to deceive. Mark Twain's comment about statistics seems to lump all users of statistics into the third category, which is grossly unfair to those in the first category. (And, to a lesser degree, unfair to those in the second category. Despite what Al Franken might think, the concepts of error and lie are not interchangeable.)

Words can be used to lie. But that doesn't mean that all words should automatically be dismissed as lies. The key is knowing when people are lying and when they're telling the truth. Statistics can also be used to lie. But that doesn't mean that all statistics are lies. If I were to tell you that the population of the United States is about half male, half female, or if I were to tell you that residents of Silicon Valley are on average younger than residents of Florida, or that residents of California are less likely to be smokers than residents of Las Vegas, I'd be telling you the truth. In this case, the OP appears to have embraced an erroneous assumption. Erroneous assumptions will lead to inaccurate conclusions, regardless of whether those conclusions are expressed in words or as statistics. The erroneous assumption that the OP appears to have made is that offensive supporting casts and defenses tend to be of roughly equal quality around the league, making it fair to evaluate QBs based on the quality of "their" win/loss records. The falsehood of that assumption is self-evident.

I have no formal background in psychology, though I've learned a little about it here and there. As for whether you've become an INTJ, I suggest you read this playful description that "tells it like it is," and see if it fits! Or you could read something more serious, if less specific. I've noticed that your own posts tend to be well thought-out and intellectually rigorous. Creating a post like that is a form of mental exercise, regardless of the posting quality (or lack thereof) of the majority of posters here. It's also something I appreciate--I want to know more after having read a post than I had beforehand. A discussion can have one of two purposes: 1) To inform, enlighten, express new ideas, etc. The emphasis here is on the discussion's content. 2) Discussion can be a sort of music, with the actual content being irrelevant. The emphasis here is on building social relationships between people. This is the sole purpose of small talk, because the actual content of the small talk has zero chance of resulting in mental stimulation. If you are an INTJ, you will strongly prefer, and be better at, the first type of communication than the second type. But both forms of communication are legitimate.