Orton's Arm

Generally speaking, a defensive line and a defensive secondary are supposed to work as two complementary components of a defensive machine. The defensive line is supposed to provide pass pressure/hits and sacks as quickly as possible, while the defensive backs provide coverage for a long time to keep the QB from finding an open man. If it usually takes 5 seconds before a receiver gets open, and if the pass rush usually arrives after 3.5 seconds, the other team's quarterback will have few or no good options. The way the Jets' defense played against the Patriots was a textbook illustration of how that's supposed to work. An ideal offense is basically the mirror image of the defense described above. The offensive line should be very good to give the quarterback a lot of time to throw. The receiving corps should be very good so that guys can get open quickly, or even catch the ball when they're covered. There's one other thing as well: the quarterback should be elite, and should maximize the opportunities his OL and receiving corps create for him. In the Patriots/Jets game, the Patriots seemed to lack all three components of that kind of elite offense. The Patriots' OL was dominated by the Jets' DL. The Patriots' receiving corps was dominated by the Jets' DBs. Even Tom Brady, elite quarterback though he is, didn't look anything remotely like an elite QB against the Jets. As for the idea of the Bills using an early pick on a DB: the problem there is twofold. One is that over the last decade, there have been three times when the Bills' DB with the best combination of youth and proven accomplishment has been allowed to leave in free agency in the prime of his career. (Winfield, Clements, and Greer, with Whitner having one foot out the door.) Using a first round pick on a DB would be an exercise in futility if the plan is to let him go first contract and out. The second potential objection is that if you have a Darrell Revis as one of your DBs and a bunch of mediocre DBs everywhere else, the QB will simply ignore whichever receiver is being covered by your Revis. If your goal is to add (for example) 1.5 seconds to the amount of time the other team's receivers stay covered, you're going to need to do a lot more than draft just one guy. The strategy of drafting a slew of DBs to increase average coverage duration is difficult to pursue for a team like the Bills because there are so many holes across the board. Conversely, if the other team normally has 5 seconds to throw, and you want to reduce that to 3.5 seconds, the addition of just one elite defensive lineman--such as a Bruce Smith--will go a very long way toward achieving that.

There are four teams still alive in the playoffs: the Steelers, Jets, Bears, and Packers. Of those four teams, the Steelers, Jets and Packers have starting quarterbacks they drafted in the first round. The Bears' starting QB was also drafted in the first round, albeit by the Broncos. Nor was Jay Cutler's time with the Broncos considered a disappointment, as demonstrated by the king's ransom the Bears traded away to acquire him. With the exception of Sanchez, all of the quarterbacks in question have equalled or exceeded their draft positions. Even Sanchez had a big day against the Patriots' defense; and without that big day from him the Jets would not have won. As for Peyton Manning: his career average is 7.6 yards per pass attempt. This past season he averaged 6.9 yards per attempt. He was drafted back in 1998, and is no longer in his prime. As for Drew Brees: he led his offense to over 40 points against the Seahawks. Normally you'd think that having your offense score 40 points would be an extremely useful part of your overall effort to win a football game. Unfortunately for the Saints, Greggggggggg and the Saints' defense weren't able to do enough to win the game even with their offense doing all that. The Brees example doesn't illustrate the uselessness of a franchise QB, because 40 points is obviously a lot better than, say, 10 or 20 points. But you can't just have an offense and no defense and expect to win the Super Bowl. Flacco and the Ravens were eliminated by a Roethlisberger-quarterbacked team, and Ryan and the Falcons were eliminated by a Rodgers-quarterbacked team. Those games don't illustrate that franchise QBs have become superfluous, any more than the victory of a team with Bruce Smith over one with Reggie White (or vice versa) would illustrate the lack of importance of RDEs. (As an aside, I'm not saying that any of those quarterbacks are as good at their positions as Smith or White were at theirs.)

It would be very arrogant, foolish, and wrong for me to try to speak for Ozymandius. But I won't let that stop me! Only one team wins the Super Bowl each year, which means there's a 1/32 chance of doing so. Winning a Super Bowl is a lot like coming in first in a race. Coming in first may well require a completely different approach than would merely running a solid race. You can get from bottom-dweller to being the tenth-best team in the league with a quarterback who's merely solid. Having the tenth-best team in the league is a lot like running that "solid race" I described. But it's extremely difficult to go from tenth-best to first unless you have a franchise quarterback. Look at the Ravens of 2000. All four of their defensive linemen were guys that were good enough to deserve to be double-teamed. (Though obviously, not all four could be.) Playing behind them was a top-tier LB corps led by Ray Lewis. Every LB on that corps played at or near the Pro Bowl level. At CB they had a pair of former first round picks, each of whom had turned into a shut-down corner. They had guys like Ed Reed at safety. On offense they had Jon Ogden at LT, who was close to being a Hall of Fame level player when he played. They had a very solid overall OL. They had Jamal Lewis and his pounding running attack. (Lewis would later rush for 2000 yards in a season.) Despite having achieved all that, that Ravens group won just one Super Bowl. Conversely, a team with much less overall talent at the non-QB positions--such as the Patriots of the 2000s--was able to come away with three Super Bowl wins and a Super Bowl appearance. That's the difference having a franchise quarterback makes. The Ravens of 2000 also illustrate how hard it is to overcome the lack of a franchise QB if you want a Super Bowl win. However, opportunities to draft franchise QBs are rare. Opportunities to draft QBs of Luck's caliber are especially so. There aren't that many franchise-level QBs in the league today, and many of the ones who are have been in the league a while (Brees, Brady, Peyton Manning). Put another way, the pace at which franchise quarterbacks have entered the league has been slow: no more than one a year, and very probably less. Luck is next year's franchise quarterback. Maybe next year will be a good year and there will be more than one franchise quarterback. But even if that's the case, it's not certain that the Bills will be able to successfully identify him. Or will be in a position to draft him if they do. Most teams in the league currently don't have franchise-level quarterbacks. That's another way of saying that if you follow a standard-issue approach, odds are against you getting a franchise QB. Having a franchise quarterback is the exception. To get one, you must do something exceptional. You can get exceptionally lucky (as the Patriots did when they took Brady) or you can have an exceptionally good draft pick (such as the Colts had when they took Manning). I prefer to avoid placing too much emphasis on luck (no pun intended). Having a franchise quarterback is critical to a team's ability to win the Super Bowl. Every other hole on this team is much easier to fill than a franchise QB. Also you can win a Super Bowl with a LT who's merely above-average, as the Patriots showed with Matt Light. Similarly, you can get away with being average or above-average at most other key positions. But it's almost impossible to win the Super Bowl without obtaining very good play from your quarterback position.

I like this plan! You're clearly thinking outside the box, and in an intelligent way. One minor detail: I'd suggest that the Bills not trade away Moats. If you draft a guy say, 15th overall, sit him on the bench for the year, and then try to trade him away the next year, you're not going to get the 15th overall pick. Other teams will assume you're trading him away for a reason, and will give you a lot less than 15th overall for him. (You'd probably be lucky to get a third round pick.) I'll grant that Moats wasn't a first round pick in the first place, so the above doesn't directly apply to him. But he's a young guy who has only begun the process of proving himself on the field. From the perspective of the other teams in the league, he's much less of a known quantity than, say, Kyle Williams. This means that if the Bills trade him, other teams will assume that he's close to having hit his ceiling. (If he hadn't, why would the Bills trade him away?) Since Moats very probably hasn't hit his ceiling, he'll probably be worth a lot more in a trade a few years from now--once he's proven a lot more--than he's worth today. But I fully agree that there needs to be a reduction in the available talent on defense if the Bills are to maximize their chances of drafting Luck. Trading away Kyle Williams would be an excellent start to that talent reduction: a player like that should be worth plenty in a trade. After that, I'd suggest evaluating the players on defense to determine which ones will be too old to be solid starters two or three years from now. Anyone like that should be released after this season if we're implementing your plan. Players like that are typically worth little or nothing in a trade, and that's okay. There are enough players in that category to make a much more dramatic difference on the 2011 defense than the loss of Moats alone would represent.

You could well be right about this! Any quarterback taken after the first round is going to represent a significant amount of risk. But if you're going to take that risk, better it be on a guy whose arm recently had surgery than on someone who never showed he could be a good pocket passer. Losman represented the latter kind of risk, and look how he turned out! I'd be fully on board with using the Bills' second round pick on Ponder. Then he could be left on the bench his rookie year while he learns the offense and while Fitz takes all the snaps.

I did not mean to suggest that Yards Per Attempt was the only stat we should be examining. And I think you raised an excellent point about how Fitz made the OL look better than it was, how he ran for first downs, and threw TDs. Those things are important; as is the fact that he was apparently the 9th best at converting third downs into first downs. His play during the 2010 season was at a higher level than I thought he could achieve. But he still struggled with accuracy; and that showed up in his yards per attempt stat. Seldom if ever will a quarterback correct significant accuracy problems after he's been in the league as long as Fitz has. I have no doubt that Fitz works very hard in practice; so if his lack of accuracy could have been solved by hard work, it would have been. What we're looking at is a guy who's much more than the backup quarterback we all thought we were getting when the Bills signed him, but much less than a QB in the Brees/Rodgers category. Edit: I agree with AlphaDawg's analysis of the KC game. I realize that some potential interceptions get dropped. But for a defense to drop three very easy interceptions in the same game seems a bit much. Add to that the incompletions that resulted from some of Fitz's other inaccurate throws, and you have a performance well below what you'd expect from a long-term answer at quarterback.

I agree with your first sentence more than your second. If you want to use a second round pick on a somewhat risky quarterback, why not go after a guy who's known more for being a pocket passer than for being athletic? Very few franchise QBs get drafted after the first round. Of the good, non-first round QBs still in the league, the ones that come to mind are Drew Brees, Tom Brady, and Matt Schaub. (Maybe there are one or two others I'm forgetting.) None of those guys are particularly mobile or athletic. The fact these players were drafted at all was because of what they'd shown as pocket passers, not because of their athletic gifts. Obviously, very few quarterbacks taken outside the first round reach the level of Brady or Brees--or even Schaub for that matter. But if you feel like using a non-first rounder on a quarterback to give yourself at least a chance of getting one of those success stories, why not go after a pocket passer QB rather than an "athletic gifts QB"? Christian Ponder might still be around when the Bills' second round pick comes up. He's a guy who's shown good accuracy in the pocket; as well as the other traits you'd hope to see from a pocket passing QB. While any QB taken outside the first round is a lot more likely to turn into a career backup than into a franchise QB, Ponder has as good a chance as any non-first rounder to become the next Drew Brees story.

I'll address your bolded comment. I realize you made the above comparison to show why you think completion percentage (and perhaps to a lesser degree yards per attempt) are not all-critical stats when determining a QB's performance. But the above-mentioned numbers could be seen in a different light. Did Edwards in 2008 have a better offensive coordinator than Fitz did this year? No. Gailey is clearly better than any coordinator Edwards ever had (except for his first two games this season). Was Edwards' receiving corps better? No: Fitz has Stevie Johnson, Lee Evans, Nelson, etc. Edwards had Lee Evans and Josh Reed. What about offensive lines? There were a lot of games in 2008 where the OL would fail to pass protect much in the first half, do a so-so job in the third quarter, and come alive in the fourth quarter. That improvement in pass protection was why the Bills had the late game comebacks they did. There were times in 2010 when the Bills' OL played reasonably respectably--except at RT of course. While I'll grant that the 2008 line was probably better overall, and certainly more complete, the difference wasn't enough to offset the 2010 Bills' advantage in receiving corps and offensive coaching staff. So why was Edwards able to attain 7.2 yards per attempt in 2008 while Fitz this season only had a yards per attempt of 6.8? Part of the answer is that 2008 was a good year for Edwards and he played above his usual level. Edwards' career average is 6.5 yards per attempt. But Edwards playing better than usual in 2008 is only part of the reason for Fitz's failure to equal his yards per attempt stat from that year. A quarterback can always inflate his completion percentage by dumping the ball off. Conversely, there's very little he can do to inflate his yards per attempt stat. One of the things he can do is pile up lots of yards in garbage time. But the evidence AlphaDawg presented suggests that Fitz did a significant amount of stat-inflating in garbage time himself during 2010. So we shouldn't be quick to assume that Edwards did more (or even an equal amount of) stat-inflating through garbage time in 2008. Another way of inflating the yards per attempt stat is by doing things that might work for a few games--or even an entire season--but that will stop working once defenses catch onto them. For example, Losman's average yards per attempt stat from 2006 looked pretty good in large part because of all the long bombs he threw to Lee Evans. But then defenses figured out that when you defend against Losman, the first thing you do is take away the long bomb. After that realization sunk in, defenses changed, and Losman's yards per attempt stat plummeted for the 2007 season. It's worth noting here that the New England defense did a much better job against Fitz the second time it faced him in 2010 than it had during the first time. More generally, Fitz's good games seemed to come in the first half of the season; while the second half seemed to contain mostly mediocre or disappointing performances. We'll see how Fitz does next season. But in the meantime, I suggest a strong level of caution about accepting the proposition that Fitz's successes early in 2010 represent something sustainable. What we're left with is the realization that, in the all-important yards-per-attempt stat, Fitzpatrick of 2010 did less well than Edwards in 2008. Nor is there an easy way to explain away that statistical difference. No obvious explanation as to why Edwards' YPA overstates the quality of his play in 2008 or why Fitz's YPA understates his level of play in 2010. That should be an extremely disconcerting realization to any Bills fan who sees Fitz as the long-term answer at quarterback. The reason for the above is a simple, if potentially unwelcome truth. Fitz is not an accurate quarterback. More specifically, he can be very accurate some of the time, but his accuracy is very far from consistent. Fans may be willing to forgive or overlook the drives that stalled because of those inaccurate passes, and the opportunities the Bills missed. But these things show up in the yards per attempt stat.

As a high school quarterback, Joe Montana was notable for being very accurate. That high level of accuracy carried over into college; and was part of the reason why the 49ers were willing to use a third round pick on him even though he lacked the arm strength Bill Walsh craved. If a quarterback doesn't show you an exceptional level of accuracy in college, he's very unlikely to do so in the pros. Fitz's lack of accuracy is one of the reasons why he was an afterthought in the draft. That lack of accuracy is why, when he became a free agent a few years back, he was generally regarded as a backup quarterback. There are a lot of things to like about Fitz's game. He makes great decisions and makes them quickly. He can read defenses, audible out of the wrong play and into the right play, look off safeties, sense and avoid pressure, play through injuries, and show great leadership and on-field generalship. Those are all traits you love to see in your quarterback, and Fitz has them. What he does not have is the ability to throw the ball with consistent accuracy. There were a number of times this past season when his lack of accuracy went unpunished. When a Bills' WR would catch a badly thrown pass. When a defender would drop a potential INT that had been thrown right to him. Even when Fitz's lack of consistent accuracy was punished, he'd often do something else later in the game to make you forget about it. Something exciting and impressive. Unfortunately for the Bills and for Fitzpatrick, consistent accuracy is an absolutely critical part of being a top-tier quarterback. Consider the effect that lack of accuracy has on the offense. Normally, an NFL offense will keep moving the chains until something goes wrong. Maybe that something is a missed block resulting in a sack. Or some running plays that got stuffed at the line of scrimmage. Or a holding penalty followed by a subsequent failure to reclaim the lost yards. Or a dropped pass on third down. Or excessive pass pressure when everyone is covered. There are lots of things that can go wrong on drives to make them stall. Having a quarterback who throws a lot of inaccurate passes creates one more thing to go wrong on drives. One more reason for them to turn into punts, or at best field goals, instead of touchdowns. To a large degree, Fitz compensated for his lack of accuracy by being very good at the other things I mentioned. But there are hard limits to the extent to which that weakness can be masked, and Fitz may already have reached them. Fitz's decision-making, leadership, etc., are already so good that his future ceiling is likely to be dictated strictly by his ability to throw accurately. Unfortunately, quarterbacks who haven't demonstrated consistent accuracy after five years in the NFL typically never display consistent accuracy. That means that for all Fitz's virtues (and there are many) the Bills will be at a significant disadvantage when facing someone like Brees, Rodgers, Brady, or Manning. That problem will only be solved if or when the Bills acquire a franchise QB.

I'd love the idea of trading up for Luck--even at a very high price. I can't think of a single example in NFL history where a team has said to itself, "We found our franchise quarterback for the next 10+ years. But the price we paid to get him was too high." Just as it would have been a serious mistake for the Colts to have traded away the Peyton Manning pick--even if they'd been given a king's ransom in return--so too it makes sense to trade into a Peyton Manning-style pick, even if you have to pay a king's ransom to do it. At this point, I'd like it if the Bills could acquire additional first round picks in next year's draft. They could offer deals along the following lines: "We'll trade you the third overall pick this year for your first round pick this year and your first rounder next year." At least according to the NFL value chart, the third overall pick is worth 3200 points, and the 32nd overall pick is worth 590. A pick a year from now is considered to be worth one round less than a pick today. (A 2nd rounder next year is worth a third rounder this year, for example.) So at least in theory, that highly valuable third overall pick could be converted into a number of first round picks in next year's draft. Whether there are willing trade partners is of course another matter. If I'm Buddy Nix, my goal would be to acquire as many first rounders in next year's draft as possible. Especially from teams I suspect will have lousy records in 2011. That way when Luck does enter the draft, I've maximized my odds of being able to take him. Even if I don't have the first overall pick, having multiple picks in the first round could make me a viable trade partner with some other team looking to trade down. Unfortunately, the above-described, outside-the-box thinking is not something we're used to seeing from One Bills Drive. Normally they're conventional and boring. When they're not those things, it normally means they're doing something stupid. (Such as reaching for a player, or addressing a position they should be ignoring.) Seldom if ever do you see the Bills' front office show a Belichick-like willingness to throw conventional thinking out the window as part of their effort to pursue a larger, well thought-out strategy.

Thanks for putting this list together. I don't claim to be ultra-familiar with the Eagles roster of the early 2000s, but very few of those names seem like success stories to me. The only one that really jumped out at me is Donovan McNabb. His career yards per attempt is 6.9--which is fairly solid, but doesn't suggest elite play. It's also worth noting that Mike Ditka had tried to trade up with the Eagles so he could take Ricky Williams; and that the Eagles refused. Ditka offered a king's ransom to move up a few slots. But the Eagles were in love with McNabb, and hence turned Ditka down. I think the argument could easily be made that the Eagles could have gotten more out of the Ditka/Ricky Williams deal than they would have had by staying put and taking McNabb. Then again, for the Ricky Williams deal to have been successful, the Eagles would have had to have been able to turn their extra draft picks into good players. It's not necessarily clear Modrak could do that.

A strong case has been made that Modrak is largely responsible for the Bills' poor drafting over the last ten years. If I was Buddy Nix, I'd want to review Modrak's player grades over the last ten years, just to see with my own eyes the grades Modrak had given to players like Maybin, Hardy, Losman, Mike Williams, McCargo, etc. But assuming he was reasonably on-board with those and the other major busts of the last decade, I'd let him go. I agree that it's fairly probable he was on board with those guys, but I don't think it's something that can be known for certain without looking at his player grades.

I specifically do take issue with the positions the Bills draft!! Since 2001, the Bills have done the following: Used three first round picks and a second round pick on RBs. Used another three first round picks on DBs. Have drafted just one QB in the first round. Have drafted zero LTs and just one RT in the first round; and no OTs in the second round. Have drafted no DEs in the first round. (I consider Maybin an OLB.) Have drafted just one DT or NT in the first round, and only one in the second. Suppose a man was to walk up to the owner of an NFL team, put his arm around the owner's shoulder, and begin talking about his ten year plan for that owner's team. "I see today that your team has no quarterback," the man would say. "At the end of this ten year plan it still won't have one. But during those ten years I'll use three first round picks and a second rounder on running backs!!! :w00t: Plus I'll use three first rounders on DBs, even though the other part of my plan is to allow whichever of my DBs have the best combination of youth + proven accomplishment to leave via free agency when their rookie contracts expire. I don't see the sense in using first or second round picks on OTs--even though this team doesn't have any good OTs--because those picks could better be used on running backs!! " If a plan such as the above looks like a bad idea in hindsight--as well it should--then it ought to have seemed like a bad idea at the time as well. There were many on this list who argued against the above-described mistakes as they were being made. Those people were right, those mistakes were avoidable, and they would have been avoided by better, more mentally self-disciplined front office personnel. I consider the OT positions both more important, and harder-to-fill, than interior OL positions (especially OG). So the fact that the Bills used a first and second rounder on a pair of OGs does not make up for their neglect of the OT positions--especially not when the earlier of those two picks was obtained by trading away the best player on the Bills' OL in the first place!

I'll address your bolded comment. Yes, there are those who evaluate QBs based on "their" number of wins--as though quarterbacks were the only players whose efforts contributed to winning or losing. There are those who claim that an elite QB can mask nearly every other form of offensive deficiency. A bad OL won't matter much because the elite QB will throw the ball quickly. A bad running game won't be a big deal because the passing game will take pressure off the running attack. The quality of the receiving corps isn't a big deal because an elite QB can get by with mediocre WRs. Even the defense need merely be decent, because this elite QB will lead the team to a ton of points and will help keep that defense off the field. Frankly, I don't agree with the above-described mentality. The quality of a team's offensive line, defense, and receiving corps strongly influence the outcomes of games. An offense will be shut down if the offensive line fails badly enough. At that point, it won't matter how good the QB is or isn't. But when the offensive line holds up in pass protection, when the receivers run the routes they're supposed to run and catch the passes they're supposed to catch, when the play-calling is reasonably solid, the difference between an average QB and an elite QB is impressive. A comparison of the Cardinals' offense with Warner versus that offense without him dramatically illustrates this. But even with Warner, the Cardinals were never able to get a Super Bowl win due to weakness on their offensive line and on their defense. The problem the Bills face is that QBs with Warner-like ability are very rare; and that Fitz is not among them. Even if the Bills were to acquire a franchise QB, they would still need to upgrade several other positions on the offense before that offense is where it needs to be. They have to hope Bell gets physically stronger, that they can find a RT, and that they can get a good OG to let Wood permanently move to center. A good pass-catching TE would also be a key addition. But of all the Bills' needs on either side of the ball, a franchise QB is by far the hardest to fill. I strongly disagree with those who think that if the Bills had the choice between a franchise QB and a good player at some other position, they should choose the latter. Opportunities to acquire franchise QBs are very rare, and it's generally a serious mistake to assume that if you pass up such an opportunity today, you'll be given a similar one tomorrow. Take the Dolphins for example. They could have chosen Matt Ryan, but went in a different direction instead. Because of that decision, they've been suffering QB-related problems ever since Pennington got replaced. Those QB-related problems have dramatically impacted the Dolphins' record. Nor is there any currently visible, workable plan to fix those problems at QB, or to allow that team to escape the mediocrity that Henne at QB imposes. The Bills should avoid walking into a similar trap.

My own take on the guys in question: Maybin. Clearly a bust, but as you point out it's not certain that Modrak deserves the blame for that bust. Lynch. Any time you draft a player 12th overall, and trade him away a few years later for a fourth round pick, that player has to be considered a bust. Even if the Bills could have gotten a third rounder from New Orleans--as some are now claiming--the fact is that Lynch performed well below the expectations you'd associate with 12th overall. The decision to go with a RB in the first place was also extremely questionable. RBs have very short careers, so all else being equal you're generally better off drafting a player at some other, longer duration position. Plus the Bills still had McGahee back when Lynch was drafted, and it's not as though Lynch provided a huge upgrade over what McGahee would have done. Certainly not enough of an upgrade to even come remotely close to justifying a first round pick; let alone the 12th overall choice. The Lynch pick was a clear-cut failure: the only question is which people were most responsible for that failure. Trent Edwards. QBs drafted in the third round don't normally turn into long-term answers at starter, and Trent Edwards was no exception to that. If a third round QB is a solid backup, that's good enough for the pick to be considered reasonably successful. Whether Edwards belongs in the solid backup category is, of course, open to debate. John McCargo: bust. James Hardy: bust. Chris Ellis: appears to be a bust. But like you, I have a hard time for faulting the front office on this pick. Third rounders are less likely to work out than are earlier picks. I agree that the front office should be credited with finding Johnson and Bell in the seventh round of that same draft.

My understanding was that, going into the 2006 draft, the two positions Marv and Jauron were most interested in addressing were SS and DT. They felt they could get a better combination of players if they went SS first and then DT, as opposed to the other way around. The fact that McCargo turned out to be a bust, and Whitner has come nowhere near living up to his draft position, illustrates the flaw with this general approach. To address your point, the Bills failed to get an elite player with their 8th overall pick in part because they went into the draft with a mentality which predisposed them to reach for perceived need. The failure of the Whitner and McCargo picks--the failure of Marv's early picks in general--illustrates the weakness of reaching for need as a strategy. Besides that, the Bills had a ton of holes after the end of their 2005 season, so a blinkered focus on just two positions was far harder to justify than would have been the case for a team with only a few holes. There are other problems with picking DBs early. One is that there have been three separate times over the last decade when the Bills DB with the best combination of youth + proven accomplishment has left via free agency, with no compensation. The first was Antoine Winfield after 2003. The Bills received just five years of his career; whereas the Vikings have (thus far) gotten seven years of his play. The next to leave was Nate Clements, which he did after the 2006 season. The third to go was Jabari Greer; who left after the 2008 season. Like Winfield, he provided the Bills with five seasons of play before moving elsewhere. Now it appears the next player out the door will be Whitner. As little as I liked (or like) the Whitner pick at 8th overall, I must admit that Whitner is currently the Bills' DB with the best combination of youth + proven accomplishment. McGee is too old (and isn't that great anyway), McKelvin is too young and has proven too little. Over the last decade, the Bills' front office has acted like good DBs are pure gold on draft day; but seems to view them as a dime a dozen once it's time to renew their rookie contracts. The front office's split personality WRT defensive backs has caused the Bills to squander an inordinate amount of early picks on DBs, while neglecting other positions. Another factor worth considering is that if your offensive line is bad enough, your entire offense is almost guaranteed to fail. The quarterback won't be able to throw because he'll always be on his back, and your running backs won't be able to produce because someone will always be there to meet them in the backfield. Conditions such as those make it hard to evaluate your talent on offense. Such conditions can also ruin a quarterback, for example with concussions. That's one of the reasons why I feel that a team which lacks both OL and DBs should try to get the OL first if possible. Needless to say, I strongly disagreed with the draft day priorities Marv and Jauron had decided upon going into the 2006 draft. (Not to mention the 2007 draft, but that's another story.)

This is an excellent post; and I agree with it. I'd like to draw attention to the point you raised about Fitz's interceptions--a point which, to me, is at least as good as the one you raised about completion percentage. For those who for whatever reason don't like the idea of using completion percentage, I'll add in yards per attempt. Yards per attempt is, for quarterbacks, analogous to yards per carry for running backs. Trent Edwards' career yards per attempt is 6.5. Ryan Fitzpatrick's average is 6.0; but he increased it to 6.8 this past season. Tom Brady's average is 7.4, Drew Brees' average is 7.3, Peyton Manning's is 7.6, and Aaron Rodgers' is 7.9. Ryan Fitzpatrick is obviously not in that category, as you can also tell from the eyeball test; as well as the number of inaccurate passes he still throws.

If Luck doesn't declare, trading down to the Lions' spot and getting their first round pick in next year's draft makes a lot of sense. The Patriots shouldn't be the only team with multiple first round picks.

You seem to be defining a luxury pick as a player who won't start his rookie year. My definition is different: I think a pick is a luxury pick iff it's at a position where the Bills are already strong. (The Spiller pick comes to mind.) If you wanted to argue for an expanded definition of "luxury pick," you could include reaches such as Donte Whitner. You could even include luxuriously replacing good players in the primes of their careers. For example, the Bills drafted McKelvin as a replacement for Greer, instead of just giving Greer an extension. You could argue that the best Bills' DBs generally go first-contract-and-out, so any first round pick on a DB should be considered a luxury pick. But if the Bills don't have a franchise QB--which they don't--and if there's a franchise QB waiting for them at 3rd overall, drafting that QB would be the very opposite of a luxury pick. QB is the single most important position on the field; and the position where elite play produces the greatest impact in comparison with merely solid play.

He had a point even about Chad Pennington. There's a tendency among fans to over-value arm strength (which Pennington clearly lacked), and undervalue accuracy and decision-making (areas in which Pennington excelled). The single most important reason why the Dolphins have regressed since their division championship is that Henne hasn't provided the same level of QB play that Pennington did in 2008. I don't like using wins to evaluate quarterbacks, because doing so makes Trent Dilfer of the Ravens (15-1) seem like a better quarterback than Joe Montana. Nor am I a big fan of the completion percentage stat; which a quarterback can always inflate by dumping the ball off. Trent Edwards has a career completion percentage of 60.5, as compared to 60.1 for Jim Kelly. Average yards per attempt is almost impossible to inflate, which is why Jim Kelly's career average in that area is so much higher than Trent Edwards' or Ryan Fitzpatrick's. Fitz has good decision-making, but lacks good accuracy. I strongly agree with Alphadawg when he wrote that, "[Fitz's] accuracy is a definite issue and he is well below where a succesful starting NFL QB needs to be in TODAYS NFL."

In my eyes, one of the most critical numbers for quarterbacks is his average yards per attempt stat. It's analogous to the yards per carry stat for running backs. Trent Edwards has averaged 6.5 yards per attempt over the course of his career. Ryan Fitzpatrick's career average is 6.0 yards per attempt. This past season Fitz improved considerably, averaging 6.8 yards per attempt. I think we can all agree that Fitz's play this season was considerably better than we've come to expect from Edwards; and that difference shows up in the fact that Fitz's season was 0.3 yards per attempt better than Edwards' career average. Over the course of his career, Jim Kelly averaged 7.4 yards per attempt.

The question is not whether Fitz is or isn't a reasonably good starter. I think most of us can agree he is that. The real question is whether he's a franchise QB. As far as I'm concerned, he's shown that he isn't that, and won't become that. As you pointed out, he's a good leader, makes good, quick decisions, has good pocket awareness, and is a good on-field general. No one (I think) is questioning any of that. But there's one thing that franchise QBs have that Fitz lacks, and that's the ability to consistently throw the ball accurately. If Fitz hasn't learned that after this many years in the league, I strongly doubt he's going to learn it, period. Joe Montana was remarkably accurate even as a high school QB, let alone a college QB. There's a reason why Fitz wasn't picked until late in the draft, and why when he became a free agent no one saw him as a starter. There's a reason why Fitz' average yards per attempt for 2010 was 6.8--only slightly higher than Trent Edwards' career average of 6.5 yards per attempt. I'd argue that the offensive line Fitz had in 2010 was actually slightly better than the line that protected Trent. I'd also argue that Fitz in 2010 had the better receiving corps, and a much better offensive coaching staff, than Trent Edwards ever had. Yes, Fitz is a good quarterback in all the areas you mentioned--a far better quarterback in those areas than Trent Edwards, for that matter. But you can be the most pocket-aware guy in the world, and make exactly the right decision, but if you follow those things up with an inaccurate throw, it's going to be an incomplete pass or an opportunity for the defense to make an interception. Over the course of the season, the defenses Fitz faced dropped a significant number of potential interceptions. A lot of fans took a, "no harm, no foul" attitude towards those. The problem is that sooner or later you're going to face defenses that won't drop potential interceptions; as the Bills found the second time they faced the Patriots. The Patriots defense simply exposed a weakness that had been there all along. Yes, Fitz is a better quarterback than Trent Edwards, Tyler Thigpen, or Jay Fiedler. But his accuracy isn't nearly as good as the elite quarterbacks in the league. Any time a Fitz-led team faces a Manning- or Brady-led team, the former is going to be at a significant disadvantage. That's why it makes so much sense for the Bills to take Luck, even if it means trading up in the draft to do so.

As little as I like doing so, I have to agree with the overall sentiment you've expressed above. Prior to the start of the season, I felt that the Bills should either have The Guy at quarterback, or they should have nothing at the position. The worst that could happen is to have a player who's "sort of" the answer at quarterback. A "sort of" answer would cost the team draft position, would prevent the front office from trying to find The Guy, and would overall hinder the rebuilding process. Unless your defense is as good as the Ravens of 2000 defense, you're not going to win the Super Bowl with a "sort of" player at quarterback. The problem with Fitz is that he's not good enough to be The Guy, and yet he's significantly better than a nothing quarterback like Trent Edwards. If the Bills had stuck with Edwards over the course of the season, the need to add a quarterback with a first round pick would have been glaringly obvious. Also, the Bills would likely have the draft position required to take Andrew Luck. (An Edwards-led team would have lost more games than a Fitz-led team.) The Bills would have taken their lumps for a year, and then would have moved forward with Luck. That would have been perfectly fine. Fitz makes great decisions, is an excellent on-field general, has great toughness and great leadership, and is very passionate about the game. Unfortunately, he's not a consistently accurate passer. He got away with some inaccurate throws against Miami's defense (they're the best in the league at dropping potential interceptions), but was exposed against New England. The flaws he displayed in the Patriots game were there all along--but that game is when they really bit the Bills. As to the argument that Fitz can still improve--I don't think he will. He's been in the league a while now. If he had the potential to become a consistently accurate passer, you'd think he would have become that by now. Fitz is not good enough to be The Guy, but he's a lot better than a nothing quarterback like Trent Edwards. Over the long run, that's very bad for the Bills' chances of winning the Super Bowl.

I agree with the above. Unfortunately, Bill made a good point about the Spiller pick--which looks very questionable at the moment. Hopefully that was an aberration rather than part of a pattern. I get to spend the next few months being excited by what the Bills could do with their very early pick. Hopefully that sense of excitement won't disappear on draft day.

I wasn't trying to claim that a Peyton Manning or a Bruce Smith could win a game by himself. That would obviously be absurd: Bruce Smith usually averaged less than one sack per game, and the greatest quarterback ever can't win games by himself if his receivers constantly drop passes or the OL fails to pass protect. My point was that Bill Polian can do more with a top-5 pick (Bruce Smith, Peyton Manning, Edgerrin James, Kerry Collins) than with a pick lower in the first round. Which is true. As for the Patriots: it's a myth that they always pick in the 20s every year. They find ways to get earlier picks without losing games. For example, one year the Patriots traded away their first round pick, straight-up, for San Francisco's first round pick in the next draft. The theory was that the 49ers' future first rounder would likely be early in the draft. Another year they had two picks later in the first round; both of which they traded away to get a top-10 pick. Another year they traded Bledsoe away for a first round pick from the Bills. (It turned out to be a pretty good first rounder at that.) They also traded away a defensive lineman to the Raiders for a first rounder, a WR to the Seahawks for a first rounder, and Matt Cassell to the Chiefs for a first or second rounder (I don't remember which). That is why they keep beating us. (Plus Belichick and Brady, of course.) Not to mention the fact that the Bills typically squander their first rounders on RBs and DBs who go first-contract-and-out; whereas the Patriots use their first rounders on bona fide good players.