Orton's Arm

Suppose you were building a new house. While you're in the process of building it, you're living in a cardboard box that's on-site. But that box gets cold at night, and it leaks when it rains. After a while you get tired of the cardboard box, and slap together a temporary dwelling made of some 2x4s and plywood. Now you're better off in the short-term, because the plywood thing you built is warmer and it doesn't leak. But that small plywood whatever does not represent progress toward building your house. On the contrary: the building materials and labor expended in its construction represented a setback in the construction of that house. In the first preseason game, Trent Edwards played like a leaky cardboard box. Quite possibly, Tyler Thigpen could play like a temporary shelter slapped together from 2x4s and plywood. But I'm going to go out on a limb here and suggest that neither player is the long-term answer at QB. Suppose the Bills acquire Thigpen, and suppose he plays well enough to lead the Bills to a few more wins than they otherwise would have achieved. Those wins would hurt us in the draft, and weaken our ability to draft whichever QB Nix thinks is most likely to fill the void created by Kelly's retirement. Getting that QB represents real progress towards building the house. In the meantime, we should simply grin and bear the leaky cardboard box.

The Bills did address the offensive line last offseason, with a first round pick (Wood) and a second round pick (Levitre). Granted, those guys are interior linemen, when what the line really needs is a LT, C, and RT. Wood could turn into that center, but the holes at the tackle positions remain, and have not been adequately addressed. But your overall point still stands. The Bills need a QB, and they need offensive linemen at the most challenging and difficult to fill positions. If the Bills come away from the 2011 draft with nothing else, I hope they at least find a first-rate QB and a very solid LT. That's not too much to ask, is it?

Point taken. WIth Brohm third on the depth chart, I think the odds of his overtaking Edwards as the starter are relatively slim at this point. (That said, I'm still a little intrigued by the idea of seeing what Brohm can do.) I don't really see Gailey going into the season with Fitzpatrick as his starter. So I see the odds being heavily in favor of Edwards getting the starting nod, but you're right: that's not yet set in stone.

Good point. The OP clearly indicated that the Bills offense will attempt to model itself as a West Coast-style offense where the receivers run good, crisp routes, the QB hits them in stride, and the ball is thrown very quickly after the snap. He never said that Edwards would do as good a job of that as Montana would have done. It's difficult to hit a moving target like a WR in perfect stride, and it remains to be seen how good a job Edwards will be able to do with that. But I suspect it's something they'll spend a lot of time on in practice, if that's the style of offense they're aiming for.

thanks

Not only did I read the piece, I downloaded the spreadsheet. Before I go any further, I want to refresh people's memory about the three criteria he used: Criterion 1: Whether the player was a starter after three years. Criterion 2: Whether the player was a starter in the last year of his rookie contract Criterion 3: Whether the player was in the top 30% at his position. If you look at the sheet for 2006, you will see that Whitner was considered a bust by criteria 1 and 3, while criterion 2 was NA. (Criterion 2 was NA for all the first rounders drafted that year, as they're not yet at the end of their rookie contracts.) That demonstrates that the 30% rule does apply, even if the player hasn't yet reached the end of his rookie contract. Open the spreadsheet yourself if you don't believe me. As for whether the 30% rules applies to just starters at a given position, or all the players at a position: barring any statements to the contrary, it is reasonable to believe the former. Lee Evans was considered a bust based on criterion 3. While Evans might not be in the top 30% among starting WRs, it's absurd to suggest that he isn't in the top 30% among all WRs (starters and backups lumped together). The only way Evans fails criterion 3 is if he's looking just at starters.

I'll address your bolded statement. Take a sport like professional hockey, where almost all the players are white. Please describe how--other than the race of the players--the NHL's business arrangements are significantly different than those of the NFL. In both cases, you have players getting paid millions to play a sport they love. Both sports are violent, and involve a significant risk of injury. Do you feel that that arrangement exploits the predominately black NFL players, but does not exploit the predominately white NHL players? If so, please explain why. Do you feel both groups are being exploited equally? If so, why bring up race at all? Or do you feel neither group is being exploited? The bottom line is that every time costs go up, the owners have to figure out a way to squeeze more money out of the fans. Take a guy like Jerry Jones. His cost structure is far too high, which has created some financial uncertainty for the Cowboys. To make up for that, he's been messing around with concepts like the idea of selling tickets which will let you into the stadium, but which don't actually give you a seat. (There are places you can stand, and watch the game either directly or on a video screen.) Maybe there's some merit to that idea, but the end goal is to milk NFL fans--that means people like you--for more money. Those tickets seemed pretty overpriced to me, considering you're not getting a seat. Or take the television situation. The NFL overcharged the TV networks for broadcasting rights. To help make up for some of that, the networks seem to be bombarding us with an awful lot of advertising. The bottom line is that greed--whether from the owners or from the players--hurts the sport. Revis wanting to get paid eight digits a year is his greed, and the fans should be disgusted with that. The owners wanting to overcharge for tickets or concessions, or television broadcasters wanting to subject us to too many ads, is their greed. That should be resisted as well. But any time someone tries to make the cost structure more reasonable--in this case, by resisting unreasonable salary demands--that effort should be welcomed. Only with a reasonable cost structure will the NFL not be forced to gouge the fans. Don't forget who ultimately pays for the $12 million+ a year salary Revis is demanding. That someone is you. You pay for it either directly, by buying tickets, or indirectly, by being subjected to an unending stream of commercials for beer, pickup trucks, and SUVs. The fans don't owe Revis that kind of money.

Good points about Washington, and about the violence of the sport. But that said, there are plenty of jobs which exist on an at-will basis: meaning they can end any time the employer or employee wants them to end. No cause need be given. The percentage of total revenues that's been allocated to players has been going up. Also, the definition of revenues that get included into the salary cap has been getting broader as well. If Jerry Jones manages to make a deal with some Texas company--a deal which helps the Cowboys alone--that deal will cause an increase in the salary cap. (Even though the other 31 teams aren't seeing a penny of that money.) The pendulum has swung too far toward the players, who in some cases have become overpaid, full of themselves, and with a sense of entitlement. (Albeit not nearly to the same extent one sees in the NBA.) As for owners "exploiting" the talents of NFL players: exploit how? NFL owners offer players money in return for a service. Players are free to either accept that offer, or to do something with their lives other than NFL football. No one forces players to accept hundreds of thousands, or millions of dollars a year to play a game they love. Players do that because they want to. If NFL players are being "exploited" despite getting paid millions, then what about college players (who are just getting scholarships)? What about high school players, who are doing it for free? What about kids playing football on their own in someone's back yard? Who should be blamed for exploiting them? Forgive me, but when I see a guy getting paid the way those guys are, it's difficult for me to conjure much sympathy, or to see him as a victim of "exploitation."

There are 32 teams in the league, which means there are 32 starting strong safeties. For Whitner to be in the top 30% of those 32 strong safeties, he needs to be among the ten best at his position.

It's possible that the author made an error in excluding Evans from his list of non-busts. I would have to look at the raw data to confirm that for sure, but have no plans to invest that time right now. But even a record of one non-bust, and six busts, still puts us on the same level as the Detroit Lions. So the overall point remains that the Bills have done a very poor job of drafting in the first round. One thing I especially liked about that guy's analysis was that it fully captured the Bills' failure to find any difference-makers in the first round. Sure, there have been some solid starters: guys like Evans and, to a significantly lesser degree, Whitner. But not even Evans is what I would call a difference-maker. To be considered a difference-maker, a WR should be able to consistently produce at a reasonably high level despite double coverage. He should be able to be a threat everywhere on the field, and not just on deep routes.

If you wish to make the case that Whitner was or is among the top 30% at his position--or anywhere close--the onus is on you to explain why he hasn't made the Pro Bowl even as an alternate, and why he spent most of last season as a backup while George Wilson started. I'm not trying to suggest that you necessarily want to argue that Whitner was among the top 30% at his position. Only that his benching and the lack of Pro Bowl invitations are both things which need to be addressed if that argument is going to be made. A person who wanted to make a strongly pro-Whitner argument could claim that Perry Fewell had made a serious error in benching Whitner for George Wilson. Alternatively, that person could try to argue that George Wilson is himself among the top 30% of starting strong safeties. That person could try to explain away Whitner's lack of Pro Bowl appearances through some combination of lack of name recognition, stiff competition from other AFC safeties, politics, stuff like that. A heavily pro-Whitner argument could be made. But making that argument would be an uphill battle. Perry Fewell began as a secondary coach. He later became the Bills' defensive coordinator, and then the interim head coach. He'd seen years of Whitner's play. If, after watching those years of game tape, he'd concluded that Whitner was among the top 30% at his position, do you really think he sends Whitner to the bench for George Wilson? Fewell's opinion is valuable here, because it's based on his own personal area of expertise (the secondary), and on years of Whitner's game tape as a starter.

This.

The man who created that analysis had three criteria for determining whether a player was a bust: Criterion 1: Whether he was a starter by his third season. Criterion 2: Whether he was still a starter by the last year of his original contract. Criterion 3: Whether he was in the top 30% at his position. The person also noted that, "if players left their original team and then turned it on with a new team I still counted them as busts, since they were not successful with the team that drafted them." Obviously, Whitner was not even close to being in the top 30% among strong safeties, so he didn't meet criterion 3. Lynch wasn't a starter in his third year in the league, because he'd been relegated to the bench by Fred Jackson. So he didn't meet criterion 1. McGahee's season in Baltimore was discounted because it did not help the Bills. Apparently, Lee Evans wasn't among the top 30% of WRs in the league, which meant that he didn't meet criterion 3. This is a case where criterion 3 looks a little harsher than would be ideal. There should be a category for players who, while perhaps not in the top 30% at their positions, are nonetheless solid starters and solid contributors to their teams. At the same time, it's worth remembering that the author's harsh criteria were applied to everyone else's first round picks as well. Everyone in the league--except of course the Bills--was able to have at least one non-bust even by the high standards the author had created. The best-drafting teams were able to obtain four or more non-busts during the period he examined. That clearly demonstrates that the Bills have been among the league's worst when it came to evaluating talent in the first round.

That was an excellent post (article?) and well worth reading. Apparently, not even Lee Evans was in the top 30% at his position. As for the other players taken in the first round during that span . . . On another note, a guy like Donte Whitner is just barely holding onto his starting spot. Other players like George Wilson and Bryan Scott could do the job about as well as Whitner does. If the Bills had Wilson, Scott, and Byrd, but didn't have Whitner, very little would be gained by adding him. It's unfair to Whitner personally to declare him an outright bust, when he's still starting and making plays for the team. But certainly, the draft pick we used to take him was completely wasted.

I realize you're responding to someone else's post. (The one about how finding Kyle Williams in the 5th supposedly balanced out the McCargo bust.) Since you're responding to that earlier post, I may as well do so myself. Marv had three first round picks from 2006 - 2007. Those picks were used on Whitner (8th overall), McCargo, and Lynch (11th overall). Of those three, McCargo is fairly close to being an outright bust, Whitner does not represent a significant upgrade over guys like George Wilson, and Lynch--while a solid player--is not the kind of difference-maker you'd hope for from an 11th overall pick. Marv had four picks in the second and third rounds. Those picks were used on Poz, Trent Edwards, Youboty, and the Stroud trade. Both Poz and Trent have roughly lived up to their respective draft positions. Youboty was obviously a bust. Stroud played well for a while; but the strategic wisdom of a rebuilding team trading away a first day draft pick for someone else's aging veteran is questionable at best. So that leaves Marv's picks in rounds 4-7. Kyle Williams is a good player. Brad Butler would have been a respectable (not great) starter at OG, had he not prematurely retired. But other than those two, that's about it for Marv's haul over those two years. Getting one solid starter, and one "might have been starter" over two years' worth of second day picks, seems about par for the course. Maybe even a little above-average. But by no means good enough to compensate for the outright disaster of Marv's first round picks; or his almost equally disastrous free agent signings.

Four pages of thread, and no one has commented on Steve Johnson getting the starting nod at WR. I think he has potential; and I'm looking forward to seeing what he can do now that he's being given a bigger opportunity.

Looks good to me! Edit: someone mentioned having additional players in the P2 and P3 categories to go for a more best player available approach. If that's the goal, I could see bumping OLB up to a P2. Maybe also bumping up RT and OC/OG a notch. If (for example) the Bills end up drafting a franchise-level QB in the first round and a good long-term answer at RT in the second, they'd be off to a very solid start in the draft. Obviously, getting a solid answer at LT would be better than an answer at RT. However, the odds of getting a solid answer at LT in the second round are somewhat slim. If a second round RT is considered a better value pick than a second round LT would have been, that probably means the LT isn't good enough to be the answer we need.

My own list: QB: P1 LT: P2 RT: P3 OLB: P3 C: P4 NT: P4 I placed QB at P1 because I see it as an all or nothing proposition. Either the Bills don't need a QB at all, or else they need the best possible QB they can get their hands on. A quarterback who's somewhere in between those two extremes--some decent, not great, QB to arrive in training camp to "compete" with Edwards and Brohm--would be worse than useless. The Bills don't need "competition" at the QB position. They need The Guy. If Edwards isn't The Guy, they need to use a first round pick on someone who is. The above logic meant that, for me, QB would either be P1 or P10--but not in between. I chose P1, because I feel Edwards is more likely to turn out to be a second- or third-rate QB than he is to be the next Jim Kelly. I chose LT as P2, because we had nothing there last season, and because a former Green Bay practice squad member (Meredith) is unlikely to be the long-term answer there. Also because the LT position is so critical; second only to QB among importance for the offensive positions. I have similar concerns about the RT position, but ranked it at P3 because it's less important, easier to fill, and because we have some stuff there which will allow us to get by in the short-term even without adding a draft pick. Going into last year's draft, Maybin's best position was generally felt to be an OLB in a 3-4. But even if Maybin contributes nothing to our defense, I still feel that the 2011 draft should emphasize the offense first, defense second. Once the QB and LT positions have been taken care of, the Bills will be in a better position to take a more balanced approach. That said, pass rushing OLB currently appears to be the defense's biggest need. Center is a need as well: Hangartnar was the 32nd ranked starting center in the league last season. The Bills' division rivals all use 3-4s, so a good starting center is pivotal to making the offense work. The only reason I didn't rank this position higher is because it's harder to find good QBs and OTs than it is to find good starting centers. The Bills could draft an OG and move Wood to center. One option is to eliminate the P4 at center and replace it with a P4 at OG. The Bills drafted Troupe, and by all accounts he's off to a good start in camp. But you really need at least two good NTs in your rotation for a 3-4, and I think Kyle Williams would be a better fit as a LDE than as a NT. Adding a good, solid NT would help toughen up the Bills' front seven. One need I didn't mention was at CB. In a 3-4 defense, you strongly benefit from the presence of a shutdown CB. While the Bills' secondary is very solid top-to-bottom, it does not have a true shutdown CB. Possibly McKelvin will turn into that player. Even if he doesn't, the Bills should address the above-mentioned needs first, before attempting to improve the situation at CB.

I think there are several reasons why you don't see the cycle thing more often than you do: 1) It takes a while to determine whether any given draft pick will be a bust. Sure, a few draft picks blossom right away, but many or most successful NFL players needed a while to develop. 2) Even a good GM will still make mistakes in the draft, even with first round draft picks. Likewise, even a bad GM will still sometimes have successes in the draft, even with bad draft picks. 3) In part because of the first two factors, it takes a while to identify and replace the bad GMs of the league. Matt Millen, for example, held onto his job for a surprisingly long time. It took the Bills five years to get rid of TD. 4) A bad GM with early draft picks will typically achieve less than will a good GM with slightly lower picks. Guys in the first category are the ones picking the Akili Smiths and Jamarcus Russells of the league; while guys in the latter category find players like Aaron Rodgers. 5) Because of factor 4), a team with a good GM is very unlikely to bottom out, unless it's very early in that GM's tenure. Take the Chargers under the leadership of Butler and (later) AJ Smith. They only got top draft picks early in their regime. Since then, the team had a few good years and a few less good years, but they were never bad enough to get a very early pick. A good GM is more important than good draft position. 6) By the same token, it is rare for the bad teams to suddenly get good GMs. A Matt Millen team will tend to have a very early draft pick year after year, because a guy like Millen will largely squander whatever draft-day resources he's been given. 7) Typically, the only times you'll see the combination of a good GM and a very early draft pick are when a bad GM has just been fired, and his replacement has inherited a bad team someone else built. Bill Parcells in Miami. Bill Polian in Indianapolis. John Butler in San Diego. 8) When #7 happens, the good GMs almost always make good use out of their early picks. Parcells took Jake Long; a very good LT. Butler took LaDanian Tomlinson. Polian took Peyton Manning. Picks like those demonstrate the power of combining a good GM with a very early draft pick. However, it's very rare to see that combination, due to the factors listed above.

A lot of the first round QB busts that have occurred were drafted more because of their physical gifts than because of anything they'd proved as pocket passers at the college level. That's why it's so important to combine a good GM with an early draft pick. John Butler, for example, specifically avoided taking Vick, even though the Chargers needed a quarterback. Bill Polian chose Peyton Manning, even though a lot of the so-called experts out there felt he should have taken Ryan Leaf. A good GM doesn't guarantee that your team will avoid busts with its early QB draft picks, any more than that good GM can guarantee the absence of busts at any position, anywhere in the draft. But the combination of good GM + early pick maximizes your odds of getting a very good QB indeed! As an aside, one thing I'm worried about is the fact that Chan Gailey apparently wants a mobile QB for his offense. Any time you start looking overly hard for a QB with exceptional physical characteristics, there can be a tendency to de-emphasize mental traits. That is extremely problematic, because a quarterback's accuracy and ability to read defenses are the key ingredients to being a successful pocket passer. Conversely, Gailey's QB while with the Steelers was Kordell Stewart: a mobile QB who lacked the mental traits necessary to be a good pocket passer. I hope the Bills don't go the Kordell Stewart route under Gailey's influence. We did that once before, and ended up with Losman.

Well said! That has been a point I've been trying to make; but you said it better than I could have. One of the fastest ways to build your team's talent level is to combine good talent evaluation with very early draft picks. Bill Polian getting the first overall pick and using it on Peyton Manning. The San Diego Chargers getting the first overall pick, and trading down to avoid Michael Vick. Instead, Butler took LaDanian Tomlinson 4th overall, and Drew Brees with the first pick of the second round. Drew Brees has been cited both as an example of a franchise-level QB taken outside the first round. As well as an example of a franchise-level QB acquired through free agency. And as an example of a franchise-level QB who needed a long time to develop. The fact of the matter is that Drew Brees stories on any level are extremely rare. Of the franchise-level QBs active today, how many were taken outside the first round? Drew Brees, of course. Tom Brady, who was drafted back in 2000. But since 2001--when Brees was drafted--it's difficult to think of any QBs taken outside the first round who have played at or near his level. Conversely, an abundance of very good quarterbacks have been drafted in the top five or ten picks. Matt Ryan. Philip Rivers. Carson Palmer. Eli Manning. (This past season, Eli had 7.9 yards per pass attempt, and a QB rating of 93.1. His brother Peyton also averaged 7.9 yards per attempt this past season, with a QB rating of 99.9)

Fair enough.

Agreed. This team doesn't have a quarterback, and it needs one. If a top 5 draft pick is what it takes to eliminate that source of pain, and to turn it into a constant source of strength, then so be it. On another note, many players currently on the team will need to be replaced over the next two to three years. Some are nearing retirement, others are simply fill-ins until we get real replacements out there, etc. Building a "winning culture" for a player who won't be here two years from now seems like an exercise in futility; or at least in short-term thinking. It's better to get the right people on the team--which in this case means early draft picks--than it is to sacrifice draft position in an attempt to create instant cultural change. Take the Colts, for example. They were able to draft Peyton Manning because they went 1-15 the previous season. Do you think Manning's presence on the Colts helps create a winning culture? I do! If the Colts' 1-15 season had been 6-10 or 7-9 instead, Manning would be quarterbacking some other team; and the Colts would have far less of a winning culture than they do today.

I'd argue that the post to which you were responding was one of the Dean's weaker posts. Ralph is in his 90s. There is currently no succession plan for the team after he dies, beyond "sell the Bills to the highest bidder." While Ralph Wilson has personally (and commendably) been committed to keeping the Bills in Buffalo, no provisions at all have been made for keeping the team in Buffalo after he's dead. In the absence of such a plan, doubts about the Bills' future (post-Ralph) are perfectly valid. This team's future, post-Ralph, involves an unknown owner, who will receive offers of currently unknown size to move the team. There is a significant chance the new owner will be highly leveraged, which means he or she will likely have a strong incentive to maximize the team's revenue to offset those hefty interest expenses. We don't know what financial incentives the new owner will face, or how much (if any) loyalty that new owner will feel toward Buffalo. In the absence of that information, it would be extremely foolhardy to firmly conclude that the new Bills' owner--whoever he or she might be--will keep the team in Buffalo.

I disagree with the bolded text; because I think that Jimmy Clausen will turn out to be a better QB than Edwards, Fitzpatrick, or Brohm. But that's just my opinion, and I could be wrong. But this might be the case where the team didn't want a "sort of" or "maybe" answer at QB. Their logic might have been as follows: "If we're going to invest significant resources in the QB position, we want to know that we're getting The Guy. Not 'sort of' The Guy. Not merely an upgrade over the scrubs we have now. We want The Guy. And if we can't have The Guy, then we want nothing at the QB position. No upgrade at all. Because if we can't get The Guy in this year's draft, we'll be drafting him the next year. No sense in burning a second or third round pick on a 'maybe' quarterback in the meantime." At least, that's what I hope they were thinking!