JDG

After all, what use would the Bills have for a QB who was won NFL Playoff Games in his career???? JDG

Which starters did we let walk? As best I can tell, we've lost Trey Teague and Ron Edwards/Justin Bannan as starters. (Sorry, but Sam Adams has to play more than 1/3rd of the plays to be rated a starter in my book.) Given how bad our lines were last season, that looks like addition by subtraction to me. Well, I kind of would have liked to hang onto Bannan, but I'm not going to get worked up over it. I mean, we franchised Clements, and we haven't even got rid of Eric Moulds yet (and its looking less and less likely that we would do so - the TO/Keyshawn day would have been the day to do it, I think, since the market would be flooded with WR's at that point.) So, we're going to get Spikes back, and we've replaced a defensive tackle with Triplett. We've significantly upgraded the coaching staff. I think we have a chance to contend with this team.... I'm not saying that another year of obscurity at sub-.500 is impossible, but just saying that I don't think the playoffs are a mere pipe-dream either. JDG

"Marv" Kind of sad, I think - but also true.

What's coming up next week - and I can't believe we didn't sign Will Wolford post? What I'm saying is - ain't this kind of old news?

And all the free agents Tom Donahoe brought in every year produced *how many* playoff berths? Goood for the Browns - they're the winners of March this year in the NFL. Too bad they don't actually play any games in March.....

Wasn't the bringing in of Andre' Davis a dead giveaway that as of this moment it is Holcomb's team until Losman proves otherwise?

This is an awful lot of panic being stirred by losing out on Ryan Pickett of all people...... I'm happy with Peters and Villarrial as O-Line starters. The Bills have clearly made a decision that Duke Preston is going to be fine at Center - and who are we to object? We'll have to see about Gandy, but he wasn't terrible.... and Bennie Anderson could be repalced with a 2nd round draft pick, or perhaps by Geisinger. All in all, not necessarily a complete disaster. And let's not discount the importance of getting rid of an incompetent moron as Head Coach, and brining in someone who is at least competent to Coach this team. JDG

Unless of course, Losman really is just plain bad.....

That's funny - I thought you were talking about Culpepper!

Miami? All because Saban won one game against an exhausted Chargers team? Look at Miami's roster..... I expect Miami to be third place or worse.... JDG

But we don't have enough money for Eric Moulds, and so should instead be creating another hole at the WR position, right? Unless its the WR position, where getting a younger player who will be around in three years is apparently paramount.... JDG

Its not about "sympathy" - its about cutting our best offensive player for marginal cap savings at best. JDG

Kelly, its called rational logic. Bringing up money that has already been spent is like pretending you can change the past. Unless you've invented a time machine, then the only things the Bills can worry about is what they control - which is from this point onwards. Who's talking about two years? The cost for Moulds this year to the Bills is $7 million dollars in new money for a $10 million total cap hit. The cost for David Givens this year is $8 million plus $1-3 million in salary, for a total cap hit of $5.3 million from Moulds + $2.5-$4.5 million cap hit from Givens. Cap savings to the Bills if we had cut Moulds and signed Givens - $0.5 - $2.5 million. *That's* why we haven't cut Moulds yet boys and girls. JDG

But isn't it amazing that even then he retained the support of his teammates.....

Sorry, but this is not correct. The Bills are not offering Moulds the opportunity to convert his salary into signing bonus to reduce the cap hit. In this case, Moulds is worried that the Bills will wait to cut him until the market for WR's has dried up, thus substantially impacting his earnings on the open market. JDG

Oh come on, Moulds is trying to protect himself. One of two things is going to happen to Eric Moulds: 1) He plays next season for the Buffalo Bills under his current contract 2) He is released by Buffalo and negotiates a new contract, either with the Bills or some other team, this season. If option #2 comes to pass, Eric Moulds will make a lot more money if he is released today than if he is released in April, May, or June. I think that Moulds is well within his right to read the writing on the wall, and try and protect his ability to land a job for the highest possible salary next year. To call this "screwing the Bills" is beyond absurd. If the Bills thought that a $7 mil salary was going to be too much for a 33 year-old WR then they should not have offered Eric Moulds a signing bonus for signing the contract!!!! Isaac Bruce who has two more NFL seasons of wear and tear on his body than Moulds, is one year older, and who caught a mere 36 balls in 11 games last year, while missing five due to injury, just landed the following deal from St. Louis - 3 years, $15mil, including $6 mil in this year alone. Bruce had been scheduled to earn $8.1 mil in salary with a $10 mil cap hit under his old contract. Kelly, your sense of the market for WR's is waaaay off the mark. From Eric Moulds' perspective he needs to look at things from the perspective of how much new money he can earn. The signing bonus is completely water under the bridge, sure it counts as cap hit this year, but that's accounting - and it doesn't make the water any less under the bridge. If Isaac Bruce can get $6 mil next year, Moulds has to think that there is at least a shot he can get at least the $7.1 million in new money he would be seeing this year under his contract for next year from a team like Philadelphia and Denver - and oh yes, if that happens, he'd have a lot better chance at playing in a Super Bowl. All Moulds is asking for is the chance to find out if he can get that $7 million for next year before he just stuffs some money back into Ralph Wilson's well-lined pockets. JDG

I'd agree with you if the Bills then turn around and cut Moulds in April sometime. But if, in the end, the Bills hang on to Moulds, then all they did was play hardball..... JDG

And this careful analysis is the result of your study that every other NFL player that caught 80 balls in 15 games last season is going to only receive a combination of $3.2 million dollars in salary and cap hit from amortized signing bonus next year ????? Isn't his salary for this year $7million? Whatever. Its not like Moulds just *wants* $7 million, he accepted that "signing bonus" which you are calling his "payment for this year" in exchange for signing a contract that promised to pay him that much for this year. All Eric Moulds wants is for the Bills to either: a) Abide by the signed contract b) Let Eric Moulds shop his services to the highest bidder before agreeing to a pay cut. What's so wrong with that? If the Bills are so convinced that Moulds isn't worth the terms of the contract, then they should let Moulds find out how much Philadelphia, Cleveland, Minnesota, or anyone else is willing to pay, and if the Bills are right they can sign him to an Isaac Bruce deal. Moulds, however, I think wisely doesn't want to get caught negotiating against himself, and instead of just handing a give-back to management, he wants to find out what he is worth. I can't fault him for that. And of course, the Bills seem to be speaking by their actions that they aren't 100% convinced that Moulds is overpaid, or else they would have released him a long time ago now. JDG

You mean it was Moulds' fault that Donahoe & Co. insisted upon trotting out a QB who had no business being on an NFL playing field for half the season? It was Moulds' fault that Mike Williams, Bennie Anderson, Trey Teague, & Co. couldn't block the broad side of a barn? It was Moulds' fault that McGahee averaged a stunning 3 yards per carry or less in four out of five games down the stretch? It was Moulds' fault that when teams decided to run against us, we couldn't stop the run, and when teams decided to pass against us, we couldn't stop the pass? I get it.... things sucked last year because it was the fault of our *best* offensive player. Oh that must be it....... JDG

Because Davis might not make it out of Training Camp......

Detroit, Arizona, and Baltimore are all in the "next 5" category. There's zero chance of Leinart being on the Board when the Bills pick, and I don't care what you think about Losman, but the Bills would be insane to pass on a player of Leinart's caliber if he were somehow there due to the collective insanity of the other Teams in the League. Matt Leinarts just plain should not be available at #8. JDG

Because the Bills lost one game in which they were favored and three games in which they were heavy underdogs? JDG

I have a friend who is a huge Jets fan - so I have examined almost every one of these famous incidents right as they happened. In several cases, like the Jets-Baltimore game linked above, I was actually watching the whole game in question with my friend. I understand your skepticism, about one fan claiming to be smarter than the whole media, but in this case it is true. Bring up any other of the famous "Edwards mismanagement cases", and I'll defend Edwards almost every time. Let me give you another example... I guarantee you that next year Al Michaels will *still* suggest "leaving time on the clock in case of a bad snap" in the event of a game-winning field goal, even though a kick return for a TD is a far more likely scenario than a bad snap. But Al Michaels will still suggest it (and I like Al Michaels.) This is just a rare case of the conventional wisdom being dead wrong. Clock management is not easy, as it requires a knowledge of statistics... and knowledge of statistics is in terribly short supply among sportwriters. That's how the media's collective wisdom has ended up being so wrong. Its no secret that as soon as Edwards was given the boot that he was snapped up by one of the smartest organizations in football. JDG

Actually, I think that the clock management in this game was decent - albeit not excellent. What Herman Edwards understands, and what far too few NFL observers understand, is that football becomes a completely different game when you have four downs to get 10 yards vs. 3 downs. The bulk of the criticism against Herman Edwards seems to be letting 32 seconds tick off the clock on 1st and 4. That just shows the ignorance of the AP writer in this case. With three timeouts, the Jets were correctly positioning themselves to be the last team with the ball, and to not give Baltimore any chance for a miracle. Either the Jets would score a TD, or they would kick a chipshot as time expired. The only reason it didn't work is because they were playing a QB who hadn't even been to training camp with them, and who is a bit of a head case, and he screwed up the third-down play, blowing a timeout. JDG

What about it?