Pyrite Gal

I've seen it called on a team for one player using another player's help to elevate to block a field goal attempt. I think cases such as this were the case that generated the rule.

As article also demonstrated with its recounting of the tangled web of the Bidwill family teams like fish often start rotting at the head first. The first thing the Cards need to do to get better is to fire the owner and his family.

In addition to this good answer which indicates that the Bills franchise in and of itself (without Ralph dipping into his personal resources by selling a painting or his third Ferrari if cars are his vice) the Bills corporation is easily in a position to borrow a boatload of cash from a bank or some other capital holder to get the wad of cash necessary to pay a bonus. It is true that the team would lower its profits annually by going into debt, but owning ab NFL franchise is likely as close as one can get to printing money in this society as the largest cost of the franchise, labor costs, are set at specific levels for a number of years by agreement with the players. Further, these salaries go up specifically as the revenue stream goes up. As long as this cost stream is firnly controlled by the CBA and moves directly with the level of income produced, the question of having additional cash is purely a question of how one chooses to generate it. Extremely successful businessment like Jerry Jones or Dan Snyder do this through having businesses which generate cash. Merely successful (rather than extemely successful) businessment like Ralph would also seemingly have a great deal of cash they can make available unless they have been incredibly foolish with their investments, or have an investment strategy which is so conservative they choose not to be liquid enough to generate up front cash which eventually will fall subject to the cost controls of the cap. The answer to the question of whether Rakph has the money to extend a large bonus is yes if he chooses to and winning means enough to him.

My sense is that if the Bills tag him in anyway, iy goes against the agreement reported in the media (certainly not a dead lock certainty of accuracy regarding contract terms and certainly language). It may well be that there is no language to support the concept that the Bills agreed not to tag him, but it is probably more important what the perception of the deal is than the reality as if the perception becomes widespread among other players that Marv and/or Ralph cannot be trusted to keep their word then many players will simply chose not to believe or even negotiate with the Bills. It actually makes little difference whether the Bills can win a battle in court that allows them to tag Nate, if the cost is that they lose the war in peveption among possible FAs. The legally focused out there may want to argue over what "is" means, but in the end the rep of the Bills is probably big part of why we have been quite competive in getting the FAs we have gone after with the Bills having a history off signing FAs early in the signing period or have them not do other visits they have announced they would do, . If there is a Bills problem it has been their unwillingness to even go after the highest profile FAs (though sometimes this has been forced by cap limitations), but this team under Marv, TD and even Butller has shown a history of going after second tier guys (sometimes with great results and sometimes with so-so results). However, the perception whether all the legal "t"s are crossed and :i"s dotted is that this team will not tag NC after this season.

The contract Reyes got from the Bills (around half a mill for one year) seemed to be an indicator that they did not visualize him as a long term answer for the team (for example FA Fowler got a significant bonus and multi-year deal) while draftee Preston has more upside. As far as Neufeld, while he is not good enough in terms of his play to be more than a role player for us and preferably cut, he is no where near as bad as some of the negative reactions from some folks in this thread. He is another player whom it is a great sign for your team if you can cut him as it means you have more than role play talent at his position. However, given some of poor play and problems we have had from players who were supposed to be dominant at their positions (Royal has been up and down at TE with some nice catches AND also recurring penalties while Everett has not asserted himself though his lost season to injury last year makes him a worthwhile experiment next season) Neufeld has actually performed OK and above expectations as a role player on ST and even getting a TD as a TE in the redzone. I hope we have enough talent to cut Neufeld next year but I do value his play this year on a bad team.

As far as WRs, I think Monk gets in before Reed. Irvin had some recent scandal issues with his CBS job last year and given the log jam of worthy candidates. any reasonthough remote from a player's career may be enough to make them a non-choice. Its a deserved honor Reed to be a finalist but I suspect these other WRs, Thuirman, and even Tasker (who did not make it as far this year as before but I think he will come back to the finalist list when their are fewer Bills and WRs- his position though he gets in for his ST work) up for consideration. As far as the rest, I'll take another look but the interesting things to me are whether Derrick Thomas gets in since he was a good player who died tragically and that Ralph is also losing gound. I think Ralph gets in after he is dead.

Exactly. Another key beyond this also is that while it is fine for us fans to face reality (though many of us rarely do for our team since it is not required) the coaching staff should never give up as long as it is mathematically possible. While they should not insist that we will make the playoffs loudly, they also should not give up on the possibility, Wade deserved to be canned in his final year when he publicly conceded that the Bills were not making the playoffs due to our lousy record with three games left. In contrast, Indy under Mora (I think) had the same record as us and actually ran the table (including beating a Bills team coached by Wade who had given up) and lo and behold they made the playoffs. If some fans give up even before the season starts then so be it, but I hope we never see an HC or anyone connected with running the team give up prior to the fat lady singing.

McGahee is also apparently done for this game but Thomas has shown some good stuff as his reserve the last two weeks. The Bills passing game has been ineffective for reasons folks love to debate, but Jauron has been able to use the running game as a tool to play coinservatively and keep us in the game. If the opponent plays well enough the Bills implode as they did when Lindell missed a makeable FG last week and the opponents win. If the opponent is not very good as GB demonstrated the week before, they implode at a key point and the Bills win. Particularly as the opppnent this week is a banged up Texans squad, I think many Bills fans see the implosion we play around working in our favor this week. A lot of the gameflow will be deterined by ST play. Thuis can be figured out with analysis of a variety of stats but is more easily ascertained by talking to anyone knowledgable and objective about how this portion of the game works. The Bills also feel good about this aspect as the punt game revolves around Brian Moorman who has oddly been the most valuable Bills in our limited # of wins, McGee has struggled at times at CB but has been superb as a return guy, Lindell missed a makeable FG on Sunday, but has been remarkably solid as a placekiceker and even better as a kick-off guy this year and on punt returns, Parrish has been a reliable punt catcher who has yet to be a weapon as a return guy but has a few nice catches as the #3 WR. You can tell us as a Texan watcher how your ST is, but against a not very good team which can flip the field with their offensive performance like Indy, I suspect the opponents will be fighting all game to get field position. Finallly, another factor which is difficult for us outsiders to gauge for sure is that as both seasons are effectively over for both teams and the motivation of the players which can make the marginally better or worse will likely have to come from their infividual athletic pride and from their individual desire to get big contracts. As far as team spirit goes, it may be the case that the Texans will want to build on their win. I think more likely though as there is no there there for either team it would not surpirse me if the Bills individuals are actually more motivated coming off a tough loss than the Texans may well be since they won a game they were expected to lose. We'll see.

Having seen teams implode before, I do not see a widespread sense of that from the Bills. I would have the same sense you seem to have if I felt that the Bills as a team had some real expectations of doing quite well or even making the playoffs this season.. However, though I think there were hopes (as there always are and really have to be in order for athletes to be psyched to face the season). How can you or the team have their expectations of being a great or even good team dashed when I think few anyone connected to this team had even the remotest expectations of achievement or anything beyond the required hope.. My sense is that among the main motivations that all the players have are: 1. The money- always a major factor regarding anyone's job. 2. Athletic pride and love of competition- I think just about every athlete is motivated by their personal desire to beat the other guy and to not get beaten. In addition, to these shared motivations which I think make it hard for any player to give up completely (though any player can lose their marginal edge and marginal efforts make a big difference in performance at this level) there are other factors which many individuals may have and which if the team shares generally it can become a TEAM. These include: 1. A sense of being a good teammate and sharing the journey- I think this shared commitment is actually the big difference between great teams (NE) and simply good teams a host of teams which routinely have winning records but rarely or never go deep in the playoffs. But even in the many cases this is not there (usually due to a lack of team leadership), the players fall back on their need/desire to make a big buck and personal athletic pride rather than implode into being a bunch of whining Eric Moulds 06 types. 2. Allegiance to the region- Ironically, I think that this appears in players most when their families are linked to the area because the player's wves are from here and they routinely get anchored to the area by their nuclear and extended family. 3. Being part of a good story- the being a teammate sense can be delivered by the challenge of a few injuries, but in some cases where the region adopts a player as one of their own and the player)s) respond by being a local booster or local media icon then one can get a transcendent feeling. I do not think the Bills have found these extras yet, but the desire to do well personally to get a good contract and the desire to compete and do well individually are still there and are a big part of why on any given Sunday a bad team (the Bills) can beat or come close to beating a good team like the Colts. Ithink any sense of implosion may say as much about the fans' attitude toward life as it says about some judgment of where the team is. Though the players and coaches were hopeful as the season began its hard for me to see how they or anyone connected to the team are disappointed that their expectations were not met because its hard to see how any of them had expectations beyond it being a long season beyond their hopes of winning a lot.

I agree wth you that money talks and does so quite loudly (one would be a fool not to listen at all and deal with the financial aspects of compensation for your work). However, as foolish as it would be to ignore the fact that money talks, it would be just as foolish to conclude that it means the same thing to everyone and that allegiance and loyalty mean zero to everyone. Not only is there variation which is detectable and which should be taken into account by a fan regarding different players, but even regarding the same players, allegiance and money have a different priority for them at different times in their life and it simply makes for incorrect predictions to assume falsely that it has the same value. One can have a situation like a Ryan Leaf where as soon as he signed the big contract his effort went south or a player like a Garrison Hearst who despite being set for life worked like a demon to rehab himself so he could play again. Do you really believe one size fits all? Even in cases where the basic personality of a player is set. Some folks claimed that we would never get any production out of Sam Adams as he was well into the backside of his career and seemed to take a lot of time off during the game. Yet. he was offered more by other teams (based on what folks were saying they offered) but signed with the Bills and for a couple of seasons played well enough to get a Pro Bowl nod and various folks remarked that with the Bills he seemed to take a lot fewer plays off. In the end, the Bills seem to make a judgment that he was now even older and that he had demonstrated he would not take orders if the D changed to a scheme which demanded something from him other than what he wanted to do. However, one would be incorrect to simply claim that their is some singluar of static reaction to the money/effort question even for this individual at different points wth different teams and even more incorrect to claim that Sam Adams, London Fletcher, Willis McGahee and TKO would have exactly the same zero allegiance response to any given situation.

Nov. 19 @ Houston A possible win since the Texans are simply not very good. Ironically the Bills loss in a game they should have come even closer to winning if they played even partially reasonably better and after a Tex win that has left them a little banged up makes this game I think we will win. Nov. 26 Jacksonville It really depends most on which Jax team shows upand how they do week to week impacts their attitude a lot so I really feel this one is not really very predictable until after this Sunday. Nevertheless this one is at home and the up and down play of Jax makes this one very winnable. Dec. 3 San Diego A likely loss to a team which can out a lot of point on the board and unlike Indy where Peyton knew they would likely either beat us anyway or that we would give the game away (which is what happened) he was patient. I do not expect SD to ne patient and thus they will play like their hair is on fire and as the Bills have yet to show an ability to win games where they are under heavy duress I suspect this will be a loss. Dec. 10 @ NY Jets This should be the game where we will be able to best measure whether this team is learning from this rough season. We might but I suspect we have not as this team does not yet have the on the field vet leadership it needs to put us over the top. I hate to say it but I think this one is a likely loss. Dec. 17 Miami I am so biased against the Fish I put this one down as a likely win. i think an objective look would actually come to the same conclusion. Dec. 24 Tennessee This is another team which seems to often find a way to lose. I think this one will also be a likely win. Dec. 31 @ Baltimore Our best chance will likely be that the Ravens are so surprisingly beating their division that we will face a team that has to let its key players like McNair sit the last game out. If these Bills do develop a killer instinct which they have not yet shown i think they will win this one. However, though I think the Ravens will make the playoffs, they may crawl in if they make some mistakes and if they do then we likely lose. From what I see and I can easily be wrong (as basically all folks on TSW eho are reasonable will admit) I think that this team could actually come out of this season with no chance at the playoffs but a pretty good record at or near .500.

We'll see. Reality will make the difference here. If he does not produce the next 8 games I still would be reluctant to write him off because of his contract, but it would make me a lot more serious about trying to get a QB in free agency because a failure by him to progress in his last 8 means to me we need to look harder elsewhere for our QB of the future. I think even in this bad case it would be the height of panic to cut him as there are just too many cases of bad QBs procing to get it and becoming adequate and even good in Brad Johnson's case. However, there are even more cases of potential QBs turning out not to get it and they never produce. JP could easily be one of these victims. He is not injury prone like RJ and he does not have terminal happy feet like TC and he tries as hard as he can unlike Hobert. However, the proof is in the pudding and he simply has not gotten it done as of yet. My guess is that if he fails there are several things we will do: 1. Holcomb is too old to be our QB of the future but though it is unlikely that Nall has the iright stuff he is the right age at least. His good production as a mop-up for Favre proves little and actually since the Pack was willing to let him go they did not seem to judge him able to make the jump. However, if JP continues to falter, i think we move Nall up to #2 on the depth chart and give him some some limited reps with starters in practice so he can show a little of what he may be able to do and to send a final warning shot across JP's bow. Again the reality of whether JP responds and/or how good Nall is with better players determines what we do. 2, If JP falters this off-season there is no reason contractually to cut him and it would be stupid INHO to do so. However, it becomes even more important to get another a vet QB in FA to compete with and likely supplant JP as starter next year. We'll have to see who is injured and what happens in the second half of the season to determine whom that might be or if it is necessary. However, if we want to spend big bucks we are looking for the 2007 version of Drew Brees and if we do not want to spend big bucks then one is looking for a Harrington. Daunte Culpepper was the middlin altenative in 2007 of such QBs. Its still too early to tell whom it might be (at this point last year it was unclear whether any of these three would be available or might even be reasonable choices) but we are already seeing potential candidates like Brian Leftwhich to fall into one of these roles. 3. I do not think that a draft pick will be an option such a Brady Quinn or any rookie QB as that player would simply commit us to yet another development project who since this team is quite unlikely to be even as good as Pitts was last year means we would be on a 2-3 year development track until this team wins with a rookie QB in 2008 or 2009.

None of the really bad TD's the player he was covering got in previous games (though many times I think that the mistake was a failure of coordination between him and the safety as it was their application of the Cover 2 scheme which did not work. He should not have released the streaking WR to a safety who was not in a position to cover deep, but likewise the main fault may have been that the safety should have been in position to cover deep. In any case, they are rookies and he is the vet so he should have made better plays), Farve did log a lot of yard passing and this was to WRs for whom both McGee and Clements had coverage, but what actually happens makes a real difference and in particular Clements made the critical play at the right time in the redzone and they did not score from our 1 to tie it at 17. Overall, though the critical contribution from McGee was not his CB play but his KR play. He contributed a great deal to the Bills and got us off on the right foot with hid initial return and folks would be foolish to overlook his return contribution to the team even with some not very good to bad coverage work on his part. It was a very good day for McGee as we won, his KR work contributed to this win big time and his CB work was not a big problem for us at worst. If one chooses to ignore reality and focus only on his CB work it was better but still not good enough for someone manning our #2 role at CB.

I think that this is the correct attitude to take regarding the real world issue of JP development and is a key point (though it is not the same thing at all) regarding the prospect of Bills develop as a team. As we have seen with QBs such as Brad Johnson, a player can be a total loser as a QB not only once but even twice as he was cut loose by two teams as inadequate, before a QB becomes capable of being the QB for an SB winner. Its great when your QB develops into a John Elway or Joe Montana capable of carrying a team on his own broad shoulders (or athletic legs or great mind and heart in these two cases) seemingly on his own. However, even this judgment of QB achievement is an illusion since it really was the Brocos as a TEAM which found the contributions of runners such as Terrel Davis essential to turning the Elway led team into an SB winner and the prescence of all-world WRs such as Rice and Clark that was essential to the 9ers to have a winning team/ JP is is not way capable of bringing the Bills to an SB win or even berth on his own as an athlete, but who cares because no one is. Is JP capable of being an adequate enough QB to be part of the Bills even making the playoffs not to mention an SB berth/win? Not at this point at all. However, he does have a lot of raw tools and it certainly is a real world possibility that he can develop (even fairly quickly) into a QB adequate to the task of being a key part of a competitive team. I hink 8 games is easily enough time for him to achieve that level of play, as it is also quite possible for him to achieve that level even if he sucks the rest of this year and develops in the off-season. The hard thing for us, is that what it might take for JP to actually develop is to in fact fail and get cut by the Bills. He has enough talent from what I have seen of him in college and as a Bill, that he might need the wake-up call and maturing experience of getting cut (like a Brad Johnson) before he finally gets it together. I hope not, but this may be the case, as it appears a lot of his development has been poorly done his first two years as really the Bills situation under TD behind Bledsoe needed more immediate output than JP was capable of. His first uear development was not good as it was cut short by injury, but it was also not bad as he needed some serious classroom time to learn the prio game after doing well simply improvising with his athleticism while running for his life behind the Tulane Nonffense. He did show some progress when he finally played from his debacle in NE in his mop-up performances in his rookie year for bledsoe. Last year however, was a total loser in his development as only TD was c ommitted to him using last year as an extended pre-season while the fans, MM, the vets on the team (and most important it turned out as TD got canned) Ralph wanted the season to produce as many wins and potentially a playoff berth if possible. This year's JP development has seen progreess over his goshawful performance last year (which is not saying much at all), but basically it is like going back to square one as the Fairchild has had to slowly focus on him learning to go through his progressions and he makes typical rookie errors like focusing in only on the receiver he has decuded to throe to and that tips off even a moderately skilled DB to look for the ball. Ass to that failings like JP not protecting the ball when he is hit, his pocket prescence radar failing to work well at all when he is focused on whethe the reeiver is free and other issues and it has not been pretty at all these last four games. However, folks really strike me as panicking a bit when they want to write off JP now. His problems are serious and they are real. However, he has also shown some good basics and talents such as: 1. He can learn and make progress as seen when he got overwhelmed when thrown into the NE game in his first appearance, but he did make real progress in his 2004 season mop-up appearnance which caused TD to stupidly give him the starting job last year. He went from being overwhelmed against NE, to simply being befuddled when he got a delay of game penalty in his second game, to being in control but ineffective when he had to take a TO in his third game, to being a reasonable adjunct but not a real leader when he handed off to WM several times in a row for a TD in his fourth game, to finally showing some athletic skills (though still not NFL level control) when he led the team to a TD in his fifth performance. He can show progress which is good, he simply has a long way to go. 2. He is a teachable athlete. Jauron and Fairchild have really reined him in this year and called a conservative game which does not call on him to win the game himself. In our initial games this season until opposing teams got some tape on us and we began to show tendencies, he was quite successful at running this reined in team. He produced a good QB rating, no turnovers, and most important some Ws against bad teams like Miami and at home against MN. He also kept us competitive against NE up there and was productive in a losing cause against a bad NYJ team. He can change his game and make good pre-play reads. However, as we now face better opponents and HCs with time to look at tape and prepare for us as we show tendencies, his failings are showing big time. It remains to be seem whether he can take another step up and be able to make adjustments and do counter reads to the opponents knowing what we are gonna do and how we are gonna do it. I fear he will merely go back to the bad habit of forcing it and running for his life but we will see. Yet, it is clear to this observer that he is a very good athlete as seen on plays whre he got flushed from the pocket on one play and scrambled to his right and hit Teed for an improvised first down a few games back. As noted correctly by the commentators in the last game, one of the best things about Favre was that when he scrambled he kept looking downfield and made passes and plays. JP ha shown the ability to do that and if his receivers hang in there when the play is busted and make good adjustments we can be very good. At any rate, the losses to NYJ at home and not beating Det on the road (and not even being competitive against NE at home) have effectively ended any whistful playoff hopes this year even if mathematically we are still in it. 8 games is more than enough time (and even next season actually) for JP to still develop into an adequate QB. I do not know if we will want to take that long for this to happen as we already see a lot of whining on TSW to simply cut him as folks would prefer to go the doubtful to be much better route and no long term upside route of going to Holcomb. I hope that our coaching staff has the stomach to go through this learning curve cause it ain't gonna be pretty

I think you are right on target pointing out that different people are inspired to better action by different styles of leadership and one of the big sources of error on YSW IMHO is that since folks want to or are forced to (by the possibility that the Boss may notice them spending a bunch of time ob TSW at work) try to give one answer as the cause of all problems or one key change as the THE solution. Sorry Virginia, but the real world (and even the fake world of the NFL) is determined by a lot more than one simple answer and a winning team needs a lot more than one leadership style or one player to act as a leader. One of the keys to the Bills great teams of the early 90s was that there were a number of recognized leaders on the TEAM and they employed and used different leafership styles to inspire (or force) better play from their teammates. There were vocal yellers like Kelly who did a lot of good, but likewise, as his antics were a major part of the Bills at first being labeled "The Bickering Bills" as he did dirty laundry in public (and sometimes unfairly as when he publicly attacked Howard the House Ballard). Yet, there were other recognized leaders of particular units or the whole team generally. who STFU publicly but led by solid example like Kent Hull, folks who were in your face but always were supportive vocal rooters like Darryl Talley and individual upstarts like Bruce Smith who did not draw a lot of public respect for his attitude, but always showed up to play and produced so his fellow players gave him little greif for marching to his own drummer. I think a major failing of this Bills team is that it has not yet found away to establish a set of leaders and the team has not fallen into a mold of particular players finding and being drawn to the particular leaders whom they respond to best, and particular players stepping up within each unit to be the internal motivator, teacher and oftern disciplanarian that a good TEAM needs. As far as JP, he obviously is a talented athlete, but he has not yet produced ebnough on the field to really get into anyone's face all that much. True a good leader is one who recognizes his own faults and shows a good example by diligently working to get better at them, but JP simply cannot take this necessary step because otherwise he would be apologizing all the time as too much happens that is simply his fault or he has a major role in the problem. JP would simply be helped a lot by pulling off a couple of wins due to his actions, and he has shown the talent to do this, however, he did this in the past at Tulane by running for his life and improvising and being creative. NFL players are simply too big, too fast and too good to survive for long if one is running for your life. However he shows many of the signs of a rookie QB learning the pro game for the first time as he no lomger os allowed to improvise as soon as he sense danger and is standing in to make the reads. What he has to learn from what I see is the elementa l task fo not focusing solely on one player and instead running through his progression quickly and making the throw or simply throwing it away. Until he masters this activity, I do not see him credibly getting tinto anyone's face.

The downside is that if one accepts the standard you apply to JP then the same standard should also be applied to Nall. The standard you set for a QB being able to show he is the real deal completely eliminates any risk to waiting to start Nall if you judge JP can potentially profit for more time. If Nall is in fact the real deal we ALL hope for meeting your Gradkowski standard, there is no rush whatsoever to go with him. If one judges that Nall MAY potentially develop (even if the chances are few) with additional nurse-maiding starts, there is little cost to wait until game 12 to start Nall, as after 4 games this season by game 16 we will be able to tell whether he has met your lofty Gradkowsni standards. For the coaches its a relatively pure judgment about what they think is useful in developing the QB's and any potential costs to the other QB development to invest in the other player. Your own standard pretty much lets the Bills off the hook for taking their time with JP as you set an expectation that Nall would need to show development and potential pretty quickly or its quite reasonably off to the FA market for a QB this off-season in search of a QB. The capital investment in JP easily dictates giving him a few more games to see if he is another Brad Johnson (sucked so bad in two outings he justified getting traded before he proved to be good enough to QB a team to an SB win). By your own standard, one can easily wait another quarter of a season and still give Nall enough time to show what he's got.

There is nothing good about an injury to a player that should make one root for them. However, they are simply a reality in this league and a team has no choice but to try to make lemonade out of these lemons when they occur. While it is a bummer as a fan to see WM and Reed go out, if neither can return next week, I do look forward to what this may mean for the Bills and their play. 1. The running game now depends on a sub RB- This is not good as I judge WM to be far better player than Thomas. However. the switch may mean greater productivitu ny the Bills O with Thomas in the immediate future as I think the Bills O probably recognizes in a big way that in order for Thomas to succeed his teammates must open holes for him and make plays rather than simply hoping the highly regarded WM will do something special. I would not be surprised if the improvement of out running attack with Thomas almost putting up 100 yards and showing some good stuff in crunch time was in part because the OL players (and Shelton who was great today and whom I think has been a negative so far this season) made the extra effort that players seem to make when a well-regarded player goes down . I also think that part of this may have been due to Thomas's situation as well as I think he showed his greater experience than WM by probably reading his blocks and picking a side to run through a bit better than the still young WM and also he knew that this game was his first real shot since 2004 to show what he could do. Overall, in the shiort-term the team may be a bit more productive on O with Thomas than with WM. 2. I prefer Evams/Price/Parrish to Evans/Price/Reed in 3 WR sets/ I guess the Bills coaches prefer Reed because they like him in the control game as he really developed into a go-to WR for Losman. However, with Reed gone, I think that Fairchild with have little choice but to go with Parrish more and if they do I like the scary speed of thse 3 WRs and what it essentially forces anh OC to do to utilize what they do well. I think we have emphasized control as they try to give JP learning experiences, but if they use these 3 (I think they will actually probably use Shelton and 2 WR sets more unfortunately) WRs more I think the O will actually be more effective and i would love to see it. 3. Fairchild with be forced to be liberated- Just as they used Price today in an end around to pick up a first, i think the absence of WM will force Fairchild to loosen up and go for it a bit more as he will not be able to hope WM springs one. The irony is that this team may well show a lot more diversity and creativity without the crutch of simply running WM and hoping for the best.

Add to the list of things which are not good about his game is that he has developed a really bad habit of staring down the receiver he is throwing too and thus tipping off a SB watching his eyes where he is throwing the ball. Yet, despite the fact that this and the other issues you raised are true if by the JP bandwagon you mean those who endorse the Jauron decision to keep him as the starter for as many as 8 more learning experiences as starting QB this year even if he proves not to be the ultimate answer as an adequate QB, then count me as being on the bandwagon, then count me as being on the bandwagon. 1. The loss of two games to NE and even worse the loss to the division opponent Jes at home pretty completely eliminated the pipedream of getting (and likely even competing) for a playoff spot this year. 2. Holcomb is a reasonable choice as a back-up who can potentially play the Frank Reich role of being a spot starter in a playoff run if your #1 goes down, but there is no way he is gonna lead a team to playoff competition or has any potential upside as your QB of the future as he is well into the backside of his career where he never won a starting QB job. 3. Nall on the other hand is at least the right age demographically to have some career left. However even some good performances in hia brief career as a mop-up guy for Favre really demands that he get little more than a fair look when the situatiion allows, and unfortunately for him life is not fair and he had the bad luck of suffering a boo-boo which knocked him out of the early pre-season when the situation allowed for giving him a good look. He apparently has done nothing in the limited opportunities carrying the clipboard as our disaster QB gives him to force the coaches to give him a shot, and given the fact Ralph has a chunk of change invested in JP for bad or for good, its his job to win or lose (lose it looks like at this point) and the Bills unfortunately must give him more than every chance to finally learn to play on the job. Overall, the incredible likelihood is that we come out of Indy 3-6 after next week (though the Felons demonstrated in Chicago today that any given Sunday is still true in the NFL) and the deal is as best as I can tell is that you simply live with the pain of JP's learninf and make a decision about how aggressive we are in the FA market for a QB this off-season. If JP contiues to put up the sorry numbers he did today but we happen to not get the bounces and lose, then I advocate simply moving Nall up on the depth chart to #2 to put even more pressure on JP in what really is a last ditch effort to force him to do something. Then perhaps if JP does not respond AND Nall show something in the marginal additional time a #2 QB gets then maybe you give him a shot in a real game as the season crawls to its ugly finish. However, for right now we simply will have to put up with whatever horrors befall us under JP because outside of giving some whining fans relief from having to watch JP screw up, there is no real reason to be on any other bandwagon except the start JP one.

I disagree in general because my sense is that the talent level across the NFL is narrow enough that individual players differ in performance (sometimes significantly) based on changes on issues of motivation caused by contract and other mental issues rather than their raw level of physical talent. This is most easily seen for the Bills in terms of cases like Bennie Anderson who has the talent to perform well eenough for the Ravens to gey a big contract and then seemed to simply lose his motivation to apply his talent for the Bills once he got the big bucks. If your point is one of a simple talent assessment then I think you are wrong, if your point is one of whether the Bills are motivating players well enough so that their talent shows, your post does not seem to go into detail in this area to demonstrate this point. On the flipside, I think Clements had and likely has the talent which got him a pro Bowl berth, but I think he seems to be a player who tries to hard to make big plays to get a big contract and again I do not think his talent level has simply dropped, but that better motivation and coachin and potentially a change in his contract status may well improve his performance. Likewise you seen to discount the role of chemistry and leadership in allowing players of the same talent level to achieve better results. Do you think that the NE team which went 0-2 under Bledsoe suddenly developed more talent to become an SB winner under Brady's guidance. It is an extreme case but this extreme case shows how relatively pedestrian talent can actually achieve good results based first on them becoming a true TEAM as they sucked it up to support the young Brady and then as Brady developed into a player who makes players around him better their output improved. Lest you attempt to believe that this extreme but true case was a one time event. How do you explain the talent level difference between the Bills that beat the Pats 31-0 in a game within the 7 year window you put into play compared to a Pats team that beat the Bills 31-0 in the final game. Claiming that this performance is all based on talent and ignoring homefield advantage, motivation and Kevin Killdrive's then well documented and predictable play calling is simply not the case. Specifically regarding this season, you do not see as far as I can tell you effectively rebutting the argument that tennesseeboy makes that talent level does not explain the pretty good Bills early season performance versus their dismal performance in the last 3 games. In general the cliche of any given Sunday despite the talent level of teams obviously not changing a great deal has been shown time and again to be a cliche because it is true. The assertion that the issue here is pure talent seems overblown at best and simply facile at worst.

Sorry, but worked call and I was away for a couple of days. However, my response is that the objective facts and context that you lack are not the facts that JP's play in areas such as turnovers. 3rd dowm conversions, etc are clear amd at best JP is inadequate overall and has really sucked the last 3 games. The objective facts your arguments lack is why you think that even given the fact his play has been inadequate and sucks we would be better off to make a QB switch to Nall or Holcomb. The facts are that Holcomb sucked worse than JP did running the Fairchild offense in pre-season and given his failure to win a starting job in 9 years as a pro or to take the Bills job snd play good QB when he had every chance to do this last year and when he went into this season first of the depth chart, there is no logical reason why one would switch to him. KH is a reasonable back-up QB because when other teams have used him in this role whem they were forced to, he has done some good work, but outside of a seemingly childlike desire to want to see different because one is to weak in the stomach to see if JP turns it around, there really seems to be no logical reason to go with Holcomb. There is at least some case to made to go with Nall who is a younger player. but really there is no logical reason to think that our disaster QB can somehow immediately play adequately as a starter. Not only does he seem to be a better option than Holcomb due to his age, Nall's failure to win the job in pre-season was in large part due to him not getting a real shot at earning the job due to injury. However, this would seem to be a good argument for making him #2 abd seeing how he looks in practice and with more reps the starters rather than panicking and throwing him into a situation where he would seem to being set up for failure. No one argues at all that JP is playing even adequately. What i think is the rational argument here is that there seems to be not only no logical reason to switch to KH or nall, but you seem to argue that you do not care, you are simply sick of JP and therefore you argue we should act with no logical reason. If you want to make even a semi-rational argument then you would not need to focus on JP sucking (we all agree and that is why folks think he needs to develop) but instead should focus on why you think KH or Nall have shown some onjective indication that they can get the job done. You have not done that and most people simply do not advocate that the Bills do something irrational at QB.

Of course there is no medical definition or term injury prone, but I think it is a useful football term for describing a certain type of ability to lose playing time in a particular way which includes the ability to play through pain, I do not view calling someone injury prone as polite at all since often I judge a player to be injury prone because he is a weenie who cannot play through the wide variety of boo-boos which are part and parcel of playing through the NFL. I label a player as injury prone when he loses time to injuries to three or more different parts of his body. I would not judge a player who blows out a knee and then has recurring injuries to that same knee as being injury prone, his knee simply did not heel adequately for whatever reason. I would not judge a player who loses time with a bum knee and then after healing then goes down with a concussion or some other injury to a different part of his body. Injuries simply happen in this game and unfortunately some of them are bad. A second injury which causes lost PT may simply be a coincidence and just bad luck. However, i think injury prone is a good way to describe a player such as Jennings or Rob Johnson as they not only lost significant time, but lost it to a whole set of different injuries. In his final year as a Bill JJ started 14 of 16 games, but add to these two misses, he also failed to finish (I think missing the final quarter + each time) 2 other games meaning he missed significant time in 1/4 of the games that season. He went down with a bad leg, a concussion, an upper body injury and I do not know what else. I think it is a good football distinction to use a different phrase like injury prone to distinguish him from players like McGahee who suffered a far worse injury in college, but showed how diligent he was when he was able to do a public workout within weeks as part of his effort to get picked in the 1st round. The Bills docs were not fooled by this workout and gauged he would need at least a full year off before he could stand the hitting of football, but they also correctly judged that despite the widespread trauma of the injury, all the tears were clean and could be repaired with hard work and a careful regimen. I think the phrase injury prone embodies that distinction,

Rather than lay all or even a lot of this at the door step of the scouts, I think that the strong smell associated with our QB choices is like a dead fish, rottinh starts at the top and the guys in charge from Ralph the owner on through Butler snd onto TD get the lionshare of the blame for the QB debacles. Certainly the the inner workings of the scouts are part of the issue as there is a bit of garbafe in equals garbage out which is initiated often with bad info from the guys on the frontline. However, we are talking about: 1. Multi-miillion $ decisions where the ultimate decision maker is the guy who signs the checks or the guy he out incharge to organized things and blame does not get very far from Ralph, Butler or TD in this equation. 2. Also key QB decisions were clearly made by the guys in charge such as the handshake agreement between Ralph and Jimbo that are the beginning of the QB issues. Only Ralph has the ability to trade on his personal word and sure the advice he got from the director of pro personel at the time was a major factor for him. but this deal was ultimately his and he blew it big time judging Jimbo was gonna be able to play long enough that he couild sign a new deal with him and he was flat out wrong. This foolish assessment that Jimbo was gonna last longer than he did was the error which triggered a situation where the Bills in hindsignt over-reached drafting TC in the 2nd, rush him to start before the happy-feet got trained out of him as best as could be done, etc. It also is quite clear that it was a publicly stated observation (order) by RWS that he was so impressed by RJ leaduing the beating of a Colts team that had given up which saw RJ get the start in the HomeRun Throw-Up game. Looking to the scouts as the main or even a leading cause of our QB woes misses a whole bunch. 3. Even if one wants to blame the scouts for this debacle, the buck stops with the guy in charge for a reason and the question is not merely whether the scouts are bad, but if you want to insist this is the case, then the question quickly becomes who hired and managed such bad scouts. The QB disasters are RWS, Butler's, abd TD fault if you want to look for someone to blame.

You have a lot more confidence in our opponents (an unexplained confidence) than I do that even a Bills team playing as badly as they have the last 3 weeks has a shot at wiining at least 6 of there remaining games, Its a lot more than about the mediocre (or worse the last three weeks) Bills we are going up against some mediocre opponents who can lose anywhere and anytime outside of the games against Indy and the Ravens on the road which look like sure losses. One can even declare the SD game a likely loss and I think you have a tough time calling all the rest dead lock certain losses.

Its fine if you want to ignore the reality that there is little to no evidence that Holcomb or Nall will solve your own stated issue of seeing a better performance from this team. Its also fine that you state you are willing to ignore the reality that this team will make no change at QN (though your stated rationale for this that the coach and GM are under no pressure to win as Ralph is a happy boy with Marv around seema to completely ignore the reality that Ralph is clearly under the pressure that he will likely die at some point sooner or later and he pretty badly would like an SB win before he moves to a better address. It also ignores the reality thst Jauron as a former athlete and anybody who has been a successful HC in the NFL likeMarv are intensely competive individuals who simply hate to lose, there is no evidence whatsoever that you have stated or I have seen that indicates these men are not under pressure to win. If your rationale for drawing this conclusion is not based on any objective evidence but seems logical or obvious to you it says more about how you think than about them. Again despite stating you choose to ignore reality on these two points, it appears you are hitting the trifecta by simply failing to state any denonstrable evidence regarding your opinion that JP has not shown some improvements in his game to go with the step backards and problems he shows. JP's play is clearly problematic, however, his main problems today (a bad case of losing fumbles this season and he has locked onto some receivers a bit to much with his eyesight and good DCs read his eyes and can pick it offt are in fact new problems rather than the problems he has last year. Last year, JPs big problem seem to be that he was pressing a bit too much and got to the point where he bailed out to soon on plays and some even accused him of having happy feet. He also would clearly try to make thing happen last year even when there was nothing there and many times this led to a bad turnover. He has improved in these facets of the game this year and Jauron/Fairchild are running a conservative offense that some complain (I think legitimately does not take enough chances abd should go downfield a bit more. Just like the clear improvement demonstrated by real life occurences in his first year where JP was bad in his initial mop-up appearances for Bledsoe at getting plays called in the huddle and taking unecessary punishment going for an extra couple of meaningless yards, he improved in these first year problems enough that TD felt comfortable cutting Bledsoe and handing him the job which even JP said was not the way to earn it. Clearly again this year comparing JPs play to his horrendous 05 which led to him losing his job to KH, JP has improved his play this year over last. Subjectively one can see this in my sense that he: A. Is willing (perhaps too willing) to throw the ball away so that he lives to fight another day rather than risking an INT by forcing it in there. B. Is willing to hang in there until the last minute to make the throw rather than bailing out early which led some to claim he had happy feet last year (those claims are not there today and if anything my complaint is that he now holds the ball a bit too long and his sack total is up because of this. Objectively the fact he has improved is seen in him sporting an inadequate but still far better QB rating this year than last. The problems beimg new can also objectivelyu be seen in his INT numbers earlier in the season and in his career and his fumble #s previously as a Bill. Historically he had one of the lowest INT rates on any QB at Tulane and did not throw more than one if any in the first 4 or so games. Multiple funbles for him in a game are also a new occurence for him. These problems seem pretty directly traceable to changes he has made in his game which are likely the cause of his statistical improvement in some facets of his work. Generally, your indictments seem relatively easy to dismiss not simply because we all are entitled to our own opinions and if we disagree that is fine, but because your opinions do not seem to be supported by many objective facts. Your strong indictment of him would seem to be just another fact-free opinion, but he has not played adequately (yet?) this year. However, your over the top and actually unsupported conclusions appear to only have some basis in reality by coincidence. JP does have some real issues to be dealt with. However, his big current problems (the INTs and getting read by the DBs with even a cursory analysis seem to be effects of coaching changes in his game. A rational assessment and debate of these problems would actually be whether folks thinks they can be solved or not. I think one can legitiamtely express doubts about solving them as these problems arehave popped up when another JP problem is solved. One can legitimately argue that if it is not one thing it is another with him. However, to give the impression that his problems are the same as they were before is simply not correct and any indictment of him to be credible and certainly to support an extreme suggestion like benching him deserves a little more support than just a claim one is sick of him, particularly if you are going to admit you are simply willing to ignore reality in the face of folks pointing out various issues like Nall and Holcomb offer no credible alternative an that Ralph clearly feels the pressure to win because no one lasts forever then one shoukld not be suirprised if folks find your complaints fairly vacuous. What alot of your view seems to fall back on is that for some reason KH or Nall is going to give the other players better practice than JP. I doubt this point as well as no one thinks Holcomb has the arm to give the WRs practice going deep and Nall is simply an unknown factor in terms of giving good reps. If the coaches owe the players anything it is to give them their best judgment rather than simply make roster moves based on guesses and hopes/

I think the difference between you and the posters who disagree with you (and also the difference between you and the football professional who coach the Bills and Ralph who has money on the table( is that while you are unwilling to sit through 9 more games of the JP development saga they are willing to sit (coach and own) through this. My sense of this situation is that I think they are correct in this judgment and you are wrong in your view, My sense of this is because: 1. Holcomb and Nall show no real signs of being better options for winning with this team or even better training options for the othe vets. This judgment says less about any belief that JP is the real deal but actually a belief which is I think substantiated by their play that Nall and KH really do not have a lot to offer which is clearly better than even a troubled JP. Holcomb demonstrated with his play last year that like JP he is at best one step forward in his play ( ex. the KC game) and one step back (ex. the NYJ game). He secured this judgment when he retained the #1 QB position on the depth chart as pre-season began and he simply sucked running the Fairchild O and sucked in comparison to JP. JP also has been inadequate at best with his play so far this season, but the signs seem to point toi KH actually being worse than that running this offense with this team. It is not unreasonable to have the experienced Holcomb as your back-up if you are forced to go to him, because there is such uncertainty regarding Nall, but you would need to lay our a compelling case to voluntarily move to KH given his poor play when he had more than a fair shot with this offense and these players in pre-season. Particularly since it seems pretty clear we cannot even luck into the playoffs with how poorly we have performed so far and how well NE has performed in terms of Ws, I think there is a better case to be made to switch from JP to Nall as at least Nall is not on the backside of his career as far as age and he actually finally got into the line0up after his pre-season injury and though he did not perform well enough in this short stint to command more time, he was oribabkly better than Holcomb on the whole. Yet, keeping KH as the #2 made more sense than going with Nall since he was adequate at best in his short stint but has no experience starting games in the NFL and little experience in cruncg time and KH as long as he finally ended his really bad play which he began the pre-season with appears to be a better back-up candidate. As far as benching JP now as those who are unwilling to watch him play anymore want to do, it seems most likely that if we did this and threw Nall into the game without a more gradual process we likely would destroy all 3 QBs as potential Bills as I think Holcomb would be done as a Bill if he were demoted to #3 and I think that Nall needs a little more time to practice with better players, and get used to the notion he is moving up than to have him promoted from #3 to #1. 2. While some fans are so impatient they want to pull the plug on JP, I think NFL professionals make a correct judgment that based on his play and even limited progress it is too early to conclude JP cannot ever be a reasonable pro QB. I too doubt he will be a great one, but there are simply examples of players like Brad Johnson who were so bad they were cut twice and deservedly so given his play, but they proved capable of winning an SB with the right team and he plays reasonably well with MN on the backside of his career. JP has shown definite faults in his play such as his taking a penalty for delay of game when he first came in and then being forced to call a TO when he could not get the play called in his second game and then really only leading the team to a TD in his third game because he kept handing it off to WM on a short field. However, he followed up each of these episodes of poor play (not to mention him getting overwhelmed when MM threw him into a game unexpectedly to mop up for a demolished Bledsoe in NE) wuith improvements like calling a TO instead of taking the penalty, and finally being able to put together a drive for a TD in his first year. Likewise, JP though not a good QB (yet?) has definitely shown a bit more control than the sometimes near panic he showed last year. When you add to this that he has shown some incredible athleticism and ability to make plays such as when he scrambled from what seemed like a certain sack to his write and has the downfield vision to hit Reed for a 1st down last game. The Bills coaches seem to disagree with you (correctly IMHO) that JP has shown enough improvment from some bad play that he actually could get it together either seemingly suddenly or easily over next off-season. This does not mean to me that you gurantee him a shot next season or even guarantee him playing time through the end of this season if he performs badly. However, it seems to me that even a reasonable amount of patience certainly for a coach and even for us wild-eyed fans dictates that you are no where near benching him and we suffer through some more steps back by him this season as long as he shows the steps forward reflected in him actually having a QB rating in the high 70s still (QB rating is definitely not a perfect rating of a QB and arguably is even a bad rating in particular cases, but I think while maybe bad it is the BEST rating out there and cannot be simply ignored without good reason though it should not be bowed too uncritically in all cases). 3. The other reason in reality for which you do not bench or give up on JP is that Ralph really has invested a serious chunk of change in JP. This might have been foolishness or bad assessment of TDs and Modraks part, but it is reality that there are true salary cap constraints which force a team to give a 1st rounder every possible chance and those are still in play in reality for Ralph and JP. You may not like it and I may not like it, but that is simply the reality and a fan would be foolish to ignore reality. The bottom line is I think your proposal to not want to watch JP anymore has little to do with the reality of the NFL as JP still may turn it around (I would not bet the ranch and the dog he will but it is possible), the Bills do not have reasonable alternatives to produce wins or allow for better practice from Nall or KH than even the unsatisfactory performance of JP so far. Further, it would be fairlu silly for the coaches to give up on JP given the improvments one can see in his inadequate play and given the past experience of young QNs suddenly getting it (Come on players like Favre and Young wer so bad initially they were tradable and they improved a little to become at least OK- I'm not saying that JP is Favre or Young, but I am saying that an observer would be foolish to conclude JP is done at this point) and finally that the realities of the salary cap and Ralph's inveestment simply make it to early to throw him under the bus.