mannc
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Posts posted by mannc
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This is an excellent thread with a lot of intelligent, thoughtful posts.
But I have not seen anyone mention the situation in St. Louis, which, in seems to me, is good window into what will happen to the Bills post-RW. I admit that I have not followed the St. Louis situation very closely (it seems like the only real attention it's gotten is a result of the Rush Limbaugh fiasco), but from what I understand there may be a lot of parallels between the Rams and the post-RW Bills: small market team with a woeful on-field track record whose owner dies leaving the team to her heirs. The only real option is to sell to a new ownership group, which may or may not be local and may or may not be interested in keeping the team in its current location. If I'm not mistaken, Georgia Frontiere died almost two years ago and the situation is not nearly resolved yet. I would be interested to hear from someone who has followed it more closely.
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"The Miami Dolphins are shopping for a star wide receiver. If the Buffalo Bills can't figure out how to deliver the ball to Lee Evans, maybe they should consider trading him for a plum draft pick. ... The Cleveland Browns were short on playmakers even before Wednesday, when they traded wide receiver Braylon Edwards to the New York Jets. If he stays out of trouble, he'll be a big boost to the Jets. Now the Browns will be even less dangerous entering Sunday's game at the Bills"
http://www.democratandchronicle.com/articl...a+grand+sendoff --> it's on the 2nd page...
Now is not the time. There is no one trade or series of trades that can help this team until a quality General Manager is brought in who can identify the problems and chart a course to completely change the way this organization is run, which of course includes hiring a new coach. Until that happens, any trade will simply bring draft picks that will be wasted, as so many picks have been wasted in the last 10 years. The decision whether to trade Evans or any other key player, will have to wait until a new regime is in place. Of course, the chance that Wilson will give meaningful authority to a General Manager who actually knows what he's doing is microscopic. It has happened only once in the last 30 years.
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I work with two Pittsburgh Steelers fans (both from Pittsburgh), and they tell me that the Steelers haven't had a good offensive coordinator since Mularkey.
No good offensive coordinator, just two Lombardi trophies.
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Washington Post is reporting that the Dolphins have acquired QB Tyler Thigpen from the Chiefs. Seems unlikely he will play this weekend, but who knows. Thigpen actually played some very good games for the Chiefs last year. I was surprised he was relegated to 3d string this year.
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Obviously Jauron is a loser, just look at the record. Probabilities say no matter what he does, down 10 with 7:30 left, his team is not winning the game. Jauron's offense was playing losing football, so give the ball to them & they'll screw it up. Give the ball to the D & they screw it up.
Bottom line: Until Jauron is gone, the players will continue with their poor execution on both sides of the ball and most of his decisions will be wrong, no matter which decision he makes-Unless the NFL allows us to play Tampa every week and forces them to use Byron "Statue" Leftwich at QB.
Now that's a post I think we can all agree with.
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In the NE game the Patriots got the ball with 5:32 left, down 11 points. So BB had about 2 minutes less than when the Bills punted on Sunday. BB scored with 2:06 left and what did he do-he kicked off-why don't you consider that waving the white flag? If Belichick was confident enough to kick off at 2:06, why do you think he would have gone for it if he had 7.5 minutes left at his own 28? Just add the time up. His 1st drive started at 5:32 add 2:06 to that & you have 7:38-almost identical to when the Bills punted at 7:30. Obviously Belichick thought he could get the ball back in less than 2:06 AND HAVE TIME TO SCORE, so how can you conclude he wouldn't have punted and expected to get the ball back in virtually the same timeframe that the Patriots won the game with?
Because with 2:06 left the Pats had all their time outs and ONLY NEEDED ONE SCORE TO TAKE THE LEAD! (And they had Tom Brady at QB, I might add). One defensive stop and they get the ball back with plenty of time to score. As it turns out, they didn't even need that. It's just not a comparable situation. The chance of recovering an onside kick is substantially less than 30 percent, while the chance of converting a 4th and 1 is greater than 70 percent.
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Making a foolish decision is not proof of one's "stones." I have "stones," yet I refrain from having sex with HIV-positive Haitan heroin-users... And I look before crossing the street.
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Here's the article I was looking for. You'll have to copy-paste the link (below) to your browser... I never have any luck posting links. Anyway, the fellow is a statistician who did a statistical analysis for Football Outsider and - surprisingly - his analysis strongly supports going for it in MOST situations. HOWEVER, down in the conclusion section (way down, it's a long article) he states the situations in which you DO NOT go for it. The Bills-Saints scenario is described. It doesn't "prove" anything. but perhaps it's because Harvey ("Albany,NY") and I make our living doing statistical analysis that we respect arguments based upon mathematical empirical evidence more than emotional rushes to judgement based upon one's perception of what constitutes having "stones" . We argue our viewpoint as correct. And speaking of empirical evidence, it doesn't hurt that the overwhelming majority of NFL coaches agreed with us in the overwhelming majority of actual similar game situations...
The link: http://www.footballoutsiders.com/stat-anal...6/never-punting
Thank you for posting this excellent (albeit dense) article.
Only problem is, it does not support your argument. The author suggests that a team should probably punt late in the game from its own territory, when protecting a lead, and the other team could win with a FG. That obviously was NOT the Bills-Saints scenario. The article strongly supports bold coaching decisions, not waiving the white flag like Jauron did on Sunday.
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You do it when you're ahead by more than 3 points, not when you're behind by 10 with 7+ minutes to go. So far nobody has met my challenge of just 1 time, same situation where it worked. Many teams have come from behind down two scores with less than 5 minutes to go, but when has one come from behind trailing by 10 (less than 2 TDs) with 7+ minutes to go that went for it on their own 28 or worse. I'm begging for just 1 time for you people to prove your case & all I'm getting are generalities. Just one boys & girls, just one.
Oh, OK, we'll pore through the play by play of every NFL game played in the past 3 years and try to find a few specific examples to satisfy you and prove what we already know--that the only way on earth the Bills have a chance to win that game is to convert the fourth down, keep their defense off the field, and score some points.
Why don't you give us an example of a team that (a) punts from its own 28 yard line (or thereabouts) on fourth and one, (b) while losing by 10 points, © with 7 and half minutes left, (d) at home, (e) against the best offensive team in the NFL (which had driven the length of the field for a TD on the previous possession), (f) gets a defensive 3-and-out and (g) goes on to score two more times to win or tie the game? (I would have added, "with Trent Edwards at QB" but that would be overkill.)
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There's a 99% chance I've seen more Bills games both at the Ralph & on TV than you have. Ok, wiseguy-find me just one other time in the NFL where a coach has done what you are advocating-down 10 in the 4th quarter, went for it on 4th & <1 with over 7 minutes left from 28 or worse, got the 1st down & won the game. I can give you at least two games in the past 3 seasons where an opposing coach was down 11 with less than 5 minutes to go & won the game.
Well it's obvious that you've watched a lot of Bills games the last 10 years because punting in that situation is exactly what losing coaches like Williams, Mularkey and Jauron always do. I can guarantee that good teams like the Steelers, Patriots and Giants go for it in that situation, especially at home. In fact, they often go for it when the mathematical odds might suggest that they punt, like in the NE-Atlanta game just this past week, when Belichick went for it on fourth and one from his own 24, leading by six points. It's called demonstrating confidence and a winning attitude and it rubs off on the players on the field. Anyone with half a brain who watched the game on Sunday knew that the Bills defense was not about to get a stop at that point in the game and that the game was over as soon as the punter's foot made contact with the football.
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You're the one who is dead wrong. Name me one time that a coach trailing by 10 points with about half a quarter to play has ever went for it on his own 28. It's moronic. Too much time left. That's a 3-minutes left decision. Just keep being a media lemming and parrot what Sullivan, Simon & the rest of WGR's knuckleheads come up with.
You don't watch much football, do you?
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I respectfully disagree, Simon, but for different reasons than the others here. I actually don't think that whether they could play good D or not at that point was the issue. As far as I'm concerned, at that point of the game the Bills had pretty much proven they couldn't move the ball with only three downs. At a certain point, the coach has to bite the bullet and accept that his only chance of scoring is having four downs to work with instead of three. They were what -- 2 for 13 at that point on third down? They needed to score at least one TD, and doing that with three downs had pretty much been proven to be a nonstarter by that point. You gotta go for it, not simply because of the situation in that particular instance, but because they should have realized they weren't good enough to run a regular three down offense after 52 and a half minutes of failure. Remember, they were the fortunate recipients of a couple of terrible roughing calls against NO. They had done *nothing* up to that point.
Ding, Ding, Ding! We have a winner! Absolutely correct. As an added bonus, when you know as an offense that you have four downs to work with, it opens up more play calling possibilities. For example, 3rd and 3 is no longer a shotgun formation, gotta pass play; a running play becomes plausible because you don't HAVE to gain all three yards and the pass rushers can't pin their ears back. But all this is of course lost on Dick and Co.
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The Saints were the most prolific offense in the game at the time... giving them the ball at the 28 with eight minutes left and your team down ten is certain defeat. Punt and your defense can set you up.
Nice try, Dick. Now go back to preparing for the Dolphins.
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Anyone watching the game knew that it was imperative to keep our defense off the field. They had played great up to that point, but it was clear that they were wearing down. The thought of punting should not have even entered Jauron's mind.
By the way, I loved the Saints naked bootleg call on 4th and 1 a few minutes earlier. Talk about losing contain.
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thanks again everyone. Yes Eball it is fun pulling for them. It is still strange for me because coming up watching the Saints it was always Defense and ball control on O with more running. When we had the dome patrol in the early 90's now that was fun to go to games since you can participate on defense more. One thing you cant play down in this game is special teams. That is where any team can catch up to them. The offense is usually fine when they arnt getting too cute (and that happened a couple of times last year) Our defense is not as bad as they have been. They may surprise some people but the no huddle could expose them since Williams cant do his subs like he wants. We will see.
Overall, the Bills' special teams have been the best in the league the past 4 or 5 years, but they have been pretty bad so far this year. (You may have heard that a fumble was lost on a KO return on opening night.) I expect that is because of the new rules and new personnel. I also expect that to turn around very soon because Bobby April is the best special teams coach in the league and because the Bills have a strong commitment to special teams.
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6.5????
Thats way too low right now. NO is averaging 46.5 points a game right now, I think that the line will definitly start between 10-15 for NO. It might get lower as the week goes on though.
Eitherway, I don't care, I will still be there in person
Wrong. Depending upon which casino you listen to, the line is Bills +4.5 to +6.0. It's not easy to win on the road in the NFL, especially two weeks in a row.
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No way the Bucs defense is gawd awful and way worse than the Saints and the Pats defense is 4th in yards against and 16th in points against, whereas the Saints are 21st in yards and 22nd in points against.
The Lions D is better than the Bucs and the Eagles D is better than the Pats. Therefor the Bills have put up 29 pts per game against lesser defenses than who the Saints have played. Bills are gonna have their work cut out for them if they want to win this game.
Good grief! Some of you people are talking like this is the 2007 Patriots coming to town this week. It's the freakin' New Orleans Saints, a team that finished 7-9 last year, as I recall. It's a very winnable game regardless how many points they ran up on the Lions and the Eagles (two teams with QBs starting their first NFL games, and neither of whom was exactly bottled up by the Saints' below average defense).
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I really think a full reading of the data on this is in order. Without intending any disrespect at all, I'm not sure we need to resort to "football sense" for a decision like this any more than one would use "blackjack sense" at a blackjack table in deciding whether to hit 16 to a dealer's face card. There are objective answers in the data. (A recent example is at: http://www.advancednflstats.com/search/lab...x-results=100.)
The benefit of possibly going up by 13 instead of 10 (and then kicking off to them) yields the benefit of forcing their 2 scores to be TDs instead of one TD and one FG. If they do score those 2 TDs though, we lose - i.e. we indirectly force them to go for the win, and in the course of scoring the FG we concede them field position on a kickoff.
The alternative is to: (a) score, going up by 3 scores, effectively ending the game; (b) get a first down, effectively ending the game; or © fail to get one yard, turning the ball over to them at their own 2, down by 2 scores with 2 mins to go. (Fumbles/disasters could happen during either a FG attempt or going for it.). Probability-wise, at the time the decision is made, any of those outcomes give us a bigger EV of winning the game than attempting a FG.
If there is some kind of objective analysis (i.e. one that doesn't rely solely on feel, momentum, etc.) that shows differently, I really do think it would be interesting to see it.
Notice I've mercifully refrained from invoking the WWHD standard. (What would Hoodie do?)
Please don't inject logic and clear thinking into this argument. We are only interested in our "gut feelings" and vindicating the conventional football wisdom. And by the way, I have no doubt that the Hoodie would have gone for it, just as I had no doubt Jauron would kick it.
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The year prior being Buffalo implemented the "no-huddle" full time we had an effective offense but it definitely could have been better. What everybody noticed was when we went into the 2minute drill, we would EASILY march up and down the field and score a quick TD within a minute or so w/Jim Kelly @ the helm. Then towards the 2nd half of that season we used it from time to time with the same gret results.
I remember going to the home opener the following year and I can't remember who we were playing off-hand but once Buffalo received the ball for the very 1st time in the game the no huddle was immediately utilized.
The one thing I remember vividly @ the game is when they did that the whole stadium erupted into cheers. It was obvious from the Owner, to the coaches, to the players, and to right up to the fans in the stands is that was the way to go. They never looked back.
As I recall, the K-Gun was installed at the beginning of the 1990 season, after it was used to great effect throughout the second half of the playoff loss to the Cleveland Browns the previous season--yes, the Ronnie Harmon dropped ball game.
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He was a consensus top ten pick for a little while, chose to go back to school, spent a few months as a #1 overall prospect, then had a rough senior year and fell to the second round.
Brian Brohm, welcome to the practice squad.
Another reminder of why it is a bad idea to draft a QB in the first two rounds. No one really has any idea if they can play in the NFL until they actually try to do it.
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Watching New England's front office compete against the Bills is like watching the men against the boys. What a freakin' mismatch!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I somewhat agree with this statement, but the real mismatch is in the coaching department. The Pats really have not drafted much better than the Bills over the past 4 or 5 years, but I agree they have done much better in signing useful free agents.
I think this trade is highly questionable and somewhat puzzling from the Patriots' standpoint. Pro Bowl defensive linemen don't grow on trees and Seymour is unquestionably still a Pro Bowl quality player. One has to wonder why this trade is being made now instead of prior to the 2009 draft. The rule of thumb is that a future year draft pick is discounted one round for each year into the future the pick is taken. So it looks more like the Pats traded a perrenial Pro Bowl lineman still performing near his peak for a third round draft pick. (Looks a little like the Bills' pick up of Marcus Stroud from Jax for a 3d rounder.) If the Bills made such a trade, they would be crucified. And I wouldn't count on it being a top five pick--a lot can happen in two years. As someone pointed out, the Raiders have the makings of a very good defense. And of course, top five draft picks aren't exactly in high demand these days anyhow; most everyone who has them would like to trade out of the top of the round.
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Chances are his contract prohibits him from talking about the specifics of the scheme with any other coach. However, the practical reality is that this would be hard to prove if it was done covertly and wisely. It is an issue of honesty and integrity.
Perhaps Schonert will be hired next week by the Pats as an "assistant quality control coach" or some such thing. On the other hand, why would they bother?
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on the positive side we do pick 14th rather than 11th
Also, the Steelers beat Carolina in the Superbowl.
I had forgotten about all those passes that Kevin Everret caught as a Bill. If only we can get that kind of production out of Nelson.
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Peter King thinks everything apparently hinges on T.O. A safe prediction would be 7-9.
http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2009/writ...10/may11/2.html
The Bills remind me of the Orioles in the American League East. No matter what they do to improve in the offseason, they can't get over the New England hump. Even when Miami and the Jets make overtures to pass the Patriots, the Bills stay stuck down in the pack. That's why they went out and risked their season on Terrell Owens. If they've hit a home run with T.O., it might be enough to eke out nine or 10 wins against a manageable schedule. But I doubt it.
King is a doofus, but really, it's hard to argue with this. Over the past 10 years, all the haters in the media have been right about this franchise a lot more than they have been wrong.
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This reflects what I thought about Dockery - it wasn't that he didn't have the Physical part- but he often didn't seem to have his head in the game at all or just didn't care- he stole money from the Bills
Yep. Typical UT player.
Um, so do we have a shot vs the Jets?
in The Stadium Wall Archives
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I can't think of a single logical reason that the Bills will win, but I thought the same thing before the NE game. For some reason, Jauron's teams seem to put together decent performances just when all hope seems lost. The uncertainty regarding the coaching situation certainly hurts, but I think the Bills will put up a very good fight before blowing it in the final minute.