The Big Cat

Well, switching up the casts for TD (unlike AHS) allows HBO to keep cycling A-Listers into the mix, which is cool. I also like the ensemble of AHS, too. Mind you, HBO series pull from a pretty consistent pool of actors, too. The Wire, Treme, Deadwood, even True Detective, there's a lot of overlap in who they cast. Which I also think is cool. Kind of like a really awesome, consistently baller theater company. As for the anthology format, I think it's great!! Mostly because it allows for finite story telling. And given the way viewers consume "TV" these days, I think it's an inevitable shift. Plus, how many great shows have over-stayed their welcome? How often do plots/characters just seem to meander through the last two or three seasons as the creators continue to milk what they can?

Uuuuh, just because one guy thinks CJ is a bust, some guy thinks Byrd's a diva, another guy thinks Chandler is a ****ty TE and somebody says Stevie chokes doesn't mean WE ALL think we should get rid of ALL those players. More so, our opinions have zero impact on personnel decisions, I can guarantee you that. You could go through the entire roster and find a player someone here has bashed, doesn't mean they're on the cutting block.

Neat.

I'm 3.5 episodes in (started today w/wife) The anthology format is gaining popularity, sorry. This is 2014 TV and it's a format I personally love.

And this is where I come down: the guy may play like a lumbering clutz, but he's the most consistent, most productive lumbering clutz we've had at the position for more than a decade. An indictment of his predecessors, to be sure, but let's not pretend like the guy has done NOTHING in a Bills uniform.

Uuuuh...Lee Evans also broke franchise records...with JP !@#$ing Losman chucking it deep. Why can't cutting him be neutral? Why does there have to be a benefit? Can't it just be "not bad?" This isn't wishful thinking here: what if they just don't like the guy? May be the FO sees it as a net zero. Again, I don't think they should cut him. But I wouldn't be shocked/dismayed if they did.

Okay. So, 3 catches a game at 11 yards per catch? But your prognosis is he'll be back to full speed? You know this...how? BTW, speed and David Nelson should never come in the same sentence, anyway.

It was also the opposite of letting guys go who shouldn't have been let go...which was, you know, what we were talking about. Questionable releases: Lynch (during the 2010 season) Whitner (after the 2010 season) Poz (after the 2010 season) Seriously, can someone name another? Not to mention, does anyone really see ALL THREE of those cuts as irrefutably bad for the organization? Now, flame me all you like, and accuse me of having personal motives if you must, but how then are so many Bills (like they were when we cut Lee Evans) cocked-sure that cutting SJ13 would be a mistake?

Why was it a mistake to give up on Nelson? Chandler would be a great second TE option.

Has the "we don't keep our talent" argument been relevant since 2010? Is Lynch the last guy we can point to that burned us in this regard? Is it even a valid point anymore? I'm not invalidating it out of pocket, I'm sincerely wondering who we can point to since 2010 to whom this applies.

Right. Which is precisely why it's something just about all rookie QB's have in common

I said it better!

Yeah, damn those injuries and the subsequent missed time. But again, I'm curious as hell what 8 offseason months do for the guy...

Also, counting backwards: We know Fitz spent a couple days once on a high school field in Arizona throwing patterns to uncovered receivers. We know Edwards played a lot of golf. We know JP...surfed? And we know EJ has said, more than any of these guys ever did, that he's committed to improving and putting in the offseason reps to get better. His colleagues and coaches have said the same. Mark me in the wait and see column and consider this reasons 1-1000 why the Bills WON'T draft a first OR second round QB in 2014.

This is an interesting conversation and I'm glad OP brought it up. The question of whether Downing has the goods to fix EJ is valid, but only if we all agree with what's wrong with EJ. Anyone who watched The Bills last year knows EJ's footwork sucks...sometimes. When he's confident and poised in the pocket (which he is...sometimes), there's virtually nothing wrong with his mechanics. It's been talked about a lot: EJ needs to learn to just let her rip! So, when it comes to Downing, I don't think his first priority is devoting EJ's brain cells to footwork, but rather getting into the right frame of mind to sling it a little more (kinda like...I don't know...Stafford does).

Hey ice bowl stay sweet

http://instagram.com/p/kfUs9wzNDU/ To wit, it's a pic of him and David Nelson.

Now this is a surprising new precedent!

I can only speak for myself, but unlike you, I have a hard time living with them because they always seem to have the worst impact imaginable. The fumbles, the drops, the miscues. They only seem to happen at times when they simply can't. And what makes it harder to get over these--as has been hashed out SO many times by SO many posters in addition to me--is that there are other factors at play which seem to indicate he'll never get over these problems, compounded by the fact that every time he's given a chance to prove otherwise (the one !@#$ing catch against Carolina notwithstanding) something else goes wrong. Did you or did you not formulate your case by accusing me having an "odd" "personal hatred" for a member of the Buffalo Bills?

This is why I'm genuinely curious. As offsides mentions, he pulls from the tax free trough BEFORE it's filtered down BEFORE it's taxed. So which is it? Also, this all to point to the less-alarming aspects of his salary. As for KD scolding me because I say it's ridiculous. Sorry, but it is. Not because he doesn't earn it, not because he isn't entitled to it, not because I have some fundamental misunderstanding of how compensation works, but ridiculous because I, and I'm assuming most of the posters here (in spite of what some of the money bags who like to shame us will have you believe) have a difficult wrapping our heads around that kind of loot. Spending it, investing it, looking at all the commas in the paychecks, it's all just a very hard thing to imagine. It's ridiculous. It's an amount so absurd that it feels farcical to lowly earners like me. I get that this is no new concept in the realm of professional sports, doesn't mean we can't check in on these crazy dollar amounts from time to time.

Aaaaaaand you accused me of making it personal...just like I said you would. Nobody who questions the guy--in spite of the growing number of people who do--has any idea what they're talking about, according to you. Re: your first response, fine then, please name for me the team's for whom he'd be the unquestioned number one. There are plenty of Bills fans who don't believe he is here. They must all be wrong because you said so, I guess. Re: your second response, I think I showed ample numbers to indicate there was no hometown discount awarded. He earned what he earned. It was neither a bargain (as you continually suggest it was) nor was it an extravagant amount (as I have yet to suggest). But you insist it was a hometown discount to make your point, then accuse others of hyperbole...hmmm. Re: your third response, If he benefited from Chan/Fitz because of all the time they had together, then how is it he put up his best numbers during Chan's first season that began with Trent Edwards at the helm? If it's rapport (or the unjust lack thereof) we're blaming 2013 on, how come the rapport you speak of resulted in a statistical tapering/plateau following the aforementioned career season? Not at all. Unlike most people who are blind to his shortcomings and choose instead to sing the guy's praises by calling me a cook with an axe to grind, I can actually acknowledge the good things he's done for our team.

Are you honestly pleading ignorant to any/all of Stevie's flaws?

We're getting to the point where the tropish "indie" aesthetic has become the goal. Can't say I blame filmmakers for going this route since the Hollywood tastemakers (in all their infinite wisdom) are so easily manipulated into stamping these movies with approval. See also: Sideways, anything starring Zoe Deschanel, The Descendants, The Kids are Alright, blah blah blah. Highly pretension, meandering, stubbornly paced globs of schmaltz that rarely achieve anything. Kind of entertaining or kind of enlightening, but never both. Cue the slow-zoom soliloquy! We're building us a two hour Oscar reel! Reminding folks that you're too cool for movies made after 1975 never gets old for some people!

By all means, enlighten. I'm actually quite interested to know.

I acknowledge my outspokenness on this topic, but I'm far from alone in my opinion. In fact, I'd say there enough posters who share my opinion that it's time to stop marginalizing the argument by referring to it as "personal" or as a "crusade." This is often the counterpoint, as evident in this thread.