Cash

This.

With Poz at OLB and Davis at MLB, apparently. Which is surprising - why wouldn't those be switched? Does Poz still make the defensive calls at that point?

You misspelled "softies."

Thanks for the correction. I guess I got his San Diego tenure confused with his post-San Diego, pre-GM Bills tenure. So I overreached a bit there. Still, he's a first-time GM in his 70s. That's not the sort of thing that inspires confidence.

Take a look at the linebackers we're using in our new 4-3 alignment: Inside Slant Does this make sense to anyone? I have two specific questions: 1.) If the opponent is in a run set but passes anyway (play-action/audible/whatever), can this front stop them? 2.) If the opponent runs anyway, can this front stop them? I think #1 is a massive, massive NO, and #2 is probably a no as well, but I'd like to see it in action first.

It's hard to get into specifics, but I would be happy if there were signs that a plan was in place, and that the plan was a good one and likely to work. A promising QB would help, a foundation of a couple of potential studs to build around would be awesome. Unless the plan was to do nothing for a year, then start rebuilding, I'm not seeing a plan. And if that was the plan, I should be allowed to complain all I want until the rebuilding actually starts. I guess the one thing that would make me most happy would be a proven coach/GM type calling the shots. Buddy Nix is a first-time GM in his 70s, who's spent his entire career as a scout, not even an assistant GM. Chan Gailey's success with Dallas is debatable, but he was definitely a flop at Georgia Tech, and no team other than the Bills considered him for their head coach opening last year. When else has a guy been fired from a coordinator job, then been hired as another team's head coach? That's crazy. I'm tired of seeing crazy moves from my team. I liked the fact that they went hard after Cowher, Shanahan, and Gruden. But after they missed out on those three, the moves they've made have mostly left me puzzled or angry. It's not just that the Bills are bad. It's that they've been bad for over a decade, they're getting worse, and it doesn't seem like they're going to get any better with the current guys calling the shots.

The phrase "building through the draft" is such a joke. It's just something that teams say to get their fans excited. Especially because they usually say that they're building through the draft instead of through free agency. Every team gets draft picks. Every team hopes to hit on all of those draft picks. If they're pretty good at drafting, they don't really need to sign many free agents, and you end up with a team like the Steelers. If they're pretty bad at drafting, they need to sign a ton of free agents, and if those free agents are good, they'll be a good team. But if they're bad at drafting and either sign crappy free agents or don't sign many free agents at all, then you get a team like the Bills. Where are these teams that are forfeiting their picks because they believe in building through FA instead of the draft? You can sort of argue that a team that makes a lot of trades (like the Jets since Ryan took over) doesn't believe in building through the draft, because they keep giving away their picks. But that strategy has been working great for the Jets. They basically traded all of last year's draft for 2 guys - Sanchez & Greene. (Maybe that doesn't count, b/c both were still draft picks.) They traded a 3rd + a 5th for Braylon Edwards, a 3rd for Antonio Cromartie, and a 4th for Santonio Holmes. All three of those moves look pretty good right now. We'll see how that 4th + 5th or 6th turns out for the Bills, but I tend to doubt that both picks combined will be half as good as Marshawn Lynch.

Remember, there were only 2 good tackles in the entire draft, and both went before the Bills picked at #9, according to Nix's post-draft comments. And since we build exclusively through the draft, that means we missed out on any chance to bring in a quality NFL tackle this offseason. Anyway, this announcement gives me some sliver of hope for our team's talent evaluators. The reports have said that Green's had some nagging injury since preseason, but hasn't missed any practice time. If this current injury is an aggravation of the nagging thing he's been dealing with all year, then maybe a healthy Cornell Green isn't totally awful, and maybe signing him wasn't the ultra-boneheaded move we all think it was. We can hope, anyway.

I hate the "it's all luck" line of reasoning. Yes, luck is certainly a factor, especially from the fan's perspective. Maybe the guy who drafted Tim Couch knows that Couch could've been good, but got screwed up by some specific mistakes his coach made in his first couple years. Or maybe he just thinks he got unlucky. Maybe the Raiders were the only team with a 1st-round grade on JaMarcus Russell, and every other team knew he'd be a bust. We don't have any inside knowledge, so from our perspective, it's just bad luck either way. Anyway, just because luck is a factor, and maybe a pretty big factor, doesn't mean that it's the be-all, end-all. If it was mostly about luck, then you'd see the same success rates for QBs drafted in the first round as guys drafted in the 2nd round, and the same in turn for the 5th round, etc. But that's not the case. First-rounders have the best success rate by a solid margin -- about 2 out of 3 wind up as busts. Then the 2nd round -- about 3 in 4 bust. Then the 3rd round, where about 90% bust, and surprisingly the next best is the 6th round, which has about the same success rate as the 3rd. In all other rounds, plus undrafted free agents, 95% or more are busts. Bottom line, it's like a craps table. The house has the edge on every bet, and every bet comes down to luck, but not every bet is equal. If you play the pass line and back up your bet, that's like drafting a guy in the 1st round, or maybe even in the top half of the first round. You've got about a 50% chance of winning money. If you bet numbers, that's like a 2nd-round pick. Hard ways are like mid-round picks, and those awful single-roll bets (snake eyes, yo, big red, buffalo, any craps, etc.) are like 7th rounders and undrafted free agents. Sure, once in awhile some moron will hit snake eyes at 30-1, let it ride, and hit it again, but usually people just lose every single bet they place.

Keep in mind that Ralph is about to turn 92, which is old enough to die without being in poor health. If Wilson passes before the end of the season, any new ownership would have a free pass to can Gailey. Assuming Ralph is the one pulling the trigger, though, it seems unlikely that he'd give Gailey just 1 year in light of his recent "3 year turnaround" comments. However, there's still a chance. Keep in mind that when Ralph put the blame on himself, he said something along the lines of it was his fault for not hiring the right people. So that leaves the door open to the idea that Ralph realizes he hired the wrong GM/coach combo to turn things around, and will make a change at the end of the year.

QB - Fitzpatrick, Brohm (until he actually plays and we get confirmation that he sucks) RB/FB - Spiller, Jackson, McIntyre. Also, I wouldn't go out of my way to cut Andre Anderson, but I wouldn't be specifically inclined to keep him. WR - Evans, Steve Johnson, Parrish, David Nelson TE - Shawn Nelson OL - Bell (still has upside), Levitre, Hangartner, Wood, Wang (until he actually plays), maybe Howard & Urbik DE - Stroud (although I'd try to trade him if we're going to keep playing him at end - he looks terrible), Carrington, Spencer Johnson, maybe Dwan Edwards (has been terrible as a Bill so far, but a good history with Baltimore) NT - Williams, Troup LB - Poz, Andra Davis, Moats, Coleman, maybe Torbor & Ayodele CB - McGee, McKelvin, Florence, Youboty, Corner. Honestly, these guys are not the problem. Same w/ safeties. S - Whitner, Byrd, Wilson, Scott Special Teams - All 3 are solid. Moorman's showing his age a bit, but he's still well above average.

Typo. Should be 5 of 17. I had the same thought as you when reading the article. "Where the hell did we get 14 picks in 2008?"

According to Chris Brown, Maybin got 2 defensive snaps last Sunday, and zero action on special teams. Are you sure you're talking about the right guy? Maybin wears #58.

It's nice to see some refreshing doses of reality from the Bills in the last few weeks, even if there's still nothing refreshing about their play. At least Gailey seems in touch with reality. Maybin never does anything positive even when he gets on the field. That just can't be ignored. http://blogs.buffalobills.com/2010/10/11/lb-update/

There is no sure thing. Every single QB in the draft has some level of risk associated with him, and there's a chance that he'll be a bust. But you miss 100% of the shots you don't take. I'd rather have a 50% chance at a franchise QB for 10+ years than a guarantee of mediocre QB play. The bottom line is that it's so important to have a great QB, and the reward is so great, that teams are willing to take a lot of risk to try to get one. This is one of the main reasons QBs bust at a higher rate than less important positions. The potential payoff justifies the risk. The two positions least likely to bust are safety and guard, because they're relatively unimportant. Teams won't take a S or G in the first round unless they're extremely confident he'll be a good starter. So neither I nor anyone else can guarantee you anything, but we can hope, and it's a pretty realistic hope, because all 3 of the guys you mentioned have a lot of upside. They all have some red flags, too. I think Luck has the fewest red flags by a decent margin, but I still wouldn't dream of calling him a guaranteed Pro Bowler. (Which is a more fair criterion than Hall of Famer. There's only 23 QBs in the Hall of Fame.) Even Peyton Manning, arguably the closest thing to a guaranteed QB prospect in NFL history, had some uncertainty around him when he was drafted.

Well that's good. Still wish they'd dump Kelsay instead of Ellis, though.

Defense can usually be turned around quicker than offense. We might be halfway competent with as little a change as hiring a real NFL defensive coordinator. QB and O-line take the longest to develop. Let's focus on them this offseason, and maybe by the time they're any good, we'll have been able to fix the defense.

100 out of 100 GMs say that they *did* draft the best player available, whether they actually reached to fill a need or not. GMs are the worst people to listen to when it comes to the draft, because their entire focus is keeping their job. Which means 1.) not letting other GMs know their strategy, and 2.) trying to make themselves seem really smart in the eyes of the fans and the team's owner. Former GMs tend to be a little more forthright, and usually they come down somewhere around "take the best player who fills a need." Anyway, regarding the Spiller pick specifically: That may yet become a good move, but it isn't one yet. Why not? Because Spiller hasn't really done anything! He's the #9 pick and he only touches the ball about 5-10 times a game. And he's looked good at times, but he certainly hasn't dominated at any point. He's got a lot of potential and he's not a bust or anything, but in terms of real world production, Spiller has not lived up to what you expect out of a #9 pick so far. Especially since he was supposedly the best player available (by far, depending on who you ask). Jahvid Best is a similar player who's looked a lot better and produced a lot more so far. So picking Spiller has yet to be validated as a good move. What has? I'll say signing Andra Davis. Cheap contract, not a bad player, one of the very few who fits the scheme. Would probably be a marginal starter or top backup on a really good defense, but instead, he's one of our best defenders. I can't really endorse any of our other FA signings as good moves yet. Cornell Green is horrible, Dwan Edwards has surprisingly sucked (he frequently gets pushed back 3-4 yards on run plays, and is a major part of the problems with the run D), Torbor and Ayodele have been pretty invisible and don't really play much anyway. But both make very little, so if either fails to suck, I'd call that signing a good move.

This is the time to *trade* Maybin, not play him. The more PT he gets, the more he shows how bad he is. He's still young enough and inexperienced enough that someone can talk himself into thinking that he can turn Maybin around. Every snap Maybin plays lowers his price. It's not like this is unprecedented. The Bucs drafted Gaines Adams #4 overall in 2007, and traded for a 2nd-round pick in 2009. Now, Adams actually had some production (12.5 sacks combined in first 2 years, made All-Rookie Team), so we wouldn't be getting anything like a #2, but the point is that we could still get something instead of cutting Maybin for nothing.

Wow. This Bills front office continues to perplex me. McCargo has been a healthy scratch in every game this year, and when everyone on the d-line is healthy, both McCargo and Carrington have been healthy scratches, so there isn't exactly a need at the position. Meanwhile, Chris Ellis has played in every game and even started in week 1. As another poster pointed out, how does it make sense that Ellis started week 1 and played well, then saw his PT decrease each week, and is now cut? How much of a coincidence is it that the D has gotten worse as Ellis has played less? (Probably a lot.) To my amateur eye, Ellis has consistently looked better than Kelsay at OLB, whether in preseason or regular season. But Ellis got cut and Kelsay got an extension. "Yeah, but the Bills' front office are professionals and know more than you." Do they? Uwe Boll is a professional filmmaker, but I'd say anyone who's taken a few film study classes knows more about movies than Boll. When the team has zero wins, they don't get the benefit of the doubt on counter-intuitive moves. Ellis is no great shakes, but from what I'd seen, he had been playing fairly well. And with Moats still out for a couple more weeks, doesn't it seem like we're a little short at OLB? On the bright side, this may mean that Antonio Coleman sees the field at some point. Probably just on special teams once Moats comes back, but we'll see. I'd rather see Moats or Coleman playing than Ellis, because they're younger and have more upside. But I'd much, much, MUCH rather see Ellis playing than Kelsay. Or Maybin. Seeing Maybin on the field just depresses me.

Well said. Just because he's overpaid and overdrafted doesn't mean he sucks. He's a good (not great) player, and would start for probably most teams in the league.

When your head coach was most recently fired in-season from his coordinator job, and not considered for any coordinator openings, what do you expect?

The Harp is awesome, and so is Bleacher Bar! The Bills Backers of Fenway are celebrating their 1-year anniversary of gathering at Bleacher Bar for the Bills games. Located on Yawkey Way literally underneath Fenway Park. All TVs have the Bills game, as well as the sound, and the Shout! song is played if and when the Bills manage a score (which is pretty likely tomorrow, b/c Jax's D is terrible). Also, I think in honor of the 1-year anniversary, they're doing a Garbage Plate thing tomorrow. Both bars are tremendous places to watch a Bills game with fellow Western NYers. I'd recommend going to whichever one is easier for you to get to.

It's surprising that none of the four split-end type receivers from that draft have done anything promising so far, and all 4 look like busts. Jordy Nelson is big (like 6'3") and decent, but he exclusively played the slot in college, and I believe plays the slot for Green Bay. I really don't fault the Bills for this particular draft bust. Nelson went before our pick, and the 2 good receivers in that round (Royal & Jackson) are both little skinny guys. Our receiving corps at the time was Lee Evans, Josh Reed, and Roscoe Parrish. Royal is basically a younger Josh Reed and probably wouldn't have helped us. Jackson's really good, but doesn't really bring anything to the table that Evans & Parrish don't already. Plus, as the Kolb/Vick situation has shown, Jackson really can't do much unless he has a QB who can get him the ball deep.

I like the over.