Peevo

I don't get this, there's no mention of hosting any NFL product of any kind in this article. Is there even any interest in 'Cuse hosting an NFL game, regardless of team?

We're all aware the NFL Offseason program is strict in terms of how much actual physical practice time the players get in football drills. For a complete list of rules, click here. Since Josh Allen himself continues to talk about how much work he has to do on his footwork and mechanics, how much can he really get from the team before we're in Training Camp? Once OTA's/Minicamp end, is Josh Allen PROHIBITED from doing footwork drills / passing drills on his own time? Can he work on these things in addition to strength and cardio training he's surely already doing everyday anyway? How can the Bills maximize the time they have to train a raw prospect before preseason opens if the offseason workout regimen is so prohibitive? Is this making fundamental football worse? This may be a completely separate topic, but it seems like so many talented, but raw, football players enter pro ball with such few technical abilities, like solo tackling, catching, holding onto the football with two hands, etc, that they never seem to correct these issues before it catches up to them in game action. Since there's no formal prospect development system in football, guys like Allen, who COULD be really good, tend to flame out on bad teams because they simply don't have enough time to teach them the position. I recognize the rationale for limited practices. Somebody VERY important will blow his knee out on the first day of OTA's, and the lead column on ESPN/ProFootballTalk will be "Why OTA's need to end, now.." This is a nuanced argument. I guess what I'm getting at is that I'm very concerned there just isn't enough practice time in the offseason schedule to get a rookie QB ready. How does he really learn the game? Live reps. He makes mistakes, the team struggles, and fans get antsy for change. Coaches get fired. New systems, new terminology, new players and the process repeats itself. We could be onto the 3rd OC in 3 seasons under McBeane should Allen predictably show flashes, but struggle with an NFL passing offense.

I don't disagree, but I don't think the coach wants any extra attention on his players and staff. It's fair to say McDermott would practice at 5 am everyday for 2 weeks straight with no fan attendance, no evening practices, and no media in attendance, if he could. They worked out, what, 13 times in Rochester last year? I think it was the shortest Training Camp at Fisher since the agreement began. It's a small, private, affluent suburban college that does very little (read, literally nothing) to accommodate crowds, walk-up traffic, parking. The college doesn't want people there, and the team doesn't really want people there either. If this were at UB, as example, there'd be more than enough room for access, infrastructure, parking, amenities, activities, etc. It's actually a way better idea, but the Bills would never do it. I think if you're reading the tea leaves correctly, should Beane and McDermott last here beyond 2020, training camp in Rochester is not gonna last much longer. I give it to the end of their agreement, which I think is 3 more years, including this one.

Yes, it is super risky to pay assets to trade up for a QB that history shows is likely a bust anyway. But if Bills wait, and play it "smart", they may be out of QB options by 12, and then all the fans and writers and media KILL them for that. So doing it "right" gets you criticism. Trading up gets you criticism. There's no option that someone won't have a defensible critique of. On this whole "football first" thing, I feel this is all American pseudo patriotic capitalist nonsense. Does ANYONE here like their job, all the time, regardless of conditions? Answer this question honestly. Do you like your job? Is it fair to expect a professional football player, one who is under constant scrutiny, constant derision, let alone the massive physical and mental beating he's gonna undertake as the starting QB of the Buffalo Bills, you really think he's gonna be jazzed about coming to work every day, all the time? At least Ryan O'Reilly admitted the truth, that losing sucks, and it beats you down. He's a human person. I don't need Josh Rosen to LIKE being a QB. I don't care at all. I really just need him to be good. Whether you may think there has to be a link between loving the craft and succeeding in the craft is arguable. I just choose to reject that argument. Plenty of people are great at what they hate doing. It's this sad, American capitalist argument, that we all should just LOVE our jobs, and love work because that's what Americans do. I don't live to work. I work to live. Furthermore, most evidence says we work too much, and earn too little. If Josh Rosen wants to play football to earn enough money to pursue his actual passions and interests, good for him. That's what life's about. No one criticizes the doctor who loves boating, and travel. Or the lawyer who puts his money and time into charitable causes. (these are just made up examples). That a public figure, especially a guy that plays a dumb game for a loving, MUST always be job first, all the time, without consequence, is completely unreasonable.

See I agree with this. He made, what, 44 starts as a Bill? That's the most for a Bills QB in a long time. EJ Manuel was a 1st round pick and made 18 starts as a Bill! Think about the playing time versus investment. Tyrod was signed as a throwaway free agent, and ends up starting full time for a decent stretch. His body of work speaks for itself. 3,000 yards passing a season is nowhere near the NFL passing standard in 2018. He has 1, count it, 1, 300 yard game in his career. Not enough.

I subscribe to the "broken" emotional fan you describe above. It's just been too long, and I'm too young to know of the "glory days" when the team lost a bunch of Super Bowls in a row. It's not so much the ability to see the Bills as winners, as I doubt they'll get the help. The odds are something like 13% the Bills win and get all the help they need. So it's not looking good, and that's LIKELY. It's more likely they miss than get in. That's a fact. I can't take much more of this "wait 4 months until the Patriots win the Super Bowl" thing. It's depressing, predictable, boring, and stupid. Nobody cares, nobody likes it, nobody wants to see this again. They'll win another one, and Belichick will COMPLAIN at the postgame podium about how much less time his team has to prepare for the draft after all these long playoff runs. And the wheel keeps turning. Someone needs to put a bullet in my head. I'm at a complete emotional loss. A lot of fans that for some reason either convince themselves (lie to themselves) that they're gonna win each week get on the "naysayers" that offer a reasonable, fact-based, objective perspective. Somehow I'm a bad guy for not believing in a team that's known for nothing but losing virtually their entire existence. They're a franchise loser, with a 408-467-8 overall record. They'd need years of sustained, consistent winning to just get back to .500 overall. The future is bleak. Let Morty explain this better than I can.

You clearly didn't read what I wrote.

Asking as if he can't understand what this means, or why fans would consider the freakishly Greek tragic ways the Bills lose all these important games, with different players and different coaches is awfully tone deaf. It's not that listeners aren't aware of the fact that Murphy is a Bills employee. I NEED to have Murphy give the listeners more credit than that. Like, not understanding why Bills fans are so broken by a generation of losing for the sake of your employer is terribly dishonest. Tone deaf is the best way I can describe it. It's similar to the classic rock station in town blissfully unaware that that CCR song they just came out of is pushing 50 (!) years old. It's not new. Can't you admit, that I dunno, Nirvana is band after 30 years? It's tone deaf. Just admit your faults and move on. No one is judging you, John. I just need a sense of place, humility, accuracy and accountability. Just be honest about the fact the Bills ARE irrelevant and they lose more often than they win. These are not opinions. They have more losing seasons than winning ones in their franchise history. Just be honest. I think listeners will respect that more.

Meh. Perhaps this is the CBS/Buffalo D list NFL treatment, but they rarely show alignments, coverages, hell you rarely get replays during Bills' TV broadcasts. Especially on critical 3rd down stops, or a questionable penalty that extends a drive, etc. I'd rather them cut to a game that's interesting. One could argue 1:00 PM redzone is TOO intense, fast-paced, because it's constant action, no replays, no challenges, no injuries, no penalties, etc. Severe injuries appear to be an every-play occurrence, allowing for more vamping from the also-ran uninteresting fluff CBS crew. "Great stuff Steve, let's go down to attractive blonde lady on the sidelines" Attractive blonde lady asks milquetoast, generic questions that offer no insight to the game or plays at hand, she nods accordingly to every boring thing football coach X says, and its "back to you guys." "Thanks Suzie! That halftime report brought to you by Geico..." Or just the lack of any interesting thing from color analysts too. Bills are 4th and 2 down 9 with 11:00 to go 4th quarter on +43, "oh, well they HAVE to punt this here, there's no way you go for it this early.." "Right you are Rich, punt the ball, put it in the hands of your defense to get a stop and try to win the game." UGHH. And the MNF guys are no exception. You've got Gruden, who has a very small sample size of any NFL coaching success, devolve into some obtuse parody of himself. "I'll tell ya right here man, ya go X y stick z yellow stick y banana cumquad on 3, right there man" It sounds super cool on television, but it's literally just an unintelligible garble of nonsense. That COULD be a football play, or it could just be a bunch of random gobbledygook. But SUPER BOWL WINNING COACH Jon Gruden said it, so OK.

Agreed. I don't have cable, and my TV viewing experience has improved tremendously. There's so much good stuff on Netflix and Hulu, all commercial free. It's too much to watch, and that's only 2 services. I went to my buddy's to watch Game of Thrones once a week. Pro sports has not adjusted to the commercial free, "over the top" consumption model of modern streaming services. While I doubt we'll get to a point where live pro sports will eliminate spots, they need to figure out a way to either charge more for commercials and air less of them, or air longer commercial breaks but less net commercial time. Something's gotta give. The sponsorships are brutal too. "This Toyota.com replay brought to you by Geico, 15 minutes could save you 15 percent or more on car insurance. Geico.com technology partners are brought to you by Sprint. Switch to Sprint and get a new iPhone! Details in store. That store brought to you by Target. Target run, and done!

This may be true across the league, but I'm speaking to the professionalism level of the broadcast itself. Lots of bad cuts, mistakes and bad camera angles. This is CBS, network level TV production. It should be the best of the best. There's no excuse for mistakes at that level. It speaks to the irrelevancy of the Bills. To CBS, who cares if there's mistakes, it's the Bills.

I realize the Bills, and subsequently the requisite CBS broadcast of them, are probably the lowest ring on the broadcasting ladder for the network during the season, but holy crap it's gotten so bad. This is not even to necessarily bag on Harlan and Gannon, who are your usual say nothing actually interesting or critical types, it's just the whole damn production. How many important yet questionable plays a week do you NEVER get a replay on? It's a close 3rd down conversion, or an important 3rd down penalty, or a really close "was it a catch?" type play, and you don't even get to see it again. We get 3 minutes of screen time of a maybe-injured referee on the sideline, yet no shot of what's going with the actual game. 3 and out after 3 and out, do we get a look at if the receivers are getting open? Is the offensive line struggling against the Carolina front seven? Give me something, instead we get a ref chirping to McDermott on the sideline and complaining about going to the locker room. We get a terrible, shaky-cam close up of either another camera man or some useless coach on the sideline? What the hell was that shot yesterday? In TV a "technical director" is supposed to know whether to cut to "camera 1, camera 2, or camera 3" so as to know that the camera on that feed ISN'T A HORRIBLE CLOSE UP OF SOMETHING THAT'S USELESS TO THE PRODUCTION. Do these people not exist for the CBS Bills coverage? Did anyone notice the 3 second satellite CBS rejoin filler before the game came back on TV? Like, instead of CBS and WIVB synching exactly at 1:30 from network to local break and back to the network, they seriously thought "CBS Buffalo/Carolina NFL Game" TV card was suitable for broadcasting to the air. It's so amateurish and embarrassing. It's gotten so bad I don't know if I can stomach an entire season of this college broadcasting class level TV. You can bag on Michaels and Collinsworth all you want but at least the NBC cameras look good, and the transitions are smooth, breaks are seamless. Am I alone in this thought?

A fair point, but one could argue Kyburn is a scientist, a necromancer. He raised the Mountain from the dead with science, not magic. It is technically different. He used the technology and means of his time to "resurrect" him. I think it is an important distinction. I really like how one could argue that Sam and Kyburn are opposites. Both left the Citadel because they want to be harbingers of change, not just history. Kyburn's ideas are too radical, yet prove they yield results. Not just with the mountain, see the scorpion. That weapon was a marvel of medieval engineering; how it so easily moved on its tilt, aimed and reloaded with efficiency. Kyburn knows his stuff, despite his wretched intentions. Sam doesn't want to record the histories "of better men," and so sets out to make history himself. He already cracked the biggest mystery of the seven kingdoms, is one of 2 living people to kill an ice zombie demon of the Apocalypse, and is in the heart of the battle to come. Could he be the one retelling "the song of ice and fire" to young students at the Citadel when the story ends? The fact he's a chubby dude named Sam, a la LOTR, and hangs out with all of the major characters can't be a coincidence. Ugh. We all should start working out, eating healthy and hope North Korea doesn't start the actual Game of Thrones before 2019.

Meh. The Greyjoys are in my opinion the most useless House and most useless storyline in the entire plot. Why should I root for yet another Theon redemption arc? What's the point of them at all? They serve no purpose, other than to ferry a few dozen thousand soldiers over the Narrow Sea to add to the Night King's roster.

It's tough. I think to level the playing field, (which I think already is a stretch considering how broken the Night King already is) a dragon HAD to die. I mean, what's sicker than ice zombies v dragons than ICE ZOMBIE DRAGONS V DRAGONS? Even though Khaleesi still has the dragonvantage (sorry, had to), I still don't see how team pulse makes it out on top in 6 episodes. The dead are at least 100,000 and climbing, and you've only got 2 armies committed to the cause. Could The Kingslayer himself use his Valyrian steel to take out the Night King? Could he be Azor Ahai all along? It seems like Jamie's gone full good guy and leaving his sister for good. We'll see if he it makes to the North alive. Despite some pacing/clumsy issues with this season, is there really any debate we've lived the greatest television event in history? What tops this damn show?

I think rebuilding/tanking is more a question of end goals. If the Bills want to win championships, and consistently compete for one, they're very unlikely to do so as the team is presently constructed. Tyrod Taylor is very likely not the answer long term, and without that QB, you're stuck. Even "if the defense improves, if they get lucky on calls, if the qb sees the middle of the field, if Watkins, Wood, McCoy, Darby K.Williams, Dareus et al stay healty...." and they get all the breaks and actually break the drought, what happens next? No one in their right mind bets the Bills in the playoffs. What's the point of any of this? NE will represent the AFC in the Super Bowl again, or it least is certain to appear in the Conference title game. If we want to win championships, maybe it's best to think long and hard about what we really want out of this year. But once again, it appears the Bills are middling it. Getting another 1st round pick next season, but bringing back Kyle Williams, LeSean McCoy and other aging veterans. You want to "build for the future" and "trust the process" but also want to "win every practice, every preseason game, and as many regular season games as we can." It's a mixed message. Are you "trusting the process" or "leading the charge" (to 7-9)?

This is an interesting analysis. I don't what really the answer is. Ultimately, I as a fan want a championship. It's very unrealistic for the Bills or Sabres this season to seriously compete for one. That's how tanking gets into the conversation. Patriots domination of the AFC, the terrible state of QB play overall in the league, and the playoff format makes it very, very hard for Buffalo to clinch a spot every season. So what is the goal? You have to be VERY bad to clinch the 1st pick, and you have to be the Patriots to win a championship. The Bills are about exactly halfway between these two realities. What's the point? The NFL has a problem on its hands and no one seems to care. When you have 1 team that has a chance at winning, realistically winning it all, what is the point of any of this? I honestly have no hope left. I can't conceive a reality in which the Bills are ever good. I'm broken. Cue the Pantera riff.

I don't really even think the players care that much. The schedule should be first and foremost about competitive balance and equal opportunity. The Patriots domination of the AFC East has shifted the balance of power so far in their direction, it would benefit other AFC contenders to not have them walk into a first round bye every season. Think about it, New England has to win one playoff game to lock in their spot in the AFC title game every year. That's insane. The system is desperate need of reform.

This is so good. I completely agree. Why is the NFL so desperate to make "Bills-Jets" happen? 3 straight years on Thursday Night Football. Stop trying to make it happen. It's never going to happen. I hate the old rivalries, the entire system is completely flawed and is desperate need of change. Why so many fans are so hesitant to any new ideas that COULD MAKE THE BILLS COMPETITIVE is beyond this poster.

Disagree. Buffalo is more a Great Lakes, rust belt city than it is North East, like Boston, New York and Baltimore. The "Rust Belt" division of Cleveland, Buffalo, Pittsburgh, Detroit, or Cincy is a fun, geographically easy idea that would get killer road trip rivalries. The winner each year could literally win 'the Rust Belt," a "once proud," "looked really cool in the 1960's" championship belt that would be passed along team to team every year. It fits so well on the highways I literally see no reason why the NFL should't do this. Realignment and relegation are sorely needed in this sport.

I agree with the above posters about NE. It's borderline impossible to compete with them in the AFC. There are MAYBE two teams in the entire conference that could potentially beat them in the Conference title game. B + B have set an incredible, unattainable standard for NFL success. Similar to the western conference in the NBA, the best you can hope for is to get into the playoffs and maybe win one game against the Warriors. There's literally no hope for 29, maybe 28 NBA markets. How the leagues of both of these powerhouses throw their hands up at at it and refuse to act speaks volumes. What can you do? The only option available is to realign the conferences or divisions and make the Patriots someone else's problem every year. And that's only to help the Bills end their playoff drought. Seriously, no snark, who can beat NE in the playoffs? Pittsburgh? Maybe Denver? Who else? What's the point of following this stupid sport if there's virtually no hope for a team to win besides fans of New England? It's utterly hopeless. If you can't tell, this whole 17 year playoff drought has changed my attitude about the world for the worse.

I just can't process how anyone, even correctly, predicting 7-9, 8-8, 9-7, is somehow either A) satisfied with that performance, and/or B) thinks that's somehow a mark of a successful NFL season. Vegas has the Bills at +/- 6 wins. Those that make insane profits on correctly predicting sports outcomes don't think the Bills will do too well this season.

Why is 9-7 the goal? If you're gonna go 9-7 in the AFC East you're almost certainly missing the playoffs again. The Bills did it twice themselves during the drought. I'm over being mediocre. Seriously. I'd rather be 1-15 and guarantee myself at least one very high pick than go 9-7, draft 17th again, and "wait till next season to get the QB cause we all know how highly rated they are compared to this year's crop." Does it guarantee them a winning team? No. Spare me the list of teams that tanked and didn't win. Would you rather be the Bucs, Titans, or Bills right now? Be objective. I choose Tennessee. Talented young QB with lots of weapons. We have to give up on the idea of getting a wild card and losing in the 1st round by 34 points as some sort of victory. When is this team gonna go 13-3 and win home field? Control the AFC? Call me when Brady retires and Belichick somehow croaks. Until then, hope for the worst cause that's the best situation we could have.

Jesus Christ.

Personally, as "millenial" Bills fan who rarely tailgates, I'm usually embarrassed by the Billsmerfia stupidity. I'm also a pretty judgmental wrestling fan and they often botch the moves they try to sell. If you're gonna go for the AA, bend your knees and get the guy over your head. It's hard for a reason, you gotta be in good shape to sell the bumps correctly. Just use the damn table WWE uses so it breaks cleanly and looks right! I can't believe I just openly complained about the quality of backyard wrestling at Bills tailgates. But that's beside the point. As much as it pains me to say it, the chubby kid at about 7 mins in says it best, "if you don't like the table slams, don't watch it." It's one example of a group of fans that CHOOSE to risk bodily injury week in and week out for their own supposed entertainment. No one is pressuring anyone else to do anything else. As strange as this is going to sound, the concept of letting fans police themselves and reap the consequences sounds pretty liberating in 2017. I don't want people to get hurt, and I don't want people deliberately hurting other people. But if two consenting adults want to throw amateurish, shoddy wrestling moves on each other for fun, they know the risks and it's only gonna hurt their tailbones and their pride. And it's sorta grating to read old-timers wax nostalgic of "the day" back in the '70's. If you hit it so hard back then, why are you criticizing the next generation? You can't in one sentence boast about how hard you guys partied, then complain about the kids on your lawn the next.