Search the Community

This is a great topic. Now that we have a few years of work under Levy/Jauron et al, we can objectively compare how much "better" we are from the dredges of the Donahoe years. Donahoe's 1st round picks, for the most part, were pretty awful. Bledsoe (traded a #1), Williams, McGahee, Losman. McGahee is still a player in this league, and has had some success since leaving, so in a player perspective, he still can play, but for Buffalo, obviously, this is nill. So I think on McGahee its a special case since Williams and Losman simply can't play in the league as it stands. There ARE believe it or not some Donahoe hits in the draft. The 2001 draft was really good, to be honest. Nate Clements, Aaron Schobel, Travis Henry, Jonas Jennings all in the first day. That's pretty impressive. 3 Pro Bowlers, and 4 starters in day 1? OK. Sure, Henry is a felon now, and Jennings is certainly up there, and making a ton of money on bad knees in SF w/Clements, but you can't deny, at the time, the efficacy of that draft. Jason Peters, "the best LT in football" was a Donahoe scrapheep find. As was Jabari Greer who is a starter in this league. Lee Evans, Roscoe Parrish, Josh Reed are still here. How about those Bills Special Teams? Moorman, Lindell, McGee, and Parrish all Donahoe finds. Angelo Crowell is still a starter in this league. Takeo Spikes and Fletcher had a couple really good years here. Despite his many mistakes, and I do credit a lot of our problems to Donahoe's long term errors, but he DID actually get some talent in here, despite everyone's hatred for the man. Levy has his busts too, McCargo is glaring. Whitner is arguable suggestion, especially at 8th overall. You need Ed Reed at 8th overall, not a guy with I still think only 1 INT in his career. They have a good running back when he's not suspended or arrested. I like Edwards, lets just hope he stays healthy. All in all, the above poster with regards to average record put it best. We haven't really had much difference. Average record w/TD 6-10, avg w/Jauron/Levy/Brandon, 7-9. Donahoe DOES have a winning season on his record, and an 8-8. So that does count in his favor. But nonetheless, we're still almost 10 years removed from the postseason, and still a coupel BIG holes to fill if we really wanna compete next year. I actually have to do work now. Out.

Franchise him? That is always the worst way to go, especially with a QB! Look at that trade the Pats had to make just to dump Cassell's one year 12 Mil. contract. They "tossed" in a terrific veteran linebacker with a couple of good years still in him in Vrabel, and still didn't even get a #1 pick back from KC. Why? Because the Chiefs had to deal with that insane contract of course, that's why. Besides, the Bills have not used the franchise tag since.....wow, I don't remember the last time they used it. Have they ever used it? They could have and should have used it on Nate Clements. Not that Nate has lived up to his contract he ended up signing with in SF, the Bills still could have used his talent for at least one more season, and ended up spending less then the 49ers gave him.

Firstly I would always want to believe and do believe, that Pete Metzelaars and Frank Reich are excellent coaches. We have no way of knowing if that's true but everything we know about them would suggest that they are excellent coaches and not riding some sort of Polian gravy train. And it does seem odd and unfortunate that so few of the men from our Super Bowl teams have any affiliation with the team. Even more curious because Marv was GM for two years and his tenure might have been an opportunity to recruit some alums from our glory years. I think what it might come down to is that few Bills from the Super Bowl years are still in football. That was roughly 15 years ago. On top of that few of the Bills great players (Smith, Kelly, Thomas, Reed, Hull, Bennett, Talley, Conlan, etc) ever went into coaching or administration. Not only did none of the all time greats stay in the game but none of the role players did either. Ray Bentley coached indoors for awhile. You could imagine guys like Rob Riddick or Nate Odomes coaching in the league but they never did. Steve Tasker works in broadcasting. John Butler passed away. The Bills employ one of the few players from those teams still in the NFL, Mark Kelso who's an analyst on Bills radio broadcasts. There actually seems to be very few former Bills players from any era working in the NFL. I think James Lofton might still be in football, and former Bills DB Martin Mayhew is GM of the Detroit Lions. Former Bills QB James Harris the first black QB to start a season opener, (Bills, 1969) was a long time VP Player Personnel with Jacksonville and works with Mayhew in Detroit now. Paul Maguire does college football broadcasts I believe. There's just not that many Bills from that or any era working in the NFL it seems.

While the Ball State alums do bring up valid points, coming from someone who never really "got" college football, last year's UB football season was some of the most fun I had watching football in a looong time. Isn't that what its supposed to be, fun? The players genuinely enjoyed being on the field, playing for pride, and pretty much, nothing else. That's what its about folks, connecting oneself to the bigger picture. Thats what a good sports story is. Was Willy the best QB in college football? Of course not. There is something to be said about A LOT of people that are paid big money to do what we're doing right now, talk about football, that believe Willy to be a pretty talented player. He made some GREAT throws last year, and, actually uses the laces by the way. When Nate Davis got drafted, Jaws was going on and on about his flawed footwork and mechanics. Mechanics can be corrected, but retraining YEARS of muscle memory is going to be a challenge. I'm not an athlete, but I can tell you that much. Was it the best football you'll ever watch? Obviously not, its a mid major conference. But at least it was fun. You can feel that the coaches are in charge of the situation and wont make boneheaded, terrible game-day decisions like professional buffalo football coaches. Take it for what its worth. Tickets are free, or REALLY cheap. The band is good. Some of the cheerleaders are good looking. Oh, and there's not a crowd full of wasted idiots that cant stop shouting incessant nonsense the whole time. At a recent Sabres game, the guy right next to me could not go literally a minute without shouting "FIRE REGIERRRRRRR" Seriously, they heard you, and please just watch hockey and shut up. Ill tell ya what, for free, I'll go to as many UB games as possible.

bringing the discussion back to Drew Willy, since this thread was originally about him before some disgruntled people brought up Nate Davis and Big Ben.. after the 'Fins released John Beck, he got signed up by the Baltimore Ravens - is Drew Willy still with them? that would add another player int he competition for the backup position.. http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2009/foot...s.ap/index.html

They also thought Nate Clements was worth $80 Million

Hey, they signed Nate Clements!

Am I the only one out here who is terrified that, god forbid, Trent goes down with a serious injury this season? Our depth at quarterback is almost laughable. We picked up Ryan Fitzpatrick who displayed glimpses of mediocrity last year for the Bungles (I'm not impressed). Coming off the bench we have Gibran Hamdan. I know he's good buddies with Trent and that's really sweet........but I'm pretty certain that he would not be able to step up and lead this team. Finally, we have Matt Baker, "the human paperweight." Enough said. My main point being.....why didn't we take a shot on a "groomable" QB in rounds 4-7? In lieu of selecting 3 defensive backs in the latter rounds we could have had a guy like Graham Harrell (went undrafted), Stephen McGee, Nate Davis, etc... I know we had to address a lot of needs in this draft, but I really was hoping we would take a QB somewhere along the line. I like our early round picks. I am really excited about the potential of out o-line. I'm a little confused about what they were thinking in rounds 5-7.

Actually, they did not use the Poison Pill clause, but no point in using facts to back your argument. Here is an exerpt from the Globe about the trade for Welker. By that point, the only question was how to finalize the process. The Patriots were prepared to sign Welker to an offer sheet that included a "poison pill" that would make it difficult for the Dolphins to match. Yet in hopes of avoiding the bad blood that sometimes can accompany offer sheets - the Seahawks and Vikings recently engaged in a nasty back and forth with offensive lineman Steve Hutchinson and receiver Nate Burleson exchanging teams via offer sheets - the Patriots instead called the Dolphins and proposed a trade. The Dolphins were amenable, shipping Welker to the Patriots for second- and seventh-round draft choices. The Dolphins used the second-rounder (60th overall) to select Hawaii center Samson Satele, who has started all six games this season. The seventh-round pick (238th overall) yielded Abraham Wright, a linebacker from Colorado who has been inactive for every game

Fine, let's go over the list. This kind of crap gets really old, but sometimes people's noses have to be rubbed in it. Parish has, for the past two years been the top punt returner in the league. Period. He doesn't get a lot of reps at receiver because we have had too many people in front of him. He's a top talent in the return game. In case you have forgotten there are three phases to an NFL game, all of them important. Parrish's stats are as follows: http://sports.espn.go.com/nfl/players/stats?playerId=8469 Just for a summary, he's had 94 PRs in 54 games since he was drafted totaling 1312 and 3 TDs. No other punt returner has better numbers. As for Fred Jackson, last year, his stats were as follows: http://sports.espn.go.com/nfl/players/stats?playerId=10195 As a BACKUP running back, Fred Jackson has 188 carries for 871yds, good for a 4.6ypc average. You show me another backup running back that has those kinds of stats, and who carried for 110 yds against the Patriots Defense. You won't. Josh Reed has been playing out of his best position, the slot for the past three years. He will be back at that position this year. As a number three receiver, he has the following stats: http://sports.espn.go.com/nfl/players/stats?playerId=3564 No one is saying that he is a top ten receiver, but he is one of the five best #3's in the game. Schobel is one a top-ten or twelve DE when healthy. Look at his career numbers. http://sports.espn.go.com/nfl/players/stats?playerId=2594 In his first seven injury free seasons he had 67 sacks. That's 9.75 per season. That's elite range. Averaging 10 per year is considered elite. He's right there. With him healthy again this season, and Maybin to take away double teams on passing downs, Schobel will get to ten sacks again. As for the rest of your list. McGee is widely talked about as a top ten corner in the league. His stats as a CB show why: http://sports.espn.go.com/nfl/players/stats?playerId=4569 Compare those statistics over the last two years with the player that McGee replaced in Nate Clements who was and is considered to be one of the top cover CBs in the NFL. His stats are as follows: http://sports.espn.go.com/nfl/players/stats?playerId=2569 Please note the clear similarities and in some cases better stats that McGee has accumulated in his six years compared to Clements in his 9 years. Kawika Mitchell is one of the top-fifteen OLBs in football. I'm tired of posting stats for you. Before making stupid statements you should look them up yourself. As for Youboty and Poz, they are still basically rookies. Poz played his first full season last year and looked strong at MLB. I'm not saying he was top fifteen last year, but the potential for him is there, and he's very young. I know you're probably a Jets or Patriots fan because that's the cool thing to be. Just because the Bills are a small market and don't get a lot of love from the TV personalities on ESPN or FOX doesn't mean there isn't a lot of talent on this team. You mentioned that no one has mentioned the talent on the OL. Fine, quick, and without looking it up on ESPN or at Stats Inc. name me the five starters on Miami's OL in less than thirty seconds. Unless you rooted for that team you wouldn't be able to. Buffalo's right side last year was one of the best in football statistically. Walker is significantly underrated as an RT and Butler was basically a second year player who played well above expectations. That being said, the "superstar" player on our OL was traded and we now have a completely reworked and more solid OL left to right. Learn how the game is played and actually look up statistics before you go trolling on other teams' message boards. Unless of course your goal in life is to be a full time .

Not ahead of Dubenion. Chuck Pollock picked him (ahead of Moulds, not Duby) because he figured anyone in the HOF automatically deserved a spot. I respect that, but to me, he got into Canton because of his Packers career, not his 3.75 years here. Honestly? I might have put Jerry Butler on the team ahead of him, too. I will say that Lofton was a lot easier to accept than putting Nate Odomes in ahead of both Bob James and Booker Edgerson, though. That's just foolish talk.

The pressure of the MAC championship game did not get to him. I played for baseball for Ball State, and roomed with two football players, one of which is in the NFL now, and I can tell you that any Ball State player would rather beat a MAJOR conference school than worry about winning the MAC Championship in front of 7,000 fans. While a conference title is always your goal, when you actually win the MAC Championship game, you are usually locked into a crappier bowl game than the team that isn't in the title game. In this case though, BSU was undefeated, but assured to be locked out of the BCS which still would have had them playing friggin Tulsa in a bowl even if they beat Buffalo. So, many times, a MAC teams biggest games are the beginning of the year non-conference games against a major power. Nate Davis has taken Ball State into hostile environments and put up 50 plus points at Nebraska, almost won at Michigan, and was winning games against Big Ten and Big East teams at home in Muncie. He also already had performed well the year before in the bowl game vs. Rutgers, which is one of the reasons BSU acquired so many ESPN Prime Time games even before Ball State was 8-0, 9-0, 10-0. Believe me that any player would much rather beat one of those schools than win the Motor City bowl and go on to play another Mid Major in a meaningless bowl game. And Davis performed very well in a number of huge games that BSU played outside of the MAC conference. This is what all made the MAC Championship, bowl game, and combine so puzzling. I don't know what the hell happened to the kid. You had a large number of games to judge him from all thrown out the window for those two games. Makes no sense.

I was bored weeks ago.....still bored really .........but came up with 3 teams Bills Golden Anniversary Team First Team Quarterback – Jim Kelly Running Back – Thurman Thomas Wide Receivers – Andre Reed, Eric Moulds, Jerry Butler Tight End – Pete Metzelaars Offensive Line – Will Wolford, Joe DeLamielleure, Kent Hull, Billy Shaw, House Ballard Defensive Line – Bruce Smith, Tom Sestak, Phil Hansen Linebackers – Mike Stratton, Darryl Talley, Shane Conlan, Cornelius Bennett Safeties – Tony Greene, George Saimes Cornerbacks – Robert James, Butch Byrd Kicker – Steve Christie Punter – Brian Moorman Special Teams – Steve Tasker Coach – Marv Levy Second Team Quarterback – Joe Ferguson Running Back – OJ Simpson Wide Receivers – Elbert Dubenion, Bob Chandler, James Lofton Tight End – Jay Riemersma Offensive Line – Joe Devlin, Reggie McKenzie, Al Bemiller, Ruben Brown, Jim Ritcher Defensive Line – Ron McDole, Freddie Smerlas, Ted Washington Linebackers – Takeo Spikes, Harry Jacobs, Bryce Paup, London Fletcher Safeties – Steve Freeman, Mark Kelso Cornerbacks – Booker Edgerson, Nate Odomes Kicker – Rian Lindell Punter – Chris Mohr Special Teams – Mark Pike Coach – Lou Saban Honorable Mention Quarterback – Jack Kemp Running Back – Cookie Gilchrist Wide Receivers – Lee Evans, Frank Lewis, Peerless Price Tight End – Reuben Gant Offensive Line – Jason Peters, Ken Jones, Stew Barber, Dave Foley, John Fina Defensive Line – Aaron Schobel, Jim Dunaway, Pat Williams Linebackers – Jim Haslett, Shane Nelson, Sam Cowart, Chris Spielman Safeties – Henry Jones, Leonard Smith Cornerbacks – Nate Clements, Antoine Winfield Kicker – Scott Norwood Punter – Paul Maguire Special Teams – Terrence McGee Coach – Chuck Knox

About the Nate Davis point: This is not something to poke fun at but he has a learning disability. This made it hard for him to learn a college playbook and I can only imagine it will be just as hard to learn a pro playbook. Will he be able to play to the level of the NFL now that talent all around him (both side of the ball) has gone up? I hope for his sake that he can, but somehow I doubt he will. He has also shown some serious bad judgement calls. The guy said he was going to stick around for his senior year and then once Brady Hoke left (for San Diego State) he bounced too. He then skipped Ball State's pro day to hold his own. The only team that came to the Nate Davis Pro Day was the Colts, who happen to be in the same state. While Davis may have a better arm and athleticism I think Willy has more intelligence (fair or unfair) when it comes to football. Drew has shown better decision making at the tailend of his career and that is why he has a MAC title and Davis does not. It also helped that in that game UB's defense finally decided to show up. I also feel that Ball State going 12-0 in the regular season is why some people think so highly on Davis. While that is certainly an impressive feat they only beat three teams with winning records. Only Central Michigan, Western Michigan, and Navy finished .500 or better. None of their opponent were ranked. In the end it doesn't matter much, both guys are going to be going to a training camp, one was drafted and one was not. Sure we are all jealous of Nate Davis, just like we are jealous of Drew Willy, they are getting a chance to play pro football. I hope both guys do very well at the pro level, except when they play the Bills or Giants.

My only exposure to Nate Davis was the MAC Championship and the GMAC Bowl. You can understand why I didn't think that highly of him. PTR

Good luck to all the MAC players.. i'm ticked off with the NFL site for completely ignoring the MAC as a conference.. anyone know how many MAC players ended up getting drafted? I don't want to get into the Nate Davis vs. Drew Willy argument, they both did what they had to, and when it mattered the most in the title game, one did what it took to win, while the other did what it took to throw an excellent season away.. as all of us Bills & Sabres fans know by now, the title at the end is what it's all about.. Go UB Bulls!!

Could've fooled me, because everytime there is a post about Willy and UB, someone ripping Nate Davis has to come up somewhere. It's kind of the inferiority Bills, no respect, factor, that has crept in (I.E. jealousy) to the UB side. Nate Davis had one hell of a career at Ball State. He also dominated the MAC and some very good MAJOR (non-MAC) teams in his career at BSU. No other recent QB in the MAC can even come close to saying the same. I hope Nate recovers, or it's truly a travesty what happened to him. I also hope all of the other MAC players do well in the NFL. The MAC seemed to have a pretty good year this year in getting players drafted.

Dunno about the rest of your post, but I doubt anyone here is jealous of Nate Davis...or at least anymore jealous than they are of anyone who has a chance to play in the NFL.

I'm not sure what happened to Davis in his last two games at Ball State and then at the combine. He just collapsed for some reason. However, as my alma mater, I'm not going to let Davis get torn apart by you guys either (even though I was ready to kill him for tanking against Buffalo and Tulsa). If you want to root for Willy, I think that's great. I wish him luck too. However, Willy couldn't, didn't, or wasn't even close to accomplishing anything near what Davis accomplished in college. Some of you come off so jealous of Nate Davis it's not even funny. Relax, enjoy both QB's and even Hiller from Western Michigan. But please, if you want to talk about a player coming out of school, what they've accomplished, and how good they are, Nate Davis is, by far, the most accomplished MAC QB in quite a while. Again though, I have no idea what the hell happened to him at the end either. And I'm also not sure he can get it back together. One of the biggest mysteries ever.......I think this is a classic case of an agent ruining a young kid. After all, before the end of year and combine IMPLOSION, Davis was thought to be a late first round to second round pick. He was that good. Then, he made his decision to come out, and sucked after that.

im saying it now, of the two prolific MAC QB's he'll be better than nate davis in the NFL, even if he never takes a snap

Jones has a bum knee. And has become a whiner. So I suppose they might axe him to save some $. However, they did cut OT Kirk Barton on Friday, who they picked up the last week of '08. He was scooped up by DET on the waiver wire. If Andrew Whitworth comes back from his injury (bad high ankle sprain), I guess they'd move him back to LT, with Nate Livings at LG, Bobbie Williams at RG, and last years' #4 Anthony Collins at RT. Center is a question for them. Have to wait and see if/when Smith gets any starts...

Actually, most my post have nothing to do with the QB...it was a handful of threads where the debate dragged on that you frequented that gave you that impression... Aside from that, I wouldnt have mind a QB then or now, but at the same time I dont really care if we get one after Nate Davis went off the board. There isnt anyone else out there I think will beat our Fitz any time soon and probably not even Hamdan as the staff supossedly is high on him. So, once Davis went off, I dont see anyone else out there that will make this roster...

Nate Davis....he might be good if you can simplify the playbook.

Hamdan and Trent are very close according to Chris Brown. With Fitzpatrick at #2 there's no room for Willy on the Bills. I like him more than Nate Davis. I hope he gets a shot in the NFL. PTR

Referencing a college player's stats is pretty useless. How many passes did Antonio Gates catch in college? Did he even play college football? Would he have been worthy of a 2nd round pick, in hindsight? I know it's a rare case, speaking about Gates. But you don't draft a "blocking" tight end in the 2nd round. Some TE's made good careers for themselves as blockers that were taken high (Bruener, Brady), but they weren't drafted that high for their blocking that's for sure. As far as Scheffler goes, something has to be up there. Graham is a good player, and the old regime at least really liked Nate Jackson too. I believe he started over Scheffler for a couple of games early in the season. So I'm sure he gets moved. He would be a really nice pickup for the Bills...I just hope they don't overpay. The guy is a really good deep threat for a tight end and could do a lot of good things in Buffalo.