Be careful what you wish for, Bills fans

[BuffaloRebound]

I have read all of your comments with interest. My take on the subject is this: I have no problem with Shanahan taking over the Bills. Mike's name will give the organization credability. Back during the glory years, free agents would come to Buffalo to play with Kelly, Smith, ect. Polian knew who to contact in order to make things happen. My point is that Buffalo needs one person with credability to join the team, and others will follow. If we somehow make it to SB #5, I will worry about the emotional pain of losing it then. I remember the pain of all four losses. It still stings today if I let it. That pain is STILL better than the crap we have watched this past decade.

 

Excellent post. When you think you are part of a 2nd rate team/organization, you inevitably play like one and other teams expect to beat you. Shanahan or someone like him who has won in the NFL is needed to provide credibility around the League and within the organization itself.

[DrFishfinder]

Some people would complain if they got shot with a brand new, silver bullet.

[thewildrabbit]

This franchise is light years from a championship. How about establishing a foundation of competence on the field and within the organization first? How about pulling a moribund franchise out of the mud, pi$ing away a decade and giving it actual direction first before concerning yourself with a Super Bowl?

 

This team is not light years away, a few PROPER moves and this team makes the playoffs last year, this year.

 

Say the team rewards Jason Peters 2 years ago with a bonus and makes his pay equal to Dockery and Walker. The entire O line is happy and does a better job pass blocking and run blocking. Look at the way they ran the ball against the Jets last season, if they can do that in that game with the proper motivation, then they should do that every game.

 

Once Steve Fairchild quit, Instead of hiring Turd Schonert as your OC you hire an experienced play caller to run the offense. The entire offense performs much better, and both JP and Edwards PROGRESS instead of regressing. When Jim McNally retired, instead of promoting an inexperienced O line coach the team hire's a really good experienced line coach like they did with the D line.

 

Just those few moves make the offense respectable and in the top 15 instead of the bottom 5.

 

The Bills cost cutting moves seem to come back and haunt them, but then you get what you pay for. I'm pretty sure It wasn't just Jauron who made all the idiotic decision's the last few years.

[evilcape]

i would take a superbowl loss every year if i could if it meant us being there year in, year out. You have to win the Conference Championship to appear in the League Championship the Super Bowl. AFC championships still look pretty good on the franchises total record.

[starrymessenger]

Only one NFL championship-winning coach ever won a second one with a new team. That was Weeb Ewbanks with the '59 Colts and '69 Jets. You don't give $50M and a piece of the team just to lose Super Bowl #5. You may think it's better than going 7-9 but trust me, losing the big one hurts the worst of all.

 

PTR

How about 50MM, a piece of the team and total control just to go 8-8 and miss the playoffs. Where's that on your misery index Promo?

Re 50MM- I don't care. Its Ralph's money. Re a piece of Ralph's property- I don't care, its Ralph's property. Re total control, I don't like it. Shanny would be a great coach, but I don't want one person trying to do two jobs.

Why not do it right, like KC for example. Go out and find a good GM and let him hire a good coach. Let both these guys focus on their respective assignments. That is the way to get best value for your buck. The tried and true way.

Unless all this is just another brilliant R Brandon marketing ploy, Ralph appears to have lost his senses. Its starting to look like a recipe for disaster. Looks to me loke we are out there chasing big names to impress people, like the national football media, who despise us anyway.

[PromoTheRobot]

i would take a superbowl loss every year if i could if it meant us being there year in, year out. You have to win the Conference Championship to appear in the League Championship the Super Bowl. AFC championships still look pretty good on the franchises total record.

I need to archive these posts so I can pull them up after we lose another Super Bowl.

 

PTR

[reddogblitz]

I played on the Seattle Seahawks drumline in 2005. I went to every home game and home playoff game. I got to go to the Super Bowl and yeah, we lost. But the season was a great ride. We won many meaningful games down the stretch and won 2 playoff games. Yeah the SB loss was tough, but I just remember all the good times and there were tons. Way more than the one bad day that was the last day of the season. I can surely attest that it was way better than these last 10 seasons with the Bills and no playoffs. Yeah, no big punch in the gut in the end, but also not much winning and meaningful games after halloween.

 

Only one team out of 32 wins it all every year. If your mentality is that you're totally bummed if you don't win the SB, then even if you are a fan of the most successful team in the NFL, you're gong to be bummed 71% of the time. Not good odds.

 

As far as SB winning coaches not re winning, that's true I suppose. But many have won and had playoff runs with other teams. Parcells, Johnson, Gruden, Dungy, Holmgren, Vermeil. Several coaches have gone with different teams like Reeves, Parcells, Holmgren, Vermeil, and of course Weeb. Let's go with a proven winner.

[thewildrabbit]

I need to archive these posts so I can pull them up after we lose another Super Bowl.

 

PTR

Woo hoo, hope you can pull them up next year

[mabden]

Did you live through '91-'94? Trust me, those happy-just-to-be competitive feelings fade pretty fast. You say you'd gladly accept SB loss #5 but it will hurt worse than the other 4 combined!

 

Face it. If Shanny comes to Buffalo it will be the LAST move the Bills make. There will be no Plan B.

 

PTR

 

 

I have "lived" with the Bills since 1974. Seen it all. The SB teams where the best, why? Becasue I got off the coach and jumped up and down, sometimes when it was just a first down. I would save my money to buy tickets to the game, what an experience. My kids where young back then and I would take them up to the local sledding hill for them to "wear out" before the games. That hill was nothing but Bill's hats, jackets and pants. It was great and the pride everyone had for their team was unbelievable. It hurt to loose the sb's, but I live and die with the Bills.

 

This past Sunday I lay'd on the coach with zero emotion for a team I love, but knew would loose in the end.

[PromoTheRobot]

I played on the Seattle Seahawks drumline in 2005. I went to every home game and home playoff game. I got to go to the Super Bowl and yeah, we lost. But the season was a great ride. We won many meaningful games down the stretch and won 2 playoff games. Yeah the SB loss was tough, but I just remember all the good times and there were tons. Way more than the one bad day that was the last day of the season. I can surely attest that it was way better than these last 10 seasons with the Bills and no playoffs. Yeah, no big punch in the gut in the end, but also not much winning and meaningful games after halloween.

 

Only one team out of 32 wins it all every year. If your mentality is that you're totally bummed if you don't win the SB, then even if you are a fan of the most successful team in the NFL, you're gong to be bummed 71% of the time. Not good odds.

 

As far as SB winning coaches not re winning, that's true I suppose. But many have won and had playoff runs with other teams. Parcells, Johnson, Gruden, Dungy, Holmgren, Vermeil. Several coaches have gone with different teams like Reeves, Parcells, Holmgren, Vermeil, and of course Weeb. Let's go with a proven winner.

I just know how it works in Buffalo. No one is going to paint Seattle as "Loser-ville" for losing a Super Bowl. Meanwhile Buffalo is the whipping boy for the national media and depressive local fans. Our losses are magnified 100-fold. In Seattle, you lose a game, maybe a franchise, shrug your shoulders and have a latte.

 

I think this thread is getting off my original point. What I've been trying to say is that if Buffalo really wants to win the big one, the smart way to do it is getting a solid GM to build and organization from the ground up, like most winning franchises do. I'm also pointing out that, historically, SB winning coaches do not have much success with new teams. I'm not dissing Shanny or Ralph for trying to land the big fish. Just saying visions of glory are not guaranteed.

 

But no one who follows the Bills wants to build the team from the ground up. It's too scary hiring people who don't have huge reputations preceding them. We want to do it from the top down. I hope it works. I'll be the first in line for my crow.

 

PTR

[spartacus]

How about 50MM, a piece of the team and total control just to go 8-8 and miss the playoffs. Where's that on your misery index Promo?

Re 50MM- I don't care. Its Ralph's money. Re a piece of Ralph's property- I don't care, its Ralph's property. Re total control, I don't like it. Shanny would be a great coach, but I don't want one person trying to do two jobs.

Why not do it right, like KC for example. Go out and find a good GM and let him hire a good coach. Let both these guys focus on their respective assignments. That is the way to get best value for your buck. The tried and true way.

Unless all this is just another brilliant R Brandon marketing ploy, Ralph appears to have lost his senses. Its starting to look like a recipe for disaster. Looks to me loke we are out there chasing big names to impress people, like the national football media, who despise us anyway.

 

"Go out and find a good GM and let him hire a good coach"

 

This is what they need to do, if for no other reason to disband the "inner circle"

 

 

"Unless all this is just another brilliant R Brandon marketing ploy"

 

Unforunately this is also probably true. doesn't cost Ralph much to pursue these coaches and get the hype rolling.

 

we will see how much Ralph really spends on the next great re-tread.

can you say Jim Haslett

[reddogblitz]

I have "lived" with the Bills since 1974. Seen it all. The SB teams where the best, why? Becasue I got off the coach and jumped up and down, sometimes when it was just a first down. I would save my money to buy tickets to the game, what an experience. My kids where young back then and I would take them up to the local sledding hill for them to "wear out" before the games. That hill was nothing but Bill's hats, jackets and pants. It was great and the pride everyone had for their team was unbelievable. It hurt to loose the sb's, but I live and die with the Bills.

 

This is my point. Sure the SB losses are tough, but getting to them sure is lot of fun. Way more fun than being spared the pain of even getting to the playoffs and losing the SB. Besides, maybe this long drought has taught us a lesson that getting to the SB is a huge accomplishment and we shouldn't feel bad and be bummed forever if we lose. 30 other teams would trade places with the SB loser every year.

[reddogblitz]

What I've been trying to say is that if Buffalo really wants to win the big one, the smart way to do it is getting a solid GM to build and organization from the ground up, like most winning franchises do. I'm also pointing out that, historically, SB winning coaches do not have much success with new teams. I'm not dissing Shanny or Ralph for trying to land the big fish. Just saying visions of glory are not guaranteed.

 

But no one who follows the Bills wants to build the team from the ground up. It's too scary hiring people who don't have huge reputations preceding them. We want to do it from the top down. I hope it works. I'll be the first in line for my crow.

 

We've been trying to build this thing from the ground up for the last 10 years and it's failed, MISERABLY. Time to stop banging our head against the wall and try to bring in somebody who knows what he's doing.

[spartacus]

We've been trying to build this thing from the ground up for the last 10 years and it's failed, MISERABLY. Time to stop banging our head against the wall and try to bring in somebody who knows what he's doing.

 

WRONG

 

You aren't building from the ground up when you don't even have a GM to set the philosophy of the organization and demand the accountability needed to execute the plan.

 

proof that the "inner circle" has not been building from the ground up is the total ineptness of the OL and front 7, premium picks and resources sacrificed for DBs and other "small" positions.

 

I use the word "small" loosely, as the Bills like all of their defenders to be severely undersized from what every other team in the league employs.

[Pine Barrens Mafia]

This is my point. Sure the SB losses are tough, but getting to them sure is lot of fun. Way more fun than being spared the pain of even getting to the playoffs and losing the SB. Besides, maybe this long drought has taught us a lesson that getting to the SB is a huge accomplishment and we shouldn't feel bad and be bummed forever if we lose. 30 other teams would trade places with the SB loser every year.

 

Exactly. Making the SB and losing is better than being eliminated from contention on COlumbus day, only to win 3-4 meaningless games at the end of theyear and lose out on draft position.