BillsFan-4-Ever Posted July 13, 2012 Share Posted July 13, 2012 (edited) selective editing? when did this place start emanating the MSM? Fitz is a stop gap until the Bills can get real young talent. Fitz can = Dilfer Edited July 13, 2012 by BillsFan-4-Ever Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
clayboy54 Posted July 13, 2012 Share Posted July 13, 2012 Let's see this objectively... 1. Tim has been a regular here. 2. Most every TBD thread includes "we're doomed" or some such notion. 3. Tim writes that fans are not as excited as you may think. Sounds accurate to me. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
EasternOHBillsFan Posted July 13, 2012 Share Posted July 13, 2012 http://profootballtalk.nbcsports.com/2012/07/12/pft-live-can-fitzpatrick-turn-the-bills-around/ Very interesting interview on PFT live. However, I was surprised with the seemingly negative tone of Tim Graham's comments. I may be off base, but he seemed to poo poo the positive spin Florio was trying to put on the Bills offseason. I only noticed because it's the first time I've ever heard a "home town" reporter speaking less positively about his team than Florio. Struck me as out of character for Tim. What do you guys think? Be careful, don't criticize him too much- he might take all his toys and go home. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NoSaint Posted July 13, 2012 Share Posted July 13, 2012 I understand what you're doing with this post, but if I recall correctly, Lee was pretty "in demand" this offseason... He had us and the jets. Which is fair. If he could easily turn around any qb though, he'd be the most valuable coach in the league. Thats all I was getting at. Sure we like him, but it's not a gimme that it works out. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
The Senator Posted July 13, 2012 Share Posted July 13, 2012 Obviously, he's no Bucky Brooks Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hapless Bills Fan Posted July 13, 2012 Share Posted July 13, 2012 I'm a longtime lurker, had an account for a couple years, never posted but the season has me excited. I've been interested in getting involved on TBD but its been slow past week or two but this thread is something I wanted to comment on. The guy who started this thread is offended by negativity and his whole thing is negative. He pulled out every negative slanted thing from the interview. I listened to it. I thought Graham came off as excited about the season too and layed out all the reasons. The ONLY thing that stopped him short was Fitz. He said Bills fans were guarded and I think that's accurate at least from my friends I talk to. On the second question Florio himself said QB coaching doesn't always work and mentioned the failed Tebow overhaul from last year. Graham just said its hard for old dogs to learn new tricks and talked about Stevie saying Fitz looked much better throwing to his left. Graham also said he's convinced Fitz played hurt last year. Graham also talked up David Lee and the Wildcat and Brad Smith. On the third question Graham said a lot of great things about Donald Jones. He mentioned T.J. had a prblem with drops and going acrross the middle at NC State which he did. Not some smoking gun accusation exactly. So anyways, one of my pet peeves are people who look for reasons to get upset. This thread is exactly that. I heard a totally different interview than the author of this thread. Thanks for the alternate take on the interview. A significant difference between the Tebow total-overhaul attempt and Lee's attempts to help Fitz is the scope of the overhaul needed. Lee acknowledges that at times Fitz is "deadly accurate", not to be messed with, and that his "funny body" (on the run) throws are good. He made the point that it's a subset of throws, throws when Fitz has time in the pocket, that need change. And it doesn't have to see a lot of success - 1-2 more completions and 1 less interception on average per game would put Fitz up in the top 10, where he was for the first 8 games. I think it's spot on that people are on the fence about Fitz. Teen Insight summarized it well in another thread if Fitz is playing like himself, are we 0-6 or 6-0? They want to know if we're seeing progressive improvement in a serviceable QB who is now getting 1st team reps and coaching attention for the 1st time in his life, or an above-average streak of games for the first half of the year, to be followed by regression to the mean. I think the former, but I understand why there is concern about the latter. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Homey D. Clown Posted July 13, 2012 Share Posted July 13, 2012 While a lot of us around here are excited for the upcoming season, I'm sure we all have a little hesitation, given the good starts the team has enjoyed in recent years with a complete unravel for each, and I also feel like the Sabres awful season has something to do with the tempered excitement sentiment from Tim as well. As far as the Fitzpatrick comments, I tend to agree with him slightly, since we have been down this road with JP and Trent having Turk Shonert.... But this is a new season, different players involved, and I'm taking a we'll see approach on that too. And as far as TJ Graham goes, we haven't had the best of luck with our WR draft picks, he(Tim) was not entirely wrong with his assessment on the drops, and I think that the team may already have more game ready talent on the roster, so TJ will have time to develop, and may not even be a factor this season. I'd be happy to see TJ flourish, but I am also a fan of Donald Jones and the rest of the goon squad if they can stay healthy, plus I also have that desire to see Easley make a splash, I just have a good feeling about the guy, like a lot of TSW members did about Stevie when we were all waiting for Hardy to not be a bust. I can see the OP's point a little, but I probably would have had similar comments in an interview too. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dorkington Posted July 13, 2012 Share Posted July 13, 2012 *shrugs* He makes valid points. We've been excited in the recent past and failed. We've started strong and failed. We need to put it together before talking up this year's team as great. Fitz may or may not improve, there's no guarantees. At the very least he's shown improvement over the last couple of years, but he's still incredibly inconsistent. There is no way that any reasonable person can predict with 100% certainty that we will have a good year, or that Fitz will make giant strides. I'm hopeful both things happen, but that's about all I can be. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Maddog69 Posted July 13, 2012 Share Posted July 13, 2012 He is entitled to his opinion. I for one could not care less what his opinion is. I've never been a big TG fan. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
1B4IDie Posted July 13, 2012 Share Posted July 13, 2012 Wow. You guys really like to attack don't you? I thought the interview slanted a bit negative and I outlined my reasoning and then asked if you thought I was off base and all of a sudden I am super sensitive and looking for negative things to say? For the record, Tim Graham is my favorite Buffalo sportswriter. I read all of his stuff and I agree he is objective and a very good writer. If you go back in the timeline you'd see that I regularly sided with Tim when he used to post here on the board. The ONLY thing about my post I would change is the title, which states the article was negative. I should have put a question mark at the end. I agree with you. Graham sounded irritated and was much more negative than expected. Florio was asking fluff, softball, rah rah questions. In any other team it would be much more rah rah shish boom bah. I wonder if someone pissed in his Wheaties that morning. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BuffaloBill Posted July 13, 2012 Share Posted July 13, 2012 i was surprised that graham suggested the team could win 7 games and still be thrilled by their progress. the notion that they might not surpass the jauron threshold makes me physically ill. No way is seven wins to be considered a "good" season. I might accept missing the playoffs but not a losing season. The Bills need to be in the playoff picture with a winning record going into the final week for this to be a "good" season. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Doc Posted July 13, 2012 Share Posted July 13, 2012 Listened to it and I disagree with the characterization that he said there isn't much excitement. I think he's saying that fans have been burned before, but there was excitement for adding the FA's along with the playmakers they have, and that excitement will build as the season approaches. As for Fitz not being able to improve based on watching boxers, that's ridiculous. And Graham probably won't be the #2 this year. Not to mention I didn't hear of problems with dropping passes or not going across the middle in OTAs/minicamp. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Optometric Insight Posted July 13, 2012 Share Posted July 13, 2012 7-8 wins would be awful for this team in my eyes. The final year of the 3 year plan that the FO set in place and after one great draft and one un-proven, yet still looks great, draft; Getting off to a 5-2 start to lose out to what seemed like depth issues which looks to have been fixed; and the fact that its been so long since this team has made the playoffs. Ending at or below .500 would be disappointing to me. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PromoTheRobot Posted July 13, 2012 Share Posted July 13, 2012 (edited) I think some people are too hung up on QB performance, in that they expect perfection. In all my years of football watching I've yet to see a QB play a perfect game. Even the greats have bad games. Not saying Fitz is one of the greats, just that people's assessment of him can be unrealistic. PTR Edited July 13, 2012 by PromoTheRobot Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
millbank Posted July 13, 2012 Share Posted July 13, 2012 think Tim Graham comments fair enough. Think generally speaking supporters of team are pleased with general direction of team and optimistic , but this tempered by the sobering realities of past failures. Fans will be excited when they actually make playoffs . Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mattsox Posted July 13, 2012 Share Posted July 13, 2012 http://profootballtalk.nbcsports.com/2012/07/12/pft-live-can-fitzpatrick-turn-the-bills-around/ Very interesting interview on PFT live. However, I was surprised with the seemingly negative tone of Tim Graham's comments. I may be off base, but he seemed to poo poo the positive spin Florio was trying to put on the Bills offseason. I only noticed because it's the first time I've ever heard a "home town" reporter speaking less positively about his team than Florio. Struck me as out of character for Tim. What do you guys think? Why did I say he was "negative?" 1- Florio- Great offseason, fans must be excited. Graham- Bills have a bad track record, people aren't as excited as you think 2- Florio- New QB coach has people excited about Fitz's potential. Graham- New stuff never worked for old boxers, so Fitz probably won't get much better. 3- Florio- Who's gonna be #2? Graham- TJ drops balls and can't go over the middle. 1. I think he's wrong about being excited. I think we all are. Obviously we shouldn't be thinking playoffs until we see what this team can do this year, but there is a buzz about the team and you'd have to live in a hole not to notice it... 2. The X-Factor. Can Fitz get better and lead this team to the playoffs. That's the Million dollar question... 3. We don't know who the #2 is. All points right now it's Still Donald Jones' to lose. Stevie came out of nowhere. We need someone to do the same. It that's TJ, Even better... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
montanafan Posted July 13, 2012 Share Posted July 13, 2012 think Tim Graham comments fair enough. Think generally speaking supporters of team are pleased with general direction of team and optimistic , but this tempered by the sobering realities of past failures. Fans will be excited when they actually make playoffs . Agreed, the Bills by any measure had a solid off-season, and with their resignings and added free agents, have shown a willingness to build a strong team. But they still haven't played a down yet, even the players are tempered in there remarks that they have to prove it on the field. TG's interview was hopeful, but tempered with a wait and see attitude. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Doc Posted July 13, 2012 Share Posted July 13, 2012 He did seem enthusiastic about the defense. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Fan in San Diego Posted July 13, 2012 Share Posted July 13, 2012 I thought I would chime in here. He was rah rah about the defense. He was realistic about the offense. Can David Lee make a big difference in Fitz? Who is our #2 and #3 WR's? He didn't talk about the OL where we have improved IMHO. The most negative thing was the W-L record he predicted 8-8 or 9-7, I think we go 10-6 this year. TG conceded losing the division to NE. I don't concede defeat we can win the division and then we don't have to fight for that 6th play off spot. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
hondo in seattle Posted July 13, 2012 Share Posted July 13, 2012 (edited) I'm a longtime lurker, had an account for a couple years, never posted but the season has me excited. I've been interested in getting involved on TBD but its been slow past week or two but this thread is something I wanted to comment on. The guy who started this thread is offended by negativity and his whole thing is negative. He pulled out every negative slanted thing from the interview. I listened to it. I thought Graham came off as excited about the season too and layed out all the reasons. The ONLY thing that stopped him short was Fitz. He said Bills fans were guarded and I think that's accurate at least from my friends I talk to. On the second question Florio himself said QB coaching doesn't always work and mentioned the failed Tebow overhaul from last year. Graham just said its hard for old dogs to learn new tricks and talked about Stevie saying Fitz looked much better throwing to his left. Graham also said he's convinced Fitz played hurt last year. Graham also talked up David Lee and the Wildcat and Brad Smith. On the third question Graham said a lot of great things about Donald Jones. He mentioned T.J. had a prblem with drops and going acrross the middle at NC State which he did. Not some smoking gun accusation exactly. So anyways, one of my pet peeves are people who look for reasons to get upset. This thread is exactly that. I heard a totally different interview than the author of this thread. Thanks for joining in... I appreciate your point of view. However, while Tim certainly didn't morph into Sully and wasn't entirely negative, he was more Negative Nancy than usual in his Florio interview. Tim's predicting 8-8 or 9-7... says playoffs are possible but doesn't seem optimistic. Edited July 13, 2012 by hondo in seattle Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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