Gotta give Florio props, he loves to stoke the fire and he’s real good at it.

[Tipster19]

I dunno, the last year and a half to 2 years Florio has been rabble rousing the notion that the current Bills’ administration is suspect and may not be the answer to getting the Bills to the promise land, whether it be Beane, McDermott or both. I can’t say that he’s wrong, especially after this latest fiasco, it was made to order for a gossip monger like Florio. I mean Florio’s whole existence depends on stirring the pot and the Bills handed him a real doozy to him on a silver platter. I just watched the latest episode of PFT where he actually called out McDermott for lying about the highly concerned/excused absence PCs. McDermott imo has been overplaying his hand a bit for some time now. There were rumblings about Dabol wanting out even it was just for another OC position to Frazier’s awkward release or whatever you want to call it. McDermott reminds me of Tony Dungy only with a more rigid way of getting his point across. 
 

I think the best way for McDermott to get out from under fire is to come up with an awesome defense week in, week out and to ride the tandem of Rosseau and Leonard in particular. 

[Aussie Joe]

He loves to stroke something …not sure it’s the fire..

[Dablitzkrieg]

No

[DCbillsfan]

Florio is a joke

[Arkady Renko]

He always loved talking about the Bills moving. 

[MJS]

Some of you are like middle schoolers with how you thirstily lap up the gossip. Pathetic.

[Shaw66]

Nah, I think you're way overstating this. 

 

McDermott simply is not comfortable talking to the press about internal matters.   He doesn't want to make a mistake in that arena.  He knows there is no benefit to cultivating the press, and he knows there's real downside to making a mistake.  

 

So, on Tuesday, when they talked to Diggs and decided that he was still too hot to have around, they suggested he go home and come back after practice.  But in the press conference, McDermott didn't think he needed to give that detail - he thought it was enough to say Diggs wasn't there without trying to explain it.  Super cautious.  Overnight, he saw that it was getting spun as Diggs skipped practice, and McDermott realized he needed to say more to take the heat off Diggs.  So, on Wednesday he explained that Diggs had been excused and hadn't just blown it off.  Just super cautious. 

 

And Frazier was handled brilliantly.  DC for one of the best teams in the league gets relieved of his duties, a Black DC at that, and there was hardly a ripple in the news.  Perfect for Frazier, because the press wasn't all over him about how it felt to be fired, and perfect for the Bills because the press wasn't all over them, either.  By the time it became apparent that Frazier had been canned, it was old news and no one wrote about it. 

 

Now, whether there are people who don't like McDermott's style, I can't really say.   I haven't seen anything before suggesting Daboll wanted out, but maybe that's true.  Not everyone loves the guy they're working for.   Everything you hear from the players sounds like they love it.  Phillips and Lawson came back, and Oliver likes it enough that he didn't seem to look too hard for a new place to land. 

 

Maybe it doesn't work for Diggs, but I'm not too worried.  I think he'll be seriously into ballin when the time comes.   I could be wrong. 

 

Florio and all the others need something to talk about.  Diggs gave them something, and they wouldn't be doing their jobs if they just let it lie there.   Chris Jones was in the news, too, for not showing up.  Press has to find something to say about the Chiefs.   

 

It's a good thing if the only controversial thing they can find to talk about is that the star didn't show up for a practice in June. 

[Punching Bag]

27 minutes ago, Aussie Joe said:

He loves to stroke something …not sure it’s the fire..

 

@Tipster19 ?

11 minutes ago, Arkady Renko said:

He always loved talking about the Bills moving. 

 

They are going to move - across the street.

[Doc]

He’s a master…

[RoyBatty is alive]

2 minutes ago, Doc said:

He’s a master…

He would give Einstein a run for his money as to which is the best

[Warriorspikes51]

Florio is the FAKE NEWS king of the NFL 

[Malazan]

He's TMZ. Turns out sports fans like TMZ more than the actual sports. 

[wppete]

Florio is like a child. He is all about controversy, gossip and 💩 talking. He is a joke and so is his sidekick Simms. 

[Augie]

We have some fire stokers here, as well. Especially that core group making up the predictable vocal minority. 

[Shaw66]

34 minutes ago, RoyBatty is alive said:

He would give Einstein a run for his money as to which is the best

He's not as smart as Einstein.

 

 

 

Oh, you meant THAT Einstein.

[stuvian]

He's a spam merchant who trots out the collusion bogeyman every offseason

[WhoTom]

I won't give props to someone for being very good at something that's very bad for journalism in particular and, as an extension, bad for society in general. Don't get me wrong, I'm all for investigative journalism and asking tough questions, but not just throwing $#!+ against the wall to see what sticks.

 

The same principle that propels a rocket is also used to make a bomb, but one is designed to move something forward while the other is designed to cause destruction. An investigative journalist does the former; a gossip columnist - the latter.

 

Any idiot can blow $#!+ up, but that doesn't make him a rocket scientist.

 

[Beck Water]

2 hours ago, Shaw66 said:

McDermott simply is not comfortable talking to the press about internal matters.   He doesn't want to make a mistake in that arena.  He knows there is no benefit to cultivating the press, and he knows there's real downside to making a mistake.  

 

So, on Tuesday, when they talked to Diggs and decided that he was still too hot to have around, they suggested he go home and come back after practice.  But in the press conference, McDermott didn't think he needed to give that detail - he thought it was enough to say Diggs wasn't there without trying to explain it.  Super cautious.  Overnight, he saw that it was getting spun as Diggs skipped practice, and McDermott realized he needed to say more to take the heat off Diggs.  So, on Wednesday he explained that Diggs had been excused and hadn't just blown it off.  Just super cautious. 

 

I appreciate your take on this, but what it would boil down to, is that by trying to avoid a mistake, McDermott blew it up nationally.  If your scenario is correct, why not just tell the press Diggs was an excused absence from minicamp?  If he'd done that, the question about "how concerned are you about that?" would never have been asked, and if it was, he would have said something canned like "I'm always concerned when one of our players is not out there practicing".

 

I think he's a little more savvy than to respond to an excused absence like that.  I think he was taken by surprise, and somewhat alarmed, when he learned Diggs had left and wouldn't practice.  In that scenario it's true that he told Diggs to take a break (from their talks, not from practice), it's true that he excused him so that he wouldn't be fined - but one proactively and one retroactively.

 

I think what he said had its intended effect as it motivated Diggs agent Bakari to reach out to Diggs and try to settle things down/straighten them out, and McDermott was more than willing to take it all on his shoulders to keep things settled and straightened.

 

2 hours ago, Shaw66 said:

And Frazier was handled brilliantly.  DC for one of the best teams in the league gets relieved of his duties, a Black DC at that, and there was hardly a ripple in the news.  Perfect for Frazier, because the press wasn't all over him about how it felt to be fired, and perfect for the Bills because the press wasn't all over them, either.  By the time it became apparent that Frazier had been canned, it was old news and no one wrote about it. 

 

If you are correct about Frazier actually being relieved of his duties/fired, then Beane and McDermott are both lying through their teeth about it when they insist it was Frazier's decision and that if he hadn't decided to take a year off, he'd still be the DC of the team.  Is that your belief?

 

2 hours ago, Shaw66 said:

I haven't seen anything before suggesting Daboll wanted out, but maybe that's true.  Not everyone loves the guy they're working for. 

 

It's well known Daboll wanted "out" as in becoming a HC.  It was pretty clear there was conflict between Daboll and McDermott at times, mostly about the lack of run game and the amount of running Josh Allen was asked to do.  Whether that conflict rose to the level of Daboll wanting out in a lateral move vs maybe kvetching over a beer, I can't say; the only place I've seen it was in Flores' racist hiring practices suit against the NFL, where it reads more like a "I'll say whatever" recruiting pitch than a serious search for a lateral move on Daboll's part.  He got his HC gig, so we'll never know I guess.

 

2 hours ago, Shaw66 said:

It's a good thing if the only controversial thing they can find to talk about is that the star didn't show up for a practice in June. 

 

With this, one can only agree.

[Captain Caveman]

kind of

it's not about the Bills, it's not about McDermott or Beane
PFT is built on clicks and just like a lot of sports media, they'll frequently publish stuff that will drive clicks.  I'm not saying he's lying, or even disingenuous, I don't know how he feels about the Bills or any other team, but it's kind of a less insane Skip Bayless or Stephen A. Smith vibe over there.

[Einstein]

Florio is fantastic if you understand what he is.

 

He isn't in the business of delivering news.

 

He is in the business of giving hypotheticals and explaining all possibilities  - including possibilities that may never happen.

Florio is the best in the business at breaking down contracts, analyzing legal matters, etc.

 

Edited June 15, 2023 by Einstein