The GM's Job is Amazingly Difficult

[Shaw66]

I've been thinking about how hard a GM's job is.   The job is almost hopelessly complex, and it requires constant, complex thinking and decision making in an environment where you don't know the answers to many questions. 

 

Think about Beane:

 

Your team has about 70 players during the regular season, when you include guys who are injured or on the practice squad.  Fifteen or twenty or thirty of the players you had at the end of last season are going to leave your team in the next four months.  Your job is to fill the openings with players who, together with the guys who carry over, give your head coach the best opportunity to assemble a great team.  

 

Although 20 or 30 might leave, you don't know today which 20 or 30 that is.  That will depend on decisions they make in free agency, or you make about them.  You don't know which players are going to be available from other teams as the same thing is playing out in their offices.   You have essentially no idea who you'll be able to draft, and you have very little idea of which guys in the draft can help the team in 2024.  

 

You talk to McDermott and Brady, and ask which guys are essential and which are expendable.  Their answer is, "It depends on who you bring in to help fill the spots that will become vacant.  

 

What you do know is if you sign this guy you won't have enough cap room to sign that guy.  And the importance of the positions in your consideration changes as you keep or lose guys.  

 

One guy may be your priority, but you have limits on how much you can spend and how that spending can be structured, and the player may not like the financial package, so you don't even know if you can get your priority guy.   Occasionally, a guy who becomes your priority changes the whole picture for you, sometimes for multiple years.  Giving up picks for Diggs solved a problem but affected the shape of the roster because a first-round pick disappeared.  Signing Von Miller changed the whole picture, because he brought significant cap consequences to the equation going forward.  

 

In that environment, an environment where you're not sure who you're going to lose or who you're going to get, and all of it is limited by how much you have to spend, you have to make decisions.   You have to let some guys walk, extend some guys, rework some deals, all in preparation for when free agency hits.   When free agency starts, you have to start making decisions about players.  Every decision you make, every deal you work, changes what you need and how much you can spend.  Thirty-one other teams are making deals, too, so the players who remain available keep changing, and what they're worth keeps changing as the deals affect the market.  

 

When the draft comes along, you take a break from the free agency puzzle and run a mini-version of the whole problem in your head over three days to acquire 8 or 10 guys, each of whom may or may not perform the way you think they will (after all, you've never seen them against NFL competition).   Then you go back to working deals with other free agents, based on a revised picture of the roster as the result of the draft.  

 

The bottom line is that it's impossible today for Beane or any other GM to have a plan for what the roster will look like on September 1.  It's a huge puzzle the GM has to put together over the next five months, a puzzle where the actual picture of the completed puzzle keeps changing, and the pieces available to complete the puzzle keep changing too.  

 

 

[JGMcD2]

Is it? Everyone here seems to have it figured out 😉

 

Very nice post. 

Edited March 5 by JGMcD2

[stuvian]

Shaw, you make it sound complicated. In Denver, all you have to do is write cheques.

 

In all seriousness, I'm sure that there are very sophisticated technological tools to track players who are a fit for Buffalo's schemes, their injury history and contract status.

 

The benefit of having organizational stability with Beane and McDermott is that they can be philosophically aligned as to the kinds of players and culture we are building.

 

I'm curious as to the extent to which AI has become a part of play calling and decision making. There is still no software or test that measures heart. 

[Sweats]

I don't really think it's too difficult......i mean, come on, man.....do you think he is one individual who is managing all of it? He has guys working for him and guys working for those guys and guys working for those guys and on down.

At the end of the day, he's the guy at the top, so all of the minor Pions who work below him do all the work and shuffle it up, while the guy at the top takes all the credit. 

I've been in business for a long, longgggggggg time......i've seen how it works.

 

It's not one guy running the whole show. It's more like one guy at the top while everyone else does everything to make the guy at the top look good, in hopes that they might get noticed for their hard work and efforts.....which they never do and the cycle goes on and on and on and on and on and on and on.......

[Buffalo_Stampede]

Beane and McDermott are one.

[Bob Chandler's Hands]

There are plenty of jobs out there that are this complex. 

And yes, it's complex. 

[Prospector]

I think you have a complex for thinking about it being complex

[HOUSE]

How hard can it be?

Everybody on the board does this job every day

[Sweats]

I'm telling you, i could have been the GM of this franchise in the garbage early 2000's teams and i wouldn't have done any worse, i can tell you that. In fact, a 3 toothed hobo could have done a better job.

[Shaw66]

5 minutes ago, Bob Chandler's Hands said:

There are plenty of jobs out there that are this complex. 

And yes, it's complex. 

I agree.  I think we often tend to under-appreciate the difficulty of other people's jobs.  

 

What's interesting to me is not simply the complexity.  As some have said, he has a staff that's evaluating the draft talent, evaluating the free-agent talent, running the cap numbers, evaluating the consequences of one move or another.   What's interesting is that he has to make big decisions with such incomplete information.  He knows, for example, that if he signs a big-ticket receiver it will affect what's he's able to do at several other positions.   If he decides he can't afford it, well, a big-ticket D-tackle is waiting to be signed, too.  Can he afford the impact in the receiving room if he splurges?  Exactly how much linebacker help does he need?  How much cornerback help?    No matter how much information his staff may generate, he still has to make consequential decisions without all the information he'd like to have.   

2 minutes ago, Sweats said:

I'm telling you, i could have been the GM of this franchise in the garbage early 2000's teams and i wouldn't have done any worse, i can tell you that. In fact, a 3 toothed hobo could have done a better job.

First, I think the chances are that you would have done worse, and I would have, too.   It simply isn't simple.   Having said that, however, I know (because I thought it at the time), that when I traded up in the third round, I would have taken Russell Wilson instead of TJ Graham.  That probably would have made a difference. 

[Shaw66]

23 minutes ago, stuvian said:

 

I'm curious as to the extent to which AI has become a part of play calling and decision making. There is still no software or test that measures heart. 

AI is an interesting subject.  Getting from here to September 1 is like a big chess game, and it isn't possible for a human brain to evaluate all the possible combinations of players who are or might be available (including possible trades).  AI certainly could help do that, spitting out potential rosters that could be created, given cap space, presumed contract values, etc.  And AI doesn't work in a vacuum.  The staff certainly could add its own biases about the heart and cultural compatibility of a player.  

 

If the Bills have AI like that, it certainly would be useful.  McBeane could sit down this afternoon and look at potential rosters, decide which they like and don't like, then develop plans about how they could deal to achieve those rosters.   They'd still stumble along the way, because they can't control losing a guy to another team, they can control injuries, and they can't control the draft.  

[SoCal Deek]

The job itself isn’t all that difficult. The challenge is that your performance will be judged based on a bunch of variables that really aren’t under your direct control. 

[Shaw66]

1 minute ago, SoCal Deek said:

The job itself isn’t all that difficult. The challenge is that your performance will be judged based on a bunch of variables that really aren’t under your direct control. 

Well, sure, the job isn't difficult.  Just show up and make decisions. It is literally true that anyone can do that.  

 

Being good at the job, however, is something else, for exactly the reason you give:  To do your job well, you have to manage a lot of things that are outside of your control.  

[Bill from NYC]

23 minutes ago, Sweats said:

I'm telling you, i could have been the GM of this franchise in the garbage early 2000's teams and i wouldn't have done any worse, i can tell you that. In fact, a 3 toothed hobo could have done a better job.

A 12 year old kid with a copy of the old Pro Football Weekly would have done a better job than Marv Levy as GM. 

[Buffalo_Stampede]

Imagine being a GM without a franchise QB? Impossible. It’s all fun drafting one, but developing one is stressful. But if you somehow develop one you’re job is so much easier.

[SoCal Deek]

2 minutes ago, Shaw66 said:

Well, sure, the job isn't difficult.  Just show up and make decisions. It is literally true that anyone can do that.  

 

Being good at the job, however, is something else, for exactly the reason you give:  To do your job well, you have to manage a lot of things that are outside of your control.  

It’s not true that anyone can do it. It takes a unique skill set of someone who’s reasonably skilled with people, and extremely skilled with money and budgeting. 

[The Jokeman]

Managing any group of people is difficult. As every person is individual and not all individuals are always on the same page or agree with said management. What's worse if some athletes are somewhat coddled as they've always been the best and/or treated as though they're superior most of their lives. Toss in not all of them have much education passed high school level which evenso not equal everywhere. Throw money into the mix and sense of worth and got even more drama to deal with. Not easy but if you surround yourself with good people around you it makes your job that much easier. 

[BillsVet]

11 minutes ago, Bill from NYC said:

A 12 year old kid with a copy of the old Pro Football Weekly would have done a better job than Marv Levy as GM. 

 

A kid with an Ourlads guide could have done better than Levy, Brandon...and Nix!  Imagine the possibilities!

 

But, when you've got a guy in the room, HC or GM, who demands defense...well, by golly you go and get it.  Because history has proven that you can never have enough DB's...or RB's.  Right Bill?  

[SoonerBillsFan]

1 hour ago, Shaw66 said:

I've been thinking about how hard a GM's job is.   The job is almost hopelessly complex, and it requires constant, complex thinking and decision making in an environment where you don't know the answers to many questions. 

 

Think about Beane:

 

Your team has about 70 players during the regular season, when you include guys who are injured or on the practice squad.  Fifteen or twenty or thirty of the players you had at the end of last season are going to leave your team in the next four months.  Your job is to fill the openings with players who, together with the guys who carry over, give your head coach the best opportunity to assemble a great team.  

 

Although 20 or 30 might leave, you don't know today which 20 or 30 that is.  That will depend on decisions they make in free agency, or you make about them.  You don't know which players are going to be available from other teams as the same thing is playing out in their offices.   You have essentially no idea who you'll be able to draft, and you have very little idea of which guys in the draft can help the team in 2024.  

 

You talk to McDermott and Brady, and ask which guys are essential and which are expendable.  Their answer is, "It depends on who you bring in to help fill the spots that will become vacant.  

 

What you do know is if you sign this guy you won't have enough cap room to sign that guy.  And the importance of the positions in your consideration changes as you keep or lose guys.  

 

One guy may be your priority, but you have limits on how much you can spend and how that spending can be structured, and the player may not like the financial package, so you don't even know if you can get your priority guy.   Occasionally, a guy who becomes your priority changes the whole picture for you, sometimes for multiple years.  Giving up picks for Diggs solved a problem but affected the shape of the roster because a first-round pick disappeared.  Signing Von Miller changed the whole picture, because he brought significant cap consequences to the equation going forward.  

 

In that environment, an environment where you're not sure who you're going to lose or who you're going to get, and all of it is limited by how much you have to spend, you have to make decisions.   You have to let some guys walk, extend some guys, rework some deals, all in preparation for when free agency hits.   When free agency starts, you have to start making decisions about players.  Every decision you make, every deal you work, changes what you need and how much you can spend.  Thirty-one other teams are making deals, too, so the players who remain available keep changing, and what they're worth keeps changing as the deals affect the market.  

 

When the draft comes along, you take a break from the free agency puzzle and run a mini-version of the whole problem in your head over three days to acquire 8 or 10 guys, each of whom may or may not perform the way you think they will (after all, you've never seen them against NFL competition).   Then you go back to working deals with other free agents, based on a revised picture of the roster as the result of the draft.  

 

The bottom line is that it's impossible today for Beane or any other GM to have a plan for what the roster will look like on September 1.  It's a huge puzzle the GM has to put together over the next five months, a puzzle where the actual picture of the completed puzzle keeps changing, and the pieces available to complete the puzzle keep changing too.  

 

 

I love you Shaw, but how much did Beane slip you to post that? 🤣

[TheBrownBear]

Nah, it's easy.  The salary cap isn't real.  You can just scout free agents by Madden rating.  And there's plenty of mocks to get you through the draft.

[Bob Jones]

1 hour ago, Sweats said:

I don't really think it's too difficult......i mean, come on, man.....do you think he is one individual who is managing all of it? He has guys working for him and guys working for those guys and guys working for those guys and on down.

At the end of the day, he's the guy at the top, so all of the minor Pions who work below him do all the work and shuffle it up, while the guy at the top takes all the credit. 

I've been in business for a long, longgggggggg time......i've seen how it works.

 

It's not one guy running the whole show. It's more like one guy at the top while everyone else does everything to make the guy at the top look good, in hopes that they might get noticed for their hard work and efforts.....which they never do and the cycle goes on and on and on and on and on and on and on.......

Agreed. The voiceover at the end of the movie "The Other Guys" explains it perfectly:

 

"The people that do the real work, the ones that make the difference, you don't see 'em on TV or on the front page. I'm talking about the day-in, day-outers, the grinders. Come on, man, you know who I'm talking about: the other guys."

[Virgil]

Saints make it look easy.  Sign players to large, stupid contacts, restructure and kick the can down the road, close eyes and hope down the road never comes

[Bills!Win!]

Josh Allen needs to get married and take the “I’m married to someone with money “ team discount 

[Dr. K]

I agree, Shaw. 

 

Reading the responses confirms that if there's one resource that fans on this board have in abundance, it's arrogance. 

[SoonerBillsFan]

19 minutes ago, Bills!Win! said:

Josh Allen needs to get married and take the “I’m married to someone with money “ team discount 

That's what Brady did

[Bob Chandler's Hands]

2 hours ago, Shaw66 said:

I agree.  I think we often tend to under-appreciate the difficulty of other people's jobs.  

 

What's interesting to me is not simply the complexity.  As some have said, he has a staff that's evaluating the draft talent, evaluating the free-agent talent, running the cap numbers, evaluating the consequences of one move or another.   What's interesting is that he has to make big decisions with such incomplete information.  He knows, for example, that if he signs a big-ticket receiver it will affect what's he's able to do at several other positions.   If he decides he can't afford it, well, a big-ticket D-tackle is waiting to be signed, too.  Can he afford the impact in the receiving room if he splurges?  Exactly how much linebacker help does he need?  How much cornerback help?    No matter how much information his staff may generate, he still has to make consequential decisions without all the information he'd like to have.   

It's the literal reason "he gets paid the big bucks" (as opposed to the sarcastic or ironic way that term is often used)

[mjt328]

You forgot to mention the ridiculous expectations by the fanbase.

 

They never forget about the missed picks (Boogie Basham, Zack Moss) or the prospects they should have taken (Creed Humphrey).  But somehow nobody EVER remembers the college guys they were pounding the table for... who ultimately became absolute busts.  For example, I came across the name Ifeatu Melifonwu the other day.  It brought back all the memories of people freaking out when we passed him up.

 

I'm old enough to remember when a large number of Bills fans were crying how Beane was always too conservative in Free Agency, and needed to make a splash to get past Kansas City.  He ended up making the move for Von Miller.  It looked like a great decision for 10 weeks.  Then Miller tears his ACL, and the narrative totally flips to how stupid it was to sign him.

 

[Shaw66]

1 hour ago, Bob Chandler's Hands said:

It's the literal reason "he gets paid the big bucks" (as opposed to the sarcastic or ironic way that term is often used)

Wow!   That's exactly right.  The thing about it is that 32 GMs are getting paid the big bucks, are probably only about half of them are really good at their jobs.  I'm not saying they're slouches; they do it seriously, but the roster they end up with to start the season isn't as well constructed as the best GMs.  The best GMs have their teams in the hunt every season.  And there's luck, too, but the guys who get it, like John Lynch and that guy who was so great in Baltimore.  I think Beane is growing into that kind of success, but time will tell.  

 

But you're so right.  The size of the job, the importance of the decision making, and to just work your way through, year after year, always hunting around half blind trying to find your way from here to a roster.  Good for those guys.  

[Shaw66]

15 minutes ago, mjt328 said:

You forgot to mention the ridiculous expectations by the fanbase.

 

They never forget about the missed picks (Boogie Basham, Zack Moss) or the prospects they should have taken (Creed Humphrey).  But somehow nobody EVER remembers the college guys they were pounding the table for... who ultimately became absolute busts.  For example, I came across the name Ifeatu Melifonwu the other day.  It brought back all the memories of people freaking out when we passed him up.

 

I'm old enough to remember when a large number of Bills fans were crying how Beane was always too conservative in Free Agency, and needed to make a splash to get past Kansas City.  He ended up making the move for Von Miller.  It looked like a great decision for 10 weeks.  Then Miller tears his ACL, and the narrative totally flips to how stupid it was to sign him.

 

Good points. 

 

And what's funny about that is that, if he could speak frankly about it, he'd say fan expectations are a tremendous distraction.  Here he is working on trying to put a team together, and he hears a constant drumbeat, sometimes virtual screaming in his ear, none of which is of any value to him.  And yet all the time he's trying to do the job he's hearing this stuff.  He has to just shut it out, because he has to make the decisions based on the quality information the scouts have developed, not the whims of the Mafia.   

[stuvian]

To understand the GMs job, read Ron Wolf's The Packer Way. Ultimately a GM has to assemble talent and hire a coach to get the best out of that talent. To be good at their job must be able to recognize talent. If the GM has not worked as a scout they had better hire those who have. 

Financial, PR and administrative talent is generic. 

[Mr. WEO]

Pick the right QB/HC

 

put feet up on coffee table 

[Turk71]

 Sure, it's complex with a lot of moving parts, but no one is expected to get everything right. There are 31 other guys with the same complex job and you're trying to be better than them. 

Spending too much draft and cap capital on the dline with limited success; and taking too long to get a decent offensive line, while needing another top wr, have been his biggest shortcomings imo. Whether that's on him, McD or both?

[Chandler#81]

-and the September 1st roster begins changing before the Opening Game even begins. Then, there’s injuries… Players still have to get paid but could be gone for ten games to a year while counting against the cap. We’ve already seen with this team that a year removed still isn’t enough time for seriously injured star players to return to form..

 

In 4 short years, Beane has gone from wearing a silly flap hat at Christmas to a gray-haired old man.

[Albany,n.y.]

5 hours ago, Shaw66 said:

First, I think the chances are that you would have done worse, and I would have, too.   It simply isn't simple.   Having said that, however, I know (because I thought it at the time), that when I traded up in the third round, I would have taken Russell Wilson instead of TJ Graham.  That probably would have made a difference. 

You better have traded him like the Seahawks did, otherwise we'd be eating an $85 million cap hit.  😄

[gjv]

Based on the current salary cap situation, and the number of free agents on the roster, I believe this will be the most challenging year for Beane to improve the roster. Especially challenging will be to improve the roster for pass rushers. I wish Beane all the luck with free agency and the draft.

[GoBills808]

2 hours ago, Mr. WEO said:

Pick the right QB/HC

 

put feet up on coffee table 

This

 

Bills FO in the Josh Allen economy is like falling out of bed 

[gobills1212]

Thats why you need to meet the requirements set in place, and at the VERY least, you need your GED. Honestly, that last part is probably the only thing holding some people back from realizing their potential. Shame

[John from Riverside]

We don’t get as much complaining about beane as we have in the past, but there are still some detractors out there

 

Brandon Bean has done an awesome job with this team

[Bob Chandler's Hands]

3 hours ago, Turk71 said:

 Sure, it's complex with a lot of moving parts, but no one is expected to get everything right. There are 31 other guys with the same complex job and you're trying to be better than them. 

Spending too much draft and cap capital on the dline with limited success; and taking too long to get a decent offensive line, while needing another top wr, have been his biggest shortcomings imo. Whether that's on him, McD or both?

No one is "expected to get everything right" then you list deficiencies without also listing positives or pointing out the 4 division titles in a row, 5 playoff wins, etc. 

Unclear what your point is here. 

[Thurman#1]

13 hours ago, Shaw66 said:

I've been thinking about how hard a GM's job is.   The job is almost hopelessly complex, and it requires constant, complex thinking and decision making in an environment where you don't know the answers to many questions. 

 

Think about Beane:

 

Your team has about 70 players during the regular season, when you include guys who are injured or on the practice squad.  Fifteen or twenty or thirty of the players you had at the end of last season are going to leave your team in the next four months.  Your job is to fill the openings with players who, together with the guys who carry over, give your head coach the best opportunity to assemble a great team.  

 

Although 20 or 30 might leave, you don't know today which 20 or 30 that is.  That will depend on decisions they make in free agency, or you make about them.  You don't know which players are going to be available from other teams as the same thing is playing out in their offices.   You have essentially no idea who you'll be able to draft, and you have very little idea of which guys in the draft can help the team in 2024.  

 

You talk to McDermott and Brady, and ask which guys are essential and which are expendable.  Their answer is, "It depends on who you bring in to help fill the spots that will become vacant.  

 

What you do know is if you sign this guy you won't have enough cap room to sign that guy.  And the importance of the positions in your consideration changes as you keep or lose guys.  

 

One guy may be your priority, but you have limits on how much you can spend and how that spending can be structured, and the player may not like the financial package, so you don't even know if you can get your priority guy.   Occasionally, a guy who becomes your priority changes the whole picture for you, sometimes for multiple years.  Giving up picks for Diggs solved a problem but affected the shape of the roster because a first-round pick disappeared.  Signing Von Miller changed the whole picture, because he brought significant cap consequences to the equation going forward.  

 

In that environment, an environment where you're not sure who you're going to lose or who you're going to get, and all of it is limited by how much you have to spend, you have to make decisions.   You have to let some guys walk, extend some guys, rework some deals, all in preparation for when free agency hits.   When free agency starts, you have to start making decisions about players.  Every decision you make, every deal you work, changes what you need and how much you can spend.  Thirty-one other teams are making deals, too, so the players who remain available keep changing, and what they're worth keeps changing as the deals affect the market.  

 

When the draft comes along, you take a break from the free agency puzzle and run a mini-version of the whole problem in your head over three days to acquire 8 or 10 guys, each of whom may or may not perform the way you think they will (after all, you've never seen them against NFL competition).   Then you go back to working deals with other free agents, based on a revised picture of the roster as the result of the draft.  

 

The bottom line is that it's impossible today for Beane or any other GM to have a plan for what the roster will look like on September 1.  It's a huge puzzle the GM has to put together over the next five months, a puzzle where the actual picture of the completed puzzle keeps changing, and the pieces available to complete the puzzle keep changing too.  

 

 

 

 

Yeah, extremely difficult, and there is an absolute ton of uncertainty built into the system.

 

I'd argue you've overstated this in a couple of specifics.

 

It's not impossible at all to come up with a plan. I'm absolutely sure that every single GM does it. It's anything but impossible. But yeah, no plan will be precisely on target. All NFL plans have to have back-up plans, back-ups to the back-ups and back-ups to those tertiaries as well. Every plan will have to be incrementally adjusted again and again and again.

 

The other minor gripe I have there is that I think that after asking McDermott, Brady and Babich were asked about guys they needed or did not need, they might indeed say, " "It depends on who you bring in to help fill the spots that will become vacant." But they would then continue with, "But having said that," and reams and reams of ideas, requests and suggestions. (Which while helpful might also make the puzzle even more complex.)

 

Oh, and yeah, that Von Miller move was a huge risk, looking to be either a brilliant move that could bring championships, yet make our cap situation a lot worse. If he'd stayed healthy, IMO we'd have at least one Lombardi by now. But he didn't, and the cap consequences bit deep just the same as if he'd been healthy. No way to predict the injury, though I'm 100% sure they knew it was a realistic risk, but worth taking. Sigh.

 

And I think you might be underselling the difficulty and uncertainty involved in the draft process. Even if your scouting is perfect, there's no way to rule out the guys you want and need from being picked ahead of you, particularly if someone trades ahead of you.

 

Overall I think you're dead right. Immensely complex job, requiring tons of work, brains, extreme flexibility and adaptability and an understanding that even the best in your job make and have to accept responsibility for mistake after mistake after mistake after mistake, and that few other jobs have so many people hanging on your smallest decisions ready to criticize within minutes, fairly and unfairly.

 

Great stuff.