Author: GregTheBillsFan

Seems we continue to have technical difficulties here at the Buffalo Bills Review. Not only was the recording electronically garbled last week, now we are not able to publish articles to the website either! Perhaps all part of Ralph’s grand conspiracy? We’ll see… if this article doesn’t publish, I may begin to believe that…

If there was any doubt regarding the game-day competency of Dick Jauron I hope Sunday set the record straight.

1. By Sunday morning before the Broncos game, I had come to realize something important about being a Bills fan. It doesn’t matter to me if the Bills fire their head coach. It doesn’t matter to me if Jason Peters plays or doesn’t play. It doesn’t matter to me if Trent Edwards succeeds or fails.

The Buffalo Bills matter to me. I’m a Bills fan, and I watch the games. I root for my team every week. I love it when they win; it hurts when they lose. I get pleasure out of it every week, even when they lose. All the rest is just noise, and the noise makes me unhappy.

So I was completely at ease Sunday afternoon, because I was ready simply to enjoy what I love – another Bills game. Well, not completely ready. There was a big storm in New England, so I drove to a local sports bar instead of one of the better bars. The local joint only has about 12 TVs. We walked in; 9 TVs had the Pats blowing out the Cards, and 3 had the beginning of the Jets game. THe Pats game kept going and going. Finally, after about 10 minutes of dealing with waitresses and changing tables, 10 minutes of my blood pressure rising, the Bills were on – and down 7-0! First thing I saw was the Bills first offensive series. I would have been better off watching The Deer Hunter or some other upbeat movie.

2. The past couple of months have been so discouraging, I’m finding it hard to get excited about a win. I have to stop and think about it first.

This was a great win! Come from behind, on the road, bad weather, against a playoff-contending team with a winning record. Great win! The team was dealing with the Peters thing, Lynch being injuired, Trent coming back, all of the noise about the coaches.

I love the players on this team, and they deserve some success. Against the Broncos, they got some.

3. There are a lot of things wrong with this team, and slow starts is one of them. It’s absolutely maddening. I didn’t see the opening drive, and I haven’t gone back to review the play by play. Why should I? I’ve seen it before. The defense can’t stop the opening drive, and the Bills can’t move the ball to open the game.

I’m convinced it’s because everyone knows what the Bills are going to do. The Bills have announced to the world that they will play passive, bend-don’t-break defense and adjust as the game goes along. That’s an invitation to offensive coordinators to script the first drive and take advantage of the Bills’ passive approach.

On offense, it’s clear the Bills will try to run the ball and won’t throw deep. So the defensive coordinators script their opening defenses to attack the standard offense and give the QB some new looks.

The Bills were down 10-0 before they began to compete. It’s happened virtually every week.

I think the coaches put the players at a serious disadvantage by playing such predictable schemes. When the Bills play predictable schemes, they have to be better, physically, to win. Other teams also win by outsmarting the opponent, disguising defenses, presenting different looks.

4. A bad-weather win for Trent! The first of what I hope will be many.
Here’s what I like and don’t like about Trent Edwards:

Likes

a. He stands in and takes a hit.
b. He makes decisions in the pocket promptly, and he works to find the open man.
c. His throws are accurate. (Anyone wonder like I did that the ball he threw behind Roscoe was intentional? BIlls were going left to right on the screen, Roscoe came off the left side of the line, and about 12 yards downfield cut across the middle. Looked to me like the linebacker was coming into the zone, Trent saw it and threw behind Roscoe. Was Roscoe supposed to see it too and settle in the spot instead of continuing the crossing pattern?)

Dislikes

a. He’s a drama queen after he gets hit. Get back up and show your team you’re ready to go.
b. His throwing motion is ugly and impedes his ability to throw the deep ball. He needs to work on that.
c. I’m still not convinced he recognizes when a receiver will get open. Having said that, he didn’t have trouble finding Josh Reed. Josh made the Broncos pay for doubling Lee all day.

I still think Trent is the QB of the future. He’s in his second year in the league, 15th in passer rating, 5th in percentage completion and 12th in yards per attempt. In QB rating, he’s ahead of McNabb (can we please stop with the “sign McNabb” pleas?), Favre, Roethlisberger, Delhomme and this year’s savior, Kerry Collins.

5. The bad play I liked the most: Marcus Stroud’s hold. Cost the Bills a takeaway (and cost the Ball Burglar nearly $400) in the process. Why did I like it? Because it was a guy trying to make a play. He was trying clear a path for his teammate to make a run at the QB. He didn’t just quit on the play because he was blocked – he understood what was happening on the play and tried to make something more happen. He helped create the pressure that may have forced a quick throw and the interception. Of course, the INT may have happened anyway. Still, Stroud was doing whatever he could.

6. Speaking of the interception, I thought the DBs played pretty well. That’s a big-time passing offense with a really effective QB, and the Bills forced 20 incomplete passes. That’s a lot. McGee was outstanding. Just running down the wideout on the end-around saved four points – if they’d gotten the touchdown on that play, instead of field goal later in the drive, at the end of the game a field goal would have tied the game. He had some nice pass breakups. He’s a good player.

I continue to like Leodis. The INT was nicely done – he has closing quickness better than anyone on the team. There was a third down pass in the second half that they completed against him for a first down, but he was right there.

What bothers me about the back seven is that they can be in the zone, give up a completion and have three guys there to make the tackle. Why can’t one of them be there for the breakup? Poz, particularly, seems always to be a half-step late. Maybe he isn’t good enough. Maybe he’s still learning.

Corner made some plays and got beaten badly sometime too. The game ending play, he was beaten. His recovery was spectacular.

I guess the Bills had Scott at strong and Whitner at free. I saw Whitner cause the fumble Corner recovered, I saw him overrun Royal on the end around when McGee saved his bacon. I didn’t see much more of him. He was playing free safety against a team that put up 532 and he made 3 tackles? What’s with that? 3 tackles? Were the Bills in the zone all the time? I don’t know, but I think the Bills are not turning him loose. He has his assignments and he does them. When you draft a safety in the first round, he’s supposed to be someone the offense game plans for. The Bills haven’t made him into that kind of player.

7. The Bills running backs are GOOD. Obvious, I know, but it has to be said. Marshawn had several sweet runs, and Fred did too. They’re getting some running room and they’re making plays. Second half, particularly, it looked like the Bills had worn the Broncos down. Unfortunately, by then the Bills were down to Jackson and Omon, and the Bills (wisely) weren’t going to pound Fred over and over again.

8. I really like how the offensive line is performing. No sacks, nice run blocking. It does appear that the line is coming together, but there’s a lot more that needs to be done. I’d like the running game to be dominant, and they have a ways to go to get there, or even near there.

I have no idea about Peters. No idea. Poor guy has all this talent and behaves like a jerk. We’ll never know, of course, but the Bills probably share some of the blame here. If it’s true that they haven’t even talked about redoing the contract, they’ve bungled this situation. We don’t know what was said when Peter’s came back, but the sense people got was that the Bills had committed at least to get started. The contract should be redone in the off-season; in order to accomplish that, the Bills should have been having conversations during the season – not to finalize the deal but at least to advance the ball. Jason should have known what the schedule was.

If, as I fear, everything has gone sideways, the Bills may now have a guy who doesn’t want to be here, who wants even more money, and who will be that much more difficult to motivate in the future.

In short, the Bills should have been building a relationship with Jason over the past three months, and it seems like they weren’t.

As I said at the top, it doesn’t really matter to me. I’ll be rooting for the left tackle wearing the Bills uniform next season. I hope it’s Jason Peters. If it isn’t, I’ll still be at the games.

9. Everyone complains about the pass rush. You know what? With a very few exceptions, if you rush four in the NFL, you don’t get to the QB. Most teams do not have a guy who beats his man one-on-one very often. The offensive linemen are too good.

Mercifully, as the game wore on the Bills came with some blitzes. I would have come with more. Pressure created the McKelvin interception, and pressure created the Mitchell interception. You need regular pressure, so that the QB hurries throws and so that the QB is always worrying that you’re coming.

And the opposite of the blitz is that awful prevent defense with a three-man rush. Get rid of that baby – that’s an automatic first down every time the Bills run it. Terrible. Against good QBs, and Cutler is a good QB, no pass rush leads to pass completions.

The defense on this team is okay. They keep the score down, and that’s a good thing. But they give up a lot of yards. Look at the scores this time of year, and look at the teams that are winning. They have defenses that are shutting the opponents down. Tight. The Bills are much too soft.

10. Fred’s catch and run was the play of the day. Fabulous. If Trent had thrown it deeper and to the sideline, does Fred go straight to the end zone? Did Trent lead him into the middle of the field intentionally? It was an easier ball to catch that way. Did anyone else worry that Fred would get stripped from behind? I did.

The catch was followed by Xavier not-ready-for-prime-time Omon twice, a great job by Johnson running his route and a great throw by Trent delivering the ball. I will NOT anoint Johnson as the second coming of anyone, but he’s definitely showing some stuff.

A woman from Kenmore who now lives in South Carolina and comes to New England for the holidays showed up for the game at the table next to mine at the sports bar in Glastonbury, Connecticut. She was there with her husband, a Packers fan. Bills fans are loyal.

I gave her a Ball Burglar business card and asked her to join. The Ball Burglar has cruised past the $10,000 mark, but we’re not done yet. We need you and your friends to join. The Ball Burglar is THE Buffalo Bills fan movement – hundreds have joined and we need hundreds more. Proceeds go to Hunter’s Hope and Carly’s Club, two great western New York charities fighting serious childhood diseases. Please join today – all we ask is a buck for every takeaway the Bills get. www.Ballburglar.com. Thanks!

Happy holidays to all! See you next week.

GO BILLS!!!

1. It’s a terrible time of the season, and we’ve been there before. The Bills are out of the playoff hunt. You don’t want them to lose because they’re your team; you don’t want them to win because then you’ll be asking all night “why couldn’t they do that when it counted?” Then you get a game like this, and it’s the worst of both worlds: They play well enough to win on the road against a good team with a Hall of Fame quarterback, then lose anyway. Is there any pain like the pain of being a Bills fan?

2. I have to start with Whitner. If there was any doubt, I think he eliminated it against the Jets: Whitner plays pass defense just well enough to stay with his man and make the tackle after the catch, but not well enough to break up the pass. I can’t remember when I’ve seen him cause an incompletion covering a receiver. I’ve seen him come out of his zone to make hits on receivers, but simple man-to-man coverage, it’s a completion every time. This game was the worst. He led the team in tackles because his receivers caught so many balls.

I wonder what he will guarantee next season.

3. The defensive performance against the Jets also combined the worst of the Bills defense: A touchdown on the first possession (and for good measure, a touchdown on the second possession, too) AND a long run for a score. The Bills defensive strategy seems to be play the standard, passive defense for the first half, see how they’re attacking it, make adjustments and stop it. The problem is that it’s SO standard and SO passive that the Bills are always in a hole by the time they make their adjustments.

This defense gave up 3 points in the second half and got the ball back over and over for the offense. In the second half, the Jets had an eight play drive that ended with an interception, then five plays and a punt, three plays and a field goal (after the Losman interception), and then three straight three and outs. Once again, the defense played well enough to win (just barely well enough), if the offense had produced (or if the offense hadn’t given up a touchdown with two minutes left).

I watch the Bills on Sunday afternoon and then I watch the Sunday night game, and every week I have the same reaction: Why don’t the Bills hit like that? Did you see the Giants and Cowboys? They were absolutely pounding each other. Every player took every opportunity to deliver maximum punishment on every play. Steelers do it, Ravens do it, all the good teams do it.

Some fans say the Bills don’t hit enough in training camp. Some say they don’t practice outside. I think it’s all of that and then some. To succeed in this game there has to be a level of hunger, a level of frenzy, a level near madness that we never see from these Bills defenders. Poz makes picture-book tackles but never blows anyone up. When have we seen Whitner hit anyone this season like he hit Chad Johnson last season?

This isn’t flag football – it’s nearly a war. It isn’t Madden – it’s NFL football, for Pete’s sake.

Memo to Dick Jauron: I saw Yale (remember Yale?) beat Columbia this year. Yale hits harder than the Bills.

4. It seems like every year there are hints that the Bills will start taking some chances, doing the unpredictable. We see a little bit early, then they go back into their shell, and it only when the playoffs are out of reach that they open up again. Fake field goal in the first game, fake punt in this game. I think there was one other fake punt. Wendling leapt over the line to try to block a field goal in the first game, tried it again in this game.

We didn’t see the no huddle much at all.

It happens in games, too. First play from scrimmage, the Bills had several defenders on the line of scrimmage. After the first play, the linebackers fell back into their standard 4-3 spots. Not much blitizing, not much of anything that would take Favre out of his comfort zone.

5. We got the worst of both worlds with Just Pray Losman, too. When he’s your quarterback, there’s nothing you can do except give him the ball and Just Pray Losman doesn’t screw it up.

Just Pray said he was putting together a highlight reel, and he was right. This game had everything in the JP arsenal, except the long pass. We saw the rifle arm, the nimble feet, the short-ball inaccuracy, the indecision in the pocket and the turnovers. Touchdown pass was great, interception to Reed was pretty bad, interception to Royal was horrible, and the fumble was, of course, a total disaster.

I don’t believe JP finds the open receivers. He clearly doesn’t know how to pull the trigger.

And now I’ll say what Losman fans have said for a couple of years: At least some of the blame has to fall on the coaches. JP may make lousy decisions when he can’t find open receivers, fine. Then it’s the coaches’ job to run the plays where he CAN find them or to redesign pattens so these receivers CAN get open, because JP hasn’t had trouble unloading the ball when he finds the guy. When Trent struggled for several weeks this season, it was the same thing – the QB can’t find an open receiver. These quarterbacks have been having the same problems for two years now, and the coaches have failed to find solutions.

6. The grousing about the Bills’ playcalling will go on forever.

I didn’t have a problem with calling the pass play that lost the game. I can make the argument both ways; in the end I come out in favor of another run because (a) it was time to challenge the O-line to keep delivering and (b) Just Pray has a knack for making the big bad play. But it was second and five, the Bills needed at least one more first down, and the two-minute warning would have stopped the clock, anyway, so an incompletion wouldn’t have hurt that badly.

What bothered me more was not running out the clock at the end of the first half. It neither hurt nor helped the Bills. I’ve had this argument with people forever – I like running out the clock deep in your end on the road, because a bad outcome is more likely than good, and the Bills were down only four. I understand a lot of people see it the other way. That’s okay.

What I didn’t like about that decision was this: Jauron very clearly believes what I believe – kill the clock and win the game in the second half. If he believes that’s correct, it’s correct in every game, whether you’re 4-1 or 6-7 fighting for the playoffs. If you believe you maximize your chances of winning by killing the clock, why would you open up the offense at that point in the game against the Jets? Or if you believe you maximize your chances of winning by opening up the offense in the last minute of the first half, why have the Bills shut it down in that situation for the last 2+ seasons? There’s no point in playing hunches – just decide what’s right and do it.

7. Too bad about Hardy. I hope he recovers fully; next year was the year I was hoping he’d begin to prove valuable.

Nice touchdown catch by Johnson. Nice pattern, good grab (and nice celebration by Evans). Ugly run on the end around. The guy clearly is not a ball carrier, but most receivers aren’t. Want to know who’s a ball carrier? Ellison. That was a great cut on the fake punt.

8. Marshawn was magnificent. Still not a lot of running room, but Marshawn made the most of it. The offensive line, finally, seems motivated to run the ball. I have no doubt the O-line and Marshawn were disappointed when the Bills decided to pass before the two-minute warning. After Marshawn’s run, followed by the spectacular touchdown for Jackson, followed by the success running the ball right up to that play, I’d guess the O-line was thinking “pound it five more times and this game is OVER!” It wasn’t to be.

9. With all due respect to Mr. Wilson, I don’t think it’s the players. It’s the men who are responsible for getting these players ready to win. Granted, playing with JP is playing with one hand tied behind your back, but well-prepared players don’t:

Let the safety get a free run at JP when he fumbled.
Hold on the kickoff return.
Hold on the final punt return.
Give up opening-drive touchdowns every week.
Give up 40+ yard runs almost every week.
Congratualate themselves when they complete an 11-yard pass. The coaches need to explain to the players that the rules permit pass plays to go for more than 20 yards.

10. I have to say it again: I really like Leodis McKelvin. There weren’t many balls thrown at him, so that says something about him. Favre wasn’t picking on him (why should he? he had Whitner to pick on.) I loved Leodis’s pursuit on the Leon Washington TD run. Simpson couldn’t close the gap, but Leodis coming across the field could.

Nice kick returns. Too bad about the hold; maybe without the hold he could have made the run any way. (Can’t really blame Corto – that was one of those plays where he had to make the block, got locked up with the defender, and held. It happens.)

Leodis can play.

The Bills played pretty well against a quality opponent. Just well enough to allow us to see, again, that this team COULD be good, and just bad enough let us down, hard, one more time this season.

It is very, very hard to be an excited Buffalo Bill fan right now. The only guy who feels worse than all of us is the guy who has to sell new season tickets in 2009. How would like THAT job?