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#41 Re: The Garden » 2012 NFL Season » 660 weeks ago

The Bills need to fire the entire coaching staff. I'm going to rant about it now and then try to let it go for the year because the year is done. Not many teams get lit up by Mark Sanchez, Alex Smith, and Matt Hasselbeck in 2012. Once again, the defense looks entirely unprepared to start the game. Tennessee did the same thing the Jets did in week 1, which was go no huddle from the shotgun and get short passes. Immediately clear that the Bills personnel and game plan were way mismatched, it was obvious to me they needed a timeout. Instead, they let Tennessee score 3 TDs on their first 3 possessions. Dave Wannstedt's defense has been terrible, despite the talent level being miles ahead of the Bills teams of 3 or 4 years ago. Then there's the offense. Fitzpatrick played as well as he's going to play, and Tennessee missed a bunch of tackles on CJ and Fred Jackson throughout the game. The offense looked really good for most of the game, but made terrible decisions in critical moments and disappeared in the final 5 minutes. There's some blame to go to Fitz, but really Chan Gailey has to be held responsible for this. We know Fitz's limitations, and he put up better numbers that you can really expect of him most weeks. Yet, it was another repeat of the Arizona game because of coaching. With the lead and about 3 minutes left, and a rushing attack that had been great, the Bills were still throwing the ball (in their own end) and got picked off. Then they surrender the TD, and get the ball with 2 timeouts, a minute to play and only needing a field goal. 1st and 2nd down are short passes that are tackled in bounds for a total of like 7 yards. 3rd and 4th down are deep throws that fall incomplete. That's completely backwards decision-making!! And with that amount of time (and willingness to be tackled in bounds short of the marker) they, again, could've been running the ball. But I get the passing, because the Titans supposedly have one of the worst pass defenses in the league - yet the Bills can't throw it down the field when they have to. Bruce DeHaven should also be fired, because he was the one who wanted to cut Brian Moorman, who was an amazing all-pro punter, for this new kid who doesn't know how to punt in Buffalo wind. Great. He had something like a 20-yarder in a crucial situation where Moorman could've boomed it 50. Another stupid decision by a coaching staff that went from making the most of shitty pieces in 2009 (4 wins) to retarding the progress of a much better team in 2012. Moorman was also always doing stuff in the community, a fan favorite, a team favorite, maybe the most liked punter in the league by his team's fans. Dumped for a kid who can't punt in the wind. To play in Buffalo. Oh well, I guess we needed the roster spot to sign Shawn Merriman again.

It's a bye week now. I'd be happy to fire them all. At 3-4 with Houston and New England coming up, the Bills are essentially 3-6 and so the playoffs are gone. We know we need the best QB we can get in the draft this year, and we need a new coaching staff. So the instant they find the right coach who's willing to come, chuck out Chan and crew and forget this season. It died today at the Ralph. Buddy Nix is building a team with the talent to contend, but they need someone else at the helm to put the pieces in place on the field.

#42 Re: The Garden » 2012 NFL Season » 660 weeks ago

The Thursday games are tough. Teams really seem to be running out of energy and healthy players by the end of them.

Baltimore-Houston is probably the best 1 o'clock game this week, although I think the Redskins could win in New York and that could make for a good game. I'm sure I'll skip the Jets-Pats game at 4 that'll be everywhere. I know the division is locked up at 3-3, but I've just seen waaaay too many Patriots games for my liking in the last 10 years, and the Jets are terrible.

Looking at the schedule, I might be most interested in Detroit/Chicago on Monday Night.

#43 Re: The Garden » 2012 NFL Season » 661 weeks ago

Cardinals refused to let the Bills lose today, and the AFC East has a ridiculous 4-way tie because of it. Seahawks beating Patriots was pretty exciting!

#44 Re: The Garden » Lance Armstrong » 661 weeks ago

I don't understand where the line is between acceptable medical performance enhancers and unacceptable ones. I'm another in favor of legalization.

From what I can tell, Lance doped, and so does everybody else in cycling, and he was the best at it. To me, that could easily be a part of being the best in cycling.

For athletes and fans who are strongly anti-doping, you could have, for instance, separate track and field divisions based on what medical enhancements are allowed. But it's just a hopeless endeavor to try to rid them from the sport, because the tests will always lag behind the drugs. And a lot of it isn't that different from practices we already allow.

#45 Re: The Garden » 2012 NFL Season » 661 weeks ago

Living in the AFC East, I don't get to see a lot of Vikings games during the year. How similar is the personnel on this year's team and the Favre team that went to the NFC Championship game?

#46 Re: The Garden » 2012 NFL Season » 661 weeks ago

I think a lot of it with the Bills is mental. There's no swagger on that team and hasn't been any since the days of Takeo Spikes and London Fletcher. Fitzpatrick and Fred Jackson gave the offense the leadership and confidence it was missing under Losman and Trent Edwards a couple years ago, but the defense still looks shell-shocked and buckles in big moments. They're terrible on third down and just can't ever stop the bleeding, which to me says that they lack playmakers and leaders.

The pass rush has been a huge disappointment. Buffalo had no pass rush last year, and it killed us constantly, but Kyle Williams was an all-pro who went down with injury for that year, and Dareus showed some bright spots as a rookie. With the Mario Williams and Mark Anderson signings, it looked like the Bills had gone from a league-worst front 4 to one of the best. We spent high draft picks on cornerbacks the last two years (Aaron Williams and Stephon Gilmore) and legitimately like our safeties (Jairius Byrd and George Wilson)... so the thinking was: the improved pass rush will help the secondary as Williams and Gilmore develop into NFL-caliber corners, and with Williams-Dareus-Williams it would be really tough to run inside against us. Why hasn't it happened?

The short answer is that the front 4 is still lousy. Sanchez, Brady, and now Alex Smith have had all day to find open targets. I still think it's early to give up on the Bills' D. There's lots of things the Bills would need to truly contend, particularly more talent at WR and linebacker and a better QB, but this defense has the tools to be average or even good, I think. But the pass rush has been non-existent, the corners look young, and our linebackers can't cover tight ends over the middle or half backs in the flats. So we get burned a lot. And without any leaders or confidence on defense, it snowballs on us as soon as the other team finds a weakness. Mario Williams was supposed to inject some swagger into us or at least an impactful 3rd down pressure every now and then, but he hasn't delivered at all.

#47 Re: The Garden » US Presidential Debates » 662 weeks ago

I'm sure he was tired. Being President is a full time job. Romney had nothing to do but prepare himself, whereas Obama probably had to fit his preparation into days of dealing with state affairs and campaigning. It's not an excuse, because every incumbent faces that difficulty, but that job is a killer. Obama looks way older than 4 years ago like all of them do.


If I was Romney, I would be going after Obama's awful record on transparency, his failure to close Guantanamo or repeal any significant portions of the PATRIOT Act, NDAA and the indefinite detainment of U.S. citizens, the expansion of executive powers, such as the assassination of U.S. citizens abroad without any oversight, the drone war that's creating the next generation of terrorists, and the massive electronic surveillance of the American people.

But Romney and Obama agree completely on all of that stuff, unfortunately.

No choice for me!

#48 The Garden » US Presidential Debates » 662 weeks ago

Communist China
Replies: 45

The 1st of 3 Presidential debates just wrapped up in Denver. Did people watch it? What did everyone think?


I'd give Romney the win by a slight margin, which I think is a bit of an upset. I want to see what other people think before getting into more specifics though.

#49 Re: The Sunset Strip » Is Rock dead? » 662 weeks ago

To be harsh, you could say: Rock hasn't had a big, perceived-as-legitimate movement since grunge. Grunge isn't fun and you can't really sing along to it. Hair metal and glam that preceded it is still as uncool and embarrassing as it seemed in 94. Metal takes itself too seriously and seemingly insists on being an insular clique. So what rock music is a hypothetical "new fan" going to listen to? You have to go to individual bands, not entire scenes, I think. That's part of why it's so hard to tell what's "going on in rock these days" or have discussions with broad samples of rock fans.

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