SB Nation User Blog: Brian Galliford

NFL Week 14: Buffalo Rumblings Authors Picks

Brian Galliford — Thu, 10 Dec 2009 19:17:47 -0000

Week 14 of the 2009 NFL regular season is set to kick off at 8:20 PM this evening, and the authors of Buffalo Rumblings are back to provide our picks for all 16 games on the docket. Nine of us are participating, and once again, we encourage you to leave your own picks in the comments section. All of our picks are after the jump. The standings after 13 weeks of NFL action:

#1: Brian Galliford (132-60)
#2: krytime (130-62)
#3: poz (127-65)
#4: Kurupt (126-66)
#5: MattRichWarren (122-70)
#5: Ron From NM (122-70)
#5: sireric (122-70)
#8: MARVelous (121-71)
#9: WABillsfan (115-77)

Game	Brian	krytime	poz	Kurupt	MRW	Ron	sireric	MARV	WA
PIT at CLE
NO at ATL
DET at BAL
GB at CHI
SEA at HOU
DEN at IND
MIA at JAC
BUF at KC
Game	Brian	krytime	poz	Kurupt	MRW	Ron	sireric	MARV	WA
CIN at MIN
CAR at NE
NYJ at TB
STL at TEN
WAS at OAK
SD at DAL
PHI at NYG
ARI at SF

LSU hires Tyke Tolbert as new receivers coach

Brian Galliford — Thu, 10 Dec 2009 16:36:27 -0000

LSU hires Tyke Tolbert as new receivers coach

Buffalo Bills wide receivers coach Tyke Tolbert has accepted the same position on Les Miles' coaching staff at LSU. Tolbert will finish the season with the Bills.

Ten worst Buffalo Bills draft picks of the decade

Brian Galliford — Thu, 10 Dec 2009 13:22:24 -0000

More photos » by David Duprey - AP

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Yesterday, we talked about the ten best draft picks that the Buffalo Bills have made over the past decade. In order to complete our "[descriptive adjective] of the decade" series here, we've got to knock off the worst picks, too. This list can also be known as "why the Bills have sucked for a decade," but we're also hoping that one last vent session over these missed picks will be therapeutic as the franchise turns a new leaf - and a new decade - next month.

On to the list. Hope you can stomach it.

10. Josh Reed, WR, LSU (2002, Round 2, No. 36 overall)
Tom Donahoe's first draft as GM of the Bills, in 2001, netted some really good players. Nate Clements, Aaron Schobel and Travis Henry all made our "best of" list yesterday, and the Bills even got quality years and production out of third-round pick Jonas Jennings. 2002, however, was an epic flop, and Reed, the Bills' second-round pick (fourth overall in that round), was part of the reason why.

Drafted well ahead of his talent level thanks to a huge bowl game as a senior, the converted running back had a solid rookie season playing between Eric Moulds and Peerless Price on a very prolific Bills offense led by Drew Bledsoe. Then Price was shipped out of town, Reed became the starter, and his career has been incredibly average since then. This was the first in a long line of high-round luxury picks made by Donahoe that did not pan out, and obviously eventually cost Donahoe his job.

9. Chris Ellis, DE, Virginia Tech (2008, Round 3, No. 72 overall)
It's tough to put a player in his second year on this list (and we'll do it again soon), but Ellis is the poster child of several "good idea, bad philosophy/wrong player" picks that the Bills have made this decade. Picked when the Bills had a need to boost their pass rush, Ellis has seen extremely minimal playing time and barely made the roster in his second season. Unlike former second-round picks Schobel, Ryan Denney and Chris Kelsay, Ellis has not found any way to contribute to the team - and though it might still be too early to write him off, the Bills picked a project player with attitude issues in a season when they needed their high-round picks to produce.

8. Donte Whitner, S, Ohio State (2006, Round 1, No. 8 overall)
I suspect that most of you will want to see Whitner higher on this list, simply because the Bills passed on a dominant defensive lineman (Haloti Ngata) to get him. Philosophically, the pick makes at least some degree of sense; look at most of today's elite NFL teams, and you'll find an elite safety on the back end of the defense. Whitner, however, has failed to produce to the standards of a No. 8 overall pick thanks to his being shuffled from position-to-position and his own lack of elite playmaking ability. Whitner is a good player, which is why this pick doesn't rank much higher on the list. Philosophically, however, Buffalo erred here, and thus got the Dick Jauron era off to a not-so-hot start.

7. James Hardy, WR, Indiana (2008, Round 2, No. 41 overall)
Much like Ellis, I'm hesitant to put a second-year player on this list, particularly at the wide receiver position. I still very much believe that Hardy has what it takes to be a poor man's Plaxico Burress-type threat in this league, particularly in the red zone. He won't get the reps to do it any time soon, however.

This pick makes the list because philosophically, it was perhaps the worst team-building move the Bills made in the last half of the decade. Buffalo knew entering the '08 off-season that they needed a threat to complement Lee Evans and help develop young quarterback Trent Edwards. They courted veteran free agents like Bryant Johnson, but that didn't pan out, so they went to the draft and came away with... a tall receiver in need of an incredible amount of polish. Everyone knows that the bigger a rookie receiver, the longer it'll take to develop them. (Unless their surname is Fitzgerald or Johnson.) Hardy couldn't nail down a starting job, Edwards went into a shell thanks to a lack of weapons that he'd never re-emerge from, and the rest is history. Buffalo fixed the situation a year too late with the Terrell Owens signing.

6. Travares Tillman, S, Georgia Tech (2000, Round 2, No. 58 overall)
Tillman played in the NFL for quite a while. He made a nice living as a journeyman safety with some range and athletic ability, and he even picked off 3 passes with Miami in 2005. But you generally would like your second-round picks to spend more than two seasons with your team, which is exactly what Tillman did. He did not survive the regime change from Wade Phillips to Gregg Williams, and that's an indictment on the efforts of former GM John Butler in his last Bills draft class.

5. Roscoe Parrish, WR, Miami, FL (2005, Round 2, No. 55 overall)
Yikes. Without a first-round pick thanks to an epic draft-day blunder of a trade that we'll discuss a bit higher on this list, Donahoe, in his last draft as a Bills GM, chose the gadget player to rule all gadget players with Parrish as his top selection on the season. Parrish has had his moments with this team, and for a while, he was the NFL's best punt returner, setting career average records and putting the Bills in position to win a few games thanks to timely big returns. But Parrish was drafted to be much more than a punt returner; unfortunately, that's all the Bills have gotten.

4. John McCargo, DT, North Carolina State (2006, Round 1, No. 26 overall)
It'd be difficult for most teams to find a bigger first-round flop than McCargo in the past decade; unfortunately for the Bills, they have three bigger flops. Again, this was a case of the Bills taking a player far higher than his talent level indicated; the Bills desperately needed a starting defensive tackle that season, and the fact that they lucked into Kyle Williams four rounds later doesn't make this pick any less of a reach. Since this pick, McCargo has dealt with several small injuries, one major injury (a bulging disc in his back), been traded, had the trade negated, and toiled at the bottom of the Bills' depth chart. Not exactly what you'd like out of a first-round pick.

3. Erik Flowers, DE, Arizona State (2000, Round 1, No. 26 overall)
Butler's last draft featured Flowers as its centerpiece. Bruce Smith had left the team, and the Bills were searching for their next great pass rusher. Flowers didn't stick in Buffalo because Gregg Williams brought in a 4-3 defense that Flowers, a 3-4 pass rusher, did not fit into. But the four sacks that Flowers picked up in two seasons with Buffalo represent 80% of his career total of five, which he picked up in five NFL seasons.

2. J.P. Losman, QB, Tulane (2004, Round 1, No. 22 overall)
This, my friends, was Epic Fail No. 2. Drew Bledsoe had something left in the tank, and the Bills were pushing toward a playoff berth. They did, however, need a quarterback of the future, and then-head coach Mike Mularkey fell in love with the deep ball of a cocky kid from Tulane. Mularkey loved that deep ball so much that the Bills traded multiple picks to Dallas to move back into the first round to get their cocky kid quarterback. Two years later, Mularkey was gone, Losman had a flash-in-the-pan season under Dick Jauron, and then a Losman knee injury began the memorable Trent Edwards era. Now, Losman is attempting to get back into the NFL after leading the Las Vegas Locomotives to a UFL championship.

1. Mike Williams, OT, Texas (2002, Round 1, No. 4 overall)
It's tough to top Losman, but Williams found a way to do it. Williams is the poster child for terrible Bills drafting, and the centerpiece of the plethora of issues that got Donahoe fired. At the time, Williams was given the richest contract in franchise history, but to say that he never lived up to his potential would be a severe understatement. He spent four highly mediocre seasons as Buffalo's right tackle before lazy-ing himself out of the sport entirely; one of the very first actions Marv Levy took on this roster as GM was to cut Williams. Big Mike made a not-so-dramatic return to NFL football this season with Washington, and is now toiling in anonymity on one of the league's worst units that features another former Bill, Derrick Dockery.

Just click his name and take a gander at his picture to see just how far Williams' star has fallen.

Top 10 Buffalo Bills draft picks: 2000-2009

Brian Galliford — Wed, 09 Dec 2009 14:37:21 -0000

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I don't get into the whole "Hey, a decade's about to end, let's make lists!" culture. It's fun, but it's repetitive and boring. Still, those types of lists engender some fun discussions, so while I won't go overboard and do best/worst lists for every possible topic concerning the Buffalo Bills, I figured we'd knock off the most important aspect of the team: drafting.

This past decade has been a brutal one for Bills football. But even in bad times, a few (random and ultimately meaningless to the win column) good decisions are made. What follows is my list of the Bills' ten best draft selections of the past decade.

10: Travis Henry, RB, Tennessee (2001, Round 2, No. 58 overall)
We start our "best of" list with one of the more controversial figures in the NFL of the past decade, and he only played four seasons in Buffalo. That should tell you a lot. However, as a second-round pick, the Bills got three highly productive seasons out of Henry - until he was usurped by a man who will appear a little higher on this list.

Henry finished his Bills career with 3,849 yards and 29 touchdowns. He played in three more seasons with Tennessee and Denver, but his career was cut short thanks to off-field troubles. Henry is currently serving a one-year NFL suspension for violating the NFL's substance abuse policy, but that's made irrelevant by the fact that he's nearly a year into a three-year prison sentence for financing a cocaine trafficking operation.

9. Angelo Crowell, LB, Virginia (2003, Round 3, No. 94 overall)
He got his start as Takeo Spikes' replacement, and when he got into the lineup, he hung onto a starting job for a number of seasons. Not a flashy performer, Crowell nonetheless put up solid stat lines in three seasons as a key defensive contributor, tallying 233 tackles, 7 sacks and 5 interceptions in his brief Bills career. He spent the 2008 season on IR (controversially, I might add), and is now out of football after being cut by Tampa Bay prior to the start of the 2009 season.

8. Marshawn Lynch, RB, California (2007, Round 1, No. 12 overall)
He's only in his third season - and his third season isn't going so well - but Lynch has been a consistent performer on some bad football teams, to his credit. He's rushed for 2,489 yards and 17 touchdowns to this point in his Bills career, and you can add a Pro Bowl berth to his resume as well. Off-field issues have plagued him early in his career, but if he can lay those issues to rest, Lynch is in line for a solid career.

7. Willis McGahee, RB, Miami, FL (2003, Round 1, No. 23 overall)
Before he became the hated son of Buffalo, McGahee was one of the bolder and smarter picks of the Tom Donahoe era. Drafted in spite of a knee injury, McGahee rewarded the Bills for their risk in the form of 3,365 yards and 24 rushing touchdowns in three seasons as a Bill. Still one of the more productive scoring backs in the game with Baltimore, McGahee also makes the list because the Bills were able to trade him for three more draft picks. He wasn't a need pick, but the Bills got production and tripled their draft selections with this investment.

6. Nate Clements, CB, Ohio State (2001, Round 1, No. 21 overall)
The Bills have had a lot of "whoops" moments with their first-round draft picks in recent seasons, but Clements decidedly does not fit that criteria. In six seasons with the Bills, Clements picked off 23 passes and scored 7 touchdowns (5 on interceptions, 2 on punt returns) while establishing himself as one of the best corners in the game. He has spent the past three seasons in San Francisco, where he has added a further 7 interceptions to his resume as the cornerstone of a re-building defense.

5. Lee Evans, WR, Wisconsin (2004, Round 1, No. 13 overall)
With Drew Bledsoe in town, Buffalo needed a speedy receiver to complement Eric Moulds. They got a good one - and an immediate contributor, which is rare for rookie receivers - in the form of Evans. He caught 24 touchdown passes in his first three seasons, including 9 as a rookie, and since then Evans has established himself as one of the more under-appreciated receivers in the game. His production has slipped, but as he's been catching passes from awful quarterbacks, that's not overly surprising. Furthermore, Evans is one of the few draft-day investments the Bills have made at the receiver position in the past decade that actually panned out as planned.

4. Jairus Byrd, S, Oregon (2009, Round 2, No. 42 overall)
It's tough to put a current rookie on this list, but we'll make an exception for a guy who is still leading the league in interceptions (8) as a rookie making a position switch. Byrd has dealt with nagging injuries all season, and he's very much a one-dimensional player. But his ball skills and ball-hawking presence has been a tremendous boost to Buffalo's pass defense, and for his flaws, he's still a heck of a football player with a bright future.

3. Kyle Williams, DT, LSU (2006, Round 5, No. 134 overall)
I love it when teams find excellent, underrated contributors in the middle rounds. Williams has been a very nice find for the Bills, emerging as a very solid run defender as a fourth-year starter out of LSU. He'll never be a dominant player, but he's the type of guy that can find work on any NFL team thanks to his overall ability, his attitude and his work ethic. He's started every game he's ever appeared in as a Bill, and picked up 127 tackles and 7 sacks in the process.

2. Terrence McGee, CB, Northwestern State (2003, Round 4, No. 111 overall)
McGee is decidedly the "one who did NOT get away," as he's the only big name corner the Bills haven't allowed to leave via free agency in recent memory. A no-name draft pick out of Northwestern State, no one was really sure what to make of the McGee selection when it happened, but he's proven to be the steal of the decade for the Bills. A contributor since a rookie and a defensive starter for the last four years, McGee 390 tackles, 16 interceptions, 4 fumble recoveries and a defensive touchdown to his name. He's also widely regarded as one of the best kick returners of the past decade, with a 26.3-yard average and 5 return touchdowns. He made a Pro Bowl appearance in 2004 for his return efforts, as well.

1. Aaron Schobel, DE, TCU (2001, Round 2, No. 46 overall)
Clements was the big name draftee in 2001, but Schobel has given the Bills the most production and the most longevity of any draft pick made this decade. In his ninth year as a Buffalo Bill, Schobel ranks second on the Bills' all-time list with 75 career sacks, trailing only Hall of Fame end Bruce Smith. He's also got 19 forced fumbles, 8 fumble recoveries, 30 tipped passes, 3 interceptions and a defensive touchdown on his resume. Schobel has never been flashy and he makes a bit more money than he probably should, but he's been one of the most respected pass rushers in the league over the past decade, and as a second-round pick, he's also by far been the Bills' best draft pick of the past decade.

Talk Bills with Buffalo Rumblings...

Brian Galliford — Wed, 09 Dec 2009 15:46:28 -0000

... if you can stomach it. Some days, we can't.

Is there a less exciting game on the NFL Week 13 docket than Bills/Chiefs? Statistically speaking, there are a few that contend for the crown; the Bills and Chiefs have combined for 7 wins this season, a number featured in the Steelers/Browns, Jets/Buccaneers and Raiders/Redskins games. We're actually surpassed in this category by Titans/Rams, but hey - Chris Johnson and Vince Young are in that game.

Alas, NFL football is more exciting than most other sporting events, and this particular game holds some intrigue. I'm here to answer any questions y'all might have about the Buffalo Bills, and if my answers are not satisfactory, I'm sure several of my Buffalo Rumblings minions will set the record straight.

Best of luck this weekend. Stay healthy. And throw us a bone if you feel the urge.

Peyton Manning, Randy Moss, Ray Lewis lead NFL All-Decade team - SI.com

Brian Galliford — Tue, 08 Dec 2009 18:01:17 -0000

Peyton Manning, Randy Moss, Ray Lewis lead NFL All-Decade team - SI.com

Four men with ties to the Buffalo Bills - LB London Fletcher, CB Antoine Winfield, defensive coordinator Dick LeBeau and GM Bill Polian - made Sports Illustrated's All-Decade team.

It's just unfortunate that Polian did none of the work that got him that honor in Buffalo.

Reed, Tasker semifinalists in fan HOF voting, too

Brian Galliford — Tue, 08 Dec 2009 17:42:42 -0000

About a month ago, I wrote a short piece detailing the JC Penney/Van Heusen Fan's Choice vote, giving NFL fans a chance to cast votes for Hall of Fame candidates. That post was written for two reasons - because JC Penney and Van Heusen sponsored SB Nation's NFL blogs this season, and because several former Buffalo Bills, including Darryl Talley, Kent Hull and Cornelius Bennett, needed a little boost in the voting process.

Now that the Hall of Fame has released its list of 25 semi-finalists - with two former Bills (receiver Andre Reed and special teams ace Steve Tasker) on the list - it seemed like a good time to compare results.

NFL fans voting at www.fanschoice.com currently rank Reed at No. 18 on the voting list. He trails four other receivers on the list - Jerry Rice, Tim Brown, Cris Carter and Cliff Branch. Meanwhile, Tasker comes in at No. 23. If the fan vote is indicative of the real vote, Reed and Tasker don't have good, strong shots at enshrinement next August. Still, it's nice to see that experts and fans alike recognize the quality of play Reed and Tasker provided some of the NFL's best teams of the '90s, and recognized them on each semifinalist list.

Of the 25 semifinalists actually in the running, fans agreed with just 14 of those selections. The mutually exclusive groups are below; the first group are actual semifinalists that were not recognized as such by fans, and the second group is men recognized as semifinalists by fans, but not by the experts.

Semi-finalists: Don Coryell, Roger Craig, Terrell Davis, Dermontti Dawson, Chris Doleman, Russ Grimm, Rickey Jackson, Cortez Kennedy, Art Modell, Paul Tagliabue, Aeneas Williams

Fan semi-finalists: Randall Cunningham, Jim Plunkett, Phil Simms, Joe Theismann, Sterling Sharpe, Todd Christensen, Ed "Too Tall" Jones, Steve Atwater, Tom Flores, Jim Tunney, Otho Davis

The final results of this vote will be announced on NFL Network early next year, just before the official results are announced. Voting is still open, so if you'd like to cast votes for either Andre or Steve to get them recognized on NFL Network, do it quickly over at www.fanschoice.com.

Fitzpatrick still the right call for Bills at QB

Brian Galliford — Tue, 08 Dec 2009 13:10:18 -0000

More photos » by Nathan Denette - AP

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Amidst one of the worst seasons to witness as a fan of the Buffalo Bills in the past decade - and as the entire decade's been bad, that's saying something - calls for the Bills to change quarterbacks occur on a seemingly weekly basis. With Buffalo all but eliminated from playoff contention and awaiting organizational direction in the form of new football decision-makers and a new coaching staff, Bills fans are making their voices heard about the quarterback position.

It's tough for me to understand why. Buffalo doesn't have a desirable starting quarterback option on its roster. The man with perhaps the most vocal fan support at the moment, Brian Brohm, has been with the Bills for less than three weeks. Starter-by-default Ryan Fitzpatrick has put up some truly horrendous stat lines this season, to the point where even Trent Edwards, who fell out of favor quickly after a slow start in his third season, is the choice candidate in some circles.

Ultimately, however, it's Fitzpatrick that should stay in at quarterback for the Bills. I understand completely that that's not exactly the best news in the world. The reasons behind that opinion aren't great, but they're better than the reasons for starting Edwards or, far more importantly, Brohm. Buffalo has bigger fish to fry than trying to find a franchise quarterback this month.

The argument against Brohm
Since he became a Bill on November 19, infatuation with the second-year player out of Louisville has grown each week he's been on the sidelines as the Bills' emergency quarterback. (He's done it twice, by the way.) Once heralded as a sure-fire Top 5 pick and one of the more prolific college passers of recent memory, Brohm was a huge flop in Green Bay, failing to impress the coaching staff that developed Aaron Rodgers, losing confidence more rapidly than Edwards himself, and landing on the practice squad in just his second year while 2008 seventh-round pick Matt Flynn became Rodger's undisputed backup.

Yes, the talent is there with Brohm. He's not a blue-chip prospect, but his raw talent says he's capable of being a productive player in the NFL. But his psyche is fragile, he doesn't know the playbook yet, and even if he started all four games, we likely wouldn't learn anything definitive about him. He might end up playing an entirely different offensive scheme next year. If he played great, that'd be awesome, but that's incredibly unlikely given the Swiss Cheese nature of our offensive line. Do we really want to be putting a player who may or may not have the mental fortitude for the position into the lineup just to "see what we have" when the negative effects of the move could ruin yet another young quarterback in Buffalo? How, exactly, is that a good idea?

Seriously, what might we learn? That Brohm might be a good player? Can't we make the same claim right now, with Brohm stuck on the sidelines? Yes, it's the conservative approach, but there is absolutely no reason for the team to be aggressive in bringing Brohm along, nor is there a good reason for the fan base to want them to.

Here's the biggest reason that Brohm seeing any field time is a bad idea: Perry Fewell is his head coach. More accurately, Perry Fewell is his interim head coach. Like it or not, Fewell is three weeks into a seven-week job audition. If Fewell were to insert Brohm into the lineup, no matter how prepared or not he might be, Fewell would be asking Brohm to save his job. Fewell's coaching for a permanent head coaching gig. He's not coaching to groom talent, and his players realize it. Brohm would be in the lineup to play lights out and prove that his coach is the right man for the job. Fewell wouldn't do that to Brohm, and if he did, it'd be a severe blow to his head coaching chances, no matter how well Brohm performed. It's just not going to happen, folks, and y'all should be glad it won't.

Fitzpatrick still gives the Bills the best chance to win
Nothing against Trent Edwards. I'm not nearly as anti-Edwards as the venomous corner of the Bills' fan base, but he shouldn't be on the field unless playing in injury relief. Nothing would be better for Edwards at this point than a change in environment. He's proven himself to be dysfunctional as a starting quarterback in the current environment. His career is in a holding pattern; whether or not it continues in Buffalo remains to be seen, but throwing him back into the fire would do him nor the team any good at all.

That leaves Fitzpatrick. His play is incredibly hit-or-miss, but he's the choice starter of the offensive unit, he plays smart football, and for all of his flaws, he at least is capable of keeping the Bills competitive in games. Those are hardly glowing arguments, but it's the best we've got. He's the best choice for Fewell, who needs wins to remain here as the head coach. He's the best choice for the team, who at least are still playing with some small semblance of confidence.

Fitzpatrick obviously isn't the long-term answer at quarterback for any team, including the Bills. He's a good backup quarterback at his best, and with two more years on his current contract and some solid performances in the last two years under his belt, it's likely he'll stay as a backup quarterback for at least 2010. He's the best the Bills have right now, and he's the best choice for Perry Fewell. Like it or not, Fitzpatrick should, and very likely will, close out 2009 as Buffalo's starting quarterback.

Poll

Who should start at quarterback for Buffalo's last four games?

Clausen enters NFL Draft; is he a fit in Buffalo?

Brian Galliford — Mon, 07 Dec 2009 17:40:47 -0000

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The Buffalo Bills are back to work on the practice field today, but with news scant and the team not very interesting to begin with, it's still, unfortunately, more intriguing to ponder future iterations of the Bills than the current outfit. Naturally, we're going to be taking a brief field trip from talking about the Bills this afternoon - these Bills, anyway - and instead focus on the bigger news of the day.

Notre Dame quarterback Jimmy Clausen has announced his intentions to enter the 2010 NFL Draft. [Mocking the Draft]

Playing quarterback for the New York Yankees of college football, Clausen is one of the most highly-debated prospects in the nation simply because of the golden helmet he wore at Notre Dame. The 6'3", 226-pound junior was college football's second-highest rated passer in 2009, and given the fact that his head coach, Charlie Weis, was recently fired by ND, his declaration for next April's draft is not anywhere near surprising.

The natural thought process for Bills fans at this point is something along the lines of, "Hey, Buffalo's quarterbacks stink, and a new regime will, of course, want a new quarterback. Is Jimmy Clausen the answer?" Time will tell, but fans shouldn't dismiss him as a potential remedy to the team's longest-standing personnel issue out of habit.

Clausen the player
Clausen, as mentioned, measures in at 6'3" and 226 pounds, but it wouldn't surprise me - nor Rumblings draft guru Der Jaeger - if he measured in shorter than that at next February's NFL Combine. He doesn't look too tall on film, though he's certainly tall enough where his height won't be a huge problem for him. He's packed on a lot of weight over the past three seasons at Notre Dame, and while he's still skinny, he's thick enough to absorb hits and stay strong in the pocket.

Clausen's arm isn't elite - you won't be wowed by the velocity on any of his throws - but it's strong enough where he can hurt a defense at all levels of the field. He's pretty accurate and is able to put a nice touch on short and immediate throws; he can squeeze the ball into a tight window, too. He's a playmaker with his arm, but he's very much a pocket quarterback; he's mobile enough to roll out and pick up the occasional first down on a scramble, but his legs are decidedly not a weapon for him.

Where Clausen has distinct advantages over many of the other quarterbacks that will be available next April is in the fact that he's played - and excelled - in a pro-style offense, and that he's an elite decision-maker. As a sophomore in 2008, Clausen completed 60% of his passes and had a 25-17 TD-INT ratio. Those numbers increased dramatically as a junior, when he completed 68% of his passes and had a 28-4 TD-INT ratio. As Mocking the Draft notes in the story linked above the fold, three of Clausen's four interceptions came on tipped passes. The kid didn't make many mistakes in his final year in college.

Clausen was 16-19 at Notre Dame. In his junior season, Notre Dame finished 6-6, but of those six losses, the Irish scored at least 21 points in all of them. Their two biggest losses on the season were 7-point losses to USC and Stanford. He struggled in three games, but still tossed four touchdowns in those games, and in a win at Purdue, he played through a tough injury to his foot. Clausen played with grit as a junior, getting banged up behind a rather mediocre offensive line, yet he still started every game and put up elite numbers.

The big questions surrounding Clausen
Clausen is consistent mechanically, but he's not perfect. He's got a bit of a windup, and he's kind of slow and almost lethargic in his drops - though the ball always comes out quickly. Again - he's not fleet of foot, and he'll need a little work in his drops, in my opinion. His tools are not elite, but they're very good - and in a quarterback draft class that has been slightly overrated, Clausen's well-rounded physical and scheme attributes will likely get him drafted a touch higher than his skill and potential probably dictate.

People have, in the past, questioned Clausen's maturity and mental fortitude. He grew up in California and had tremendous hype as a high school product, and while he struggled mentally early on because of this, he grew a bit as a leader in South Bend. Through tremendous adversity and ridiculous expectations, Clausen has flourished and, perhaps more importantly, gotten better each season. He's rallied the troops for some thrilling late-game performances - in both victory and defeat. His transition to the NFL might not be immediate, but given what he's already experienced, I find it highly unlikely that the NFL game will faze him.

You'll also hear plenty of arguments that Clausen worked in a system that accentuated quarterback stats, and that he was surrounded by top-flight talent. Both are true. Weis has always had productive quarterbacks, wherever he's been, and the likes of Golden Tate (who also announced his intentions to go pro today), Michael Floyd and tight end Kyle Rudolph gave Clausen tremendous skill positional assets to utilize. His numbers may have been inflated because of both factors, but the bottom line is that Clausen still had to make the throws, and more often than not, the ball was exactly where it needed to be.

I've heard the "Notre Dame quarterbacks bust, just look at Brady Quinn" argument too many times to adequately express my true level of frustration toward it. If a quarterback can play football, I don't care if he went to Notre Dame or if he went to South Central Montana State. Clausen has proven that he can play, and he's done it against pretty solid competition. That's all that should matter.

The bottom line on Clausen
I view Clausen as a fringe Top 10 talent that, ideally, would be picked somewhere between the first 10 and 20 picks in the draft. He's not an elite prospect, but he's good enough to build a franchise around. He's not a sure bet - very, very few prospects are, and none of them are quarterbacks - but there's definitely some energy to be excited about surrounding Clausen.

I question just how much distance he has to close between his current level of play and his true 'potential' as a prospect. That is, I'm not sure how much better he can get. That'll happen when you play nearly flawless football at Notre Dame. I think he can make slight gains in technique and obviously in experience, but I don't think he's capable of playing near-perfect football at the NFL level.

I worry a little bit about his willingness to lead, too. He's got kind of a Tony Romo vibe about him, in that when he's on, he's elite, and when he's not on, you question whether or not he's really the guy to head up your program. I'd be very hesitant to plug him in as a rookie starter - particularly in Buffalo - because if he took some early hits and lost confidence behind a porous offensive line, I'd have serious doubts as to whether he'd have the mental fortitude to get through the rough patch. If he starts off hot, however, I think he'd end up being fine, and more able to work through the low points of the game.

The bottom line is that the Buffalo Bills desperately need a franchise signal-caller. Jimmy Clausen is a franchise signal-caller. I'm not advocating that the Bills do whatever it takes to get him next April, but there's little doubt in my mind that he's capable of leading a consistent, productive NFL team down the line. It's way too early to draw lines in the sand, but Clausen is good enough - and the Bills will be picking high enough - that Clausen needs to be on your radar if he wasn't already.

Jets 19, Bills 13: Week 13 Film Session

Brian Galliford — Sun, 06 Dec 2009 23:55:34 -0000

by Chris Young - AP

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It's Monday, and even though the Buffalo Bills are a full three days removed from their most recent loss - in this case, a 19-13 loss to the New York Jets in Toronto - Monday means it's film session day.

You know the drill. We've added a few thoughts about teams and games outside of this (dreary) matchup, so that's slightly different, but you know what to expect. As always, feel free to add your own thoughts and observations to those presented here in the comments section.

Rex Ryan has Buffalo's number. Buffalo put up 29 points in two games against the Jets this season. They ran the ball well in (extremely occasional) spots, and were able to hit the (extremely occasional) big play. But New York's offense was also very kind to Buffalo, giving them plenty of opportunities to put both games away, and the Bills were only able to do so once. Just how thoroughly is Rex Ryan's defense owning Buffalo's offense? Take a quick look at Ryan Fitzpatrick's stat line in the two games: 39.6% completions (19 of 48), 214 yards (4.46 yards per attempt), 1 TD, 2 INT, 3 sacks and a quarterback rating of 43.2. Fitzpatrick's quarterback rating of 43.2 is only slightly higher than the number of yards per quarter Thomas Jones picked up against the Bills this season (39.9).

Ryan's defense didn't do a ton, but given Buffalo's massive upheaval along the offensive line, it did the only thing it needed to do: run a bunch of exotic blitzes and confuse the hell out of Buffalo's blockers. Just like in Week 6, the Bills had opportunities to make plays down the field in this one - Lee Evans was open on intermediate routes several times, for example - but overload blitzes and stunts got pass protection out of whack, and Fitzpatrick was forced to either throw an inaccurate pass or eat the ball nearly every time.

I feel bad for Ron From NM. Not because of anything he's done or anything that's in his control. I just feel bad that most of the excellent, hard work he puts into analyzing Buffalo's offensive line on an annual basis will be largely meaningless this season. Demetrius Bell hasn't played enough to be evaluated fairly. Grades on Jonathan Scott, Kendall Simmons, Kirk Chambers and Jamon Meredith will be largely meaningless, because none of those players figure to be in Buffalo's long-term plans.

If I were Ron - and if I were him, he'd be me, and he'd probably use my body to do his usual analysis anyway - I'd just focus on three guys in my ultimate end-of-season analysis. Those three guys would be Andy Levitre, Geoff Hangartner and Eric Wood. They're the only guys who've played enough to fairly evaluate, and considering that fact alone, it's not hard to understand why Buffalo's offense is so ridiculously awful.

Given everything that's happened up front this season, as well as the fact that the Jets threw exotic looks at the Bills again, I came away impressed with Levitre. I think it's pretty safe to say that he has been the Bills' best lineman this season, his first in the league. He's played in every game, he's acquitted himself nicely when asked to play positions beyond his skill level (left tackle), and while he's had his ups and downs, his technique and consistency have come a long way since September 14 in New England. He's going to be a good player in this league for a while.

We've already talked about the abysmal run defense. Read that article if you missed it, but if you're looking for the Cliff's Notes version: backside contain and gap discipline are lacking, the linebackers stink, and the secondary is hit-and-miss in run support across the board.

That's it. I don't think I can talk about the rest of the team, because the game was so dreadfully boring and repetitive that we won't learn anything new by re-hashing what we've been talking about for three months. Blech. This team is awful to root for sometimes.

Mark Sanchez has the stuff to be the real deal. When I'm looking at a young quarterback, I don't care as much about the throws and the production as I do about what he looks like in the pocket. Sanchez has a little bit of a Tony Romo flair to him - he's quite mobile, can throw from different arm angles, and can create throwing lanes with his movement. He's terrific with ball fakes, and he has the arm to eventually make "all the throws," as they say in the biz. Yes, he's struggled in two games against the Bills this year, but I beg you to understand that that is not likely to continue. Sanchez is gonna be pretty good.

The AFC East stinks. Is there a more overrated division in the NFL? Our division leader is 7-5. Buffalo has beaten each of the two teams currently a game behind New England - who also barely beat us in the season opener. New England split with New York and Miami, two highly, highly average teams. I mean, they lost to the Bills, for crying out loud.

Going into the season, fans fretted about the "difficulty" of the two divisions the AFC East would be playing in 2009 - the AFC South and the NFC South. Granted, those two divisions sport the only two undefeated teams in football, but beyond those two teams, there aren't any others that strike fear into its opponents, with the possible exception of the Tennessee Titans of the last six games. This division is 7-5 against the NFC South - although, to be fair, they're 7-1 against teams not playing in New Orleans - and, more pertinently to the overrated argument, they're 3-6 against the AFC South.

There aren't any elite divisions in the NFL this season - mostly because there aren't many elite teams - but the AFC East race, at least in my personal opinion, is one of the least exciting out there. Which is, of course, a bummer.