The Bills desire to lose this game was in full effect days leading up to the game. The brain trust of the marketing department decided:
1. “Let’s go ahead and change wearing blue jerseys at home even though it’s been working thus far and go with white.…after labor day”
2. “And, let’s steal other teams’ ideas with the whiteout and make that our big marketing plan.”
3. “oh, Russ, I’ve got one more great idea since we are really on a roll here with original and non-karmically destroying ideas. Let’s get a diamond company to sponsor the white pom-pom. They’ve agreed to make these low-end toxic plastic sticks, but they are only willing to make 50,000 of them despite the stadium seating 70,000+. I’m not sure what the cost of low-end toxic plastics, but I guess they cost a lot. I mean the Lindsay Lohan (a low-end toxic plastic herself) Playboy shoot cost $1MM. I guess we shouldn’t push to fill the stadium with white when the whole idea is based on the idea of filling the stadium with white.”
4. “and one last thing, let’s honor Scott Norwood during the game for reasons that aren’t clear to anyone. I can’t help but think the guy who missed the game winning kick to Jersey A in the biggest game of Bills history should be at the Jersey B game when it’s the biggest game of the season thus far. Are we going to have him come out with the single bar helmet? ”
5. “actually sorry, Mr. Brandon, one more thing. I’m Ralph’s personal assistant, he asked if he could attend even though he hasn’t been to a single home game this year. I realize the team is 4-0 without him, but he does own the team, so I guess it’s happening no matter what.”
These are conversations (or some derivation of a conversations) that happened prior to kickoff. One bad idea can ruin the sports universe. A whole hand of bad ideas creates 27-11 outcomes in divisional games at home.
Aside from the game, I thought the whiteout was the saddest part of the day. The Arab spring launched used twitter. A revolution from dictatorship came from tweets! Yet, getting 70,000 in white shirts was not doable through twitter. The Bills tried. They really did. I’m guessing Chan Gailey gave up game planning for two days to make sure the whole team was tweeting as much as possible about the whiteout.
Despite this push, the stadium was filled with your usual spattering of hunting coats and starter jackets circa 1993. It was kind of white. It was kind of working. Which sadly is better than what you could say about the Bills offense. And whatever you say about the Bills offense is better than what you could say about the officiating.
I’m not one to constantly complain about referees (despite the fact I always complain about the referees), but when 2 penalties and one non-call put the ball on the 1 yard line 3 times in one game, these things have big impacts in a game where neither team moved the ball. With the game 6-3, Plaxico Burress pulls McKelvin’s jersey over his head and pushes him out of the way and gets to the 1. You’d think he was trying to leave a night club after shooting himself or something. 13-3.
Next drive, Fred Jackson uncharacteristically fumbles. Next play Sanchez throws for the same corner. There may be some incidental contact between Holmes and McKelvin, however, the ball isn’t catchable. The ball is placed at the 1. 20-3. And late in the game when it just didn’t matter, the most legit of the pass interference calls is called, and the ball put at the 1. 27-3.
This isn’t it to say the Bills were going to win, but it wasn’t going to be a blow out. It would have been nice if the 50 yard bomb that Fitz put out to Fred Jackson to start the second half would have drawn a flag. The Jet defender only launched him into the heated seats on the play, and the ball was catchable.
The Bills just didn’t make any adjustments. They seemed scared of the Jets secondary. They seemed to hope that Fred Jackson would just win them that game, and the short passes would take some heat off of Fred. They didn’t make use of the wildcat, reverses or screens until it was too late. They didn’t do anything to stop the Jets from being able to rush the passer and stuff the run. There wasn’t a single wrinkle to slow down the heat. However, if the game was still 6-3 or 9-3, momentum would have played a part of deciding a winner. And unless Momentum is the name of one of the refs, it had nothing to do with the winner of that snoozefest.
In the end, I’m not terribly worried about that loss. The Jets continue to play poor football and get the breaks. If the Bills lose again to the Jets and look as uninterested as they did on Sunday, then we have a problem. If the Bills get 2 wins like they should in the next two weeks, all is fine.
DVD Extras
– Ed Hochuli – It is my firm belief that Ed Hochuli likes to call at least 15 penalties a game just to showcase his arms. His false start call is all arms. Most people just rotate the wrists, but this ego maniac needs to flex the bi’s and then rotate the motion super slow. It’s gratuitous is what it is. That’s my nice way of saying that I feel like he’s shooting Ref Cinemax soft porn. He practically wants to kiss the guns himself and then wink at the camera. I also believe the NFL is afraid of him because there is zero reason for that guy to be a playoff referee. Yet he’s been there the last couple years.
– NBC guys – When Rodney Harrison is defending the Bills on bad calls, you know that something was amiss.
– Matt Barnaby, not helping the 5 points above – I saw Matt Barnaby at the game. He was dressed head to toe in Jets gear. The rat really knows how to rile people up. There were some kids who passed him and did a double take. “why is Matt Barnaby in all Jets gear?” The kid’s face looked like he was watching his father kiss someone that wasn’t his mom. It was terrible.
– Peter King Article– Peter King had an article on Tuesday that said that apparently some owners of the NFL would like to see a 5/3 split with Toronto. So just to be clear, WNY should pay for $100MM in stadium renovations for just 5 games a year. Ok, that sounds like an amazing deal. I wonder if I can pay 60% more than MSRP for a car that has had significant work done on it. If we act now, do we get to have two preseason games a year as well?
– The last two minutes of the first half marked the worst football ever – At the 1:47 mark of the second quarter, Fitz threw an interception. At the 1:04 mark, the Jets used almost 30 seconds to miss a 50-yard field goal. At the :53 second mark, Fitz threw another interception. At the :49 mark, Sanchez fumbled the snap. At the :25 second mark, the Bills went 4 and out. And then the Jets mercifully ended the most boring 2 minutes in football ever. This is primarily why I’m not terrified of the rematch. Without those pass interference calls, this was the battle of attrition that should have occurred.
– Though I have one worry – The Bills’ five wins come from KC (a team that lost to Miami), Oakland (a team that is crumbling), New England (perhaps living off of past performance), Philly (struggling team themselves) and Washington (Craptacular). The three losses to division leaders. Beating bad teams, losing to good ones? Is 2008 happening all over again? Are we the 2010 Chiefs? I may just be panicking for no reason.
– Sitting 3 rows up from the field – This was the closest I’ve sat to the field. The game moves 200 mph at this level. Playaction is deadly in the NFL game. You know that watching from home and higher up in the field, but when you are looking at the line of scrimmage at field level, you have no idea who has the ball. You are kind of left having to watch the TV.
– The two people behind me – I had a lady behind me that kept screaming at like 130 decibals into my left ear, “Let’s go boys, let’s get it done!” But her voice sounded like Starscream’s voice from the original Transformer series. Only if Starscream was fairly inebriated and screechier. She had no variation in what she said. This was on repeat for 3 hours. Her guy pal would only scream “defense” the way Yankee stadium beer vendors scream “cold beer.” That annoying bottom of the scale note for the word “Cold” and then progressively sliding to the upper register in 2 seconds for the word “Beer”. This guy found out that it works for “De” and “Fense”. I’m not such a prude that I’m anti screaming at the game. But when it’s still in TV timeout, you need to quiet down. And for some reason all I could think is that these two probably make love screaming the same things at each other. “De-Fense!” “Let’s go boys! Let’s get it done!” Although they probably would have to say what their partner says at the game in that hypothetical situation.
– Fancy I down – Fancy I made a TD saving tackle on the opening kick off. I was impressed and was hoping that Merriman taught the special teams unit the lights out dance. When he didn’t showcase the move, I was devastated. And now that Fancy I is potentially out for a couple games, I wish I never spoke ill of Fancy I. Who else is out there right now to replace, Mr. Average to kind of below Average? I’m seriously asking. I’ve ragged on the man so long; I’ve totally taken him for granted.
– JetBlue annoyance avoided – I have ranted for a while about that flight from Buffalo to NY on Sunday after the game. This year I avoided it by taking the 5:45am flight on Monday morning. The Sunday flight was $300; the Monday one $59. The Sunday flight is with angry, NJ fans; Monday is with sane people who will sleep. Sunday the plane smells like a urinal, Monday the plane was odor free. I’ve found the cure. The down side is that I arrive at work at 8:30am having been up since 3:30am. Still it’s a price worth paying to not sit near drunken Jet fans.
– DirecTV Give away! – So my friend, Jeff at DirecTV who asked if I could promote the ultimate fan giveaway contest, told me that he has two Bill’s remotes that he’s giving away. He told me that I can decide who gets them. Know this, these remotes work exclusively for the DirecTV boxes. The remote is your standard remote, but in red, white, and blue with a Bills logo in the middle. He sent me a pic and I didn’t take the time to save it and upload it. Sorry. Trust me, it’s cool. I’m happy to do some sort of giveaway with you guys. Aside from anyone wanting to mail me a check for $1BN so I can buy the Bills, the two winners will be decided on their email. I wanted to make a contest or something fun, but I’ve got nothing. So just send me an email at onefansview@gmail.com that you are interested. Tell me something interesting about this season. You’re feelings, your ups, your downs. Something other than “give me the remote, man”. However, it’d be great if the subject was “give me the remote man.” If you are one of the first two, I’ll send you an email asking for your address. DirecTV will ship it directly to you. If you don’t hear from me, you missed out. Is this a fair plan? But again, if someone responds later with a wire transfer of $1BN, that takes precedent and you lose out on the remote. I will send you a sizeable cash prize so you can buy all the remotes you want to make it up to you should that scenario play out.
– Shelly on Animal Planet – This Friday at 10pm on the Animal Planet, Shelly will be on “My Extreme Animal Phobia.” She grew up terrified of Indian men with Irish first names and Buffalo sports obsessions as well as sharks. She spent a week doing the show in California in August. I won’t tell you if the “therapy” worked or not. We haven’t seen the episode. We’ll be seeing it the first time with you guys. Watch it.
Kevin Shenoy can be reached at onefansview@gmail.com. @KevinShenoy is the twitter handle.