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Week 9 – Wreck-It Ralph

The Bills should take the advice of a recent children’s movie and “wreck it, Ralph.” The Bills have, if you can possibly believe, taken large steps forward from the Jauron regime, but still remain wildly undercoached. When Jauron left, there was no o-line, a struggling running game, questionable QB play and a talentless, undersized defense.

Today the Bills have a solid OL, a running unit that they don’t particularly like using for some reason, some wide receivers who make ridiculous catches from their inaccurate QB, some TE options, and a front 4 DL that could be good if the LB core played up to snuff.

That being said, the next coach for the Bills will have some pieces with which to work. “Why do we need a new coach, Kevin? You think he’s a good OC.” Because he has become one gigantic weenie. Take this example. The guy attempted four field goals. Two were from 4th and two inside the red zone and the other was with nine seconds on the clock before the half. He’s trying to hold the margin of defeat. That gutless effort is noted by the players whether it’s explicitly or implicitly noted.

A coach who has a run game that averages 6 yards a carry and opts not to run more than 12 times in the game is crazy. Gailey likes to pass the ball out of the spread. That’s his thing. But it’s no longer 1992. You can’t just assemble dream teams and have the best players do their thing. You have to work with what you got post Free Agency. He has a QB who is 5-14 since signing a huge contract. It’s almost cruel and unusual punishment that he’s out there. This is like letting a shellacked goalie stay out there. Pull him for his own good, Chan!

And to be honest, Fitz looked mildly capable. For a half. He threw his first pass to Donald Jones this year where Donald Jones wasn’t almost decapitated. But at the end of the half when you simply can not get sacked, he got sacked. At the end of the game when you couldn’t fumble, he fumbled. When it’s third down, he doesn’t convert. When they were down two scores, he’s throwing 8 yard passes.

For Ralph to wreck it, it could start with Gailey. But I think it goes to Russ Brandon. This is a guy who is wowing even Bank CEOs from the 2008 crisis. He has presided over two major seasons falling apart, four head coaches, three quarterback controversies, two old man GM signings and a partridge in a pear tree. He still has the job. In fact, he’s gotten promoted! And he started off as a baseball guy. Even the Bank CEOs under pressure for legal reasons still left their gigs eventually. Russ Brandon has the job for life.

Which pretty much ensures that this will never get fixed. And for those who think it’s such a conspiracy that the Bills are intentionally tanking, it is bizarre that 31 other teams have been to the playoffs once and we can’t get there from coaching changes, 4-3 to 3-4 changes, QB changes, drafts. Somehow the people in control of the draft keep messing up in ways that defy logic. It’s like watching a trader lose money every single year when they would have made more money buying a Vanguard Index Fund. Really? This is why we pay the high fees? But in high finance those guys don’t survive. In Buffalo they are credited for being the genius who sold Football to Buffalonians. At the halfway mark of the season its hard to tell if we’ve even seen football.

DVD Extras

Now what? Now we IR people who have injuries that take 3-6 weeks to heal. Then we sign guys named Leon Joe who last played LB at a division 3 school in Switzerland.

You talk so much, Shenoy, what’s your plan – Well, we have no quarterback. I’d host a dunk tank with Russ Brandon donating his time to raise funds for charity. First person to dunk him on a throw longer than 10 yards is next year’s starting QB. Second guy is the back up. You draft another QB in the draft. There are your quarterbacks for next year. Currently all better than the current three.

Texans first touchdown – What a play. How many times have you heard that you shouldn’t throw the ball across the field? How many times have you heard that slow developing plays are a bad idea? Yet Schaub rolled out, set his feet and launched a ball to Owen Daniels who ran 65 yards (25 across and 40 deep) to be wide open. Truly a pathetic defense.

A land of delusion – Kelvin Sheppard was in the news this week trying to defend his defensive corp. “We played lights out!” Really? He went on to say that the fans who look at the stats “don’t know football.” Clearly Sheppard’s hatred for math and facts has him looking at a front running position for the Republican 2016 ticket (I know, one political joke. You’ll survive.) The team gave up 52 points to a team that routinely embarrasses us. They gave up more than 35 points four other times. That’s lights out? I asked Sal Capaccio (@SalSports on Twitter), “what is the last team to give up two plus 50 point games?” I was kind of expecting “not in the modern era,” but Sal is a stat king and definitely worth following. He responded, “the 2007 Lions.” You probably are thinking of the 2008 Lions as the only team to lose every game in the season. But the 7-9 2007 Lions lost two games by allowing 50+ points. They also gave up 4 games with 40+ points. In 8 games, the Bills have given up one 50+ point game and three 40+ point games. We excel at being terrible. Sucking at almost twice the rate of a bad Lions team. Oh, and we have an 0-16 season to look forward to next year.

Patriot game – Oh, the good news keeps coming. The Patriots have cleaned up the spanking field and are ready to put up an easy 60 points to a Bills team that most likely will take the beating like a character in the “Fifty Shades of Grey” series. The Patriots will be playing us coming off their bye week for the 900th time out of 901 times. While Chan keeps wondering how to deal with an extra attacker in the box, Bill Belichick will phone in the refs to make sure all the calls are ready to go his way… again.

Two more wins… tops – Can someone look at the schedule and see more than two wins? I am stretching when I say I think the Bills can beat Jax and St. Louis. And you know they will get those wins because it’ll screw them in the draft.

Geno Smith – I just want to be on the record and say “I don’t think he’s going to be anything but a stat machine vs bad teams.” Go ahead and send this back to me next year when he’s tearing it up. But the guy has disappeared the last three weeks. In bigger games, he’s no where to be found. In easy games, he’s unstoppable. We have had that quarterback for 12 years. I don’t have a better answer, unfortunately… but I say no to Geno Smith. You heard it here first.

Kevin Shenoy can be reached at onefansview@gmail.com and @kevinshenoy on twitter.