2 Year Window

[patmoran2006]

That's what I have for the Buffalo Bills to make a run at the AFC as long as Ralph Wilson is the owner.

We have plenty of youth and plenty of cap room. The youth will get more experience this year, and the cap room "should" help us extend some of our more underpaid players next season, Schobel being the most noteworthy.

2008 there is absolutely no excuse not to be geared for a run. Lynch and Poz will have a year under them, and the five defensive rookies from last year will be in their third season.. Evans is one of the best and Losman is growing big time.

After that however, it could be back on the downward cycle.
2008 marks the final year in the contracts of vets including JP Losman, Angelo Crowell, Keith Ellison and Melvin Fowler.

Undoubtedly in the next two years, you can expect Lee Evans and Jason Peters to play themselves into a deserved raise. Not to mention Schobel is signed through 2009 and I highly doubt he'll be playing that long with his current salary on today's market. Whether these guys have a right to want an extension/raise is irrelevant; when they look around the league and see guys they're far better than making much more money, they will.

Anyway, assuming Wilson (who would be pushing 90 by 2008) is still the owner, and assuming he keeps his BS "cash to cap" in tact. There is absolutely NOT a chance that we will be able to maintain this core of talent and make it fit under his economical structure; ZERO.

A guy like Evans between bonus/guarentee is going to command $15-18 million in cash to cap alone.. Hell, Kelsay already commanded $12 million, and he's Chris ****ing Kelsay for God's sake. What do you think Losman will cost for us to keep in "cash to cap" dollars? Now I"m starting to understand why we drafted Edwards.

Bottom line: probably half of these guys will be gone via FA and/or trades by the time their contracts are up. We simply can't afford to pay them all.

That will lead to a ****load full of new holes, and more rookies and inexpensive free agent projects to take their spot.

So while I understand the anti- Redskin spending sentiments, Cash to Cap is none at all better as we're in spending jail pretty much year-to-year.

But hey.. At least Wilson will make more money.

Now, while what I think will happen financially with these guys is only my OPINION at this time. What isn't opinion is that these guys will all become free agents, they will all demand significantly more money than their contracts call for now, and in some cases like losman and evans demand FRANCHISE player money; and with Cash to Cap it's never, ever going to happen unless we gut 4-5 other positions to make "cash to cap" room to accomodate them and basically start over.

[LtFinFan66]

Re: 2 Year Window

If nothing else, your post have entertainment value Pat. And in this case, I tend to agree with you on most of it

[patmoran2006]

Re: 2 Year Window

I don't know if they have any value, and I'm sure I'll get bashed up a storm here.

But 90% of that post is fact and unless things change in ownership or ownership policy, it's exactly what's going to happen.

[John Doe]

Re: 2 Year Window

That's what I have for the Buffalo Bills to make a run at the AFC as long as Ralph Wilson is the owner.

We have plenty of youth and plenty of cap room. The youth will get more experience this year, and the cap room "should" help us extend some of our more underpaid players next season, Schobel being the most noteworthy.

2008 there is absolutely no excuse not to be geared for a run. Lynch and Poz will have a year under them, and the five defensive rookies from last year will be in their third season.. Evans is one of the best and Losman is growing big time.

After that however, it could be back on the downward cycle.
2008 marks the final year in the contracts of vets including JP Losman, Angelo Crowell, Keith Ellison and Melvin Fowler.

Undoubtedly in the next two years, you can expect Lee Evans and Jason Peters to play themselves into a deserved raise. Not to mention Schobel is signed through 2009 and I highly doubt he'll be playing that long with his current salary on today's market. Whether these guys have a right to want an extension/raise is irrelevant; when they look around the league and see guys they're far better than making much more money, they will.

Anyway, assuming Wilson (who would be pushing 90 by 2008) is still the owner, and assuming he keeps his BS "cash to cap" in tact. There is absolutely NOT a chance that we will be able to maintain this core of talent and make it fit under his economical structure; ZERO.

A guy like Evans between bonus/guarentee is going to command $15-18 million in cash to cap alone.. Hell, Kelsay already commanded $12 million, and he's Chris ****ing Kelsay for God's sake. What do you think Losman will cost for us to keep in "cash to cap" dollars? Now I"m starting to understand why we drafted Edwards.

Bottom line: probably half of these guys will be gone via FA and/or trades by the time their contracts are up. We simply can't afford to pay them all.

That will lead to a ****load full of new holes, and more rookies and inexpensive free agent projects to take their spot.

So while I understand the anti- Redskin spending sentiments, Cash to Cap is none at all better as we're in spending jail pretty much year-to-year.

But hey.. At least Wilson will make more money.

Now, while what I think will happen financially with these guys is only my OPINION at this time. What isn't opinion is that these guys will all become free agents, they will all demand significantly more money than their contracts call for now, and in some cases like losman and evans demand FRANCHISE player money; and with Cash to Cap it's never, ever going to happen unless we gut 4-5 other positions to make "cash to cap" room to accomodate them and basically start over.

From the looks of things here, the real problem with the Bills is that they just have too much talent.

[patmoran2006]

Re: 2 Year Window

From the looks of things here, the real problem with the Bills is that they just have too much talent.

If you look at this team 12-16 months from now, that could actually be the case. They definitely have a lot of talent. It's just too young and inexperienced to contend this year.

But what good is having all that talent if you have an owner that won't be able to keep at least half of them as contracts expire and deserved pay raises come into effect.

Do you think a LEFT tackle like Jason Peters, who could have Pro Bowl potential is going to keep playing for $1.5-2 million per year?

Do you think a guy like Schobel is going to play out the next THREE years of his deal making significantly less money than Kelsay?

Do you think Evans and his agent are going to sit around, put up 1300 yard, 12 TD seasons and watch guys like Andre Johnson cash in on $60 million deals and not want one for himself?

We talk about this potentially future STUD LB corp of Crowell, POZ and Ellison. Well by the end of 2008 (2 years) 2/3 of them will become free agents.

I've never stated this team didn't have any talent. I've contended that Ralph Wilson is a lousy owner in today's NFL and in the next 12-24 months pretty much everybody on this board is going to see that too, whether you like it or not.

It's easy to be excited about the Bills right now with all this young, growing talent. But I wouldnt get too excited thinking about winning championships down the line unless a new owner comes in, keeps the team here in Buffalo and commits to keeping this talent together and adding a peice or two here and there via Free Agency.

If Wilson stays on as owner past 2008, I will guarentee you that guys like Crowell, Ellison and maybe even Losman are gone and their replacements will be much cheaper draft picks; starting the rebuilding process YET again.

[Hammertime]

Re: 2 Year Window

I don't know if they have any value, and I'm sure I'll get bashed up a storm here.

But 90% of that post is fact and unless things change in ownership or ownership policy, it's exactly what's going to happen.

Jeez, looks pretty grim. I hope you are wrong. Has that ever happened?

[patmoran2006]

Re: 2 Year Window

Jeez, looks pretty grim. I hope you are wrong. Has that ever happened?

Im wrong all the time. that's not a secret.

But it's not about me and if people actually want to talk FOOTBALL--- Assume I am wrong about the subject of this post and give me something, anything to show me how I will be wrong as long as we keep our self-imposed salary cap under one Ralph Wilson with all these free agents and sure-to-be extensions coming up by the end of 2008 which I said is our window.

[patmoran2006]

Re: 2 Year Window

I think its universally agreed that Peters, Schobel and Evans are three of the best players on this team.

Let's assume, hopefully safely that all three have very good seasons this year in 2007.

According to the NFLPA, these are their base salaries for 2008 (doesnt include their signing bonuses- which weren't a lot)


Jason Peters: $2.2 million
Aaron Schobel: $2.5 million
Lee Evans: $1.005 million

Anyone who doesnt think this becomes an issue next-summer are absolutely fooling themselves. If they have one more good year they will have outperformed their contract to the point its ridiculous and some or ALL could be in prime condition to command hefty raises (Again not to mention 2008 you're looking at Losman, Ellison, Crowell and Fowler's final year under contract).

Now this is the same with ALL 32 NFL teams. The difference is going to be, as long as it is cash to cap, to extend or resign these guys it WILL come at the expense of letting other key players go---- and a guy like Lee Evans or Jason Peters is going to command a LARGE chunk of cash to cap by themselves.

My point is this COULD become a championship calibre team, but will only have a two year window before the "addition by subtraction" crap starts again as it did the past two years, because of WHO our owner is.

[patmoran2006]

Re: 2 Year Window

BTW.

In a "fair" word players would all sign their contracts and honor them to their entirety. Unfortunately, this is the NFL.

We shouldn't have to even think about Evans and Schobel until 2009, and Peters until 2010-- but we all know that's not going to happen.

[raphael120]

Re: 2 Year Window

At one time a team can only have so many good players. But i think we should be able to keep a team like the Colts.

A good QB, a good RB, a good #1 WR...etc.

I'm hoping the reason that we let go our good players in the past is because of their age. Which means that people like Schobel would be gone, as he is giong to be, what, 30 next year? It's apparent we don't pay for aging talent.

We went the cheap route for WRs, CBs, and currently we're payin kinda cheaply at LB. We spent tons at OL. IF we lock up JP and Evans and Peters, that means our offense as we know it now, will be good to go for 5 years or more. I like our offense thus far, and think it can explode this season.

As for our defense, it is young and full of rookies, and low round rookies at that. If we keep a formula like the Colts keeping the decent players, not superb, that play together well, then we'll be good.
'But again, as the self imposed cash to cap, we can't be shelling out more money than we need to be. If Langston Walker turns our to be another Mike williams, thats MASSIVE amounts of money wasted that we could have kept to lock up our proven players.

I just think the times to make mistakes like last season are coming to an end. Marv could afford to hit and miss with most of his FA choices last season, but this season is a critical year from turning the Bills into a have not to a have. At the end of this season we could be talking about playoffs or we could be talking about tearin it up hardcore next season, but if at the end of this season we're talking about "oh well, at least we won one more game than last season and we're .500" and our FA choices we spent so much money on blow up in our faces, i think then, the gig is up for marv &co.

[patmoran2006]

Re: 2 Year Window

Over the next two years (which I said we have a two year window with this team) we're not as bad defensively.

Crowell and Ellison will become FA's following 2008, and its all but certain Schobel will either have a bigger contract as a Bill by then or be gone (more likely)

Offensively is where the bigger worry lies:
At the end of 2008 JP Losman and Melvin Fowler have expiring contracts. By this point, Jason Peters and Lee Evans will have far outperformed their contracts. Both are/will be Top 7-8 players at their positions in the league and I'd be shocked if they didnt' demand to be paid accordingly, especially after having two more productive seasons like I expect them to have.

NO team can keep their entire core in tact from season to season. MY biggest point was that as long as we implement Cash to Cap we're going to lose more players than others.

One quick example: The Andre Johnson contract signed by Houston.
In houston his cap hit for next year is going to be about $3.4 million.
If the Bills signed him to the same deal, his cash to cap hit for 2007 would be $17 million. Think Lee Evans.

Cash to cap will prevent us from being over the cap and in jail like a few other teams sometimes find themselves. But what good is it, when we're serving a life-time in jail year-to-year; which is exactly what cash to cap is.

UNLESS a new owner is here or cash to cap is dropped or at least severely modified, you can say goodbye to at least 50% of the players I mentioned following 2008.

[Elminster]

Re: 2 Year Window

Hmm? Some one needs to brush up on his Bills history, I think....

[gil]

Re: 2 Year Window

I'm looking forward to this season, I think it's going to be entertaining.

In my opinion, there's enough to worry about with all of our issues on the field this year, I'm not sure I'm ready to worry beyond that what happens with contracts - but thanks for taking the time to offer your opinion on it.

[patmoran2006]

Re: 2 Year Window

I'm looking forward to this season, I think it's going to be entertaining.

In my opinion, there's enough to worry about with all of our issues on the field this year, I'm not sure I'm ready to worry beyond that what happens with contracts - but thanks for taking the time to offer your opinion on it.

I agree about this season and ESPECIALLY next year. I don't think aside from DT and WR there is a lack of talent anywhere on this team. Even the CB situation isn't quite as bad as nationally made out to be, especially if Webster plays well.

[gil]

Re: 2 Year Window

I agree about this season and ESPECIALLY next year. I don't think aside from DT and WR there is a lack of talent anywhere on this team. Even the CB situation isn't quite as bad as nationally made out to be, especially if Webster plays well.

Sweet Fancy Moses Pat, that almost sounded like optimism!

Don't worry, I won't tell anyone :-)