Complete and utter arrogance

[HenryRules]

For those saying that TD doesn't have an ego ... I found this on the Bills official site:

Josh McCarty (St. Louis): As a GM, do you feel you have shortchanged this team by getting zero production out of the first day draft picks in 2002 and 2003? All we have to show for those first day picks are 2 DE's that can't rush the passer, an offensive tackle who is a liability vs. speedy DE's, a WR in Josh Reed who has been the poster child for inconsistency, and players like Coy Wire and Angelo Crowell who have been nothing but special teams players. When you look around the league and see the elite teams getting immediate production out of their first day picks, which is what you need in today's NFL, how can the Bills justify not having one impact player to show from either the 2002 or 2003 draft class?
Tom Donahoe: With all due respect, we would not agree with your assessment of some of our young players, many of whom are in various stages of development and are getting better each and every day. When you look at the personnel in this team with Tom Modrak, who heads up our college scouting, and John Guy, who is in charge of our pro scouting, we're very pleased with the job that they have done. We have virtually had to transform this roster over the last three years and we think it's a young roster with a group of players who are going to continue to get better.

http://www.buffalobills.com/news/news.jsp?news_id=2776

I can't believe that ... his last statement (saying they had to transform the roster) is basically blaming the previous administration. What ******* balls!! Blaming the last administration (which hardly ever finished below 8-8) for your own pathetic performance.

[Nighthawk]

He's an F'n moron...

[FTG]

Tom Donahoe: With all due respect, we would not agree with your assessment of some of our young players, many of whom are in various stages of development and are getting better each and every day. .

getting better everyday?

[LtBillsFan66]

Development? I'm watching ESPN and seeing Big Ben tearing it up.

[Tatonka]

yeah.. he is an arrogant ass.

[Charlieguide]

How many years does it take to rebuild, Tom? How many coaches? I'm thinking Jon Fox, Marvin Lewis, or either Pats coordinator might have helped move the process along. And maybe instead of rebuilding, you could have kept more key players. Yeah, it might have meant actually asking them to stay, maybe even with a restructuring . . . and that might have meant admitting that the previous admin wasn't all wrong, but it might have helped.

[TigerJ]

I'm not any happier about the season so far than anyone else, but in fact the cap situation when Donahoe was hired, not the level of talent, required that Donahoe make some hard decisions. The decision he made was to gut the lineup of some established veterans and rebuild from the ground up.

[Michael82]

I'm not any happier about the season so far than anyone else, but in fact the cap situation when Donahoe was hired, not the level of talent, required that Donahoe make some hard decisions. The decision he made was to gut the lineup of some established veterans and rebuild from the ground up.

Thank you! Great post!

[The_Philster]

I'm not any happier about the season so far than anyone else, but in fact the cap situation when Donahoe was hired, not the level of talent, required that Donahoe make some hard decisions. The decision he made was to gut the lineup of some established veterans and rebuild from the ground up.

I agree with that...but we've had a good cap situation for 2 years now...a lot of talent both years that doesn't seem to put it together

[Tatonka]

tiger.. that was 4 years ago.. and we are going the WRONG direction..

3-13, 8-8, 6-10, coach fired, headed for 3-13 again.

i am tired of giving the guy breaks.. how long did it take belichick and company to turn NE around?

[Dozerdog]

I'm not ready to tear the guy apart-

It's one thing if he made a bunch of stupid moves (See Rick Spielman-Fins) or gambled and lost with overspending on the cap in hopes of getting a winner (See Redskins)-

With the big exception of picking GW, most of his moves when they were made weren't outlandish risky moves- a lot of the fans supported them.

Needed a QB- he got what apparently was one of the more accomplished ones out there at the time. He even recouped the pick. But the QB after a hot start fell on his face.

Needed Defense- he turned over one of the least talented units into something that keeps this offensively challenged team in every game. No one thinks Spikes, Posey, Adams, Vincent, Milloy, extending Schobel were mistakes at the time.

McGahee- I think he's still a tremendous talent. Everyone complains we shoulda- woulda- coulda on draft day 2003 but please give me the name of a guy we should have picked there.

Some of the draft picks have under performed- but again- at the time they were selected it's not like we gambled on no-names and they washed out (See Miami's draft history). Reed was the SEC's all time WR- a conference that passes in ungodly amounts - Mike Williams was supposed to be all that and a bag of chips too....We have to wait and see on Losman.

The Salary Cap- had his hands tied for 2 years and I think he's done well in not blowing the wad on one player.

Maybe it's because of my background - I hire and fre people too. They interview great, they have a past college and work history that is loaded with accomplishment and excellence- and then some fall on their asses when it's time to step up.

With today's NFL you evaluate the talent and make your moves. Unfortunatley once you move the chess pieces into place you are somewhat stuck with them. You can't fire everyone in mid season after frustrating loses. We would like too- but if that was truley the right move- then other clubs in the NFL in similar boats would do the same. It just doesn't happen.

People look at Baseball, Basketbal, Hockey with very long seasons and easier player movement (trades, minor leagues, ect) and try to equate it to football. Unfortunately it doesn't work out that way.

Am I satisfied with this team- Absolutely not.
Am I happy with the talent? - I think it's a talented roster that is underperforming. If two coaching staffs can't get the talent to perform than change the talent. Maybe it's a good thing Jennings and others remained unsigned.
Do I think TD has made mistakes?- Sure- no GM is perfect
Do i think TD is a bad GM? Absolutely not.

[Historian]

"Save the postage!"

That about sums it up for me.

[RedEyE]

I'm not ready to tear the guy apart-

It's one thing if he made a bunch of stupid moves (See Rick Spielman-Fins) or gambled and lost with overspending on the cap in hopes of getting a winner (See Redskins)-

With the big exception of picking GW, most of his moves when they were made weren't outlandish risky moves- a lot of the fans supported them.

Needed a QB- he got what apparently was one of the more accomplished ones out there at the time. He even recouped the pick. But the QB after a hot start fell on his face.

Needed Defense- he turned over one of the least talented units into something that keeps this offensively challenged team in every game. No one thinks Spikes, Posey, Adams, Vincent, Milloy, extending Schobel were mistakes at the time.

McGahee- I think he's still a tremendous talent. Everyone complains we shoulda- woulda- coulda on draft day 2003 but please give me the name of a guy we should have picked there.

Some of the draft picks have under performed- but again- at the time they were selected it's not like we gambled on no-names and they washed out (See Miami's draft history). Reed was the SEC's all time WR- a conference that passes in ungodly amounts - Mike Williams was supposed to be all that and a bag of chips too....We have to wait and see on Losman.

The Salary Cap- had his hands tied for 2 years and I think he's done well in not blowing the wad on one player.

Maybe it's because of my background - I hire and fre people too. They interview great, they have a past college and work history that is loaded with accomplishment and excellence- and then some fall on their asses when it's time to step up.

With today's NFL you evaluate the talent and make your moves. Unfortunatley once you move the chess pieces into place you are somewhat stuck with them. You can't fire everyone in mid season after frustrating loses. We would like too- but if that was truley the right move- then other clubs in the NFL in similar boats would do the same. It just doesn't happen.

People look at Baseball, Basketbal, Hockey with very long seasons and easier player movement (trades, minor leagues, ect) and try to equate it to football. Unfortunately it doesn't work out that way.

Am I satisfied with this team- Absolutely not.
Am I happy with the talent? - I think it's a talented roster that is underperforming. If two coaching staffs can't get the talent to perform than change the talent. Maybe it's a good thing Jennings and others remained unsigned.
Do I think TD has made mistakes?- Sure- no GM is perfect
Do i think TD is a bad GM? Absolutely not.

Why not make this a new thread? I think that it exposes some information that needs to be stated seperately from this thread.

[HenryRules]

I'm not ready to tear the guy apart-

It's one thing if he made a bunch of stupid moves (See Rick Spielman-Fins) or gambled and lost with overspending on the cap in hopes of getting a winner (See Redskins)-

With the big exception of picking GW, most of his moves when they were made weren't outlandish risky moves- a lot of the fans supported them.

Needed a QB- he got what apparently was one of the more accomplished ones out there at the time. He even recouped the pick. But the QB after a hot start fell on his face.

Needed Defense- he turned over one of the least talented units into something that keeps this offensively challenged team in every game. No one thinks Spikes, Posey, Adams, Vincent, Milloy, extending Schobel were mistakes at the time.

McGahee- I think he's still a tremendous talent. Everyone complains we shoulda- woulda- coulda on draft day 2003 but please give me the name of a guy we should have picked there.

Some of the draft picks have under performed- but again- at the time they were selected it's not like we gambled on no-names and they washed out (See Miami's draft history). Reed was the SEC's all time WR- a conference that passes in ungodly amounts - Mike Williams was supposed to be all that and a bag of chips too....We have to wait and see on Losman.

The Salary Cap- had his hands tied for 2 years and I think he's done well in not blowing the wad on one player.

Maybe it's because of my background - I hire and fre people too. They interview great, they have a past college and work history that is loaded with accomplishment and excellence- and then some fall on their asses when it's time to step up.

With today's NFL you evaluate the talent and make your moves. Unfortunatley once you move the chess pieces into place you are somewhat stuck with them. You can't fire everyone in mid season after frustrating loses. We would like too- but if that was truley the right move- then other clubs in the NFL in similar boats would do the same. It just doesn't happen.

People look at Baseball, Basketbal, Hockey with very long seasons and easier player movement (trades, minor leagues, ect) and try to equate it to football. Unfortunately it doesn't work out that way.

Am I satisfied with this team- Absolutely not.
Am I happy with the talent? - I think it's a talented roster that is underperforming. If two coaching staffs can't get the talent to perform than change the talent. Maybe it's a good thing Jennings and others remained unsigned.
Do I think TD has made mistakes?- Sure- no GM is perfect
Do i think TD is a bad GM? Absolutely not.

Get off your damned high horse and quit talking down to people like you're the only one that can evaluate Donahoe appropriately. I hire and fire people too ... and I get judged based on their performance. I would expect nothing else and anyone in my position who would expect something different is either bad at it or incredibly unreasonable.

Needed a QB - he went out and overpaid a divisional rival for their backup. Trying to justify it as anything else is misplaced. We did not recoup the pick we gave up ... instead, we sacrificed a key part of our offense in order to pick up another first rounder.

Needed defense - he spent all of our cap money on our defense so that we now no longer have any room to pick up free agent linemen. Our defense still could hardly stop the Jets at all today and has been at the bottom of the barrel in turnovers every year of his tenure.

McGahee - you want a name? How about Eric Steinbach. Seems to me, the problem with our running game (and our offense in general) has been our OL, not our RB.

Draft picks - Wire wasn't a gamble? McGahee wasn't a gamble? At the end of the day, what does it matter what the media or the fans thought of the picks on the day of the draft? Those people have incredibly limited knowledge compared to those employed by NFL teams. Freeney was considered a bad pick by the Colts, but that worked out well. No, the only fair way to judge Donahoe is by the performance of his picks, not by their popularity. And his picks have not performed well. If we're going to judge Donahoe's drafts by their popularity, why not go out and get a good solid draft guide or two and just compare the rankings? There's no reason for a GM, the popular decisions are the right ones.

Salary cap - piss poor job. We're an untalented team and have no cap room next year. A lot of that has to do with bad contracts - Bledsoe, Teague, Prioleau, Lindell, McGahee (yes, if we had picked someone else, we wouldn't have his cap room tied up in a position that we don't need help), Posey (overpaid for his role), Campbell, Milloy, and Shaw to name a few. Yes, we haven't gone over the cap, but that's because we don't have a good team, nothing else.

[HenryRules]

I agree with that...but we've had a good cap situation for 2 years now...a lot of talent both years that doesn't seem to put it together

What talent? At what positions do you think we have better than median-quality talent (that's top-15 or so).