If Bledsoe stinks up the joint next year, and the bills finish 5-11, do we draft a QB

[BufBlue4ever60]

I think yes, because if Bledsoe does bad next year, then I dont think he is going to get any better. Lets hope we dont have to worry.

[Akhippo]

I say yes anyway. Maybe not a first rounder, but hopefully they have the luxury of having a second rounder that they can use on one. I give Bledsoe 5 years here to get it done, at the most. After next year hell have 3 years left. A perfect amount of time to groom a non first QB. What I mean by that is one that doesnt have expectations to start due to a huge contract. Look at Pennington. And if he beats out Bledsoe in his 2nd or 3rd year cant complain.

[LABillsFan]

It's stands to good reason the Bledsoe has about 5 years left in him. How good he'll be for the last 2-3 years remains to be seen, but to groom a QB to take over the reigns takes about 2-3 years.

The fact is with the exception of a few teams there is little patience with that position and few teams outside SD, ATL, DET, Hou, to name a few, seem to go after FA QB's instead of bringing them up within the system ala OAK, KC, MIA, . It's hard to sign a high pick QB pay all that money just to have him ride the pine for a year or two and then have him play for a season only to lose him via FA. If you draft a QB with your 1st or 2nd pick he needs to play to get your moneys worth, hopefully your OL is in tact so he doesn't get creamed and he produces. AVP is not going to take over after Drew is gone, Brown? If the Bills are high on Brown then they should put him at #2 and let him play in the preseason and scrubb time to get some experience. Forget about AVP as a QB, however he does have the intellegence to be a coach at some point.

I'd say hold off for right now, maybe not this draft but possibly the next, that way the team can review where it stands, Brown would have some film on him to review and the neccesity can be determined.

[Dr Phil]

Draft a QB in 2004? Possible. Even if Bledsoe has a great season.

[Bert102176]

we need to Draft Chris Simms this year he will probably be there in the 3rd round, the guy will be better than his father

[WG]

What if he stinks up the joint and costs us games and we go 10-6 and make the playoffs but lose in them b/c of him?

What then?

Keep him around for more of the same?

Unfortunately that's the track record, like it or not. He can get as many yards and attempts as he wants in the season but his postseason performances average just over 200 yards, less than 1 TD/game, and more than 2 INTs/game.

[4thAndLong]

Wys, aren't you the one who says stats mean nothing?

He was with a different team with those stats.

[WG]

I have no idea what you're talking about quite honestly.

All I know is that Drew chokes, and by that I mean personally, in the playoffs and against the best teams. It's a fact. I can be sorry, I can not hold that view, I can be all "Go Drew", but it's a fact nonetheless and one that's serious.

If you look at the games this season, we didn't beat a single team of consequence other than Miami in game 2 and even that is sketchy b/c Fiedler only played after Lucas came out.

Against all the best teams Drew made significant personal errors to give the game away in many instances. We only beat S.D. b/c we gave up on him and gave the ball to Henry and were only in a position to do so b/c of the D.

So I'm not quite sure what you mean. But it was a simple question. What if Drew chokes again v. all the better teams next season and costs us games either to prevent us from reaching the POs or in them?

Are we gonna simply ignore all that and continue to point to attempt, completion, and yardage records? Or are we gonna say perhaps Drew isn't the best QB for this team and where it is now? Or what...?

[WG]

If you're saying that the Bills are a different team, I fully agree. Yet, with more than he's ever had, he couldn't even match his TD production here with that. Why not?

Why do yards and attempts count more than TDs/points and scoring drives?

And yes, he was w/ a different team, but how does that affect his propensity to make extremely poor throws? It sure didn't change this year.

Go back and look at the box scores.

At what point was the Raider game out of control? What happened on the following drive?

At what point did the Bills go down to N.E. in that second game? Why?

Did Drew make any errors in the G.B. to cost us points and conversely to allow G.B. the chance at scoring some on top of that?

In the K.C. game, why couldn't we put up more than 16 points?

In the first N.E. game, why couldn't we put up more than 7 points?

V. the Jets in game 1, did Drew make any mistakes that virtually gave the Jets 7 points which if he hadn't done, we would have won in O/T?

Did Drew make similar mistakes in the second Jets game?

Answer those and you'll know what I'm referring to. I'm a pariah for mentioning this stuff, but it has merit and verity to it. But as long as people close their eyes and say "Rah, rah, go Drew", we will never address the situation. I'm not saying cut him, but what I am saying is not to make him the focus of the O. To the contrary. Ensure that he doesn't get 600+ attempts and make it in the 400s. Who cares if we don't have the league's leading WR tandem for yardage records. Records and playoff wins and a Superbowl performance don't, usually not, go hand in hand.



GO BILLS!!!

(Not Go Drew!)

[4thAndLong]

Wys, he got worse when the weather got worst.

We didn't put up points in those games because Gilbride is an idiot. You and I both know that.

The 1st Jet game was his 1st game with his WRs...He had no chemistry with them. Those INTs were misques. (sp)

Oh please Wys....What did he do to lose the Miami game? Nothing.

His TDs are down because everytime we're in the 10...Gilbride calld pass every down forcing us to bring Hollis out.

[honey]

I read that post, Wys. I have to agree with part of it - run the ball more!!! I know Henry fumbled a lot at first, but he's improved greatly, and in the big games I think running the ball if Drew is having a bad passing game is the way to go. I'm still behind Drew for now, but I DO say draft a decent backup. If I HAVE to bring it up (and I know I don't but, still....), Drew Brees was a great backup the first (and only) year Flutie started for SD, and this year he's actually been quite effective. I think it depends on the quality of the QB you draft on how quickly he "gets" it.

On the other hand - let's see what Drew does next year, then I'm willing to give someone else a shot at it. But, really, it does usually take even a seasoned QB at least a year to get it "right". :)

[TigerJ]

I think it's a little early for this thread.

[WG]

Originally posted by 4thAndLong
Oh please Wys....What did he do to lose the Miami game? Nothing.

What did he do to win it? Not much either. He had 110 yards passing other than that one single TD pass to Moulds that really only happened b/c Madison thought the safety was going to pick up Moulds and didn't, at least not early enough. Henry had more rushing yards than 110.

Everyone wants to give him credit for wins over teams that we had no business even making it a game with even though we did, and then conversely no one wants to allow him any blame for losses.

In the first Jets game he tossed an INT to set the Jets up 1st and 10 at our 19 YL. If he doesn't do that, then the game doesn't go to O/T and we win.

He personally cost us the Raider game.

We lost to K.C. b/c we relied on the pass to much. WAY too much passing on downs on which we should have run.

We lost to G.B. b/c Drew threw the ball away to cost us 7 and then got sacked later on to cost us 3 more. Meanwhile, his other INT gave G.B. prime field position and momentum that they hadn't had and they responded by putting in their only TD of the game for 7.

Both Pats games were just about all Drew offensively and we stunk up the joint. It was Drew's INT to Seymour that put the Pats ahead 17-0 which proved to be the winning/tying TD.

He led us, this high powered Bills offense with Moulds, Price, JR, Moore, Henry, Centers, and a good OL to only 13 points through the first 57 minutes before we had to essentially say adios amigo to him and the passing game in order to run Henry and win.

We've heard how he audibled many plays. Did he audible into runs? I haven't heard that he did. Usually that doesn't happen.

Perhaps Gilbride is at fault, and I couldn't agree more that he is, but where are the quotes by Drew saying "We need to run Henry more?" Why didn't Drew lobby for Henry to get more carries? There were 8 games in which Henry averaged only 14 carries/game.

All season long the party-line Bills statement has been "Our best chances of winning are when the ball is in Drew's hands" when in fact, in fact, the opposite has been true. We're 1-5 when he throws the most, 5-1 when he throws the least.

He made game-changing horrendous errors in the games against the 8 best teams that we played and were 0-8 in. Against the worst teams, we were 8-0. This just in, we're not gonna face Cincy and Houston like teams in the playoffs next season. As well, if you review his games in the POs while at N.E., you'll see that the team, D and rushing game, generally played very well, oustanding in some cases, and he still played horribly on top of that. At some point the criticism has to stop bouncing off of him and he needs to start taking some of the heat more than in post-game interviews. If Gilbride isn't doing a great job, then Williams should have the gumption to correct that. Drew should say, "hey, Henry's running well and we need the balance. How bout if we cut down my attempts to under 30 or at least try." Did he do that? Or was he, the WRs, the team, the coaches, and its fans all more interested in setting attempt and yardage records?

Good questions IMO.

honey,

I hear ya. Drew is here for next season at least. Thus the risk involved in this trade. Forget the draft pick. The risk was in whether or not he would play differently than he did in N.E. So far, the answer is no. He plays poor teams reasonably well, but the better teams poorly and costs his team game-losing errors.

How long are we going to give him next season? I say that the fans still won't allow him to be criticized and that he is still immune to any criticism. But in my book, he gets 8 games. If nothing's changed, then at least we need to begin considering our options. IMO one of those would be to see what our backups can do. B/c if we're gonna pay $6M for average play, then there's no need to pay that kind of money for average play. And worse than average when you consider that the chances of Drew being able to string 3/4 games together against good-great competition in the playoffs are slim to none if history is to be our guide. If emotions are to guide us, then I suppose that's an entirely different story.

But $6M is not a lot for a QB who plays well. But for one who doesn't show up, or worse yet, craps the bed in the biggest of games, $6M is $5M too much. Next year Drew gets $5.5M and in '04 he gets $6M. If we want him after that we need to sign his extension. Barring some very significant changes, we'd have to be nuts to sign that thing.

As to Gilbride, if he's that bad, and I fully agree he is, then let's ditch his arse now, tomorrow. I guess these "postseason reviews" might be formality, but if I had to wager ZBs, then I'd say he's still around unless some team takes him as a HC. Wouldn't that be nice.

[DIHARD2]

What would be the difference in touchdowns if Bledsoe's receivers caught the ball in the end zone. Like I said before there are no status on dropped balls that should have been caught.

I think that next season will be a difference, yes it is too early for a thread like this.

GO!!!...BUFFALO!!!...

[German]

I think we'll need to draft one anyway because Van Pelt won't be around much longer. If the new guy is good enough that he ends up taking over for Bledsoe in the future, great.