Losman Watch

[ghz in pittsburgh]

Before you guys give Losman all the praises for yesterday's game, let me remind you that pass to Moulds at the end. Yes the Panthers brought blitz and Losman was under pressure. And Yes Losman for the first time all game read the blitz coverage correctly and identified where to go with the ball, but he missed it - and that is the bottom line.

Don't take lightly of that situation. When the game is on the line, big players make plays. It's a hump that big players cross in their career - seize that opportunity. In reality, that might be the only opportunity yesterday they gave the Bills to win the game. Losman came close but did not get it done.

Yes Losman started only 6 games so we'll let that pass for now. But notice is served. In close games, there is usually one or two moments that you have to seize. That's the mark of a good QB.

Now to the rest of the Losman's play. It's safe for me to say that he looked more confident in delivering the balls, resulting better accuracy. Also knows when to throw the ball away instead of taking sacks. And regardless whether the players like him or not, he looks to be in total control of the huddle.

On the bad side, I felt a little jittery from him from time to time in the pocket. Still miss open receivers at times (on the throw to Evans in the end zone, he could've gone to the slot receiver for 1st down). The biggest problem he has is reading defense, particularly on blitz. the Panthers didn't blitz a lot, but when they did, they usually got to him or forced incompletions. From my vintage view point, a big part of the problem was the failure of Losman's recognition of the blitz and where it's going to come.

The part of beating blitz is the only area that I didn't see significant improvement from Losman from the KC game to yearterday.

[Mitchy moo]

Did Jim Kelly make all of his plays when he arrived in Buffalo the first year or a few years later?

[RedEyE]

You have to expect these type of mistakes from a young QB. Bottom line is that JP rarely does give up the ball, although he picked the wrong time in this game to pitch the INT. Even still, he put together two great scoring drives against a very powerful Carolina defense. The 3rd FG drive was set up by the defense.

Still, and again, we couldn't score in the red zone. This is where I find Holcomb to be more effecient. With that being said, the play calling in the red zone is pitiful and very predictable.

[Forward_Lateral]

At least he didn't throw it to a WR 20 yards short of the first down line.

[Philagape]

His progress at this stage in his career is good. That's what matters.

[doomsdayvirus]

completing that pass on 4th and 8 won him some respect in my book.

for a guy who's only started 6 games he did pretty well, but he can't do it all. especially when his life is in danger every snap.

give the kid a little time, he's essentially a rookie, he'll make a few rookie mistakes. even veterans throw INT's now and then, look at farve's INT count this season.

when the chips are down and you're getting desperate there's always going to be some risk. rememeber when holcomb dumped off the ball to moulds instead of throwing into coverage at the end of the game because he didn't want to risk an INT? remember how he got roasted by the fans for that?

well, losman took that chance yesterday. next week he'll be a better player because of it.

[LtBillsFan66]

I'd like to see what JP can do with some semblance of an OL.

[dannyek71]

give the kid a chance. Its his first year starting for Pete's sake.


He has a good work ethic, big time arm, feels the rush very well, and is quick. He has all the tools to be good. He just needs to learn.

[doomsdayvirus]

speaking of interceptions, here's a sample of interception stats from around the league. i'm only including a handful of big name players here as an example.

QB..........INT..GAMES..INT/GAME
FARVE.......19...11.....1.72
DELHOMME....12...11.....1.09
MCNABB.......9....9.....1.00
E.MANNING...10...11.....0.90
BLEDSOE......9...11.....0.81
VICK.........7...10.....0.70
P.MANNING....7...10.....0.70
PALMER.......7...11.....0.63

so where does jp stand in this mess? well, he's officially played 7 games and has 4 INT's. so that means:

LOSMAN.......4....7.....0.57

even if you take away an entire game to account for the time he's spent on the bench he's not doing bad:

LOSMAN.......4....6.....0.67

sure this one came at a critical moment, but at least he tried. when you're slinging passes left and right in a last minute attempt to save the game, you get desperate, you don't have time to wait and judge, you just have to fire away. he knew this was their last chance and he played like it.

the game should never have come down to this in the first place, carolina did NOT look like a serious super bowl contender yesterday.

and yes, jp needs to up one other little stat a bit. the TD stat. but i think holcomb showed us that the QB isn't the only thing keeping us out of the end zone.

[Bill Brasky]

yeah, too bad we don't have a powerhouse running game, good defense, good coach, and insane OL so JP can be overrated like Roethlisberger, GHZ... how many games has Roethlisberger won Pittsburgh single handedly? :rolleyes:

85% of football fans are complete ******s when it comes to talking about teams they don't follow... have you heard anybody complain about Kyle Orton's play this year? His numbers are worse than JP, but because he has a good defense to support him, everybody is blinded by his inept play.

put JP on any other team in this league with a better supporting cast and coaching staff that knows what they're doing and this kid's development would be leaps and bounds ahead of what it currently is. you can't knock him for trying to develop into an NFL QB surrounded by a team full of bumbling morons and teammates who have pretty much quit on him and the season.

[ghz in pittsburgh]

Losman is not Roethlisberger. I'm sure everyone is saying that. What is important is that people need to know that Losman plays a complete different style from Roethlisberger's, something this Mularkay & Co. finally came to grip after the first 4 weeks of the season.

Losman is not a game manager like Big Ben. He's gun slinger, more like Favre's style. He may take some sacks and bad INTs, but one pass he can kill you!

That's why I was excited to watch him that final two minutes because that's exactly the type of situation he should excel at - eventually. Well you know what? He's doing enough against the Panthers on the last drive until that particular moment, that one time he could kill them, arrived and .. and he missed.

You are not a good/great QB until you can seize that moment. Roethlisberger, even though not a gun slinger, did not come on the stage into the spotlight (unlike the superbowl winning QBs in Tampa and Baltimore) until the Dallas game last year when he rallied in the dying minute of the 4th Qtr to beat the Cowboys, and mind you that was on the road.

If he can somehow show me that he can do that this year, to me, year 2005 is a good year for the Bills.

[AndreReed83]

There are so many QBs who just plain out sucked their first years starting. Aikman started his career with two very subpar seasons. Elway was bad. Peyton Manning had 26 ints his first season and we all remember how lost Eli looked last year. Drew Brees took many seasons to pull it all together. Palmer had a rough going his first season for awhile. Drew Bledsoe had the same exact QB rating his first season as JP has this season. Even Big Ben didn't necessarily have good stats his first season, he merely managed games well as the Steelers ran the ball 600 times.

The bottom line is being just a decent starting QB in the NFL takes more then one season of starting. Losman is progressing well, and hopefully he is allowed to open his play up some more as the Bills improve the O-line and Mularkey gets over JP's first year starting status.

[Bill Brasky]

this is how i see it...

if the morons up top decide to upgrade our line, even by half of what it is this year, it will be a big help not only for losman but mcgahee as well.

if the line is upgraded, even by 2 guys, Losman still will struggle next year.

in 2 seasons, if this line can be completely rebuilt either through solid drafting (ha!) or free agency (ha ha!), Losman should have had enough time to develop into a top QB by 2007... and if McGahee decides not to be a dick we should have a pretty solid Offense in place by then with JP, WM, Evans as our core... but then the question will be our D...

Therefore, I don't see this team making the playoffs for a long time, given the current trend of things... of course, I've always been a realist and right 80% of the time and I get lynched for it... we'll see.

basically... this team needs to take the cincinnati approach if it hopes to be competetive by 2007... they have enough to build around to have a good offense by then, and they should hope to have the shattered remains of this current or re-building defense by that time... only issue is getting TD (or hopefully his soon-to-be predecessor) to spend some cash to make it happen.