The Buffalo Bills opened the JP Losman era in Green Bay Friday night in front of 62,000 at Lambeau Field. In the first series, Losman completed passes to Starters Mark Campbell, WR Eric Moiulds, and the Bills top rookie pick Roscoe Parrish. The last two completions came on 3rd downs faced with pass rushers in his face. He looked poised, with making quick decisions and displaying a quick delivery.

At that point, I was thinking to myself, who the hell were those people reported from TC that Losman looked terrible?

That first series ended with incomplete pass to Lee Evans. It would have been borderline pass interference on the Packer’s defensive back- who did all he could to keep himself from getting burned.

Then the Bills seemed to focus on play actions on the second series. I admit that Losman has very good fake actions. But both of his throws came up short and I started to understand what people were initially complaining about Losman. When he had time; he could comfortably setup and deliver. One thing I noticed was he would stay in his hurry-up quick delivery rhythm from the previous drive and threw the ball a bit sloppily….not in his best form.

In my opinion, I’d offer up that the game has not slowed down for him. It appears to me that everything seemed very quick, sometimes too quick for him. He needs to realize that he can actually be patient and spend a few extra seconds back there to setup.

Here’s where it could have been ugly. On the second drive closing in for a score, Losman dropped in the pocket, had plenty of time, and an open WR. The Packers dropped into coverage and Losman seemed to have an eternity to pull the trigger. After hesitating, he unleashed the pass- and it was almost sent the other direction for an easy defensive 6 points the other way.

This is something Losman cannot have for the Bills in 2005. It is something That Pittsburgh’s Big Ben Roethlisberger never had in 2004. The Steelers kept their rookie QB under wraps most of the season with a conservative offense.

Conclusion: we can see Losman has a lot of potential – cannon arm, quick delivery, reasonable decision making, and the mobility to escape the pass rush. In his debut as a starter he was somewhat inconsistent. On a scale from 0 to 10, I'll give him a 5 for his performance tonight. A little rough on the edges, but that is to be expected this early in training camp.

Losman will have to acclimate to the speed of the NFL, concentrating on making the game slow down for him. There is no substitute for playing time and experience. With 4 pre-season games remaining on the Bills schedule before the season, I'm sure Mularkey is grateful that he has 4 more NFL defenses to get Losman valuable snaps.