Bills Suck Again; Davis Departs

The Bills sucked again this week, managing to go down 28-3, before apparently stabilizing things and making it a respectable 31-20 loss - at home, to the San Diego  Los Angeles Chargers. I want to say that Phillip Rivers completed like 15 of his first 16 passes (I did not watch the game as it wasn't on locally and my son had a youth game anyhow). Rivers fast start was against a pass defense that included veteran cornerback Vontae Davis, who was one of the Bills' top off season free agent signings. Davis was inactive in Week 1, started Week 2 and then retired at halftime. Shades of Anquan Boldin from last year . What is it about these Bills that makes people want to walk away from the Bills? Is the fan base next? (SI pointed out that Kyle Orton left the Bills a few years back in similar fashion, not to mention Doug Marrone [who now coaches possibly the best team in the AFC] taking the money and running.)

Also, apparently McDermott took over defense play calling responsibilities from coordinator Leslie Frazier, which helped lead to the second-half improvement. This wouldn't seem to bode well for Frazier, the former Vikings head coach (21-32-1) who was hired by the Bills prior to last year. Is he even going to make the trip to Minnesota this week?

Next two weeks we are at Minnesota and Green Bay, so I'm expecting an 0-4 start. Maybe we can get Tennessee at home the following week, but I have no idea. Josh Allen seemed to play better than Peterman ever has at QB, so he's likely the guy from here on out. Let's hope he improves enough to lead us to some wins. 

Allen getting the Starting Nod

It seems that Josh Allen is getting the starting nod for the Bills this Sunday at home vs. the San Diego Los Angeles Chargers. Not exactly sure what to make of this. On one hand, it appears the Bills are throwing him into the fire vs. a ferocious pass rush - on the other hand Nathan Peterman certainly hasn't proven he is a capable NFL starting QB, so why not start letting Allen gain some experience now? Potential injuries and a loss of confidence long-term are probably the two reasons against starting Allen, but at least with Allen you appear to be working toward some future goal. The Peterman road seems to be a dead end.

Good luck Josh. It can't be as bad as last Sunday's 3-47 loss to Baltimore or last year's 24-54 loss at the Chargers when Peterman threw 5 INTs in the first half of his first professional start, can it? My paranoia tells me yes, but let's hope I'm over-reacting.

Bills Win -Prognostications on Target

First of all I want to apologize to Dr. D, all Vikings fan, and perhaps to anyone associated with the Minnesota professional football club for my comment/prediction related to the Vikings stomping the Rams in Week 1. I merely said, "Of course, it is the Vikings, so I am sure you are holding your breath until some sort of disaster strikes. " Which was promptly followed by Adrian Peterson being suspended for child abuse and the Vikings getting stomped by the Patriots - who, in the Vikings defense I guess, were coming off a loss and apparently rarely lose immediately again after such an outcome. Either way, it was a bad day for the Vikes, and I feel I may have knowingly jinxed them in the same way I jinxed the Yankees last night by repeatedly saying how bad Kelly Johnson was, while at the same time telling my kids he would certainly turn around and do something to help the Orioles - which he indeed did with a walk-off double.

To further enhance my prognostic credibility, I will remind you that I correctly called the Dolphins a good match-up for the Bills, which they certainly seemed to be in an easy 29-10 win for the Buffaloes yesterday. We seem to have the 'Fins number and have now posted three wins in a row over them, including two relatively dominant home performances - and we really don't dominate games that often.

The one revelation yesterday for me was the sparkling play of Sammy Watkins. Don't get me wrong, I knew Watkins had the potential to be good - which is why I wasn't totally against the Bills seemingly ridiculous decision to pay a king's ransom to move up and draft him this year. From my standpoint, he was only one of a handful of for-sure impact players available, and the Bills weren't going to get one at number 9 - where they sat before maneuvering with the Browns to get to number 4, giving up next year's first round choice in the process. The only misgiving I had was that Watkins would be wasted because of QB E.J. Manuel's inability to throw.

Manuel didn't look great throwing the ball yesterday, and clearly missed an open Watkins on what should have been a TD in the first half, but Manuel was good enough, and he managed to connect with Watkins 8 times for 118 yards and a TD. And Watkins looked like he was open on almost every play as the game went along. He made it look easy - and that kind of stuff helps.

True test of how good the Bills are will be coming up at home Sunday vs. Philip Rivers and the Chargers, who are coming off a win over the World Champion Seahawks. Bills have the advantage of being in the Eastern time zone vs. a West Coast team, but I don't like a veteran heady QB like Rivers against the Bills relatively inexperienced secondary - although Corey Graham was great (he's not inexperienced) for the second week in a row vs. Miami. And although Bills did mostly shutdown Dolphins TE Charles Clay (7 catches, for a mere 31 yards), which was a nice change -maybe having LB Nigel Bradham back after 1 game suspension helped with that -  I'm a little wary (to say the least) about Kellen Winslow - I mean Antonio Gates - who burned the Seahawks for the 3 TDs yesterday.

So, Bills are playing at home, but as the weather should be nice, I'm not sure how much that will help. I'm not saying I know a whole lot about the Chargers, but have seen them play at least a couple times in last few years, and unfortunately, I like them to knock the Bills from the ranks of the unbeaten next Sunday. But, I'll still be cheering for Bills and hoping I get this prognostication wrong!

Bills Take Down Bears in OT

The Buffalo Bills pulled off what, to most experts at least, seemed like an improbably win yesterday in Chicago - on the opening Sunday of the NFL season. The Buffalo squad won 23-20 in OT, with the highlight of the game being this wonderful Fred Jackson stiff arm of overwhelmed Bears' white safety dude. That play set up the game winning field goal.

Otherwise, the Bills primarily took advantage of Bears mistakes - three turnovers to be specific, and a solid running attack - as well as some timely EJ Manuel completions to stay close. Defense wasn't bad, but it clearly missed The Legend in the middle of the field - especially on shorter pass plays. Manuel's accuracy seemed like a problem again, although he did complete 16-of-22 passes. To their credit - his receivers, in particular Mike Williams and Robert Woods that I can remember, made a couple of key leaping catches to keep drives alive. Manuel is a big dude and has decent pocket presence, but he seems to float the ball out there too much. I think he might not have confidence in his accuracy, so he is trying to aim the ball a bit too much. Luckily, it seems his receivers seem to have adjusted to high floaters, although Sammy Watkins was disturbingly quiet.

I don't know what this win means for the rest of the season. My first instinct says that the Bills will still go 5-11 and this was an early desperate win by a desperate team. I mean they had to be motivated by all the bad press they have been getting about the preseason and then, of course, you had the shouting match and the f-bombs exchanged between Head Coach Doug Marrone and some members of the Bills front office in practice last week leading up to the game. This kind of turmoil/tension can sometimes be a good thing and if used correctly can lead to an "us against the world/nobody believes in us" mentality that is great for fueling the fire of a football team.

Of course, I'm not sure how long using this type of motivation can last, especially, when you consider how little depth the Bills have. So, while it was a nice start, I'm not sure that level of play is sustainable. Plus, the Bears were a good match-up, with their suspect run defense, and Cutler's reputation for making untimely (Fitzpartick-esque) mistakes - which were both on display Sunday. (That, and the Bears didn't seem to be taking the Bills too seriously, as evidenced by Brandon Marshall's laughing after his early fumble.)

That said, next Sunday at home vs. the Dolphins doesn't seem like such a bad mach up either. My buddy Mike, who is a huge Dolphins fan, stopped by later in the afternoon to get a scouting report on the Bills. He said the Dolphins pass rush and running game dominated in their win over the Pats. For whatever reason, I'm not overly worried about the pass rush, although reportedly (even aside from Mike's opinion), it's pretty good. For some reason, I think Manual's size and calmness in the pocket will neutralize it's advantage. And I think our D-line backed up by Brandon Spikes is solid enough that we will hold up okay vs. the run. And if we can pressure Tannehill close to how we did last year...Also, our secondary, led by a solid game from free agent pick-up Corey Graham, looked pretty solid on Sunday.

So, maybe we can pick-up a second win, as long as we can run the ball with our trio of strong backs - Jackson, CJ Spiller, and new guy  Dennis Dixon. And that would put the Bills at 2-0, which would be a nice start and maybe bring me some more optimism. But, we will see.

Some Sympathy for O.J.

I know the man is a killer and all, and currently serving time for attempted armed robbery, but hear me out. (Also, if we can have a Stones' song called Sympathy for the Devil, can't we have a little sympathy for a man who is a human being - albeit a very flawed one, but therefore cannot possibly as completely evil as the devil?)

Anyhow, here's the O.J. legend has I understand it: He grew up in San Francisco and ran with a pretty rough crowd as a kid. After a childhood bout with Rickets that led some doctor to tell him he would always be handicapped, he grew into a physical stud and was a star running back in high school. His grades weren't great so he went to a junior college in Los Angeles, where he starred and made JC All-American. He was offered a scholarship to USC - one of the prime national football programs in the heart of Los Angeles, where once again he starred. So, now he's getting national attention, hobnobbing with movie and TV stars in LA, starting to dabble in acting - life is good.

Then he gets drafted by the Buffalo Bills. As you may know I'm a Bills fan, but was this really fair? I mean to take a guy from San Francisco, who went to college in LA and place him in Buffalo - on a terrible team - to start his career. No wonder he went crazy. In no other career but pro sports do you not get to pick the city you want to live and work in after going to college. Would OJ have been happier if he could have played for the LA Rams and stayed near Hollywood and acted part time? Absolutely.

I remember my grandfather, who lived in Dunkirk NY (down the road from Buffalo about a half hour or so) saying OJ couldn't wait to get out of Buffalo when the season ended and back to CA. At the time, (I was like 7) I thought he was a jerk. But now, having been around a bit, I can totally understand. Buffalo is nothing like Southern CA or San Fran. No wonder OJ wanted to get home.

And he was drafted in 1969, which is only a few years after the legendary Bills back Cookie Gilchrist had been complaining about racial prejudice in Buffalo after having played for several years in Toronto. And, as I said, the team stunk. Luckily Lou Saban, who had coached to Bills to some titles in the Gilchrist era, came back to town, recognized OJ's talent and built a team around him. So, from a career standpoint, OJ ended up having success, was loved in Buffalo, and even found time to do some acting in the offseason. But I'm sure this all put a good deal of stress on him that could have been alleviated if NFL rules had just allowed him to stay on the West Coast. I'm not saying all this made him a murderer, but I'm sure it didn't help....On the other hand, maybe if he had stayed in CA with all the crazies, he would have flipped sooner!

Physicality Wins Postseason NFL Football

Well, it at least helps a lot. The last three Super Bowls have been won by the Seahawks (last night) preceded by the Ravens, and the Giants. Non of these three squads would be what you call finesse football teams. They all featured physical, strong defenses, and more or less older-school offenses. All three champions' offenses could run the ball - with the Giants and Ravens also specializing in the deep ball, while Russell Wilson is a bit more of a "West Coast" offense guy, who is still a very physical with his ability to run and throw absolute bullets on shorter passes.

Let's just ignore the physicality of the defenses, which is somewhat obvious, and look at the quarterbacks for a minute. Wilson, Flacco, and Eli Manning were all relatively younger guys, with Eli, at 31, the oldest of the three. Tom Brady last won the Super Bowl when he was 27. Granted, he's been in a couple Super Bowls since, but it seems that in general youth prevails in the playoffs these days. Aaron Rogers, Ben Roethlesberger and Aaron Rogers have both enjoyed tremendous postseason success under 30, and while Payton Manning and Drew Brees seemed like veterans when they won their Super Bowl titles, each was still only 30. (Going back 10 years, you start to run into Brad Johnson and John Elway, who were older, so we'll restrict our argument to the last 10 years.)

Colin Kapernick probably needs to be mentioned here, as well. After somewhat struggling, as Wilson did, during the 2013 regular season, Kapernick acquitted himself nicely with two wins in the playoffs - and, in light of the Super Bowl, the close loss to the Seahawks in the NFC championship game cemented the contention that the 49ers were the second best team in the NFL this year. Kapernick is interesting because he is a very athletic quaterback who was chosen as the the starter over the less athletic, but solid Alex Smith. While Smith was let go and enjoyed a fine regular season with the Chiefs (probably better statistically that Kapernick's), his team was one-and-done in the playoffs, while Kapernick's went 3-1 for the second straight year. Russell Wilson, meanwhile, is now 4-1 in the playoffs for his short career.

Bottom line is that the key to playoff/ultimate success in the current version of the NFL seems to be a strong, physical defense, and a strong, younger, physical quarterback. Which isn't really too different when you think about from the formula the Stillers used to win four Super Bowls back in the 1970s.

All-time College Football Top 15

Top 15 College football programs from my perspective - a bit biased and limited of a kid who grew up in Western PA, Catholic, and came of age (as a sports fan) in the 1970s, but still follows sports today - with renewed interest (thanks to sons?)after burning out on it a couple times earlier in my life, including after working for three-plus years as a sports writer:

1. Alabama Crimson Tide
2. USC Trojans
3. Notre Dame Fighting Irish
4. Ohio State Buckeyes
5. Michigan Wolverines
6. Nebraska Cornhuskers
7. Oklahoma Sooners
8. Texas Longhorns
9. LSU Tigers
10. Penn State Nittany Lions
11. Florida State Seminoles
12. Miami Hurricanes
13. Florida Gators
14. Clemson Tigers
15. Georgia Bulldogs

Bills Train Derailed...

Well, we all know the Bills stink, but here's the latest. It's from the stat geek Football Outsiders site-an article discussing the slew of quarterback benchings after only the second game of the season. It includes this great line about our now deposed starter Trent Edwards: "The question that coaches need to ask themselves before making a move: He's Derek Anderson. He's Matt Moore. He's Trent Edwards. What did you expect?"

And this sterling endorsement of our new starter Ryan Fitzpatrick: "Edwards is being replaced by Ryan Fitzpatrick, who's ranked 36th, 35th, and 36th in DVOA over his three seasons with significant playing time and has to rank as one of the worst quarterbacks in the modern era to get 23 starts." Yup, that's now our guy. The question now becomes, can the Bills win a game?

Too Tall Jones -Geico Commercial

Former Cowboys defensive end Ed Jones had one of the greatest nicknames ever. I mean, can you compare any nicknames today to "Too Tall?" They even use it on Arthur. Anyhow, I happen to be in Dallas and saw this commercial. Has anyone seen this locally?

BCS Follow-Up

From Gregg Easterbrook's TMQ column this week (He offers an explanation of why the performance of the Texas freshman QB picked up coincidentally with Colt McCoy's return to the sideline in the second half of the game):

"Colt McCoy was injured early and freshman Garrett Gilbert entered, never having played in a pressure situation in college. Instantly it was obvious the game would turn on whether Gilbert could perform cold. My seat was low behind the Texas sideline, with a clear view of the Longhorns coaches and players. To my amazement, when the Texas offense wasn't on the field in the first half, Gilbert simply stood alone. He wasn't throwing to his receivers. Senior leaders were not coming by to urge him on. And no coaches were talking to him! Texas not only has $5 million-a-year coach Mack Brown, it has a bloated coaching staff, yet none of these gentlemen came over to help Gilbert prepare, calm down or adjust. Greg Davis, the Longhorns offensive coordinator and quarterbacks coach, was nowhere to be seen as Gilbert stood alone. Just what exactly was Davis doing that was more important, at that moment, than helping a freshman get ready to go back in at quarterback in the national championship? Only when McCoy returned from the trainer's room in the third quarter, donned headphones and started assisting Gilbert, did the Texas comeback begin. McCoy, a student, was the one "coaching up" Gilbert. Where was the Texas coaching staff?

White Running Backs

Here's an interesting article (written by an African-American, ok, black, journalist) speculating that prejudice is a factor in the lack of opportunities being given white running backs in big time college football and the pros. He makes some really good points. The impetus for the article is the great season that Stanford's Toby Gerhart is having. I'm not sure who else is in the running for the Heisman, but this guy has more than 1,700 yards and 26 TDs and has helped lead the surprising Cardinal to wins over USC, Oregon, and Notre Dame (a game in which he even threw a big TD pass). I had heard talk that he was going to pursue a professional baseball career, but more recently I've heard people talking about his prospects for the NFL Draft.

Although there have been white fullbacks, Tom Rathman comes to mind, that have had some success catching passes out of the backfield, the last white back who enjoyed any sustained success carrying the ball, I believe was Craig James. James, who split time in college at SMU with the great Eric Dickerson, rushed for more than 1,200 yards for the 1985 Pats. I don't know if he got injured the year after or what, but he never came close to duplicating that success and was out of the league a couple years later. He did go on to a very successful career as a sportscaster.

Anyhow, James' 1,000 yard season was almost 25 years ago. Should we start calling Gerhart the Great White Hope? After all, my 10-year-old son keeps asking me if there is any chance he can make it to the NFL. He was the build and skill set of a back, but I told him that based on history he better hope he grows to at least 6'-3" and hope his arm continues to develop if he wants to have even a very slight chance. If Gerhart succeeds in the NFL, well, maybe he can expand that scope of hope a little bit...

Cheers.

Ralph

Bus makes the right call

If anyone his interested, Jerome Bettis continues to do great work for sportsillustrated.com. Here's a quote from his latest column, which was presumably posted yesterday:

"I like the Saints Monday night in a runaway win. It may not happen right off the bat, but Drew Brees will eventually eat this New England secondary up. The Patriots can't hold these guys off for four quarters." - Called it pretty much perfectly.

But also had some interesting comments on Dennis Dixon to start the column. He was obviously much more impressed than I was, and I have always been a Dixon fan. Maybe I was expecting too much. But, if the Bus calls it a good performance that establishes Dixon as a solid back-up, I'm buying in.

Final note on the Bus - he went to Notre Dame, which just fired its coach. That's the third time in 10 years that a coach there has been canned. Every coach since Lou Holtz. No doubt it's a tough job. From what I've read, the school boasts graduation rates for football players of higher than 90%. So, not only do they want you to win football games, they expect you to graduate players. Hats off to the Irish for being demanding on both fronts. Bettis' fine writing (and I'm not a Notre Dame alumnus or fan, just a fan of good sportswriting) is a product of that system. Let's hope they can find a coach who maintains the educational standards, while also fielding a more competitive team. After all, Fighting Irish football has a great tradition of winning as well. I've heard Jim Harbaugh's name mentioned...

Achilles: A Great Middle Linebacker

From the 19th book of Iliad:

"You talk of food?
I have no taste for food-what I really crave
is slaughter and blood and the choking groans of men!"

Would make Ray Lewis proud...

Celebration of football

Yesterday, was a great day for football - well, maybe not for all Browns and Stillers fans, but it rocked for me. First off, my son's 5-6th grade team won its first game, and he finally got some playing time - as he's on second team, and he had a blast. So that was cool, and the weather was great, so we came home and watched the Bills game on the TV outdoors - with the over-the-air HD feed. Grilled some brawts, had the neighbors and friends over and celebrated T.O.' first TD as a Bill and the first Bills' win of the year. (Skip to about the last 15 seconds to see T.O.'scatch. He dropped a perfectly thrown bomb earlier in the game [you can see that on the link too if you like], but when he made the catch for the TD, you could see why we signed the guy. Yeah, it was a nice catch for the TD, but, even better, the place went nuts and he played it up beautifully. The guy is electric.) Two games into the season, it's definitely been a fun one. We got the Saints at home next week.

Cheers.

Ralph

The Art of Losing

If losing is an art form, the Bills can certainly make their claim to being Michaelangelo. (Perhaps the Bengals are De Vinci after their horrific last second debacle on Sunday, but Bills' loss tonight was equally bad. I think in Bill Simmons' meter, it's called a stomach punch game.) I mean we were winning all night- a game nobody thought we could win - and we blew it with an incredibly bonehead play at the end. When the announcer tisks as the kick-off returner decides to bring the ball out of the end zone late in the fourth quarter while you're protecting a lead - and then the return man promptly fumbles and sets up one of the NFL's all-time clutch quarterbacks 30 yards from the winning score - I mean, the pain! Would it have been better to have been blown out?

So, let's rank this one in the pantheon of heartbreaking Bills losses:
1. Loss to the Giants in the 1991 Super Bowl - that kind of set the tone for all the misery that has followed.
2. The Music City Miracle - That was the last time the Bills were in the playoffs
3. That Cowboys loss on Monday night two years ago - I was at the Mannechor watching the Yankees get eliminated by the Indians in the playoffs on the other screen.
4. Tonight's fiasco.
5. The Browns loss at home last year - especially significant to me because of where I live.

Alright, the fifth one might not be included as one of the toughest losses of all-time for any team, but the other four certainly are. In each instance, twice on Monday Night and twice in the playoffs, the Bills managed to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory in front of a national audience. What have we done to deserve this? (and this gets me back to my question about why am I a fan - I like that explanation about the rituals of fall). I feel like we are cursed by some sort of Greek god, like perhaps we harmed or insulted one of Zeus' children at some point and he has damned our team to public failure. Right now, I feel like Raskolnikov in the beginning of Crime and Punishment when he is wondering around St. Petersburg in a half-coherent, feverish state. I keep telling myself I don't care about this stuff, but then the season starts, and I realize my hopes get irrationally up for some glory for the Blue and Red. Then, they even tease me by taking the hated Patriots to the brink, only to blow it and practically hand the Patriots the game on a sliver platter. Woe is me! Woe is the city of Buffalo, Western New York, and all the sorry-ass Pollack Bills fans all over the world. Say it ain't so Joe Ferguson, Cribbs, or whoever you are....

Ralph

Hope Springs Eternal - NFL Kick-Off

Despite the fact that I've told everyone who's asked to take the Patriots and give the points (like 11 1/2) against the Bills tonight, I still find myself getting excited about watching the red-and-blue take on New England. There's at least some chance - maybe 1 in-a-thousand that we can win and probably a 1-in-100 chance of the Bills being competitive - but I'll take it. Why? I have no fuckin' idea. Why should I feel loyal to a bunch of football playing mercenaries carrying the banner of a team I have rooted for for 35 years. What's the attraction? Any ideas? (I need help.)

Thanks.

Ralph

Weekend-Monday update

Well, we got our first snow of the season. The rest of the week looks a little questionable, with more snow perhaps next week. Could we possibly be in for a big snowy winter?

Looks like it will at least be pretty nasty for the Prep-Vincent rematch on Saturday. I've seen the Ramblers play twice this year, and, from my perspective, they got killed both times, vs. Vincent and McDowell. I sure hope they have some sort of a different game plan for this one. Prep seems to do pretty well in the games I haven't gone to, so maybe I should stay home.

Prep runs this spread offense and they do have a new quarterback from the one they had in the beginning of the year. As the QB is definitely the key to this type of offense, perhaps they really have turned a page, but I'm not overly confident. Vincent has been really, really solid all year.

On a professional football note, the Bills have really shit the bed after their fast start. I've had a link to this guy's page for a couple years now. He is absolutely brutal on the Bills, and it turns out justifiably so. Basically, he's insisted that for the past four years - at least, any winning they have done is through smoke and mirrors and that they just don't block, tackle, and execute well enough to win consistently in the NFL. Maybe if Mr. Phillips would spend a little more time on his day job with Cowboys and less time writing under his alias, his team in Dallas would have more success. Seriously, when Wade was in Buffalo, the Bills sure could tackle and hit you at least. I don't know what's happend to his D in Dallas.

Oh well, that's about it. All sorts of fun on several fronts here.

Ralph

Gotta Love Denny Green

Was listening to the Browns-Broncos game last night. Former Vikings (and regrettably Cardinals) head coach Denny Green was doing the color commentary. To give you an idea of what he sounds like, I thought it was Jerry Glanville. Anyhow, he made this call, "the Broncos still need a whole half-yard for the first down."

Oh yes, another great episode of Life on Mars. I absolutely think this is the best network TV show ever made through five episodes. Unforuntely, I haven't found anyone else who shares my opinion. Are you out there?

Ralph

Texas-Oklahoma

They call it the Red River Shootout, and in this day-and-age of the overuse of terms like "shootout" and "classic" as part of media hype - this one actually lives up to the hype. I think they've been playin' it for 110 years, which is clearly long enough to establish a "classic" rivalry.

I remember a few years back reading a list of the 10 greatest college football rivalries, and at the time, to me, the Nebraska-Oklahoma game always seemed like one of the biggest. But, this list, which obviously had a broader perspective than I did, listed Texas-Oklahoma. It said something like, these two states just don't like each other. If you want to insult someone from Texas, just say they're from Oklahoma, or some such jazz. Anyhow, when a rivalry goes back 110 years, as I said, and you typically have two good football programs, it's going to get pretty heated.

Saturday's game was fantastic. Oklahoma jumped out early and help on until the 4th quarter when the Longhorns came rolling like an orange tidal wave that the Sooners couldn't hold back. Something about Brent Mussburger calling Oklahoma Coach Bob Stoops by his nickname "Stoopy" I think doomed them.

Mussburger did have one great line when his color man said something about them potentially riding together the largest Ferris Wheel in the world, which is installed at the Texas State Fair. "Do they serve cold ones up there?" Mussburger asked. I think he may have a been a bit uncomfortable with the propsition.

Anyhow, great game, fun time, lot of patentry, good quarterbacking - that Colt McCoy of Texas can play - college football the way it should be. As a sidenote, I was in Austin last week, and even though the Cowboys played on Sunday, the big story in the paper was the upcoming Saturday's game with Oklahoma. That's what it's all about.

Ralph

NFL Round-up

I tried to post this last week, but kept getting error messages for some reason. It's my return to the AFC East Report, the place where I made my unfortunate predictions about the Tom Brady-Randy Moss combo last year. I've gone on record as admitting how wrong I was on this. Watching the Patriots, and Moss in particular struggle this year, reenforces what a wonderful combo Brady and Moss really are.

It's also interesting to note that whereas Brady was still a pro-Bowl player without Moss, Moss is really struggling so far without Brady. Related to that, if the Patriots continue to struggle, I think it will somewhat expose Belichick as a fraud. I'm not saying this is going to happen, but Miami sure put a thumping on them at home yesterday. This puts Belichick's career record in games when Brady was not his starting quarterback at 43-58. As I wrote last year, who's the real "genius?"

Which brings me back to the Bills and Trent Edwards. Yesterday, for the second game in a row, Edwards led the Bills to an awesome fourth-quarter comeback win. Without Edwards... well I was going to say the Bills would be 1-2, instead of 3-0. But he did stink the joint up for three quarters, before turning it on. Like Brady, and perhaps Joe Montana even, Edwards seems to have that ability to turn it on when he needs to to win a game. This has always been my favorite trait in a QB. It's an intangible that's real hard to quantify. Granted, the Bills did barely beat the lowly Raiders at home, so not all was peaches and cream, but they did pull it off. It's always the mark of a good/great team, when they can win if they are not playing their best, and the Bills certainly made enough mistakes yesterday to give the Raiders the game. Hopefully, the mistake part is not a trend.

One final note - both Brady and Edwards grew up in Northern California, where Montana played most of this career.

Also, Dr.D, maybe Frerotte is your savior. He also did just enough to help the Vikes pull out a win. Perhaps the ole Kittanning Kid is ready for one last run...

Cheers.

Ralph