Bills battles to keep jobs just beginning?
Over t he past t wo weeks the Buffalo Bills have fallen to 0- 2 at home with a sloppy mess of a loss to the Jets on a Thursday night, fired offensive coordinator Greg Roman the next day, bounced back 10 days later with a huge and impressive upset of the Arizona Cardinals and then immediately seen head coach Rex Ryan begin taunting and poking the biggest, baddest bear on the block as they ready for this Sunday’s trip to New England.
Ryan may not be the best coach in the NFL, but he never fails to entertain.
That said, how much longer the show goes on in Buffalo remains to be seen.
As badly as the Bills needed that win over the Cardinals, it really didn’t answer many questions and Ryan is a long way from out of the woods.
Bills fans would like to believe the firing of Roman and installation of Anthony Lynn in his place was all the Bills needed, but that would be naïve at best.
In the Jets game that triggered Roman’s firing, the Bills put up 31 points, although seven came on a defensive score, while the defense overseen by coordinator Dennis Thurman, assistant head coach defense and twin brother of Rex, Rob Ryan and Rex himself gave up 497 yards and 37 points.
In 2015, Roman’s first season running the Bills’ offense, the team was average at best but the 23.7 points per game, 360.9 yards per game and 5.68 yards per play the offense managed was the best of any of the seven Jets and Bills teams Ryan had been the head coach of.
Lynn was Ryan’s running backs and assistant head coach with the Jets and followed him to Buffalo to take the same job. He is now in his first offensive coordinator job and the pressure is squarely on Ryan for him to succeed.
Lynn is Ryan’s fifth offensive coordinator in eight years as a head coach following Brian Schottenheimer, Tony Sparano, Marty Mornhinweg and Roman, suggesting hiring one is not Ryan’s strong suit.
Adding to the intrigue are the circumstances surrounding Roman’s firing. It has been reported in the Buffalo area it was a move from the top, pushed for by relatively new owners Terry and Kim Pegula, who purchased the Bills just two years ago and made Ryan their first head coach at the end of the 2014 season.
The Way We Hear It, that was not the case, as it was Rex’s doing all along and he merely sought approval from the Pegulas who had made Roman one of the highest paid offensive coordinators in the league and will now continue to pay him not to work for them.
Our sources are telling us that the Pegulas are taking a page from their experience purchasing the Buffalo Sabres in 2011, settling in, and trying to learn the NFL and then moving slowly. It is highly unlikely they told their head coach to fire his coordinator.
The perception has been that with Ryan still due $ 22 million for the remainder of this season and the next three after, the Pegulas felt stuck with Ryan, so looked to find improvement elsewhere.
Our sources say that after paying roughly $ 1.7 billion in cash to buy the Bills, ownership’s last concern is over saving $ 22 million if they decide Ryan isn’t the guy they hoped.
Ryan is still very much on the coaching bubble in Buffalo and the wins better keep on coming if he hopes to be there after this season.
NERVES BEGINNING TO FRAY IN CLEVELAND AS BROWNS KEEP LOSING?
Cleveland Browns first- year head coach Hue Jackson has received somewhere between solid and rave reviews for the way he is handling his young Browns team so far, as the club has gone from losing big to just blowing games they might have won.
But at the end of the day, 0- 3 is 0- 3, and some of the moves the Browns have made to get there have insiders scratching their heads, and we’re hearing could be beginning to strain the relationship between Jackson and front- office honchos Paul DePodesta and Sashi Brown.
With DePodesta being a baseball sabermetrics guy and Brown a salary cap guru with no NFL talent evaluation experience between them, it’s unclear who is making final calls in the war room on draft day.
It is also unclear whose idea it was to let Alex Mack, Mitchell Schwartz, Travis Benjamin, Tashaun Gipson, Donte Whitner and Karlos Dansby all walk via free agency, releases which yielded little in return – Cleveland could receive compensatory draft picks next spring for Mack, Schwartz, Benjamin and Gipson – and with no proven talent waiting in the wings to replace them.
And that’s just where the story starts. The Way We Hear It, Cleveland dealt the second overall pick in the draft this year in part to load up more picks, but also as much because they didn’t believe Carson Wentz could be their quarterback of the future.
Our sources are telling us the Browns were reasonably sure the Rams were taking Jared Goff with the first overall pick before trading their pick to Philadelphia, but the Browns’ “talent people” didn’t see Wentz as an eventual top- 20 passer in the NFL.
Is it possible the Browns are so smart that they see a better prospect than Wentz coming in 2017 and can grab him and still have plenty of extra picks?
Jackson has been around too long to buy that.
We’re hearing nothing is imminent in Cleveland, but don’t be surprised if there is a minor coup of sorts after the season and before the draft that leaves Jackson with a clear hold on personnel power in Cleveland and DePodesta or/ and Brown in different positions, in Cleveland or perhaps even elsewhere.