Where do I start? I guess we should start at the top. Our lovely owners Terry and Kim Pegula. They’ve done tremendous things for this city and downtown development. They’ve kept our major league franchises here in Western New York. BUT, They’re the worst owners in the history of sports. Think about it. They bought the Sabres and kept a GM and coach who had been here way too long and who hadn’t won in years. They finally fire them (though not at the same time) and hire a past legend Pat Lafontaine to run hockey operations. Lafontaine hires Tim Murray to be for all intents and purposes a glorified scout. When trouble starts t brew between Patty and GMTM what do the Pegulas do but back the brash arrogant Murray and send Patty packing with a non-disclosure agreement. We saw how well that went.
Smart people learn from their mistakes. Ignorant ones keep making the same mistakes over an over again. Fast forward to their purchase of the Bills. They keep Whaley and hire the bully on the block Rex. Two dysfunctional years later they fire Rex but keep Whaley on and hire McDermott. They let their first year coach run the draft based upon a lame duck scouting department’s recommendations then fire Whaley AFTER the draft. Everyone including Doug knew he was getting canned. wouldn’t it have been nice to have a football guy who had been scouring college football be the GM and direct the draft? Instead they get a defensive coordinator who’d never scouted before and give him full reigns. In fact, in what I believe is the only case of it’s kind in modern sports history, the let the coach hire the GM. And to top it all it was Terry and Kim who ran the interview which culminated in McDermott’s hiring. WTF do those two know about interviewing a head coach for a football team?
So twice now, instead of getting a hockey/football guy in to run the organization and then have that person run the team they’ve stuck their noses into the mess and done their own “due diligence”. We’ve seen how good that’s looked so far haven’t we.
So the Pegulas hire McDermott and give him carte Blanche to do whatever it takes to run the football team. In his first draft he passes on Mahomes and Watson(even though we needed a QB), trades up to get Ze Jones (even though guys like JuJu Shuster-Smith, Devin Cook, Cooper Kupp, Alvin Kamara and Chris Godwin were still available), hires Rick Denison to be Offensive Coordinator, lets Woods, and Goodwin go for nothing, trades his top WR Watkins and picks up Kelvin Benjamin as our #1 guy, benches his starting QB who has the team at 5-4 for a rookie who throws 5 interceptions in his first half as a starter and continues the Bills streak of mediocrity with a 9-7 win that somehow breaks the 17 year non-playoff streak. The fact that we couldn’t score more than three points in our playoff game combined with the fact that the offense was terrible should have told McDermott something during the off season. It didn’t!!! We trade Cordy Glenn and lose Incognito and Wood BEFOR Free Agency and BEFORE the draft. What does McDermott do? He drafts an offensive lineman with his second pick in the 5th round and picks up a back up center from Cinci who was rated the second worst offensive lineman in football by Football weekly. he then trades up for a QB that most, if not all draft prognosticators felt was a reach at pick #7 and the least likely of the top five QBs to be a successful NFL QB. We’ve seen a very few instances where these prognosticators have been proven incorrect. A couple flashes but overall the same issues he had at Wyoming…inaccuracy, bad pocket presence and overall lack of football IQ.
His offensive line is terrible. He picks up a cornerback in free agency who quits at halftime and has the audacity to start Peterman, the man of five 1st half interceptions last year, as his QB for week #1. Well 5 for 19 with a QB rating of 0 proved how well that decision went.
What’s worse is that he trades McCarron leaving themselves no option whatsoever but to start the raw rookie Allen in game two. When Allen gets hurt (which you had to realize was probable given the lack of talent on the O-line (16 sacks in three games), he’s left with Peterman who, as per his resume, throws a pick-six and another interception to seal a loss in his relief appearance against Houston. Left with no other QB on the roster due to Allen’s injury he calls on a guy who’s out playing golf trying to get on the senior tour someday to be our QB. Anderson hadn’t started a game in 6 years. He comes in and looks like crap which is to be expected. What happens to Peterman? Of course they cut him correct since he had the highest interception % in the history of football right? Of course not. They are smarter than everyone else. They keep him on the roster and of course the inevitable happens and Anderson gets hurt and who becomes our savior once again but Peterman. What a frickin joke!!! They then get a guy that’s been out of football for two years (Matt Barkley) to back him up. Talk about dysfunction!!!
McDermott has shown he is a good defensive coach. He’s also shown he is absolutly clueless as to how to judge offensive talent or to help coordinate an offensive team. This is why guys like him make good Defensive Coordinators and TERRIBLE head coaches (remember Rex Ryan, Wade Phillops, Greg Williams and the rest of the defensive gurus that have flopped as head coaches in the NFL).
So here we are. We have a rookie QB who has not yet shown he is the answer as a franchise QB, we have very little talent on the O-line or at WR. We have $8,000,000/yr 31 year old running back whose production has steadily gone down as his age has gone up, and a team that’s 2-6 and could end up with 3 or 4 wins this year. Yea we have $$$$$ in next year’s cap space to spend next year in free agency. Great…with the way McDermott has judged offensive talent to date combined with the difficulty of getting players to voluntarily come to Buffalo it looks like another unsuccessful coach/GM and a “starting over again” in a couple of years.
Maybe next time the Pegulas will let someone with a football IQ interview the candidate since they’ve done so well so far on their own.