Well, that stings. The Bills had this game. I thought when David Nelson caught that long pass to put the Bills inside the Giants 30-yard line, we were golden. Alas, it wasn’t the case.
For the first time all season, turnovers and mistakes caught the Bills and not to the opposition. To be honest, I’m not really that angry about today’s game. Sure, disappointed, but these aren’t the same old Bills. They can play with a lot of teams in this league. They were in a great spot to win this week while having Andy Levitre play left tackle and Chad Rinehart play guard. Oh, and half their WRs from the practice squad were starting it seemed like.
The Giants aren’t a bad football team. They played a great game today and if you were to pick on things they did wrong, there really weren’t that many. All week, the Giants story was about whether the good G-men or the bad G-men would show up. Today, the good ones showed up, but, we still hung with them. They are a 8-10 win team and it is extremely hard to play games in NYC.
Yes, the Bills could easily be 6-0 or 1-5 at this point, but this is the NFL and it is a Game of inches that can swing wins/losses either way. They are 4-2 and I think we would have all taken that before the season. Yes, I’m still optimistic.
—If we are going to play the blame game, I think Ryan Fitzpatrick is your leading candidate. I have absolutely no problem with the Bills calling passing plays on his two interceptions. Why? Because Stevie Johnson was open. However, Fitz’s throws were wounded ducks. That is on him and only HIM. Those were probably his only poor throws today. Even still, Fitz has to make those throws. There are no excuses for him not connecting. He didn’t have pressure and he had time. If he makes those throws today, we probably win.
—Now, I’m not going to throw him off the ledge like some on Twitter are doing. Yes, QBs make bad throws and if it wasn’t for his play against the Raiders/Pats, our record wouldn’t be 4-2. Also, aside from the picks, he made some nice throws today and he’s doing it with UB kids for god sakes. Chill and get off the ledge. What? Did you think he was going to throw for 350 yards every game? He won’t. The Bills should extend him and I’m confident with him being the QB of the future. Plus, picture what he’d do if he had a decent defense to help him out.
—In fairness, because I don’t want to come out as a complete homer, #14 has come back down to earth a bit over his last three games. During that span, Fitz is averaging just 212 yards with three touchdowns and three interceptions. Yes, he’s slowing down, but it is hard to crap on him when he’s missing his left tackle and wideouts keep going down with injuries. He can still be the guy. Don’t let the whole “We need a franchise QB!” crap get to you. I remember when there were fans who wanted Flutie out of here because he didn’t make every single throw. Yes, it is easy to want perfection when you are a Bills fan, but sometimes, you just have to settle for good or more importantly, not broken. And that’s Fitz. Work together to get better is all I’m saying.
—To go back to the play call on Fitz’s last interception, a lot of discussion was on the WGR postgame show and twitter about the Bills going for the jugular in the 4th quarter. I have no problems with it. Even if you go conservative and chew up the clock, what will the end result be? The Bills kick a field goal and give the Giants the ball back with less that three minutes remaining? The Bills defense has been giving up truckloads of yards this season and continued that trend today. The Giants weren’t going to be denied offensively, especially since the Bills defense lost their turnover mojo today. Plus Johnson made Corey Webster look like Emanuel Lewis (He played Webster) today. He had him beat a lot and I actually wish they went to #13 more today. Stevie was open, Fitz made a terrible throw, end of discussion.
—If you want to complain, how about the way the Bills managed to screw up the drive before the half in which they were in field goal range, only to take two sacks and get no points. That drive annoyed me way more than Gailey’s play call. Fitz/Gailey were greedy on 3rd and 16, and they should have just played for the field goal on that situation. Why? Because there aren’t many 3rd and 16 plays that can get you a 1st down. Taking the sack killed the drive and gave the Giants momentum to storm down the field and score a touchdown. The Bills should have done a simple screen play for 5 yards. They got greedy, and Ryan needs to know to keep it simple on those situations.
—Well at least the Bills defense didn’t give up over 450 yards five weeks in a row, instead, they gave up JUST over 400 yards. Yes, I could say that the Bills were without three key defensive players, Merriman (Don’t laugh), Williams and Kelsay, but even when those three are together, they are still giving up 450 yards a game. The Bills better shore up their defense during the bye week. You can’t count on them causing four turnovers a game like they have been doing. Besides the turnover factor, the Bills defense hasn’t done anything right this year. They can’t get sacks, they can’t stop the run, and they can’t stop the pass. When they don’t get turnovers, the defense doesn’t exist. It should also be noted that over the last 22 games, the opposition has scored 24 points or more, 13 times.
—One more note on the defense, when is the front office going to get the blame for their performance? I know Edwards is getting a lot of cristisim, but 3/4’s of Nix’s draft picks went to the defensive side of the ball. The majority of their free agent signings have been towards helping the defense. They bring in Dave Wannstedt. They have invested money and draft picks into this unit, but at times, they still remind me of Dick Jauron’s epic Cover 2 defense.
—Who the hell is Jake Ballard?
—Memo to CBS: Can you at least get a Bills package on the pregame? You know, you are the AFC Network. Ugh! How I hate big market teams.
—Over Fitz’s last 19 starts, Stevie Johnson has 14 touchdowns, which accounts for almost 40% of his touchdown passes (35)
—You just couldn’t make that interception towards the end of the game, Leodis? ARRRR!
—I know all week I was talking about wanting the Bills to go after wideouts (Owens, Wayne, or a guy not from UB), but after today, I feel kind of cool with their wideouts. I thought Spiller played well in running 8-12 yard routes (5 catches for 39 yards). If I’m Gailey, I’d still like to take a couple more shots down the field. You have Spiller back there, who has speed, so why not use him deep? Oh, and I still think Stevie Johnson has speed to stretch defenses, but the Bills always seem to use him in slant/curl routes. Overall, the Bills WR corps. played their best game since week 3. Everyone contributed with timely catches for 1st downs.
—Up until the start of the 2nd half, David Nelson only had 3 catches for 24 yards in his last 12 quarters. In the 3rd/4th quarter today, he had four catches for 62 yards, which were all for 1st downs.
—Loved the Fred Jackson TD run. I got a couple of tweets indicating that his final move on the 80-yard scamper was straight out of Tecmo SB. I actually thought he kind of looked like Elvis or John Travolta in Saturday Night Fever with the little shake/dance. Even with the 80-yard run, the Giants were still able to contain Jackson, who gained only 41 yards on the his other 15 carries. Hmmm, 16 rushes doesn’t seem like a lot, does it? Jackson’s 100-yard rushing performance gives him 100-yards in total offense in 10 of his last 14 games.
—I also had no problem with the Bills going for a field goal at the end of the half. If anything, I hated the offensive formation on 3rd and short. It was one of those plays that I knew wasn’t going to work because the Giants had too many men in the box and the Bills didn’t have enough blockers (two wides). At least they figured it out in the 4th quarter when they ran a QB sneak on 4th and inches. Works every time.
—I wish the Bills actually went to CJ Spiller on those end around fakes they were doing. It seemed like the Giants were zeroing in on Jackson where ever he went and I think the Bills should have made them pay with Spiller.
—It seems like on a weekly basis, we always get two Bills defensive backs, who either plays well or plays poorly. George Wilson seems to always get the gold star for the secondary, while McKelvin gets a dead rose. Today, Terrence McGee looked solid as hell. He was a tackling machine and was solid in pass coverage. Drayton Florence? Eh, he seemed to get the McKelvin treatment. He was awful today. If I’m a offensive coordinator, I try and beat Florence deep. He doesn’t seem like the type of cornerback who does well in defending deep balls. He’s just not fast enough and is better suited at defending short passes. BTW, when will defensive backs learn to turn around. If you don’t turn around and make contact with the WR, you will be called for pass interference every time!
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