Its really hard to gage who is full of shit in the matter of Doug Whaley’s job security. Some local folks have sources stating he’s safe, while Jason LaCalifornia (Del’s nickname) is kind of stirring the pot with saying he’s in trouble. Recently, like 3 local guys said he’s fine and I’m sure Russ Brandon was working the phones doing his best Frank Drebin. There are so many vultures out there that want Whaley gone that they are leaking stuff to just about anyone. Well, Whaley and sources don’t know who the hell I am which means I don’t need to pretend to have some sort of agenda. I like to stat the facts and weigh out both options in terms of whether he should get the boot or not.
Con: 37-57
Doug Whaley was hired by the Bills on February 10th, 2010 as the assistant GM/Pro Personnel director. The above numbers are what the team’s record has been since the 2010 season. 20 games under .500 seems like a fireable offense. Now, we don’t exactly know how much of a say he had in his first 3 seasons as Buddy Nix’s protege, but basically we know he liked EJ Manuel (Fail) and he was in charge of the pro personnel department during his time under Buddy Nix. How did Mark Anderson, Shawne Merriman, Brad Smith, Dwan Edwards work out? Alright, he did have Mario/Nick Barnett/Urbik under his regin. But, again, was Nix pushing for some of these guys? Smith/Merriman seem more like Buddy/Chan guys to me in terms of that they wanted them and probably told him we were signing them. Who the hell knows?! That’s the annoying part in figuring out how big was Whaley’s say during the first 4 drafts that Nix ran. Did he want Kiko/Woods? Did he tell Buddy that Mark Anderson was a 1-hit wonder? Did he go to the bathroom when the Bills drafted Troup? Did he want Robert Meachem over Vincent Jackson in the 2012 FA courtships? Only the fly in the Bills war room knows what the deal was, but all I know is that when Whaley was the assistant GM the Bills went 16-32 (2nd worst record during that time) and he got promoted. Go figure.
Pro: 3 full seasons isn’t enough
You thought promoting the assistant to the GM who had a 16-32 record was odd, so would be canning the GM after just two draft classes. Two years as the main GM with an ownership change isn’t exactly fair amount of time to assess whether a GM is good at their job. Normally, a GM gets about 5 years to really have a shot and riding a ship correctly. Also, we all know that Ralph Wilson wasn’t exactly the best owner to work for with his frugal ways and the fact that Whaley had to put up with some of the stupid lifers along the way. The Bills are just 22-25 under Whaley since he’s been named the GM and if we are just basing it on the NFL norm for a GM shelf-life, he probably deserves one more season. Also, he’s only been in charge of the Bills under new ownership for 14 months. I assure you, if Ralph was still the owner, no way in hell would they have given out those huge contracts this past off season. In other words, its hard to gage how good of a job Whaley is doing when his last two owners did things vastly different.
Con: Not playing well with others?
It was always easy to play Doug Marrone as the fall guy in terms of the discord/blame between he and Whaley. He was on his way out and its much easier to kick a guy in their ass on the way out when he’s completely unlikable. However, with a new coaching staff, there seems to still be some friction there. There was the whole Matt Cassel/Fred Jackson ordeals where leaks about him being a rogue reared their ugly heads. While I am Pro-Whaley in those regards, it still doesn’t look good that he’s been surrounded by this crap for the last 18 months. I will say that my theory on the discord probably has to do with me thinking Whaley didn’t have the biggest say in hiring the HC like GMs for other teams have. I think Marrone was a Brandon choice and Rex was on Pegula. So, maybe Whaley wants that authority over the roster and coaches like other GMs have in the NFL. These Bills coaches may just report to the owner and they are like F-off to Whaley cause they don’t really report to him. Of course, its easy to say that most of this discord is just fabrication. Arguments between GM/coaches probably happens more times than they are reported. Disagreement is fine, but resentment for those disagreements is not.
Pro: The Hits
I’ve always hated comparing the Bills roster from previous Bills rosters because the Bills past is soooooooooo sad. If anything, you want to compare them to what the top 10 NFL teams are and NOT to the bottomless pit of previous Bills rosters that have gone belly-up. However, I do think that if everyone was healthy this season and the coach didn’t hold onto his precious defensive scheme tighter than his balls, they probably have a top-10 roster in the NFL. Prior to this season, the Bills had 10 former Pro Bowlers on their roster. We can go via FA first…Corey Graham has been decent for the most part, even though I feel he’s struggled converting to safety this year. Manny Lawson has done well when he’s in a 3-4 defense. The McCoy/Kiko deal has worked so far in Whaley’s favor. Ritchie Incognito has been a great bang for the buck signing. Charles Clay was on his way to have the most receptions and yards for a TE in a Bills season until he got hurt. With the draft, we got Ronald Darby, who has played like a ROY candidate. Pretson Brown overachieved last year as a rookie when he was in a system that suited him. Jerry Hughes/Kelvin Sheppard deal? Steal.
For a guy who rode the bench for 4 years in Baltimore and seemed like “just a dude” when the Bills signed him, Tyrod has done well when you consider where he came from and the collective yawn we all did when they signed him. Karlos Williams has been decent as well. I’ll probably include the Sammy deal in the misses, but the guy has been awesome when he’s on the field. Over his last 7 games, Sammy has 38 catches for 764 yards and 7 TDs. Bacari Rambo has evolved into more of a player than a last name punchline.
In 2012, the Bills ranked 21st in scoring and 26th in defense…In 2014 they went to 18th in scoring and 4th in defense…This year, they went to 12th in scoring and 16th in defense. With all the gripes I’ve had about Rex’s defense, we are still in a much better spot than 3 years ago. Still, its about beating the best teams in today’s NFL and not the ghosts of bad Bills football teams past.
There’s talent on this roster. Unfortunately for this season, injuries and egos from the players/coaches really messed up the chemistry and undercut the value of the roster.
Con: The Misses
While the Watkins deal gets most of the scrutiny online, I’m going with Cyrus Koundjio. Holy shit is that guy a bust or what? What the hell is with him? I don’t exactly remember giant red flags going when he was drafted, but when Jordan Mills gets a start over him…ugh. Plus, he’s lined up as a TE sometimes? WTF. This is James Hardy/Aaron Maybin bad. From there, we can go to the Percy Harvin signing. I understood that it was a low risk/high reward signing, but at 7 million bucks and just 5 starts?? It would have been better to put that money into something else. While it wasn’t Whaley who pulled the tag to draft EJ Manuel officially, we can all pretty much assume that Whaley really likes him which is kind of an indictment. If Whaley didn’t like EJ when he inherited the GM gig, they could have went after Carr or Bridgewater.
Furthermore, we are talking about a GM/#2 personnel guy who hasn’t made the playoffs at all during his 6 seasons with the club. Lastly, there’s the Sammy Watkins deal. The jury is still out on that deal and while I think the Browns butchering their picks thus far has helped, I probably wouldn’t have done the deal with OBJ on the board (Note: I still think having Eli as your QB over Tyrod/Orton/EJ is a big deal). However, as long as Sammy keeps evolving as a player, I think it will lessen the burn. The Bryce Brown/Mike Williams/Stevie Johnson deals were pretty dumb as well. On top of that, the right side of the OL has been bad the last 2 seasons.
Final word:
I would keep Whaley for a few reasons…
1) I think the roster has improved under his watch.
2) 2 draft classes isn’t enough to fire a GM.
3) If you fire him, then you gotta find a GM who likes Rex and that’s easier said than done since most GMs want their own guy.
My biggest bone of contention with Whaley is where he comes from. As you guys know, I loathe anyone in the front office who came from the Ralph Wilson chain of command. I basically think anyone hired by Ralph Wilson or his top confidents are damaged goods destined to fail because the hirers are failures as well. I just have zero hope that they would get it right to begin with and Whaley is a guy brought in by a GM who went 16-32 and was hired by an owner who was kind of an idiot. That’s not my idea of a knowledge tree. I’m hoping without having idiots hire him, Whaley was destined to rise to the top of any organization. In fact, I remember the Colts were snooping around to hire him back in 2012. Also, he comes from decent stock in Pittsburgh.
I’ve been rooting for this team long enough to know that if you lay out the resume’s of every Bills GM since 2000, some of them have some nice hits. Tom Donahoe’s 2001 draft class to go along with his 2003 FA class was pretty decent. Marv Levy as the “defacto GM” drafted Kyle Williams/Marshawn Lynch/Poz in two draft classes. Tom Modrak’s 2009 draft class had Eric Wood/Byrd/Levitre.
The biggest reason why those guys are viewed as failures besides their W/L record is because they completely fucked up the HC/QB decisions. That’s it. If you don’t hit on either of those, you are going to fail as a GM. Donahoe did it with Bledsoe/Losman/Williams/Mularkey…Marv/Modrak fucked up with Trent/Jauron…Nix messed up with Chan/Fitz…and then it starts getting muddled with Marrone/EJ and whether that’s on Nix or Whaley since Nix was the GM when they unveiled the duo.
Whaley has Tyrod/Rex right now.
Tyrod has upside when you consider his numbers are pretty good based on just 13 starts. However, we still don’t know what we have with him and probably won’t have a clear cut vision of him until a year from now. Rex…well…he’s been a disappointment especially with his defense. Rex/Tyrod need to be good. They don’t have to be elite, but being good will ultimately keep Whaley’s job safe.
I’d give Whaley one more year. If they don’t make the playoffs after him being the GM for 4 seasons here, then I think a change is needed, especially since he’s been here since 2010. I am also cool with hiring a consultant/czar who has zero affiliation with the Bills and doesn’t give a rat’s ass about the Bills history to evaluate what sort of operation we have here.
In other words, stop calling Bill Polian.
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