Sully on Sports

Bills at Jaguars

Greetings from Jacksonville, my least favorite NFL city. Bills and Jaguars square off in about an hour in Perry Fewell's debut as interim head coach. Don't forget to follow the game today at our Bills Live site. It's up at noon and runs until an hour or so after the game. Mike Harrington will be running the show today from our Buffalo offices. I'll take his pitch off the Billboard site and repeat it for you here. I'll be chiming in on the chat, as usual. I won't be blogging here during the game. 

Harrington: "Don't wait until kickoff. There's plenty to talk about after this week and our Bills Live gameday chat kicks off today at noon. From pregame through the contest in Jacksonville and all the postgame chatter, join me at our special Bills Live page for all the post-Dick Jauron/Perry Fewell debut talk.

Don't show up at 12:45 and ask where the chat was!. Use one of those links to get there right from the kickoff. I promise some chuckle-inducing music, funny pictures and funny chatter. And, hey, how about bookmarking the link too?

The End for Trent

It has become very bad for Trent Edwards, as I suspected after Dick Jauron pulled him late in Sunday's loss at Tennessee. When Jauron was fired Tuesday, that left the call on the starting quarterback to interim coach Perry Fewell. Fewell announced Wednesday that he was starting Ryan Fitzpatrick this week at Jacksonville, because Fitzpatrick gives him the best chance to win.

Fewell's decision speaks volumes about Edwards' standing within the team. I have to think Fewell has a good sense of how the other players feel about Edwards and has concluded that they have little faith in him. That sentiment played out before a national audience last Sunday when Terrell Owens and Josh Reed complained openly on the sidelines about reads being missed on the field.

Fitzpatrick is no answer. Yes, the Bills won two games with him under center. But he has been decidedly mediocre. Fitzpatrick has completed 49.4 percent of his passes. Among quarterbacks who have thrown 75 passes, only two -- Derek Anderson and JaMarcus Russell -- have a lower completion percentage. Fitzpatrick's 4.70 yards per pass is abysmal, and only slightly lower than his career mark.

But this isn't about Fitzpatrick. It's about a team and a franchise losing confidence in a failed franchise quarterback.  

Jauron Firing

Maybe it was seeing Bud Adams flip off his team from the owner's box. Or maybe it was seeing Terrell Owens and Josh Reed yelling on the sidelines. Maybe Ralph Wilson finally realized his ticket-buying public was fed up with the situation. Maybe it was the offense. Whatever the reason, Wilson came to his senses today and fired Dick Jauron as his head coach.

It's about time. I can't give Wilson much credit for making a move that should have happened last January. He saved a couple of million dollars on the ill-advised contract extension he gave Jauron last season. That's a small benefit, indeed, for wasting more than half an NFL season waiting for Jauron to confirm what any lucid person knew long ago: That he was a failure as an NFL head coach.

It's also hard to get encouraged when you consider Wilson's history of underpaying for head coaches. This is where the hard part begins: Will the owner finally loosen the purse strings and find a proven head coach who will command an elite salary? Or will he go the typical route and hire some young coordinator who will learn on the job?

In the short term, an interim coach will almost surely be elevated from the staff -- Bobby April or Perry Fewell, presumably. But if the Bills want to be taken seriously, they need to do a thorough and aggressive search for a coach who can lead them out of their decade-long funk.

This franchise is at a crossroads, whether Wilson cares to admit it or not. The time for hiring key people on the cheap has to end. First of all, Ralph needs to do what he should have done after he fired Tom Donahoe: Bring in a respected football man to oversee the operation and hire the next coach. By reaching for Marv Levy, he lost three plus years. He got stuck with a mediocre coach in Jauron. Then he elevated Russ Brandon when Levy left two years later.

Wilson and Brandon are trying to regionalize the franchise and keep it viable in Buffalo. But they've been regionalizing a dysfunctional product. It's time to get serious. They need to hire a real general manager to run the football department. And they need to spend money on a top coach.

There are a lot of options. Mike Shanahan, Bill Cowher, Mike Holmgren, Brian Billick. All former Super Bowl winners who aren't coaching. All of them would probably want complete control of the operation. Wilson has always been wary of the GM-coach figure, with good reason. It rarely works out well in the NFL. At this point, I'd be willing to give it a shot, but it's not likely Wilson would go for it.

But that doesn't mean he can't bring in a strong GM type. He should promote Brandon to president -- a title held only previously by Donahoe. Then the new GM can hire the head coach. There are good candidates out there. Greg Gabriel, a Buffalo native who runs the Bears college draft, is a possibility. Rick Mueller, the former Saints GM, is now working in the UFL. Wilson respects him. Mueller might bring in Jim Haslett as coach.

There are other possibilities. But the key is getting a football guy in here to evaluate the team and determine where they've gone wrong. That means spending money. Wilson says he's still committed to winning a Super Bowl for the fans. It's time for him to put his money where his mouth is.

Poll: Bills' quarterback situation

poll by twiigs.com

Live Chat at 1

Just a reminder that I'll be chatting live at 1 p.m. today. I'm committed to doing a full two hours after having to cut it short a week ago.

Who would you rather have as your quarterback now, Trent Edwards or Vince Young? I believe I asked that in a blog last year, when Edwards was flying high and Young was on the bench and crying about being booed. Seems things have turned again since then.

T.O. Update

We can all calm down now. Scott Berchtold, the Bills' VP of communications, came into the media room and informed us that Owens' absence is injury-related. Berchtold realized the media were buzzing over T.O.'s absence and decided it would be better not to wait until Dick Jauron addressed the media at 2:30 p.m. Way to show a grasp of today's rapidly moving media universe!

Of course, a cynic might suggest the Bills are using this injury as a way to keep Owens from having to talk about his agent, Drew Rosenhaus. Rosenhaus ripped the Bills coaching, quarterbacking and offensive line on a Miami radio show last week. Owens hasn't yet addressed his agent's rant. Maybe he has no knowledge of it!

No Sign of T.O.

One of my objectives at Bills media day today was to ask Dick Jauron if he would consider giving some of Terrell Owens' playing time to James Hardy -- who is expected to be activated today. Well, the Bills might do something even more dramatic.

Owens is not at practice today, and was nowhere to be seen during the 15-minute period where the media is given access. That is naturally leading to speculation that the Bills might have cut the controversial wide receiver. It would be a stunning move -- considering that they sold thousands of extra tickets after signing T.O. as a free agent.

We'll just have to wait and see as the day unfolds.

Poll: Michael Vick and the Bills

poll by twiigs.com

Kern Still Unbeaten

Brett Kern, the punting pride of Grand Island, achieved a rare distinction last week. Kern was waived by the Denver Broncos, who were unbeaten at the time, and picked up by the Tennesee Titans, who were winless.

Kern, a second-year pro out of Toledo, was 10th in the NFL in punting average (46.1 yards) when Denver let him go. Josh McDaniels, the rookie Broncos coach, didn't care for Kern's direction punting. Kern had punted into the end zone six times in 27 kicks. He had a long, low punt returned 77 yards for a touchdown by San Diego's Darren Sproles.

The Broncos signed Mitch Berger, a 37-year-old veteran, after waiving Kern. Berger punted eight times in his debut against Baltimore last Sunday and had a net average of 36.3. He put only one punt inside the 20-yard line.

Kern had a terrific game in his first outing with Tennessee. He dropped three of his four punts inside the Jacksonville 20-yard line and finished with a 43.3 net average for the day -- the third-best in the NFL last weekend.

Oh, the Broncos lost for the first time Sunday. Tennessee won for the first time. So, unlike his former team, Kern is still unbeaten this year.

Live Chat Today at 12:45

Just a reminder that I'll be chatting live this afternoon. It's scheduled for 1 p.m., but I'll try to get it going 15 minutes earlier, at 12:45. I'm expecting a phone call at 1:45 from Gill Byrd, the Bears' secondary coach. His son, Jairus, was just named NFL Rookie of the Month for October. I'm doing a piece on J. Byrd for Sunday's paper. So I'll be leaving the chat for 10-15 minutes and then resuming around 2. We'll go at least two hours, as usual. Talk to you then.