Last year, to help pass the time of the NFL's "dead season, " we had a feature every Friday until the start of the season called "Around The AFC East." It was a chance to talk about some of our divisional rivals and hear what their thoughts were about the upcoming season. From what I could tell from some comments and a few e-mails, it was rather popular.
Well it's back for 2008. Every Friday, each of the AFC East SB Nation sites will exchange questions and comments about carious topics. And though we don't have a Jets blog at the moment, we were lucky enough to get Brian Bassett from the premier Jets site on the net, The Jets Blog, to help us out.
So to get us started, let's talk Buffalo Bills. And to do that, we enlist the help of Brian Galliford from Buffalo Rumblings. Below is his response to my question. You can head over to his site to see my response to his Dolphins-related question.
Matty I: It seems like the Bills have really addressed a lot of their needs this off-season. So what area of the team are you currently most worried about as we inch towards training camp?
Brian Galliford: The biggest position of worry in Buffalo is, unequivocally, quarterback. What else would it be? The Bills are rolling the dice on second-year signal caller Trent Edwards, a young quarterback with high upside but less than a season's worth of NFL starting experience.
The Bills are installing a new offense (though since new coordinator Turk Schonert was promoted from quarterbacks coach, much of the terminology will stay consistent), so Edwards must adjust to that. He also needs to continue to learn how to read defenses and become more of a leader on an offense that needs it. The Bills have put together a defense that can keep them in any game (on paper, at least); none of that will matter if Edwards can't get his offense to score points. The Bills can be a playoff team if Edwards is merely efficient; if he flounders, Buffalo's season goes up in flames. Hopes are high, but the kid needs to deliver.
My Take: I would agree with Brian here in that QB play is definitely the key to the season. And I do like Edwards. It's funny, though, that J.P. Losman has seemingly fallen off the radar in Buffalo. I guess I was right after all about Losman (yes, that's me patting myself on the back). I will say, though, that even if Edwards plays well, I don't think this team is a playoff team...yet. In the NFC, sure they could make the playoffs. But in this tough AFC, I don't think they will win the 10 or 11 games they will need to in order to earn a wildcard berth.
Thanks to Brian for his input. And be sure to head over to Buffalo Rumblings to see my response to his question.
Back in a little with part two of "Around The AFC East."