Now, I can't say I'm hype for it, but sometimes a Deeg Emeritus challenges you to throw down on a Koch Brother cum-Bills blogger, and sometimes you're high on cough syrup and sanctimony and your ego can't refuse.
So, well, here. This guy has been spamming Bills Backers facebook with his blog posts despite living in Western New York, so I is about to fuck him up in a justified roundhouse kick of expat reciprocity. I timed myself and this came out to about 23 minutes of actual effort and then a quick proofread for typos, so apologies for anything that you might think merits an apology I guess.
By Brandon J. Koch
I would bet all the money in my pocket (zero dollars and twenty cents) that this guy only started using the middle initial when MAGA became a thing. The only people that willingly publish their middle initials in their byline are: Hunter S. Thompson; cops; fascists. WHICH IS BRANDON I WONDER.
The national media knows absolutely nothing about small market teams, especially the Bills. That the Bills are a small market team is entirely irrelevant to everything that follows here, but it's a useful clarion call when you want to be lazy and pretend that the national press is somehow bad at analysis of a football team because it happens to exist in a small media market that is also incredibly touchy about being reminded of how good other places are in comparison.
NOTHING. And it shows.
They are so out of touch.
I have a feeling Brandon here has above his kitchen table a framed picture of Bucky Gleason holding hands with a woman but her head is cut out and John Wawrow's head is scotch-taped on. Admittedly, this a weird feeling to have but something about the lede here is terribly derivative of some of the worst writing in Buffalo sports media.
When it comes to the Tyrod Taylor benching, the national media wants to push their own agenda, a false one that is: Tyrod Taylor being blackballed by McDermott, Bills.
Eat shit. Putting aside the syntax fuckery in play here, the Bills have consistently shown through their actions vis a vis Taylor's contract renegotiation, the offensive scheme chosen for this team, the decisions to let Goodwin, Woods and Watkins play elsewhere, that they have no significant love for Taylor. Whether this is justified or not is a separate question, and you can argue about the semantics of whether it's blackballing him, assuming any national writer actually used that word and not that Koch chose to use it since it's hyperbolic, but arguing that they've been happy to give him a fair shake with an approach that would maximize his success at QB is as heinous as it is silly.
That couldn’t be more wrong.
The national media once thought there were WMDs in Iraq and that the aforementioned Brain Worm Reality TV star couldn't be President, so I believe they are capable of being more wrong yet I DIGRESS. Give me your bulletpoints, BJK.
1. Since day one, Sean McDermott has said he will make decisions that is [sic] best for this football team to win games. Yet Rick Fucking Dennison is the offensive coordinator and Sammy Watkins is a Ram. And Mayo McTroops hasn't even really said that this is his goal; instead, he has said he is making decisions that are best for the football team, whatever that means. Homie has been entirely torn on whether he actually wants to win football games now, or whether he's trying to put together a team for the future, entirely built in his image, that is a team full of players that love Jesus but hate being asked to explain away the many inconsistencies of the Bible; players that love camo but hate being asked to explain Department of Defense policy regarding taxpayer-funded military displays at sporting events; players that love winning, but somehow hate Marcell Dareus pulling two blockers so that Kyle Williams can eat.
2. Yes, it back fired. [sic] But McDermott was looking for a spark, what's wrong with that? The problem with cliches is that they cover all manner of sins. WHAT'S WRONG WITH LOOKING FOR A SPARK? NOTHING, EXCEPT HE LOOKED FOR IT IN THE HANDS OF NATE "DRESSES LIKE 18 YEAR OLD DUBS AT A 745 AM RELIGIOUS STUDIES CLASS BUT HEY HE'S WHITE" PETERMAN. Peterman is trash. He's the Barron Trump of NFL QBs - sure, it's not his fault that his dad decided to thrust him into the spotlight too early, but that doesn't change the fact that he sucks. Nate Peterman can't even accurately spark a joint, which is surprising since he loves Popeyes. Taylor against the Saints threw for 56 yards in a brutal performance. WHY DO YOU HATE GRAMMAR, DID GRAMMAR FUCK YOUR MOM IN FRONT OF YOU OR SOMETHING FUCK. Of course it wasn’t all his fault, he’s not playing defense. But, he’s gotta be better than that. Thing is, Taylor has been better than that, was better than that just this past weekend, and the aforementioned replacement QB was WORSE, which was actually hard to do BUT HE DID IT BY GOD HE DID IT. The only thing Nate Peterman is good at is writing shitty country music [not true] and playing abysmal, historically awful, worse-than-Tyrod-Taylor-on-his-worst-day football at the quarterback position. HE has to be better than THAT.
The national media believes that mediocrity is good enough for the Bills because they haven’t made the playoffs in 17 years. Mediocrity is literally not making the playoffs for 17 years but never being so bad as to get the first pick in the draft. Making the playoffs is quantifiably better than mediocrity. So the Bills can’t try and be better? I like Taylor, he’s good enough to make it into the playoffs, but that’s it. The "I like Taylor" line needs to be dropped into every defense of McTroops' move to Peterman these days because the argument is indefensible. "I like Tyrod, but" is the "I have black friends" trope that lets the speaker feel like he can openly wonder why black people are just so violent. As it is, sadly, even if you say "I like Tyrod" and then proceed to defend starting Peterman against the Chargers, you still look like a shitheel who dips kale chips in Franks and calls himself cultured. Bills fans, like me, want more than just mediocre play. THEN WHY ARE YOU A BILLS FAN AMIRITE.
For instance, John Clayton was on Schopp and the Bulldog a couple of weeks ago and said this: “Is it that big a deal in any city to be able to make the second wild card, lose by 2 touchdowns… in Buffalo it’s huge.” The City would drown itself in hops and Crown but fans are going to pretend they wouldn't enjoy it. “I know that in the big picture it’s like ‘OK a wild card loss isn’t great’, but for Buffalo it’s fantastic.”
Now, I ask you this: How much in depth does Clayton really watch and study the Bills? I dunno, I'd say a reasonable amount since he willingly goes on WGR to talk about them. He lives in Seattle covering the Seahawks. Just because he’s the “insider,” doesn’t mean he’s right when he says just making the playoffs and losing by two touchdowns is “Fantastic,” for Buffalo. That’s settling for just being mediocre.
John Clayton has been a football analyst for as long as I can remember. He has the face to show for it. "He covers the Seahawks" is a serious thought? Did you just look him up on Wikipedia or something? Fucking hell, Clayton is one of only a handful of people who have been in the game long enough to look like Lou Holtz fucked a Fraggle but not to have been fired along the way for some sexual indiscretion and/or racist comment on air.
A journey begins with a single step or some such idiom. The idea that Bills fans are regularly jumping on twitter or WGR's airwaves or a new, totally necessary sports blog to express the thought that "playoffs aren't enough" is fucking bizarre. We have been desperate for playoffs for so long that not only can that desperation drive, but that desperation can drive drunk, get pulled over by the Erie County Sheriffs doing 80 on the 400 and get threatened by a meth cook in a holding cell in Elma. I keep hearing how folks aren't bagging on Taylor because of he's black, or that they don't want Peterman because he's white, but fucking hell, I see jabroni after thundergunt after jabroni rock out with "I don't want the playoffs, I want MORE" like some perversion of Veruca Salt meets Ralph from Tonawanda and I have to wonder - IS THIS BECAUSE YOU DON'T WANT TO SEE THE BLACK MAN SUCCEED? The playoffs are, fate would have it, the way a team gets to a Super Bowl, so these newfound aspirations coming from the fanbase don't pass the smell test. We're on the verge of 18 years of Drought now, thanks to McTroops trying to light a fucking spark by giving the ball to Football's Ted Cruz last week, and folks are pretending it's justifiable to scoff at a wild card berth.
After the Kansas City win, Jonathan Jones wrote a piece at MMQB SI.com
He acts in this piece that Taylor is being a victim. What the fuck does this even mean? How can a writer "act" in a piece of written commentary? "Being a victim?" What are words, even.
[quoting Jonathan Jones] In Sunday’s 16-10 win against Kansas City (struggling with its own problems), Taylor proved once again that he’s good enough to win his team games and maybe good enough to sneak into the playoffs with just one fellow star on offense in LeSean McCoy. How many times must he prove his worth at this sport’s most important position?
Apparently, many times. Even though Buffalo is threatening to make its first postseason since 1999—which would end the longest active playoff drought in the NFL (yes, longer than the Browns)—Taylor, a wholly decent seven-year veteran, will still likely not play for the Bills next season. Buffalo went so far as to give rookie QB Nathan Peterman the chance to unseat Taylor last week against the Chargers, and, well, we all know how that went. Peterman is clearly not the Bills’ answer at quarterback, and never should have been considered to be so.
Not for nothing, but Jones nails it here. Koch, well, disagrees.
“Good enough,” and “Decent.”
Yes. As in, "Tyrod Taylor is good enough to quarterback a team to the playoffs, and is decent when compared to the dreck that the NFL insists on marching out under center and also when compared to the parade of horrors that have played the position for the Buffalo Bills over the course of the last two decades."
He wrote in a tweet: “Tyrod Taylor is now 20-18 as a starter for a team with 1) the longest active postseason drought and that 2) doesn’t want him”
What 20-18 is something to be proud of? Yes, particularly for a team that was 103-143 in the years between their last playoff appearance and Tyrod Taylor taking over. Also, it's 21-18 if you count that 2015 Colts opener, which I do because I was in attendance and saw each of those touchdown passes in between drunk napping on strangers somewhere in the upper bowl.
But seriously - what in Christ is preventing Bills fans from displaying any modicum of perspective rather than these weird delusions of grandeur that they've been on about these past couple weeks. NONE OF THIS SHOULD MAKE US PROUD. But, you compare Taylor to the available QBs in the draft, the available QBs that the Bills are actually possibly going to get, the backup QB who broke records of ratfucking QB play against the Chargers, and what choice is available? To watch fans disregard the context that Taylor's play exists is to watch a fanbase waiting on unicorns. Pop quiz, hotshot: you are managing an historically bad franchise that has been coached into rabbit holes of failure, the options for future QBs are speculative at best, and you have a QB with a winning record as the team's QB. WHAT DO YOU DO? Bills fans: "I LIKE, TYROD - CAVEAT - BUT HE ACTUALLY SUCKS, I WANT MORE GIVE ME ALL THE SPICED HAM." Ask that to the Bills front office who is trying to build a something bigger. They traded Dareus for nothing. Stop pretending that this front office is in any discernible way special.
And then of course the two that know all! The PTI guys! Do you think they watched one quarter of a Bills game all year? Doubt it. I do, for the record, since the Bills have often been pretty fun to watch this year, particularly if you're a neutral and not absorbed in this weird routine of WHAT DOES IT ALL MEAN CAN THIS PAIN BE OVER NOW?
Mike Wilbon said if he owned the Bills, he would’ve fired McDermott and doesn’t know why he’s still employed. He also called McDermott: “dopey.” 100% agree. He is a mayo sandwich but with less flavor and more calories. He said with a straight face that he thought Peterman gave the Bills the best chance to win and then Peterman went and threw five interceptions and somehow Troops is immune from criticism because he is a serious man with serious devotion to something or rather.
Then of course there are sarcastic Twitter people who act like they have never made a mistake. I have never made a mistake on par with thinking Nate Peterman was a good football player. Accidentally leaving a browser tab open on pornhub at your mom's house or forgetting you left a bong on the table when the police came over to play cribbage - these are totally hypothetical mistakes that I totally never did but even if I had done they are not as bad as what Troops did when he benched Taylor in favor of a walking talking Family Circle cartoon. Fuck Family Circle and fuck you. I saw something Sunday about Paxton Lynch starting and there were multiple tweets saying, “The Bills would’ve benched Tyrod Taylor to start Paxton Lynch.”
Really creative. What. are. words. even.
I get it, that’s how sports work, McDermott’s move ended up being terrible, so he got the criticism, [sic] But know why he made that decision. Because he's an idiot. Be informed. I have just informed you that Troops is an idiot. This is just all overreaction and being blowup by national media who barley [sic] watch the Bills. BARLEY YES YES YES I think this is Joe Buffalo Wins younger self traveling through time and fucking with me. I am incredibly moved by Joe's devotion to the craft, frankly. Debortuary.
Taylor is not the victim (correct, Bills fans and grammar are the victims) this is the other side of how sports work. WHAT OTHER SIDE? The side that makes awful decisions and values the contributions of Nate "Never Misses an Episode of Young Sheldon" Peterman? Count me out. The Bills want to be better than 19-for-29 for 183 yards. They want 6-for-14, 5 INTs and losses. And White Jesus.