Inside The Bills

Thigh contusion for Stevie

Making his weekly appearance on Bills flagship station WGR Sportsradio 550 Monday morning Bills head coach Chan Gailey was asked for an update on Stevie Johnson’s thigh injury and provided the following update.

“He got hit in the thigh,” said Gailey. ”He’s got a bad thigh bruise is what happened to him. He played through it and it depends on how much it swells and how much of it drains into the lower part of his leg. All of those kinds of things play into how he’ll be for this week.”

Gailey will address the media later this afternoon.

Nix: Gailey here for long haul

In his weekly appearance on Bills flagship WGR Sportsradio 550 Bills GM Buddy Nix was asked by a caller about the job security of head coach Chan Gailey if the team doesn’t make the playoffs. Nix quickly responded that Gailey is going to be here for the long haul.

“There’s no way that we’re looking for anything like that (changing coaches), we’re looking for improvement of our team and we have the right people to get them there and I’ll go back to one thing. I never told you that we’d be in the playoffs,” said Nix. ”I said my goal was for us to take the next step and be competitive throughout the year. If we’re in it at the end of the year then we’ve taken the next step. Now whether we make the playoffs remains to be seen.

“I know you fans have been through 12 years (of no playoffs) or whatever it is and you’re frustrated about it. The big thing is you don’t want to start over. If you start over you’re going to get 12 more (years) and that’s not where we’re headed.”

Searching for defensive answers

Bills head coach Chan Gailey in his weekly appearance on WGR Sportsradio 550 was asked for an explanation as to why the defense continues to have big problems. Buffalo’s sideline boss doesn’t have those answers now, but intends to find them during the bye week.

“I can’t give you that answer today,” Gailey told WGR morning host Howard Simon. ”I’m going to spend some time this week looking at it. Maybe I’ll have a better answer next week, but I don’t have that answer today. We’ve been week to week trying to keep ahead of the curve so to speak trying to win games. I haven’t sat down and visited at length with Dave about where things are. The thing about it is it’s like a Jekyll and Hyde situation where we either play really good or don’t play well at all. We’ve got to sit down and evaluate.”

Buffalo is last in the league in run defense, last in third down defense and 31st in points allowed.

McKelvin’s time on ‘D’

Bills CB and return man Leodis McKelvin has turned in some solid play on special teams, but Sunday he also made some plays on defense in Buffalo’s dime package.

In his weekly appearance on Bills flagship WGR Sportsradio 550, head coach Chan Gailey explained McKelvin’s playing time on defense.

“He was playing in our dime package, which brings in a bunch of DBs to the game,” said Gailey. ”It’s not like the other guys have been doing a bad job. It was just an opportunity to get him in there with who they had on the field. If we continue to incorporate that package he’ll continue to get on the field. And the good thing is if something happens we know we’ve got another good player that’s playing well right now.”

The Bills used their dime package on 18 of their 71 plays on defense.

McKelvin had a pass breakup on defense along with a tackle. He also had a fantastic special teams tackle on punt coverage as a gunner, beating the jammer and tackling Patrick Peterson for no gain. He also averaged 27.5 yards on kick returns Sunday with a long of 33.

Nix predicts big things for Stevie Sunday

Bills GM Buddy Nix was at every practice this week on the Arizona State campus and believes what he saw will translate into something very good for Stevie Johnson.

In his weekly appearance on WGR Sportsradio 550, Nix said he thinks Johnson will have a big day Sunday.

“Steve has had the best two weeks of practice that I’ve seen him have since I’ve been around him,” said Nix. ”I expect him to have a breakout game. He’s determined to get this team to winning just like most of our players are and I look to him to have a really good game.”

Johnson earlier in the week said he looked forward to the matchup with Patrick Peterson.

Nix: It’s going to take everybody

Bills GM Buddy Nix has heard the appeal of fans for someone to give a fire and brimstone speech to the team or a team captain to get in someone’s face to motivate them. Nix said it’s not that simple.

In his weekly appearance on WGR Sportsradio 550, Nix said there’s got to be self-motivation from the top to the bottom of the roster. 

“Obviously we’re concerned,” said Nix. ”Fans feel one speech or one flip of the switch can fix it. It’s not like a car that quit running and you found a wire that was loose and you connect it back and you’ve got everything up and running again. A lot of this because it’s such a team game has to come from each player and each individual. We’ve all got to do better.

“Each player has to have enough pride and enough urgency about winning to kick up their performance. Starting with me and all the way down we’ve got to do a better job and it’ll show up on Sunday. But the last couple of weeks it hasn’t.”

Why Gailey trusts Fitz

Bills head coach Chan Gailey said after Sunday’s game that quarterback was not position with an issue when questioned about it following the blowout loss to San Francisco. He explained why that’s the case as he sees it.

When asked in his weekly appearance on WGR Sportsradio 550 about why he has faith in Fitzpatrick as his quarterback this was his response.

“Because I’ve seen the guy play well and win games,” said Gailey. “You have too. Everybody has seen him do that and you know he can do it.”

With Fitzpatrick’s completion percentage at 58.3 percent thus far this season and ranking 25th in the league, Gailey was asked if his quarterback’s play has regressed.

“A lot of factors go into all of that stuff,” said Gailey. ”When you start talking about not having the receivers sometimes or people not doing the right thing or just different factors that go into it. That’s not an issue guys. It’s not an issue.”

Gailey did say he intended to sit down with Fitzpatrick to make sure his confidence is intact saying with quarterback such a critical position he has to know that his signal caller’s mindset is still strong.

Fitz focused on improving, rallying team

Ryan Fitzpatrick is a co-captain on offense, and he along with Fred Jackson intend to take the lead in pulling the Bills out of the funk that they’re in right now after a pair of blowout losses.

“I think it’s important to remember the successes that we’ve had in times like this when we’ve hit a low after two games that have gone very bad for us,” said Fitzpatrick in his weekly appearance on WGR Sportsradio 550. ”It’s important to remember the successes that you’ve had and kind of revisit those and figure out what’s wrong now and what was going so well back when things were great.

“As veteran guys that have been around a while we have to lean on guys like me and Stevie and Freddy, guys that have been through both the bad times and the good times and pull everybody out of it and look at the big picture and try to get better.

“It’s the NFL and no one feels sorry for you. That’s the biggest thing. Nobody feels sorry for us that we got blown out two games in a row and we’re sitting at 2-3. So we have to go out and play our best football to go out and win.”

Fitzpatrick said with respect to his own play he realizes his game has to improve. He’d like to hit on more of his downfield throws after missing three more Sunday against the 49ers, and do a better job of getting the ball in his playmakers’ hands. At the same time he’s trying to rally everyone back up knowing a winning performance will help most in turning the team’s psyche around. 

“You have to keep it in perspective because it’s such a long season. All the games are going to be competitive. It is important to keep in perspective that we’ve had two bad games in a row, but we’re 2-3 and have plenty of games left and time to get this thing going,” he said. ”But we’ve got to figure it out and figure it out in a hurry.”

Gailey to talk to Wannstedt

After one very poor performance, Bills head coach Chan Gailey was not going to run into the defensive meeting room and start ringing alarm bells. He has too much trust in Dave Wannstedt as a defensive coordinator. But after two such performances Gailey said it’s time to get some explanations.

“After last week (New England game) I’m not going to go in there and hit a panic button and demand what’s going on after one game,” said Gailey in his weekly appearance on WGR Sportsradio 550. ”But after two games and two issues we’re going to go in there and have a discussion about it. What is our biggest problem and how are we going to fix this. I think you have to understand that people have a job to do and they’re trying to do the best they can. I’m just going to talk to them about the different processes of what it might take to get it fixed.”

Gailey said the only thing he wants to offer is his assistance in terms of practice structure during the week, amount of practice time devoted to defense in an effort to help Wannstedt. The Bills head coach has too much faith in Wannstedt as a defensive coordinator to take a more hands on approach.

“There’s more knowledge in that defensive room about the defensive side of the ball than I could ever have,” said Gailey. ”I coached defense the first seven years of my career, but that was back in 1981. Dave has amassed more knowledge than I’ll ever be able to have. I have to trust them to be able to get the job done. I make sure that we talk about the personnel and about what the biggest issues seem to be. I ask him what we can do to help. Is there a way we can tweak the practice schedule or things we can do that might be helpful. There are enough problems in every area to go around. We need to start scoring more points on offense too, and not turn it over.”

The search for answers

After Sunday’s second-straight blowout loss, head coach Chan Gailey said he has to come up with answers. Here’s his plan for finding them and implementing them.

“What you have to do is you have to figure out what’s the biggest problem and what do you solve first and you go there and start chipping away at it,” said Gailey in his weekly appearance on WGR Sportsradio 550. ”You can’t fix everything at one time, but you’ve got to fix something. We’ve got to go fix something. I know that.”

After Sunday’s game Gailey said he had no answers for what went wrong, but that doesn’t mean he won’t come up with some.

“I think you keep searching,” he said. ”You’re not beat until you quit. You’re only beat if you quit. So as long as you’re fighting and you’re working and that’s for every Joe Blow that’s out there. You’re only beat when you quit. I hate quitters. I can’t stand quitters. So that’s the worst thing in the world. You can be down and you can be out a little bit, but if you keep fighting you’ve got a chance to solve problems.”

Chan concerned about team psyche

After a pair of record breaking losses Chan Gailey is searching for solutions and is concerned about his team’s collective psyche.

“If you’re not worried about the psyche of your football team after two losses then I think you’re sticking your head in the sand,” said Gailey in his weekly appearance on WGR Sportsradio 550. “Yes, I’m concerned about the psyche of our football team. You got beat twice bad you’re going to worry about it.”

Perhaps what has Gailey concerned the most is he talked directly to his team last week about the need to be mentally strong knowing this game against the 49ers was going to present some adversity. The lack of response on the field Sunday when things started to go wrong was troubling.

“I talked all week long about how you have to be mentally tough in this league,” he said. ”You have to mentally tough to handle the ups and downs of a season and the ups and downs of a game. If you don’t have a strong personality you’ll get eaten up. That’s just the nature of our business. You have to be a strong person. We’re not finishing like we should. So that means we’re not as strong as we should be.”

Knowing Gailey saw signs of his team getting “rattled” as he put it way back in the preseason when Pittsburgh staged a 99-yard drive he recognizes the mental toughness of the team has to be improved. That’s a tough thing to do however, during the course of a season.

Nix trusts locker room leaders

Bills GM Buddy Nix in his weekly radio appearance on Bills flagship WGR Sportsradio 550 admitted his team did not match the intensity of New England in the second half last week. But he trusts the leadership in his locker room to right the ship this week.

“We’re very confident in the guys we’ve got,” said Nix. ”We’re a little bit young as far as some of the leaders, but that’s no excuse. Good teams win with young guys if they’re talented enough. We expect our guys to step up out there. I think they will this week. It’s a tough task. We’re playing what I think is one of the best teams in the league at their place and us 2,000 miles from home or further, but we expect to rise to the occasion.”

Nix has been scouting out on the west coast, but has had conversations with Chan Gailey this week and does not expect a hang over from last week’s loss on Sunday.

“Chan said we’ve had good practices and the attitude has been great,” said Nix. ”I don’t expect any of that to linger into Sunday. It better not.”

Nix breaks down matchup

Bills GM Buddy Nix in his weekly appearance on Bills flagship WGR Sportsradio 550 was asked to assess whether the Bills have closed the gap on the Patriots and what they can rely on in their matchup with New England Sunday.

“I do think we’ve closed the gap, and if I sat here and told you we don’t look at where the Patriots are I’d be lying to you,” said Nix. ”That’s where we want to be and if we haven’t closed the gap some in three years I’ve wasted some of my life here.”

Last season Buffalo depended on turnovers to post a comeback victory over New England in Week 3. Relying on turnovers is dangerous however, because when you don’t get them you won’t win. That’s part of what happened to Buffalo in the second half of the 2011 season. Nix doesn’t believe they need to do that anymore.

“We can’t depend on the turnovers like we did last time and I don’t think we have to this time,” he said. ”I don’t know that this one game will either way will say we’ve arrived or we’re there, but I do think it’s a measuring stick. To be the best you’ve got to beat the best and that’s where we want to go.”

As Nix sees it completely shutting down the Patriots offense is unlikely to happen, but he believes the Bills have the ability to slow Tom Brady and company down.

“We are better and I think that is why there is a little different feel this year than last year when we were undefeated at this time. Turnovers have a tendency to even out and we were winning on some of those which was great, but you’re probably not going to get them all the time. I think we’re definitely better in maybe all areas. Tom Brady is going to get their points and make their plays we’ve just got to limit them.”

Anderson on Brady’s work ethic

Bills DE Mark Anderson only played for one season in New England, but it was one that left an indelible impression on the pass rusher concerning Tom Brady and his approach to the game.

“Brady is a hard worker,” said Anderson in an appearance on WGR Sportsradio 550 Wednesday morning. ”On the plane rides I’d sit right next to him. Every away game after that game he’s studying film. He’s already on to the next opponent win or lose. A very professional guy. He works hard every day at practice and knows how to do the little things right. I kind of look up to the way he handles situations. A great professional and a good guy.”

Anderson also explained how Brady and Belichick work together during the course of the week leading up to a game.

“He knows just about everything that’s going on with the defense and takes control of the offense,” said Anderson. ”He and Belichick have meetings together. They work well with each other. Brady he gets all his information from Belichick and they work hard together. He really knows defenses and really knows where his players need to be.”

While Anderson wasn’t going to give details on Buffalo’s defensive game plan for Brady, he did stress mixing things up on Brady throughout the course of the game.

Bills on the radio

Here’s the list of where you can find Bills players and executives on the local radio airwaves Friday morning.

The Howard Simon Show – WGR 550 (listen online)
Buddy Nix – 8:00 AM

Janet and Nick – Kiss 98.5
Scott Chandler – 8:00 AM

Norton in the Morning – 97 Rock
Chris Kelsay – 8:00 AM

Shredd and Ragan – 103.3 The Edge
Stevie Johnson – 8:10 AM

Dareus not with team today

Bills DT Marcell Dareus is still back home in Alabama today as he attends the funeral for his younger brother.

That according to Bills CEO Russ Brandon. Making his weekly radio appearance on Bills flagship station WGR Sportsradio 550, Brandon said he was flying down to be at the funeral today as a Bills representative for Mr. Wilson.

“Hopefully we’ll get Marcell back with our Bills family soon,” he said.

Brandon: Not done with regionalization

Bills CEO Russ Brandon in his weekly appearance on Bills flagship station WGR Sportsradio 550 Wednesday morning was asked if the club has exhausted their regionalization efforts.

Brandon said there are still other options to explore.

“I think there are another couple of shoes to drop on that front,” said Brandon. ”We do have a radio agreement through the Entercom family in Syracuse. Syracuse is definitely a Bills town. I grew up there and it was certainly split between Giants, Jets, Bills back in the day, but it is certainly a Bills town now. I think there’s more that we can do there as well. It’s just a two-hour and 15 minute drive. There’s more opportunity, but we need to continue to strengthen Rochester and Toronto and Southern Ontario.”

Brandon: No multiple games in Toronto

Despite reports to the contrary last week, Bills CEO Russ Brandon in his weekly appearance on Bills flagship station WGR Sportsradio 550 explained that there will not be a scenario in a new Toronto deal that will have more than one regular season game a year played at the Rogers Centre.

“We’re continuing those negotiations and we’re close to an agreement,” said Brandon. ”But the one thing that I will say is the report in the Buffalo News was not accurate. The one thing I want to make clear is we will not be playing multiple regular season games in Toronto.”

Brandon explained how despite fan opposition to the initial Toronto agreement that the club has seen positive results from it.

“You look at the past five years and the what the Toronto initiative has done and we talked about bringing our fans from Southern Ontario back to Ralph Wilson Stadium,” said Brandon. ”That’s been the biggest positive. Five years ago roughly 11 percent of our fans came from Southern Ontario. Now literally 20 percent of our fans are from that location each and every Sunday.  So it has worked and it’s about keeping the team viable in Western New York and it’s a huge part of it.”

Where ‘D’ has been most consistent

While the five sacks Buffalo’s defense registered Sunday will get all the glory in the wake of the win over KC, there’s another part of Buffalo’s game that’s been solid in each of the first two games.

Buffalo’s run defense while Sunday’s game was still a game was giving up 3.9 yards per carry with 47 yards on 12 rushes through the first half. The longest was a Matt Cassel scramble for 21 yards. The Chiefs’ three backs in the first half rushed 11 times for 26 yards (2.36 avg.).

“I feel like our run defense is pretty good right now,” said head coach Chan Gailey on his Monday morning appearance on the Howard Simon Show. ”That’s one of the best things. That’s what I tell our team, if you can run the football and stop the run and dominate on special teams you give yourself a chance to win every week. I think our run defense is right where it needs to be. Can we get better? Sure we can, but I don’t think we’re searching for answers there by any stretch of the imagination like we were last year.”

In Week 1, Buffalo’s run defense allowed 3.3 yards per carry to the Jets.

Pass coverage gets tip of the hat

Bills head coach Chan Gailey wasn’t shy last week in calling out his secondary for playing too loose in coverage. This week he was quick to credit those same cover men for a much improved effort in Sunday’s win over Kansas City.

Appearing on the Howard Simon show on flagship station WGR Sportsradio 550 Monday morning, Gailey gave the cornerbacks primary credit for the success of Buffalo’s pass rush Sunday.

“The one thing that allowed that to happen was this week the coverage was a lot tighter that allowed the pass rush to get there,” said Gailey. ”We had some good pass rushes the week before, but the ball was out so quick. It was not out as quick yesterday and it allowed those front four to go make some hay. I think we ended up with five sacks in the ball game. There’s some credit due everywhere now on all that.”

Defensive co-captain George Wilson felt Aaron Williams, Stephon Gilmore, Terrence McGee and Justin Rogers performed admirably.

“I think they fared well,” he said. “Especially early on I know we gave up some plays late in the game when the game was in hand. I was very pleased with how aggressive our young guys came out at corner. After last weeek we gave up some plays on the outside, it can get to you as a corner. Our guys didn’t make excuses after last week. We went to work this week to correct those mistakes and we didn’t give up the big play to put us in position to be in control late into the second half.”