Bills notebook: Jauron won't say if Edwards is starter
Published: November 16, 2009, 3:13 pm
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Ever true to his guarded approach, Bills coach Dick Jauron would not say whether Trent Edwards will be under center Sunday when the team visits Jacksonville.
That in itself, however, spoke volumes about where things stand with the quarterbacks on the roster.
"We make all our personnel decisions on Wednesday and that's about all I'm going to say about it," Jauron said Monday, less than 24 hours after pulling Edwards in favor of Ryan Fitzpatrick late in the fourth quarter of Sunday's 41-17 loss to the Tennessee Titans.
"There's a possibility of changes," Jauron said, referring to the team in general. "Certainly the ones I'm talking about are on the football team, it's the only ones I have any control over. We'll meet on that. We talked about some things this morning. We'll talk about more of those things tomorrow."
Jauron said his opinion of Edwards' play had not changed significantly from what he thought immediately following the game.
"I thought he did some good things and he did some things we'd like to have back and he'd like to have back," the coach said.
As for his confidence in Edwards, Jauron said he still had it, but stated the obvious for anyone who's followed the team.
"It hasn't gone the way any of us would like it to have gone to this point. Certainly the football team, certainly our fans, certainly the front office and ownership," he said.
Edwards said he's going to continue to prepare as if he's the starter.
"There's no reason why I shouldn't," he said. "That's not my decision. I'm not paid to make that decision at all. I'm just going to continue to prepare as I [have been]."
According to Edwards, the coaching staff told him they made the switch because he had missed a couple of throws and they wanted to "shake things up a bit."
"When you're losing football games, every position is going to get evaluated," Edwards said.
Jauron said Monday the team is "not optimistic" about the right knee injury suffered by left tackle Demetrius Bell.
"He saw our doctors after the game and they'll see him again later on [Monday] evening ... and we'll know more then. We're not optimistic about that, though, at this point," Jauron said.
With Bell presumably out this week against Jacksonville and possibly for the season, that leaves the team with just two healthy tackles, and that presumes Jonathan Scott returns to the team after missing Sunday's game due to the death of his father.
"We're just hoping that Jonathan returns to us as quickly as possible and as quickly as he can. At least he'll bring back some depth to us and give us options," Jauron said.
The Bills are expected to look outside the organization for help at the position.
"I believe we will bring in people and work them out," Jauron said. "Whoever is available, again, we'll bring them in and look at them. We've got a pretty good idea because of our situation through the year of who is available, but I know we'll go through the process again and be as thorough as we can be."
Rookie left guard Andy Levitre shifted over to tackle after Bell was hurt Sunday and will be a consideration to play there again, Jauron said.
Cornerback Ashton Youboty suffered a high ankle sprain against the Titans, an injury that can take a month or more to heal.
Jauron said the team won't know more about its other injured players until Wednesday. That includes cornerback Terrence McGee (knee surgery), linebacker Keith Ellison (quad) and defensive tackle Kyle Williams (knee).
Williams tore the MCL in his right knee against the Carolina Panthers a little more than three weeks ago.
"It heals itself," said Williams, referring to whether the injury would need surgery. "It just takes patience, and I'm not very good at that."
Williams said he ran some on the side Monday at practice and there was an improvement from last week.
"Hopefully it just keeps getting better every day and it progresses and they [team doctors] will feel good enough about it to clear me and let me play," he said.
Safety Donte Whitner and right tackle Jamon Meredith dressed Sunday, but did not play because they weren't fully recovered from injuries. They dressed only on an emergency basis.
"I liked the way he had worked last week but it was really his first week back of working," Jauron said, regarding Whitner. "[I] thought he was close to being ready and we would've used him if we had to in that game so that's kind of where it is. We expect that he'll just keep getting better now in this week of practice."
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