COMMENTARY
Jerry Sullivan: Free fall from grace starts with quarterback
What was it I said after last year's loss to Dallas on Monday night? Well, I'll say it again. How much more can Bills fans take? How many more of these heart-wrenching losses can people absorb before they throw their hands in the air and swear off football once and for all?
Incredibly, it happened again here Monday. The Bills lost to the Browns, 29-27, in excruciating, maddening, rip-your-hair-out fashion. After years of such heartbreak, maybe it was inevitable that they would subject their fan base to a reprise of past disasters.
We'll start with the macabre ending. With 43 seconds to play, the Bills had one final chance to win. But Rian Lindell missed the field goal. Really, when you saw that it was from 47 yards out, was there any doubt, any question that it would sail wide right?
How about Phil Dawson, the underrated Cleveland kicker, lining up the 56-yard field goal with 1:44? Who didn't have flashbacks to Nick Folk hitting the game-winner from 53 a year ago, after all the coaching meltdowns? It's a surprise the Bills didn't call timeout and make him kick it through a second time.
Somebody named Jerome Harrison runs 72 yards for a touchdown on the first play of the fourth quarter. Willie Parker, anyone? Or can I interest you in a more recent memory of the Giants' Ahmad Bradshaw, having his coming out party here last December?
Oh, and let's see ... a young Bills running back, in his second season, having the game of his life against the Browns, catching double-digit passes and having it all go for naught? Marshawn Lynch, you sure reminded me of Thurman Thomas in that playoff game in 1989.
OK, you've been tortured enough. As Dick Jauron says, we have to put this one behind us. Enough of the past. The real issue today, the one that has Bills fans climbing the wall and anguishing about the future, is the young quarterback, Trent Edwards.
Just one month ago, Edwards was the toast of the NFL, the flavor of the month of September. He led the Bills to three fourth-quarter comeback wins. Credible NFL writers were touting him as an MVP candidate. Now, he's an utter mess, a quarterback in full crisis.
Edwards was horrible last night. This time, you can point to the quarterback and say he cost them the game. Edwards threw three interceptions in the first quarter alone, allowing a mediocre Cleveland team to take control of the game and taking his own home fans out of the game for a stretch of the opening half.
For the rest of the game, Edwards barely even looked down field. He played scared. He didn't complete a single pass to Lee Evans, who signed a $9 million a year extension a few weeks ago. How does that happen against one of the worst pass defenses in the league?
"I was thinking that their defense was rushing three guys on every down and dropping eight guys into coverage," Edwards said. "That's what we're facing every week now. They're dropping into Tampa Two coverage and dropping eight back and we have only three or four receivers out. It's tough to find holes in that defense."
Actually, there were times when it appeared Evans was open, but Edwards didn't throw the ball. He was all too happy to throw safe checkdowns to Lynch, who caught a career-high 10 passes for only 58 yards.
Edwards sounded like a coach. All that talk about Tampa Two and eight men back sounds like excuses. He was bad, and he should stop talking about how "we" turned the ball over. He sounded like J.P. Losman, making brutal throws sound like a collective mistake.
Speaking of coaches, it was not their finest hour. They're timid when they should be aggressive, cute when they should be careful. Late in the first quarter, the Bills had a third-and-1 deep in their own territory. Edwards had already thrown two picks. So what do they do?
They come out with an empty backfield and four wide receivers, advertising their intention to throw. Then, evidently startled by this curious strategy, they had to call timeout. Given time to reconsider, they came out in the same formation. Edwards locked onto his receiver and threw his third interception.
Jauron talked about trust during the week. What does it say when the coaches don't trust the offense to get a yard on third-and-1 Ñ and advertise it with an empty backfield?
They did get the run game in gear against a bad Cleveland defense, rushing for 186 yards. Lynch had 119 on 23 carries, his first 100-yard game of the season. But Turk Schonert could have been a little more aggressive at the end, when he ran Lynch three straight times before Lindell's miss.
Clearly, they didn't trust Edwards to throw a pass, which might have gotten Lindell closer. He hasn't missed inside 40 yards in two years.
"I was just doing what they told me to do," Edwards said. "That was well within his range. To be perfectly honest, we shouldn't have been in that position to begin with. We should have put more points on the board and not have had it come down to that situation."
That's true. The Bills wasted two timeouts in the first half, one before Edwards' third pick and the other when they had 12 men on the field on defense. Jauron continues to throw timeouts around like candy wrappers. His command of game-day situations continues to be an issue.
Jauron didn't have a lot to say afterward. His team is tough, they play hard, the same tired refain. The fact is, his team is toast. Playoffs? Did someone say playoffs?
One month sure has made a difference. In four weeks, the Bills have gone from darlings to a full-blown disaster, a team in free fall. It's no longer a question of whether they'll make the playoffs, or even whether they'll finish .500, but when they'll win a game again.
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