There really are not enough words in the English language to describe the extent of the Buffalo Bills' bad play over the last three weeks. Coming off of an embarrassing 38-10 road loss to Miami, the Bills found a way to top even that pathetic performance, losing a miserable 6-3 home game to the previously winless Cleveland Browns. Buffalo has now lost to winless teams in consecutive weeks as they have watched a promising 1-1 start dwindle to 1-4.
As far as this particular game goes, you don't need to look any further than 13 penalties - 9 of them by six different offensive linemen - and two turnovers as culprits behind the loss. Even as poorly as Buffalo played, they'd have beaten Cleveland today if they had not beaten themselves.
But that's not even close to the whole story. The crowd was deservedly miserable. Ralph Wilson's halftime ceremony, in which he was scheduled to receive his Hall of Fame ring, never happened. The offense was terrible, mostly due, again, to the penalties. Two more Bills players - Kawika Mitchell and Marcus Buggs - suffered what appear to be long-term injuries. Derek Anderson, Cleveland's starting quarterback du jour, threw for 23 yards and an interception - and emerged as the winning quarterback. Roscoe Parrish literally handed the game to the Browns on a silver platter by fumbling a punt deep in his own territory late in the fourth quarter. Oh, and Dick Jauron? My guess is that fans calling for his head don't need to ask "if" anymore; it now looks like a matter of "when."
I'm probably forgetting other ugly things, too. I definitely know I'm leaving descriptive nouns and adjectives out of this post, but what's the point? I don't need to say any of this, because the team's issues are gloriously obvious. Unless Wilson gets fed up and brings the hammer sooner than any of us expect, we've got eleven more weeks of this crap to look forward to. The hammer is coming, but for many, it already hasn't come soon enough.
More tomorrow. For now, vent.