The recent decision by Jets Offensive Coordinator Brian Schottenheimer to reject a job interview with the Buffalo Bills has a large majority of the Buffalo fan base up in arms. As in, who does this guy think he is? What's wrong with the Bills coaching position? What does this say about our organization? But I'm here to assure the loyal Buffalo fans, this is actually a good thing. You wouldn't be happy with this guy as a coach. Seriously, he did us a favor. Don't believe me? Fine, let me explain.

Schottenheimer served as the Quarterbacks Coach in Washington and San Diego from 2001-2005 working underneath his Dad Marty, who was the Head Coach of those teams at the time. While my main intention was to research these seasons to see how well Schottenheimer did, it would be far too hard to judge the effects that the QB Coach had on those teams. For the sake of argument, during that time, those teams made a grand total of one playoff appearance (2004 Chargers). That same season featured a Pro Bowl season from Drew Brees, while under the tutelage of Schottenheimer. While this might not seem especially impressive, it was good enough to land him his current position, Offensive Coordinator of the Jets.

This season marked Schottenheimer's fourth with the Jets. His first season in New York started out well enough, as the Jets finished 10-6 and qualified for the playoffs. However, it didn't last long as they were ousted by the Patriots in the first round. The Jets offense finished 25^th in the NFL that season, averaging 19.8 points per game. Chad Pennington was the QB that year and finished with mediocre numbers, 17 touchdowns and 16 interceptions. The Jets leading rusher was Leon Washington, who had a pedestrian 650 yards on the ground. On the surface, nothing to write home about.

The following season was a disaster for the Jets, as they finished 4-12 and were even swept by the Bills. Ouch. As you can probably guess by now, the Jets offense was about as good as their record. In fact, they finished 26^th in the league as Pennington and Kellen Clemens split the QB position. Combined, the two players threw for 15 touchdowns and 19 interceptions. The scoring for the Jets decreased as well, only averaging 16.8 points per game. The lone highlight for the Jets that season was running back Thomas Jones, who finished with 1119 yards, but only one touchdown.

The 2008 season was a marked improvement for both the Jets and their offense, as they finished 9-7 but well short of the playoffs again. At one point in late November that season, the Jets were 8-3 and in clear control of their playoff destiny. Of course, I'm not going to hang that on Schottenheimer. He was merely a victim of Brett Favre being Brett Favre. Oh that's right, didn't I mention that? Favre was on the Jets that season. Replacing Pennington and Clemens with a first ballot Hall of Famer had to improve the offense, and it clearly did, as they finished 16^th in the NFL. The Jets had their best season in terms of scoring, averaging a solid 25.3 points per game. Of course it helps the average when the NFC West allows a combined 103 points in two games.

Heading into the 2009 season, the Jets had just fired Eric Mangini and were searching for their next Head Coach. Having served as Offensive Coordinator for the previous three seasons, Schottenheimer got his chance to interview. However, in the long run the Jets decided to go with Rex Ryan and retain Schottenheimer as his usual position. Why is this relevant? Because Schottenheimer was interviewed by the team that currently employs him and the Jets felt at that point that he wasn't good enough. That fills me with confidence.

The Jets finished this season with the same 9-7 record that they had in 2008; however this time it was because they finished the season with two consecutive wins, rather than two consecutive losses. The offense as a whole dipped a little bit this year compared to last, but that is bound to happen when replacing someone like Brett Favre with an untested rookie like Mark Sanchez. The Jets offense finished the regular season 20^th overall in the NFL. To be fair, they did have the number one rushing offense, but the passing offense ranked 31^st, which was enough to drag down the overall rankings and put them on par with the previous three seasons. If there is one thing that stands out in Schottenheimer's tenure in New York, it's consistency.

Maybe that is why fans in Buffalo were so enamored with Schottenheimer. You say consistency and the Buffalo Bills come right to mind. Three straight 7-9 seasons followed by 6-10 will do that for you.

Since the only memory people have is the most recent memory, I feel inclined to bring up a very key point. Yes, the Jets offense was effective last week in defeating Cincinnati. Before that, not so much. I'm going to completely discount Week 16 and 17 since both the Colts and Bengals rolled over and played dead with the Jets and examine the first 15 weeks of the season.

One game that sticks out in my mind is Week Six, when the Jets hosted Buffalo in New Jersey. The Bills eventually won that game 16-13 in overtime, but that wasn't the real story. The real story was how the Jets racked up 318 rushing yards and still lost the game. How is that even possible? Well, you can thank Mark Sanchez and his five interceptions for the rare Buffalo victory. While I'm sure people will argue that Schottenheimer wasn't on the field and can't control Sanchez's erratic arm, he can control the play calling. In fact, last time I checked, that is the job of the offensive coordinator. Simply put, there is no excuse for losing a game in which your team runs for 300+ yards. Sanchez attempted 29 passes that game, connecting on just 10 of them to Jets players. Don't you think at some point Schottenheimer would've realized this and just pounded the ball on the ground to seal the victory? To me, this is awful coaching. Just plain awful.

Of course, if I'm willing to just ignore the one good playoff game and focus on the one bad game, I should be fair and look at the entire body of work. So without further ado, here are the other games in which the Jets offense accumulated 99 or more yards rushing and still lost the game by allowing Sanchez to throw the ball 20 or more times. Week Four at New Orleans. Week Five at Miami. Week Six vs. Buffalo. Week Eight vs. Miami. Week 10 vs. Jacksonville. Week 11 at New England. Week 15 vs. Atlanta.

In case you're wondering, that is all seven losses this season. The Jets had the number one overall defense and the number one overall rushing offense in the entire NFL, and still lost seven games because in all seven, they allowed their rookie QB to throw the ball 20 or more times instead of just pounding the run and controlling the clock. Amazing!

And before everyone chirps up about how the Jets might have been down a lot of points and were forced into throwing the ball, they weren't. The Jets were down 3-0 to New Orleans in the second quarter with the ball at the Saints 15 yard line. Sanchez promptly threw an interception that was returned 99 yards for the touchdown and a 10-0 Saints lead. Still, only down 10, Sanchez then dropped back to pass later that quarter and was sacked, which was resulted in a fumble and another Saints defensive touchdown. If you're scoring at home, the Jets were actually down 17-10 to the Saints late in the fourth quarter and had held the highest scoring offense in the NFL to three total points at that point in the game. Had they just run the ball when they were down 3-0 in the first quarter, this game probably goes a little differently.

Besides New Orleans, the only other loss all season that was by double digits was a 31-14 defeat at the hands of the Patriots. In this game, I suppose you could argue that the Jets were down so much early that they were forced to abandon their game plan and throw the ball often. Of course, if Sanchez didn't hand New England an early 7-0 lead via an interception return, the whole flow of the game could've gone differently. Still, once down 24-0 in the first half, the running game goes right out the window. I understand that one.

So that brings us to the playoffs. The Jets offense was very efficient and the Jets disposed of the Bengals to advance to the second round. New York ran for 171 yards and only allowed Sanchez to throw the ball 15 times total. Funny how that worked out. In fact, upon some further digging around, in five of their nine regular season wins, the Jets attempted 19 or less passes total.

In the second round against San Diego, it was more of the same. The Jets ran the ball for a team total of 169 yards and relied on their strong defense to keep them in the game late. Sanchez only threw the ball 23 times total on Sunday.

Do you see a trend here? When the Jets offense runs the ball, controls the clock, and wears down the opposing defense, they usually win the game. When they get pass happy and starting chucking the ball down the field, they usually wind up losing the game. Reminds me of myself when I'm playing Xbox. Yet somehow it took almost the entire season for Schottenheimer to come to this realization and adjust their play calling accordingly. Hell, I don't even know if he fully realized it yet. I guess we'll see this weekend in Indianapolis.

So before everybody mourns the fact that Schottenheimer passed up the opportunity to interview with the Bills, maybe we should take a step back and be thankful. Not only will he not bring his erratic play calling to Orchard Park, but he is staying in the AFC East, where his offense is bound to give the Bills another one of their few wins.









   

Chances are that if you're a Buffalo Bills fan, you've been intently scouring all forms of media for any bit of news you can find as it relates to their coaching search. Many names have been tossed about as of late, but with very little word actually coming out of Orchard Park itself, it's anybody's guess as to what the Bills are actually doing. There is a list of former head coaches that may be looking to get back in the game and of course there is an ever growing list of assistants out there looking for their chance to finally become the main man. The question, besides the obvious "who is it going to be?", on everybody's minds is "what's taking so long?"

The fact that Buffalo is currently the only available head coaching gig in the league probably has a great deal to do with it. The Bills currently have the luxury of taking their time to pursue whoever they'd like because they have no competition. Rumor has it that the Raiders will be firing Tom Cable sooner rather than later, but Oakland and working for Al Davis might be one of the only jobs less desirable than Buffalo at this point. With the quick transitions of Mike Shanahan in Washington and Pete Carroll in Seattle, the Bills no longer have to deal with those spots looking like a better choice than theirs. Thus far, only 2 candidates are known to have had actual interviews for the position, those being former interim head coach Perry Fewell along with current Minnesota Vikings defensive coordinator Leslie Frazier. Fewell was pretty clearly not going to get the job, but it was still beneficial to both the organization as well as the man himself to interview for it just the same. Frazier on the other hand seems to be the front-runner so far. That could very well be due to a lack of competition however.

It seems as though multiple possible candidates have actually declined to be interviewed for the job. This is almost a mind boggling situation really. How bad must the Bills organization look in the eyes of others around the league if assistants aren't even willing to interview for a head coaching vacancy? The latest addition to this list is Russ Grimm. The offensive line coach of the Arizona Cardinals reportedly will not accept an invitation extended by the Bills, though it is unclear if it's simply because it's Buffalo offering or if he has decided he isn't ready to take on the role of head coach quite yet. Either way, it looks bad for Buffalo. The Bills have also contacted the Jets about interviewing their offensive coordinator Brian Schottenheimer. With the Jets still involved in the playoffs, finding a good time for an interview with him would be tricky. Again, this is one benefit of the Bills having no direct competition at the moment.

I would be remiss if I didn't of course mention the big fish in this competition however. It's far from a secret that both the Bills, and more obviously, Buffalo fans, are extremely interested and coaxing Bill Cowher out of retirement. Cowher had a long and successful campaign at the helm of the Steelers and has been out of the coaching game for the past 3 seasons. He currently can be found manning a spot on the CBS NFL studio show and has remained rather tight lipped on the situation. It has been reported that the Bills made contact with Cowher to discuss their interest in bringing him to Buffalo, but the level of reciprocation has been very unclear. Rumors have ranged from Cowher having a second "secret" meeting with the Bills in Orchard Park to several noted NFL media types saying Cowher absolutely will not be the next coach of the Bills. It is clear that Cowher has the upper hand in this situation as he has a comfortable job and there is no immediate need for him to return to the sidelines, the demand for his services will remain for at least a few more years. The interesting part in all of this is the silence from the actual parties involved. Buffalo has said little more than that they made contact with him, and owner Ralph Wilson went so far as to say that he had no idea what's Cowher's interest level really was. For his part, Cowher isn't speaking either. He has thus far declined to comment on his intentions not only for Buffalo, but for a return to coaching in general. Wouldn't he just come out and say so if he had no desire to coach in Buffalo? Well, perhaps not. The possibility remains that he is simply trying to leverage himself into the best possible position for any other offers that might come along. Once again, with only one available choice on the market, there is no need from his point of view to rush to a decision.

Clearly Bills fans are incredibly anxious for a result at this point. A decade mired in mediocrity and little visible hope of a return to the glory of four straight Super Bowls in sight have left fans incredibly discouraged, and rightfully so. The question that needs to be asked however, is does it really matter who the choice is at this point? It could easily be argued that with the current state of the Bills, failure is the most obvious outcome. There are some fans out there that are still willing to give the next hot commodity coordinator a chance to prove himself at the next level and hope for the best. There are far more that seem willing to settle for nothing less than a man with real experience and a proven track record. With names like Gregg Williams and Mike Mularkey in the Bills' recent past, who can really blame them? At the end of the day though, owning Super Bowl championships are simply an indicator of past performance and not a guarantee of future success.

It matters for another reason though. For several years now, there has been an ever growing consensus that owner Ralph Wilson has been unwilling to spend the money necessary to turn the franchise around. Now, there are of course counters to that argument like the fact that Daniel Snyder spends money like he's playing Monopoly in Washington and has nothing to show for it, or the fact that Ralph has at times seemed willing to spend cash in the free agency market and the team has just failed miserably with their decisions. However, with Bills fans in their darkest hour in a very long time, if Wilson were to spend the large amount of money necessary to land somebody the caliber of Bill Cowher, it would at least be a sign of good faith towards the fan base. At least they might believe he is really trying this time.

Without delving too deep into the subject, suffice it to say that the Bills could gain a lot with their fans by putting on the full court press. The secrecy and lack of discussion emanating from One Bills Drive is doing absolutely nothing to quell the ever growing sentiment amongst Bills fans that Mr. Wilson just doesn't truly care about the team or its fans. While they may not land the man they and the fans are after, the least they could do is prove they're trying. In the end, a large portion of the fan base will still be upset with any result short of landing the "big one", but winning back a few would be better than losing them all.