Thursday, January 24, 2013

Bills' coach-scout collaboration to hit full stride

BY DAN BEGNOCHE

Mark it on your calendars: The future of the Buffalo Bills’ roster under new coach Doug Marrone will begin to take shape starting Feb. 5, at least on paper.

Marrone has been elbow-deep in the preliminary stages of his new position, namely the appointment of his coaching staff. So upon his arrival to Mobile, Ala. for the Senior Bowl, he had yet to even meet the scouts that would be feeding him the information on the players he was looking at. (photo: BuffaloBills.com)

General manager Buddy Nix said Wednesday that getting the meet-and-greet with the scouts out of the way was first on Marrone’s wish list following his hiring, and that he felt that meeting earlier this week went well.

“The first thing he said when we hired him is, ‘I want to meet the scouts,’ and he’s the one that instigated the meeting on Monday morning,” Nix told buffalobills.com. “So we got them all together, he addressed them, and I think they all felt comfortable with each other.”

Marrone and his staff have a much lengthier meeting ahead, according to Nix. The coaching staff is slated to meet with the scouts and Nix in the beginning of February before the combine to discuss the type of team they’ll be looking to assemble.

“When we go back, before we have our pre-combine readings, we’ll have a meeting on February 5th, early that morning and bring in the coordinators and Coach Marrone and some of the position coaches, to tell us what their wish list is like as far as their positions — height, weight and speed, what a guy can do and can’t do for that particular position,” Nix said. “It gives you a good idea when you are looking for, but it always goes back to production and athletic ability.”

Though that meeting may not be too far off, Marrone was sure to emphasize while speaking with reporters on Thursday that there’s still tons to do in terms of offseason preparations, roster moves and staff training. He noted that a lot of the decision-making process with his coaching appointments was centered around candidates who spoke the same language (coaching language that is) as he does, which would in turn allow for more time with the players and less time training the staff.

“It’s genesis, just the beginning of it,” Marrone said. “It’s a long process. Obviously you watch film, but our players aren’t with us right now, so we’re in the early stages of watching film, watching practice film. A lot of times what you see on tape you don’t know what that player was taught. We’re excited about working with them ourselves.”

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