Fighting Tickets Is Fun

Bills fans: We have big feels, today. Ohhhhhh, biggity big big feels. All of the feels! Have you ever tried to fight a parking or speeding ticket? 

Sorry if I triggered your ADHD, or if you’re sick of non-sequitors, but if you haven’t tried fighting a ticket, you really should give it a go sometime; it’s a learning experience. You actually do have a shot at getting it waived just by appearing before the judge, if the cop doesn’t show up. And they don’t… sometimes. 

But the key is showing up, and doing so for the right judge. You can’t just walk into any court, waltz in with your carbon-copy print-out, waggle it in front of any judge and proclaim your undeniable innocence. No. If you want to succeed in overturning a ticket, you have to be in the right place, and in front of the right judge, and then some things have to break your way.

Now, what does this have to do with the Buffalo Bills, circa 1/19/2026: The eve of McDermott’s unexpected swan-song? I feel like Bills Mafia is in a shell-shocked state: Minds blown wide open like the path to this year’s Super Bowl should have been, drooling incoherently about how we pissed away another year, and pissed that our arch-rivals of yore are going to stumble into the Super Bowl like it’s as easy as getting out of a parking ticket. 

The question is: Who is the judge?

Like many of you, dear Mafia maniacs, I was at work this morning when the notifications started plowing through my phone like so many snowplows on The 90. I switched on WGR to hear Jeremy and Joe reacting to the news. Thank God for podcasts; I rewound to the moment the bombshell dropped and tuned in. And then I replayed the segment three, four, maybe five times… I listened back a little further, stretching for some sniff at a hint of what was to come; playing Time Lord with the playback function, and obsessing like a position coach over the All-22. 

At one point, prior to the announcement, Jeremy mentioned that he had taken a poll on who should get canned: Beane or McDermott. The poll’s results? 91.7% of the respondents weighed in on the “Fire Beane” team.

But should the fans be the judge? Should the WGR listeners decide who slides and who pays the fines?

I like to hope that we could appeal to something more tangible than the whims of the fanbase. How about some numbers for a little perspective:

Sean McDermott ran the 2017 draft. In that draft, McDermott selected three Pro Bowl players (Milano, Dawkins, Tre White).

From 2018 onward, Brandon Beane ran the drafts. In that eight year span, Beane has drafted 3 Pro Bowl players: Allen, Cook, and Knox. 

Take a moment to let that sink in: McDermott had ONE draft, as a rookie coach with no drafting background. He selected THREE Pro Bowl players, out of the SIX he selected. That’s a 50% hit rate.

Of the 56 selections Brandon Beane has made in his eight year span as the GM and head of our drafts, he has drafted THREE Pro Bowl players... In EIGHT YEARS! That translates to a 5.357143% hit rate... 

We kept the guy whose job it is to draft and build a roster, who hits at 5%, and we fired the guy who isn't even a draft guru, but managed a 50% hit rate...

Do you think we made the right choice?

I may not be the one to pontificate on this, but to my knowledge, the job of an NFL coach is to win games with the players you are given to work with. The job of an NFL GM is to build the best roster possible, by both drafting and acquiring the best talent available, and then managing the team’s cap constraints.

Does McDermott determine the player’s salaries?

How many times have we heard, “But there’s no room under the cap!”? 

Who is making these decisions, and did they get a promotion?

Who got the ticket, and who slid on by? 

These are all logical questions, and I think any judicious person who considers them, as well as the roster McDermott dragged into the playoffs would agree that it’s very hard to find McDermott guilty of this year’s annual Buffalo heartbreak.

But is logic our judge? Does reason preside on the bench?

I think we all know who the judge is. I think we all know where the judge’s courtroom is. And I think we all know whose silver tongue is curled around Pegula’s ear. 

Go Bills (or what’s left of them).

–Tim Avery - 1/19/2026