Bills head coach Chan Gailey talked about his team's lack of mental focus toward the tail end of camp practices when the team wrapped up their time at St. John Fisher Tuesday. He stated how it got sloppier toward the end, which got him even angrier than he was when some mental mistakes were initially made.
One position group he challenged in particular was the receiving corps, a group where Gailey believes there is a lot of ability. The Bills head coach just knows that he won't be able to maximize the talent he has at that position without each and every one of them staying sharp.
"I thought we had improvement," said Gailey of the receiving corps. "We are mentally not where we need to be with that crew, but physically there's some talent in that group. We have to continually work with them to get them exactly where we need them to be down in and down out. I'm pleased with where we can be. We're not there yet."
Current number two wideout Steve Johnson was one player that drew the ire of Gailey at the team's final night practice at St. John Fisher Sunday. Knowing he's still fighting to lock down the number two role there's incentive for him to be on point with each and every rep he gets.
"I kind of get lost sometimes trying to be too creative with routes and it kind of gets me in trouble," he said. "But it's just work that needs to be done, be crisper on everything and he wants everything to look the same. So I'm going to try to do that work on my routes and make everything still look the same. Like I said, it's just work to be done."
Current starting quarterback Trent Edwards said the mental mistakes that have been made here and there are easily correctable and just require a bit more concentration on everyone's part to make the offense work at optimum efficiency.
"There were a couple of little things that you wouldn't notice unless you're in the meetings and know the little intricacies of our offense," Edwards said. "There's some formation mistakes, some read mistakes, some dropped passes – just a lot of little sloppy things – but we came back in that two-minute segment (Tuesday), and everyone was in the right spot on every single play. We haven't had a two-minute like that at camp, especially after a sloppy start."
Edwards was referring to the team's two-minute drill that closed out camp Tuesday morning, which ended on a third down strike to Chad Jackson for a touchdown.
Several of the receivers including Jackson have put together solid camps. Gailey mentioned David Nelson and Naaman Roosevelt as pleasant surprises. But beyond Lee Evans and Roscoe Parrish the group is very young. Gailey knows that it will require extra effort by the coaches and the players involved to help the offense click sooner rather than later this season.
"We've got some good players to work with," he said. "We've just got to develop them."
