To start this short article off, I should explain my definition of a "fundamental decision." This will help everyone stay on the same page for the rest of the piece; so here it is:

Fundamental decision: This is a key decision that influences other, less important, decisions in your life. An example of this would be a person's religion. Time is often designated for religious practice that is left un-interfered by other decisions and events.

Now, I'm not saying that fans should make being a Jaguars fan equal to practicing religion. Religion is an individual choice, and I am only using that as an example because it gets to the point. Here's my point. Buying tickets shouldn't be a spur of the moment thing. The time to go to the games and the money needed to be able to go should be set aside far in advance in a way that is less flexible than other decisions.

The Jaguars have been going down to the wire for far too long in regards to ticket sales. This week is no different. Yesterday, it seemed clear that the Jaguars game agains the Bengals would be blacked out, but with less than 3,500 tickets left to sell today, that doesn't seem like such a certainty. If they could pull through this week without a blackout, it would be great, but it doesn't solve the primary issue here.

I'm an out of market guy; so it's easy for me to point the finger saying, "Why don't you buy tickets? If I were there, I'd be at every game!" While I would like to believe that I'd be at every game, that's most likely not true, and you know it as well as I do. This I can promise you. I'd try to go to as many games as I could. Football is one of my passions, and I don't get to many games, but I enjoy each and every one that I actually get to see live.

I hate to beat the old go-buy-tickets drum, but wouldn't you like to be one of the people that can say, "I was there when Gabbert was a rookie." I'm hoping to get to the November game between the Jags and Colts in Indy. If I had a way to be at Everbank Field on Sunday, I'd be there. If you CAN be there, you SHOULD be there.

Update 2:05 PM EST: Ashley Gurbal Kritzer of the Jacksonville Business Journal is reporting that the Jaguars have partnered with Anheuser-Busch to avoid a blackout of this weekend's game against the Cincinnati Bengals. While the move is welcomed, it doesn't change the fact that Jacksonville needs to step up and BUY tickets. I guarantee that this won't happen every week, as it shouldn't.

Much has been made of the Jaguars' play-calling of late, and that didn't stop following the Jaguars' loss to the Saints on Sunday. The Jaguars' coaches, most notably Jack Del Rio, have been criticized for running the ball too much. Well guys, they opened it up, and the Jaguars still lost. I hate to go back to a quote from everyone's favorite Jaguars.com senior writer, but, "players not plays." That's a fact.

The Jaguars came out with a game plan that the Saints weren't ready for. Unfortunately, the Jaguars' players weren't able to execute that game plan, especially once they made it inside the Saints' 30 yard line. That's the players' failure, not the coaches'.

There is a silver lining in all of this. The Jaguars looked better. Much better as a matter of fact. The Saints game ended with the Jaguars being in a 2 score hole, but it would have likely been just 1 score had the Jaguars kicked field goals in the second half. Del Rio was aggressive. Let's face it. He had to be, and that's the mindset he coached with on Sunday. He coached to win the game, and they fell short to a superior team.

The Jaguars take on the Cincinnati Bengals this weekend. I believe the Jaguars will get back to a more balanced offense, but they will likely continue to give more responsibility to Blaine Gabbert. He made a few mistakes against the Saints, but he looked like he belonged under center. Look for the Jaguars to continue to grow as the season progresses. The Jaguars have 3 winnable games in a row, and it's possible they could be 4-4 going into the bye week.

Editor's note: I said it's "possible" that the Jaguars could be 4-4 not "probable." Remember guys, "possible" not "probable."

DISCLAIMER:   First off, let me apologize to Shane Clemons for this article.  Sometimes I have a very sarcastic sense of humor.  And to those of you that have thin skin & no sense of humor....well, try to lighten up & laugh a little.  Sorry Shane-O, the Jaxson De Ville made me do it.

This Sunday, the Jacksonville Jaguars will play host to the Cincinnati Bengals. To the national media, there's not much on the line, but to the Jacksonville Jaguars, everything's on the table.

Jack Del Rio has had some fine, fine moments as the Jaguars' head coach. Remember 2007? Do you remember David Garrard on 4th and 2 cutting through the Steelers defense to set up the game winning field goal in the playoffs against the Pittsburgh Steelers? Do you remember? I do.

I have wondered if I am the last remaining "keep Jack" guy out there, and I doubt that I am, but our numbers are dwindling. Some would say that it's crazy to continue to trust in a coach that's never had his team win the division, and I would tend to agree under different circumstances.

Let's face the facts here. Jack Del Rio took over a team that had just gone through it's first, and probably still largest, roster implosion. The team that Jack Del Rio took over in 2003 was terrible. Still, it wasn't long until he had turned it around and had the Jaguars competing at a high level.

Then the terrible drafts came. It wasn't like the Jaguars would hit on one guy and miss on the next. It was more like they'd hit on one guy in the draft and follow it up with 4 or 5 misses in a row. There's a reason Jack Del Rio has never won the AFC South. He's, frankly, never had the players.

There's another huge reason the Jaguars haven't won a division crown since the days of the AFC Central. Peyton Manning. This past summer, I did a lot of research on Peyton Manning, and I've found that he's at the top of virtually every significant passing stat in the history of the game. He's truly one of the greatest players to ever play, and he's been healthy, until recently, since he was drafted. We shouldn't be surprised that the Del Rio era has been tough as fans.

Now let me ask everyone a question. Is it really his fault that the Jaguars have no good wide receivers? Is it his fault that David Garrard didn't continue to develop into an elite quarterback? Is it his fault that they haven't had a talented team since 2007? No. He doesn't decide who is and isn't on the team. That's Gene Smith's job. Del Rio has a say in personnel moves, I'm sure, but he doesn't have the final say. My point boils down to one simple truth. You can't make a cake out of crap.

Sure, I'm disappointed that this season hasn't gone the Jaguars' way to this point, but I'm choosing to look on the bright side. Blaine Gabbert is the Jaguars' man of the future, and he's already showing flashes of brilliance. The defense is unbelievably better than it was last year. You don't think Del Rio, a defensive coach, had something to do with that improvement (new talent doesn't hurt either)? This team may have taken a step back on offense, but as a whole, the Jaguars are getting better.

I realize that it will be tough for Del Rio to keep his job, and I hope that he finds another great opportunity if he's forced out of Jacksonville. He's always done great things for the Jacksonville community, and it'd be a shame to have a good coach such as Del Rio lose his job to poor personnel decisions made by other people. Let's not forget Blaine Gabbert in all of this. The way to develop a young quarterback is not by putting him in a different offensive system every season. That doesn't work; just ask Alex Smith.

In all reality, I think it'd take 9 wins for Del Rio to keep his job. I don't think Wayne Weaver could legitimately justify firing his coach for getting a young team such as the Jaguars over .500. The season is still young, and the Jaguars' schedule has been brutal. At the very least, Del Rio deserves the rest of the season to turn it around. I'll be driving the "Del Rio Band Wagon" all season. Feel free to hop on.

Good morning folks. It's game day, and I'll be taking a different route today. Normally, I'd give you 5 things to watch for, but today, there should only be 1 thing. Kill kill kill.

The Jaguars' coaching staff was heavily criticized last week for not going for the win. They were accused of being far too conservative in their play calling. That can't be the case today.

The Saints have a very high powered offense. They will be scoring points today. I don't think there's any doubting that, and this game could be a blow out. There's no other way of looking at it. The Jaguars don't match up well.

The Jaguars have 1 and only 1 chance of winning this game. They have to go for the kill. Screw going for the jugular veins; the Jaguars should be going for the carotid arteries. If the Jaguars have a 10 point lead in the 4th quarter, they should try to make it a 17 point lead. There should be no sitting on anything today if they want to get back to .500.

Regardless of the outcome, the Jaguars will likely face less criticism following this game than they did last week. I'm being realistic here. No one, outside of maybe the Jaguars themselves, expect the Jags to pull off this upset. The match-ups don't look good, and the Jaguars haven't shown that they can score points on a regular basis. This is a learning phase for Blaine Gabbert, and opening up the playbook completely isn't the answer. Maurice Jones-Drew will be the work horse today, and I wouldn't have it any other way.

Long over due, yes I know.  I have tabulated all new prospect rankings in the last month and am sure they will change again very soon.  Currently we are picking top-5 (yes I know) but while a down season means more jeers and boos, it also brings a lot of good quality top-end talent to our team.  For instance here we are taking the best Widereceiver in the Nation and a top-3 pass rusher.  If I were to post more of the mock (which I do have) we are also taking a Right Tackle in the Third (Tanner Hawkinson, Kansas), a Corner in the Fourth (Desmond Trufant, Washington), an Offensive Guard in the Fifth ( Amini Silatolu, Midwestern State), and finally a Runningback (Bernard Pierce, Temple) in the Sixth.  With out further delay, to the mock-mobile!

I was walking today when I ran into my friend John. We naturally started talking about the Detroit Lions and football in general. The conversation quickly turned to Matthew Stafford and finally Blaine Gabbert.

In this short conversation, I brought up the fact that everyone wants to blame Jack Del Rio for the Jaguars' poor offense, but no one wants to give him credit for the 4th ranked defense in the NFL.

From there, I pointed out that Del Rio is a defensive coach, and he probably leaves the offense more to Dirk Koetter than people want to believe. I said firing a head coach isn't always the best solution, and I voiced my opinion that Jack Del Rio is more of a scapegoat than anything. That's when the line of the week; hell, the line of the year was uttered by John.

Firing a team's head coach doesn't mean they'll start sh**ing rainbows.

For all the times that I've tried to be rational about hanging on to Jack Del Rio as the head coach of the Jaguars, I've never been able to be that concise, to the point, and on target.

Let me expound a little bit here. Jack Del Rio isn't in charge of getting players to Jacksonville. That's Gene Smith's job. I really think he's done a good job, but the process has been slower than expected.

Jack Del Rio is a good coach. Let's suspend judgment on him. The whole point is that the Jaguars won't be sh**ing rainbows just because Jack Del Rio is gone.