The Buffalo Bills already have decided that question once this season by agreeing to a contract extension with their head coach in October. However, the Bills' 2-7 record over the past two months, along with their refusal to acknowledge the extension, has reopened the debate. It will be decided when Bills owner Ralph C. Wilson Jr. conducts his annual postseason review of the team in the coming week.

The expectation is Jauron is going to survive because of Wilson's strong relationship with the coach and the owner's assessment that the team's talent level still needs to get better.

However, today's season finale against the New England Patriots in Orchard Park could impact the decision. An ugly loss to the Pats -- make that another ugly loss, since the Pats have won 10 straight over the Bills by an average score of 31-10 -- would not be good timing for Jauron.

Here are the cases for keeping Jauron and letting him go:

>Why Jauron should stay

*Continuity. How are the Bills ever going to get ahead if they keep changing management and retracing their steps? If Jauron is fired, next season the Bills will have their fifth head coach and their seventh offensive coordinator in 10 years (presuming Turk Schonert goes out the door with his boss). Firing the coach is a great way to appease the fans and sell tickets (as the Bills have proved this decade), but does not necessarily address the ROOT of the problem.

While there are some examples of fast turnarounds by new coaching staffs (see Miami and Atlanta this year), that is wishful thinking. The history of the NFL shows that a new coaching staff will push most of the blame on the incumbent players and will want a bunch of new players to fit its specific tastes.

A new broom sweeps clean in the NFL. Quarterback Trent Edwards would be asked to learn a new offensive system, which probably would set back his development. Wilson is firmly in Edwards' corner. Wilson's desire for continuity is the reason he chose Russ Brandon as chief operating officer last year. Brandon is a strong believer that continuity in the management team is crucial to an organization's success.

*The 7-8 record is no shock. The Bills' quarterbacking was not as efficient as that of the Patriots or Dolphins. Was it a shock that Edwards struggled through part of his second season? No. The Bills had the 30th ranked offense last season and added just one player to the mix: second-round draft pick James Hardy. While Hardy was a disappointment, rookie receivers are notoriously slow to produce.

So it should come as no shock the offense was not good enough this year. While Jauron shares responsibility for the offseason moves, the insufficient way the Bills addressed the offense was an organizational mistake, starting at the top with Wilson. With this in mind, Jauron no doubt will argue to Wilson the team is going in the right direction. The defense took a step forward this year. With a few key moves, Jauron will argue, the team can be a legitimate contender.

*The players love him. Jauron unquestionably has the faith of the players, and they play hard for him. Effort is not an issue with Jauron's Bills. Because the organization is so clearly committed to Edwards, his loyalty matters, and he is totally in Jauron's corner. Say what you will about game management (see below), Jauron is an intelligent man whose strength as a leader lies in getting people to work together and tapping into their strengths while spreading credit around in every direction but his own.

*He fits the Bills' preferred management structure. Wilson likes a balance of power and a diversified leadership team. Jauron lets the personnel departments do their job and is not power hungry.

*He has a good relationship with Wilson. This is a must.

*The alternatives are not necessarily attractive. The Bills, as their history shows, do not believe that spending for one of the highest-paid coaches in the league is necessarily a wise or essential investment. Jauron may have as much experience and competence as you can find for the price. He has a veteran, generally respected staff of assistants.

Wilson decided he wanted a man with NFL head coaching experience after the Gregg Williams and Mike Mularkey failures. He probably is not easily inclined to turn to a first-time head coach. But the Bills also would not enter the price range of a hot, young candidate like Pats offensive coordinator Josh McDaniels.

>Why Jauron should go

*He is a hard sell to the public. The fans are not in Jauron's corner because of the team's collapse and because he has such a nondescript public profile. The sell factor, beyond the wins and losses, is what dooms many coaches in the end.

The Bills have to be concerned about season-ticket and suite sales. This past season they did not have to sell a single ticket in the current economy. All the tickets were sold before September. So this will be the first year the team has to sell tickets during the recession. Fans tend to get re-energized after free agency acquisitions and the draft. But the Bills could face a lot of unsold seats if Jauron returns and the team gets off to a slow start next season.

*He is uninspiring. Yes, the players play hard for him. But as Bill Parcells likes to say, there are no medals for trying. The larger question is whether Jauron inspires the players enough, whether he holds them accountable enough, lifts them to a higher level.

In this respect Jauron seems to suffer in comparison with Marv Levy. Like Levy, Jauron is cerebral and at times erudite. Levy also at times, especially before 1990, was criticized for lacking enough motivational ability. But there never was any doubt Levy had a pulse. His strong personality always shined through. He set an emotional tone for the team. He projected a strong passion to the players. Jauron may well be more passionate in team meetings than he is in public interviews. But the question of whether he raises the emotional level of the team is a serious one.

Is there enough concern that the players will get sent to the principal's office, so to speak? Questions have been raised this year about whether the Bills practice hard enough to instill a nasty attitude on the offensive line. The Bills rarely practice outside. The Patriots almost always practice outside. When you have a young team, you need to crack the whip a little more.

*Game management. Jauron could have and should have done more to make a difference during the 2-7 stretch. The decision to let J.P. Losman throw instead of running Marshawn Lynch with 2:06 left against the Jets was a disaster. . . . The team wasted four timeouts in the 10-3 loss to San Francisco, and wasted timeouts were not a rarity this year. The decision to kick a field goal on fourth-and-7 from the Niners' 22 with 5:32 left was shaky. . . . The decision to play conservatively and settle for a 47-yard field goal at the end of the Cleveland game instead of giving Rian Lindell a little easier kick backfired. . . . Losman's fade pattern interception near the goal line against Miami backfired. . . . The challenge with no conviction in New England, which the officials did not see, was not a good moment.

*The record. In eight years as a head coach, Jauron has had one winning season. He's 56-71 (.441) -- excluding five games as Detroit's interim coach. Jauron could argue that he almost never has had a proven veteran quarterback. Yet has he shown he is the man to lead the Bills over Bill Belichick and a Miami organization led by Parcells? Continuity is great and necessary. But if you have the wrong guy (see Matt Millen), it gets you nowhere.

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The Bills put rookie receiver James Hardy on the injured reserve list. He tore a ligament in his left knee in the Bills' loss at the New York Jets two weeks ago. Replacing Hardy on the active roster is running back Bruce Hall, a rookie from Mississippi who was on the practice squad.

e-mail: mgaughan@buffnews.com

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Three Jaurn low points

Jets 31, Bills 27 (12/14/08):

Bills surrender three-point lead with two minutes remaining when J.P. Losman fumbles after sack by Jets' Abram Elam.

Browns 29, Bills 27 (11/17/08):

Cleveland gets a 56-yard field goal by Phil Dawson with 1:39 left to hand the Bills a heartbreaking defeat on MNF. Rian Lindell's lasts econd 47-yard kick sails wide right.

Patriots 56, Bills 10 (11/18/07):

Tom Brady and Randy Moss stomp all over Bills in a Sunday night rout. The Pats improve to 10-0 in a game symbolizing their dominance over Buffalo .

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Bills 30, Broncos 23 (12/21/08):

Bills snap three-game losing streak on the road in Denver in a victory that many of the players say is dedicated to embattled coach Jauron.

Bills 23, Chargers 14 (10/19/08):

Trent Edwards completes 25 of 30 passes for 261 yards with one touchdown and no interceptions. Bills improve to 5-1 for the first time since 1995, and Edwards raises his record to 10-5 as a starter.

Bills 17, Redskins 16 (12/2/07):

Jauron outcoaches Joe Gibbs and Rian Lindell nails a 36-yard field goal with four seconds left to stun Redskins in Bills' biggest win of 2007.