E-Mail
Print
Today is my eighth anniversary. My wife and I were married on a Saturday, an idyllic autumn day with lots of orange leaves and red wine. Work, graciously, freed me from the next day's traditional soul-sucking postgame duties.
My wife and I each had several relocated Bills fans in town for the weekend so even though I had the rare opportunity to not be strapped to a game, Bills-Ravens still showed up on my TV at 1 o'clock.
You may remember the game. You've seen games like it 50 times in this continuing run of Bills futility.
The Bills fell to 1-5 that day with an uneventful 20-6 loss, a game perhaps best (only?) remembered for a Deion Sanders interception return for a touchdown. The Bills' defense held Kyle Boller and Baltimore to only 12 first downs but Drew Bledsoe's four picks trumped that.
It's always something.
The 2004 team straightened up after this game, winning eight out of nine before choking in the infamous season finale against the Steelers.
Exactly eight years later the Bills haven't been as good since and aren't now.
Is their future even that bright?
This Mario Williams business has to get straightened out. This year may or may not be already lost. The Bills need to do something they're not exactly good at -- thinking creatively -- and figure out a way to make him at least a useful player. They've got him for five more years. Is he in top shape? Does he need a psychiatrist? Whatever, figure it out because a player under that contract not making any contribution may drag this team to even greater depths than they've seen.
Everyone and their dog knows the Bills have one of the NFL's worst quarterback situations. Talk all you want about how obvious it is that the Bills need to draft a young stud, it's no more obvious than it's been at two or three other mile markers along this 12-going-on-13-year playoff drought. If someone were actually running the Bills that person should call Chan Gailey in and tell him that he's got four more games to make Fitzpatrick look like a winner. Afterwards if that fails then they're both out. Get busy living or get busy dying, right? How many years can I get away with citing that same Shawshank Redemption line before the Bills actually adopt it and rebuild for real? It's been six or seven years already.
As has also been true before, the Bills despite their many inadequacies are fabulous at running back. A lot of good it's doing them. C.J. Spiller looks phenomenal but ironically with the rest of the team floundering his being drafted becomes more dubious. If the NFL ever becomes about how good your second string running back this team will be fully prepared. Spiller is super cool to watch. He also shouldn't be here.
Bill Polian was honored by the Bills last weekend. He spent a great deal of time praising Buffalo and talking about how special the teams he built here were. Amen to that. For me his greatest move was the trade for Cornelius Bennett. Greg Bell's production by then had slipped but he was still only a young 25 and had had two big seasons for lousy Bills teams. (Is it interesting to you too that Bell is two and a half years younger than Jim Kelly?)
Trading Bell was a risk but a calculated one by Polian, who it should be noted drafted a running back in the 1986 first round himself (Ronnie Harmon). The trade turned out to be a catalyst and a pivotal move toward the greatest Bills teams ever.
So long ago.
Trading Bell was a risk but a calculated one by Polian, who it should be noted drafted a running back in the 1986 first round himself (Ronnie Harmon). The trade turned out to be a catalyst and a pivotal move toward the greatest Bills teams ever.
So long ago.