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It's a brave new world for Buffalo and it's sports fans |
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I'll never forget the feeling I got when the Buffalo Bills traded for Cornelius Bennett in 1987. I was living in Florida at the time having finally left the harsh Buffalo winters for some fun and sun (like sipping a cold one on Christmas in 85-degree weather.) It was shocking move by the Bills. In a good way.
I remember saying to myself at the time, "This is something the Bills don't do, It's usually some other team that makes a bold move like that."
As a Bills and Sabres fan, the 80's were a pretty bad time. The first decade of Sabres' hockey gave way to the Scotty Bowman era as well as first-round futility that stretched into the 90's. In Orchard Park, Ground Chuck was cast aside for Kay Stephenson, and a couple years later, Hank Bullough. Their record from 1984, the second season under Stephenson to 1986 when Bullough was fired and Marv Levy was hired, was a combined 6-37.
Meanwhile, the Buffalo Sabres had hired Bowman, a hockey coaching legend, to come in and retool an aging Sabres club. From 1979-80 to his firing during the 1986-87 season, Bowman was able to ice a fairly competitive hockey team while moving on from the 70's French Connection-era. When he purged that group and loaded up on highly touted draft picks and prospects, euphoric fans were soon caught up in a dynastic dream world.
Despite making the playoffs in all but one season, while also taking into account that all but five teams made the playoffs at that time, the Bowman era, and the lofty expectations that came with his tenure, was a monumental flop.
The Bills hadn't done anything of note since trading an aging OJ Simpson to the San Francisco 49'ers for five draft picks spanning three years. And that was the only thing positive outside of drafting Bruce Smith with the 1st overall pick in 1985. Yes, Jim Kelly did finally come on board after the USFL folded, but his refusal to sign with the Bills, who took him with the 14th-overall pick in the 1983 Draft, was just another blotch on the Rorschach test that was the Bills through most of the 80's.
It wasn't until they made the blockbuster three-team trade for Bennett that one could sense the winds of change beginning to howl. It took a bold move to do that as the Bills saw RB Greg Bell, two first round picks and a second rounder sent to Indianapolis for the unsigned linebacker. That trade would help define their defense during their incredible run of the early-90's.
On the heels of yesterday's bold move by the Bills to land two-time, first-team All-pro running back LeSean McCoy, I got that feeling again.
It's the second brash and brazen trade that Bills GM Doug Whaley has pulled off within the last year. At the 2014 draft Whaley traded two 1st round picks to Cleveland to move up and select WR Sammy Watkins at No. 4-overall. And it's the third time the Bills have made a franchise-defining move since Wilson passed away nearly a year ago. The hiring of veteran head coach Rex Ryan was the other and put an end to a long line of non-descript coaches that have been paraded through Buffalo since they last made the playoffs under Wade Phillips in 1999.
Both trades, as well as the Ryan hire will be sliced and diced for years, if not decades, and the future will tell the story of their impact on the franchise. But as a fan who remembers that dreadful time during the 80's, all three moves jolted and shocked me, in a good way. They were moves that other teams usually made, not the Buffalo Bills.
I also got that same feeling less than a month ago when Sabres GM Tim Murray pulled off a blockbuster when he sent Tyler Myers and four other pieces to Winnipeg for Evander Kane and Zach Bogosian. Once again, it was shocking, something that other teams did, not the Buffalo Sabres.
Sure, Murray did pull off the Ryan Miller trade which turned out to be a blockbuster. But that was expected. And although the Myers/Kane trade was in the rumor-mill prior and wasn't as surprising as the Bennett pre-internet trade, it blew people away.
What the Bills' Whaley and the Sabres' Murray have shown is that they have the kahunas to go after what they want using the resources they have, just like Bill Polian did when he was GM of the Bills back in 1987. They're following their vision diving head first instead of sticking their toes in. It's a refreshing and exhilarating departure from the mundane, middle-of-the-road, safe approach which has enveloped the Buffalo sports scene for most of the last 15 years.
One would be remiss if the owners of both franchises, Terry and Kim Pegula, were not mentioned in all of this. They have provided the professional freedom for both Whaley and Murray to do what they think needs to be done as well as the financial wherewithal to be the big-time player necessary to get it done.
It's a different world, Buffalo sports fans. Hold on to your boot-straps, we're about to go on a ride. Where it takes us is still up in the air, but I'm pretty sure it'll be anything but boring.
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