Commentary /By Larry Felser
Bills will struggle to match these opening gems
What are the chances that to-day’s opening game against the Seattle Seahawks will turn out to be something to paste in your Bills’ memory book? Not great, which is why the rare gem is so memorable.
The Bills were in their fifth season of existence before they finally won an opener. That was in 1964 when they defeated Kansas City, 34-17, in War Memorial Stadium. It felt so good they also won their next eight games on their way to the American Football League championship. That was the team which included Jack Kemp at quarterback, the legendary power runner Cookie Gilchrist and a defense which would have been great in any era.
The jewels of the O. J. Simpson era came in 1973 on the road against the Patriots when the Juice ran for 250 yards in a 31-13 victory. The next opening game was even more satisfying, when Joe Ferguson’s last minute touchdown pass to Ahmad Rashad beat the Raiders, 21-20, in a Monday night game in the new stadium in Orchard Park.
The opener most memorable for me is best seen through a rear-view mirror, revealing to where it led. That was in 1988, 20 years ago, when the season began with a 13-10 victory over the Minnesota Vikings, the significance of which wouldn’t be clear until deep into the season.
The prelude to the game was heavy gloom. Two days before opening day, Bruce Smith, voted the American Conference defensive player of the year in 1987, was suspended for 30 days due to a drug infraction. The player taking his position was Leon Seals, at the time unpopular with his teammates since he was among a handful of Bills who crossed a picket line during the NFL players’ strike of the previous September and October. Seals was one of the replacement players, “counterfeit Bills,” who were cursed and harassed by the “real” Bills as they prepared to play three games which bore no resemblance to the usual NFL product but served as a wedge for the owners to break the strike.
The Bills were a young team. Jim Kelly was not yet the genuine Kelly. Thurman Thomas was a rookie whom the Bills had drafted despite his suffering a serious knee injury in college. The defense was a work in progress. Marv Levy was beginning his second full season as head coach.
The game was not a work of art, but the Vikings were defeated. Veteran Art Still, the outstanding defensive end whom Levy coached for the Chiefs and signed as a free agent for the Bills, had 2z 1/3 1/2 ck 1/3 . Seals took part in eight tackles. The offense scored just a single touchdown.
Buffalo would score just one touchdown in its next two games, but won both of them over Miami and New England. Rare touchdowns or not, the Bills were growing up as a team. That close, mostly uneventful opener against Minnesota had propelled them. Kelly began to look like the genuine Jim Kelly and Thomas became a revelation. They just kept winning, 11 of their first 12 games.
It was a herald of the franchise’s greatest years, the four consecutive Super Bowl appearances.
The Bills took a step backward in 1989, the year of the “Bickering Bills.” But they put aside their differences sufficiently to qualify for the playoffs, meeting the Browns in Cleveland Stadium.
It was a classic, mainly because the Bills had learned to think as a team.
Down by 10 points with less then seven minutes to play, Kelly, who passed for 400 yards, ignited a comeback which carried his team inside the Cleveland red zone in the final seconds with victory just four points away. Then Ronnie Harmon dropped a pass in the end zone and on the final play Browns’ linebacker Clay Matthews intercepted Kelly on the 2-yard line.
Yet, from this vantage point, that garden-variety success on opening day in 1988 led to the Bills’ most unforgettable time.
Larry Felser, former News columnist, appears in Sunday’s editions.
