The
Buffalo Bills are a professional American football team based in the
metropolitan area of Buffalo, New
York
. They play their home games in the suburb of
Orchard
Park
, and beginning in 2008, one home game is played in
Toronto
. They are members of the
Eastern Division of the
American Football Conference
(AFC) in the
National Football
League (NFL). The Bills began competitive play in 1960 as a
charter member of the
American
Football League and joined the NFL as part of the
AFL-NFL merger.
The Bills won two consecutive American Football League titles in
1964 and 1965, but the club has not won a league championship since
the merger. Buffalo is also the only team to win four consecutive
American Football Conference
Championships, and lost all four
Super
Bowls. Since the NFL's expansion to 32 teams in 2002 the Bills
are the only AFC non-expansion team to not make the playoffs.
The Bills were named as the result of the winning entry in a local
contest, which named the team after the
AAFC Buffalo Bills, a previous football
franchise from the
All-America Football
Conference that merged with the
Cleveland Browns in 1950. That team, in
turn, was named after
William Frederick
"Buffalo Bill" Cody. The Bills' cheerleaders are known as the
Buffalo Jills. The official mascot is
Billy Buffalo.
The Bills
conduct summer training camp at Saint John Fisher College in
Pittsford, New York, a suburb of Rochester
.
They are
the only NFL team to play their home games within New York
State. Both the New York
Jets and the New York Giants
play in East Rutherford, New Jersey
, outside New York City
. On October 2, 2005, the Bills played the
New Orleans Saints in the first
NFL regular-season game held in San Antonio
, Texas
.
With the
inception of the Bills Toronto
Series in 2008, they are also the only team to play home games
in Canada
.
History
Logos and uniforms
Buffalo Bills uniform
combination
Buffalo Bills uniform: 1975-1983
*solid red socks were worn from '82-'83
Buffalo Bills uniform: 1987-2001
The Bills logo from 1962 to 1973; still used as an alternate logo
today.
When the Bills began playing in 1960, the team's colors were royal
blue, white, and silver, very similar to that of the
Detroit Lions. The team wore blue jerseys with
gray numbers and white jerseys with blue numbers. The helmets were
all silver with blue numbers on the side.
In 1962, the standing red bison was designated as the logo and took
its place on a white helmet. In 1962, the team's colors also
changed to red, white, and blue. The team switched to blue jerseys
with red and white stripes on the shoulders. the helmets were white
with a red center stripe. By 1965, red and blue center stripes were
put on the helmets.
The Bills introduced blue pants worn with the white jerseys in
1973, the last year of the standing buffalo helmet. The blue pants
remained through 1985. The face mask on the helmet was blue from
1974 through 1986 before changing to white. Buffalo sporadically
wore white at home in the 1980s, but has not since 1986.
In 1974, the standing bison logo was replaced by a blue charging
one with a red slanting stripe streaming from its horn. In 1984,
the helmet's background color was changed from white to red,
reportedly in part to distinguish them more readily from three of
their division rivals at that time, the
Indianapolis Colts, the
Miami Dolphins, and the
New England Patriots, who all also wore
white helmets at that point. (The Patriots now use a silver helmet
while the Colts have since been realigned to the
AFC South, though the
New
York Jets--who wore white helmets until
1978--have since switched back to white
helmets.) Then in 2002, a darker shade of blue and nickel were
introduced, along with red and white pipe trimming on the jerseys
and pants. The original shades of red and blue, however, were
contained as striping colors. They are also still used on their
logos.
In the same year in 2002, the Bills white uniforms went through a
radical change. The white uniforms include a red stripe on the
sides and are dark blue along the shoulders of the uniforms. The
current white uniforms are worn for most Bills road games. The
current helmet is scarlet with one navy blue, two nickel, two royal
blue, two white stripes, and white face mask. The current helmet
bison logo is royal blue, with scarlet streak, white horn and
eyeball with a royal blue pupil.
In 2005, the Bills revived the standing bison helmet and uniform of
the mid-1960s as an alternate uniform.
The Bills usually wear the all-blue combination at home and the
all-white combination on the road when not wearing the throwback
kit. They have not worn blue on white since 2006, while the white
on blue has not been worn since 2007.
Players of note
Current players
Buffalo Bills Wall of Fame
Pro Football Hall Of Fame
Retired numbers
- 12 Jim Kelly, QB, 1986–96
Unofficially retired
- 32 O.J. Simpson, RB, 1969–77
- 34 Thurman Thomas, RB, 1988–99
- 78 Bruce Smith, DE, 1985–99 (although guard Ruben Brown used 78 as his practice jersey; he
wore 79 on the field)
Since the earliest days of the team, the number 31 was not supposed
to be issued to any player. The Bills had stationery and various
other team merchandise showing a running player wearing that
number, and it was not supposed to represent any specific person,
but the 'spirit of the team.' The tradition was broken in 1969 when
reserve running back
Preston
Ridlehuber was issued number 31 for one game while his normal
number 36 jersey was repaired by equipment manager Tony Marchitte.
The number 31 was not issued again until 1990 when first round
draft choice James (J.D.) Williams wore it for his first two
seasons. The number has since been released for use by any player
and is currently being worn by rookie safety
Jairus Byrd.
All-time first round draft picks
1960s
1970s
1980s
1990s
2000s
1 In addition to their own pick (11th overall), the
Bills received the 28th overall pick, as well as a fourth-round
pick (121st overall) in the
2009 NFL
Draft and a conditional sixth-round pick in the
2010 NFL Draft, from the
Philadelphia Eagles in a trade for OT
Jason Peters
Recent Pro Bowl selections
- 2008 Season - Jason Peters (Starting Offensive Tackle),
Marshawn Lynch (Running Back - Injury Replacement)
- 2007 Season - Jason Peters (Offensive Tackle), Aaron Schobel
(Defensive End - Injury Replacement)
- 2006 Season - Aaron Schobel (Defensive End), Brian Moorman
(Punter)
- 2005 Season - Brian Moorman (Punter)
- 2004 Season - Brian Moorman (Punter), Mike Schneck (Need
Player)
- 2003 Season - Takeo Spikes (Line Backer), Ruben Brown
(Offensive Guard)
- 2002 Season - Drew Bledsoe (Quarterback), Ruben Brown
(Offensive Guard), Eric Moulds (Wide Receiver), Travis Henry
(Running Back - Injury Replacement)
Coaches of note
Head coaches
Current staff
Radio and television
The
Buffalo Bills Radio
Network is currently flagshipped at
WGRF
96.9 FM, with games also available on
WEDG
103.3FM.
John Murphy is the
team's current
play-by-play announcer;
he was a
color commentator
alongside and eventually succeeded longtime voice
Van Miller after Miller's retirement at the end
of the
2003 NFL season.
Mark Kelso serves as the color analyst.
The Bills
radio network has over twenty affiliates in upstate New York and one affiliate,
CJCL 590AM (The Fan) in Toronto.
Buffalo is also one of eight teams that is contracted with
Compass Media Networks to syndicate
selected games nationwide.
During
preseason, most games are televised on Buffalo's ABC affiliate, WKBW-TV
channel 7,
with several other affiliates in western New York. These games are
simulcast on sister stations WTVH
in Syracuse,
WICU
in Erie, WHAM-TV
in Rochester, and beginning in 2008, CITY-TV
in Toronto. Ray
Bentley, a former Bills linebacker and current
AFL on ESPN analyst, does play by play,
while CBS analyst and former Bills special teams player
Steve Tasker does color commentary on these
games. WHAM-TV sports anchor
Mike
Catalana is the sideline reporter. Since 2008, preseason games
have been broadcast in
high
definition.
In the event that regular season (or preseason) games are broadcast
by a cable outlet (
ESPN or
NFL Network), WKBW-TV carries the ESPN or NFL
Network feed.
Notes and references
- Elbert Dubenion - 1960
- Cookie Gilchrist - 1962
- Billy Shaw & Tom Sestak - 1965
-
http://www.nflteamhistory.com/nfl_teams/buffalo_bills/retired_numbers.html
- NFL 2001 Record and Fact Book, Edited by Randall Liu, pp. 393,
Workman Publishing, 2001, ISBN 0-7611-2480-2
- 2008 Pro Bowl rosters
- 2007 Pro Bowl rosters - NFL - MSNBC.com
- 2006 Pro Bowl Rosters
- ESPN - 2005 AFC Pro Bowl roster - NFL
- 2004 Pro Bowl Roster - AFC
- ESPN.com: NFL - AFC Pro Bowl squad
See also
External links
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