What Else Could Go Wrong?

I have a new theory about the Bills’ 10-years-too-long struggle to have a winning season, make the Playoffs and be respected in the NFL and/or by non-Bills fans everywhere.

We are cursed. Yes, I said it, cursed. I don’t know why this happened, I don’t know what we did to incur the wrath of this unknown bestower of bad luck, but I’ve decided there’s no other explanation.

Everyone knows that the Buffalo Bills have been a revolving door team ever since 2000 at the latest—quarterbacks, head coaches, front office, if it can be switched or shaken up, it was.

Maybe someone took Jim Kelly’s departure in 1996 a little too hard and decided we didn’t deserve to ever have a long-term quarterback again, which is why Doug Flutie, Drew Bledsoe, JP Losman and Trent Edwards started out being touted as the answer to success, but eventually fell prey to the “no more than four years as a Bill” curse.

After Thurman Thomas threw those deuces up after 1999, someone must have been pissed or heartbroken and handled it by torturing us. Their scheme was to tease us with some solid running backs. But, with other areas of the team struggling statistically, nobody but Bills fans cared or recognized their success and eventually they too moved on to try their luck elsewhere—some gracefully, others not so much. There was Travis Henry running around like a greased pig (announcers used to describe him as that, I didn’t make it up), Willis McGahee did his thing for a second, Marshawn Lynch brought us beastmode for a bit and now Freddy J and CJ Spiller are rushing their butts off, to no avail. It’s cruel, really.

Wide receiver has been a position we’ve consistently had talent and potential in: Andre Reed, Eric Moulds, Peerless Price, Josh Reed, Roscoe Parrish, Terrell Owens, Lee Evans, Stevie Johnson. And yet, it still exhibits symptoms of the curse. Moulds and Price were a dynamic duo—then Price left and Moulds wasn’t afforded nearly as many opportunities as when they could work off one another. Josh Reed began to emerge as a viable receiver and then peetered off. We had one of the No.1 receivers in history with T.O. and yet he recorded probably his worst season ever in Buffalo. Evans was forced to waste his talent with inept quarterbacks until Week 3 of this season. Stevie Johnson sat in the background for a few seasons, only now getting the chance to show us what we’ve been missing out on. Parrish has been hot and cold—and now, when he’s finally hot again, suffered a broken wrist and is out the rest of the season. Seriously, what are the chances?! Did we not have enough issues to deal with that our curser threw in another, just to make sure we couldn’t turn ourselves around?

Coaching staff must have been an area of the franchise that had personal meaning to this bad luck bandit, because he/it/she attacked this position hardcore. They came in, they did little/nothing (or were let SLIP AWAY like Perry Fewell), they peaced out and led their new team to success. Why couldn’t they do that in Buffalo, was the question I asked my daddy whenever Wade Phillips’ Cowboys would win or when Gregg Williams’ Saints defense was ranked at the top. What did we do wrong and the other team do right? See, that question isn’t easily answered, thus the unexplicable curse theory can be applied.

And then, of course, there’s the defense. We were good, we were bad, we were good again, now we’re having problems. Once we got a decent secondary in place, the defense was really the only bright spot for awhile, clocking more gametime than the offense many games. But now, with roughly the same personnel as last season, we’re marginally worse, whether we’re using 3-4 or 4-3. That’s typical “Bills” and you know what it screams? The curse.

There are the general examples that a curse does, in fact, exist. But don’t forget about all the Bills blues that happened in between, like the games we lost by a hair, the years we started 5-0 and then didn’t win another game until probably five games later. Bills players seem like some of the most genuine in the league, they really do, and Bills fans are legit the best in the league, former players have even said so. So I’m telling you, there’s no logical reason for us to be shouldered with this unshakeable struggle—unless, you see, there’s a curse.

– Alyssa Jung

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