My how far Buffalo's drafts have fallen

[BuffalothruMyVeins]

I was looking through the archives at Billsdaily, and found myself checking out old draft mocks from early this decade. Everyone knows how poorly the Bills have drafted since the original stinker, the Eric Flowers Draft. If your not, and you have a strong stomach, here is the 2000 Bills Draft.

 

What really struck me was when I read the mock draft that Steve Saslow puts out every year. It was a more innocent time, when Buffalo fans had obviously been spoiled by success for the last decade-plus. There was such optimism in his words, and confidance in his team, he sounded like a Patriots or Steelers fan would sound today in their mocks. Knowing the baseball-bat upside the head that was about to befall this team and fanbase starting with this draft, and continuing mostly to today, this conclusion paragraph of his mock really feels like the final, eerie voicemail left by somebody who immediately thereafter drove a speeding car into a bridge abutment and their loved ones hear their voice post-humiously... haha.

 

Anyway, check out the quote:

 

The draft is always a crap shoot and it is more important than ever for the Bills. A bad draft this year can set the club back a few years at least. History may be on the Bills side though, they are perhaps the best drafting team in the league. Last season 17 of 22 starters were draft picks and that is with the club having the lowest average drafting position of any team in the 90's. So sit back and watch the draft with confidence and look for all the updates on the future stars of the Bills right here at Bills Daily all weekend long.

 

This isn't meant as a shot at Steve for not correctly for not being able to tell the future; who could have known that a team that was once good at something would all of the sudden become one of the worst at something. It was just meant as a window back to the non-defeatisim mentality that we Bills fans used to have, where we assumed that left unattended, the front office would just make good choices, not poor ones.

 

Btw, just thinking now, wasn't big bad Ralph involved in these 90's drafts that were so good, just as he was involved in these 2000's drafts that... well... weren't? Or did Polian/Butler have some sort of autonomy on the decision-making that later GM's have not been afforded?

[Johnny Hammersticks]

I was looking through the archives at Billsdaily, and found myself checking out old draft mocks from early this decade. Everyone knows how poorly the Bills have drafted since the original stinker, the Eric Flowers Draft. If your not, and you have a strong stomach, here is the 2000 Bills Draft.

 

What really struck me was when I read the mock draft that Steve Saslow puts out every year. It was a more innocent time, when Buffalo fans had obviously been spoiled by success for the last decade-plus. There was such optimism in his words, and confidance in his team, he sounded like a Patriots or Steelers fan would sound today in their mocks. Knowing the baseball-bat upside the head that was about to befall this team and fanbase starting with this draft, and continuing mostly to today, this conclusion paragraph of his mock really feels like the final, eerie voicemail left by somebody who immediately thereafter drove a speeding car into a bridge abutment and their loved ones hear their voice post-humiously... haha.

 

Anyway, check out the quote:

 

The draft is always a crap shoot and it is more important than ever for the Bills. A bad draft this year can set the club back a few years at least. History may be on the Bills side though, they are perhaps the best drafting team in the league. Last season 17 of 22 starters were draft picks and that is with the club having the lowest average drafting position of any team in the 90's. So sit back and watch the draft with confidence and look for all the updates on the future stars of the Bills right here at Bills Daily all weekend long.

 

This isn't meant as a shot at Steve for not correctly for not being able to tell the future; who could have known that a team that was once good at something would all of the sudden become one of the worst at something. It was just meant as a window back to the non-defeatisim mentality that we Bills fans used to have, where we assumed that left unattended, the front office would just make good choices, not poor ones.

 

Btw, just thinking now, wasn't big bad Ralph involved in these 90's drafts that were so good, just as he was involved in these 2000's drafts that... well... weren't? Or did Polian/Butler have some sort of autonomy on the decision-making that later GM's have not been afforded?

 

Sammy Morris was the cream of that crop.

[BillsPhan]

I was looking through the archives at Billsdaily, and found myself checking out old draft mocks from early this decade. Everyone knows how poorly the Bills have drafted since the original stinker, the Eric Flowers Draft. If your not, and you have a strong stomach, here is the 2000 Bills Draft. ....

 

The draft is always a crap shoot and it is more important than ever for the Bills. A bad draft this year can set the club back a few years at least. History may be on the Bills side though, they are perhaps the best drafting team in the league. Last season 17 of 22 starters were draft picks and that is with the club having the lowest average drafting position of any team in the 90's. So sit back and watch the draft with confidence and look for all the updates on the future stars of the Bills right here at Bills Daily all weekend long.....

 

Btw, just thinking now, wasn't big bad Ralph involved in these 90's drafts that were so good, just as he was involved in these 2000's drafts that... well... weren't? Or did Polian/Butler have some sort of autonomy on the decision-making that later GM's have not been afforded?

 

Here's an "interesting" footnote about that amazingly bad draft. Leif Larson, the big, slow, talent-less Euro-trash linemen the Bills drafted in the 6th round, was taken 2 picks before Tom Brady was taken by the Pats! Unbelievable, huh? The Bills were going into their 3rd season of "Johnson vs. Flute", and neither one had proven capable of being a long term viable option for the Bills. If only Butler had taken the flyer on Brady at that late round pick, thinking he might be a good guy to "throw into the mix" next training camp, especially if he was going to move Flutie out due to his age soon!

 

And oh by the way, as far as wondering about Wilson's input during the great 90's drafts compared to the terrible 2000's drafts? Bill Polian and John Butler ran the drafts in the 90's, and Ralph never "told them" who to draft. Tom Donahoe, Tom Modrak, Marv Levy, Russ Brandon and Buddy Nix have run the drafts in the 2000's, and Ralph has never "told them" who to draft either, in my humble opinion. I can't believe Wilson has had any impact on exactly who the Bills have drafted since the day Polian took over in late 1985.