The Scizz (& friends!)
I'm about to flip the switch on y'all this week. No Super Troopers. Its too happy.
After last week's embarrassing loss to the Rams, and another failure of a Buffalo Bills season almost in the books, I took to Twitter to see how my fellow Bills fans were reacting. There was heartbreak, confusion, indifference, acceptance, and everyone's favorite, pure unadulterated rage. If you're like me, you probably have experienced all of these emotions at least once throughout this dismal season This week I endured a new one....exhaustion. The Bills have exhausted me. They have left me tired and bewildered, and these "scars" keep getting worse season after season. By 5pm on Sunday I knew that there was no way in Hell I could write my normal Bills preview for the upcoming week, so I decided to reach out to some twitter friends and readers to help me voice some opinions on this franchise that we are supposed to love with all of our heart.
First up, @Bleez17 from twitter, who actually inspired me to make this a community project, and provided the amazing quote from Dark Knight that lends itself to this post. I can not take credit for that brilliance.
I'm about to flip the switch on y'all this week. No Super Troopers. Its too happy.
After last week's embarrassing loss to the Rams, and another failure of a Buffalo Bills season almost in the books, I took to Twitter to see how my fellow Bills fans were reacting. There was heartbreak, confusion, indifference, acceptance, and everyone's favorite, pure unadulterated rage. If you're like me, you probably have experienced all of these emotions at least once throughout this dismal season This week I endured a new one....exhaustion. The Bills have exhausted me. They have left me tired and bewildered, and these "scars" keep getting worse season after season. By 5pm on Sunday I knew that there was no way in Hell I could write my normal Bills preview for the upcoming week, so I decided to reach out to some twitter friends and readers to help me voice some opinions on this franchise that we are supposed to love with all of our heart.
First up, @Bleez17 from twitter, who actually inspired me to make this a community project, and provided the amazing quote from Dark Knight that lends itself to this post. I can not take credit for that brilliance.
I was born in Western New York 27 years ago, so all I have ever known is being a Bills fan. Even though I was young I still remember the Super Bowl era. I remember getting miserably sick the day of Super Bowl XXVII....and then the game happened. I listened to "The Comeback" game on 96.9 since it was blacked out, and stuck with it even when down 35-3. There are numerous other events that I could list from when times were good with this franchise, but we've all been through them and they seem so far away now, so I'll spare you.
Then the last 13 years happened. Each year I have found myself becoming more and more pessimistic about the Bills, but I've stood by them. Even after I moved to Columbus, Ohio I have made it a point to watch them every week. Last Sunday was pretty much rock bottom for me. I hated the Chan Gailey hiring from day 1 and Sunday's game pretty much sums up why. He is a stubborn old man that the game has passed by, which pretty much describes everyone in the front office/ownership. I know the Bills weren't going to get a big-name coach during their last coaching search, but I was beyond disappointed when I learned it would be Chan. I knew immediately that we would have another 4-5 years of mediocrity during his bumbling reign. His usage, or lackthereof, of C.J. Spiller during this season is the worst thing I have seen since Wade Phillips went with Rob Johnson over Doug Flutie in the "Music City Miracle" game.
I've been criticized by Bills fans for being too negative, but some men just want to watch the world burn. I'm one of those men. My worst fear going into this year is that the Bills would go 7-9 or 8-8, miss the playoffs, get somewhere around the 15th pick in the draft, and Chan gets another year at the helm. It looks like the first 3 are going to happen, and I'm just going to assume that the 4th will also happen since the world hates me. I'm to the point where I think an epicly bad season is what is needed to possibly turn things around. Look at the Detroit Lions in 2008, they go win-less and 3 years later they make the playoffs.
You wanna know I got these scars? The last 13 years, but mainly the Chan Gailey regime are responsible. Every single team in the NFL has made the playoffs at least once since the last time the Bills have qualified. It didn't used to be like this, we used to actually have hope going into the season. Now it is just resignment to mediocrity. Whenever the Bills start the season strong now I'm just counting the minutes until it all comes crumbling down. I'm just a dog chasing cars these days. I wouldn't know what to do with a winning team if I caught it. We deserve better and I'm not holding my breath thinking that change will come anytime soon.
#FireChanGailey forever and always
@BLeez17
Then the last 13 years happened. Each year I have found myself becoming more and more pessimistic about the Bills, but I've stood by them. Even after I moved to Columbus, Ohio I have made it a point to watch them every week. Last Sunday was pretty much rock bottom for me. I hated the Chan Gailey hiring from day 1 and Sunday's game pretty much sums up why. He is a stubborn old man that the game has passed by, which pretty much describes everyone in the front office/ownership. I know the Bills weren't going to get a big-name coach during their last coaching search, but I was beyond disappointed when I learned it would be Chan. I knew immediately that we would have another 4-5 years of mediocrity during his bumbling reign. His usage, or lackthereof, of C.J. Spiller during this season is the worst thing I have seen since Wade Phillips went with Rob Johnson over Doug Flutie in the "Music City Miracle" game.
I've been criticized by Bills fans for being too negative, but some men just want to watch the world burn. I'm one of those men. My worst fear going into this year is that the Bills would go 7-9 or 8-8, miss the playoffs, get somewhere around the 15th pick in the draft, and Chan gets another year at the helm. It looks like the first 3 are going to happen, and I'm just going to assume that the 4th will also happen since the world hates me. I'm to the point where I think an epicly bad season is what is needed to possibly turn things around. Look at the Detroit Lions in 2008, they go win-less and 3 years later they make the playoffs.
You wanna know I got these scars? The last 13 years, but mainly the Chan Gailey regime are responsible. Every single team in the NFL has made the playoffs at least once since the last time the Bills have qualified. It didn't used to be like this, we used to actually have hope going into the season. Now it is just resignment to mediocrity. Whenever the Bills start the season strong now I'm just counting the minutes until it all comes crumbling down. I'm just a dog chasing cars these days. I wouldn't know what to do with a winning team if I caught it. We deserve better and I'm not holding my breath thinking that change will come anytime soon.
#FireChanGailey forever and always
@BLeez17
Next up is our good buddy, Frank Gifaldi of "From the Rockpile".
My feelings for the Bills are forever fluctuating, but will never dip far enough for me to walk away. I expect the bullshit from them nowadays and I have come to expect nothing less than crushing disappointment every fucking time I’m in that stadium or watching from the bar. I love them, but they slay me and betray me weekly. If they could just stop giving me hope altogether I’d be really cool with that. Fuckers. (Oh god please don’t leave I love you I need you xoxo)
Follow Frank on twitter @fgif
Are there any other kind?
Next we have a little something from "The Pants", aka my fiancee Jess. Bless her little heart, she stumbled into this franchise because of me. She grew up a Giants fan, but jumped into Buffalo sports with both feet. I'm not sure why she is marrying me. I also think she was drunk when she wrote this. Oh wait, that's why she is marrying me!
Frankly, I'm pissed. I'm annoyed and I'm exhausted. Year after year the FANS get their hopes up. Someone somewhere in the Bills organization should get their shit together and fix it for the fans. Fuck the players, Fuck the coaches, Fuck Ralph. DO IT FOR THE FANS. They are the only ones who have the heart and the soul and every stinking year I listen to them try to hype themselves up and be positive. They come out in the cold for their town, for the love of their city and every single year since 1999 they have been basically kicked in the face. Enough. Fix it for the fans who spend the money on the merchandise and the tickets and who defend their team through and through. Stop kicking the fans in the face. Best, Stannypants.
Follow Jess on twitter @Jstanny1
Frankly, I'm pissed. I'm annoyed and I'm exhausted. Year after year the FANS get their hopes up. Someone somewhere in the Bills organization should get their shit together and fix it for the fans. Fuck the players, Fuck the coaches, Fuck Ralph. DO IT FOR THE FANS. They are the only ones who have the heart and the soul and every stinking year I listen to them try to hype themselves up and be positive. They come out in the cold for their town, for the love of their city and every single year since 1999 they have been basically kicked in the face. Enough. Fix it for the fans who spend the money on the merchandise and the tickets and who defend their team through and through. Stop kicking the fans in the face. Best, Stannypants.
Follow Jess on twitter @Jstanny1
I just bought season tickBOOMF!
And then we have our very own Outlander, who really takes it to a new level. After buying season tickets for the first time, I can't imagine the scars he has taken on this year. Or maybe I can. Behold his glorious rant:
Over the past few weeks, one word has been repeating itself in my head as I attempt to formulate a description for what this pathetic franchise has become over the course of the 2012 campaign: parasite. This team is now- has become- due to their own arrogance, ignorance and simple lack of talent, nothing but a parasite to this city, region and its indomitable people. The Bills are, for all intents and purposes, what Western New York shows to the rest of the nation and the world more than anything else (no, I’m not counting something so ubiquitous as chicken wings. We might as well be the home of the letter “L” by this point). That franchise has made us either irrelevant or an embarrassment in the eyes of those paying attention. We have a decrepit owner who is insultingly pushed on us as some sage statesman making the decisions, as if we haven’t caught a glimpse of his decomposing frame or his frail voice. We have a PR man as CEO who’s shitty at PR and a train wreck at CEO.
We have a general manager stinking of arrogance and sour mash standing behind a coach who seems befuddled by the modern version of the game he’s spent his entire life around. We are expected- demanded (“Lead the Charge!!”) to support a group of young men, sparkling personalities, clean criminal records who for all intents and purposes, can’t win when it matters. I don’t know how low the bar is now for NFL players, with high profile shootings, DUI’s, drug arrests and all, but in most fields of employment, if you can’t get the job done when it counts, you’re called one thing- losers.
The players may be losers but it is the perpetuity of this franchise, this dance of replacing one retread conservative coach with another, giving each three years until the franchise moves or we die. I’m embarrassed that I still want them to win on Sunday’s; I’m embarrassed that I still watch. Buffalo is in the middle of a great resurgence, from the beautiful canal-side district to the new hockey complex going in on Washington Street at the Pegula’s behest. From the fresh new bars popping up on Elmwood and Delaware to the billion dollar grant the Governor has sent our way for no good reason, considering we voted for a lunatic last time. We have so many great things occurring in this area and the face we show the nation is a bunch of losers, intermixed with B-roll shots of wings and Niagara Falls.
I have never been one to harp on the taxpayers paying for new stadiums or renovations to old stadiums, if for no other reason than this is how it’s done and it’s pointless to fight a fight you stand no chance of winning. But here’s the thing- this franchise is going to move, whether through a hostile takeover from some billionaire in the Hollywood hills or from some supposed savior stabbing us in the back like what happened to the Seattle SuperSonics. For those hoping for a local boy- good luck finding someone willing to drop some 800 million dollars to own what- when hockey returns- will remain second fiddle to a fucking NHL team in its own city and what will still be avoided by promising coaches like the plague. So no, fuck renewing the lease, fuck the taxes, fuck them just being here being enough. Give me an MLS team that gives us a performance on the pitch to mirror our region’s resurgence. Give me a CFL franchise that I watch because it’s fun, because the consequences don’t involve being an embarrassment on national television. We deserve a winner, and beyond that, this is the NFL. Other cities don’t tolerate losers, neither should we.
Sometimes there are people in your life that you’re forced to deal with, that are parasites in a more personal way, that make every moment with them in it just a little worse. Eventually the only thing you can do is eradicate those people from your life and damn the consequences. That’s the micro level. The Bills are that person on a macro level in that it affects you, your friends, and millions of people you don’t even know. There’s only one thing to do.
And if you disagree with all of this, I have another word to describe the Bills: albatross. Eventually it will get too heavy for you to bear as well.
Follow the Outlander: @MattyRenn
Over the past few weeks, one word has been repeating itself in my head as I attempt to formulate a description for what this pathetic franchise has become over the course of the 2012 campaign: parasite. This team is now- has become- due to their own arrogance, ignorance and simple lack of talent, nothing but a parasite to this city, region and its indomitable people. The Bills are, for all intents and purposes, what Western New York shows to the rest of the nation and the world more than anything else (no, I’m not counting something so ubiquitous as chicken wings. We might as well be the home of the letter “L” by this point). That franchise has made us either irrelevant or an embarrassment in the eyes of those paying attention. We have a decrepit owner who is insultingly pushed on us as some sage statesman making the decisions, as if we haven’t caught a glimpse of his decomposing frame or his frail voice. We have a PR man as CEO who’s shitty at PR and a train wreck at CEO.
We have a general manager stinking of arrogance and sour mash standing behind a coach who seems befuddled by the modern version of the game he’s spent his entire life around. We are expected- demanded (“Lead the Charge!!”) to support a group of young men, sparkling personalities, clean criminal records who for all intents and purposes, can’t win when it matters. I don’t know how low the bar is now for NFL players, with high profile shootings, DUI’s, drug arrests and all, but in most fields of employment, if you can’t get the job done when it counts, you’re called one thing- losers.
The players may be losers but it is the perpetuity of this franchise, this dance of replacing one retread conservative coach with another, giving each three years until the franchise moves or we die. I’m embarrassed that I still want them to win on Sunday’s; I’m embarrassed that I still watch. Buffalo is in the middle of a great resurgence, from the beautiful canal-side district to the new hockey complex going in on Washington Street at the Pegula’s behest. From the fresh new bars popping up on Elmwood and Delaware to the billion dollar grant the Governor has sent our way for no good reason, considering we voted for a lunatic last time. We have so many great things occurring in this area and the face we show the nation is a bunch of losers, intermixed with B-roll shots of wings and Niagara Falls.
I have never been one to harp on the taxpayers paying for new stadiums or renovations to old stadiums, if for no other reason than this is how it’s done and it’s pointless to fight a fight you stand no chance of winning. But here’s the thing- this franchise is going to move, whether through a hostile takeover from some billionaire in the Hollywood hills or from some supposed savior stabbing us in the back like what happened to the Seattle SuperSonics. For those hoping for a local boy- good luck finding someone willing to drop some 800 million dollars to own what- when hockey returns- will remain second fiddle to a fucking NHL team in its own city and what will still be avoided by promising coaches like the plague. So no, fuck renewing the lease, fuck the taxes, fuck them just being here being enough. Give me an MLS team that gives us a performance on the pitch to mirror our region’s resurgence. Give me a CFL franchise that I watch because it’s fun, because the consequences don’t involve being an embarrassment on national television. We deserve a winner, and beyond that, this is the NFL. Other cities don’t tolerate losers, neither should we.
Sometimes there are people in your life that you’re forced to deal with, that are parasites in a more personal way, that make every moment with them in it just a little worse. Eventually the only thing you can do is eradicate those people from your life and damn the consequences. That’s the micro level. The Bills are that person on a macro level in that it affects you, your friends, and millions of people you don’t even know. There’s only one thing to do.
And if you disagree with all of this, I have another word to describe the Bills: albatross. Eventually it will get too heavy for you to bear as well.
Follow the Outlander: @MattyRenn
Now playing at One Bills Drive.
So there you have it. I had a lot of people send me tweets and DM's about how the Bills make them feel now, from the Continental's simple frowny face, to @Husaria who in reference to watching the Bills added, "I’ll be setting my hair on fire and watching ice skating on NBC". Nothing was positive. However you want to look at it, this team is a major bummer and that's all there is to it. Right now, I'm in that numb phase where I know everything sucks but there's nothing I can do about it, so I'll watch Christmas movies on Sunday instead of the car wreck in Toronto. But I know the anger will return with a vengeance. I honestly think this team has some amazing talent and with the right coach and few other pieces SHOULD easily be a playoff contender. Yet as always, I know something will prevent that from happening. That something will most likely be an odious taint.
Oh right, there's a game this week. Prediction?
Home Alone/Die Hard/Christmas Vacation 42 - Bills 0
@TheScizz
Oh right, there's a game this week. Prediction?
Home Alone/Die Hard/Christmas Vacation 42 - Bills 0
@TheScizz
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