Forty Years of Bills Preseason Taught Me One Thing: None of It Matters
I’ve been a Bills fan since 1989, and if there’s one thing I’ve learned over nearly four decades, it’s this:
NFL preseason tells you absolutely nothing.
Every August, we do the same dance. No….the fourth-string receiver with six catches is NOT going to be a hidden gem. A backup pass rusher gets two sacks against an insurance salesman playing left tackle and he will NOT be the next Bruce Smith. Every throw, tackle, and interception gets dissected as if it means something.
Then September arrives and reality punches everyone in the face.
There used to be one exception. Remember when the third preseason game was considered the “dress rehearsal?” Starters played into the third quarter. Coaches supposedly game-planned a little. It wasn’t perfect, but at least it resembled NFL football.
Now? That game is gone too.
I honestly can’t remember the last time Josh Allen threw a meaningful pass in one of these fake football games. NFL coaches have made it pretty clear: if you’re an established starter, your most important job in August is staying healthy.
Which makes sense.
What doesn’t make sense is asking fans to pay full NFL ticket prices for games that the teams themselves clearly don’t treat like real football. You’re paying regular-season prices to watch a glorified job interview.
Then, when someone has a monster preseason, it immediately becomes the biggest content talking point of the week. Everyone wants to be the first person to identify the hidden gem—the football equivalent of buying Microsoft for pennies before anyone else knew what it was. The problem is those preseason darlings almost never become Microsoft.
More often than not, they become Blockbuster.
I’ve seen too many examples over the years to ever fall for it again and here come the receipts.
One of my favorite reminders of how meaningless preseason is goes all the way back to the Super Bowl Bills. The early-‘90s Bills were notorious for looking awful in August. They’d stumble through the preseason, sometimes not winning a game and getting pushed around, only to flip the switch once the games actually counted.
And every year, the panic would start anyway.
The newspaper columns would question whether the team had regressed, whether the offense had lost its edge, or whether something was wrong. Then the regular season would begin, and those same Bills would go on another Super Bowl run.
If fans and media couldn’t correctly evaluate one of the greatest teams in franchise history based on the preseason, why do we keep pretending we can evaluate today’s Bills?
Want another example?
Do you remember Antonio Brown with the Bills?
No, not that Antonio Brown—the one who might have been a Bill for about three hours before things fell apart and he had a mental breakdown.
I’m talking about return specialist Antonio Brown, who seemingly scored every August. Between kick and punt returns, he took three preseason returns to the house during his Bills career in 2003.
Mr Brown played one season here and averaged 4.4 yards per punt return (which ranked 32nd).
Trent Edwards looked like Joe Montana every August. In both 2008 and 2010, he put together outstanding preseasons that had fans believing he’d finally turned the corner.
It resulted in absolutely nothing. Two games into the 2010 season, he was gone. JP Losman turned a corner during 2008 preseason as the backup cause he got humbled courtesy of TBN
Aaron Maybin once looked unblockable during the preseason. Three sacks had everyone wondering if Buffalo had finally found its next great edge rusher.
They hadn’t.
How about Chris Ellis? Yeah…I don’t remember him, but I’m sure Pat Moran was telling some bartender that he was the next Daryl Talley
Then there was George Edwards’ defense in 2011. The Bills piled up 11 preseason sacks against Chicago, and Shawn Merriman looked like he was back!
If memory serves, it took until around Week 8 of the regular season just to reach that same sack total and Merriman had 2 sacks in 11 games as a Bill.
Or how about Rob Johnson in 2000? Against the defending Super Bowl champion Rams, he threw for roughly 250 yards and three touchdowns in the preseason. Bills fans were ready to believe.
We all know how that movie ended.
Then there was 2018, when Nate Peterman and Kelvin Benjamin absolutely torched the Panthers in the preseason. Peterman looked like he’d finally turned the corner. Benjamin looked like the No. 1 receiver everyone hoped he’d become. They lit up Carolina, and for a few days people were talking themselves into the Bills offense.
Fast forward a couple of months.
Peterman was released after another regular-season disaster, and Benjamin was cut before the season was over. That’s preseason in a nutshell. One month you’re carving up vanilla defenses. The next you’re unemployed.
How about Buffalo Joe’s preseason from 2024? Living legend!
I can’t recall one play this guy has made the last two seasons.
And here’s the funniest part:
Nobody remembers any of this.
Every August, it’s like we all get Men in Black memory-wiped. Pockets of fans react to preseason performances as if they’ve never watched an NFL preseason before. Media people will use buzz words to describe performances. If preseason actually predicted the regular season, Trent Edwards would’ve been a Pro Bowler, Aaron Maybin would’ve been Bruce Smith, Rob Johnson would’ve been a franchise quarterback, and Nate Peterman would’ve had a long career in Buffalo.
Instead, they’re all reminders that August football is the biggest liar on the NFL calendar. The truth is, preseason has become little more than a glorified evaluation camp. Coaches aren’t trying to win. They’re trying to answer questions.
Can the rookie line up correctly?
Can the seventh-round pick play special teams?
Is the backup guard versatile enough to justify a roster spot?
Could someone emerge? Absolutely. Every year there’s a player who earns a roster spot because of a strong preseason. But using these games to project how good the Bills will be or that mystery player keeps momentum?
History says you’re wasting your time.
There’s another reason I can rattle off dozens of preseason frauds from 2000 through 2018 and not many from the Josh Allen era.
The Bills were bad.
When your team isn’t very good, you’re desperate for hope. Every August becomes a scavenger hunt for reasons to believe. That undrafted receiver? Maybe he’s the answer. The backup defensive end with two sacks? Maybe he’s a diamond in the rough. The third-string quarterback who lights up guys who’ll be selling insurance in two weeks? That’s why I can effortlessly remember Trent Edwards, Aaron Maybin, Antonio Brown the returner, Nate Peterman, Kelvin Benjamin, Rob Johnson and dozens of others. When your franchise is mediocre, every preseason breakout feels like it might be the thing that changes everything.
Ironically, I can’t think of many examples over the last six or seven preseasons. Joe Andreessen is one of the few that comes to mind.
Why?
Because the Bills are finally good.
Winning football teams don’t need preseason heroes.
Bad football teams do.
I’ll still watch because Pat Moran is forcing me to if I want to be on his podcast. But I’d watch every single Preseason game for the last 50 years if some of the live and die by preseason society/media finally accepted what preseason really is.
It’s not a preview of the regular season.
It’s football-shaped entertainment that you’re somehow expected to pay full price for and by next August, we’ll all pretend none of these lessons ever happened…except when I RT this piece in 2027 and beyond.
The Culture War That Hijacked Women’s Sports
Want to know who suddenly became the biggest supporters of women’s sports? A lot of people who couldn’t tell you who won last year’s WNBA Finals.
That’s why so much of the transgender athlete debate feels completely manufactured.
There are legitimate questions about competitive fairness and eligibility. Sports have always drawn lines around who can compete, and governing bodies should be able to debate those policies.
But that’s barely what we’re talking about anymore.
Instead, an incredibly small number of transgender athletes have been turned into one of the biggest culture-war topics in sports. There has never even been a transgender player in the WNBA, yet you’d think women’s professional basketball was facing an existential crisis.
Why? Because this isn’t really about women’s sports for a lot of these people. It’s about trans people.
If your only interest in women’s athletics comes when there’s a transgender athlete to be angry about, you’re not protecting women’s sports. You’re using women’s sports as a socially acceptable vehicle for your hostility toward transgender people.
Look at the coverage. How often do these same voices discuss WNBA strategy, the NWSL, women’s hockey, golf, Olympic sports or college basketball when there isn’t a controversy attached?
Then one transgender athlete competes somewhere in a high school and suddenly it’s DEFCON 1.
Stephen A. Smith is the latest example. One of the biggest voices in sports media rarely makes women’s sports central to his political commentary, yet this issue suddenly deserves multiple segments on his political show.
Clay Travis has spent years mocking and dismissing the WNBA, but now we’re supposed to believe he’s a martyr for women’s athletics because transgender people are involved?
Come on.
And then there was Friday’s stunt, when 2 former NBA players -who are always on Fox News- declared themselves eligible for the WNBA Draft by announcing he was a woman. I saw former NFL players laughing hysterically about it online.
Yeah, that’ll really help women’s sports.
It also shows what this conversation has become. Transgender people aren’t being discussed as actual human beings. They’re becoming punchlines, villains and hypothetical monsters.
We hear ridiculous scenarios that make it sound like LeBron James is one bad day away from declaring himself a woman and dominating the WNBA. A transgender player appears in some obscure league overseas and social media treats it like an invading army is headed toward women’s basketball.
It’s bullshit.
The overwhelming majority of female athletes will never compete against a transgender athlete. Yet isolated examples get amplified into national emergencies because fear, anger and resentment generate clicks.
And that’s why I have a hard time believing this crusade is really about protecting women.
If it were, these people would spend considerably more time watching, covering, promoting and investing in women’s sports when transgender people aren’t involved. Women’s sports deserve serious conversations about fairness. Transgender people deserve to be treated like human beings instead of political props.
And female athletes deserve attention for what they actually accomplish—not just when somebody can use them to fight another culture war.
STAT HEAD OF THE WEEK: 16
Since 2017, 16 Bills draft picks have been extended by the team. I have conflicted feelings about this. I’ve said repeatedly in the past that the Bills don’t have enough members of the Justice League on this squad. Instead, it’s filled with the Alfreds and Jimmy Olsens of the world. By extending basically everyone who is, at best, fine, a role player or good, there aren’t enough GREAT players.
And by doing this, you can’t really get involved in a Myles Garrett trade or anything along those lines. This is something I’ve posted about and talked about on Pat Moran’s podcast. By my count, Tremaine Edmunds, Devin Singletary and Gabe Davis are the only homegrown starters they’ve allowed to leave.
The cynic and Brandon Beane hater in me wonders if this is part of how he keeps his job. He can tell Terry Pegula, “Look at how great we’ve been at developing our own guys,” and then pass the buck to the coaching staff when things don’t work out. Again, that’s me going to my Beane dark side.
The other thing that stands out about this list: besides James Cook, Matt Milano and Josh Allen, I don’t think anyone has really gotten better after receiving an extension. Some have regressed, some have gotten hurt, and the rest are basically the same players they were when they signed.
It got me thinking: How do other teams that I would put in the same general group as the Bills handle extensions?
I picked the Chiefs, Rams, Eagles and Ravens because I always feel like they’re grouped with Buffalo when we talk about the NFL’s most successful organizations of this era.
The numbers are staggering…
Yes, I get that there isn’t one way to construct a roster. The Chiefs have been willing to trade guys who are about to get paid, while the Rams have basically lived by “F them picks.” Different philosophies can work.
But here’s the question I keep coming back to: If you held a fantasy draft using the rosters of these five teams—the Bills, Chiefs, Eagles, Ravens and Rams—and drafted based on who has had the best players over this era, I think it’s fair to say Buffalo would lack the most star power.
That doesn’t mean the Bills haven’t drafted good players. They clearly have. My issue is that they’ve spent a lot of money keeping good players while the other teams seem to have found, acquired or retained more great ones. There’s a difference between having a deep roster of quality NFL starters and having the handful of difference-makers who can completely change a playoff game.
Viral Buffalo Tweet of the Week
Well, it took roughly five minutes for the new Highmark Stadium to have its first viral controversy. I wrote impromptu about this yesterday after doing the finishing touches to this post, so call this the “after party” post.
A photo of an obstructed view blew up on Bills Twitter, racking up 400K+ views and prompting the very reasonable question: How the fuck is this possible in a brand-new stadium?
Look, every stadium has some shitty seats. But when you spend $2 billion building the thing, you’d hope “staring through a railing” wasn’t one of the available seating options. And judging by Bills Twitter, this person wasn’t alone in wondering who looked at this during construction and said, “Yep, nailed it.”
This is a story that absolutely should be covered. I yelled at Pat on our podcast about who exactly should be responsible for covering it, because he felt the Bills beat reporters shouldn’t have to. My counter is pretty simple: if you were pumping out content about the new stadium with posting videos, showing off the concourses, the seats, the amenities and everything else in a positive light, but suddenly decide the obstructed view story isn’t your lane, then you are just choosing the path of least resistance.
You can’t have it both ways.
If the stadium was enough of a story for you when everything looked shiny and new, then it’s still a story when fans who spent a shitload of money on tickets discover their view of the field is partially blocked. You don’t get to become a stadium reporter for the ribbon-cutting and then turn back into strictly a football reporter when something negative happens.
And I’m not saying every Bills beat reporter needs to turn into an investigative journalist and spend the next three weeks digging through stadium blueprints. But ask the question. Talk to the fans affected. Call Andy Major. Ask the Bills how many seats have obstructed views, whether buyers were properly informed and what, if anything, the team plans to do about it.
Because if you helped tell everyone how great the new stadium was, you should probably be willing to tell them when something about it isn’t.
Dad shots
—The new Highmark Stadium opening should have me insanely excited. It’s the start of a completely new era for the Bills, and seeing fans finally walk into the place we’ve watched being built for years is pretty damn cool.
But being a Buffalo expat kind of tempers the excitement. Everyone back home is posting pictures, making plans and talking about when they’re going for the first time, while I’m watching it all from afar.
It feels like watching all your friends go on spring break while you’re stuck at home. You’re happy for them. You want to see every picture. But there’s also a little bit of, “Man, I wish I was there.”
I’ll get there eventually. Until then, I’m basically watching everyone else’s vacation photos.
—I’m surprised Torrence got extended. Four of the five Bills offensive linemen are now playing on extensions given to them by the team.
Spotrac’s 2026 positional data, before the Torrence extension, had the entire Bills offensive line at $45.77 million in cap spending, which ranked 21st in the NFL, and $43.20 million in cash spending, which ranked 17th. Obviously, with the Torrence extension, those numbers will go up. And by next year, when some of these cap numbers that were manipulated and backloaded finally hit, that number should climb even higher. The Bills currently sit around $50 million over the projected cap for next season.
I’m not an offensive line guru, but it has always felt like a chicken-or-the-egg argument when trying to figure out what makes an offensive line work.
Is it scheme? I can tell you stories about how the Saints used to protect Drew Brees with offensive linemen who weren’t necessarily highly drafted because the offense was designed to get the ball out quickly. Is it the quarterback’s ability to avoid pressure and receivers getting open downfield? Is it the running back who can squeeze through a mouse-sized hole? Or is it simply about the five guys up front?
The answer is probably some combination of all of it.
As for Torrence, I think he’s a solid player. I don’t think extending him is some outrageous decision. But it goes back to my larger question about how the Bills construct this roster: How much money do you want tied up in solid players?
And when you look at Torrence’s PFF metrics and where he ranked among guards last season, I think it’s fair to ask whether his performance warranted making another long-term commitment to a player who is good, but has yet to show that he’s great.
During the 2025 NFL season, Buffalo Bills right guard O’Cyrus Torrence earned a 59.8 overall grade from Pro Football Focus (PFF), ranking 44th among 81 qualified offensive guards.
Performance BreakdownPass Blocking: Received a 64.0 grade, ranking 32nd at his position while allowing 32 total pressures and 3 sacks.
Run Blocking: Received a 54.6 grade, ranking 58th among qualified guards.
Durability: Played 1,129 offensive snaps (starting all 17 regular-season games) for the third consecutive year without missing a game
—Sal Capaccio and Matt Bove had Pete Guelli on their podcast, and it was a very good interview. My antenna did go up a little, though, when Guelli said the new jerseys are selling better than last year’s gear.
A few things to point out:
The Cold Front jerseys were released late in the offseason and didn’t go on sale until September 9.
The Bills only released four player jerseys at the time of the Cold Front rollout: Josh Allen, Dion Dawkins, Dalton Kincaid and Keon Coleman. This time around, they have seven players available: Allen, Coleman, James Cook, Dawkins, Khalil Shakir, Kincaid and Dawson Knox.
Eventually, the Cold Front collection did have more player jerseys available, but maybe simply having more options from the start is part of the reason these are selling better than last year. Because God knows I don’t know anyone who has bought one.
Lastly, I know personalized jerseys can happen with these alternate/spinoff uniforms, but how come there aren’t any defensive player jerseys for sale?
—It feels super weird seeing all these running backs getting paid like this. If my team didn’t have a running back on a new deal, I’d probably be laughing my ass off at how dumb some of these contracts are. Sorry, I don’t care how much more the league is running the football. My philosophy would still be: Find a running back on Day 2 once every four drafts and keep the assembly line moving. Of course, it’s a little harder to scream about positional value when your own team just paid its running back.
— On Friday, I noticed WGR had Vic Carucci on its morning show. I was a little surprised because I can’t remember the last time he was on their airwaves. I know he’s bounced around from The Buffalo News to SiriusXM/WGRZ, but he was definitely a new voice to add to the station’s lineup.
I reached out to Jeremy White to ask if there were more new faces coming to the station, and he said they’ll be getting a few current Bills players for weekly segments.
Over the last couple of seasons, they really only had Sean McDermott on the Friday show, where he would normally “break” which injured players would be out or playing on Sunday before giving us a bunch of boring platitudes. Before that was Micah Hyde, Eric Wood, Stevie Johnson and Lee Evans.
I have to assume the station is paying these players to appear, but it goes back to something I’ve mentioned in this space before: Could WGR use some of the money that would have gone toward owning the Bills’ radio rights to instead bring in paid guests and contributors? The answer seems yes.
As a consumer, I’d rather have that than the game broadcasts. Then again, I don’t listen to Bills games on the radio, so I’m probably not the target audience for that part of the product.
—Across the airwaves, I saw the Bills are adding George Wilson as a contributor to their radio show. Wilson hasn’t played for the Bills since 2012, but I distinctly remember Jerry Sullivan LOVING having him as one of his “go-to guys” in the locker room after games. He called Wilson “The Senator” because he was always willing to talk and usually had something thoughtful to say. Obviously, we know the Bills-produced shows are going to be very, very slanted toward the team. But I will give them credit for bringing in some newer voices with Wilson, Mitch Morse and Chris Trapasso. It at least gives you some different perspectives and personalities.
—I guess Von Miller would be a fine addition. Just as long as he doesn’t restart his podcast and spend the next three months telling us the Bills are going to add 10 new players at the trade deadline. He’s been posting photos of himself in Bills gear on Instagram, so naturally that’s enough to get the speculation machine going.
And look, there’s still something there. Miller had nine sacks last year, which tied for 19th in the league. The underlying numbers weren’t nearly as impressive, though. According to Stathead, he had just four QB hurries, tied for 110th, and 19 pressures, tied for 68th.
Obviously, he’s not the Von Miller the Bills signed in 2022, and nobody should expect him to be. But as a rotational pass rusher? You could do worse. He’s played in both 4-3 and 3-4 defenses throughout his career, so adjusting to the scheme shouldn’t be much of an issue.
Just please, Von: no podcast predictions about Maxx Crosby being spotted at the Buffalo airport or how Brandon Beane is becoming your GM mentor.
—I’m Team Red End Zones for the Bills. But I do wonder if they’ll alternate the end-zone colors depending on what uniforms they’re wearing. We’ve seen teams change their field designs for throwback and alternate games, so maybe whatever color they pick for the opener isn’t necessarily going to be the permanent look which is fine with me.
—We finished The Bear. It was fine. The Mrs. liked it more than I did. I think my dad brain, along with adjusting to Luke, made it hard for me to really concentrate on it. I needed to watch something like X-Men ’97 instead. Additionally, the Bills love using the one tattoo chef from the series on their food consumption content. I guess he’s from Fort Erie and does a bunch of cooking stuff on YouTube.
—Andy had a really rough week with yours truly. First off, he’s making me sleep on the ground next to him while he’s in his crib. The floor sucks, and he won’t let me have a pillow because he wants all of them. Super. Luckily, he does fall asleep within, say, 20 minutes, so I’m usually just doomscrolling until he passes out. Then I decided to change up his breakfast by getting cranberry-orange muffins instead of chocolate muffins. Boy, you would’ve thought I was telling a kindergarten class that Christmas was canceled. Full-fledged meltdown for 15 minutes, followed by him trying to kick me while I was changing him. He had more passion in those kicks than he does playing soccer, I’ll tell you that much.
Andy has also been insane when it comes to picking pajamas. Once again, it’s a full meltdown because he hates everything I bring him. The Spider-Man pajamas he loved a year ago? Apparently they’re death now, according to the Green Goblin over here.
Every night I’m basically a costume designer on a Lady Gaga tour, standing there with different wardrobe options while the talent rejects every single fucking thing I bring out.
“Spider-Man?”
NO!
“Dinosaurs?”
NO!
“Blue ones?”
NOOOOO!
Buddy, you’re going to bed, not the fucking Met Gala.
With all that said…I wouldn’t trade any of that for anything. We have been reading this cute dinosaur book where Andy names each dinosaur after our family. Even our cat is named after a dinosaur.
—When Costco opens in the fall off the Blvd., I will be the first person to dish on everything Costco since we have one by us. I will say, I’m glad Good Morning America addressed the shitshow known as the Costco parking lot. It’s basically the Hammer Lot after a Bills game combined with the feeling that there’s a tornado coming down your street. It is BAD.
—If you made it this far, I thank you! I’ll be Talking Buffalo with the medium chicken finger eater and thirst trap liker Pat Moran, who has been to camp more times than Jason Voorhees.
If you’re feeling generous, please subscribe to this Substack, buy a Homage shirt or donate. Your boy is once again between jobs as the TV industry is in shambles and if I don’t start showing more income to the Mrs…this substack will be closed. I’m kidding! Kind of. Yes. Kidding.
Have a good rest of the week, and go play laser tag.
First time reading your Substack, I think you’re doing a great job, I really enjoyed all the points that you made in the article.
As far as the trans athletes -it’s just republicans trying to create a problem that hardly exists -the racist bigoted republicans should focus on lower costs etc . than worrying about a handful of trans people-
My two random Bills preseason memories, both involve Toronto ironically.
-1997 American Bowl a 35-3 embarrassment of a loss on national TV in the “dress rehearsal” game to the Super Bowl champion Packers. An ominous sign of a 6-10 season to come.
-2008 win over the Steelers to kick off the first game of the “Toronto Series” Trent Edwards looked sharp as you previously mentioned, also a Leodis McKelvin kickoff return for a TD was the game winner.
Factoid for the road: The Bills and the Giants played three times in the 1990 season, ending of course with the Super Bowl. All three games were nationally televised.