Western New York's football team begins hypnotizing its loyal fans again this weekend.
Buffalo's Bills are built on hope. They provide more of it for the region than Niagara Falls provides hydro-power. It is their premise. And as Tim Robbins' character Andy Dufrain proved in "Shawshank Redemption:" "Hope is a good thing."
As long as you don't live and die by it, as the vast majority of the hypnotized do.
Ralph Wilson's team has handed out hope the way a candidate for office pitches campaign buttons and, just like the candidates hocking their buttons, they've left the people wanting.
It's become a successful business model. How else do you explain a mediocre team nearly breaking a record for season ticket sales?
As they prepare to host Seattle for the regular season opener, they seem to have their ducks in a row again. Young talent on the brink of breaking out. Minimal injuries. Soft schedule. Even their best blocker, Jason Peters, ended his holdout two days before the opener.
http://buffalobills.com/
I used to be one of the mesmerized. Tough to be around on game day, I remained largely an optimist, especially in the first week of September.
But something happened last year. Sitting in the Ralph, watching the Bills play an incredible game and still lose to the Dallas Cowboys on Monday Night Football, I realized maybe all the talk about small market team, and the NFL passing Buffalo by, may be true.
How else can to explain the sustained mediocrity, whether it be in the head coach (check the record,) or the defense, or a decade without double digit victory totals.
Can the Bills break our heart in a new way? Or will they make the Autumn of '08 something to Bill-ieve in?
I hope.
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