Hi, my name is Kevin Shenoy. Welcome to the Land of Rebuilding. I know you weren’t expected to come on this journey, but alas, here you are. I just wanted to welcome you.

I was unable to watch the game this weekend due to a wedding I was at. While I’ll give you a piece of what I think is happening to this team, I also have a little piece in the DVD Extras that is unrelated to this specific game. It is, however, quite helpful in the world of women and football. For those of you who have either written on the boards, written me, or talked to me about the ladies in your life who cannot understand your passion for the game, perhaps the analogy will allow you to fight a better fight. Perhaps I can get you 20-30 more minutes in front of your television. But before I do, I’ll offer my opinion on the Buffalo Bills:

Like I said, I didn’t watch the game. On the drive from Boston, I turned on the AM radio to see if I could get an update. They said Buffalo started with a 7-0 lead, but it was now 13-7. I turned off the radio immediately. I knew the game was over, and more so, I knew the team is heading towards a full-on collapse.

I hate that this team is Extreme Buffalo. How many times has our city, either in sports or regular life, been messed over? We do things hoping for the best, but the worst things spawn from the things we thought would better ourselves. For those of you who aren’t listing off every injustice that has plagued our city, here are a few to chomp on:

• Buffalo gets to hold the World Expo in the early 1900’s. Days later, President McKinley is shot in the city at the Expo, the city never recovers. Buffalo currently is barely holding on to its national status. It has no international exposure.
• We decide to create an expressway in the 1950’s to have better traffic flow in and out of the city. You know, for convenience. However, it runs through one of the nicest parks built by Robert Moses (of Central Park fame) and urban sprawl begins to plague Western New York. The city gets worse
• The City runs into some money for public transportation. In order to feed our ego as being a significant city, we build a subway. It goes for approximately 8 miles and takes no one no where. I realize that that is a double negative. In the English langue that makes it a positive. In Buffaloese, it just what it is, “a double negative”. All the negativity in double. For the same cost, more buses with free fare for every person in the city of Buffalo would have connected the city and the suburbs better.
• We are given a chance to build a SUNY campus. Instead of putting it in the heart of the city with thousands of kids and grad school kids eating and shopping and living, we put it in a swamp in Amherst. The Galleria Mall follows the same swap model years later.
• We happen to get a Billionaire business man to take affection to our city. He buys our hockey team and promises to bring the headquarters of his company to our city for thousands of jobs. Instead of being the easy ticket to rebuilding a city, he bankrupts himself, the company, and the hockey team. I have no idea if triple negatives exist in the English language. Apparently it exists in Buffaloese.
• We take that hockey team, pre-bankruptcy, to the big dance with the greatest goaltender in the last 20 years. He has the ability to stand on his head at times and do anything to stop a puck; we lose the Stanley Cup with the aid of the poorest officiating since the French judge went to town at the Olympics.

Buffalo just has that knack for not pulling through. You challenge us, we collapse. In fact when I lived in Buffalo going to school, I was mildly retarded. Doing well was an impossibility. I left and now I’m much less Buffalo. Buffalo makes all these changes, we dream all these big dreams, we have seen ourselves put against the worst odds, and we plan for better things. We believe in those plans like a religious text, and then, voila, we crap the bed.

This football team is classic Buffalo. We wanted to count on the one thing we had (a defense), believe in the x factor (our special teams) and make a couple big changes (offense) and see what happens. Let’s take a gamble. And it all goes to hell. It actually goes worse than if we stuck our thumb in our butts and just waited it out. You can look at the examples above and use the formula and it always holds true. Why?

Is there something in the water? My friend, Mark, and I always claim that. We can trade or draft any superstar hockey player. Invariably, they come to the Sabres, have an incredible week gaining the trust of the crowd, and then they fade into nothingness. This always takes about a week for the player to tank. The science behind it is that it takes one week until all the water the player had in his previous city to completely evacuate his body. Then the new Buffalo water reeks damage to their poor innards. They fail to score more than 30 goals a season. Mogilny, Ray Sheppard, etc. Once they are out drinking different water, they are amazing. Even Scotty Bowman, who wins championships everywhere else on every other level did nothing for us. TWICE!

I am not without hope though. (that is also a trademark of being a Buffaloian). We need someone who says, despite all these odds, “I am going to succeed, regardless of the history.” In fact we all need to be that person. We need to drive for unprecedented success in everything we do. We just need a figurehead like J.P. Losman or some other athlete to come here and do it differently than their predecessors. Jimbo was almost that guy. We need someone to come into Buffalo the way it currently is and leave as a huge winner. Maybe it’s not even a sports star. Maybe it’s one of us who can be inspirational and successful on a level not known to most and bring some pride back to our town.

We don’t need more excuses, we need more success. We don’t need to hear why it didn’t work, we need to know and see that it is going to work. And we want to know that it won’t stop working. I wanted JP to show that cockiness and say, “Yeah, I’m the 4th QB from the draft, I was the pick that people were unsure about, I’m the one that people can’t bare to look at right now, and by the way, go F yourself, I plan on being a winner next week and for the remainder of this season.” Show us the cocky Losman that we all secretly want. I trust that at some point soon, this year even, he’s going to back it up. Even in our success we dance around apologetically because we think it’s all on borrowed time. We think it can’t possibly last. How come all these other cities don’t think like that? I want JP to be the public catalyst to all the greater success that is way overdue for each and every one of us. Perhaps this is the time to cheer the loudest. Let’s freak out naysayers by being positive and getting the job done. It’s not too late. Bills Players, I hope you read this. As fans we’ll do our part next Sunday, now you do yours.

God speed ahead, Buffalo fans. Our time is coming.

DVD Extras:

• Terrence McGee’s run was sensational until he was too greedy to toss the ball back to anyone of the 5 players behind him who would have easily made it into the endzone. It just seemed so selfish because he pretty much knew he wasn’t going to make it and he had the blocking with the exception of one Saints player lying on the field. Football Karma will require that he never comes close to returning a kick for the rest of his football career. Mark my words.
• On 3rd and long in the fourth quarter, Deuce runs up the middle for 8 yards. Game over. Where is the defense? I would have said that if the Bills Defense was so stellar up to this point, that maybe we should hold the JP experiment. But the thing is that the defense looks just as bad as the offense. Let’s let JP get all the learning in at this point. The defense isn’t close to winning games for us. If the Saints are up on us, we aren’t the greatest defense on the face of the earth. Perhaps last year was the year the Defense could have won us games with JP at the helm. Now, they both are struggling, and I say, let them struggle and hope it translates into better football. There should be no controversy. Let’s believe in the kid and let him run on the learning curve.
• Mark quote of the week, “If we are rebuilding, are we rebuilding for a 2008-2012 Los Angles Bills Super Bowl Run?” We are both convinced that the Bills are out of OP minutes after Ralph passes on. That’s why we are so emotionally spent knowing that they won’t win this year. We are literally on the clock.
• Runner Up Mark quote. “Even Bollywood took it to JP and his 75 yards this week.” We must harness these bad times and the power of negative energy to create better times. But before we do that, we must mock all that we find offensive.
• Dad quote of the week “The bills defense said they wanted to be number 1. But they never clarified first to the bottom or first at the top.” Damn the Truth! Damn it straight to hell.

So as promised, I have an analogy that may help you with your significant other who despises your football watching habits. As stated above, I was at one of my closest pal’s weddings. I was actually selected in the later stages of the 4th round in the Groomsmen Draft of 2005. I’m not exactly the 1st round pick (best man), but I liked being given a chance to wear the uni (the tux) and show the coaches what I can do (show the Inlaws that I’m a decent enough of a guy).

Anyway, I realized that weddings are girls’ football games. They get fired up and intense for their event. They have to get to the stadium about 6 hours for pre-game prep from their hair to their shoes. They have the pre-game player announcements with the walk down the isle. The wedding is just like the actual football game to them. While the whole thing is very important to them, most of it comes down to about 3 big plays, (the “I do’s”, the rings, the kiss). That’s when the tears start. They have the post game (the reception). They do the question and answer as they rotate around to different tables. “so how does it feel to be married?” They reply with some generic answer that pleases everyone. You hear the weak reporter chuckles in the background.

I am convinced if there were TV contracts and ESPN for weddings, you’d see your girl on the couch with a thumb in their beltloop watching to it blindly. I’m sure you’d hear things like, “wait one sec I just need to know if Patty’s dress fits right. It could be 3 weeks if it doesn’t fit right. It would be a devastating blow to a girl who thought this was her year.” “I have her on my fantasy team, she went from single to married in like 4 weeks. She’s the best ever. She’s begging to be the next J-lo.” I guess it’d be funny if women went to other women’s weddings with their favorite wedding dress on and cheered during the ceremony.

Do you wonder what would happen if one wedding was set up to be like a football game? At the beginning, there would be a huge paper picture of the bride and groom over the main door. “Are you ready for this” the classic Technotronic song played at every stadium since 1992, blasts out. The Groomsmen and Brides maids come crashing through the picture waving their fingers shouting and doing the Lawyer Milloy arm pump. A mascot with the head of the groom comes out firing up the crowd, shooting out t-shirts into the pews. You see old ladies diving across isles to get a shirt with Tim Horton’s scribbled across the chest. Then the doors close. And the Groom is introduced to the Chicago Bulls/ Van Halen song. “Starting at wide receiver out of Miami University, Jon Doe!!” The door opens and the groom comes sprinting down the aisle high fiving the crowd. The doors close again. The announcer screams out to the same music, “Your starting QB out of Florida State, Jane Doe!!” The lady comes out with a beautiful gown but doing the Ray Lewis Entrance. It would be a beautiful thing, really. When the I Do’s and the kiss are completed the married couple Lambeu Leaps into their respective parents’ sections. The parents and grandparents are pulling on their child into the pews completed with bum slaps. The analogy could go on forever. In fact, if you can add to the chaos that could happen if weddings were more like Football games, please email me at binaural02@hotmail.com. The funnier responses I’ll toss in the next DVD extras. In the meantime, I’ll just wait to be invited to this wedding.

But, back to reality. The most telling thing which should be the ammo you use when defending the gross amount of TV you watch and the travel associated to the games is that the cost that ladies go through for weddings. The hair, the make-up, the pedicure, the dress, the shoes, the hotel, the travel. It all costs a lot more than tickets, the trip to the stadium and a meal at the game. My cousin was at like 10 weddings of which she was in like 7 of them. So it’s not like they can argue, “I only go to one wedding whereas you have 16 games.” Obviously since they know you are a Bills fan they won’t mention the playoffs. At some point girls go to about a football season’s worth of weddings. And the worst part is you are dragged along. We don’t even ask that they watch with us. We just want to lay down with a notebook and the remote to watch the game. Our football craziness keeps us on our couch for 16 weeks where one day in a week is completely lost. Their events are 3 day events during summer when you wanted to take a cool vacation. Can you imagine 3 day football weekends? Mmmmmm, 3 day football weekends.

I hope that helps. If you use it and it works, let me know. If it doesn’t and she literally tries killing you for likening the symbol of love to a football game, then remember, I didn’t say anything to you. At the very best, she will get a better understanding, at the very worst, you go back to sleeping on the couch that you feel asleep on during the Monday night game anyway.

This Week’s song quote:

“Oh My, It's A Mirage
I'm Tellin' Y'all It's a Sabotage”

Those are the lyrics to Sabotage from the Beastie Boys. Classic in itself, even better when you realize that it comes from the album “Ill Communication”

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