Here’s my guarantee for Sunday afternoon when the Bills host Indianapolis at Highmark Stadium.
Frank Reich WON’T be booed.
You see the Colts’ fourth-year coach earned a lifetime pass in Buffalo for the nine seasons he spent as Jim Kelly’s backup and one particular January afternoon in 1993.
Kelly was injured and unable to start the wild-card playoff game at then-Rich Stadium against Houston.
Reich got the start and the Kelly-less Bills watched Oilers quarterback Warren Moon throw four first-half touchdown passes for a 28-3 intermission lead. Still, the faithful held out a bit of hope due to Buffalo’s uptempo, no-huddle offense and a talented corps of receivers and running backs.
But when Houston safety Bubba McDowell picked off a Reich pass and returned it 58 yards for the TD that made it 35-3 less than two minutes into the second half, even the diehards started leaving.
That was still the score four minutes later when Buffalo’s Kenneth Davis scored a seemingly meaningless rushing touchdown.
Then Reich began writing his legacy.
In a span of 11 minutes, he hit Don Beebe for a 38-yard score, then threw three TDs to Andre Reed ( 26, 18 and 17 yards) and, suddenly, Buffalo was up, 38-35. The Oilers actually tied it on a field goal with12 seconds left in regulation, but the Bills’ Steve Christie banged through a 32-yarder three minutes into overtime for an inconceivable 41-38 victory.
Of course, tens of thousands of Buffalo fans will tell you they watched every exciting moment from home on TV.
Wrong.
The game wasn’t a sellout, over 5,000 below the 80,290 capacity, and blacked out on regional TV.
What is true though, is that when fans who had left early realized an epic game was in progress, they tried to get back in, an NFL no-no. But the security staff was so overwhelmed that the Bills administration decreed reopening of the gates.
Reich set a pro football record in orchestrating the 32-point comeback and, a week later led Buffalo to a 24-3 win over the Steelers in Pittsburgh. Kelly then returned and beat the Dolphins, 29-10, in the AFC Championship Game at Miami before the Bills were thrashed by Dallas in Super Bowl XXVII.
EVEN NOW, Reich is asked, almost daily, about that comeback but in a Wednesday Zoom call, he was quizzed about the Bills current quarterback.
When asked about Buffalo’s Josh Allen, he was effusive in his praise.
“Impressive development, how he has gotten better and better … the kind of plays we all know he can make,” said Reich, who played for four teams in a 13-year career. “He can put the ball anywhere he wants on the field. (Then there’s) his toughness mentally and physically.
“Watching from afar you can tell the kind of leader he is … it just jumps off the tape. You watch any game on television … this guy’s not just a great player, you can feel his leadership and the team’s belief in him. That’s a big part of playing quarterback and that’s a credit to Josh for the way he believes in himself and made that team believe in him.”
He added, “When you start looking at the particular skills of playing quarterback, I thought, coming out his first year, he was great but that his accuracy needed to be improved. But he’s done a phenomenal job at that … really turned not just into a great athlete and good playmaker but he’s also turned into an accurate passer. He’s worked at it.
“I love watching guys develop at the quarterback position, I don’t like playing against them, but I have a lot of respect for what he’s done and how he’s done it.”
REICH added, “As a Bills fan, which I still am, obviously — most of the time — I watched when he got drafted and I remember Jim Kelly and I having a conversation about it … ‘Owww, this feels like the right guy to put our old team back on the map offensively.’ A guy kind of like a Jim Kelly, cut out of the same mold in a lot of respects. ( It was) a good job by the organization finding the right guy. It’s not just any guy who should be there … it’s that kind of guy.”
He pointed out, “There are times when he throws it downfield — and I remember Jim Kelly used to do this every now and then — when he knows he can hold it for an extra second to make a play and (they both) had a knack for doing that.
“There’s always a premium on getting the ball out, you don’t want to hold it too often, but obviously Josh seems to have found the right balance … when to hold it and try to make the big play and when to get it out.”
Reich, one of the most classy and high-character players in Bills history, just hopes he doesn’t see it Sunday.
(Chuck Pollock, an Olean Times Herald senior sports columnist, can be reached at cpollock@oleantimesherald.com)
