Hello all 1,912 NYC Bills Fans!

Will we EVER get to 2,000 members? Sabres are up 1-0 over the Bruins in the first round of the NHL Playoffs, the NFL Draft is less than a week away, and spring is here. Its a great time to be a Buffalo sports fan!

If you haven’t heard, the NFL moved the Draft from Saturday to Round 1 being on held Thursday night, Rounds 2-3 on Friday night and the rest of the Draft on Saturday.   That totally screws with our Saturday all-day draft party, but the folks at McFadden’s/Calico’s were more than willing to help out. Here’s the deal:

April 22 – Thursday – Calico Jack’s will have the first round of the Draft televised with sound starting at 7pm. From 7-11pm, the bar will offer $3 import drafts (including Blue), half priced drink specials, and free wings!

April 23rd – Friday – Calico Jack’s will offer the same special with wings from 7-11pm for rounds 2-3 and will have the sound on shortly before/after the Bills pick (keep in mind its Friday night) and if there’s a Sabres playoff game that night they’ll televise if available.

Apr 24th – Saturday – McFadden’s will hold the all-you-can-drink/wing specials we use during the season from 11-4pm. The pricing can be found here:
https://nycbbb.com/features/specials.shtml

As most of you know, this is the only party around like this, and we always get a great and exciting crowd. Its more fun with non-Bills fans there as folks boo each others picks, so we encourage you to bring friends that root for other teams. Besides, its a great special!

Last year I walked into the party and told Matt Soreco I didn’t care who we drafted, as long as we didn’t take that undersized one-year wonder from Penn State named Maybin in a must win year. Of course, he’s now a Bill and his first year was an embarrassment, hopefully he can turn things around. I have a lot more faith in Buddy Nix than than Russ Brandon and Dick Jauron, so am cool with whomever they draft.

And yes, I’d be thrilled to see them take a Clausen or Tebow…

As always, check out the BEST draft coverage on the net at www.billsdaily.comand www.buffalorumblings.com.

Go Bills, Go Sabres!!!!

Matt “Talkin’ proud and pray we get a QB!” Kabel

Hello all 1,941 NYC Bills/Sabres fans!

Tonight at 10pm (or my DirecTV guide says 10:30pm?) on the Travel Channel the war of wars will take place. The channel is premiering its new show, Food Wars, which pits local city establishments against each other to determine who has the better host city’s signature dish.

Up tonight, Buffalo wings (or chicken wings as we in Western NY correctly refer to them!)

Anchor Bar (The famous creator of wings) vs. Duffs (Many claim theirs are better)

I, for one, have always had great wings at the Anchor Bar, and always have a great time. However I have had wings served to me in a soupy hot sauce at Duffs that was more like a stew than wings. As a result, I’m rooting for Anchor Bar!

Be sure to watch tonight! 10 or 10:30pm on the Travel Channel!

Oh…and no new news on the Bills. They signed some right tackle from Oakland that committed 12 penalties in 12 games…oh, and he beat the mother of his children. Great way to make me want to sign up for season tickets again guys!

By the way, were you not extra proud to be a Western NYer seeing Ryan Miller win the MVP for the Winter Olympics? Wish they would have pulled that off and won gold.

As always, follow www.billsdaily.com and www.buffalorumblings.com for the latest Bills news.

With the NFL draft now being spread out on weeknights, not sure what to do for the party yet, will let you know.

Phil Mann said JetBlue is doing some $10 flight specials to Buffalo, be sure to check them out.

GO BILLS!
GO SABRES!!!

Matt “Talkin Proud and really hope Anchor Bar pulls it out” Kabel

Hello all 1,914 NYC Bills fans!

Well, the Bills finally hired a new head coach. No it wasn’t Bill Cowher or Brian Billick or even Leslie Frazier. The Bills hired Chan Gailey. Who? Oh yeah, a guy that’s been fired from 3 coaching jobs for not being able to win big games. So it looks like the Bills had to rush and stop the embarrassment of all these coaches turning down the job. To make matters worse, former Buffalo Bill player and successful head coach Marty Schottenheimer WAS interested in the job, but Ralph Wilson wasn’t “comfortable” with him so didn’t even bother interviewing him.

Folks, this team has officially become Raiders East. Here’s an amazing piece by BillsDaily.com’s Tony Bogyo summing up why the Bills have been losers for 10 years:
http://billsdaily.com/articles/bogyo/2010/change.shtml

Also, here’s a piece today quoting several league unnamed sources hammering the Bills, including confirming my belief that the Buddy Nix hiring was a power grab for Russ Brandon AKA Smithers. Also, it indicates that Ralph Wilson personally drafted Marshawn Lynch, when it was reported at the time that Marv Levy was high on Darelle Revis, who is now a superstar and the best cornerback in the league:

Again, maybe the Bills can get lucky and Chan Gailey, who has a great reputation as an offensive coordinator (just not head coach) can turn this team around. But we’re now seeing a pattern form here where the Bills issues start at the top. It must kill Ralph Wilson to see former Bills GM Bill Polian heading to another Super Bowl. Maybe he shouldn’t have fired him.

Don’t forget to check out www.BillsDaily.com and www.BuffaloRumblings.com for the latest news.

SABRES
Hey Sabres fans. Need some good news to distract you from the Bills off-season? Well, the Sabres are in first place in their division are challenging for 1st place in the Eastern Conference with Joirsee and Washington. Ryan Miller has been the best goalie in the NHL and the team has its swagger back. It looks like we will finally be enjoying some post season hockey this year and we are planning some fun things for the second half of the season. Stay up to date with the post-season push by signing up for the Sabres emails at our website (NYCBBB.com) or just send Kevin an email and ask him to add you to the list at kevin@nycbbb.com.

In the meantime if you’d like to catch up on the team before they break for the Olympics, the best place to catch the games is at Kelly’s at 12 Ave A (Between A and Houston). There is usually a big crowd there every night and they turn on the sound. Other places that have the games but don’t have sound are Blue Moon (75th and 1st-ish) and Kinsales (3rd between 93/94th).

PUSH Buffalo on Extreme Makeover
Last night I Tivo-ed Extreme Makeover – Home Edition on ABC when somebody emailed me that it was taking place in Buffalo. I heard a ton of great things about it this morning, so just went to watch the show and saw that they partnered with PUSH Buffalo, the non-profit who throws annual fundraisers here in NYC that many of you attend and help out with. You can check it out here, I hear it paints Buffalo in an amazing light:

Hope you’re all staying dry out there!

GO Bills!
Go Sabres!!!

Matt “Talkin’ proud and really hope the Bills bring in a solid defensive coordinator” Kabel

Hello all 1,917 NYC Bills fans!

Well, the season is over and we have been put out of our misery for now. The Bills canned the entire coaching staff and hired Buddy Nix as GM. Although Nix is a true football man with experience in both the Bills and Chargers front offices, I wished the Bills would have gone outside the organization and brought in somebody that would clean house at One Bills Drive. In addition, the Bills promoted Russ Brandon from SVP/GM to President, which I feel was a horrible move as he is a sales guy and should in no way have the GM reporting to him. Whatever the Bills say, Brandon will have a hand in football decisions folks which is likely a major reason coaches are turning down the opportunity to coach in Buffalo.

Speaking of the coaching situation, the Bills have found themselves to be the laughing stock of the NFL as all the big names turned them down, and even Jets offensive coordinator Brian Schottenheimer turned down an interview. As of now, Minnesota Vikings defensive coordinator Leslie Frazier is the only candidate for the job. The Bills are reportedly still interested Russ Grimm of Arizona, whom is growing on me for his blue collar attitude towards the game. This is what happens when you lose for 10 years, have an owner that allows great players to leave, and a glorified used car salesman as your President having final say on football decisions and was a make-believe GM for two years. Part of me wonders if the front office knows they are a laughingstock, or choose to be in denial.

However, is Cowher still interested? An interesting tidbit is that the national media has been getting outscooped big time by some local folks. www.salsports.com reported that the Bills secretly met with Bill Cowher a week before ESPN “reported it” and has been a step ahead of the media since. Joe Logan, a no name from East Aurora, tweeted hours before any national source that the entire Bills coaching staff would be fired. These two guys have maintained that Bill Cowher still has interest in the job, and talks are ongoing. Logan is also calling for a writing campaign:

Are they right? Who knows, but they’ve been right about everything the last month. For us in NYC, if you want to get Cowher you should head over to CBS studios on 10th and 57th on Saturday afternoon with signs begging him to come to the Queen City. Hey, even our fellow fans in Buffalo put up a billboard this week.

Does all of this mean we will be the bottom feeders of the NFL? No, the Bills could land a coordinator who could be the next Dungy or Cowher and get lucky in the draft. Its early, anything can happen.

In regards to McFadden’s/Calico’s, let us know how things went this year. How were the wings, service, etc and do you have any recommendations for 2010?

It was a rough year, let’s hope for more success next year! We’ll email Draft Party details soon…

Go Bills!
Go Sabres!

Matt “Talkin’ proud and hope the Bills pick the right coach” Kabel