It hardly looked like the same team.
Travis Henry running the ball -- again and again?
Josh Reed catching it -- in key situations?
If it wasn't for the nearly all-blue uniforms and a series of penalties on the offensive line in the first half, you wouldn't have known it was the Buffalo Bills.
But there they were dominating a foe the way the people who sign their paychecks, as well as those who cough up the cash in the form of ticket purchases, expected since last spring.
The scoreboard at Ralph Wilson Stadium read 24-7 as the crowd filtered out early Sunday evening, but the tally of bruises was much more one-sided.
The most visibly battered Redskin was quarterback Patrick Ramsey, who finally called it a day after absorbing a pair of brutal hits in the fourth quarter. Ramsey's departure triggered the late afternoon's biggest ovation -- albeit a sarcastic one -- when former Bills quarterback Rob Johnson ambled onto the field.
A more sincere form of appreciation for the oft-hospitalized former Bills signal-caller came before the game, when a regular member of the BillStuff coverage team spotted a pair of fans wearing Johnson's old No. 11 (he wears No. 17 with Washington), with the word "sucks" spray-painted in black across the back.
There wasn't much Johnson could have done, anyway. By that point, his latest team needed three scores with just nine minutes to get them.
The Redskins were so thoroughly beaten by that point, they came as close to surrendering as you'll ever see from a professional football team on their next possession. After losing 11 yards on a reverse, Steve Spurrier called for a couple runs up the middle to Chad Morton, then punted.
Washington's desire to get out of Orchard Park as quickly as possible was more than understandable. For once, the stats did tell the story, with Buffalo dominating every line on the sheet by a sizable margin. Travis Henry established career highs in rushes and yards, scoring two touchdowns for good measure. Josh Reed matched his personal best for catches and came within a yard of doing the same in that category.
Buffalo's best overall performance since a 38-17 win over Jacksonville in Week 2 didn't result from the offensive trickiness or strategic slight-of-hand that directly contributed to three losses in the four weeks since, but from the exact opposite.
After three weeks of laboring under a mistaken identity and one with none at all, the Bills coaching staff returned to the basic formula that produced just about every championship team the National Football League has ever known -- knock the living crap out of the other guy.
That philosophy starts, oddly enough, on offense. Offensive coordinator Kevin Gilbride called Henry's number again and again, pounding away at Washington's depleted defensive front like a boxer working the body.
Not only did the holes up front eventually grow, putting Buffalo's blockers on the offensive helped keep the Washington pass rush, even that one guy that used to play for the Bills, far from Drew Bledsoe, allowing him to post his best numbers in a month.
See how easy it is?
Whether pounding the Redskins signaled a Buffalo resurgence or demonstrated how far Washington has fallen after a 3-1 start should become clearer next week. The Bills take their act to Kansas City, where the Chiefs - one of two remaining unbeaten teams heading into Monday night -- wait along with quite possibly the loudest crowd in football.
Sunday's win, along with New England's 19-13 overtime victory in Miami, left Buffalo just a game out of the AFC East lead. Whether they can keep moving up depends largely on whether they can remember how they got this far.
BILLS MVP: Henry, with an assist from Gilbride. To be fair, it's not easy to stay committed to the run when your only ground options are special-teamers like Joe Burns and Ken Simonton. With Henry healthy again, there's no excuse for not using him. On Sunday, at least, Gilbride didn't need one.
THE OTHER GUYS' MVP: Not much to pick from here. We'll go with linebacker Jesse Armstead, who made 11 tackles and notched Washington's lone sack of the day. Which brings us to:
HANG IT UP AWARD: We're sure someone besides Bruce Smith cares if he surpasses Reggie White's career total for sacks (BillStuff refuses to call it an NFL record, since it only became an official statistic in 1982, conveniently ignoring the league's first 62 seasons). And he's in amazing shape for a guy playing in his 19th pro season, a remarkable achievement in itself.
But Bruce is finished. You wouldn't have known it from the amount of camera time he got yesterday, but he did nothing. OK, almost nothing -- he was credited with an assist on a tackle. That's it. One assist. Buffalo left tackle Jonas Jennings was able to pitch a shutout going one-on-one against the future Hall-of-Famer. That alone should have Bruce polishing his retirement speech.
LEAST-SEEN BRILLIANCE: Almost lost amidst Buffalo's offensive and defensive resurgence was another brilliant performer by punter Brian Moorman.
Practicing his craft while much of the audience headed for the stadium concession stands or the refrigerator at home, Moorman averaged 48.5 yards on six punts, including a 59-yarder, to help provide the Bills with the field position so crucial to basic power football.
WING REPORT: Sorry, BS just didn't have the appetite for wings Sunday. An order from Mighty Taco was typically brilliant, however. Why no one has taken this Western New York staple national always escapes us. Their chicken and steak items actually contain pieces of the advertised meat, instead of the flavored-paste-and-rice combo foisted upon the public by that national taco chain.
BS FAN(S) OF THE WEEK: For this week's honorees, we go off the board and out of the NFL altogether. While I'm not a Red Sox fan, I married into a family of them. Now that enough time has passed since Boston manager Grady Little's eighth-inning nap put the New York Yankees back in the World Series, it's safe to make the following points:
| Niagara Falls Reporter | www.niagarafallsreporter.com | October 21 2003 |