Another season down and the last losing campaign for the duration of this series. Despite a disappointing end to their season, 1987 proved to be an interesting ride. The strike and its drama along with the Bennett trade made it memorable without even considering on the field action.

Still, there were some noteworthy games to speak of as we take a look week to week:

Blockbuster trades. Fans love them. No matter how good or bad your team is, there's nothing like a shakeup on the roster to get your blood racing a bit. That's why we all have a blast with trade scenarios on video games, and websites like Hockey Buzz have a lot of traffic despite some of he misinformation.

As Buffalo fans, how many huge player exchanges can you remember over the last 15 years or so? The Sabres' Darcy Regier has been vilified for his inaction or lack of wow factor at trade deadline day. The Bills' swaps have been even less impressive, usually dumping a player for a mid-round draft pick (see Takeo Spikes, Willis McGahee, Lee Evans). In actuality, player for player trades just don't occur in the modern NFL all that much.

I debated whether I wanted to go through with this post. Do fans really want to read about a work stoppage from 1987 after just getting through the current lockout? Probably not. And I'd much rather be writing about some of the games and players from the 1987 Bills' season. But I do need to document the work stoppage for sake of thoroughness; it had an impactful effect on the season and some of the moments surrounding it were truly fascinating. The 90's Bills' journey cannot skip this step.

When I started making analogies between the 90's era Bills and our current team, I wasn't sure where it would lead. The more I dive into it, some of the similarities are cool. And just a little freaky. At the end of the last post I made the point that the 1986 and 2010 Bills were both 4-12. They were also both teams that suffered several heartbreaking losses but showed promise in some developing talent. New head coaches brought better direction and focus. While there's no guarantees of what's to come and the 1986 club had a sure-fire franchise QB, the parallels are still there.

Time to put the 1986 Buffalo Bills season to bed. This is probably a good thing. Even though it was an exciting time with the additions of Jim Kelly, Marv Levy, Steve Tasker, and Kent Hull, when your team goes 4-12 it's not parade time. The Bills took their lumps and learned they had the building blocks for a developing team. But there was much to be done.

When speaking with Steve Tasker at the uniform launch, he not only fondly recalled the moments spent with his teammates, but also made special mention of the coaches. He rattled off some names - Nick Nicolau (Receivers' Coach), Ted Marchibroda (Offensive Coordinator), Bruce Dehaven (Special Teams Coach). Before listing these names however, he started off with, "Of course, Marv." An important distinction. These two were deeply intertwined in Bills history.

The first two entries of this series have been very Jim Kelly centric. I thought it was important to start there as his arrival was probably the most pivotal moment in the Bills' turnaround. And I'm an unabashed Kelly fan, no doubt. But there were some ultra-important personnel moves prior to 1986 in the building of this team, namely in the draft. 

A few quick points on the men in charge making the decisions for these drafts. The deservedly revered Bill Polian wasn't promoted to GM until December 30, 1985, so some of these picks were made by the previous football guy, Terry Bledsoe. Polian originally held the position of director of pro personnel but after Bledsoe suffered a heart attack on February 7, 1985, Polian was one of the people who stepped up to handle contract negotiations. This included signing a certain Bruce Smith to his first NFL contact. And I'm guessing even though he was involved in the pro scouting side of things that Polian may have had some kind of involvement in drafts prior to his bump up. But it's important to give kudos to Bledsoe as the Bills landed many key players from 1983-1985.