Heading into the 2025 season, the Buffalo Bills appear in their best position to win an NFL championship in more than 30 years. Buffalo has never won a Super Bowl in the team's history which dates to the founding of the American Football League in 1960.
The AFL and NFLannounced a merger in January, 1966, and the first Super Bowl was played a year later. But it took the Bills another 23 years to get there for the first time.
Then, as has been well-chronicled, the Bills behind Hall of Fame quarterback Jim Kelly - and another Hall of Famer in coach Marv Levy - got to the Super Bowl a remarkable four years in a row, the only team in NFL history to accomplish that feat.
They also became the only team ever to lose four Super Bowls in a row.
But with a future Hall of Famer at quarterback in reigning NFL MVP Josh Allen, the Bills have qualified for the playoffs in each of the last six seasons, only to be eliminated by the Kansas City Chiefs in four of those playoff runs, including in the AFC Championship Game twice. (They lost to the Cincinnati Bengals and Houston Texans in the other two.)
That's why this season is generally described as a "Super Bowl or Bust" year for the Bills, with anything less than a Super Bowl victory considered a failed effort.
It was somewhat surprising, then, that when they announced their final 53-man roster on Tuesday, the Bills chose to enter the season with journeyman signal-caller Mitch Trubisky as Allen's only backup, should the three-time Pro Bowl pick be forced to miss time with an injury.
In keeping Trubisky, the Bills released their only quarterback to win a preseason game, former Chiefs 2021 undrafted free agent Shane Buechele.
At least Buechele can say he aced his audition, something at least one of the other 31 NFL teams seems likely to notice now that the 27-year-old out of SMU will hit the waiver wire.
In the preseason finale against the Tampa Bay Buccaneers on Saturday, Buechele played the entire game and staged what was described as a "breakout" performance, throwing for 278 yards and a touchdown, completing 25 of 30 pass attempts in the 23-19 Buffalo triumph.
For the entire preseason, Buechele completed 36 of 46 for 380 yards and an impressive quarterback rating of 108.3.
Trubisky completed 16 of 26 with one TD and a 97.1 rating.
In eight seasons with three different teams, including two separate stints in Buffalo, Trubisky has never lived up to the promise the Chicago Bears saw in him when they made him the No. 2 overall draft pick in 2017.
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