Trent Edwards Leads Buffalo Bills

National Football League Blogcast, NFL Blogcast

Last weekend I spoke about the Buffalo Bills being “for real” in a hard fought win at Jacksonville. And I spoke of second year quarterback Trent Edwards “coming of age” as he led the Bills on a late scoring drive to take that game. In this afternoon’s come-from-behind 24-23 win over the Oakland Raiders, there was affirmation. And for everyone in Buffalo, it’s time to “Billieve.” The Buffalo Bills are 3-0 for the first time since 1992.

I can say the Bills won in spite of themselves. They turned the ball over three times — not a recipe for success in the National Football League. But they persevered. Safety Donte Whitner knows why:

“You have to stay mentally tough. That’s the difference between this year’s team and the past two years. There’s nothing different with the physical and not much different with the personnel except for a couple of new acquisitions. It’s the mental side of it. When things start getting hard we have the mental toughness to know we can still pull this thing off.”

The things they did well outweighed the things they did poorly. Buffalo only committed four penalties for 25 yards. The defense held a team under 100 yards rushing again. And the offense controlled the clock (34:27) and amassed 378 yards. But it was Trent Edwards’ resolve that led the Bills to this win.

Make no mistake, players need to block and catch and tackle. And they did. It is, after all, a team game. And the Bills understand the team concept very well. But as Trent Edwards goes, so will go this football team. And when the game was on the line, he responded by going 14-of-19 for 182 yards and a touchdown in the 4th quarter. I don’t want to put the kid up on a pedestal just yet, but it was the fourth time in 12 career starts that he rallied the Bills back when trailing or tied in the fourth quarter. Impressive. A sign of greatness? It just might be. More time will tell.

Source: BuffaloBills.com, Photo: Newscom