Former Bills Running Back Fred Jackson Joins Shawne To Discuss How Great It Was Playing For The Bills

in my opinion, not talked about enough. Um. And how great of a running back he was, man, and coming and playing with Ladanian Thompson all those years and going out and and watching Fred work. Uh, it was. It was a treatment, a grinder. Dude had the best balance of any if anybody running back I've ever seen. I ever got a chance to play with. Um. It was so damn hard to bring him down and worked every day. Man, it was crazy. As we get a chance to talk

about the teams that we had. UM. Also beating the Patriots and how crazy it was so now uh and we beat them in two thousand eleven and now watching the Bills play UM and how crazy that city would be if they want the NFC Championship game and then went to the Super Bowl, and how terrible it would be, uh, because the fans are not gonna be there enjoy it.

So always hold a special place my heart, man, that the Buffalo Bills fans and the city of Buffalo really appreciate how always supported and treating me out there, and I always showed that love back. So one of the best ever doing Man Bills Mafia builds Buffalo Bills legend. Fred Jackson, what's up, my dude? How you doing? Man? Good man? How about yourself? I'm all right, I'm right, man.

It's been a while, dude. I'm looking at everybody I talked to, Uh, Eric would last week I did this podcast, Um, and I talked to cal Boy. You know, I still talk you know, Stevie. But um, you know it's crazy, man, because it seemed like so long ago that you know, I came out that I was in I was with the charge of you know, most of my career, and I came out there and I still tell people to this day. Man, you know, I've never been a Buffalo.

I didn't know nothing about nothing out there, and uh, they claimed me off of you know, off of the waivers basically, so I'm thinking of New York, right, I got no idea, what you know, Buffalo is New York to me. That's all I know is New York. So I got on the plane. At first, I wasn't gonna come, and Buddy Nicks was like, you know you're coming, and if you don't come, we're gonna find you ten thousand ills that. I said, Buddy, I want I'll come back

out there after the season. But I think at the time, you know, you guys were like, oh and six, so you know you're having a rough season, like oh when six something like that. And I said, Buddy, I got right after the season. Whoever I go to right now, let me just get get a chance to go to the playoffs. I'll come visit. You'll be the first visit I take. Right after the season, said Sean, I don't

I don't care. You're coming out here, and if you don't come out here, it's gonna be ten thousand dollars a day. And I said, all right, cool, And I called Russ and said, Russ, send me that plane. But though I got out there and I had on Jordan's shorts and the sweatshirt and the flip flops because that's what I had on the San Diego and boy, I ain't never seen so much snow before in my life. It was like two ft of snow. I got off

the jet. I couldn't even see them. Buddy Nixon, Russ and everybody at the end dug at the end of the runway because it was a blizzard. And I came in there. I think all all y'all were gone. But the first person I've seen was was Stevie, and I had a real heart to heart man, good commistion, my first time being a Stevie. And then I met all you guys and I was like, man, this is this is cool as hell because you never really know what they expect when you've been one organization so long and

you go somewhere else. But we had a squad man. I tell people that the team, and I still to this day I tell people and I talk about Buffalo my time. Then I'm like, we want a lot of games and with the charges. But I came and looked at the team. Kyle Williams, you um you know, uh Fitzy was playing, was playing crazy. Stevie Johnson. I mean, you know, Kelsey, we I mean it was stacked out there with guys and I just didn't understand, man, like, why you know, why why everything wasn't better? You know

what I mean? Because you look at the teams we had a squad. Yeah, And I to that day, to this day, still trying to figure that out. You know, I'm looking at how well these guys are playing this, you know, this year, and you know, I look at it and I think what happened to us is we had a tremendously talented the team, like you said, but when we had guys get hurt and key positions, we didn't have the depth that these guys have, you know.

And it came back to bite us and asked you know, I don't know three or four times a year that year in but I mean I look back at it and I say, the what if if we had all just stayed healthy, which is you know, asking for a lot in the NFL. But if we all could have stayed healthy, what we would have been able to to do I would have been a lot of fun to be a part of. Man, And you know some and I'll get to you know the team and they got now. But and I'll tell you that when we did, and

when everybody was healthy, you couldn't tell me nothing. I thought for sure that we were gonna run. We're gonna run the table against everybody. Yeah, I mean we were. We were lights out. I mean for the reason we were. We were out there making plays, cracking heads, winning football games. And you it just took one injury at one position and as soon as that happened, and I mean, the wheels just fell off. We we tried to overcompensate with another position get hurt there, and uh, it was it

was a lot of fun. But the what IF's about that seasons or those seasons, you know, a couple of seasons, um where it's just like, man, we could have done a lot more with what we had in the building, you right, dude. And it was crazy because and I and I bring the charges up something. I look at the teams very similar and we you know, we got you know, certain eyes in certain positions or whatever. But if you look across the board, it was very similar to what I had. But also what was different, and

I never experienced this was the fans. You know, people came to our games when I played for the charge because we won a lot of games, but that love that was in Buffalo was a different type of of something that I've never seen before because, um, you know again when I got there, it was like, you know, the team was like on six on seven and the fans the stadium was still packed. Yeah. And that's the thing about Bill's mafia, through and through, they support no

matter what. You know, you talk about lifelong fans that have been there since they were going to spot straight Super Bowls and then they come to you know, like you said, we started out that season with one in six, one and seven, whatever it was, and it's still the same people filling up those stands that are teaching their kids a lot of time, they're you know, one year old, they're sitting in the stands with them and it could

be four ft of snow out on the ground. We are six and nine going into the final game of season, and we can still expect seven thousand people to be in the stands And and that's what was so crazy to me. And you know, being on the West Coast the whole time you're walking on the street and people

like stopping asking for pictures. You know, I'll be on a little date or something like that with you know, with a with a chick or or doing something and you got somebody like trying to record you secretly from the corner or jumping out the bushes teams and you always had that. I remember when I first got out there to Buffalo and I'm walking down the street. Nobody stopped me from pictures, but people across the street was like, yo,

what's up? Lights and kept it moving like they were a second or third cousin, like I knew them forever. And it was, like I said, but it was just a different um, you know, family vibe out there with the support and I always say that I believe, in my opinion of Buffet, the Buffalo has the best fans in football. Yeah, I mean, without a doubt. And and

speaking on that what you just said. It always gets me in trouble because I'll be walking down the street, somebody will come up to me and they'll be like, hey, what's up Fred, Yeah, man, I know I just saw Brandon doing this and that. It's all Jay doing this and that, and then they take off and they'd be like gapped me up and take off, and I'm like, man, I don't know if I know this person like like we've been pooled forever, or if this is just a

random fan, because that's how they treat you. They treat you like your family and you've known them for all all your life and that's just how they kick it out there. What you think the difference is now the teams they have, because obviously we we had some stars, like some bona fide dogs when we played, and that we was back there at that time, and you know

even before when you played, before I got there. What you think the difference is outside of the depth, right um, than the than the team and how they've been able to figure this figure this thing out because you know, like I said, I look back at the teams that we had, You're like, man, we should have easily been you know ten and six or eleven and five or

something like that. Every year. Yeah, you know, And I mean they say players player and coaches coach, But I think when you look at what the the whole front off us from top down from Brandon Been to to McDermott to Dable to President Fraser, all those all those guys, and you know, the position guys, the position coaches they ate they scheme whoever it is that they play really

really well. And you see one week is one guy that's making one week is Cold Beasily making twelve catches for a hundred and fifty yards, and next week it's Diggs. Diggs has been consistently putting up numbers. But then you have John Brown coming in, then you have Single Tarry, then you have you know, Moss. I think they do such a tremendous job going in with a different game

plan every week. Last week, you think Lamar Jackson is gonna be obviously the focal point on the defense, which had had been struggling and as a as a run defensive unit as a whole, and you think, okay, Baltimore, the number one rushing team in the league, is gonna come in and they're just gonna try and buying the ball down the bill's throat, which is if you're the number one wrestling team in the league, that's what you

want to do. Anyway, they had everything so schemed up, whether it was poorer or or hide coming down and being a knap to to Jackson, that they couldn't get all that going. I think the coaching staff just does a tremendous job putting those guys in the right situations and scheming up ways to stop people on defense and make and get all their playmakers whoever it is involved

on offense. And when you have a team like that that's built the way that this team is built, it allows you to make a lot of plays, no, no doubt. I don't know if you remember what happened we played the Patriots. It was in what two thousand, I think it was an eleven, eleven or twelve when we beat him. You know Tom Brady eleven he threw four in exceptions. And I've never seen nothing like that before in the city. Remember how crazy they weren't crazy? You would have thought

we want a super Bowl. You thought we want to super Bowl. And I remember the city being shut down and then everybody was just outside. I never it was like a movie. I've never seen anything like that before before my life. It's a hundred thousand plus people in the parking lot. I think it took me about two two hours to get out the stadium. What do you think that things don't look like the O And when this game end up going to the Super Bowl, man, look, I will pray for Buffalo. Look, I want them to

win so bad. I want them to get to the super Bowl. But I'm also like, in the back of my mind, I just know how bad not being able to experience it like they would want to. It's gonna hurt the city. But how they'll be so ecstatic on the other hand, because they they they they eat, breathe, sleep, drink Buffalo Bills. So it will mean the world to those guys. If I mean, these guys are capable of

doing it. If they go on get to the super Bowl and you know, I have a chance to win that it's the city's gonna be shut down for a month. They're gonna have to shut down four months. Oh, I said the same thing. And that's what to me was sucked the most out of it, because there's they're having one of their best years, you know, since you know that since the nineties probably and the fans do. The fans aren't even able to come and experience that. That's like,

to me, that's tragic. It is it's tragic. And I and I also jokingly, I'm also like, man, I know how crazy Bills Mafia is. When we're like I said,

when we're five and eleven. I can't imagine what that parking lot would be like in the a f C Championship game right now, pre game, Like, I just can't imagine or fathom what it would be like because I know that, I mean, the nation would run out of tables, there would be no condiments left anywhere in the nation because all love it will be in or Park, New York at the Bill City. Dude, I joked around, uh because the Charges played the Bills a couple of years ago. Yeah,

to two teams. They're playing against each other. So I was going to go out there and I was about to put about to put through the two tables. Look, I had a whole parking lot rented out right They said, Sean, you could do it here. So they've rented me out, got the the permits, got everything set, and I talked about right at like two days before my flight. I was about to uh, before I flew out there, the Bills are called me and they said, hey, can you

you know, can you not do that? And this next we're trying to I said, there's no you can stop me from doing it. And you know, of course I'm gonna respect the organization and show love if they called me, But you're not gonna stop. Fifty plus thousand people hunted thout like that's their thing. That's their thing and ain't never going away. And quite frankly, it's it's kind of showing the country, the rest of the country on how the Bills fans roll, like that's how they get down.

I remember just pulling into the stadium and it's it's the closest thing I can remind me up is a movie. Yeah, And I think, you know, for for this is not something we experienced this, you know, and this is just how they've always been, Like it's just now being brought to to the national forefront just because how well this

team is doing. But man, I I I cannot imagine what that city will be like they win this game and get to the super Bowl, They're gonna have to fly some helicopters in the something and keep an eye on it because that that city is gonna be crazy. So I'm telling you right now, they go to the super Bowl, I'm flying my ass out there somebody going through a damn table. I don't care the organization think. I don't care how mad NFL is. That mean, I don't care I'm flying my ass out there because you know,

it's just my short time there. I I can't even stop talking about it because it's it's like a place that you attached to forever. You don't even have to be there no more. I don't. I don't know, and I mean obviously know Digs he went to Maryland and stuff like, I know a couple of the guys, but I didn't play for that team. But for some reason, I always feel attached to that organization, attached to the city, because that's just what it do to you. Yeah, I mean,

it's it's and that's the thing about it. It doesn't matter where you are in the nation. You know, you step foot in Buffalo, those guys are gonna treat you the same way no matter what. Like you're like you're one of the current guys playing. And that's always how Bills Monfia has gotten down. You know, I was blessed. I spent nine years in that organization, you know, walking the streets with those fans and it, I mean, it just you just feel like you're right at home whenever

you're amongst him. Dope, man, Hey, well I'm gonna let you go ahead, get up out of here. I know you've got some stuff to do. I appreciate you, Manay we have some good time and then you know, you know it's from gonna bring up this last thing. Used to used to go and wrestle everybody in locker room, right, I used to. I used to sit back and laugh because I was waiting for that one day you came over and tried you grabbed everybody else was taking guys to the ground, and I said, one day, Fred gonna

come over and try to grab me. I was waiting on it. You never did, but she was always wrestling to dude in the locker room. I ain't grabbing you, man. You was always that crazy dude. I was like, Sean might actually snap on me, man, for real. So I'm gonna just leave him alone. I'm gonna just kind of set back and do my dream with these dudes. I know he liked to flip that switch every now and then, and all need to be on the other side of that.

So that's why I never grabbed you. Hey, my dog man, I appreciate you with root for them boys this weekend, that sir, all day every day. Alright, my dude, taken easy, no problem. Man, I appreciate you guys. Thanks guys, I appreciate it for listening. And again to another lights Out podcast with me Sean Raymond. Uh, that was dope. That was really dope for me. Um. You know, Fred to me was always like one of the unsung here rolls.

This dude worked, uh and it was a lot of TV games and stuff like that in Buffalo, So guys, wasn't talked about another but he He's definitely one of the guys that should have been. Shouldn't it should Still to this day we talked about and how special to the city of Buffalo, and that's in the Bills Mafia fans were to all of us, UM rooting like hell for my guys this upcoming weekend. UM, and also to get a championship because we know how important that is

to the city. UM, and we wish to the Buffalo Bills fans the Bill Bills Mafia was able to experience it. But we are rooting the spirit. So thanks again, man, I appreciate you guys listening. Then keep leaving those great reviews and subscribe, subscribe, subscribe, appreciate it. We'll be back next week with another hot one.