Former Bills nominated for College HOF

[Jim Gehman]

Four men with ties to the Buffalo Bills have been nominated for the National Football Foundation and College Hall of Fame. Wide receiver Marlin Briscoe; linebacker Tom Cousineau, who never actually played for Buffalo; guard Ruben Brown; and coach Dick Jauron.

 

The two who may not be familiar to younger Bills fans, Briscoe and Cousineau, talked about their experiences with the team in my book “Then Levy Said to Kelly…”

 

 

Marlin the Magician’s First Act

 

Less than nine months after Denver’s rookie quarterback Marlin Briscoe passed for 335 yards and four touchdowns during a 34-32 victory over the Bills, on August 20, 1969, he appeared in Buffalo’s training camp. As a wide receiver!

 

"After I had success my rookie year, I was not given the opportunity by [broncos coach] Lou Saban to compete for the job. I asked for my release thinking that some other teams would give me an opportunity, but that wasn’t the case," said Briscoe.

 

Discouraged, he gave the Canadian Football League a brief try, but found he didn’t enjoy that style of play. And so with the thought that they had witnessed his ability, Briscoe started calling AFL teams he had played well against.

 

"I’d almost beat the Oakland Raiders, and coach (John) Rauch was there, and then he got the job in Buffalo. So when I called, he said that he didn’t necessarily need a quarterback, but needed some help at wide receiver. Well, I had never played wide receiver in my life on any level. I was always the quarterback.

 

"He did say they had drafted James Harris and that they had Jack Kemp and Tom Flores, but they were all injured. So when I got there, he had me throw and learn the position. I was actually playing two positions until those guys got healed, and then I was primarily learning the receiver slot," Briscoe said. "The only way I made it through that period was that I had negotiated in my contract that they not cut me until the last cut. I didn’t want to come there knowing that I’d never played the position before and get cut immediately. So I studied films of Paul Warfield and Lance Alworth. And Bill Miller, who was the receivers’ coach, took a special interest in teaching me the position. He was really diligent about giving me all the information that I needed to at least have an opportunity."

 

Briscoe’s only chance to take advantage of that opportunity was on the practice field. He did not play during the preseason until the final game in Los Angeles. “I sat on the bench figuring they weren’t going to put me in and that was going to be it. Well, we were losing and Coach put me in in the last 10 minutes of the game, and Jack Kemp just kept throwing me the ball and I just kept catching it. At the end of the game, I was the leading receiver, so they couldn’t cut me.

 

"I ended up playing second-string behind Bubba Thornton, and they had Haven Moses on the other side. Bubba was a track star from T.C.U., a 100-meter man, but he wasn’t really a football player. So as I progressed week after week. I got the opportunity to get into games. First it was in the last quarter, then I would get in at halftime, and then it got to the point where Bubba would play a couple series and I would play the rest of the game."

 

When the AFL and NFL merged for the 1970 season, Thornton was gone and Briscoe was a starter. During Buffalo’s first NFL victory on October 4 against the New York Jets, 34–31, he had four receptions for 120 yards and two touchdowns including the game-winning 25-yard catch in the fourth quarter. "I had success against [cornerback] Steve Tannen for some reason. I guess I had his number. But to be up there against the likes of Joe Namath and that crew was very rewarding to come out successful."

 

Briscoe would successfully find the end zone six more times during the season and become the team’s first 1,000-yard wide receiver and Buffalo’s only player selected for the Pro Bowl.

 

 

Trading the No. 1

 

Tom Cousineau, Buffalo’s and the league’s number one draft pick in 1979, never found his way to the team’s training camp at Niagara University. He instead headed north of the border to play for the CFL’s Montreal Alouettes. But in March 1982, he bid au revoir to his Canadian team and returned home with the intention of playing in the NFL.

 

The Bills had retained the rights to the former Ohio State All-America linebacker during his CFL tenure and could have him on their roster by matching any contract offer an NFL team rendered him. And there were rumors that Buffalo planned to do just that. The Houston Oilers tested that speculation and signed him to a reported five-year, $3.5 million offer sheet sheet, which included a $1 million signing bonus.

 

The Bills matched it, only to then trade Cousineau to his hometown Cleveland Browns for their first-round draft choice in 1983, their third-round selection in 1984, and their fifth-round selection in 1985.

 

"The three years I was in Montreal, the company line out of the Buffalo front office was that if I was going to play in the NFL, I was going to wear a Buffalo uniform," said Cousineau. "We did our thing. We talked to a number of teams. We came out with what we feel is an excellent offer from the Houston Oilers. We signed a deal, the offer sheet was sent to the Bills, and then all of a sudden their stand wavers a bit. They don’t respond. At that point, I was pretty certain that something was going to happen. They were going to try to make a trade. The offer sheet was very simple. It was one page with about six lines, and they said that they had to analyze it. Well, I had given them more credit business-wise. To analyze something that was not very complex at all, I felt that they were looking for a way out of the situation, which they were.

 

"I didn’t speak to anybody from Buffalo. They never once called me during the time I was negotiating with other teams. What they wanted to do, basically, they said that they were going to match any offer that came down the pike, or across the table. I think they did that to scare people off, to intimidate them into not making an offer. Because what’s the use? Buffalo’s going to hit it anyway. Well, that wasn’t the case. I think that it got a little out of hand. They needed to talk with both myself and [my agent] Jimmy Walsh to come to terms. They couldn’t have made the deal themselves, and I think that’s where they made the mistake, with not talking to us and not trying to work things out."

 

Backtracking the three years to when he was initially drafted, did Cousineau even want things to be worked out and play for the Bills?

 

"I was very proud to be Buffalo’s number one pick in ’79," he said. "They let me know well in advance that they were going to draft me, and did I have any problems with that? I replied, ‘No,’ and that was the truth. The problem came when they offered me a very embarrassing contract. What made even less sense was when they didn’t sign me, they turned around and hired a man named Isiah Robertson. I don’t understand that! I think that my position was very well justified. It was pointed out even further with the Robertson deal."