Are the Buffalo Bills Really Better Now Than They Were in the 90's?

Many loyal Bills fans would argue that the past few seasons have been the best for the team in its history, while others may bring up Jim Kelly’s Bills and their four straight years of going to the Super Bowl, arguing that the “older” Bills were always superior. The problem with this debate is that there really is no true way to decide which version of the Buffalo Bills is better, “Josh Allen's Bills,” or “Jim Kelly’s Bills.” 

Unfortunately, I have never been a huge football fan. I am, however, a fan of statistics. (In this case, I used statista.com and statmuse.com.) Through a comparison of stats from both eras of the Buffalo Bills, I think it’s possible to determine which version of the team is “better,” at least in certain measures. 

A common argument used to decide that Jim Kelly’s Bills were better is the knowledge that although the Bills have never won a Super Bowl, they did make it four years straight under Jim Kelly as the quarterback. That’s an impressive record, and it’s even better when you know that those four straight Super Bowls are the only times we’ve ever made it that far. So that must be the answer, then. Clearly, the older Buffalo Bills were better. 

Well, it’s not that simple. Jim Kelly joined the Buffalo Bills in 1986, and his first time with the team at the Super Bowl was in 1990, four years later. Josh Allen joined the Bills in 2018, six years ago. And though he hasn’t yet led the team to a Super Bowl, he has been making amazing progress with the team, taking us from a relatively good team with a strong fan base but not a particularly big threat to other teams, to a much more successful team with a huge fan base that’s famous throughout the country.

So while Jim Kelly was faster at bringing the Bills closer to a Super Bowl win, the current Bills are getting closer and closer each year. With the recent retirements and draft, the scales may finally be shifting in the Bills’ favor. 

The Bills franchise value has risen dramatically in the past few years, jumping up quite a bit in 2015, and then again at a huge margin in 2022. Fans have begun increasing quickly since 2015, and the Bills have once again become an extremely well-known team. 

So yes, maybe Jim Kelly’s version of the Buffalo Bills played generally better, at least so far. But it’s important not to leave Josh Allen and the current Bills out of celebration. The Bills are doing better than they have in decades, and the team is just getting better. Who knows, maybe we’ll actually win this year.