Speaker 1: Are you ready for this? Sean Merriman A one a
Speaker 1: hand effack boom boom boom, out go the light. This
Speaker 1: is Lights Out with Sean Merriman. What's up, guys, Welcome
Speaker 1: back for another Lights Out podcast with me, Sean Merriman,
Speaker 1: and UM got a special Bill's Mafia Special Buffalo Bill
Speaker 1: Special guests today. One of my former teammates, Fred Jackson.
Speaker 1: What and I still say, And maybe he's not underrated
Speaker 1: to a lot of guys, but he's not talked about,
Speaker 1: in my opinion, not talked about enough. Um. And how
Speaker 1: great of a running back he was, man, and coming
Speaker 1: and playing with Ladanian Thompson all those years and going
Speaker 1: out and and watching Fred work. Uh, it was. It
Speaker 1: was a treatment, a grinder. Dude had the best balance
Speaker 1: of any if anybody running back I've ever seen. I
Speaker 1: ever got a chance to play with. Um. It was
Speaker 1: so damn hard to bring him down and worked every day. Man,
Speaker 1: it was crazy. As we get a chance to talk
Speaker 1: about the teams that we had. UM. Also beating the
Speaker 1: Patriots and how crazy it was so now uh and
Speaker 1: we beat them in two thousand eleven and now watching
Speaker 1: the Bills play UM and how crazy that city would
Speaker 1: be if they want the NFC Championship game and then
Speaker 1: went to the Super Bowl, and how terrible it would be, uh,
Speaker 1: because the fans are not gonna be there enjoy it.
Speaker 1: So always hold a special place my heart, man, that
Speaker 1: the Buffalo Bills fans and the city of Buffalo really
Speaker 1: appreciate how always supported and treating me out there, and
Speaker 1: I always showed that love back. So one of the
Speaker 1: best ever doing Man Bills Mafia builds Buffalo Bills legend.
Speaker 1: Fred Jackson, what's up, my dude? How you doing? Man?
Speaker 1: Good man? How about yourself? I'm all right, I'm right, man.
Speaker 1: It's been a while, dude. I'm looking at everybody I
Speaker 1: talked to, Uh, Eric would last week I did this podcast, Um,
Speaker 1: and I talked to cal Boy. You know, I still
Speaker 1: talk you know, Stevie. But um, you know it's crazy, man,
Speaker 1: because it seemed like so long ago that you know,
Speaker 1: I came out that I was in I was with
Speaker 1: the charge of you know, most of my career, and
Speaker 1: I came out there and I still tell people to
Speaker 1: this day. Man, you know, I've never been a Buffalo.
Speaker 1: I didn't know nothing about nothing out there, and uh,
Speaker 1: they claimed me off of you know, off of the
Speaker 1: waivers basically, so I'm thinking of New York, right, I
Speaker 1: got no idea, what you know, Buffalo is New York
Speaker 1: to me. That's all I know is New York. So
Speaker 1: I got on the plane. At first, I wasn't gonna come,
Speaker 1: and Buddy Nicks was like, you know you're coming, and
Speaker 1: if you don't come, we're gonna find you ten thousand
Speaker 1: ills that. I said, Buddy, I want I'll come back
Speaker 1: out there after the season. But I think at the time,
Speaker 1: you know, you guys were like, oh and six, so
Speaker 1: you know you're having a rough season, like oh when
Speaker 1: six something like that. And I said, Buddy, I got
Speaker 1: right after the season. Whoever I go to right now,
Speaker 1: let me just get get a chance to go to
Speaker 1: the playoffs. I'll come visit. You'll be the first visit
Speaker 1: I take. Right after the season, said Sean, I don't
Speaker 1: I don't care. You're coming out here, and if you
Speaker 1: don't come out here, it's gonna be ten thousand dollars
Speaker 1: a day. And I said, all right, cool, And I
Speaker 1: called Russ and said, Russ, send me that plane. But
Speaker 1: though I got out there and I had on Jordan's
Speaker 1: shorts and the sweatshirt and the flip flops because that's
Speaker 1: what I had on the San Diego and boy, I
Speaker 1: ain't never seen so much snow before in my life.
Speaker 1: It was like two ft of snow. I got off
Speaker 1: the jet. I couldn't even see them. Buddy Nixon, Russ
Speaker 1: and everybody at the end dug at the end of
Speaker 1: the runway because it was a blizzard. And I came
Speaker 1: in there. I think all all y'all were gone. But
Speaker 1: the first person I've seen was was Stevie, and I
Speaker 1: had a real heart to heart man, good commistion, my
Speaker 1: first time being a Stevie. And then I met all
Speaker 1: you guys and I was like, man, this is this
Speaker 1: is cool as hell because you never really know what
Speaker 1: they expect when you've been one organization so long and
Speaker 1: you go somewhere else. But we had a squad man.
Speaker 1: I tell people that the team, and I still to
Speaker 1: this day I tell people and I talk about Buffalo
Speaker 1: my time. Then I'm like, we want a lot of
Speaker 1: games and with the charges. But I came and looked
Speaker 1: at the team. Kyle Williams, you um you know, uh
Speaker 1: Fitzy was playing, was playing crazy. Stevie Johnson. I mean,
Speaker 1: you know, Kelsey, we I mean it was stacked out
Speaker 1: there with guys and I just didn't understand, man, like,
Speaker 1: why you know, why why everything wasn't better? You know
Speaker 1: what I mean? Because you look at the teams we
Speaker 1: had a squad. Yeah, And I to that day, to
Speaker 1: this day, still trying to figure that out. You know,
Speaker 1: I'm looking at how well these guys are playing this,
Speaker 1: you know, this year, and you know, I look at
Speaker 1: it and I think what happened to us is we
Speaker 1: had a tremendously talented the team, like you said, but
Speaker 1: when we had guys get hurt and key positions, we
Speaker 1: didn't have the depth that these guys have, you know.
Speaker 1: And it came back to bite us and asked you know,
Speaker 1: I don't know three or four times a year that
Speaker 1: year in but I mean I look back at it
Speaker 1: and I say, the what if if we had all
Speaker 1: just stayed healthy, which is you know, asking for a
Speaker 1: lot in the NFL. But if we all could have
Speaker 1: stayed healthy, what we would have been able to to
Speaker 1: do I would have been a lot of fun to
Speaker 1: be a part of. Man, And you know some and
Speaker 1: I'll get to you know the team and they got now.
Speaker 1: But and I'll tell you that when we did, and
Speaker 1: when everybody was healthy, you couldn't tell me nothing. I
Speaker 1: thought for sure that we were gonna run. We're gonna
Speaker 1: run the table against everybody. Yeah, I mean we were.
Speaker 1: We were lights out. I mean for the reason we were.
Speaker 1: We were out there making plays, cracking heads, winning football games.
Speaker 1: And you it just took one injury at one position
Speaker 1: and as soon as that happened, and I mean, the
Speaker 1: wheels just fell off. We we tried to overcompensate with
Speaker 1: another position get hurt there, and uh, it was it
Speaker 1: was a lot of fun. But the what IF's about
Speaker 1: that seasons or those seasons, you know, a couple of seasons,
Speaker 1: um where it's just like, man, we could have done
Speaker 1: a lot more with what we had in the building,
Speaker 1: you right, dude. And it was crazy because and I
Speaker 1: and I bring the charges up something. I look at
Speaker 1: the teams very similar and we you know, we got
Speaker 1: you know, certain eyes in certain positions or whatever. But
Speaker 1: if you look across the board, it was very similar
Speaker 1: to what I had. But also what was different, and
Speaker 1: I never experienced this was the fans. You know, people
Speaker 1: came to our games when I played for the charge
Speaker 1: because we won a lot of games, but that love
Speaker 1: that was in Buffalo was a different type of of
Speaker 1: something that I've never seen before because, um, you know
Speaker 1: again when I got there, it was like, you know,
Speaker 1: the team was like on six on seven and the
Speaker 1: fans the stadium was still packed. Yeah. And that's the
Speaker 1: thing about Bill's mafia, through and through, they support no
Speaker 1: matter what. You know, you talk about lifelong fans that
Speaker 1: have been there since they were going to spot straight
Speaker 1: Super Bowls and then they come to you know, like
Speaker 1: you said, we started out that season with one in six,
Speaker 1: one and seven, whatever it was, and it's still the
Speaker 1: same people filling up those stands that are teaching their
Speaker 1: kids a lot of time, they're you know, one year old,
Speaker 1: they're sitting in the stands with them and it could
Speaker 1: be four ft of snow out on the ground. We
Speaker 1: are six and nine going into the final game of season,
Speaker 1: and we can still expect seven thousand people to be
Speaker 1: in the stands And and that's what was so crazy
Speaker 1: to me. And you know, being on the West Coast
Speaker 1: the whole time you're walking on the street and people
Speaker 1: like stopping asking for pictures. You know, I'll be on
Speaker 1: a little date or something like that with you know,
Speaker 1: with a with a chick or or doing something and
Speaker 1: you got somebody like trying to record you secretly from
Speaker 1: the corner or jumping out the bushes teams and you
Speaker 1: always had that. I remember when I first got out
Speaker 1: there to Buffalo and I'm walking down the street. Nobody
Speaker 1: stopped me from pictures, but people across the street was like, yo,
Speaker 1: what's up? Lights and kept it moving like they were
Speaker 1: a second or third cousin, like I knew them forever.
Speaker 1: And it was, like I said, but it was just
Speaker 1: a different um, you know, family vibe out there with
Speaker 1: the support and I always say that I believe, in
Speaker 1: my opinion of Buffet, the Buffalo has the best fans
Speaker 1: in football. Yeah, I mean, without a doubt. And and
Speaker 1: speaking on that what you just said. It always gets
Speaker 1: me in trouble because I'll be walking down the street,
Speaker 1: somebody will come up to me and they'll be like, hey,
Speaker 1: what's up Fred, Yeah, man, I know I just saw
Speaker 1: Brandon doing this and that. It's all Jay doing this
Speaker 1: and that, and then they take off and they'd be
Speaker 1: like gapped me up and take off, and I'm like, man,
Speaker 1: I don't know if I know this person like like
Speaker 1: we've been pooled forever, or if this is just a
Speaker 1: random fan, because that's how they treat you. They treat
Speaker 1: you like your family and you've known them for all
Speaker 1: all your life and that's just how they kick it
Speaker 1: out there. What you think the difference is now the
Speaker 1: teams they have, because obviously we we had some stars,
Speaker 1: like some bona fide dogs when we played, and that
Speaker 1: we was back there at that time, and you know
Speaker 1: even before when you played, before I got there. What
Speaker 1: you think the difference is outside of the depth, right um,
Speaker 1: than the than the team and how they've been able
Speaker 1: to figure this figure this thing out because you know,
Speaker 1: like I said, I look back at the teams that
Speaker 1: we had, You're like, man, we should have easily been
Speaker 1: you know ten and six or eleven and five or
Speaker 1: something like that. Every year. Yeah, you know, And I
Speaker 1: mean they say players player and coaches coach, But I
Speaker 1: think when you look at what the the whole front
Speaker 1: off us from top down from Brandon Been to to
Speaker 1: McDermott to Dable to President Fraser, all those all those guys,
Speaker 1: and you know, the position guys, the position coaches they
Speaker 1: ate they scheme whoever it is that they play really
Speaker 1: really well. And you see one week is one guy
Speaker 1: that's making one week is Cold Beasily making twelve catches
Speaker 1: for a hundred and fifty yards, and next week it's Diggs.
Speaker 1: Diggs has been consistently putting up numbers. But then you
Speaker 1: have John Brown coming in, then you have Single Tarry,
Speaker 1: then you have you know, Moss. I think they do
Speaker 1: such a tremendous job going in with a different game
Speaker 1: plan every week. Last week, you think Lamar Jackson is
Speaker 1: gonna be obviously the focal point on the defense, which
Speaker 1: had had been struggling and as a as a run
Speaker 1: defensive unit as a whole, and you think, okay, Baltimore,
Speaker 1: the number one rushing team in the league, is gonna
Speaker 1: come in and they're just gonna try and buying the
Speaker 1: ball down the bill's throat, which is if you're the
Speaker 1: number one wrestling team in the league, that's what you
Speaker 1: want to do. Anyway, they had everything so schemed up,
Speaker 1: whether it was poorer or or hide coming down and
Speaker 1: being a knap to to Jackson, that they couldn't get
Speaker 1: all that going. I think the coaching staff just does
Speaker 1: a tremendous job putting those guys in the right situations
Speaker 1: and scheming up ways to stop people on defense and
Speaker 1: make and get all their playmakers whoever it is involved
Speaker 1: on offense. And when you have a team like that
Speaker 1: that's built the way that this team is built, it
Speaker 1: allows you to make a lot of plays, no, no doubt.
Speaker 1: I don't know if you remember what happened we played
Speaker 1: the Patriots. It was in what two thousand, I think
Speaker 1: it was an eleven, eleven or twelve when we beat him.
Speaker 1: You know Tom Brady eleven he threw four in exceptions.
Speaker 1: And I've never seen nothing like that before in the city.
Speaker 1: Remember how crazy they weren't crazy? You would have thought
Speaker 1: we want a super Bowl. You thought we want to
Speaker 1: super Bowl. And I remember the city being shut down
Speaker 1: and then everybody was just outside. I never it was
Speaker 1: like a movie. I've never seen anything like that before
Speaker 1: before my life. It's a hundred thousand plus people in
Speaker 1: the parking lot. I think it took me about two
Speaker 1: two hours to get out the stadium. What do you
Speaker 1: think that things don't look like the O And when
Speaker 1: this game end up going to the Super Bowl, man, look,
Speaker 1: I will pray for Buffalo. Look, I want them to
Speaker 1: win so bad. I want them to get to the
Speaker 1: super Bowl. But I'm also like, in the back of
Speaker 1: my mind, I just know how bad not being able
Speaker 1: to experience it like they would want to. It's gonna
Speaker 1: hurt the city. But how they'll be so ecstatic on
Speaker 1: the other hand, because they they they they eat, breathe, sleep,
Speaker 1: drink Buffalo Bills. So it will mean the world to
Speaker 1: those guys. If I mean, these guys are capable of
Speaker 1: doing it. If they go on get to the super
Speaker 1: Bowl and you know, I have a chance to win
Speaker 1: that it's the city's gonna be shut down for a month.
Speaker 1: They're gonna have to shut down four months. Oh, I
Speaker 1: said the same thing. And that's what to me was
Speaker 1: sucked the most out of it, because there's they're having
Speaker 1: one of their best years, you know, since you know
Speaker 1: that since the nineties probably and the fans do. The
Speaker 1: fans aren't even able to come and experience that. That's like,
Speaker 1: to me, that's tragic. It is it's tragic. And I
Speaker 1: and I also jokingly, I'm also like, man, I know
Speaker 1: how crazy Bills Mafia is. When we're like I said,
Speaker 1: when we're five and eleven. I can't imagine what that
Speaker 1: parking lot would be like in the a f C
Speaker 1: Championship game right now, pre game, Like, I just can't
Speaker 1: imagine or fathom what it would be like because I
Speaker 1: know that, I mean, the nation would run out of tables,
Speaker 1: there would be no condiments left anywhere in the nation
Speaker 1: because all love it will be in or Park, New
Speaker 1: York at the Bill City. Dude, I joked around, uh
Speaker 1: because the Charges played the Bills a couple of years ago. Yeah,
Speaker 1: to two teams. They're playing against each other. So I
Speaker 1: was going to go out there and I was about
Speaker 1: to put about to put through the two tables. Look,
Speaker 1: I had a whole parking lot rented out right They said, Sean,
Speaker 1: you could do it here. So they've rented me out,
Speaker 1: got the the permits, got everything set, and I talked
Speaker 1: about right at like two days before my flight. I
Speaker 1: was about to uh, before I flew out there, the
Speaker 1: Bills are called me and they said, hey, can you
Speaker 1: you know, can you not do that? And this next
Speaker 1: we're trying to I said, there's no you can stop
Speaker 1: me from doing it. And you know, of course I'm
Speaker 1: gonna respect the organization and show love if they called me,
Speaker 1: But you're not gonna stop. Fifty plus thousand people hunted
Speaker 1: thout like that's their thing. That's their thing and ain't
Speaker 1: never going away. And quite frankly, it's it's kind of
Speaker 1: showing the country, the rest of the country on how
Speaker 1: the Bills fans roll, like that's how they get down.
Speaker 1: I remember just pulling into the stadium and it's it's
Speaker 1: the closest thing I can remind me up is a movie. Yeah,
Speaker 1: And I think, you know, for for this is not
Speaker 1: something we experienced this, you know, and this is just
Speaker 1: how they've always been, Like it's just now being brought
Speaker 1: to to the national forefront just because how well this
Speaker 1: team is doing. But man, I I I cannot imagine
Speaker 1: what that city will be like they win this game
Speaker 1: and get to the super Bowl, They're gonna have to
Speaker 1: fly some helicopters in the something and keep an eye
Speaker 1: on it because that that city is gonna be crazy.
Speaker 1: So I'm telling you right now, they go to the
Speaker 1: super Bowl, I'm flying my ass out there somebody going
Speaker 1: through a damn table. I don't care the organization think.
Speaker 1: I don't care how mad NFL is. That mean, I
Speaker 1: don't care I'm flying my ass out there because you know,
Speaker 1: it's just my short time there. I I can't even
Speaker 1: stop talking about it because it's it's like a place
Speaker 1: that you attached to forever. You don't even have to
Speaker 1: be there no more. I don't. I don't know, and
Speaker 1: I mean obviously know Digs he went to Maryland and
Speaker 1: stuff like, I know a couple of the guys, but
Speaker 1: I didn't play for that team. But for some reason,
Speaker 1: I always feel attached to that organization, attached to the city,
Speaker 1: because that's just what it do to you. Yeah, I mean,
Speaker 1: it's it's and that's the thing about it. It doesn't
Speaker 1: matter where you are in the nation. You know, you
Speaker 1: step foot in Buffalo, those guys are gonna treat you
Speaker 1: the same way no matter what. Like you're like you're
Speaker 1: one of the current guys playing. And that's always how
Speaker 1: Bills Monfia has gotten down. You know, I was blessed.
Speaker 1: I spent nine years in that organization, you know, walking
Speaker 1: the streets with those fans and it, I mean, it
Speaker 1: just you just feel like you're right at home whenever
Speaker 1: you're amongst him. Dope, man, Hey, well I'm gonna let
Speaker 1: you go ahead, get up out of here. I know
Speaker 1: you've got some stuff to do. I appreciate you, Manay
Speaker 1: we have some good time and then you know, you
Speaker 1: know it's from gonna bring up this last thing. Used
Speaker 1: to used to go and wrestle everybody in locker room, right,
Speaker 1: I used to. I used to sit back and laugh
Speaker 1: because I was waiting for that one day you came
Speaker 1: over and tried you grabbed everybody else was taking guys
Speaker 1: to the ground, and I said, one day, Fred gonna
Speaker 1: come over and try to grab me. I was waiting
Speaker 1: on it. You never did, but she was always wrestling
Speaker 1: to dude in the locker room. I ain't grabbing you, man.
Speaker 1: You was always that crazy dude. I was like, Sean
Speaker 1: might actually snap on me, man, for real. So I'm
Speaker 1: gonna just leave him alone. I'm gonna just kind of
Speaker 1: set back and do my dream with these dudes. I
Speaker 1: know he liked to flip that switch every now and then,
Speaker 1: and all need to be on the other side of that.
Speaker 1: So that's why I never grabbed you. Hey, my dog man,
Speaker 1: I appreciate you with root for them boys this weekend,
Speaker 1: that sir, all day every day. Alright, my dude, taken easy,
Speaker 1: no problem. Man, I appreciate you guys. Thanks guys, I
Speaker 1: appreciate it for listening. And again to another lights Out
Speaker 1: podcast with me Sean Raymond. Uh, that was dope. That
Speaker 1: was really dope for me. Um. You know, Fred to
Speaker 1: me was always like one of the unsung here rolls.
Speaker 1: This dude worked, uh and it was a lot of
Speaker 1: TV games and stuff like that in Buffalo, So guys,
Speaker 1: wasn't talked about another but he He's definitely one of
Speaker 1: the guys that should have been. Shouldn't it should Still
Speaker 1: to this day we talked about and how special to
Speaker 1: the city of Buffalo, and that's in the Bills Mafia
Speaker 1: fans were to all of us, UM rooting like hell
Speaker 1: for my guys this upcoming weekend. UM, and also to
Speaker 1: get a championship because we know how important that is
Speaker 1: to the city. UM, and we wish to the Buffalo
Speaker 1: Bills fans the Bill Bills Mafia was able to experience it.
Speaker 1: But we are rooting the spirit. So thanks again, man,
Speaker 1: I appreciate you guys listening. Then keep leaving those great
Speaker 1: reviews and subscribe, subscribe, subscribe, appreciate it. We'll be back
Speaker 1: next week with another hot one.