‘You sent me there to die’

It was an unassuming winter evening in Western New York, the gray clouds that hung heavy across the sky indistinguishable from those visible on any other night of the season.

However, emanating from One Bills Drive, there was an unexpected bright spot, a proverbial beacon of light that transformed this seemingly routine March evening into something else entirely.

The Buffalo Bills agreed to acquire two-time All-Pro running back LeSean McCoy from the Philadelphia Eagles on March 3, 2015, a bold move by new head coach Rex Ryan that suggested the team wanted to move out of depths of uselessness and stepping into the NFL spotlight. “Shady”, at this point in his NFL career, had totaled 6,792 rushing yards in six seasons and was almost universally regarded as one of the best running backs in football; he was traded for Kiko Alonso, a promising young linebacker who had missed the entire previous season with an ACL injury.

McCoy was rightly shocked; A native of Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, who played collegiately at Pitt, he had never played football outside of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania and never really intended to. Adding to the shock was the fact that he had never heard of the player he was traded for.

“(NFL agent) Drew Rosenhaus, he called me, he said ‘Shady.’ . . “It’s not a joke,’ that’s the first thing he says to me, he doesn’t even say hello to me,” McCoy said in an interview with recent episode of The 25/10 Show, a podcast hosted by him and his former teammate DeSean Jackson. “Shady, this is no joke, the Eagles are trading you to the Buffalo Bills. » I said, ‘Hey, stop playing, what do you want man? What do you want, Drew? I’m busy. He said, “I’m not playing, Shady. They trade you.

“I’m like, ‘Are they trading me? The next thing I say is, “Who are they trading me for?” “I’m thinking two second-rounders, a good player, this, that, a third. He says “Kiko Alonso”. I paused, said, “Who is that?” Let me get it. Wait, Drew, how is that spelled? Who is that guy ?! I don’t know who this guy is!’ Do you know where he went to school? Oregon.”

The Oregon connection noted by McCoy is paramount to the story; Then-Philadelphia head coach Chip Kelly, who at the time of the trade had recently taken full control of the team’s 90-player roster, led the University of Oregon from 2009 to 2012. Kelly trading a beloved All-Pro who was one of the best in the league at his position for a promising, but unproven, young linebacker he had ties to was quite the example of the coach exercising his control or “putting his stamp”. on the list.

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And it would be the final nail in the coffin of the often rocky relationship between McCoy and Kelly, which the running back has spoken openly about in the past.

The trade, which caught McCoy off guard given his excellence on the field and his documented ties to Pennsylvania, sowed doubt for the running back: Is he on the decline? Is he not good enough? Commerce he said more about LeSean McCoy than Chip Kelly?

“That was the first time it was like, yo, you’re not good enough, we don’t want you,” McCoy said. “And I said to myself: is this my football? . . . I led the league in rushing the year before, All-Pro, first team, all that. The following year, I was third in the running race. He said I had a year refused. You didn’t send me to Buffalo because you thought it was the best decision for your team, you sent me there to die.

McCoy wouldn’t die in Buffalo, he would. prosper. He quickly became a fan favorite as he reaffirmed his status as one of the best running backs in the league, totaling 3,814 yards and 25 touchdowns during his four seasons with the team. Although he didn’t necessarily expect to like his new surroundings, McCoy ultimately chose Buffalo, describing it as a “special place.”

Kelly, on the other hand, would quickly overstay his welcome in Philadelphia; he was fired near the end of the 2015 NFL season, less than a calendar year after shipping McCoy to Western New York. He landed the head coaching job with the San Francisco 49ers this offseason, but was fired after a 2-14 campaign. He returned to the college ranks to coach the UCLA Bruins from 2018-2024, which he recently left to become offensive coordinator at Ohio State.

As for the player McCoy had never heard of, Alonso had a great career in the NFL. The Eagles traded him to the Miami Dolphins after just one season, where he would play from 2016 to 2018. He played for the New Orleans Saints in 2019 before bouncing around the league a bit and retiring in 2022.

It would be McCoy who ultimately had the last word; he finished his career with over 11,000 rushing yards, winning back-to-back Super Bowls with the Kansas City Chiefs and Tampa Bay Buccaneers before signing a one-day contract to retire with the Eagles in 2021.