Billy Shaw, Buffalo Bills Hall of Famer

by Jeffrey J. Miller

Long-time Buffalo Bills fans (and pro football fans across the league) were saddened with the news that Billy Shaw, one of the greatest players in team history, passed away on October 4 at the age of 85.  For anyone unfamiliar with Shaw’s career, he was a member of the Bills’ American Football League championship teams of 1964 and ’65 and considered by many to be the finest guard in that league’s ten-year existence. To Buffalo fans, he was the very embodiment of the Bills’ blue-collar spirit, the perfect representation of the team and city that has always prided themselves as underdogs and an afterthought in the world of pro football. 

Shaw’s accomplishments are well-known to Bills fans and observers of the game.  He was a five-time All-AFL selection, appeared in eight AFL All Star games, and won two AFL championships.  In 1970, he was selected as one of the first-team guards on the AFL all-time team by the Pro Football Hall of Fame, and received the ultimate laurel when he was enshrined in the Hall of Fame in 1999.  To this very day, Shaw remains the only HOF enshrinee who never played a down in the National Football League.  (He is also one of only two Bills players in the Hall of Fame who played his entire career with the team, the other being Jim Kelly).    

When I was writing ROCKIN’ THE ROCKPILE back in the early 2000s, I had the good fortune to interview more than 60 players and staff from the Bills’ AFL era, including Jack Kemp, Lou Saban, Ralph Wilson, Pete Gogolak, Booker Edgerson, Ed Rutkowski, Ernie Warlick and many others, including Billy Shaw.  Even in the day before the proliferation of the cell phone, I was shocked that I found Billy’s number in the regular white pages of the phone book, which I suppose was emblematic of the man’s “regular guy” essence.  Billy was very open and forthcoming during our interview sessions, providing deep insight into his decision to go with the Buffalo Bills of the upstart American Football League rather than the established NFL after a standout career at Georgia Tech.  

“I went to (Bobby Dodd, head coach at Georgia Tech),” Shaw recalled, “and said, ‘Coach, here are my options.  Help me.’  He said, ‘There is a place in football for a new league, and you have a chance to be part of history, because if done correctly, it won’t fail.  It will enhance football.’  And he was exactly on cue.  I actually signed with Buffalo before the NFL draft, and the reason that I did that was that Dallas had made contact with me before the draft and they wanted to play me at linebacker, and I had never played linebacker.  Coach Dodd recommended I go to Buffalo because they wanted me to play on either side of the 

On behalf of Bills fans everywhere, I say, “thank you, Bobby Dodd!”  Shaw went on to anchor one of the most formidable offensive lines in AFL history, beginning with paving the way for Cookie Gilchrist as he became the first AFL running back to top the 1,000-yard mark (1,096) in 1962, protecting quarterback Jack Kemp en route to the back-to-back championships in ‘64 and ’65, and eight straight AFL All- Star games.   Shaw was so well respected that he was selected to play in the All-Star Game after the 1967 season despite missing five games that year to a severe knee injury.   

Halfback Bobby Burnett attributed a great amount of responsibility for his Rookie-of-the-Year campaign of 1966 to Shaw.  “Billy Shaw, in one of the very first practices, told me, ‘You want to be All-Pro?’  I said, ‘Yeah.’  He said, ‘ You get on my butt and follow me where I go.  I’ll make you All Pro.’” 

Our interviews covered a range of subjects, including the early days of the team and the American Football League, the dominant years from 1964 to 1966 when the team made it to three straight AFL title games, the down year of 1967 that saw Billy miss a large chunk of the schedule due to a knee injury, 1968 when the team won just one game, the AFL All Star game in January 1965 when the black players took a stand against racial discrimination and mistreatment, his assessment of many of the players he played against, memories of old War Memorial Stadium, Bills fans and much more.   

Once the project was near completion, I had to make a decision about who I wanted to write the foreword for the book.  I had many great options from which to choose, and I know that anyone of them would have been willing and done a great job.  But when it came down to it, Billy was the best choice.  To my delight, he was more than happy to accept the invitation.  And he did an outstanding job!

Billy’s passing stands as a reminder of a time when the Bills stood at the forefront of professional football (even if it was the AFL), and that the number of surviving members of that exclusive AFL fraternity is sadly dwindling.  A recent reunion of the 1964 AFL championship team held at Highmark Stadium in Orchard Park (the current home of the Buffalo Bills) was attended by all of five alumni (Butch Byrd, Wray Carlton, Booker Edgerson, Paul Maguire, and Ed Rutkowski).  There are a handful of others still among us, but they were unable to attend due to health issues.

I didn’t want to make this article one of those typical listings of the man’s accomplishments (though it appears I did do some of that) with a year-by-year account of his career.  That approach gets tiresome after a while.  Just wanted to pay tribute and say “thank you” to Billy for being so generous with his time and memories, and for writing such a wonderful foreword for my book.  And as I am thinking about it now, that book would most likely not have been possible, or at least necessary, without Billy Shaw.