Wide receiver Amari Cooper has played in front of passionate fanbases stretching back nearly 15 years. His quote about playing in front of Bills Mafia for the first time should have Bills fans fired up and ready to run through a brick wall.
After making his debut for the Buffalo Bills, which saw Cooper reel in three of four targets for 66 yards and a touchdown, Cooper was asked about what it was like playing in front of Buffalo fans.
“It’s very impressive. I mean, you know, the fans, it has a good feel to the game. Like I said, it just felt different,” Cooper said. “For some reason, I kind of got the warning throughout the week that the fans are very passionate. I have been a part of a lot of very passionate fan bases — I played for the Raiders, Cowboys, the Browns, Alabama — but this one, it seems a little bit more heightened. I guess that’s a good thing.”
As Cooper said, his playing career has been in front of some of the biggest and loudest fanbases in all of football, ranging from his freshman season at Alabama in 2012 that saw him win a National Championship, to being a Heisman Trophy finalist in 2014 after a 1,727 receiving yard, 16 touchdown season.
He was then selected fourth overall by the Oakland Raiders, a fanbase that was as rowdy as any when they were still out in the Bay area. From there, he went to the Dallas Cowboys, a perennial media circus at the center of the football world, before being traded to the Cleveland Browns. Cleveland, despite a lack of recent success, has some of the most loyal and diehard football fans in America.
It didn’t take long for Cooper to get a taste of what makes Bills Mafia so special, and as he ingratiates himself further into the team, he’ll quickly become a fan favorite.