Former Buffalo Bills assistant coach Chuck Dickerson died at the age of 86 following a brief illness.
Dickerson, a native of Hammond, Illinois, became a Western New York staple during his five-year stint (1987-1991)
on the staff of head coach Marv Levy, and later established a lasting presence on WGR, Buffalo’s first all-sports radio
station.
Dickerson spent his first three seasons as a general assistant in the CFL and USFL before taking over as defensive
line coach in 1990-91, when the Bills won the first two of four straight AFC championships. Bruce Smith, the NFL’s
all-time sack leader, was one of his proteges, along with Phil Hansen, Mike Lodish, and Jeff Wright.
Dickerson’s Bills career came to an unceremonious end: leading up to the Super Bowl XXVI game against the
Washington Redskins, Dickerson made disparaging remarks about the opponents’ legendary blocking squad “The
Hogs.” Dickerson’s comments, according to critics, fueled Washington’s decision to fire him three days after the Bills
lost 37-24 in Minneapolis.
“A lot of people didn’t like the way Chuck did it, but it’s football,” said Bills linebacker Darryl Talley in a Dickerson
retrospective published by Tim Graham of The Athletic in January 2021. “This is a game. Sometimes you try to get
under the other person’s skin. “I thought Chuck Dickerson was entertaining.”
Dickerson returned to Buffalo after a brief stint as defensive coordinator at Illinois State, where he became a beloved
radio personality at WGR, noted for his uncensored, non-sugary comments on the Bills and the NHL’s Buffalo
Sabres. Listeners nicknamed him “The Coach” and frequently repeated his slogan “Who loves ya, baby?” which was
lifted from Telly Savalas’ title character in the CBS miniseries “Kojak.”
“We had a special relationship there,” Dickerson told his Western New York listeners, according to Graham’s article.
“I’m not trying to explain it to anyone because I don’t understand it myself. Why was Buffalo chosen as my city? I’m
not sure, but it was. In some ways, it still is, since I am confident that if I went back on the air today, I would have
another audience. The difference would be that I would have some extremely interesting topics to discuss with the Bills rather than the horse (manure) that we went through.”
