By Budd Bailey, Buffalo Sports Page Columnist

Booker Edgerson – Signed by the Bills in 1962

Booker Edgerson’s path to the Bills was an odd one. It started at Western Illinois, where he played under Lou Saban. After Saban jumped to the pros with the Boston Patriots, he told Edgerson that he thought Booker could be a pro player someday. In fact, Edgerson even signed a contract with the Pats, only to have it torn up when he found out if could end his college eligibility in other sports.

Edgerson joined Saban – now with the Bills as head coach – in Buffalo in 1962. Pro ball was no problem for Edgerson, who jumped into the starting lineup as a rookie and had six interceptions. He and Butch Byrd eventually teamed up as the starting cornerbacks on Buffalo’s championship teams in 1964 and 1965. Edgerson was the fast one of the pair.

He stayed with the Bills through 1969. Edgerson was traded to Denver in 1970, but a knee injury there ended his career. Booker hung around Buffalo after retirement, serving in a variety of roles in the community. He remains one of the most popular individuals to ever play for the Bills.

Let’s hear from Booker himself:

(Follow Budd on Twitter @WDX2BB)

Budd Bailey

Budd Bailey has been involved in almost every aspect of the local sports scene for the last 40 years. He worked for WEBR Radio, the Buffalo Sabres' public relations department and The Buffalo News during that time. In that time he covered virtually every aspect of the area's sports world, from high schools to the Bills and Sabres and everything in between. Along the way, Budd served as a play-by-play announcer for the Bisons, an analyst for the Stallions, and a talk-show host. He won the National Lacrosse League's Tom Borrelli Award as the media personality of the year in 2011, and was a finalist for that same award in 2017. Budd's seventh and eighth books, one on the Transcontinental Railroad and the other about Ichiro Suzuki, are scheduled to be released in the fall.

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