Brandon Beane shocked the Bills with this trade six years ago

Buffalo Bills general manager Brandon Beane sure took western New York by storm six years ago today.

Beane joined the Bills from the Carolina Panthers following the 2017 NFL draft. Head coach Sean McDermott, also previously in Carolina, took the helm before the draft process.

Shortly after, previous Bills general manager Doug Whaley and his scouting staff was let go by the team. Beane replaced him..

As the 2017 offseason wore on, the real massive domino fell on August 11 of that year.

Looking back, Buffalo clearly made some huge moves prior to that date: Free agents Micah Hyde and Jordan Poyer were signed. Dion Dawkins and Matt Milano were drafted.

But trading Sammy Watkins? That was a groundbreaking headline.

The Bills acquired cornerback EJ Gaines and a second-round pick for Watkins, a player Buffalo originally traded up for in Round 1 of the 2015 draft.

Eventually more deals came. Another big name, first-round talent in Marcell Dareus was shipped out to the Jacksonville Jaguars in October 2017.

The whole idea at the time was hitting the reset button. Beane and McDermott wanted their own guys in the locker room and to the credit of team ownership, they were allowed to do just that.

In addition, the moves gave the Bills a lot of dead cap hits and less room to work with in 2017.

The idea was that most of that would come off the books the following year and Beane had the ability to spend.

Then the shocker: The Bills ended their near two-decade playoff drought in 2017 anyway.

What a time to be Buffalo.

Story originally appeared on Bills Wire