ORCHARD PARK, N.Y. -- Most Buffalo Bills fans had been anxiously waiting for general manager Brandon Beane to make a history-altering move at quarterback, but maybe not this one.

Beane's months of maneuvering to get the assets to trade up for a potential franchise cornerstone came to fruition Thursday evening. He dealt the Nos. 22, 53 and 56 overall picks to the Tampa Bay Buccaneers for the Nos. 7 and 255 selections.

Both Wyoming's Josh Allen and UCLA's Josh Rosen had slipped down the board, passed over by teams -- the New York Giants at No. 2 and the Denver Broncos at No. 5 -- with a plausible need at quarterback.

More than 21 years after the retirement of Pro Football Hall of Fame quarterback Jim Kelly in 1997, the Bills were staring down their best opportunity in the past two decades to secure the future at the game's most important position. In what would be the highest-selected quarterback in team history, Buffalo had the chance to erase playoff-drought-era failures in drafting J.P. Losman (22nd overall in 2004) and EJ Manuel (16th overall in 2013).

Rosen was the undeniably safer choice, considered pro-ready and a natural pocket passer. Allen was the wild card whose off-the-charts arm strength gave him a higher ceiling than Rosen but whose 56 percent completion rate in college served as his scarlet letter throughout the pre-draft process.

"Don't do it. Don't look at the stats. Trust me," Allen jokingly urged reporters Thursday night. "Watch some game film. Watch some of the stuff that I can do. I think that very few other quarterbacks can do some of the stuff that I can do. I take pride in that."

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What did Beane do? He rolled the dice on Allen, unleashing a firestorm of social media criticism from a segment of the fan base that seemed both exhausted with first-round busts at quarterback and eager for Beane to turn his myriad trades since last year into tangible hope for a brighter future.

Beane has made precisely two draft picks as general manager of the Bills -- Allen and linebacker Tremaine Edmunds, whom the Bills traded up to No. 16 to acquire -- but it feels as though his honeymoon phase is over because of the risk associated with Allen, whose racially insensitive tweets sent as a high schooler became an unexpected storyline on Thursday.

The glaring potential downside to Allen is a blow to the feeling that Beane could not do wrong since being hired last May, when his arrival was welcomed as providing a fresh approach to an organization that had typically lacked competent leadership during its historic, 17-year playoff drought from 1999 until last season.

Beane had built goodwill with a beaten-down fan base by dumping bad contracts and former questionable draft picks while acquiring draft assets. He acquired second- and third-round picks in 2018 on the same day in August by dealing away former first-round wide receiver Sammy Watkins and second-round cornerback Ronald Darby. He also picked up a 2019 fourth-round pick for linebacker Reggie Ragland, a 2018 fifth-round pick for defensive tackle Marcell Dareus and a 2018 third-round selection for starting quarterback Tyrod Taylor.

Jettisoning Taylor in March after three increasingly mediocre seasons seemed to be part of a greater plan to turn the page and find a top prospect at quarterback, and that idea only gained steam when Beane traded oft-injured starting left tackle Cordy Glenn later that month to move from No. 21 to No. 12 in the draft.

All the wheeling and dealing reached a crescendo Thursday, when Beane gave up both of his second-round picks to move up five spots in the first round, a lopsided trade that by one measure favored the Buccaneers.

Had NFL commissioner Roger Goodell announced the pick in Texas' AT&T Stadium of Josh Rosen, the reaction might have been more positive from stability-starved Bills fans. Instead, the selection of Josh Allen seemed to deflate at least a large portion of the team's followers.

"We have to do what's best for the Bills," Beane said when asked about the reaction. "We understand this position we're in. Not anybody is going to agree with [it]. If we had drafted a different quarterback, I'm sure some people would have disagreed with that for other reasons."

That is true. Whether the Bills believed Rosen or Allen was their best bet, it would be a risk for those making the decision. Success for either quarterback would secure job futures for the coach and general manager, and failure would do anything but.

Since taking power last year, Beane had made a series of moves that could only be graded in the larger context of whether they landed him a top prospect at quarterback. They did, and now the evaluation period starts for both Beane and his quarterback. The cards are on the table now.

Stocking up on draft picks? Savvy. Making the playoffs in his first season in charge? A bonus.

But choosing Allen over Rosen? Now it is time to find out how sharp Beane really is.