He played youth football for Bournbrook Alliance,[7] from where he signed amateur forms with Birmingham as a 14-year-old.
[8] He played for the youth team and for the Central League side before making his senior debut in the FA Cup third-round tie against Halifax Town on 7 January 1939, standing in at right half for the injured Don Dearson.
He made his first appearance in the First Division three weeks later, in a 5–0 defeat away to Preston North End,[9] and played in the first three games of the 1939–40 Football League season, which was then abandoned when the Second World War started.
[7] At the start of the war, Bye was living with his parents in Vivian Road, Harborne, and working in a tobacconist's shop.
[13] Bye's death was registered in June 1995 in the Blackpool and Fylde district.