The Buffalo Bills' psychological reset
Brandon Beane wants a team that'll attack their next playoff moment head-on. So, he remade the roster. That's only step one. Now, Sean McDermott inherits that roster.
Blood still oozes from the latest scar. For all involved. How could it not? Through this window at One Bills Drive, directly behind the team’s general manager, the Buffalo Bills finally got the Kansas City Chiefs in their house, in January, and… lost.
Brandon Beane has built rosters talented enough to win Super Bowls.
Five postseasons running, however, this team has melted in the biggest moment.
For the Bills, the butterfly effect on the latest L is particularly painful. So many split-second moments could’ve ended their Chiefs torment and sent Buffalo to an AFC Championship Game, to the Super Bowl: Tyler Bass’ missed 44-yard field goal, Stefon Diggs dropping a 55-yard gem from his QB, Chris Jones’ bench press of a rep vs. Dion Dawkins and, yes, the fake punt.
That’s the play that supplied the greatest hint for 2024, and beyond.
Where everyone else saw a sadistic “Nathan For You” bit, the Bills’ head coach was trying to author a Disney classic. With 12:57 left, down 27-24, on fourth and 5 from his own 30-yard line, yes, Sean McDermott called for the direct snap to Damar Hamlin. The decision was immediately mocked by millions and, goodness, imagine the uproar if Jordan Poyer doesn’t swat the ball out of Mecole Hardman’s grasp at the 1-yard line a few moments later, if this moment unequivocally was the No. 1 reason Buffalo lost.
But the problem was not the fact that Buffalo opted to go for it at that point of the game. Or even that Hamlin was handpicked as the superhero, though keeping the ball in No. 17’s hands seems ideal.
The problem is that no head coach who’s been leading one distinct way — for close to a decade — cannot suddenly snap his fingers and expect all 11 players on the field to operate so freely, so confidently at a moment’s notice.
Installing true belief is a year-round effort. It must become embedded into the team’s fibers.
We can hyper-analyze every individual transaction. We can spend hours glued to the All-22. Truth is, the Bills have been good enough to win it all for a while now. What’s held the team back goes beyond Player X not being good enough.
In his 1-on-1 sitdown with Go Long, the GM Beane delved into a variety of subjects that all tie back to a more cosmic theme: This offseason was all about re-imagining and re-creating a team capable of owning this playoff moment.
Beane effectively steered the franchise into a new phase. This roster will look completely different at the start of training camp — 38 of the 90 players are new. By my count, only six players remain from the group that played in the 2019 wild card loss in Houston to start this streak of five straight playoff appearances. Beane understands the value of this team’s core having nothing to do with the heartbreak of playoff losses past.
“You’re not walking out there with 53 guys with the same scars,” Beane said.
“If you play sports long enough, you’ve all had moments of success and you’ve all had moments of failure. You can learn some of your most valuable lessons from failure, too. I know I have from mistakes. So you’ve got to take the positive out of some of these negative situations. If you don’t, you’re wasting it. And that starts with us as the people leading this team. We can’t waste these opportunities. You only get so many and every one is a lesson learned — or lessons learned — good and bad.”
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Our 1 on 1 with the GM, icymi:
Tales of the Bills’ heroic run to the playoffs last season were a decibel or two overblown. This dash to the 44 Percent Club included narrow victories over a skeletal, Easton Stick-led Chargers unit (fresh off trailing the Raiders 63-7 and getting its coach fired) and the Bailey Zappe-led Patriots (whose 72-year-old, lame-duck coach was eager to get back to his deranged relationship with a 24-year-old), right before Mason Rudolph had ‘em lockjawed in a one-score game late in the fourth.
But the Bills won, it’s hard to win in the NFL, they were inches from beating the eventual champs, and a major reason? McDermott did show signs of growth. He went for it in some key fourth-down spots. He didn’t hold back Josh Allen. The Bills overcame the loss of several starters on defense. Even the coach’s public tone shifted, sharply, right into this season-wrap press conference when an upbeat McDermott said the Bills need to “mentally go for it” and “coach to win” and “play to win.”
“That, to me is a winner’s mentality,” McDermott said. “That’s a winner’s approach.”
All encouraging stuff.
These dynastic Andy Reid Chiefs are eerily similar to those dynastic Bill Belichick Patriots in that players are full of sincere belief late in playoff games and constantly find a way to create their own luck.
However we quantify it, the Bills’ here-we-go-again dread has been real. This is a team that’s played exceptionally tight in the biggest moments. Teams forever take on the personality of their head coach and, as you’ve read, players and assistant coaches alike cite McDermott as the source of that tightness. The Hamlin decision was a potential sign of self-awareness. Was he overcompensating for those touchbacks and soft coverages and midfield punts of postseasons past? Probably. But perhaps it finally — once and for all — hit McDermott late last season that the only way January changes for the Bills is if he changes.
Readers might’ve been surprised to see Go Long welcomed back at One Bills Drive this offseason. This is a good time to note that I actually sat down with McDermott for an hour-plus back at the Combine in Indianapolis. It was a great chat, one he initiated himself. We barely even discussed the three-part series and, obviously, I stand by all of the reporting. But the fact that McDermott was even open to such a meeting suggests he’s open to evolving. Not many players/coaches/teams covered so critically think about plopping down on a chair inside a convention center to chat.
With the Bills transitioning into a new era, McDermott now has an opportunity.
The team clearly wanted to create a vacuum for new leaders this offseason. It’s a gamble. There’s a reasonable chance that a rejuvenated Stefon Diggs catches 100 balls for 1,200 yards and sticks it to his former team in the playoffs. But the Bills were unafraid to send Diggs to an AFC contender, exactly as they were unafraid to trade their 28th overall pick to the Kansas City Chiefs because — to them — what’s most important aren’t the numbers Diggs could put up. Nor should this team operate in a state of paralysis when it comes to those Chiefs.
To the Bills, resetting the psychology is most paramount.
Beane articulated exactly the type of team the Bills seek, describing roster construction as a great “chemistry experiment.” He wants some mean temperaments with an edge. Leaders. Believers. Like GM Bill Polian with those 2000s Colts, Beane is now weighing playoff performance much heavier. The margin between the Bills and Chiefs has been thin. Multiple times, Beane told us that your best players need to be at their best in the biggest games. That has not been the case with Diggs.
Cap hell or not, the Bills essentially declared the current core could only take them so far.
Through those “Black Thursday” cuts of March 7, the Diggs trade, draft-day trades that produced 10 picks, a few calculated signings (hello, playoff hero Marques Valdes-Scantling), Beane took the franchise a bold new direction this offseason. Buffalo isn’t pushing cap charges years down the line (like New Orleans) nor will Buffalo sit on its hands in fear of dead cash (like Dallas). This middle ground is smart. And a wave of new players gives McDermott a chance to deliver a new message 12 months a year. He can talk about coaching and playing “to win” from May… to August… to December and show that he means it through his gameday actions.
He treated coaches past poorly. New coaches — and coordinators — offer an opportunity, too. The head coach can do the opposite of what he’s done years past by sincerely empowering young coordinators with fresh ideas: 34-year-old Joe Brady and 40-year-old Bobby Babich.
Without the quarterback, of course, any talk of “psychology” and “belief” and “new leaders” around a football team is silly.
All of this is even possible because of Josh Allen.
The Bills cannot overthink its best player, cannot drag its best player through any more bureaucratic nonsense. Too often through the Bills’ 6-6 start in 2023, Allen played like a quarterback seeing red tape and hearing a blaring siren, as if he accidentally opened an emergency door inside an airport. When to slide? When to throw it away? When to smash all the buttons on the remote control? The son of a farmer, the kid who received zero scholarship offers has always been a coach-pleaser. As one former teammate told us, “He wants to run through your face and establish the fact that he’s the biggest alpha male dog quarterback in the history of pro football.” Pro football is backyard football to Allen. It’s on the Bills to kindly get the hell out of the way and allow its artist to create.
Beane’s words should give fans hope. Beane stressed that he loves his quarterback’s linebacker mentality. He does not want Allen overthinking play-to-play, believes his quarterback has struck a healthy balance and even said Allen likes taking a hard hit in the first quarter to get himself into the game. Beane can only do so much as the general manager, of course. He’ll be up in the booth on Sundays.
This is Season No. 7 for Head Coach and Quarterback in Western New York. No relationship is more important in the sport. Reid-Mahomes, Belichick-Brady, Lombardi-Starr, Walsh-Montana this is not. Allen shared something special with his first offensive coordinator, Brian Daboll, a “what if” that evaporated in the 13 Seconds night.
We’ll see if an evolved roster can evolve this relationship.
Buffalo can’t drift too far into power-rushing game territory. Everything must flow through the quarterback.
Growing pains are expected. It’s hard to picture rookie Keon Coleman setting the league on fire, Matt Milano resembling himself or Brady & Babich hitting their groove all in the month of September. Or even October. The first six games of this season include three prime-time games on the road (Miami, Baltimore, New York Jets), as well as a Monday Nighter at home vs. Jacksonville and Diggs’ Texans’ return.
Either way, do not confuse “transition” with rebuilding, with a five-year plan. The pressure to win is on.
Every team in every sport existing in the same universe as an all-time talent knows championship opportunities are fleeting. Peyton Manning won one ring with Polian’s Colts. Trapped in both the Brady and Mahomes empires, Aaron Rodgers won one ring with the Green Bay Packers. We know the Chiefs will only reload… and evolve… and — with their QB — operate in a genuine state of belief that borders on arrogance. Think of a snarling Michael Jordan in “The Last Dance” listing off allllll the times he felt disrespected and had to make somebody pay. A Top 5 moment is when Jordan is filmed watching one of Payton’s interviews for the doc. He cannot help but tilt his head back and laugh as Payton brags about flustering him. Jordan hands the tablet back. “The Glove,” he says with mockery disdain. “I had no problem with the Glove.”
Mahomes is operating with the same air of invincibility. He turns 29 in September. Many quarterbacks run the risk of getting Ewing’d and Barkley’d and Glove’d here.
After letting damn good opportunities pass them by, it’s also important to remember that Allen is only 28.
Expect the Bills to grind through the first half of the season but they’ll get to January again. When that moment comes, McDermott will pull the trigger on fourth down. This time, he’ll put the ball in Allen’s hands. And when all 11 players step up to the line of scrimmage, the emotions filling everyone cannot feel foreign.
Everyone must fully expect a first down.
Everyone must fully expect to punch a ticket to the Super Bowl.
Beane remade the roster. Now, the GM hands both the roster and its star quarterback back to McDermott for training camp at St. John Fisher College. It’s on the coach to get players to believe.
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ICYMI:
Happy Hour: Preston Brown on Rex Ryan days, Burfict, Peterman, McDermott... and why he wants to slap Odell Beckham Jr.
Life is sweet for Preston Brown. He’s happy now. The middle linebacker who roamed NFL defenses from 2014- ‘19 is living in Atlanta. He’s engaged. He has two dogs. He still works out all of the time at his home gym. Brown is also a man who can finally take a deep breath and reflect on the high drama that is professional football.
Where did the Buffalo Bills touch you man? It's year after year of your horrible takes trying to bash them. Welp another year, another division title, league mvp, 1 game away from the super bowl, I'd say they did alright. Excited to see how you're going to bash them this off season, because they're not giving you much to work with. Probably will be that they're complete idiots if they don't re sign cooks but clearly you don't really understand that there is a salary cap.
Superb as always Mr Dunne. During your interaction with McD did you get a sense that he was coming from a " friends close, enemies closer " place? He always seemed to be trying to hide his insecurity afraid to acknowledge his lengthy list of crippling legacy altering decisions. I don't see the fake punt call as being a positive sign for McD in any way. In retrospect his explanation and doubling down on his decision is alarming and disturbingly predictable. I love that the article puts the focus and pressure squarely on our biggest hurdle. A Super Bowl win or he has to go. PERIOD.