-
Alaina Getzenberg
Orchard Park, NY – Under three points in the AFC championship game with more than three minutes, the Buffalo Bills season was reduced to the final opportunity to win in the hands of Josh Allen.
Despite losing Kansas City, the general manager of the Bills, Brandon Beane, said he would register in that situation again next year and take the possibilities of Buffalo.
“You have to do a lot of things very well to be in that position,” Beane said at his season end of the season on Thursday. “And we also give credit to the Chiefs. They go for a historical three consecutive. We are not losing to different teams every year, and we are only short. It is a very good team. They have knocked down many teams.
“… we will continue delivering every rock, every stone. But again, the last five years, this team, counting the playoffs, has averaged from 13 to 14 victories. So, I want to make sure that we balancing the scale here, to Although we have not yet reached the great game.
Getting there is the challenge for a Bills franchise that still looks for its first Super Bowl title, which falls short for chiefs in four of the last five positions. However, there is a big difference in the competitiveness of this appearance in the AFC championship game to the last of the team in 2020, a game that the Bills were not ready to win. Beane referred several times in his press conference that this team does not need a review, but was only played.
It would be easier to point out than the solutions if only an obvious problem or a general restructuring were needed. That is not the case. The central group in its place has proven to be successful.
This year’s bill challenged external expectations and differed from previous iterations under Beane and the coach Sean McDermott. However, in the end, the same result was developed. The Bills have not appeared at the Super Bowl since the 1993 season, including seven seasons with Allen.
But what did they do at this time? The Bills season was full of historical grades, but again ended in a defeat against the Chiefs. Coaching performance and errors failed in the tickets when it mattered, especially in defense. The Bills simply did not do everything possible against an opponent who demands nothing less. The challenge in the future is to adjust the list and the necessary details in the big games.
“It is the same S —. We have finished with PATS on the back,” said defensive Tackle Jordan Phillips on Monday. “… we have to finish, we have to discover how to overcome it … we have the team. We have the right mentality. We just have to discover what is preventing us from taking that next step”
Allen shared similar feelings about the loss: “We are constantly knocking on the door and you are playing a team like the Chiefs, who have done so well for so long. You don’t just have to touch, you have to kick the door down, and not We did that. “
Being continuously in the mixture for the best team in the league year after year is a place that Bills’s leadership wants to be. Beane has emphasized that for several years. No team in the NFL history has won more games during a section of six seasons, including the playoffs, and has not made an appearance in the Super Bowl. As Allen said, to constantly being on the edge of the Super Bowl resonates with the team.
“I prefer to be in the position in which we are, where we are continuously knocking on the door,” McDermott said Thursday. “But … I don’t try to sit down to the limit and be like, ‘hey, well, it was a good season. It affects everyone in my back and says we will get them next year.’ That is the last of what we are, Brandon, me.
McDermott identified part of the team’s success, and sign that the plan is working, to the capacity of the coaching staff to develop players selected in posterior rounds of the Draft and those who had not had so much success in other teams. The Bills prospered this season not with traditional veteran players as team pillars, but building a new way of winning.
A fifth consecutive title of the AFC EAST was insured in week 13, the fourth team since the realignment of the division in 2002 to ensure a division with five remaining games. The offensive, directed by the MVP Allen contender, became the first team in the NFL history with at least 30 hurried and 30 touchdowns in a single season. Allen’s performance was vital, especially without a star receiver.
The defense was solid, especially when it came to carry food, but had low moments while it came to injuries in the unit. The special teams were inconsistent, from the returns to the kicker Tyler Bass, who finally ended the season with a positive note (13 of 13 in all the attempts to kick postseason).
In the AFC championship game, the Bills made mistakes in the three phases and lost crucial opportunities. Allen drove the ball several times in the first half. Such errors were typical in his career, but not this season when his ball losses drastically improved. But the defense was the biggest problem, renouncing too many early points and struggling to get out of the field. The last nail in the coffin: the failed final unit that did not join.
“[The defense] I didn’t do it enough. We do not play well enough in the Kansas City game, “McDermott said when asked about the unit’s performance.
Some of them were training, seen when the Chiefs took the offices off several times, some of them were injuries and not clicking on the field. The external corner is an important position to see progress with Christian Benford, who left the game against the chiefs with a brain shock in the first quarter, to the first round of 2022, Kaiir Elam, whom Patrick Mahomes He went successfully successfully. With Benford out of the countryside in the last three quarters, Mohamses prospered against the coverage of man, taking advantage of Elam and completing 11 of 13 passes for 160 yards and a touchdown. Starting Buffalo CB Rasul Douglas is ready to get to free agency.
The problems of the defensive line were evident in the loss of the AFC championship game (the percentage of pressure vs. Mahomes fell from 45.7% in the meetings of the regular season at 33.3%), and the defensive wing is a position for See this low season. In four playoff games against the Chiefs since 2020, the defense of the Bills has allowed 34.8 points per game (with an average of 28.3 points scored). That is despite winning the time of the battle of possession in the four combined games (30: 28-29: 31) and the billing margin (plus two).
“Winning games, winning the scrimmage line is critical. And I felt we did it sometimes this year, not enough,” McDermott said. “… I think progress, to advance only as a team in the games where I have been in the Super Bowl, is what takes you there. You have to have a good quarterback. But the O-Line, the line D, those those They are the boys who are taking you there and impact the game more than any position. “
The reception options fell short for Allen. He was without a clear “difference manufacturer” and that will have to improve by 2025 with Beane and McDermott pointing out that selection No. 33 Keon Coleman did not return to the level of play he had before his mid -season wrist injury.
The team’s first round of the team, Dalton Kincaid, also had a season that the Bills did not expect, as Beane described, dealing with injuries that include its left PCL. It was emphasized that you need to increase your game force for next year.
There are other areas and positions to address that they will come with many draft selections that expect the invoices and more flexibility of the lid than the previous year. The limit for 2025 has not yet been shared with the equipment, but Beane is projecting that the team has a lot of space.
Despite falling short of the Chiefs, once again, the Bills approach is to learn and build what worked this season and take it to the next year.
“We are not yielding, we are not,” said Beane. “We are frustrated, we want to win and all we are doing is make our chip more bigger. We will restart, recalibrate, we will not make hasty decisions and in the coming weeks and a couple of months in form what the next team seems. “
