Some people are fans of the Buffalo Bills. But many, many more people are NOT fans of the Buffalo Bills. This 2024 Defector NFL team preview is for those in the latter group. Read all the previews so far here.
Your team: Buffalo Bills.
Your 2023 record: 11-6, which started off with a bang on Monday Night Football against the New York Jets. After noted Egyptologist Aaron Rodgers snapped his Achilles approximately three seconds into the football game, the Bills proceeded to vomit all over their shoes against a Zach Wilson Jets team ... again. At least they did it in a new and exciting way this time!
After beating up on the basement of the league for a few weeks (the Raiders, Commanders, and Dolphins), the Bills slumped hard in the middle of the season, with near-misses against the Giants and Buccaneers (shudder) and a very real last-second loss to Michael McCorkle Jones’s Patriots—the last win in his Patriots career, and quite possibly the last meaningful football game he will ever win. I was in the fucking building for their next idiot loss on MNF against the Denver Broncos, which is the second time I’ve watched this team lose on a fire-drill field goal against the Broncos, but the first time I’ve ever seen an offensive coordinator get fired because a special teams coordinator couldn't count how many players should be on the field (more on that later).
Thankfully, despite a 6-6 start to the season, the Bills got all fired up about 9/11 (again, more on that later) and finished the year 11-6. Congratulations, you won the division! And after beating Mason Rudolph, you got to host the Chiefs in the Divisional Round! The Chiefs—the team that beats you in the playoffs every fucking year—were coming to you for a change! You can shake the fraud label right now! Nobody—nobody—believes in you! WHAT ARE YOU PREPARED TO DO ABOUT IT? DON’T LET NO ONE COME INTO YOUR HOUSE! TAKE YOUR MEAL! DO WHAT YOU NEED TO DO TODAY!
Lol.
Your coach: Coach 9/11, the artist formerly known as Coach Troops.
Look, we all know about the 9/11 thing at this point. Sean McDermott thinks Mohamed Atta was a Football Guy. The head coach of the Buffalo Bills thinks Salafism and Cover 3 have more in common than you might think. The man who resurrected football in Western New York tried to use a century-defining tragedy to fire up his boys, and when news broke, the team rallied around him and went on an unprecedented division-winning run.
So, while the 9/11 story is the obvious red meat here (as is the coach’s long and storied history of comic game mismanagement and the fact that he is, by all accounts, a nightmare to work with), Tyler Dunne already wrote that story. Rather than regurgitate his reporting, I’d rather you pay him money and read it yourself. (Have fun with the Niagara Falls speech!)
Instead, I want to take us to his coordinators: Bobby Babich, Matthew Smiley, and Joe Brady. Babich appears to be the rare nepo baby with some juice, getting the promotion from LBs coach after interviewing for DC jobs in the offseason. Smiley was promoted up from assistant special teams coach to STC in 2022 under mysterious circumstances (more about that soon). Brady, similarly, got promoted to OC from QBs coach after kind social studies teacher Ken Dorsey was fired in November, and ...
Look, this is Weird, right? The team’s previous defensive coordinator, Leslie Frazier, “took a year off” after a 13-3 season in 2022 and never came back. Brady is the fourth—fourth!—offensive coordinator of the McDermott tenure, and only one of his previous OCs, Brian Daboll, left for a head coaching job. Rick Dennison and Ken Dorsey were both dumpstered during/after playoff seasons, with Dorsey’s firing coming under especially dubious circumstances. How many head coaches get to hire this many coordinators? How many refuse to hire from outside the organization like this?!
Maybe most interestingly, former special teams coordinator Heath Farwell left for the same job with the Jacksonville Jaguars after the 13 Seconds game. I can’t prove that this is because, say, hypothetically, McDermott overrode Farwell’s call for a squib kick and had Tyler Bass kick it deep, which then gave the Chiefs just enough time to send the game to overtime, thus creating conflict between Farwell and McDermott that could never be mended. Nobody will ever go on the record about such a thing, so I guess we’ll never know what happened! Aww, shucks!
What I can say for sure is that a lot of Sean McDermott’s coordinators seem to leave or get fired at the exact moment people start calling for McDermott’s head. Honestly, good luck to Babich and Brady. If their boss forgets how many timeouts their opponent has—again (allegedly)—they might be called into his office on Monday morning.
Your quarterback: Imagine if Air Bud had an absolute fucking hose.
Look, I’ve written about Josh Allen before. Your quarterback is a miracle! One of the greatest athletes to ever play the position! He’s also a rocks-for-brains dullard who listens to Frank Sinatra because he thinks that’s what Adults do, possibly cheated on his long-term ex-girlfriend according to literally everyone in the Buffalo gossip mill (allegedly), and forgets which team he’s supposed to throw to three weeks a year. He likes hanging out with Daniel Ricciardo, being in commercials, and playing golf more than he likes football. All of this makes him deeply human, which necessarily limits his potential greatness. Your quarterback is probably the normal-est earth-shattering quarterback in league history, and in a world where football-throwing Roombas win championships, that’s not always good!
An interesting note about the rest of the quarterback room that you, Bills fans, undoubtedly realize, but the general audience may not: the Bills’ only criteria for selecting backup quarterbacks is how well they get along with Josh Allen. From Matt Barkley and Davis Webb to Case Keenum and Kyle Allen, being Josh Allen’s Best Friend is extremely lucrative! This year, noted breast enthusiast Mitch Trubisky (back after his previous backup stint in Buffalo somehow landed him a payday in Pittsburgh) and Shane Buechele auditioned for the role of Josh’s Best Friend, with both generally underwhelming and eventually succumbing to injuries. While Trubisky is likely to return soon, Mike White was just signed to the practice squad and will likely slot in as QB3. White was picked over Ben DiNucci, which is just as well because DiNucci seems to treat playing football as a side hustle to his real passion: selling the stupidest fucking hats you’ve ever seen in your life.
This hat called me a slur in a college bar in Norman, Oklahoma. This hat owes your cousin from Nacogdoches 40 bucks. This hat has a DUI.
Hey, has anyone noticed that it’s been five years since the Bills rostered a black quarterback? Weird! My bad, Bills! It took multiple injuries, but you did the thing! Welcome to Buffalo, Anthony Brown! You were cut five days later, but I’m sure you’re cool, too!
What's new that sucks: LMAOOOOOOOOOOOO
For shits and giggles, let’s count every single snap the Bills have to replace in 2024, OK? This may be hard for you to process, but let’s be brave. Deep breath. Just for fun, let’s bold players with at least four years of Bills tenure, and then italicize players who were voluntarily released or traded away.
Mitch Morse (1,129). Jordan Poyer (1,047). Gabriel Davis (966). Stefon Diggs (949). Micah Hyde (834). Tyrel Dodson (733). Leonard Floyd (584). Dane Jackson (564). Trent Sherfield (542). Tim Settle (436). Jordan Phillips (399). Siran Neal (387). Shaq Lawson (376). Tyler Matakevich (359). Latavius Murray (351). Deonte Harty (223). Poona Ford (184). Tre’Davious White (182). Linval Joseph (162). Damien Harris (94). Kendal Vickers (67). Kyle Allen (38). Ryan Bates (35). Leonard Fournette (26). Josh Norman (22) (yes, that Josh Norman). AJ Klein (19).
Tough look for the Salary Cap Isn’t Real people, huh? Anyway, by my count, that’s 10,708 snaps. For a team that stubbornly maintained continuity to the point of stagnation, it’s a shocking exodus for just one offseason, one that includes six of their 2023 captains. So how have the Bills decided to fill the void? Well, let’s get to that!
Receiver, obviously, stands out. Following the departure of basically the entire room (including some receiver people may have heard of), the Bills have filled with the void with career role-players Curtis Samuel and Mack Hollins. Both are expected to be major contributors right away, despite Samuel being hobbled with turf toe and Hollins being a Feet Guy, a volatile combination. The team also brought in veteran also-ran Guys To Remember Marquez Valdes-Scantling and Chase Claypool.
[producing running onstage to whisper in my ear] Really? Are you sure?
Ah, shit. Well, nevertheless, the Bills do have some promising young talent in the room with Khalil Shakir, who runs like he has to poop, and Keon Coleman, who brings ball skills, wacky antics, and an aversion to separation the Bills have not seen since the likes of Andre Holmes and Kelvin Benjamin. At least he’s funny!
Elsewhere on offense, the Bills plan to plug in Connor McGovern for the departing Mitch Morse. Please don’t get Connor McGovern confused with Connor McGovern. While Connor McGovern is a former guard that got signed by an AFC East team that later converted to center, Connor McGovern is a former guard that got signed by an AFC East team that later converted to center. Please get it right.
On defense, the starters in the front six remain the same, with new depth pieces in DeWayne Carter, Austin Johnson, Dawuane Smoot, and Javon Solomon all likely to fill out the rotation on the line. Filling in for the departing Poyer and Hyde at safety are 2023 backup Taylor Rapp and ... well ... it’s a bit of a mystery. Token Caucasian rookie Cole Bishop and veteran vaccine-dodger Mike Edwards are both injured, meaning Damar Hamlin might start Week 1.
Wait, Damar’s hurt too? Are you serious?
Never mind. Ignore everything I’ve typed about what the Bills might look like in 2024. The injury report looks like Verdun in 1916. You, fair citizens, might be pressed into service in Week 1.
(As I was typing the first draft of this section, it was announced that All-Pro linebacker Matt Milano will miss most of the season with a torn bicep. Lol. Lmao.)
What has always sucked: I could talk shit about the bajillion-dollar publicly financed stadium they’re building across the street from the current one. I could talk shit about Terry Pegula, the fracking superyacht enthusiast who ruined a perennially successful hockey team and stumbled cheeks-first into hiring a competent football coach because he’s a big tough wrasslin’ man. I could even talk about his children that are currently locked in the lamest version of Succession you’ve ever seen in your life, complete with power grapples while people are medically incapacitated, children from multiple marriages engaged in factional strife, and failsons that seem oddly obsessed with cum.
Regrettably, there’s a bigger nail that needs hammering: You Fucking People.
Look. I’m guessing that if you don’t live here, you still have a broadly positive opinion of Bills fans for their dedication and ... extracurricular activities. A formerly great website I can’t quite remember the name of used to document their antics, from Kiko Alonso jersey swaps to self-immolation. Just this past season, one intrepid Bills fan snatched national headlines for doing alcohol, marijuana, coke, LSD, covering himself in porta-potty waste, and falling into a 30-foot pit at the new stadium construction site, thus inspiring Copycat Pit-Jumpers. “What a bunch of lovable weirdos,” you might say. “Gotta love those silly Bills fans!”
All I can say is: You don’t have to live with these people.
The average Bills fan is a perfectly rectangular Polish dude from Cheektowaga who has the sense to only say slurs in private, not in public (unless Colin Kaepernick is in town, of course). He rides his “Buffalo” “cultural” “identity” extremely hard, largely expressed via products he does or does not consume. He is only capable of expressing his interest in something by saying “I’m a big [insert noun here] guy.” He has opinions on Zyn flavors. He exists to reply to Barstool personalities on social media, desperately hoping he will be plucked out of obscurity to be the third Pardon My Take host on the merit of his folding table jumps, because this is the exact kind of man who jumps through tables.
From September through January (and, trust, it will not continue through to February anytime soon), thousands of these men swarm public spaces in Western New York like locusts. You’re just as likely to hear one trying to start a Bills “Shout” chant at your local Wegmans on gameday as you are at Twin Oaks on Southwestern Blvd. It is impossible to overstate the omnipresence of this completely vacant “culture” if you haven’t lived in it.
This is the image Buffalo projects nationally, consciously or subconsciously. Here’s what fucking sucks about that, especially: THESE PEOPLE DON’T LIVE IN BUFFALO. The average Bills fan described above claims to be “from Buffalo” despite setting foot in city limits exactly five times per year: twice to see the Sabres, once to see the Bandits, once to spend a day shuffling from air-conditioned box to air-conditioned box in the Elmwood Village, and once to try (and fail) to pick up bisexual women with thigh tattoos in Allentown. To people like this, “Buffalo” is a brand they engage with, not a city that a quarter-million people live in. And they’ve so successfully abstracted “Buffalo” as identity that you, reader who’s never been to Buffalo, think of these people when you think of my city.
Wanna know something about my fucking city? It’s beautifully diverse. It’s a true honest-to-god cultural melting pot: it’s black, Puerto Rican, Yemeni, Bangladeshi, Burmese, and even Italian. It’s also one of the most segregated cities in America by most metrics, so that diversity is easily swept under the rug and ignored. While “Buffalo” is printed on T-shirts for descendants of white-flighters, the people who actually live in Buffalo often do so in food deserts. Oh, hey, speaking of white-flighters, where’d the Bills used to play? Weird!
Let’s set all this complicated real-world stuff aside for a moment, though, and put it in more blog-friendly Haha Comedy terms: Bills Mafia is That One Friend you still have from your youth. You used to get up to some shit—lots of hard nights, Canadian beer, and petty property damage—but after graduating, you grew up, quit hitting the bottle, and got a decent-enough job. You have a long-term partner, a stable living situation, and 1.25 pets. You get back in touch with That One Friend, agree to meet them for a drink, and realize that they’re still the same exact person they were a decade ago. They still talk about the same shitty movies, drink the same shitty beer, and smoke the same shitty cigarettes. They’re trapped in amber, and they’re happy that way. That is Bills Mafia.
Anyway, one last cum hat for the road:
What might not suck: Hey, you’re still in the AFC East! The trendy pick for division winner is going to be the Dolphins, but you could’ve said the exact same fucking thing last year. Sean McDermott, despite all his faults, gets good play out of his defenses like clockwork. While a swarm of veterans just walked out the door, they were all old as rocks and should’ve been replaced years ago. The void in leadership gives players like Greg Rousseau, Ed Oliver, Taron Johnson, and Terrel Bernard an opportunity to step up. On offense, Josh Allen is going to do Josh Allen Shit, regardless of who he’s throwing the ball to. This is the dude who made Cole Beasley look dope! James Cook is ... well, let’s check in on the offensive line in six weeks, but he looks like a serious individual between the tackles.
Most of all, Bills fans, I want you to take heart. No matter how fraudulent you are, you’re always less fraudulent than the fucking Dolphins.
HEAR IT FROM BILLS FANS!
Louis:
Its hard for me to put into words how much it sucks to be a Bills fan. Every year during the season is an exercise in self restraint, trying not to get too excited about a football team that only causes me grief come January. But every damn year I get sucked in, going from not wanting to watch a game at week 1 to getting drunk at a bar screaming at a TV about missed PI calls and bad interceptions at week 10. The inevitable always comes for us. There will always be a let down, always be a missed field goal, always be a missed tackle, always a few inches away from glory.
The best has already come for this team. There is no late career Josh Allen push for a super bowl. There is no new upstart OC who will come in and reinvigorate this offence to 2020 levels. There is no holding off younger, cooler AFC teams for another year. From here on out the best we will get is a 9 to 10 win season and a wild card spot where we will get waxed by a better team. The reality is 7 to 8 wins, a few Josh Allen injuries and an inevitable decline in his play. In a few years all the Bills will be good for is remembering guys. Hey, remember Tre White! Yeah I remember that guy!
Joe:
Because I grew up watching the Bills and watching their fans make complete asses out of themselves, I just want one Super Bowl so I can never associate myself with this region or these legions of bumblefuck Trump loving hillbilly fans ever again.
I’m pretty sure if he was allowed, Sean McDermott would hang the 10 commandments instead of Super Bowl trophy banner as inspiration.
I will never forgive them for running Diggs out of town. It’s all because the headcoach is a meathead phony Mr rogers who couldnt handle Diggs wanted to workout on his own and actually didn’t want to rest on their laurels. The Bills used their Bills media stooges in that town to slander Diggs in order to make the young republicans of Bills Mafia turn on him.
Josh Allen leading WR will be whatever the INT return yards the team gives up.
You’ve never seen a more whiney/insincere fan base than the Bills have. Blame it on the media who cover the fans like Fox News covers the Trump kids. All of our fans have gotten giant egos. No matter if it’s an egg avatar or a national media person, Whenever someone has mild criticism of Josh Allen, the entire Bills Twitter universe loses their shit and even the media, who are more concerned with posting their golf or chicken wing preferences photos, will play their insecure heart strings to get a Twitter impression.
The coach ran a fake punt to a player who almost died with their season on the line in the playoffs.
I hate the owners. Terry Pegula hasn’t taken a question about the Bills since 2019 and the Bills media won’t rock the boat to ask for his availability because they all want to be invited to the Bills golf event
Kyle:
I went to the Patriots game last year and witnessed am incredibly intoxicated guy drop his vape into a garbage can fire. Without hesitation, he stuck his arm into the fire to try and retrieve it and ended starting his Bills jacket on fire and his friends poured beer on him to put it out. After the game, I saw him get into the driver's seat to head home. He was in front of me and we both turned a corner and found ourselves headed to a sobriety check point (which is kind of like locking the barn door after the cows are already loose). He attempted to stop, turn around and go the other way and that's when a cop floored it and chased him down. I hope that guy is OK.
But anyway, I need this team like I need an infected scrotum.
Phil:
I was so tempted to email you immediately after the Broncos-Bills MNF game after the Bills negated a missed FG by allowing 12 guys on the field but I'm glad I didn't because then I would have missed McDermott's "Al Qaeda: Dream Work Make the Team Work????!!!" speech that came out the week after yet another blown Bills lead against the Eagles in OT.
That same week reports came out that McDermott ordered the deep kick versus a squib kick in the infamous "13 second game" and then proceeded to blame the offense for allowing too much time. Keep in mind this is the same coach that during the pre-Josh Allen era decided to switch QBs from a decent Tyrod Taylor to a NEVER STARTED a game Nathan Peterman in which he threw 3 first half picks and got blown out by the Chargers. The Bills were actually in a playoff spot at this time. He's a genius.
Oh yeah, and the owner said some insanely racist shit during the George Floyd protests that would make Jerry Richardson blush. He also owns the Sabres who haven't made the playoffs in 13 seasons and the only reason that's not the most embarrassing playoff drought in sports is because the Jets have a longer one (The team the Bills lost to on the very first game of the year to Zach Wilson because JFK endorsed Aaron Rodgers Achilles were kerblooey on the first play of the game in, you guessed it, OT).
Richard:
I really hope we go back to sub .500 records soon. Trying to get up the day after prime time games every week sucks ass. At least when we were 4-7, we were perpetually on at 1pm and my ass would be in bed by 7.
Arlo:
My first season following the Bills was 2001 when I was in first grade. The first seventeen years of my fandom overlapped perfectly with the longest playoff drought in North American sports history. Stumbling into the playoffs in 2018 because the Ravens somehow blew a 4th quarter lead to Andy Dalton felt similar to what I'd imagine Boston fans feel after one of their teams wins a championship. With the Drought as a measuring stick, the Sean McDermott/Josh Allen era has been an unqualified success. Even though the Bills haven't been able to break through and win a title, you'd think nearly a decade of stability and regular season success would at least make them a model of respectability in the NFL.
Instead, this franchise never ceases to find new ways to continue embarrassing itself. Whether its bringing the Nathan Peterman experience to the NFL, to Cole Beasley spouting such braindead Covid takes they made Aaron Rodgers look reasonable, to finding increasingly absurd ways to lose to the Chiefs in the playoffs, to the head coach making an analogy between teamwork on the field to the 9/11 hijackers, to drafting a punter who was at worst an (alleged) rapist and at best a nasty sex pest, the list just goes on. Instead of being able to just enjoy a modicum of regular season success and having one of the most exciting QBs in the league playing on my team, I instead have to put up with this nonstop stream of bullshit.
All this leads to my realization that the Bills will never be remembered for their successes. Despite having perhaps the best RB to ever play the game, despite being the only team to make four straight Super Bowls, despite winning a ton of games under McDermott/Allen, the Bills are not remembered for those things. Instead, they're remembered for having the name of the most famous (alleged) murderer in America still on the wall of their stadium, for losing those Super Bowls, and for never beating the Chiefs when it counts. The Bills have been and always will be losers, just like myself and the rest of their alcoholic deadbeat fans.
Reid:
I'm hard pressed to think of another team that whiplashes this hard between utterly dominating opponents one week and committing the worst choke job anyone's ever seen the next.
The Bills can't just lose; they need to lose in such a heart wrenching fashion that for an entire night I'm getting condolence texts as if my dog had died.
After 13 seconds, the VERY NEXT TIME the Bills played the Chiefs in 2022, the Chiefs scored to end the first half in 12 seconds to tie the game. Even the NFL script writers thought that was a little too on the nose.
I wasn't even mad about Wide Right 2.0 because I knew even had he made it that giving Mahomes even a single second was way more than the Bills could deal with. All it did was save me a few more minutes of anguish.
EJ:
Shortly after the Bills flamed out of the playoffs with no strategic plan to do anything, my teenage son accused me of being a bad parent during an argument. “And it’s your fault that I like a shitty football team and my friends tease me about it.” Can’t refute that - score one for you, kid.
Jake:
I bought 100-level tickets to the playoff game vs. the Chiefs and watched my team shit the bed in front of a national audience in absolutely freezing temperatures. My future wife sat at home and texted me that I was a dumb asshole for going the entire time, and she was right to do so.
After the game we went to a Denny's nearby to sober up and eat some shitty food, walking in to see 3 people eating and 5 staff standing around. The staff said it would be a 45-minute wait to get a table. That surreal experience was more memorable than the game.
My sincere apologies to Taylor Swift for having to endure this cartoonishly frostbitten city for as long as she had to. I hope the new stadium gets built and the Pegulas promptly move the team to London or Toronto or anyplace where I can choose to ignore them.
Matthew:
Because I'm going to spend another eighteen weeks watching Josh Allen
airmail passes sixty yards down the field on third and four, over the
head of whatever hooks-for-hands receiver we've pulled off the discard
pile, while Coach Troops claps hard enough to shatter his handbones.
Evan:
Josh Allen is not Manning to Patrick Mahomes' Brady (Manning actually won a couple of those playoff games); he's a big fucking version of Phillip Rivers – gaudy regular season stats, backbreaking turnovers, coached by a timid choking moron for most of his career, and his GM is about to saddle him with 0 help now that his contract has kicked in. Like Rivers' Chargers teams, they'll win the division perennially and find a way to lose every coinflip game in the playoffs to the actual good teams.
I knew Tyler Bass was missing that kick the second they lined up for it.
Chased off one of the best receivers in franchise history after icing him out of the offense for half a season - no wonder the guy couldn't stand Buffalo. Replaced him with a second round receiver (that they could've easily just taken in the first for the extra contract year, but they decided to trade down directly with their biggest rival instead) who can't separate and might only be a slot guy even though they keep hyping him up as an X. They have two tight ends they're psyched about who have the collective bone structure of a retirement home; they're never gonna line up together in that fabled '12 personnel.' The exciting running back who can run routes out of the backfield can't catch for dogshit. The defense is relying on Taylor Rapp and the ghost of (piece of shit) Von Miller to fill key positions.
11-6 with 9 excruciating wins, division title, beat some crapdick team like the Dolphins in the wildcard, and then they're absolutely losing to the Chiefs, Ravens or Bengals after that. But at least it was close!!!!
Michael:
Even the biggest Confederate flag-flying Mafia yokel out in Holland knows deep down inside his chicken wing stuffed gut we're going to waste Josh's career.
Jake:
I went to the divisional game and spent the whole time drunkenly booing Taylor Swift. I was genuinely mad that the Bills didn’t put out a statement honoring OJ when he died. I loudly defended Hochul when she cancelled congestion pricing in NYC because she got the Bills a new stadium. Rooting for this team has not only made me miserable, it has made me a demonstrably worse person.
But I’ll still drink that garbage! Hochul Hive rise up!!!!
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