“Well, then, I guess there’s only one thing left to do,“ Jake Taylor said near the end of the first Major League movie.
“Win the whole [redacted] thing.”
Winning the whole [redacted] thing is the only thing left to do for the Buffalo Bills.
A franchise that has an 83-33 regular-season record since 2019 (only the Kansas City Chiefs have more regular-season wins with 84 in that time) has no love left for those particular accomplishments, because the postseason shortcomings burn so hard. An 8-7 playoff
record since 2019 includes more than enough “missed it by that much” moments to make any organization crazy — especially an organization that hasn’t won a league title since 1965 in the old American Football League.
The 2025 season ended for the Bills with a typically agonizing loss in the Divisional Round, this time to the Denver Broncos. The 33-30 overtime loss included enough officiating inconsistencies that went Denver’s way to make one wonder if the Bills were (and are) somehow simply cursed. That loss cost them the opportunity to meet a New England Patriots team in the AFC Championship Game with whom they had split their regular-season series, and there was just as much of a chance that Buffalo could have advanced to Super Bowl LX if everything broke the right way.
Of course, with the Bills, that’s always a loaded prospect.
The offseason ramifications were severe. Head coach Sean McDermott was sent packing, replaced by offensive coordinator Joe Brady. New defensive coordinator Jim Leonhard came from the Broncos by way of Wisconsin and Illinois, where he developed into one of football’s highest-regarded defensive minds.
Now, the 12-5 Bills will try once again to mount the horse that has never been bucked in their case.
“Every year you go through something,” Allen recently told Go Long’s Ty Dunne. “Scottie Scheffler talks about it all the time — the absurdism of ‘Why do I want to win this so badly? What’s the point of going out there and winning?’ Because at the end of the day, you win, and it’s on to the next. You’re just trying to win again. Those emotions that go on, it’s like, ‘Damn it. Every year that’s gone by, we haven’t gotten it done.’ The fire inside of me continues to push and want to get over that hump. No matter how crazy it seems. I want to accomplish something. I’ve set my mind to it, and I want to accomplish it, and I’m going to keep trying until I do.”
Underrated veteran: TE Jackson Hawes
With all the Sean McVay-led recent talk about how tight ends can be real weapons as never before in 12 and 13 personnel packages, there’s still room in the NFL for TEs who primarily bring the desire to impose their will on opposing defenders as blockers, as opposed to detached big receivers.
The Bills proved this when they selected Georgia Tech’s Jackson Hawes with the 175th pick in the fifth round of the 2025 NFL draft. In three seasons at Yale and one with the Yellow Jackets, Hawes never had more than 21 targets or 16 catches in a season, and that wasn’t the point. Buffalo’s offense already had two proven pass-catching tight ends in Dawson Knox and Dalton Kincaid. The point with Hawes was to flip the offensive profile.
In 2024, the Bills led the league by far in snaps with six offensive linemen on the field. They maxed out 189 such plays, and while that led to a lot of success with Alec Anderson as the sixth man, it also limited the overall picture to a degree. As McVay and others have learned, putting two and three tight ends on the field at a higher rate blurs the line between power and explosiveness in ways that more big uglies simply can’t.
“You just don’t see it that often because the college game is so much different than the NFL game, and it’s very rare to have a tight end that comes out of college being able to block that well,” Knox said last November of Hawes. “Based on what I’ve seen, [Hawes is] the best blocking rookie that I’ve ever seen come into the NFL. It’s not like he’s 295 pounds; it’s not like he’s almost a left tackle. He’s a 250-pound tight end that can also run routes and catch the ball. So that dynamic ability is something that’s really awesome, and it’s really fun to watch him.”
“We all get so excited for him, because he’s such a strong-handed blocker,” fullback Reggie Gilliam said of Hawes. “He’s displacing men like he’s been in the league for five, 10 years. To me, he’s just another lineman … and, of course, he can run and move around and catch the ball as well too. So, he really brings that versatility to our offense.”
Underrated free agent: CB Dee Alford
Everybody is excited about what Leonhard can bring to Buffalo’s defense. It’s going to be less static than what McDermott and his staff put on the field — as opposed to more base nickel defense looks than just about anybody else in the NFL, there will be far more for offenses to diagnose on the fly, which fits far more and better with modern trends.
“We’ve got a bunch of different fronts, a bunch of different personnel that we can use,” linebacker Terrel Bernard said in late May. “And I feel like they try to get guys active, whether that’s an outside linebacker, an inside linebacker, a safety, a nickel. I feel like it’s been a little bit of everything right now.”
Part of the “everything” is a redefinition of the cornerback position, which was more vulnerable than expected in 2025. Last season, Buffalo’s group of cornerbacks allowed 112 completions in 208 attempts for 1,384 yards, 12 touchdowns, six interceptions, and an opponent passer rating of 81.9. Not abysmal, but more middle of the pack than this franchise would prefer.
Christian Benford and Maxwell Hairston are the primary outside guys, and to add to the equation, Buffalo signed former Atlanta Falcons defender Dee Alford to a three-year, $15.75 million contract with $10.12 million guaranteed. It’s a big investment on the 2022 undrafted free agent out of Tusculum University in Tennessee (Alford is one of two pro players from there in history)
“We were very intentional about a guy like Dee Alford and bringing him in and his versatility to be an inside nickel and have the flexibility to play on the outside,” Leonhard said in late May. “In my opinion, Dee did a great job in Atlanta. Did some similar things schematically to what we’re asking.
“One of the perks of being a versatile defense is you’re going to be playing nickel, you’re going to play base defense, you’re going to have a bunch of different packages, and having as many guys as we can move around as possible.”
Alford is all about the adjustments.
“If you look at the type of defense [Leonhard] had in Denver, you’ll see [it’s] really a match, a lot of cover guys,” he said. “I feel like he’s going to let me come in and be a cover guy and fit right in with this system. Jim’s a great guy and a great coach who also knows what it feels like to be in the locker room as a player.”
Underrated draft pick: WR Skyler Bell
The offseason addition of DJ Moore gives Josh Allen the potential for an alpha receiver. At his best, Moore combines positional flexibility, route diversity, and a knack for the explosive play very much in need with this receiver group.
Beyond that, it’s going to be key for Bills observers to watch what Skyler Bell can do in the NFL. Selected with the 125th overall pick in the fourth round, the 6’0”, 192-pound Bell caught 102 passes on 140 targets for the UConn Huskies last season for 1,282 yards and 13 touchdowns. That put Bell at third in the FBS in targets among receivers, fourth in catches, second in yards (behind only San Jose State’s Danny Scudero), and tied for third in receiving touchdowns with Indiana’s Omar Cooper Jr.
All that said, Bell is more than just a volume receiver — he was responsible for 17 explosive catches last season, and though he caught just six passes of 20 or more air yards on 24 targets last season, a look at UConn quarterback Joe Fagnano tells you that he doesn’t exactly have a Howitzer for an arm… like, say, Josh Allen does.
Which makes you wonder what Bell could be in an offense with a Josh Allen-style quarterback.
Moreover, Bell has experience with Jim Leonhard from his time at Wisconsin (2021-2023; Leonhard had various roles with the Badgers from 2016-2022), which could be a good thing.
“I was doing a lot of scout team stuff, and he was our DC, so I was running the routes against his defense,” Bell said. “Sometimes I [went] up to his office and we watched the tape. He [was] trying to get me better. He’s telling me things to work on that I could be better [at, and for] his defense to get them better. It’s just a revolving door, a little bit of everybody making each other better.”
Given his undersold ability to create big plays, and his familiarity with NFL defensive minds, it would be wise to watch what Bell can do to transcend his third-day draft status.
The tape says he can do just that.
