How much the offense will look different in 2026 versus 2025 has been a significant topic if discussion ever since former offensive coordinator Joe Brady was announced as the new Buffalo Bills head coach following the dismissal of former head coach Sean McDermott. How much the offense was influenced by McDermott’s desires, and in what ways, is a largely speculative topic. And while the truth is that we’ll won’t really know until the bullets start flying in week one what is true, the next logical
question after “how much will be different” is “how will we know”? Apart from diving into route concepts and outlining on film new or unfamiliar pieces of the offense in 2026 versus 2025, run/pass ratio is likely to be a hot topic early in the regular season. With the Bills being at the top of the league in overall run rate over the last few seasons, how pass happy the team is or is not out of the gate will likely be an easy barometer for many people when seeking to find the differential between a “Brady-envisioned offense” and a “McDermott-envisioned offense run by Brady.”
But allow me, if you would, to offer an additional (not alternative) metric for us to keep an eye on early in 2026 that may show some departure from previous years and could help show a departure from the offense of the past: first read targets.
In 2025, these were the Bills’ leaders in first-read (or designed) targets, sorted by first read/designed targets per game, per Fantasy Points:
- Khalil Shakir – 69 first read targets (4.21 per game, 23.5% of team’s total)
- Keon Coleman – 46 (3.54, 19.3%)
- Dalton Kincaid – 38 (3.16, 17.3%)
- Gabe Davis – 14 (2.33, 12.3%)
- Joshua Palmer – 27 (2.25, 11.7%)
- Brandin Cooks – 10 (1.43, 11.2%)
- Dawson Knox – 34 (2.00, 10.8%)
- Elijah Moore – 12 (1.33, 7.1%)
- Tyrell Shavers – 13 (0.76, 4.1%)
- Curtis Samuel – 4 (0.67, 3.8%)
- Mecole Hardman – 1 (0.50, 3.1%)
- Keleki Latu – 2 (0.40, 2.1%)
- Jackson Hawes – 5 (0.29, 1.6%)
The “spam the screen to Shakir button” narrative was completely justified as it became a story of the 2025 season, but these numbers could look very different even earlier in the season. For one, the Bills have a healthy Dalton Kincaid (and yes, part of that is wishful thinking and aligning myself with the tight end himself saying he’s never felt better). The numbers above are sorted by first read/designed targets per game, which means we’re controlling for the time Kincaid missed, but we’re not controlling for any limiting the Bills may have had to do with him due to lingering knee issues. Games where his overall snap count wasn’t what it otherwise would have been if not for load management are included (Kincaid didn’t play a game with more than 35 snaps from Week 6 all the way until the end of the regular season). He would have ended the season No. 2 on this list if not for the injury issues? We can never know for sure, but given his team-leading 0.27 targets per route run, that feels probable.
The second consideration to this list looking different is, of course, the addition of wide receiver DJ Moore, brought to the team early in the offseason with via a trade with the Chicago Bears. Moore not only slots in as the team’s likely top wide receiver target overall, but also provides a screen presence the Bills funneled almost exclusively through Shakir previously.
So by all accounts, the list should look markedly different this year than last. Moore and Kincaid will likely be No. 1/No. 2 in some order, and Shakir and Coleman will likely see their gold and silver spots vacated. How much of a delta there is between the top two or three and the remainder of the team will help determine if the “everybody eats” era of the Bills passing attack is officially over. Was it there out of necessity because the Bills lacked a top target and their first-round hyper-efficient tight end was injured? Was it a McDermott thing? Or is that just who they are and will always be under Joe Brady? The Bills had six players with 10% or greater first read/designed target percentage in their offensive in 2025. The only other teams that had six players in that category were the Las Vegas Raiders and the Miami Dolphins. Only one team (the Green Bay Packers) had seven players with 10% or more first read/designed targets.
The team did truly spread the focus of their offense around in 2025. I’ll be keeping an eye on what this looks like to open 2026.
…and that’s the way the cookie crumbles. I’m Bruce Nolan with Buffalo Rumblings. You can find me on Twitter and Instagram @BruceExclusive and look for new episodes of “The Bruce Exclusive” every Thursday on the Rumblings Cast Network — see more in my LinkTree!
