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One of the most revealing moments from D.A.'s conversation with Tyler Dunne of Go Long.
D.A. asks the question Bills fans have debated for years:
Was Josh Allen ready for a change at head coach?
Dunne's answer:
"100% yes."
But that's only the beginning.
Dunne explains why the offensive philosophy under Sean McDermott may have been more influential than fans realized.
"When they crafted game plans, Sean McDermott's fingerprints were all over them."
D.A. and Dunne discuss whether McDermott's conservative instincts ultimately prevented the Bills from fully unleashing Allen's unique skill set.
Was Buffalo too cautious?
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0:00
Josh is not the type of guy that's going
0:01
to walk into a boardroom maybe and say
0:03
this has to be done, but he did not
0:05
offer any public support for McDermott
0:08
or public criticism when McDermott was
0:09
fired. And the enthusiasm that he has
0:12
now for Joe Brady and being involved in
0:15
nine interview processes suggests that
0:18
Josh Allen was ready for a change,
0:20
right?
0:20
>> 100%.
0:22
>> Yes. Josh Allen is a son of a rancher,
0:26
right? Out in Firebaugh, California. Son
0:28
of a farmer. Grow growing up in the
0:30
middle of nowhere. His dad's working
0:32
with irrigation pipes and 100°
0:34
temperatures. He He's going to do what
0:36
he's told. He respects authority. He's
0:38
going to respect his coach. He's going
0:39
to respect his boss. He doesn't want to
0:41
ruffle feathers. He I mean this is what
0:43
so many teammates and people close to me
0:46
or close to Josh Allen told me is like
0:48
he isn't the type that is going to go to
0:51
the authorities, go to his boss and say
0:52
something needs to change. He's going to
0:54
want to want it to work. Sean McDermott
0:56
is just a very different personality.
0:58
They're wired very different. Doesn't
0:59
mean that one's right and one's wrong,
1:01
but this is in 2023 when I did that
1:03
three-part series, this player, who
1:05
actually, from what I recall, he liked
1:08
Sean a lot. He was going on and on about
1:10
all the good that Sean McDermott did for
1:12
this team cuz he lived the Rex Ryan era
1:14
a little bit. He said it's it's a
1:16
ticking time bomb. Those were his words
1:18
and and and that's what it was.
1:19
Eventually, they just had to get a
1:21
different voice in there. And even if
1:23
they did get along great, they've been
1:25
together a long time. We're talking
1:27
about nearly a decade of banging on that
1:29
championship door and not busting it
1:30
down. Something had to change and I get
1:33
not wanting to completely detonate the
1:36
whole thing and get a completely
1:38
different voice in there because you do
1:40
have a good thing going on. I mean,
1:42
they're in the playoffs every year.
1:44
They're Super Bowl contender every year.
1:45
Josh Allen, you don't want to completely
1:47
hit reset on the most important
1:49
relationship in sports, head coach and
1:51
quarterback. I think it was advantageous
1:54
to have somebody in-house who
1:57
knows Josh Allen's strengths, his
2:00
weaknesses, which buttons to push and
2:02
when, yet also knows, okay, if I'm the
2:04
head coach, here's what I would do
2:06
differently. Talk about game planning.
2:08
Joe Brady's calling the plays, no doubt
2:10
about it. Those wide receiver screens
2:12
drive people nuts in Western New York,
2:14
as I'm sure you know. I do believe that
2:16
when they crafted game plans, Sean
2:19
McDermott's fingerprints were all over
2:20
those game plans. And if they played a
2:22
Patrick Mahomes or a Joe Joe Burrow or
2:24
one of these elite quarterbacks, it was
2:26
very conservative. Let's play keepaway.
2:28
Let's let's
2:30
stay out of harm's way. And maybe that
2:33
was right, maybe it was wrong. Look,
2:34
they get to the playoffs, the defense is
2:36
getting lit up in these games, and the
2:38
offense can't be perfect. I feel like if
2:41
you've got a coach that wants to Josh
2:43
Allen in full,
2:44
those game plans probably change a
2:46
little bit. And there are so many
2:47
interesting comments that Josh made when
2:49
we sat down.
2:50
And in in that vein, I asked him, okay,
2:55
we all saw that turnover at the end of
2:56
the first half against Denver. It was
2:59
ugly.
3:00
Basically, the Bills gifted Denver three
3:02
points. Um but it's not like you can
3:05
tell
3:06
Pablo Picasso to color between the lines
3:08
or Dave Chappelle not to curse in his
3:10
stand-up routines. You've got to let
3:12
Josh Allen be Josh Allen. That's how he
3:14
was able to blow torch all the doubters
3:15
is he did it his way. He's always going
3:17
to do it his way. And he made it very
3:19
clear that he is not going to change the
3:21
way he plays. He will play the way he
3:24
knows how to play quarterback until he
3:26
can't anymore, which he hopes is a long
3:28
time in the future.
3:29
>> You know, you have chronicled the 13
3:30
seconds more than I think any other
3:32
journalist in in Western civilization.
3:34
But it is it is reasonable to do so
3:36
because it is like the moment that
3:38
should have should have ended the story.
3:41
And you said in this piece, 13 seconds
3:43
haunted them more than anyone knows. We
3:47
would assume it has haunted them. We
3:49
would assume Josh is haunted by this.
3:51
But why do you say it's more than
3:53
anybody knows?
3:55
>> There's everything that we saw on the
3:56
field, which was bad enough. You know,
3:59
there there were 10 players on that
4:00
kickoff that thought it would be a
4:02
squib. They heard squib. Tyler Bass was
4:04
told to boot it out of the end zone.
4:06
That's what Sean McDermott wanted.
4:07
There's all the nitty-gritty X's and O's
4:08
stuff. You've got the quote-unquote
4:10
Kodak timeouts before each of those
4:12
Chiefs throws that get them into
4:14
Harrison Butker field goal range. All
4:15
all of that is awful. You shouldn't lose
4:17
that game. I think what was worse is how
4:19
it was handled after the game, where the
4:21
head coach
4:23
didn't take accountability publicly. It
4:26
was the quote-unquote execution word,
4:28
which is code for the players screwed
4:29
up, not the coaches. And I had coaches
4:31
tell me that he basically pointed the
4:33
finger at them and said, "You guys need
4:34
to figure this out. Put it on them and
4:36
see in the spring." In so many words.
4:39
There wasn't really accountability, and
4:40
you see this in sports all the time. I
4:42
mean, you're covering all major
4:43
professional sports leagues, where an
4:46
awful playoff loss happens, a traumatic
4:48
loss. If it's not dealt with
4:50
appropriately, it will linger. The
4:53
Legion of Boom Seahawks and that
4:55
interception at the one-yard line is is
4:57
very similar. The fallout from that to
4:59
the fallout that you saw from 13
5:01
seconds. Right, I mean, this isn't me
5:02
telling you this, D.A. I mean, when the
5:04
the coach was fired, I had sources
5:06
really high up in the organization tell
5:08
me that that game, 13 seconds, just
5:10
hovered over the franchise like a dark
5:12
cloud. Now, the roster churned over a
5:14
bunch since then, to your point earlier,
5:17
but but now you've got like a second
5:19
iteration of the Bills that have kind of
5:20
handled had their own scars. And this
5:23
Broncos game provided plenty of scars.
5:25
So, I just think enough was enough. Sean
5:27
McDermott did a hell of a lot of good
5:28
for the Buffalo Bills. Where they were
5:30
with Rex Ryan was a bad bad place. He
5:33
cleaned it up. He'll be a head coach
5:35
again. It was time. And what also people
5:38
don't really know is the relationship
5:40
between the quarterback and the head
5:41
coach wasn't that great, and I think it
5:44
has the potential to be great with Joe
5:46
Brady. That matters a lot, and that's
5:48
why Josh Allen was sitting in those nine
5:49
head coach interviews.
5:50
>> How much do you think of Josh Allen's
5:53
incredible enthusiasm is because, maybe
5:56
no offense to Sean McDermott, but there
5:57
is a head coaching change and it is
5:59
specifically Joe Brady.
6:01
>> And also my mind went back to the what I
6:03
heard inside that visitor's locker room
6:05
in Kansas City, very similar to what I
6:07
was told in terms of rebellion and
6:10
players very unhappy with the way that
6:12
game ended. I think that those left some
6:14
scars there as well. It's crazy. I mean
6:16
look, Josh Allen isn't the type of
6:18
quarterback leader captain that is going
6:21
to go into Terry Pegula's office and
6:23
demand things, demand changes. And there
6:27
are quarterbacks who do that and there
6:28
are owners who listen to those
6:30
quarterbacks above anybody else. That's
6:31
just that's just not who he is and I
6:33
think that's one of his great redeeming
6:35
qualities as a leader. Watch Josh Allen
6:37
any game, you'll never ever see him ream
6:40
out a teammate. There'll be a a dropped
6:42
pass, just a brutal error that somebody
6:45
else makes, he doesn't show them up at
6:47
all publicly. And he he wants to absorb
6:49
all the blame and all the accountability
6:51
and that's that's another reason guys
6:52
love him so much. But I just think the
6:54
Bills basically had to say, "Okay, Josh,
6:57
this organization runs through you."
6:59
That was something that Sean McDermott
7:00
took a very long time to figure out
7:02
right up to the very end. It's got to
7:04
run through the quarterback. At some
7:05
point that calculus changes, but they
7:07
absolutely wanted him to be a part of
7:09
that interview process and the Joe Brady
7:11
relationship grew organically. I I've
7:14
sat down with Joe Brady for a two-part
7:15
series at GoLong as well this off
7:17
season. It was fascinating to hear his
7:20
life story and how much it parallels and
7:22
mirrors Josh Allen's where yeah, we know
7:24
Josh Allen zero star recruit. It's kind
7:27
of spooky how similar Josh Allen's rise
7:30
and Joe Brady's rise were really are. So
7:32
I think they're kindred spirits in a
7:33
way. So in a roundabout way when he he
7:35
gets fired by Carolina, he was very
7:37
transparent about his mistakes there. He
7:38
gets to Buffalo as a quarterbacks coach
7:41
and he was nervous, he was uptight, very
7:43
rigid in his first meeting, and Josh
7:46
Allen just cracked a joke. Joe Joe said,
7:48
"I can't tell you exactly what he said,
7:50
but it involved a number." And I was
7:52
talking about pass protection, so you
7:54
can kind of put two and two together.
7:56
And Josh Allen cracked this joke and
7:58
just take changed the whole temperature
8:00
of the room. They were off and running.
8:01
Joe Brady loosened up, and I think from
8:03
'22 to '23 to '24, QB's coach, the OC,
8:07
they've really developed this
8:08
relationship where they're they're very
8:10
vulnerable with each other, they can be
8:11
honest with one another. I I don't think
8:13
this is a case where the quarterback's
8:14
going to be able to railroad the coach
8:16
and do whatever the hell he wants. I
8:18
think Joe Brady will hold him
8:18
accountable. Like any relationship in
8:20
life, if somebody knows you love them
8:22
and it's really there, they'll accept
8:23
harsh criticism. That's how Allen and
8:25
Daboll kind of got something special
8:27
when he was the offensive coordinator in
8:28
Buffalo, but I think that this was the
8:30
right hire. The more you really look at
8:32
it, you can see why Joe Brady was the
8:35
choice.
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