ORCHARD PARK, N.Y. — Here are my five thoughts on the Buffalo Bills’ game against the Denver Broncos on Monday night at Highmark Stadium:
1. It used to be that the long-term view of a Buffalo Bills season was about gaining home-field advantage through the playoffs, about playing the AFC Championship Game at Highmark Stadium. Being in the postseason once was a given, the more than reasonable expectation based on the team’s quality. Not anymore.
Now, there are growing questions about whether the Bills will even reach the playoffs. Their 5-4 record reflects exactly what they are: the epitome of mediocrity.
They have no answers for the funk in which they have found themselves while losing three of their last five games and barely winning against two weak opponents. They have no identity on either side of the ball and zero indication one will be found any time soon.
Von Miller said, while there is no need to “sound an alarm,” that time is “getting close.” I think it’s here. The Bills are in crisis mode. They’re at a point where the season could go down the drain with a loss in this game, another that seemed like an automatic win before this ugly 2-3 stretch began.
The Broncos’ 3-5 record isn’t much cause for optimism, especially considering they scored a lopsided victory against Kansas City in their last game before last week’s bye. For the Bills, there are no more automatic wins. Until they prove otherwise, they shouldn’t be viewed as any less of an also-ran than Denver or other bottom-dwellers.
2. A players only meeting usually is a classic warning sign of a team in deep trouble and rarely a path to righting the ship. The Bills already have had two on offense this season (at the behest of non-captain and first-year Buffalo running back Latavius Murray), the second coming earlier in the week.
This is not to say that players taking it upon themselves to discuss, without coaches present, what has gone wrong and how to fix it is necessarily a bad thing. It’s just that when that point is reached, the problems that have led to the need to address them in such a forum are the kind that indicate some level of disconnect between players and coaches.
That’s why players want the ability to discuss freely what they think isn’t being done right. Though they might not spend the whole time questioning what coaches are or are not doing, there’s reason to believe they’re putting everything on the table beyond their own accountability. Meaningful fixes only can occur if all parties are willing to make them, but coaches tend to have a tight grip on their strategic and philosophical approaches. It’ s common for them to embrace the idea that if they are going to fail, they’ll fail their way.
Still, coach Sean McDermott told reporters he applauded the players’ initiative to meet.
“You need player-driven leadership, and you need player-driven accountability as well,” McDermott said. “Like I told you before, we’re working. We’re working hard at it. We’re drilling down every hole that we can. Sometimes you find something, sometimes you don’t, but you drill down the next hole. And that’s what we’ve been doing. No different (than) when we were 7-6. No different the Super Bowl year in Carolina (when McDermott was the Panthers’ defensive coordinator).”
3. Josh Allen seems to be getting pulled deeper into the growing heat on offensive coordinator Ken Dorsey, for whom Allen pushed hard to be promoted from quarterbacks coach to offensive coordinator last year.
Allen’s defense of Dorsey now includes a recognition on his part that the calls for Dorsey to be replaced are growing louder as the Bills’ offense continues to show a lack of explosiveness.
“It comes down to the guys on the field; we’ve got to be better for him,” Allen said. “I know he’s getting a lot of flak. People talk as much as they want to talk, but it comes down to the 11 guys on the field executing.”
Allen reiterated that he and Dorsey have a “very good rapport in terms of him knowing what I like and don’t like” in terms of play calls. Until he and the rest of the offense find a steady rhythm that they’ve shown in only a few games this season, touting Dorsey’s play-calling will be a hard sell.
4. There reaches a point when a team can simply have too many injuries to overcome. The Bills appear to be there on defense.
With safety Micah Hyde (neck/stinger) and cornerback Christian Benford (hamstring) not practicing Thursday or Friday and linebacker Terrel Bernard (concussion) limited, the list has left the Bills with more holes than they can reasonably fill.
They might already have been at that point after losing linebacker Matt Milano, cornerback Tre’Davious White and tackle DaQuan Jones to likely season-ending injuries.
McDermott tried putting on a brave face.
“I look forward to some of the challenge, I really do,” he said. “It’s not something you shy away from.”
But then the coach added, “I think injuries are one thing, but injuries to starters are another thing and we’ve had our fair share of those.”
5. Don’t be fooled by the Broncos’ 3-5 record.
This isn’t the same team that looked so pathetic earlier in the season and seemingly fell off a cliff after allowing 70 points against the Miami Dolphins.
Sean Payton, in his first year as the Broncos’ coach, seems to be getting the team back on track, which was on display two weeks ago. Russell Wilson might not be consistently performing as the top-level quarterback he was for Seattle, but he is still a veteran and knows how to deliver in the clutch.
Payton also has a good understanding of McDermott’s defensive coaching patterns from when they regularly met in the NFC South while Payton coached the New Orleans Saints and McDermott ran Carolina’s D.