It’s appropriate that we are now in February, and it’s Groundhog Day. AMC is playing Bill Murray’s movie, Groundhog Day. For Josh Allen and the Bills, every season feels like Groundhog Day. Their season seemingly ends in the playoffs against the Chiefs every year. In the playoffs, Allen is now 0-4 against Patrick Mahomes and the Chiefs.
QB
Allen has now completed his seventh season in the NFL, which many say is an MVP year. And although statistically, he may not have put up as gaudy numbers as in some of his other seasons, there is no doubt the leader he is for the Bills. He passed for 3731 yards, rushed for another 531 yards, and was the second leading rusher on the team. He also scored 12 rushing TDs.
RB
Aside from Allen, the only ground threat the Bills had this year was James Cook. He barely cleared the 1000-yard threshold, with 1009 rushing yards. He found the endzone 16 times. The only other back with any significant numbers was Ray Davis. He managed 442 yds and an underwhelming 3.9 avg. Moving forward, the Bills need a better second option on the ground to alleviate some of the pressure away from Allen.
WR
Although the Bills were 10th in offense this season, it was all about the greatness of Allen. He did not have one, thousand yd receiver, nor anyone who caught more than five TDs. Khalil Shakir led the team with 76 catches and 821 yards. Keon Coleman led the team in receiving avg gaining 19.2 yds per catch. And, although Mack Hollis only caught 31 passes, he led the team with five TDs. If the team is lacking at WR, they do have one of the best 1-2 tandems at TE. Dalton Kincaid and Dawson Knox combined for 66 receptions and 759 yards. Though they only found the endzone three times. With TEs of this caliber, Allen will need to do a better job at getting them the ball next season.
DEFENSE
If the team had one Achilles heel this season, it was on the defensive end of the ball. They were only 17th in total defense and a lousy 22nd in passing defense. Although they had a solid 157-point differential, it was only because they averaged over 30 points this year. They gave up 21.6 points, which is less than championship-caliber.
HEAD COACH
Sean McDermott is starting to get a reputation of not being able to win the big game. He’s been the Bills HC since 2017. He’s led the team to the playoffs in seven out of eight seasons. Four of the seven losses have been to Mahomes, and one was against Joe Burrow. There is no shame in that. Some have been chirping for his job, but that would be short-sighted. He is a good coach that will surely take the Bills over the hump at some point moving forward. There are many similarities between him and Andy Reid. People said the same thing about Reid when he was with the Eagles. It took him having to leave Philadelphia to prove all the doubters wrong. Hopefully, it won’t take a change of scenery for McDermott to prove the disgruntled Bills Mafia wrong.
