Bills Central

Bills come out of Sunday with a couple of major wins despite the loss

Buffalo may have lost the game, but they still won in two big aspects

Kevin Siracuse

Bills RB James Cook celebrates his record-tying 16th rushing TD of the season
Bills RB James Cook celebrates his record-tying 16th rushing TD of the season / Bill Wippert / Buffalo Bills
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The Buffalo Bills lost their final regular season game of the season, falling 23-16 to the bottom feeding New England Patriots, but failing to secure a win may end up helping the Bills in the long run.

With the victory the 4-13 Patriots were eliminated from securing the top pick in this year's draft, sliding back all the way to the fourth overall pick. Despite securing a win in the 2024 finale, the Patriots fired head coach Jerod Mayo just over an hour after the game.

One positive for the Bills was the outcome likely ruined the Patriots' chances of drafting consensus best player in the 2025 draft WR/CB Travis Hunter from Colorado.

The other positive for the Bills was that resting most starters allowed them to escape without any injuries, according to WGR's Bills beat reporter Sal Capaccio.

Sunday was more of a game about individual accolades and records than it was anything else. QB Josh Allen took the first snap on offense to extend his consecutive starts streak to 115, and then handed things over to QBs Mitch Trubisky and Mike White. RB James Cook recorded his 16th rushing touchdown on the season, tying RB O.J. Simpson (1975) for the most in a single season in franchise history.

While the Bills weren't able to set the NFL record for the most different players with a receiving touchdown (14), they did become the first team in NFL history to score 30+ rushing touchdowns and 30+ receiving touchdowns in a season, according to the Bills' PR department.

As for the personal incentives, two of the big ones were DE Von Miller getting his sixth sack of the season and P Sam Martin downing a punt inside the 20-yard line. On his $1.5 million sack, Miller said that it wasn't even on his mind.

von miller
Buffalo Bills linebacker Von Miller (40) / Kirby Lee-Imagn Images

"To be honest, I wasn't even thinking about it," Miller said. "It felt good to have all of my teammates supportive of it and wanting me to get it, but we [have] bigger fish to fry."

As for Martin's $100,000 punt, DB Ja'Marcus Ingram didn't even know about it at the time when he saved the ball from crossing the goal line.

"I wasn't [aware of it]," Ingram said. "He came up to me afterwards and let me know so man, that's a big time accomplishment for him. I'm grateful I was able to make it happen for him."

Bills head coach Sean McDermott said that it is a fine fine line to balance between resting key players for the playoffs or allowing them to risk injury by playing to achieve their contractual incentives, but that he was happy that he was able to support a few players with hitting their bonuses.

Hollins, receptions, Sunday
Mack Hollins celebrates one of three receptions he recorded on Sunday / Jaiden Tripi / BuffaloBills

"I think it's a delicate balance. You want to know, you want to be aware and it's hard because you're trying to put the health of the player and the team first," McDermott said. "But you're this close to a milestone in this case with James or some of the other guys as well."

Now, the Bills will prepare to host the Denver Broncos next Sunday at 1 pm EST in the AFC wild-card round, as the Broncos defeated the Kansas City Chiefs 38-0 to clinch their first playoff berth since 2015.

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Kevin Siracuse
KEVIN SIRACUSE

Kevin has spent several years working in digital media, TV and radio. Aside from creating Bills content, he works as a play-by-play announcer, a color commentator and a public address announcer for local high school and college sports. You can find all of his Bills takes and analysis on Twitter @kevin_siracuse!

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