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Anonymous Bills player had telling quote about coaching staff after ugly Week 5 loss

An anonymous Buffalo Bills player hopes that the team's coaching staff learns from their mistakes in the final moments of their Week 5 loss.

Kyle Silagyi

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The way in which the Buffalo Bills managed the clock in the final moment of their Week 5 loss to the Houston Texans may forever go down as an example of what not to do at the conclusion of a professional football game.

Houston was positioned to kick a game-winning field goal with just under a minute remaining and the scoreboard reading 20-20, a C.J. Stroud intentional grounding penalty pushing the team back to roughly midfield and instead forcing a Texans punt. Buffalo ultimately received the ball at its own three-yard line with roughly 30 ticks remaining on the clock and zero timeouts at its disposal.

Rather than running the ball and attempting to force Houston to use one (or several) of its three remaining timeouts, the Bills promptly threw three incomplete passes. The disaster-class of an offensive series chewed just 16 seconds off the clock before Sam Martin punted from inside his own endzone. Texans wideout Robert Woods returned the punt past midfield before Stroud and company picked up a few extra yards on the next play, positioning Ka’imi Fairbairn to win the game with a 59-yard field goal as time expired.

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The decision-making was mind-boggling. The Bills, indeed have Josh Allen, but they were backed up against their own endzone with no timeouts; it would have taken at least four or five perfectly executed plays in order to get Buffalo into field-goal range. With the proficiency with which the offense was playing yesterday (Allen finished the game with a 30% completion percentage and the unit finished with just 276 net yards), why was this idea even floated? And given Tyler Bass’ struggles stretching back to last season, could he even have been counted on to nail the game-winning kick?

It was, again, just a stretch of incredibly poor decision-making. Logic suggested that the Bills just run the clock out and take the tied game into overtime; throwing three straight passes did not seem like an auspicious decision in real-time, and it looks even worse in hindsight.

There’s a portion of the Buffalo locker room who, like the team’s fanbase, is left scratching its head after the loss. The Buffalo News reporter Ryan O’Halloran tweeted a quote stated to him by a Bills veteran after the loss, a telling tidbit that encapsulates the vibe of the team’s locker room following the game.

“I hope [the coaches] learn from it,” the player said, per O’Halloran.

Some may question the legitimacy and validity of the quote given that it’s coming from an 'anonymous' player, but O’Halloran isn’t one to post nonsense to drive engagement; he’s interviewed high-ranking employees within both the Bills and Buffalo Sabres organizations, and he was the reporter who broke the news that Buffalo defensive coordinator Bobby Babich would be calling the team’s defensive plays this season. He’s not in the business of fabricating quotes to stir controversy or create web traffic; if he posted a quote from a player, the quote is real.

And viewing the quote through that lens raises a bevy of questions and concerns. Has head coach Sean McDermott and company ‘lost’ the locker room? That seems like an unfair conclusion, especially considering the Bills found themselves down 20-3 early in the third quarter of their Week 5 clash only to mount an unexpected comeback to have the score tied with under a minute remaining. Both the defense and offense played drastically better from halftime onwards, and the coaching staff deserves a bit of credit for this; a lifeless team would not have woken up to score 17 unanswered second-half points if the locker room was lost.

That said, it’s only natural for a “veteran” player to say such a statement, as poor clock management is a concerning constant under McDermott. This has long been a concern of the now eighth-year head coach, with seemingly only marginal improvements made throughout his tenure. The consistency with which these same issues manifest is alarming, and it makes sense that some within the locker room want to see growth or evolution in this area.

Sean McDermott
Geoff Burke-Imagn Images

The choice of defensive coverages in crucial moments is another area in which this coaching staff has struggled, this shortcoming again playing a role in the team’s Week 5 loss. The most prominent historical example of this idea manifested in Buffalo’s 2021 AFC Divisional Round loss to the Kansas City Chiefs; up 36-33 with just 13 seconds remaining, the Bills played incredibly relaxed defensive coverage and allowed the Chiefs to drive 44 yards to get into field goal range. Harrison Butker kicked a game-tying field goal as time expired before Kansas City won in overtime.

Though not as egregious in Buffalo’s Week 5 loss to Houston, the Bills, again, played relaxed coverage on the Texans’ last offensive play of the game, lining their defensive backs up well behind the line of scrimmage on a play in which Houston only needed a handful of yards. Throw in the fact that Buffalo’s defense initially only lined up with 10 players, and Texans picking up five additional yards to all but ensure the game-winning kick is not at all surprising.

The 2024 season is far from over; the Bills are still 3-2 and sit atop the AFC East. Something can still be made of this season, but the consistency with which the same flavor of coaching mishaps cost Buffalo games simply makes this particular loss difficult to stomach. 

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Kyle Silagyi
KYLE SILAGYI

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