In this offseason series, Athlon Sports' Doug Farrar asks the One Big Question for all 32 NFL teams — the primary discussion point that will measure ultimate success (or not) for every franchise. We begin with the Buffalo Bills, whose near-misses with the Super Bowl just out of reach over the last half-decade is the only noise that matters. How can the 2025 Bills transcend it?
From 2019 through 2024, only the Kansas City Chiefs (78-22-0; .780) enjoyed more regular-season wins and a better win percentage in the NFL than did the Buffalo Bills, with their 71-28 record, and .717 win percentage.
However, and as everybody knows, none of that matters at this point, because of this: Kansas City's 16-3 postseason record and .842 win percentage through that time, and Buffalo's 7-6 postseason record and .538 win percentage in the postseason since 2019.
More than any other NFL team right now, the Bills are haunted by their playoff shortfalls, because they've been so completely agonizing. And usually that agony has come at the hands of the aforementioned Chiefs. On January 26, 2025, it was a 32-29 loss to the Chiefs in the AFC Championship Game in which the Bills may well have made it to Super Bowl LIX with a few more well-placed rushing attempts instead of desperation passes at the end. Before that, whether it was 13 seconds of torture and a finish that had everyone in the NFL re-thinking the overtime rules or results less notable, it's always come up the wrong way for Buffalo's favorite sons.
The Bills have faced the Chiefs four times in the postseason since the 2020 campaign, and have lost all four of those games by a total of 26 points. They are the modern version of the John Madden Raiders who lost the AFL/AFC Championship Game in the 1969, 1970, 1973, 1974, and 1975 seasons... and in each case, to the eventual Super Bowl winner.
Madden's Raiders eventually kicked the door down in the 1976 season, when they cruised through a 13-1 regular season, transcended their postseason ghosts, and beat the daylights out the Minnesota Vikings in Super Bowl XI. Finally, they had their franchise-defining series of moments, and they weren't just another really good team that couldn't win the proverbial big one.
Can the 2025 Bills do the same after so much heartbreak? On the surface, the group assembled by general manager Brandon Beane and coached by Sean McDermott looks as strong as they've ever been over the last few seasons. But is there that one X-factor that can put them over the top?
On offense, Josh Allen is coming off a legitimately-earned AP Most Valuable Player season in which he answered any remaining questions about the YOLO aspects of his play. And in offensive coordinator Joe Brady, Allen has the perfect architect for his unique talents. The Bills do not have what you'd call a No. 1 receiver in the Ja'Marr Chase or Justin Jefferson sense, but with Keon Coleman, free-agent addition Joshua Palmer, and slot weapon Khalil Shakir, this is a group that can overwhelm you with talent at its best. More will be expected of tight ends Dalton Kincaid and Dawson Knox in 2025, and if that all pans out, Allen's targets will prove very tough to cover when you factor in Allen's running abilities, and the ways in which Brady has set this offense up to confuse defenses to be a force multiplier.
With sixth man Alec Anderson as the main man, the Bills ran by far the NFL's most plays with six offensive linemen in 2024, and they're just as capable of explosive passing plays out of jumbo personnel as they are able to beat you up with the run game with it. With that run game, there is the ongoing question of James Cook's contract situation. In 2024, Cook proved to be an ideal franchise back for this particular season with 1,281 yards and 19 touchdowns on just 26 carries, and 38 catches for 322 yards and two more scores. Problem is, Cook wants to be paid accordingly, and that's not something that is likely to be resolved immediately. Behind Cook, Ray Davis is a great hammerhead power back, and Ty Johnson is a plus especially as a receiver, but there isn't another James Cook on the roster.
Defense has been the more pressing question of late. The Bills seem to have gone with the philosophy of the whole being more than the sum of the parts when it comes to personnel in that there isn't one true tempo-setter on that side of the ball. The front has a bunch of guys who can take over games from time to time, but the consistent alpha dog factor? That's still a work in progress.
The one guy to watch on the edge is Greg Rousseau. The 2021 first-round pick out of Miami really grew into his own potential last season with 11 sacks and 70 total pressures. At 6-foot-6 and 266 pounds, Rousseau has an ideal combination of size, speed, power, and technique, and he's learned over time to move past the leverage issues that generally bedevil less-refined and taller pass-rushers.
It was a rough season for interior defensive lineman Ed Oliver, one of my favorite players in the 2019 draft class. Knee and hamstring injuries prevented Oliver from matching his breakout season of 2023, when he amassed 11 sacks and 72 total pressures — both career highs by far — so a return to form would obviously help in 2025.
The linebacker group, beset by Matt Milano's injuries over the last two seasons as it's been, is pretty solid. Milano played in a total of nine games in 2023 and 2024, but Terrel Bernard and Dorian Williams have stepped up decently. You might want more from a linebacker duo in a defense that plays as much nickel as Buffalo's does, but this isn't a weakness, per se.
If there's one place where the players need to step up and provide more pure rocket sauce, it's in the secondary. Cornerback Christian Benford is the underrated star of the defensive backs, and he's also the only Bills player at his position who allowed an opponent passer rating of under 100.0 last season (79.7 in Benford's case). The team finally moved on from the Kaiir Elam mistake, as the 23rd overall pick in the 2022 draft was never able to even remotely live up to his draft capital. A low-ball trade to the Cowboys in March took care of that.
Now, Benford's bookend will likely be first-round rookie Maxwell Hairston from Kentucky, the 30th overall pick in the 2025 draft. Hairston isn't the biggest cornerback, but that's okay in Bobby Babich's defense. Hairston provides positional flexibility, and he should bring more athleticism to a cornerback group that hit its ceiling too often last season. And hey — maybe the return of Tre'Davious White on a one-year, $3 million deal can pay some dividends.
The safety trio of Damar Hamlin, Taylor Rapp, and Cole Bishop learned to work well together last season, and Cam Lewis has been the slot/safety hybrid. Buffalo was fairly coverage-agnostic last season — they were spread across Cover-1, Cover-2, Cover-3, and Cover-4 fairly equally — and they have the players capable of executing all of that for the most part.
How can the Bills finally beat their Super Bowl curse?
The Bills didn't do a lot to add major assets in free agency this past offseason. Josh Palmer was the primary addition on a three-year, $29 million deal with $18 million guaranteed, and the former Chargers receiver could be a great get for a deep passing game in need of help.
Beyond that, there are rotational guys and role-players like former Rams do-it-all defensive lineman Michael Hoecht, whose intermediate coverage abilities should be interesting in Buffalo's nickel packages, veteran interior defensive lineman Larry Ogunjobi, and veteran (former) edge demon Joey Bosa, whose own recent injury history is unfortunately already a thing with his new team.
Beyond Hairston, the Bills continued to go heavy on the defensive side in this year's draft, with third-round edge-rusher Landon Jackson and sixth-round cornerback Dorian Strong as potential pleasant surprises from the start.
So... it's primarily "stay the course and hope for the best" with these Bills, and that's not the worst strategy. This is not a team with a closing window just yet, and to be honest, last year's Bills overperformed with their 13-4 regular-season record and trip to that AFC Championship Game. 2024 was supposed to be a rebuilding year, and they made far more of it than that.
Beyond the vagaries of fortune, it will be incumbent on the Bills players who have become really good, but with qualifiers, to develop into the kinds of great-without-any-question individuals who help define a franchise. The roster is deep enough to get past the truth a few years ago, which was that if Josh Allen's Superman cape wasn't in full flight, the Bills really didn't have a shot. Brandon Beane and his staff have put together a group that's above-average in every capacity, and as hard as that is to do, the effort is laudable.
But in the postseason, flash moments matter. And the players who can consistently provide those flash moments are more important than ever. Step 1 for these Bills will be to come to terms with James Cook. Step 2 for these Bills will be to roll through the regular season as predicted, with the hope that one or more Josh Palmers or Greg Rousseaus of Ed Olivers or Maxwell Hairstons amplify their own talents to the proverbial next level..
Step 3, of course, is to get past those pesky Chiefs, or whoever's in the way this time, and win it all for the first time since Lou Saban's Bills took the American Football League championship on December 26, 1965.
Easier said than done, but at this point, very little else matters in this franchise's trajectory.
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