We’ve seen this movie before
The Buffalo Bills are your 2024 AFC two seed for the NFL Playoffs. Mark it in ink, carve it in stone, tell your loved ones about it and then forget you said it. One way or another, it’s locked in and final.
So after the Bills’ dominating 40-14 victory over the New York Jets, the question immediately turned to whether or not we’d see any of Buffalo’s starters play in a seemingly meaningless Week 18 game against the New England Patriots — a team with their own reasons to care about the presence of Allen next Sunday: they are one loss away from securing the first overall pick in the 2025 NFL Draft.
Head coach Sean McDermott has commented multiple times on the issue at hand, advising at a press conference that the team was “taking it one day at a time” while the one seed was still in play.
Sean McDermott on potentially resting starters if No. 1 seed is out of reach: “Fair question. I think we’re really were in the mode of taking it one day at a time right now. May know a little bit more later in the week. And if that comes up we’ll kind of dive into that then”
— Alaina Getzenberg (@agetzenberg) December 24, 2024
Then, once the Kansas City Chiefs had locked up the one seed and the Bills were set at two after defeating the Jets, McDermott said that being in that place gave the team “options” and that there are some members of the team who are “hurting a little bit right now that might need some rest.” He also mentioned that the team may want to take a look at some different players than they historically have active.
So what’s likely to happen next week?
McDermott has a precedent for this type of thing. During the 2019 regular season, the Bills entered the final week against the New York Jets locked into the five seed in the AFC. Quarterback Josh Allen and the starters prepared for the game as normal, and played two series while throwing five passes, completing three of them for five yards before giving way to backup quarterback Matt Barkley.
After that game, which secured a Wild Card round trip to Houston for the Bills against Deshaun Watson and the Texans, McDermott said something eerily similar to his comments at his most recent press conference, noted above. At that time, he remarked that it was “a good opportunity to get some guys out there and get them some quality reps for some of the guys who don’t get as many as they did today.”
The best predictor of future behavior is past behavior. Although this Bills team is better than that 2019 squad and Sean McDermott preaches a growth mindset, which involves adapting and changing, One Bills Drive finds themselves in a similar situation as before. With the Bills locked into the two seed this time around, I would expect we’d see a similar approach. Allen has a streak of 118 consecutive starts that he likely wants to maintain, and McDermott has shown that he values the consistency in preparation.
…and that’s the way the cookie crumbles. I’m Bruce Nolan with Buffalo Rumblings. You can find me on Twitter and Instagram @BruceExclusive and look for new episodes of “The Bruce Exclusive” every Thursday on the Rumblings Cast Network — see more in my LinkTree!