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00:00Well, Sam, let's get your just sort of general feelings about the Bills here.
00:05New coach, new stadium for what it's worth.
00:07That's exciting around here.
00:09It's a new coach, but it kind of isn't.
00:12I think it was a surprise to many that they fired Sean McDermott,
00:16seemingly in the name of change, and then promoted his replacement from within.
00:21What are your vibes on the Bills going into 2026?
00:26Yeah, I mean, I think they should still be good.
00:28Everyone should still be feeling good, optimistic, looking to take that extra step.
00:33I mean, that's the reason you fire a coach like Sean McDermott.
00:37It's a statement that he's taking us as far as we can go.
00:42We're banging our heads against a glass ceiling here.
00:44We need to make some kind of change to take that next step.
00:48If they're right, obviously that's what it looks like.
00:51As you said, the one curious element of that is you then hire a guy
00:55who would be normally seen as a continuity hiring at the same time
00:59as you're explicitly saying continuity is not good.
01:02If continuity was what you wanted, you wouldn't have fired Sean McDermott
01:05because he'd obviously been doing a good job to get you consistently
01:09with as many wins as he has in the right areas.
01:13Those things I don't think make a ton of sense.
01:16Now, even if the kind of explanation for firing him is different
01:21and it's more of an office politics thing and it's somebody's head's got a role
01:25that's not going to be mine, it doesn't mean it isn't the right decision.
01:29You may end up in the right place via the wrong methodology.
01:33If something did need to change and you had it forced upon you,
01:37it could still be a good thing and still move this team in the right direction.
01:41The betting markets still love them.
01:44There's been, like Mike mentions, we've been in and out of this room together
01:48for a couple of weeks here, but when I was last in here,
01:52there was a lot of conversation about is there more pressure on the Bills
01:57than any team in the league kind of was a vibe.
02:00There were, you know, Booger McFarlane from ESPN to name one person
02:03that I know I heard a clip from saying exactly that.
02:06And I wonder how you said you think they'll be good, but you didn't say great.
02:12Like, I wonder if it's fair to have the same expectations.
02:16Because here in Buffalo, everyone wants to get to the Super Bowl.
02:20That's what Sean McDermott couldn't do.
02:22And that seems like a lot to throw on not just a new head coach,
02:26but a first-time head coach with, like, a whole new revamped defense.
02:32It is, definitely.
02:33And that's why, you know, that's why this approach of, you know,
02:37when do you pull the pin, when do you decide enough is enough,
02:40and a guy is banging his head against the wall
02:43and can't actually take you any further versus the reality of, you know,
02:47once you get to the playoffs, you're playing the best teams in the NFL.
02:51The margins are fine.
02:53It's the bounce of a ball.
02:54It's, you know, the call of an official.
02:56It's hard to win those games, let alone win a series of them
03:00and then win a Super Bowl at the end of it all.
03:02I think I maintain it's one of the hardest things to do in sports is, you know,
03:06across sports, really, if you've consistently found yourself really close
03:10but not getting over that final hurdle, not getting over the line at the end,
03:16when you can accurately realize, you know, this is an actual failing
03:20versus we are just consistently on the wrong side of a bunch of coin flip situations.
03:27But unfortunately for, you know, the new regime, the new coaching staff,
03:32this is, you get put in that position by what went before you.
03:37You know, it's not your fault, but now your task, unlike most coaches who are fired,
03:42you know, your task is not to turn around a bad franchise
03:44and make them viable and then make them good.
03:48Your task is to take a team that's already good
03:50and take one final step and make them the best team in the NFL.
03:54And if that was easy, the last guy, you know, wouldn't have been fired.
03:57Right.
03:58Sam Monson with us on WGR.
04:01Mike Schopen, the Bulldog here.
04:02Do you have a particular opinion of Joe Brady as a coordinator, a play caller, schemes?
04:09I feel like it's kind of mixed on him out there, if not also here.
04:15I think people here are more maybe dubious of how this all played out,
04:19as we've talked about already.
04:21Is Brady for you like a top tier or even close to it coordinator?
04:28He's had a strange career where, you know, a couple of different times in his career,
04:33he's been talked about as like the next, you know, genius, sort of boy wonder type of coach guy
04:41that was going to be the next superstar head coach.
04:43And then things kind of cooled off or it fell apart.
04:47And we went from he's definitely a future head coach, you know, just wait.
04:51It's only going to be a year or two away.
04:52So then his career got, you know, completely derailed.
04:55And he had to come back at a much lower level than he left his previous gig at.
05:01But I think generally he is a good offensive mind.
05:04I think he his play calling is good.
05:07I don't know that it necessarily stands out as great.
05:10You know, I don't think if you look at a couple of different things,
05:13but the ways that sort of people measure play calling, whether it's fourth down aggressiveness,
05:19whether it's the kind of what do you call in second and long, you know,
05:23the kind of litmus test stuff that people use to judge play callers.
05:28He tends to be good, but not outstanding on that kind of stuff.
05:33And and equally, there's nothing there that sort of says he's elevating everybody around him
05:38the way a Shanahan or a McVay can over a consistent period of time.
05:42But I think, you know, the people that know and people have interacted with him say he is a smart
05:48offensive mind.
05:49The fact that he was getting that hype during his career was not was not a fluke.
05:54It wasn't a mistake.
05:54Like like he's that guy and now we just get to see how that translates to being head of the
05:59whole program.
06:01When he took over, it was really when they started leaning into the running, running, the running game.
06:09And that has served them very well.
06:11I mean, they had the league leading rusher last year and the entire league is sort of drifted more towards
06:19running.
06:19I've said a few times here, Sam, I think the Bills were maybe on the front edge of that of
06:24that wave leaning more on running games because of how defenses were defending passing plays, especially explosive passing plays.
06:33But that all happens with him under the thumb of Sean McDermott to an extent.
06:38So it's hard to get a read on whether he was serving someone above him, you know, with his play
06:45calling, with maybe, you know, not throwing as often on first down and running on second and long like you
06:52referred to.
06:55So it's hard to know what you're going to get here.
06:57But I think a lot of us are ready to see them sort of lean back into Josh Allen a
07:02little bit more.
07:04Yeah, no, you're right.
07:05It's always difficult when you're talking about a coordinator, just how autonomous they are.
07:10You know, how how often are they overruled, if ever, by the head coach?
07:14You know, do they have complete and total play calling autonomy, including that kind of stuff of, you know, do
07:20you go for it on fourth down?
07:21Those types of things.
07:23Absolutely a kind of unknown gray area for all these guys when you're projecting them forward to being the final
07:29authority.
07:30Yeah, look, I think the NFL is kind of in flux at the moment.
07:33You saw that this offseason with the way everybody was chasing second, third tight ends, you know, just as many
07:40big bodies as you can get to try and go ahead.
07:43One of the best blocking tight ends in the NFL, plus a lot of tight ends.
07:47I mean, they have both the personnel to do it in terms of volume and also the personnel to do
07:51it in terms of Jackson Hall as just being an absolute monster as a run blocker.
07:55They're already built to kind of keep pushing in that direction.
07:59Sam Monson, our guest.
08:00So when you look at the AFC East, the Dolphins are right down with the Cardinals as maybe the lowest
08:08win total projections in the league, four and a half in that space.
08:13And, I mean, it's good trivia to ask anybody to name anybody on the Dolphins wide receiver room, just anybody
08:19at all.
08:20It's pretty tough to name those guys.
08:22The Jets have been the Jets for so long, and their win total is low, too.
08:26So you have the Bills, then you have last year's division winner, New England, which famously got fat on one
08:33of the weakest schedules anybody's ever seen.
08:36And I don't know, though, Sam, like they were good.
08:39They even beat the Bills here last year and made it to the Super Bowl, of course.
08:43How do you sort of compare the Bills and Patriots going into the season?
08:49Yeah, I mean, obviously the Bills, you know, there's just a lot more proven commodity about them in terms of
08:54Josh Allen and longevity and how long they've been good.
08:57And a lot of the personnel, the bones of this thing are still there.
09:00You know, that's why I said earlier, you should be pretty confident, I think, that this team will be good.
09:04But the Patriots is more unknown because it was a very new thing.
09:09We just haven't seen them.
09:10Plus, as you said, they benefited from basically the easiest schedule in the history of the game.
09:16Now, you know, one caveat to that is the past defenses they faced were not necessarily that easy.
09:22So I think Drake May, you know, having a legitimate MVP case, I don't think that was a mirage.
09:29I know it unraveled in the playoffs, but I think that was like he faced, you know, the first, second,
09:34and third.
09:34Best defense in the NFL in the playoffs.
09:37And that's when, you know, a solid supporting cast in terms of offensive line and receiving core, you know, solid
09:43going up against the league's best gets destroyed.
09:46And that's what happened, I think, to him and the offense generally in the playoffs.
09:50But the point is, you know, if Drake May took that kind of step between year one and year two,
09:55even if he doesn't take a step forward again, even if he just stays where he was, that makes them,
10:00you know, pretty formidable.
10:02And they continued to improve those weaker areas in terms of the receiving core, not just A.J. Brown, obviously
10:09the splashiest move they made, but bringing in Romeo Dobbs as well with that receiving group.
10:14And then the offensive line, they continued working on that.
10:16So, you know, if those two groups have taken another step forward, maybe if they run up against the Houston
10:22Texans defense, they'll still be destroyed.
10:24But I would expect them to be pretty good on offense and the defense, I think, has got the ability
10:29to be solid as well.
10:31You know, pulling out even further and looking at the AFC, Sam, as we've sort of started getting into shape
10:38for these conversations, it dawns on me that for the first time in maybe certainly since the Bills arrived as
10:45a contender at some point in the 2020 season,
10:47when Allen really blasted off and they acquired Diggs before that season, that's when their contention window, I think, really
10:53objectively opened and it's still open now.
10:57We mostly have talked about the Bills, the Chiefs and the Ravens.
11:00You know, the Bengals have had a turn here, there.
11:03Miami had a hot minute when they scored 70 on Denver that year and they were leading the division most
11:07of that year until the Bills got them at the wire on the final, in the final game of the
11:11season.
11:12It seems a lot muddier now.
11:15You mentioned Houston just a moment ago.
11:17The Chargers seem like they're coming.
11:19Now Denver, you know, was in the AFC title game.
11:22New England, obviously.
11:23Cincinnati.
11:24It seems harder to clearly define that top tier anyway.
11:29I think that's largely gone now.
11:31Do you agree?
11:33Yeah, and the AFC, I think, is wide open this year.
11:35You're either dealing with really, really good rosters that have not slightly weaker quarterbacks or you're dealing with elite quarterbacks
11:44whose rosters have fallen off a little bit.
11:47Generally, I think that's kind of the landscape right now.
11:50I mean, Denver probably should have been the AFC team in the Super Bowl last year.
11:54You know, had Bo Nix not injured his ankle, he'd been able to play against the Patriots.
11:58There's a pretty good chance I think Denver beats New England and they would have been the AFC team.
12:03So I think they're right there.
12:05And then they add Jalen Waddle, obviously, in the offseason.
12:07That's a big splash move that they've made.
12:10If Bo Nix comes back healthy, you know, that might be as good a roster as anybody in the AFC.
12:15Houston, you could make that argument for as well.
12:17But C.J. Stroud is coming off a couple of absolutely abysmal playoff games where he was just wretched.
12:25You know, obviously the Chiefs have them homes, but that's not a good-looking roster in Kansas City anymore.
12:30It's really taken a hit.
12:32But the Chargers, I think, are a big egg factor with what Mike McDaniel could potentially do to that offense
12:38with Justin Herbert.
12:39You know, they're one that could become both of those things, like a very good roster and a quarterback playing
12:45out of his mind.
12:45But, yeah, I think the AFC really is wide open.
12:50Interesting.
12:51Sam, I've got your back on the Herbert vote, by the way.
12:54Not that you asked or needed that necessarily.
12:55You knew, well, let's just ask you, like, did you think about, not that it necessarily mattered to you, like,
13:02sort of what was coming when you voted for Herbert for MVP last year?
13:06I know you've always been somebody who can stick up for your stuff.
13:10And so I wonder if you knew what you were basically signing up for in that case.
13:16Sort of.
13:17I mean, I knew it wouldn't be popular.
13:18I knew, you know, you'd get some kind of the standard online abuse.
13:22I wasn't actually anticipating complete meltdown and getting doxed and that kind of thing.
13:28That took me a little bit by surprise.
13:31Well, I think, I mean, I would always say this if it comes from you.
13:36It's defensible.
13:37It was defensible, you know, like, you're trying to figure out most valuable player.
13:41It's such a twisted discourse, you know.
13:44It ended up being Stafford versus May last year and Stafford won it on what might have been sort of
13:50a legacy vote.
13:51But inherent to that decision is, I think, probably necessarily a really strong, positive opinion on Herbert and where he's
14:01at.
14:01And this year, not only is he, last I looked, Sam, third in the MVP odds going in, in a
14:10climate where there are all these, you know, great quarterbacks and different possibilities.
14:15You usually have to be on a team that wins big to win that award.
14:18But he's got Mike McDaniel now, and, I mean, not a ton different in terms of weapons or talent around
14:26him, but it sounds like this year people are really ready for the Chargers.
14:31Yeah, I think, you know, there's, Mike McDaniel has not really had a top-tier quarterback, certainly talent-wise, to
14:39work with in the NFL.
14:41And yet he's produced some of the most spectacular, statistical, productive offenses in football.
14:46I mean, it doesn't necessarily scale that way, or it doesn't necessarily work just by add two plus two and
14:53you end up with this beautiful four.
14:55But there is a world where you give Mike McDaniel a guy as talented as Justin Herbert, and he just,
15:00you know, detonates the NFL, sets all kinds of offensive records, you know, puts up utterly preposterous numbers.
15:07The running back, obviously, is talented as well.
15:10No Marion Hampton, a first-round pick from a year ago.
15:12So, like, there is a world where this all comes together and they just put up one of the most
15:16spectacular offensive performances, you know, ever.
15:19I don't know that you can necessarily expect that or predict it, but that's why, you know, people are bullish.
15:24Like, if you can get Tua to hang 70 on Denver, what could Justin Herbert do, right?
15:30Like, that's the kind of logic that people are playing out.
15:33And I think there's probably some merit to it.
15:36You know, I don't think it's necessarily that, well, Herbert is bigger, stronger, faster, and has a way better arm
15:40than Tua.
15:41Therefore, if Tua can put up 70, Herbert should be, you know, averaging 95.
15:46But I do think that his talent, his skill set, his physical abilities puts things on the table that weren't
15:54there when Tua was the quarterback or even before, you know, in San Francisco.
15:58And that should be fun, you know, letting a guy like Mike McDaniel, offensive mind as good as he is,
16:04work with basically no restrictions.
16:06You know, whatever you want to do, you've got the quarterback that can make it work.
16:10Let's dial some stuff up.
16:12It should be pretty fun to see what they can do.
16:15So, you know, now we'll get a much better idea of what kind of limiting factors are the receivers.
16:22Will that offensive line, you know, be fully repaired, be fully intact this season with a couple of guys coming
16:28off injuries with some new faces?
16:29You know, these are still unknowns.
16:32But, yeah, I think there's reason to think that that group could be very good.
16:35And if they are, you know, the Chargers could absolutely be a legit contender in that wide-open AFC.
16:41If I'm asking you something that you've looked at, maybe in terms of, like, value and what the odds look
16:48like,
16:48do you have an MVP bet, so to speak, literally or figuratively, for this year?
16:54Is there somebody, I mean, for me, and I usually lose, but I'm looking for not somebody in the top
17:00five for this usually.
17:01But I think this could be a good year for that, whether that's Prescott, who's often in the conversation,
17:06or Lawrence, maybe, or someone like that.
17:09Do you have somebody that comes to mind here?
17:12Yeah, I mean, Herbert would be a decent one.
17:14Lawrence would be an interesting one as well, because Lawrence is a guy who,
17:18and this has happened multiple times in his career, but it did look like the switch flipped for him
17:23sort of halfway through the year.
17:25Lee and Cohn, everybody got better with his arrival in Jacksonville, with the exception of Trevor Lawrence,
17:31until about halfway through the year.
17:33And then suddenly it looked like Trevor Lawrence had raised his game to where everybody else had,
17:38except Brian Thomas Jr., I guess, but everybody else, running back, offensive line.
17:42Everything was better when Cohn arrived, except really Trevor Lawrence and Brian Thomas Jr.
17:47And then Lawrence, the switch flipped, and he was playing out of his mind for the second half of the
17:51season.
17:52If that was real, you know, and now, again, you get to work with Liam Cohn,
17:55one of the best offensive minds in the game, and they can just continue that through into this season.
18:01Maybe Brian Thomas Jr. gets better.
18:03Maybe Travis Hunter is just healthy for the whole season.
18:06You know, there's definitely a world where Trevor Lawrence could put up an MVP season.
18:11Yeah, I thought they were the best team in the AFC going into the playoffs, Sam.
18:16I mean, the Bills took them down in the wildcard game, and Lawrence had some weird moments in that game.
18:21Mike has pointed them out over the course of many months there.
18:26You know, it was a fourth down run where he just sort of went down a little too easy,
18:30and that really cost him.
18:31It was in the red zone, in the Bills' red zone.
18:35But that team, to me, seemed, I mean, I could buy in that division.
18:40You know, it depends on what Houston is and if Stroud can get over the lousy play
18:44that you mentioned already in those playoff games.
18:48Yeah, and, you know, Stroud is another guy who's capable of that kind of season as well.
18:52We've sort of seen that from his rookie season.
18:55It's just that, if anything, he's been heading in the wrong direction from that point onwards.
18:59And, yeah, his playoffs were concerning.
19:03They were awful.
19:05But, yeah, look, I think, again, it's a wide-open picture.
19:08I mean, I don't think people really expect Stafford to win it last season,
19:11and he had one of the best years of his career.
19:15Obviously, Drake May, people expected him to take a step forward,
19:18but I don't think anybody expected him to be amongst the MVP favorites.
19:22So, you know, I think there's a lot of quarterbacks that have –
19:25we were talking about, you know, there's kind of the established four quarterbacks,
19:30I guess, at the top that everyone sort of agrees are the best QBs in the NFL.
19:35Mahomes, Josh Allen, Joe Burrow, and Lamar Jackson.
19:38And then, like, the next ten may not necessarily be interchangeable,
19:43but any of those ten guys, I think, are capable of having that MVP season.
19:47You know, even guys like Darnold, who people will complain,
19:51well, why is Darnold not on a top ten list?
19:53Yeah, but there's 15 guys in that group, right?
19:56And any one of them is capable of stringing together, like,
19:59an outstanding season in the right situation, and suddenly they're MVP,
20:04but probably can't back that up the following season.
20:06And that's, I think, what separates, you know, guys like Josh Allen
20:09or, you know, these other quarterbacks,
20:11is they're able to back that up year after year after year.
20:13The other guys are maybe capable of having – I mean, even Stafford,
20:17even with the Rams, has sort of had an amazing year,
20:20and then a down year, and then an amazing year.
20:22Like, he's bounced up.
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