The Buffalo Payments had been one play from spending at the moment making ready to journey to New England for the AFC Championship Sport. As an alternative, they’ve fired the second-winningest head coach in group historical past and begun a training search.
Payments proprietor Terry Pegula fired Sean McDermott on Monday, opening up what many imagine to be the highest teaching job in an insane cycle this season. And sources throughout the league — and a few throughout the Payments constructing — imagine quarterback Josh Allen would be the precedence for the following rent.
“Whenever you take a look at the massive image with the quarterback, are you altering the offensive system?,” stated one supply. “We all know the reply to that.”
The Payments, led by normal supervisor and now president of soccer operations Brandon Beane, are constructing their listing of head-coaching candidates. However three names have emerged who’re conversant in Allen, the 2024 NFL MVP.
Payments offensive coordinator Joe Brady, former Payments OC and Giants head coach Brian Daboll and former Payments backup quarterback and present Broncos QBs coach Davis Webb have all been linked to the Orchard Park opening by a number of sources.
Brady is within the combine for head teaching jobs at a number of groups after pulling his identify from consideration final yr in New Orleans. In line with a supply he has a second interview arrange with the Ravens and also will communicate to the Cardinals. He stays within the working for the Raiders job, as properly.
Brady, 36, has been the Payments OC the final two-plus seasons and cast an in depth relationship with Allen. Sources say the Payments didn’t need to lose Brady final yr and had been happy when he pulled out of the working for the Saints job.
A Western New York native, Daboll was Allen’s first offensive coordinator with the Payments earlier than taking the top job with the Giants. Daboll has interviewed for the Chargers and Eagles offensive coordinator jobs, and a number of sources say new Titans head coach Robert Saleh has curiosity in bringing him to Tennessee.
However Daboll desires to see how issues shake out in Buffalo earlier than making a call on an OC job, sources say. Curiously sufficient, Daboll and McDermott share an agent in long-time superagent Bob LaMonte.
Webb, the Broncos cross recreation coordinator who turns 31 later this week, is shut mates with Allen. It will be extremely uncommon for a group to rent the shut good friend of a quarterback.
Sean McVay, employed at 30 because the youngest head coach in NFL historical past, had a Tremendous Bowl look on his head-coaching resume earlier than his group traded for Matthew Stafford. Philip Rivers stayed in shut contact with Shane Steichen within the years since they labored collectively in San Diego when he bought the emergency name towards the tip of this previous season.
However an in depth good friend getting the job, with simply three years of teaching expertise, can be a tough proposition for a lot of executives who spoke to CBS Sports activities. Accountability and equal therapy — insofar as quarterbacks are handled the identical as different gamers on a group — would inherently be a difficulty with a Webb-led Payments group.
Webb can be thought of a powerful candidate with the Las Vegas Raiders, the place Tom Brady has vital say over who will lead that program with presumed future quarterback Fernando Mendoza in 2026 and past.
To make sure, not all sources agreed on this trio in Buffalo for numerous causes. And it’s sure the group will interview excess of simply three males for the job. A well-placed supply stated there’s early curiosity out of Buffalo in Seattle offensive coordinator Klint Kubiak, for instance.
Whoever will get the job might be confronted with assembly a regular that McDermott helped create however could not attain this season.
“Liam Coen, New England’s success, Ben Johnson… that damage Sean,” stated one group supply. Coen (Jaguars) and Johnson (Bears) received huge of their maiden season with their respective franchises, as did Mike Vrabel in New England, which toppled Buffalo out of the AFC East’s catbird seat. “As a result of success is outlined otherwise. We received 13 video games this yr and success is now a technique. It is profitable a world championship. That’s the new normal right here in Buffalo.”
The Payments are getting a late begin on their teaching search. Already 4 head-coaching jobs have been crammed by John Harbaugh (Giants), Kevin Stefanski (Falcons), Robert Saleh (Titans) and Jeff Hafley (Dolphins). The Payments are one among six groups nonetheless trying to find a head coach. Groups just like the Raiders and Ravens have already carried out greater than a dozen interviews every.
Additional complicating issues for Buffalo are the league’s guidelines round interviewing candidates nonetheless within the playoffs. If the Payments want to talk to any coach on the convention championship groups, they can not have any communication with them this week. Buffalo may communicate with coaches on the shedding groups after Sunday, however they can not interview coaches on the Tremendous Bowl groups till after the Tremendous Bowl is performed Feb. 8.
Meaning some assortment of those coaches might be unavailable to talk with the Payments till three weeks from now, on the earliest: Webb and Vance Joseph with the Broncos, Chris Shula, Nate Scheelhaase and Mike LaFleur with the Rams, Kubiak and Aden Durde with the Seahawks and Thomas Brown with the Patriots.
Who Beane will finally select continues to be a guess. McDermott was employed a number of months earlier than Beane bought the job following the 2017 draft, so Beane has by no means needed to conduct a head-coaching search. He was in shut proximity to at least one in 2011 as director of soccer operations in Carolina when the Panthers employed Ron Rivera, however that is the sum of it.
Payments proprietor Terry Pegula has empowered Beane to not solely run this search however take full management of soccer operations. For years, the top coach and GM reported individually to Pegula. Now, it’s coach to GM and GM to proprietor within the chain of command.
By firing McDermott and giving Beane extra energy, Pegula made a tacit admission he believes the roster is championship-worthy. Sources say McDermott had gotten a way of the place Pegula stood within the closing weeks of the common season.
A number of sources indicated that might have influenced McDermott’s postgame screed on the Brandin Cooks catch that wasn’t. “I am standing up for Buffalo,” McDermott stated in his postgame press convention in regards to the interception name that took little time for the league to evaluation. He then made the weird transfer to name an area beat reporter from the group airplane to additional his level.
“I feel that was the results of him realizing his head was on the chopping block,” stated one former Payments coach.
That play rocked the Payments and the overwhelming majority of the constructing nonetheless imagine it ought to have been dominated a catch. As a lot as McDermott couldn’t be satisfied in any other case, neither may Pegula, sources say.
As an alternative of making ready for the Broncos, the Payments are making ready for his or her first coach search in almost a decade. And they’ll don’t have any scarcity of candidates, particularly on the offensive aspect of the soccer, to work with Allen.
