It's nearly February, and the Bills find themselves in a painfully familiar place.
With the Super Bowl a little more than a week away, they're headed home for the offseason. They've fallen short of the game's greatest stage once again and have been forced to pick up the pieces, meaning another somber end-of-season media session awaited general manager Brandon Beane.
Such a meeting occurred Thursday, and it was clear the Bills are still processing the pain of their latest loss to their big brother, the Kansas City Chiefs. Beane used plenty of terms to describe the pain still resonating in Buffalo: the loss "stings," and the Bills "hurt" for their fans.
It's understandably frustrating that these Bills have yet to clear the Chiefs, but Beane also pivoted toward the positive with his responses.
“Until you do it, you’re always gonna get questioned," Beane said when asked why his team can't seem to win the big game. "It is what it is. We know that. We’re aware of that. I don’t think it takes away from the success, though. I think you have to not just look at it in a vacuum. You look around, you could be a team that’s not made the playoffs in X number of years. We know this team went 17 seasons. So, ultimately, the further you go the worse it stings, and there’s more eyes on you. There’s more people watching each playoff game each season.
“Yes, we’ve now been to the AFC Championship twice. We’ve had some years where we fell short in the Divisional Round. We’re right there, though. We’re not getting blown out. ... If you tell me, next year, I’ll sign up for it, to be in the AFC Championship Game, down three, with three-whatever to go in the game, and we got No. 17? I’ll sign up for that again and take our chances. You’ve got to do a lot of things very well to be in that position."
Coach Sean McDermott also took questions Thursday regarding Buffalo falling short in the playoffs and how the team changes the narrative, echoing Beane's positives while still keeping an eye on finding a way forward in the future.
“We’re very aware of where we are in place and time and where our team is," McDermott said. "That doesn’t mean you start there next season, but you certainly feel good about the day to day and our methodology of what we’re doing. Does that mean you feel completely comfortable with where we’re at and where we want to get to? No. Not at all.
“But overall, you don’t want to lose sight of the success we have experienced, knowing that we’ve won some big games. … There’s a lot of success and a lot of big games. What’s left is to go win a world championship, which is a lofty goal but one that we pursue relentlessly.”
The Bills certainly did enough to put themselves in a spot to break through in the AFC title game. They overcame an early deficit, took a lead into the fourth quarter and crucially limited the Chiefs to three points in what was a tie game late in the final period. But in the end, they still fell short, failing to convert their final opportunity to tie or take the lead and turning it over on downs on a play that has been imprisoned under a microscope in the four days that have followed the 32-29 loss.
The average fan might point toward where the Bills may have been shortchanged. Plenty have lamented Buffalo's failed fourth-down conversion earlier in the fourth, which preceded Kansas City's go-ahead touchdown. While crediting the NFL for being open to the Bills' communication efforts concerning questionable rulings, Beane offered his thoughts on the fourth-down stop of Josh Allen, which was close enough to prompt former NFL referee Gene Steratore to claim he thought Allen gained enough yardage for a fresh set of downs during CBS' broadcast, but was ultimately ruled in favor of the Chiefs upon review.
"I feel like he got that. I still feel like he got that," Beane said of Allen's rushing attempt. "I felt that in the moment, and nothing has changed my mind on that.
"The play that we challenged I thought was a good challenge. I’m not sure either player had possession on the (Bills safety -(Chiefs receiver play when the ball touched the ground. ... It is what it is. Those are just like plays we didn’t make in a game, too. By no means are we saying that’s why we lost the game.”
Beane is correct. On eye test alone, the Chiefs played the better game in the AFC Championship. They jumped out to an early lead and made the plays necessary to emerge victorious.
Beane didn't run from that reality.
“And let’s also give credit to the Chiefs," Beane said. "They’re going for a historic three in a row. We’re not losing to different teams every year and it’s just us coming up short -- that’s a very good team. They’ve taken down a lot of teams.
"Last year, that team, we actually had them here and the game came down, you know, we miss a kick. It’s a play here, a play there, so you have to be careful not to just say [we] can’t win the big game. We do have to do that, and we’re going to continue. I can promise you we haven’t slept a lot since that game. We hurt and we feel bad for the fans that hurt and everyone, all of our support staff, it’s hard to come up short. We’re going to continue to turn over every rock, every stone, but, again, the last five years, this team, counting playoffs, has averaged 13 to 14 wins. I do want to make sure we balance the scale here even though we have not got to the big game yet. We’re going to keep fighting, and I’m determined we’ll get there.”
The Bills' repeated failures when encountering the Chiefs have understandably inspired plenty outside the club to take stock of the entire organization, starting with player personnel but even extending as far as the head coach in order to find an avenue toward the still-unreachable success they desperately seek. Rest assured, the Bills are doing the same internally, but Beane made an important point when asked why he believed his team continues to fall short: They've run into a dynasty in the Chiefs, one that may prove to be historic in the not-too-distant future.
“The entire league is chasing them, and we’re right there," Beane said. "I don’t know what else you expect to do, other than if you think we should blow the roster up or strip it down. That is not how I see this. This is not a team that’s got a bunch of 33-year-olds, 34-year-olds that you need to reset. Maybe some areas or maybe a position or maybe a player here or there, but this team did a lot of really good things this season. When you look holistically at what we’ve done year after year after year, I think a lot of people would sign up for that.
“Is it what we want, the final result? No. But I’ve heard it told to me by multiple people that have been in this league longer than I have: Keep kicking the door. Keep kicking the door, and you’re gonna knock it down. That is my mentality. That is our mentality. We are not giving in. We’re not. We’re frustrated. We want to win. All that’s doing is making our chip bigger. We’ll reset, we’ll recalibrate, not make any rash decisions, and over the next few weeks and couple months, shape what the next team will look like.”
The goal remains the same for the Bills: win a Super Bowl. If history is any indicator of future outcomes, they'll likely have to defeat the Chiefs to realize their dreams. Sunday's result only reminded them of this reality.