Counting Beane’s Record with the Buffalo Bills
The person who's improved the roster could still do more.
Reviewing the job performance of the guy who reviews job performances is so meta. A reminder that everyone deserves scrutiny is not just to blow the minds of social media users. Brandon Beane doesn’t get to decide if the Buffalo Bills are set at the title he holds. Figuring out if management actually helps is like Office Space where the Bobs suddenly ask Lumbergh how much time he spends dealing with TPS reports. Yeah, this team could still do better.
Finishing not quite well enough is a consistent habit. An underwhelming cast helps show the lack of help. The glaring exception is the best quarterback we’ve ever seen. To be fair, hitting it big counts. Treating Josh Allen as the exception is like saying there’s only one day Beane won Powerball. Also, the lottery numbers are vaguely predictable if you scout for patterns and not based on random draw. But they could hit on more numbers.
It’s tough to hide underachieving of the most prominent employers. Every one of Beane's top choices aside from that quarterback of his showed why they’re lucky to be overvalued. The team isn’t as fortunate. Ed Oliver, A.J Epenesa, and Greg Rousseau together equal the production of one Pro Bowl defensive lineman.
Disappointment is spread out. Keon Coleman getting outplayed is the most memorable part of his rookie season, not his jacket shopping. And Dalton Kincaid writing himself into the Shakespearean tragedy makes him a prototypical Bill in his way. Meanwhile, trading away Kaiir Elam doesn’t keep him from being a contender for worst Bills first-round choice competition ever. Flailing in Dallas won’t help avoid embarrassing himself further.
It’s not as if a team that can’t stop winning the division has been assembled shoddily. Beane has done well at finding deep cuts in a way 97 Rock won’t. I’m sick of hearing Comfortably Numb just as sure as I’m glad to see Matt Milano seek revenge on every team that passed on him multiple times. Khalil Shakir is quietly thrilling, and it’s not a slight against an impressive extended receiver the Bills are fortunate to have that an all-time quarterback shouldn’t be relying on a fifth-round pick.
The Bills provide nice stories about players who should be quirky presences on the sidelines. An offense that needs Mack Hollins is in trouble; hopefully, New England qualifies. Damar Hamlin is the incredible human who came back to life in order to be a subpar starter.
Success at landing Allen is as prominent failure at helping him. To be fair, the biggest step is complete. Having a quarterback makes everything about football life easier. Starting with the second person to tough the ball is much better than drafting a terrific wide receiver who helplessly waves at an alleged passer vainly attempting to shot-put the ball to a specific spot.
It only seems like Allen needs no help. This is still a team game, sort of. But even Superman concedes the rest of the Justice League can occasionally provide support by encountering minor villains.
The excuse of recalibrating is invalid for again not reaching the final. The front office can claim they were abstaining in order to enjoy the upcoming year. But there was still a season going on. Optimists on the franchise’s payroll point out how many regular season wins they accumulated along with two more in the playoffs. But having a championship-level MVP means they wasted another Josh year.
Anyone who wants to appear capable of enacting miracles should take over a franchise so bad that any improvement seems to have been engineered by successful prayer. Bills fans who have historically grown accustomed to cursing out the deities of their choice have welcomed the opportunity to rejoice.
No fan needs a reminder that this team has still not reached paradise. Volunteer defenders will point out Beane’s record and act as if he is above reproach. But the survivor mentality has infested Buffalo’s sports culture for far too long. It’s possible to be thankful for what’s here while remembering that winning a championship is supposed to be the point. That’s easy to forget.
Framing critics as ingrates is the voluntary task of company men. Bills cuckolds who demand gratitude for double-digit-win seasons are the same humiliated sickos who begged for higher taxes so a multibillionaire wouldn’t have to pay his own business expenses. I’m glad that capturing the division has become commonplace, an occurrence that had not been experienced at all since the Bills last won it in Bill Clinton’s first term. A cynic would note that the easiest way to appear successful is to be mildly competent at a company renowned for ineptness.
Beane is a victim of his own success. He made the Bills relevant and also led to craving more. An insatiable desire is the result of sensing possibility. The club’s goal is supposedly to win it all despite how improbable that seems. The guy who drafted Buffalo’s best hope ever still hasn’t proven he can reciprocate.