Did the Bills Only Want Joe Brady All Along?

Here's what I think is really interesting about this, Albert.

Um, I've rarely have I seen a situation where.

You, you essentially, uh, you, you, you, you sustain this heartbreaking loss and you make the jarring decision, the franchise-altering decision to fire one of the winningest coaches in the NFL and in recent NFL history.

And then you're basically like, we want everybody else back except for you.

Like, I mean, you, you, you promote the offensive coordinator and Joe did great in his first press conference.

I thought, I think I get it.

I know why they did it.

Um, but are the bills gonna be different enough on the surface to figure out everything else that ails them?

Yeah, and I, I, I, I think like that tells you that.

Whether it was right or wrong, that maybe the front office thought that the locker room just needed a new voice, you know, and that this wasn't like some sort of schematic thing, um, although, you know, the offense, the defensive coordinator Bobby Babbage is now gone too, so there will be some turnover on that side of the ball.

Um, I, you know, and I like one thing I heard pretty consistently over the course of the last, you know, 3 or 4 days was that That Joe Brady knocked like the CEO as head coach part of the interview out of the park, and that was really what they were focused in on was they wanted somebody who, you know, was gonna be able to kind of guide the ship from that standpoint and see the big picture of everything and you know, I, I think it's interesting because I've heard Joe Brady interviews really well in general and I so mean that was going back to when he was in Carolina.

Yeah, yeah, like before he got fired in Carolina, like the story I have is that like in Atlanta, when Arthur Smith was named the coach, and they had to compete to get Arthur Smith because there were a bunch of teams that were after him in 21 and Joe Brady at the time had only been an offensive coordinator in the league for a year and was about to get fired, right?

Like was about to get fired from that job and You know, they, they, uh, And uh they, they like, he goes in and like Joe Brady goes in and knocks the interview out of the park and he wound up, he was the runner-up .

Like if it, if it hadn't have been Arthur Smith, it would have been Joe Brady.

And so Joe Brady was there at that 0.5 years ago now, and then went through getting fired and had to kind of work his way back up in Buffalo where he went from position coach back to coordinator, now to head coach.

So, from that standpoint, it's interesting and Um, you know, look, like, to, to be fair to Joe too, like the job of head coach is way, way different than the job of, of offensive coordinator, you know, so, there's certainly a world where he's gonna be able to bring to you what you already had in, um, in a top-five offense the last two years with him as the coordinator, and Like he's gonna be really good at the other parts of the job of being, being a head coach.

I'll tell you what would take this hire for me and push it to like an 11 on the scale, and that's if, um, you know, because I saw Jim Leonard being circulated as a potential candidate for this job.

I mean, you know, and we'll talk about Jim Schwartz in a second for the, for the Browns.

That's another name that if, you know, all of a sudden he's like, well, screw you guys, let me out of my contract.

I don't want to be here.

And then high tails his way to Buffalo, which I, I, I don't know, he wasn't Jim.

Jim Schwartz was in Buffalo, but was he, was he, um, he was, I, I remember that coordinator, was he?

I thought he, I think he was in Buffalo under, I'm trying to remember who that was, that was the head coach then.

Oh, good trivia question.

OK, ba ba ba.

OK, so.

OK , I know it was before Rex Ryan, so would that have been Chan Gailly?

No Who am I missing in between Chan Gailly and and Doug Marrone?

Doug Marone, Doug Marrone, Doug Marrone.

There you go.

Yeah, what a staff there.

Doug Marrone, Nathaniel Hackett , Jim Schwartz, Todd Downing.

Well, it's a good stuff.

They went 9 and 7 that year.

I could see why.

Um, well, you remember that Doug Marrone did not get fired.

Doug Marrone, he opted out to try to get the Jets job.

And then that got.

Shut down for reasons.

That's a whole other podcast one day.

Uh, I need we're gonna have to do like an offseason Jets history podcast at some point.

Yeah, maybe I'll start drinking again to get through that.

Um, the, uh, so I think that they have a chance to, to push this forward.

The defensive coordinator hire is a big one.

It's going to be an early test for Joe Brady.

And I, I'm wondering, Albert, what your take is on this.

I just think, and again this is one of 32, someone took the Browns job.

Someone is going to take the Cardinals' job, someone's gonna take the Raiders job, so good candidates are going to take these jobs, um, but was there anything about how this.

Happened in Buffalo that you think threw some candidates for a loop because this search to me was strange.

It was almost like they wanted to end up with Joe Brady.

They kind of just flew through a couple of candidates.

They threw Philip Rivers in there and then like, it was not a comprehensive search.

And so I'm wondering if this is just where they wanted to end up all along, and they didn't care how they came off because they were gonna hire Joe Brady in the first place.

Yeah, I, I mean, I think Joe Brady was a strong candidate from the start.

I do think they went into it open-minded.

Um, I think Joe Brady had to win the interview, which clearly he did, um, to get that job.

I, I also think part of it was like they, I think they had an idea that this was not.

The deepest pool of candidates like this year was kind of a tough year like in that you didn't have like the obvious names that have been kind of circulating for a while, um, which is an interesting dynamic when you consider the amount of openings, you know, when you've got 10 openings and it's, I mean, I would say, and , and we don't know how like Be clear about this.

Like, we don't know how this could wind up being a great pool of candidates.

Like, in the, we don't know, you know what I mean?

But just on the, on the surface from a perception standpoint, from an experience standpoint, from a, you know, a like time on task and, and, and pelts on the wall type of perspective like this is, this just isn't a great group of candidates, you know, versus what we've had in other years.

And so they had to know that going in.

And I also think like kind of the way that this thing was handled on the front end, and like some of the things that we saw them do, including interviewing Philip Rivers, I think tells you that they really weren't planning on firing Sean McDermott.

You know what I mean?

Like this wasn't something where, like for the last two months, Terry Pegula had somebody collecting names or doing background or anything like that.

Like this really was.

Um, as Terry Pegula probably shouldn't have said but did say publicly, a spur of the moment decision to let Sean McDermott go, you know, and so this is sort of where you land after something like that.

It, um, I.

I'm, I'm changing my mind on it in a sense that like this started as, and, and, and we're a reactive society, obviously, and especially sports writers that, um, you know, when, when this whole thing happens, you're just like, my God, what a disaster.

How can you go out and say that about Keyon Coleman?

How can you go out and say this and that and the other thing at this press conference and don't they realize how bad they look?

But And, and, and this is gonna be, I'm, I'm doing a lot of work for the Bills here.

You're welcome.

The one thing that I keep going back to is they acted like.

An irrational fan would act if they really gave a shit.

You know what I mean?

And, and there's a difference between, and, and that's not always how, that's not always a good thing.

It's not always an excuse, but I would guess that there are some fan bases out there that would, that would want their owner to just to, to act that way, to talk that way, to be that way when all they're used to is like 8 and 99 and 88 and 99 and 8, whatever it is.

And so I do keep going back to that and I'm like, all right, like I could, I could buy in on the bills.

I don't think it's gonna be that hard of a buy-in, you know.

Yeah, I mean, I think it's gonna be interesting to see.

I, I , I think with Joe Brady.

Like what's gonna be interesting to see from a football perspective , right?

You know, Sean Payton.

Wasn't really.

Sean Payton until he got on his own, you know, if you, if you look at Sean Payton, I, I, I always remember the nickname that Bill Parcells gave him.

Do you know what the nickname was?

What?

Dennis the Menace.

Well, that's especially true right now.

But yeah, and he called, he called him Dennis, and he called Sean Payton Dennis the Menace because Sean Payton had all these crazy ideas and wanted to do all these different things.

And you know, like I, I, Peyton was always with coaches to kind of put a governor on that, you know what I mean?

Like, and we're like, all right, Sean, like we can do this, but like, you know, let's not go crazy and, you know, that's their own prerogative.

They're the head coach.

Like we need to, you know, we need to be careful here and here and here about that.

And then he gets to New Orleans and now he's playing inside the Superdome and he's got Drew Brees and we started to see what the actual Sean Payton was, right?

There's a chance that happens with Joe Brady.

I think so.

I mean, Joe is a Sean Payton, uh, acolyte, uh, and he's part of the, part of the Peyton tree.

By the way, I, we're not going to do a whole segment on this, but just is sort of like an M-dash aside, Peyton's really, uh, he, he's, he's not doing all right these past couple of days.

Um, you know, I mean, from like, you know, kind of anger firing your, uh, offensive coordinator and then your offensive coordinator telling the Denver Post that like Sean's just kind of being Sean and then, Uh, talking about Bo Nix's ankle, like it's a predisposed condition and then Bo going on the radio in that town and being like, he probably shouldn't be doing that.

I think, I think Sean's going through it a little bit.

I think he was expecting to be in the Super Bowl.

Yeah, I think that was, I think the 4th down decision hit him a little harder than maybe some of the other things in the past, so I think that's fair.

Yeah, I, um.

Uh, that's, it was, uh, he's going through it.

But anyway, Joe Brady, uh, I, I, I think it can work.

Uh, and, and there's no reason to believe it can't work.

The, the problem is going to be that there's a lot of vets in this locker room.

And I think that Sean, one of the things that he, I don't, I don't want to say did well, but he had kind of this cast of characters that he could call upon to sort of just band-aid up the defense and he's really going to need, I mean, He's gonna need Brandon Beane to work with that new defensive coordinator and really kind of inject some life into this defense cause it's gonna have to be not rebuilt from the studs, it's not, but they're gonna have to invest some money there, you know, and I know that they've they've invested some draft picks .

They've, they've gone in that direction.

But they really like maybe like almost like a Denver like offseason like they have to put some, they have to put some oomph into that yeah, I mean I, so you look at the guys who are paid on that side of the ball for them so they have Greg Roussseau, Ed Oliver, Charl Bernard, Gretian Benford, um, you know, some of the young guys that haven't been paid yet that I think like I think Cole Bishop is gonna be dynamite.

Like I think he, you started to see him on the edge of like really becoming a top shelf safety, um, so you have like I think you have like a foundation there, you know, with some young players that now are paid or will get paid, that like, I think, give you something to build on.

And yeah, I mean, like I think when you're, when you're looking at this now going forward, it's like, I think they have to add a receiver.

Um, that's pretty self-explanatory, um, and I think if you add one, if you, if you have a, if you, if you can find a way to add a great receiver there, I think everything else sort of falls into place , right?

Like Khalil Shaqir would be an unbelievable number 2.

Then you have the two tight ends.

You have Kincaid and you have Knox.

You have Cook at running back.

So if you, and people have been talking about the weapons around Josh, I think if you add a number 1, if you can find a real number 1, and I don't know where that's gonna come from, but if you can find one.

Then I think the rest of it looks really good.

I do too.

And so then it becomes, OK, like what do we need to add on defense?

And I think the easy thing to say would be a pass rusher, right, depending on what sort of scheme they're gonna play.

But if you can add a receiver and a pass rusher this offseason somehow, some way, um, and who knows what receivers are all of a sudden gonna wind up being available, you know what I mean.

That's why I would have advocated for them.

I would have said like, go trade for Chris Olave, you know, all of the season when maybe he was available.

Now I think the Saints are gonna try to pay him, and it's probably a moot point now, um, but when they were really in a rough spot, you might have had a window to go and get somebody like that.

They're gonna have to find somebody that they can.

They can project into that number one receiver role and then I'm with you on defense.

Like I think just it's gonna be whoever the coordinator is.

It's gonna get where they go with that.

Go get Jim Leonard, guys.

I'm not kidding.

Go get Jim Leonard.

Make Connor happy.

I like Leonard.

Yeah, I mean, I covered Jim Leonard.

Jim Leonard, uh, was a safety for the Jets, and he broke his leg.

At least the guys you covered as players aren't like the head coach in the Super Bowl now.

That'll make you feel real old .

That's true.

Um, yeah, Jim Leonard like broke his leg, snapped his leg, and then, uh, He was a great guy.

He's a great guy too, great dude, great player, and he famously, um, and this is like ancient history at this point.

There are probably some people listening to this who weren't even born when this happened, but in 2010, um, when the Jets got stomped by the Patriots, and then, It was the Bart Scott can't wait game in the playoffs .

They got the same team in the playoffs a couple of weeks later.

They got beat like on, on, it was a Monday night, wasn't it?

It was like 45 to 3 or something, 45 to 3, yeah.

So they get the Patriots in the playoffs and the, um, Jim Leonard had broken his legs and he was a safety on that team, one of the two safeties.

And he, um, he became like co-defensive coordinator for the week and Rex always said that was Jim's game plan that beat Tom Brady and the Patriots that day, um, in the playoffs and then propelled them obviously to the, uh, to the conference title game.

So, that's my elevator sales pitch for Jim Leonard.