KANSAS CITY, Mo. — If the Bills, come season’s end, have halted their 17-year playoff drought, the turning point will have been what happened on Sunday afternoon at Arrowhead Stadium.
Remarkably, Buffalo, coming off the worst three-game defensive stretch in franchise history, went into one of the NFL’s toughest venues and pulled a stunner.
The Bills, 10-point underdogs, shocked the Chiefs, 16-10, to step right back into the American Football Conference playoff race.
At 6-5, Buffalo holds the second AFC wild-card spot, pending tonight’s game when Baltimore (5-5) hosts Houston (4-6).
But, no matter, a loss yesterday would pretty much have assured the Bills missing the playoffs for an 18th straight year. Instead, it’s time for fun with math.
Buffalo is one of only six teams in the conference with a winning record through 11 games, pending what the Ravens do tonight.
And the Bills will complete the season with three straight home games — Patriots, Colts and Dolphins — followed by visits to New England and Miami.
It’s not unreasonable to speculate that Buffalo could win two of the trio at New Era Field and it will be favored against both Indianapolis and Miami.
Those road games?
The Patriots could have locked their playoff position and be resting starters by Game 15 and the Dolphins aren’t exactly unbeatable at Hard Rock Stadium.
If Buffalo can win two of the three at home and split on the road, that would translate to a 9-7 record and, in this dismal AFC season, at least one wild card, if not both, could have that very mark.
But that’s looking ahead.
What the Bills did yesterday in Kansas City was extraordinary … and that’s not hyperbole.
This was a team in total disarray having been blown out three straight games by the Jets, Saints and Chargers to the tune of 135-55, or an average loss of 45-18.
McDermott had made the almost universally-criticized decision to bench starting quarterback Tyrod Taylor and replace him with rookie fifth-round draft choice Nathan Peterman for the game in Los Angeles against the Chargers.
Peterman’s disastrous performance — five first-half interceptions, three in the first quarter — caused McDermott to bench him at halftime in favor of Taylor.
But the resultant 54-24 loss, and McDermott so quickly reswitching his quarterbacks, put the rookie head coach in danger of losing his locker room … especially his veterans.
A loss Sunday to the Chiefs, especially another one-sided defeat, would have destroyed both morale and the season.
Instead, McDermott, in the face of near-unanimous second-guessing, coached the game of his life.
He somehow convinced his team to stay the course, “trust the process,” and stick together.
And it did.
The defense, McDermott’s specialty, which had given up 414 yards a game over the last three, held Kansas City, which opened the season at 5-0, to a mere 236.
Even more compelling, Buffalo surrendered only 57 yards in the first half, the fewest in 30 minutes since holding Miami to 56 in December of 2013. And, tellingly, tight end Travis Kelce, one of the Chiefs main weapons, was held to a modest three catches for 39 yards, mostly by strong safety Micah Hyde.
That three-game average of 45 points per game given up was reduced to 10 for the Chiefs.
And, offensively, while Taylor wasn’t lights out, the Bills never turned the ball over, enjoyed over a 6 ½-minute edge in time of possession and made its modest 268 offensive yards count.
And there were the off-field side stories.
McDermott’s mentor is Chiefs coach Andy Reid, who hired him with the Eagles in 1999 and the two remain close.
In a game Buffalo absolutely had to win, he beat the man who gave him his start … in his own house.
There’s also this involving the 2017 draft.
The Chiefs made a first-round trade with Buffalo to move up from 27th to the Bills spot at No. 10 to draft quarterback Pat Mahomes. The cost was a first-rounder in 2018 and Kansas City’s third-round pick this past spring, which the Bills traded to move back into the second round to take Temple offensive tackle Dion Dawkins.
That first-round pick?
It depends on where the Chiefs finish. When Kansas City was 5-0 it appeared that selection would be late. Now, with both teams at 6-5, it’s not out of the question the Chiefs’ first-round pick could come earlier than Buffalo’s.
After the game, McDermott, a man of faith, wasn’t about to gloat over the victory.
“This is not easy to come in to Kansas City and win against a well-coached football team,”McDermott said. “To go on the road and face adversity like we have and to push through it, players and coaches, like we did I thought was phenomenal.”
McDermott added, “I thought our run defense was outstanding and played fundamentally good football. It starts up front and you talk about third downs (KC was a mere 2-of-13) and tackling. That was a good team team defensive effort.”
Of Reid, he noted, “I learned a lot from him on and off the field and to beat an Andy Reid-coached football team is something. A lot of things we do I learned from Andy. He laid out a blueprint for me over 12 years of how to do things the right way and that’s why he’s where he is in terms of the all-time wins list (10th with 190) and that doesn’t happen by mistake or by accident.”
As for his team’s performance after three miserable weeks, McDermott added, “These guys hang together and they know in terms of people basically not giving them a chance … that was the case at the beginning of the season and that hasn’t changed.
“There are guys in that locker room with a lot of heart and character and integrity. And when you get those things together you’ve got a chance at something pretty good and I appreciate those guys and their leadership.”
And on Sunday they showed why.
(Chuck Pollock, a Times Herald sports columnist, can be reached at
