Buffalo Bills fire head coach Sean McDermott
Head coach Sean McDermott was fired Monday after nine seasons on the job, two sources close to the decision told The Buffalo News. The decision to move on from McDermott was first reported by NFL Network.
Frustrated by yet another playoff disappointment, the Buffalo Bills made a massive, stunning change at the top of their football structure Monday, firing coach Sean McDermott after a nine-year tenure that was marked by the longest run of sustained success since the franchise's Super Bowl era, but also McDermott's inability to lead the Bills back to pro football's pinnacle.
Sean McDermott was fired Monday after nine seasons as the head coach of the Buffalo Bills. The Bills are the first NFL team in history
to win at least one game in the postseason for six straight years, but fail to reach the Super Bowl during that same stretch. Harry Scull Jr., Buffalo News
McDermott leaves Orchard Park with a 98-50 regular-season record, seven consecutive 10-win seasons, eight playoff berths and two trips to the AFC championship game. The Bills, however, failed to reach the Super Bowl with McDermott and franchise quarterback Josh Allen, who will turn 30 before next season begins.
General manager Brandon Beane, hired just a few months after McDermott in 2017, will not only stay with the organization, he has been promoted to president of football operations and general manager. Together with owner Terry Pegula and Chief Operating Officer Pete Guelli, Beane will lead the new coaching search. Beane's new role will also include oversight of the coaching staff.
"Sean has done an admirable job of leading our football team for the past nine seasons," Pegula said in a statement released by the team at 10:30 a.m. Monday. "But I feel we are in need of a new structure within our leadership to give this organization the best opportunity to take our team to the next level. We owe that to our players and to Bills Mafia."
Monday evening, McDermott released a statement thanking the organization and its fans for the past nine seasons he spent in Buffalo.
"For nearly a decade I have had the opportunity to wake up every morning as the Head Coach of the Buffalo Bills, which has truly been a gift," McDermott said. "I want to express my sincere gratitude and appreciation to the Pegula family, the Buffalo Bills organization, and to the fans for allowing me to live out the dream of being a head coach in the NFL in this incredibly special place.
"I am proud and humbled to have worked alongside amazing staff and players as we shared life together and poured out our hearts and souls into both winning football games and making a positive impact in our community."
The move comes two days after Buffalo's season ended in the divisional round of the AFC playoffs with a 33-30 overtime loss to the Denver Broncos – the sixth straight year in which the Bills reached the divisional round. Over that time, however, the team made just two trips to the AFC title game, losing each time to the Kansas City Chiefs.
The Bills are the first NFL team in history to win at least one game in the postseason for six straight years, but fail to reach the Super Bowl during that same stretch. With each passing year of playoff disappointment, the feeling grew that Allen's prime was being wasted. Allen, 29, won the league's MVP award after the 2024 season and just finished his eighth season.
The Bills had some heartbreaking, close-call playoff losses under McDermott. At the top of that list is the "13 seconds" loss to the Chiefs in the divisional round of the 2021 postseason – a game in which Allen gave one of the all-time great playoff performances, going 27 of 37 for 329 yards and four touchdowns, giving the Bills a three-point lead with 13 seconds left in the fourth quarter. The defense, however, couldn't hold it, playing a soft zone coverage that allowed Patrick Mahomes and Co. to get into position for a tying field goal. The Chiefs then got the ball in overtime and drove for a game-winning touchdown without Allen ever seeing the ball again.
The stain of that loss – and the defense's continued failures to come through in the postseason – no doubt contributed to McDermott's demise.
Hired based on his success in six years as the Carolina Panthers' defensive coordinator, McDermott's defenses simply failed to get it done often enough in the playoffs in Buffalo. Over the past six seasons, the Bills have allowed an average of 33 points in their playoff losses, giving up at least 27 points in all of them.
Nevertheless, moving on from him qualifies as a stunning decision by Pegula.
McDermott changed the direction of a franchise that, before his arrival, was an NFL laughing stock. The Bills had missed the playoffs for 17 straight years, the longest such drought in North American professional sports, at the time of McDermott's arrival.
Pegula, who took over ownership of the team in October 2014, had his first head coach, Doug Marrone, quit. He hired Rex Ryan to replace him, then fired Ryan less than two full years into the job.
In the 10 years before McDermott arrived, the team finished last in the AFC East six times and had just one winning season.
McDermott immediately set a new course. He had a deep appreciation and respect for the Bills' history. Along the way, he championed Buffalo like no coach had done for years.
"I want to win a Super Bowl and a world championship. What's also important to me, however, is doing things the right way and giving a community hope maybe that they hadn't experienced lately," he said before the start of the 2025 season.
"One day, even if and when we win a world championship, those wins and losses are, unfortunately, sometimes fleeting. What's most important is how you do the job and you do your best in the life that you're trying to live. Because I think that impact is more lasting than anything, wins and losses. So I do try and keep things in perspective. That doesn't mean that at all, at all, at all, that I don't wake up every day with that on my mind."
In his statement, McDermott once more expressed his gratitude for the welcome he and his family received here.
"This community graciously embraced not only me, but my family and in some ways helped raise our children over the last nine years," he said. "For that, I say thank you to all of the teachers, coaches and friends whom we met along the way ... the City of Good Neighbors! We love you! We will miss Buffalo."
McDermott navigated the team through some incredibly difficult moments. In particular, his steady leadership when safety Damar Hamlin went into cardiac arrest and had to be brought back to life on the field during a game against the Bengals on Jan. 2, 2023, and in the days that followed, stands out.
McDermott, 51, leaves Buffalo with a .662 winning percentage, the best in franchise history, and his 98 wins trail only Marv Levy (112) all-time among Bills coaches.
McDermott ended the playoff drought in his first season on the job in 2017. The Bills went 9-7 that year. After a step back to 6-10 in 2018, Allen's rookie season, the franchise has won at least 10 games in the regular season every year since. Under McDermott, the Bills won five straight AFC East titles from 2020-24 – a run that was stopped this year by the New England Patriots.
The Bills were 8-8 in the playoffs under McDermott, including 1-6 on the road. Their first postseason road win under McDermott came in this year's wild-card round against the Jacksonville Jaguars – the franchise's first win on the road in the playoffs since Jan. 17, 1993, when the Bills dropped the Miami Dolphins 29-10 in the 1992 AFC championship game.
Here's a look at some of the probable candidates.
The Bills reached the postseason in eight of McDermott's nine seasons, including a wild-card round loss to the Texans in 2019, Allen's second season.
"Sean helped change the mindset of this organization and was instrumental in the Bills becoming a perennial playoff team," Pegula said in his statement. "I respect all the work, loyalty and attention to detail he showed for this team and the community. I wish Sean, (wife) Jamie and his family all the best.
McDermott became the 10th head coach to lose his job in the NFL this offseason in what has become a massive shift in the league's coaching ranks.
At the time he was let go, McDermott was tied with the Los Angeles Rams' Sean McVay and the San Francisco 49ers' Kyle Shanahan as the second-longest tenured head coach in the league, behind only Kansas City's Andy Reid (13 seasons). Pittsburgh's Mike Tomlin (19 seasons) and Baltimore's John Harbaugh (18 seasons) left their respective teams after the year (Tomlin stepped down; Harbaugh was fired).
Harbaugh has since landed with the New York Giants as their head coach. The Atlanta Falcons filled their vacancy by hiring former Browns head coach Kevin Stefanski.
It's not yet clear whether any of the seven teams with vacancies – the Miami Dolphins, Tennessee Titans, Cleveland Browns, Arizona Cardinals, Las Vegas Raiders, Pittsburgh Steelers or Baltimore Ravens – are interested in McDermott.
"God gave me and and my family an incredible opportunity, one that we will cherish for the rest of our lives," McDermott wrote in his goodbye statement. "Yet we know that HE has a plan. Thank you for allowing me to serve as your head coach."
